Other Game Bundles For the Cost of the PS3

ImaNumber writes "When Sony announced the price of the PS3 many people were left dumbfounded at how expensive it was going to be. Microsoft joked that people would get the Xbox360 and the Wii instead. Brittlefish has taken this a step further and put together a list of some other gaming 'bundles' that you could buy instead of just getting one PS3. You might be surprised at what you can get for that kind of money."

Wow...

[jamestheprogrammer]

I can see a lot of parents buying this bundle rather than the PS3 for the same price:

# The "And A Friend" bundle ( $600 ): $250 - Wii $260 - 2 DS Lites $90 - extra Wii-mote and 2 retro controllers (estimate)

This would be perfect for those common families that make up so much of America with two kids... the two DSs will keep them from constantly saying "Are we there yet?" in the car, and that Wii will keep them entertained at home. And you get all that for the same price of a PS3...

Re:Wow...

[Fishead]

Just curious, do you have kids?

I have 2 children (3, and 1.5 years old) and although I love them, and like spending time with them, a long road trip can be quite horrible. Children have a VERY short attention span, and the interior of a car is not the easiest place to entertain them. I know I know, they don't need to be entertained 100% of the time, but when you are on a long road trip and they are bored, trust me, electronic entertainment would ROCK.

Just last weekend we drove 5 hours to see my in-laws, and it was TORTURE (the trip, not the visit... ok, the visit was too a little bit). Part of the problem though was my choice of highway. Instead of the high elevation new highway with the $10 toll, I opted for the road with no toll that winds through arid, desert country. Bad choice! It was 38 for a lot of the way, and I don't have air conditioning!!! I was already planning that when we buy a new(er) minivan, I want some sort of electronic entertainment for the kids to go along with the AC.

Re:Well now...

[LoverOfJoy]

Just to test it out I did 3 searches on google news. One for PS3, one for wii, and one for xbox 360. Now it may change by the time the next person tries this but right now for the PS3 search I'm getting:

Other Game Bundles For the Cost of the PS3
No surprise if Nintendo Wii beats Sony PS3 to shelves
Minter: Sony's PS3 Strategy Arrogant

Then for the wii I'm getting:

Wii On Sale Earlier Than October?
No surprise if Nintendo Wii beats Sony PS3 to shelves
Cubed Report | Hands-On at the Nintendo Wii Press Event

and for xbox 360 I get:

Game developer IGS may tap Xbox 360 market
Xbox 360 vs. PlayStation 3 vs. Wii
Xbox 360 and Wii orders ramping up, say chip makers

The ps3 articles just seem more negative overall than the others. This is something I've noticed for quite some time now, actually. I do these searches on a regular basis to keep up on the latest and the trend has been negative for PS3. Granted, it's possible that it just so happens that google news searches sites that tend to be anti-sony but I doubt it. Do a search on some other sites and see if the trend is still there.

Re:More than just a games console?

[ZakuSage]

When you consider that the price of a standalone Blu-Ray player is $1000, PS3's $600 ($500 if you get the cheaper one that doesn't lose much) price tag doesn't seem so hefty.

Interesting...

[SanityInAnarchy]

You've just given me an idea of my criteria for buying a PS3:

• Price drops significantly, on both the PS3 and the games. I should be able to get a high-end PS3, a game, and a blu-ray movie for under $400.
• Sony backs down significantly on DRM. I'm not talking "Oops, sorry about the rootkit," I'm talking something huge, like making a blu-ray player for Linux, or releasing the keys needed to decode blu-ray content. Or I'm talking about some high-level people, like Ken Kutaragi, saying "Oops, we fucked up, time to completely redesign Sony". Remember when Novell bought Ximian, and Ximian culture spread through Novell? Maybe if Sony bought Novell...
• Linux on the PS3 must be at least usable (Gnome/KDE, Firefox...) and ideally it should kick ass. I want real homebrew games on the thing. It doesn't have to be all open-source, but at the very least, a good OpenGL. Or, much better, open it up to the point where even if PS3 Linux isn't a dev kit yet, it should be possible to develop an OSS devkit on top of it.
• Everything must be upgradable. And not just from sony. I should be able to buy an off the shelf IDE/SATA or USB drive and use it instead of the onboard one. 60 gigs is going to start looking pretty small, pretty fast -- if my brother can fill 15 gigs with UT2003 mods 3 years ago, I can fill 60 gigs with high-def mods today.
• It must be possible to run games off the hard disk. Not just downloadable games, not just "supported" games, but any damn game I buy at the store. The way to do this is easy, if they've been doing anything like it from the beginning -- force games to run on Linux, then all you have to do is change the game startup script.
• It must hook up to ordinary, existing monitors via DVI and VGA, and it must play high-def content if the monitor can handle it -- no HDMI crap, full resolution, no matter what the hell I hook it up to. I'm not a pirate, I have a great monitor, but it doesn't have HDMI.
• Don't just rip off the Wii controller (badly), don't just whine about how you're not really ripping it off, but actually go to Nintendo, say "We're sorry, could we please, please, pretty-please license your controller?"

In short, if they want to market it as a Linux computer, then it had better be a Linux computer.

And even if they give me all that, I'm still going to wait a bit to either see some amazing Qemu speed, or to see enough good, cheap games for the PS3 to make me want to get it instead of upgrades for my desktop. After all, for $500, you can still get quite a lot of computer, especially as an upgrade.

And of course, remember, Halo 3 and Zelda are pretty compelling reasons not to buy a PS3, even if you are a hardcore console gamer.