Play Station III

[Blue Ghost]

I don't understand the hype and all that goes with it about the PSIII. I've been playing Video/Computer games since Coleco/Atari Pong in the early 70s, and migrated to teletype computers and so forth. I love games. I remember thirsting for the latest computer games in the 90s when computers were evolving on a monthly basis.

Having said all that, I still don't understand what the huge craze is for the latest consoles. Anybody have any insights?

 

[stofsk]

You think the Playstation 3 hype is bad? What about the Nintendo Wii hype?

If I hear another word about the 'revolutionary' Wii remote...

The way I see it: any Wii success will likely be due, in part or whole, to the PS3 failing, and the latter seems increasinly likely since Sony has adopted a policy of "Screw everyone".

The Xbox 360 will probably do well.

 

[Antichrist]

Way off topic, but personally I'm disgusted by the whole PS3 deal. I mean, people are acting like spoiled children having a tantrum to get one of these. There have been violent fights, riots, stampedes and worse by so-called adults wanting one of these so bad.

In some places armed robbers went up to lines of people waiting outside stores, sometimes for days on end, to get one and robbing them at gunpoint. Some people refused to hand over their money and were shot, one man in the chest.

An EB was robbed of 4 of these at gunpoint.

Ebay has had bids of up to 9,000$ for these on it.

I'm really just disgusted with how americans are acting over these, it's really like spoiled children, and what kind of kids are these people raising? Some parents need to tell their kids they may have to wait till after xmas for it, but god forbid some of these people do that.

I also blame sony for this, with they way they're deliberately releasing a few of these to create hysteria and hype. They're more or less intentionally setting up these stampedes and such, and I'd like to see some laws passed controlling this sort of thing. I don't expect it to happen, but I'd like to.

Boy,. talk about OT.........

 

[Border Reiver]

I must be getting old. I pre-ordered my PS2 and fretted over which games to take with my initial purchase and played the Dropship demo over and over.

PS3 is doing nothing for me, I might pick it up when the price drops to something more reasonable.

 

[tjoneslo]

The frenzy over the PS3 is cultural thing the manufacturers have created. The artificially created lust for the new shiny thing that no one else has.

It's not hard to drag this back to Traveller, and to write adventure senarios about it. (The PC are carrying a cargo of new electronics, so anticipated by the recipients on the world the reseller has set up a market on the starport grounds. As the cargo is unloaded, a riot ensues...)

 

[Hemdian]

IMTU the Naasirka Entertaintment System™ and the LSP FunStation™ are both built on Efate for markets across the Jewell and Regina subsectors. There's a line to that effect buried in the Efate landgrab.

Regards PLST

 

[The Hinterworlds Rambler]

Hype is one thing. Hype is over enthusiastic public relations... This is downright disgraceful that there have been people fighting and even dying in the streets over a video game system. Its like technology making us de-evolve into walnut-brained apes or worse. Outrageous! Nightmarish! Disgusting!

I guess the more advanced we get as a species, the lower the IQ goes. Next we'll be having wars based on brand name selections. Truly horrifying.

 

[Border Reiver]

No such thing as bad publicity

 

[The Hinterworlds Rambler]

I'd say there was if people get killed over trivialities, or a device that will clog the shelves of your nearest fleamarket in a few years (or months?).

 

[Maladominus]

Originally posted by Baron Saarthuran von Gushiddan:
Hype is one thing. Hype is over enthusiastic public relations... This is downright disgraceful that there have been people fighting and even dying in the streets over a video game system.

Someone already died in the streets as a result of their zeal and fanaticism over the Playstation 3? I don't remember this being in the news recently.

 

[The Hinterworlds Rambler]

Well, I stand gladly corrected, the man that was shot in the chest and shoulder over this damn thing is going to pull through, it seems, and so is the guy that got stabbed over it. Guess people aint that bad, eh?

 

[Blue Ghost]

Originally posted by Hemdian:
IMTU the Naasirka Entertaintment System™ and the LSP FunStation™ are both built on Efate for markets across the Jewell and Regina subsectors. There's a line to that effect buried in the Efate landgrab.

Regards PLST

No wonder why the Zhos drove for Efate

 

[Blue Ghost]

I heard about the shooting incident via Yahoo.

The thing I don't understand is that I've lusted after computer games, even some wargame supplements. But I've never gone bonkers over it.

To myself the desire is for the imaginaive content that the thing can provide... sort of like building a new system to play the next generation of computer games (which I may do in about a year... but maybe not).

But I think of the games available on the platforms, and they're typically not very deep. Sports, racing, FPS, and action-fighting games with the occasional adventure title. All the really good games, IMHO, are for the PC.

Example; after DOOM I got into Dark Forces (I skipped Quake, but did Q2). Once I was done with DF I felt a little high and dry, so I did a lot of the third party addons. Then people hacked into Dark Forces and started cranking out DF addons. An old SP game suddenly had new life, and people still crank out levels for it to this very day.

But the much anticipated sequel, Dark Forces II Jedi Knight, arguably the most anticipated game sequel for a game of the then burgeoning popular FPS genre, to one of the most (if not the most) succesful sci-fi franchise in history, didn't generate the kind of frenzy that's happened with Sony's PSIII.

I just don't understand. Heck, I bought a SEGA Genesis because I liked some of the sidescollers on the thing. It was years until I broke down and bought a Dreamcast, and even then I only bought a couple titles.

This Play Station thing has me baffled.

Hmmm... I wonder what kind of games are available in the Imperium? "Papers and Paycheques" where heros pretend they're 9 to 5 workaday people and/or students trying to get by in a world without high-tech nor superheros.

