Naruto dev: Sixaxis ‘useless’

August 27, 2008 – 8:56 am

Awesome.

…producer Hitoshi Matsuyama confirmed that Ultimate Ninja Storm won’t support Trophies, before nonchalantly dismissing Sony’s motion sensing control system.

We’re not supporting Trophies,” Matsuyama said through his translator.

And before you ask, we’re not supporting Sixaxis. It’s useless,” he added.

source @ GAMER


Comparing PlayStation 3s - Which One Is Best?

August 26, 2008 – 2:49 pm

Well, NONE of them, of course. But if forced at gun point, I’d have to agree with Joystiq - the ORIGINAL 60gb is the best of them.

source @ Joystiq


Typical Sony: Recommendededing Their Products for Their Products

August 12, 2008 – 1:54 pm

For those of us not paying attention, this should say “**** disc recommended.” Not *-eded. Excellent.

source @ English Fail Blog


Microsoft’s David Gosen Needs Job at Sony. He’d Fit right in!

August 7, 2008 – 8:07 am

OMG! In line commentary! My only objective comment: Oh really? Is THAT why I still can’t find Wii Fit in stores?” On with the show:

That’s according to Xbox VP David Gosen, calling on Microsoft ‘research ‘that showed “60 per cent” of people who bought a copy of Wii Fit had only played it once.

In OTHER news 60% of statistics are made up on the spot and 80% of the time are baseless and false, and 90% of THOSE stats are agenda driven and as such, are 100% unreliable.

“What Nintendo have done with the Wii is truly fantastic – there is no question about it. But I think sometimes there is a thin line between gimmick and great gameplay,” he told us after his talk. “We’ve seen some research that says 60 per cent of people who bought a Wii Fit play it once and don’t play it again. So we have to get the balance right, because what we are doing is bringing new consumers into the market for the first time in their lives sometimes – and we have to treat them with respect.

“We’ve seen some research”. Well done! You have SEEN research. Grats on that. Keep looking at stats so that you can do what SONY does and go public to either a) belittle/berate Nintendo publicly based on nothing but “statistics” or b) concentrate on those stats and not on doing something about Nintendo consistently handing you your own ass (notice that Nintendo doesn’t have to even open their mouths - that’s because they have you. Ass.)

“And at the end of the day that comes back down to creativity. We have to ensure that the peripheral strategy that anyone employs makes sense and delivers a truly game changing experience.”

Yeahhhh.. Microsoft’s periperals are SO creative. See: Original Xbox controller as a bad example. See: everything else i nthe Xbox peripheral world as examples of directly copying the PC world. MS has no say in the world of periperal creativity. NONE.

Gosen looks kinda like French Stewart, doesn’t he? Hmmm

source @ MCV


We should have bet on Wii, admits EA’s Riccitiello

July 28, 2008 – 9:29 am

I’m still moderately stunned at this quote:

He said: “One thing that’s different is we typically figured out who the market leader was going to be before the start of the cycle and bet with our development resources on that platform.

“We made the wrong call there [by betting on the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360], which made this transition harder than it would otherwise be. But now we’re catching up, and I think we’re fine. We’ve got some incredibly innovative Wii titles, [and] incredibly innovative DS titles coming. And so I think that issue’s sort of behind us.”

But then again, I’m sure their prediction skills aren’t too wonderful. Let’s face it - they made their fortune by making the same game with a different name (all of their sports games) each year and staggering the releases to keep interest up - and ALL of those games were primarily successful on PS2 and Xbox/360. Thus, I doubt they actually had to “figure out who the market leader was”, they just went with the past stats.

source @ MCV


Sony’s Koller, “iPhone more of a threat to DS”. More than PSP?

July 18, 2008 – 10:05 am

Indeed! Koller, of course is the PSP brand manager for Sony.

PSP has always faced fierce competition from Nintendo DS, yet Koller remains optimistic about Sony’s prospects through 2009. Concerns over other competitors, such as iPhone, are virtually nonexistent according to the company’s perspective.

Asked specifically about the recently-launched iPhone App Store, Koller confessed, “We think the iPhone is more of a threat to DS than anything else.”

