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Sony Graphics Processor Not Fast Enough Yet?
Posted by Michael Cardiff Categories: PlayStation 3, Rumors,
It’s pretty safe to say that May was not a good month for Sony, and judging from articles starting to show up June might not be so great either. A recent article in TheInq lists some interesting tidbits about the second-gen Playstation 3 development kits. The bottom line: they’re not fast enough, and the specs aren’t final.
“The slightly more curious bit, encouraging and disturbing at the same time, is the current state of RSX. The disturbing part is that the slide I was shown had “Current DEH’s aren’t final spec or speed” in bold letters. Speed, OK, but not final spec at this point in time leaves precious little room for debugging before the console release. On a different note the current ones are running the RSX core at 420MHz with 550 expected for launch. Memory is set at 600MHz with 700 hoped for as final.”
It looks like a lot of game programmers might be spending a lot of late nights before the PS3 releases. And with the possibility of speed bumps and spec changes this close to launch, it should be interesting to see which console reigns supreme in the area of overheating / crashing.
Read More 
| The Inquirer
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Kazuo “Kaz” Hirai talked to Dean Takahashi at E3 about the PS3 post-announcement, about pricing and their plans for the next generation of gaming. Hirai felt generally positive about the announcement, generally expressing that Sony was able to stay on message for the press. Of course, the question of price came up, and Kaz’s response basically parroted the Sony party line, saying “We get no breaks. If we didn’t say the price, you would be all over us for that. I think that is the right price for what we’re bringing to consumers.” But of course, the price has been an issue, and has really dominated the conversation about the PS3. While Sony might have felt like they were in a lose-lose situation on the price announcement, putting such large numbers out there has really made any discussion about the Playstation 3 in the media start with the cost, pushing their positives to the side.
Also discussed was the impression of arrogance that Sony gave at the press conference; to some extent Sony has earned a little arrogance in the gaming arena, since dominating with both the original Playstation and the Playstation 2, but to say that Sony “ushered in the era of the CD-ROM and 3-D” pushes things a little bit. A small measure of arrogance from the current leader can help, but there’s a fine line between enough and too much, and a lot of gamers feel that Sony has counted on their mindshare a little too much in this generation.
Overall, Sony wanted their message to be about the content, and about the advantages that Cell and Blu-ray will bring to the next generation. Sony wants to extend the console lifecycle, and expand the market, but these messages were seemingly easily lost in the uproar over the cost that gamers will pay to play with Sony this holiday season.
Read More | Mercury News
Top Public Relations Exec Leaves Sony
Posted by Michael Cardiff Categories: Corporate News, PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3,
In an interestingly timed announcement, Sony’s top PR executive Molly Smith has said that she will be leaving Sony. Smith has presided over the launch of the original Playstation and the PS2, working with them since 1994. Given the amount of bad press Sony’s been receiving for the price of the PS3 lately, I can’t say I’d blame her. No official statement about her resignation has been given yet, so we don’t yet know what the impetus was for this decision - although we’re guessing an official statement will simply say that she’d like to “pursue other interests.”
Read More | Gamasutra
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Japanese Developers On Next Generation
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: E3, Nintendo, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360,
Famitsu was able to talk to a bunch of the Japanese developers at E3 to get their opinions on the next generation of consoles, and Next Generation has the translation. The opinions seem to be pretty much off-the-cuff remarks, so there’s not a lot of heavy or in-depth information, and most of the response is positive for all consoles. Famitsu was able to talk to developers from Capcom, Tecmo, Sega, Namco, and more.
Amongst the praise for the new consoles, a few insults were tossed, most notably from the outspoken game designer from Team Ninja, Tomonobu Itagaki, who reportedly said, “It is most interesting to see Sony made the decisive judgment to revert the PlayStation 3 controller to its true shape. It takes great bravery for a company to change something that has already been announced.” He is still probably the Xbox 360’s biggest backer in Japan, as well, declaring “America’s love for the Xbox 360 has yet to waver. If only America would just explain Japan why they love the Xbox 360 already…” and also suggested that he might consider developing a title for Nintendo’s Wii, if only to give a break to people between their sessions of Dead or Alive Extreme 2.
Overall, however, developers seemed genuinely interested in how the Wii controller will shake things up, some effusive, while some were cautious about how well the controller would really take hold in the market. Concerns were expressed over the PS3 price, but many thought that the hardware was strong and the networking possibilities were intriguing.
Read More | Next Generation
Andy Serkis to Star in Heavenly Sword for PS3
Posted by Michael Cardiff Categories: Action, Adventure, PlayStation 3,
Andy Serkis, the man behind both Gollum and King Kong, will be lending his talents to the Playstation 3 game Heavenly Sword according to the BBC news service. Serkis became involved by chance, after a trailer was passed on to Serkis by his mortgage advisor, of all people. Much like his work with Gollum, Serkis’ movements and dramatic performance is being motion-captured and used for in-game characters. The article goes on to describe some of the other Hollywood-like production qualities of this game, which is is expected to launch shortly after the release of the PS3.
If Serkis’ previous work is any gauge (13 Going On 30 being the odd exception) then we can expect great things from this game. Check the link below for a somewhat creepy look at the similarities between Serkis and his CG counterpart.