(I stole that last bit from an old gaming mag)

 

[Ganidirsii O'Flynn]

Then somebody explain 'Tickle-Me Elmo'... some devious plot by the Kamsii Entertainment Group I bet!

 

[The Hinterworlds Rambler]

Dark Forces II was excellent for what it was, and even after playing things like City of Heroes and suchawhat, I still get the urge to go pick up that lightsaber and head for the MSN Gaming Zone, even if the game came out in (gasp) 1997!

The "mods" that were made for it, and the sometimes fantastic multiplayer levels made that game come to a life that I dont think the designers even planned for. For a while it seemed the next best thing to being there.

 

[Black Globe Generator]

Originally posted by Baron Saarthuran von Gushiddan:
Well, I stand gladly corrected, the man that was shot in the chest and shoulder over this damn thing is going to pull through, it seems, and so is the guy that got stabbed over it. Guess people aint that bad, eh?

That's settin' the ol' limbo stick a bit high, isn't it, BSG?

 

[Blue Ghost]

Baron; yes, very much. I liked MP stuff, but I was mildly dissapointed that there weren't more user made SP level for JK. I had a blast playing JK (no pun intended). Guys who used to do tournaments would train against me late at night and early in the morning (up to 2AM). I had a pretty respectable rep in the JK community during its heyday.

I really miss the marvel and spectable of discovery that was Jedi Knight. The renderer (Droid game engine, I think) has shown its age, but the guys at Lucasarts were able to tweak it enough to create the "Shadows of the Empire" game, which has some very rocking graphics, even by today's standards.

But I guess sci-fi and fantasy are niche markets, which is why those games, as popular as they were, didn't spark the mega-hype and feeding-frenzy that PS3 has.

Meh... it's all a Zho plot

 

[Scarecrow]

I work in the games industry. (I'm personally responsible for one of the three Burger King X-Box 360 titles currently bothering counters of North American BK restaurants - sorry ) and I don't get the release date fever, either.

I would never buy a games console on release date. There are no games for them, none worth speaking of, anyway. Give it 6-12 months, the console will be nearly half price and come bundled with a couple of decent games. There'll also be a decent range of games on the shelf to choose from.

The other thing that bothers me is how little each new generation of consoles improves in power. We get all manner of promises of incredible feats of god-like processing from the manufacturers but in the end all you really get is a slightly more powerful procesor. Big deal.

Now - apologies Stofsk - but Nintendo are the exception. Sure, they're no more powerful than the competition but it's more about the innovation. The Gamecube came with all manner of on-board subprocessors and software libraries that allowed the main CPU to hand off jobs which increased speed and efficiency and allowed for greater creativity. If driven to it's limits, it was a fantastic machine. Just look how gorgeous Starfox Adventures was. Thursday I finally got to play on the office Wii dev kit and the new controllers are just awesome. I am totally in love. I agree with you Stofsk, that in the long run the Wii will be an also-ran. There is no doubt about that but seriously, that controller has opened up so many new possibilites for game ideas and it's that very attitude that I love about Nintendo, and Japanese game developers in general. They never lose sight of the fact that they are making games first and foremost and pretty much all of the most innovative (if not very high selling) games have come out of that country and indeed Nintendo over the years.

Going back to the original point, and by coincidence, I only bought a gamecube two days ago - a guy in work was selling his for £20 so I nabbed it. I'm now buying games off of eBay for £5 a piece. I may be three years behind everyone else but as far as I am concerned, I win. I'll probably buy a Wii too but only when I can get one for £50

. The nice thing is, I'll be able to play all my GameCube games on it aswell - bargain!

Crow

 

[Blue Ghost]

Scarecrow; I think it was SEGA who came up with the mini-bat for the baseball games meant for the genesis. I remember buying Major League Baseball in 1993 for a whopping $70 (way overpriced), and there was a flyer inside of it for a baseball bat controller wired to the console.

Now that's the kind of thing that would've sold big with baseball fans had it not been for the fact that the target market was kids. I thin I remember reading or hearing about how those contollers were being wrecked by adult players (too big and strong for the device).

Myself, I prefer the old fashioned "joystick". The thumb contollers (invented by Matel's intellivision, or so I recall) were always bothersome to me until the Japanese perfected the design. But even then, after I became used to the control, I still prefer a joystick. Any by joystick I mean the one for the Atari 2600 that you could manipulate in various ways; i.e. you didn't have to grab the whole thing... in fact, if you did, you were more likely not be able to control yourself in the game.

But I digress.

I remember the game cube. The only title that sparked my intereest was that Star Wars game. But I have the X-Wing series for the PC, so why bother? The graphics looked smooth and sexy, but I've done all the Star Wars gaming I'll ever need on my computer. AND, those titles are ported to PCs (and sometimes Macs) a few years after they're released anyway. So again, I'm baffled by the insatiable thirst for the PS3.

 

[Spiderfish]

Originally posted by Baron Saarthuran von Gushiddan:
Hype is one thing. Hype is over enthusiastic public relations... This is downright disgraceful that there have been people fighting and even dying in the streets over a video game system. Its like technology making us de-evolve into walnut-brained apes or worse. Outrageous! Nightmarish! Disgusting!

I guess the more advanced we get as a species, the lower the IQ goes. Next we'll be having wars based on brand name selections. Truly horrifying.

Yes blame it on the machine... Might as well blame money for getting itself stolen.

People who use violence to obtain this thing they are more likely to be er... entrepreneurs of the street than "game addicts".

As for this apparent wave of violence, the only shooting I have of was an incident were two men robbing people queuing up to buy PS3s and they were interested in the money not the consoles in the shop.