Could this be a reality check for Sony? Seeing as though he is the PSP guy, he’s saying that the iPhone is more of a threat to Nintendo’s DS than Sony’s PSP. Well according to DS and PSP sales stats, he’s right? So what gives on the lack of Sony-brainwashed-scripted-SONYISTHEBESTANDEVEREYONEELSESUCKS talk?

source @ Pocket Gamer


Sony Now 100% Locked Into It’s “Xross” Media Bar

July 18, 2008 – 9:09 am

Sony has decided to add the Xross Media Bar (XMB) that has proved so successful in its PlayStation 3 to its new range of Vaio laptops.

Of course, this is the same UI as the PSP and some Bravia TV’s as well. I hope it has staying power in a it’ll-never-change sort of way because they’re locking into this mess now!

What will they do when they can UPDATE the PS3’s Xross to be different? Everyone else gets left out in the cold! Oh well… who am I to tell Sony that their ideas are short sighted and not well thought through?

source @ TechRadar UK


Sony Needs to Pony Up

July 18, 2008 – 8:54 am

Sony’s mantra of not writing checks for exclusives—or much of anything—seems to be biting them in the ass a couple times this week. There are at least four cases where the PlayStation 3 has suffered because of Sony’s lack of willingness to open up the purse strings…. backward compatibility and the DualShock 3—but we only found out about the other two during the roundtable session with Sony’s Jack Tretton yesterday.

The first is exclusives. Final Fantasy 13 coming to the Xbox 360 was a pretty huge blow to the PlayStation brand … Grand Theft Auto, Devil May Cry are two more recent ones, but Wired also lists Assassin’s Creed (could have been PS3-only), Virtua Fighter 5, Beautiful Katamari, and Fatal Inertia. What does Sony have of big third-party exclusives? Metal Gear Solid 4.

…Jack Tretton, … “not in the business of writing checks for exclusives.” Jack goes on to explain … that in this day and age, it’s just much more profitable for game publishers to put their titles on as many consoles as possible, and companies would have to throw out some big chunks of money to convince them otherwise. The kind of money Microsoft has been doling out.

The second is Home. Tretton called the current state of Home a “no man’s land,”

Well done Sony. Well done.

source @gizmodo


Sony’s Collective Genius Strikes Again!

July 18, 2008 – 8:26 am

Kotaku said it best! Referring to the PSN version of the original PS’s Wipeout:

…It was playable all the way back at TGS, and has been playable at various events since, and yet at E3 this year, it was nowhere. No mention of it, no mention of a release date. So what gives? Looks as if while most of the game simply sings, some of it doesn’t, with the game plagued by a “really, really tricky technical problem” that nobody at Sony has been able to fix.

Yet in their infinite genius they have a December 2008 release date. Impressive Sony. Where ANY other company would say to the world, “The release date is TBA” or just nothing at all, YOU come out and even before you’ve informed the team that is to be working on it you announce that it’s going to happen - only to see your bravado fall on it’s still-bruised-from-the-last-time-you-did-this ass. Pathetic you are.

source @ Kotaku


PIGS FLY: Sony: We Know What’s Wrong with PS3 + BLAME GAME!

July 17, 2008 – 10:00 am

Normally companies assign projects to a group or gathering of groups that communicate well, or at least stipulate and/or micro manage communications between whomevers. This is how you get things done properly. Specialists do their jobs, and each specialist tells others who will be directly affected by their work what they are doing so that things go smoothly.

NOT SONY! They just say “We want this - now go do it!” and then leave to go media hype the expectation (which, of course is NOT based in reality) and NOW WE KNOW that’s how it is. Thx Jack Tretton!

Gratas Sony!

In short, they know what’s wrong with the way they made the PS3, and they know how to fix it.

Short summary:

As everyone knows, Sony is a hardware company. But when making the PlayStations, they’ve become a software company as well. The problem came from the fact that they didn’t know whether they’re a software company or a hardware company or even both, which influenced the way the PS3 was developed.

Lead into the blame game:

In this case, the hardware guys developed the console fairly independently then dumped it onto the software guy’s lap, effectively saying “do something with it.” In essence, as Tretton says, the PS3 was not developed in collaboration between the two teams. As a result of this, the software team has been cleaning up the mess made by the hardware team for years.

and the conclusion:

…Hopefully with previous boss Ken Kutaragi out and guys like Kaz Hirai and Jack Tretton influencing development on the sure-to-be-upcoming PlayStation 4, things will be better in the next generation.

I would say props to Sony for admitting weakness, but since it took them THIS LONG, during which their customers suffered their ignorance and bravado, they get nothing. They deserve NO cookie. They should have done a better joj from the OUTSET and not lied to the world on a consistent basis.

source @ Gizmodo