Read More | BBC News - Technology
Wii Wins Game Critics Best of Show E3 2006
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: E3, PlayStation 3, Wii, Xbox 360,
The Game Critics awards for E3 2006 have been announced, and the winner of Best of Show this year is Nintendo’s Wii console, beating out Assassin’s Creed,Bioshock, Gears of War, and Spore to take the overall title. The Wii also took best hardware, while Will Wright’s Spore was voted Best Original Game, Best Simulation Game, and Best PC Game. Epic’s new Xbox 360 shooter, Gears of War won Best Console Game. The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass came away with the award for Best Handheld Game, the rest of Nintendo’s showing was represented by Excite Truck as Best Racing Game, and Wii Sports as Best Sports Game.
In terms of console platform wins, Nintendo’s Wii led the pack with 4 wins, followed by the Xbox 360 with 3, and the PS3 with 2. Nintendo’s showing was quite impressive, given that the Xbox 360 was heading into its second generation of game titles, and had a number of great games shown; the amount of wins is a testament to Nintendo’s preparation and readiness for this Holiday season. Microsoft may have suffered a little bit due to the sheer number of nominations seen for the Xbox 360 platform; Xbox 360 games received a total of 21 nominations, resulting in multiple Xbox 360 games up for the same awards. Overall, Sony’s strongest showing were the games Heavenly Sword and Assassin’s Creed, which took Best Fighting Game and Best Action/Adventure Game respectively.
The full list of nominees (winners bolded) after the jump.
Click to continue reading Wii Wins Game Critics Best of Show E3 2006
Phil Harrison: “The Playstation 3 is a computer”
Posted by Michael Cardiff Categories: Hardware, Internet, PlayStation 3,
Stop me if you’ve heard this one before, but according to Phil Harrison the Playstation 3 is going to become your primary home computer along with your gaming console, Blu-Ray player and your most effective paperweight. Key points from the interview include the statement below:
Spiegel: Speaking of online, Microsoft has just announced “Live Anywhere”, an integrated Windows-Xbox-Mobile environment. Is that something you’re worried about because you don’t have the same access to the PC market as Microsoft does?
Harrison: No, it doesn’t concern me and I don’t think it concerns the consumer either. Once you adopt a game system as your primary entertainment device, that’s what you want. We think that Playstation 3 is the place where our users will be doing their gaming, their movie watching, their Web browsing and a lot of other computer entertainment functions. That will satisfy them. Playstation 3 is a computer. We don’t need the PC.
So it’s sounding more and more like, if you want to play against your PC-based friends online, the 360 is your best bet. If the PS3 does serve well as an online PC in addition to a Blu-Ray player and a gaming console, then the $599 price point starts to look a little less painful. Still, I hear echoes of Microsoft’s plans for the original Xbox, which was also supposed to become the all-in-one convergence center of our entertainment lives.
Read More | Spiegel Online
Read More | Joystiq.com
Wii Interest Grows in Japan
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: E3, PlayStation 3, Wii, Xbox 360,
Japanese gamers’ interest in Nintendo’s Wii appears to be accelerating, according to the latest poll published in Weekly Famitsu. When asked which console gamers were most interested in at E3, Wii lead the pack with 68.8% of respondents. The PS3 followed with 21% of the vote, and the Xbox 360 trailed at 7.2%. In addition, the top ten E3 games were polled, and The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess and Final Fantasy XIII lead the list. Nintendo titles filled out the majority of the slots, with five Wii titles and one DS title. The PS3 managed three titles on the list, and somewhat surprisingly, the Xbox 360 made a showing with Halo 3 at spot number ten. Playstation 3 pricing was also a concern: 88% felt that the price was too high. It will be interesting to see if Nintendo can build on this interest, and how Sony will respond to the Japanese gamers’ concerns. Suddenly, the market that one would have thought Sony would have locked up, isn’t looking to be such a sure thing.
Read More | The Magic Box
Final Fantasy XIII Scans
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: PlayStation 3, Role Playing Games, Screenshots,
Some new Final Fantasy XIII scans have surfaced over at The Magic Box, and it looks like at least some of the images have been pulled from the E3 trailer, but some of them may be new. The higher-resolution scans show off some of the environment of the new Final Fantasy game, and some of the action sequences as well. As Square-Enix continues to make graphical improvements to the in-game segments of the game, it becomes increasingly difficult to separate the interactive sequences from the pre-rendered narrative sections, but given the power of the PS3, this definitely will be the best looking Final Fantasy game to date. No release date has been announced for either Japan or the United States, but the new game will definitely be a strong draw for the PS3.
Read More | The Magic Box
In an interview with Computer and Videogames Magazine, David Reeves, CEO of Sony Entertainment Europe has confirmed that at least three titles will be delayed beyond the European launch of the Playstation 3. It’s unclear whether this means that the titles will be impacted for the US launch as well, but given that the titles have apparently been delayed to 2007, the games may very well not be on schedule for any territory. Heavenly Sword is probably the highest profile of the titles to see a delay, but Formula One and Motorstorm are also supposedly going to miss the console launch as well. On the positive side of things, Insomniac’s latest, Resistance: Fall of Man is scheduled to make the launch window, but Sony has to be hoping that other high profile games won’t slip as well, further reducing their 15 game launch total.
Read More | Computer and Videogames
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