European PS3 Launch Delayed to 2007 440
An anonymous reader writes "Sony has finally admitted that the November release date for the release of the PS3 is unfeasible. Specifically, it will not be available in any PAL territories until March 2007. Sony cites '(a) delay in the mass production schedule of the blue laser diode', forming a critical part of the much-maligned Blu-Ray drive. With the Xbox 360 having been released for almost 6 months in overseas markets, and the Wii looming large, can Sony afford a delay like this?" Update: 09/06 17:58 GMT by Z : Just to make sure you caught it, the announcement includes the word that the U.S. will only be getting 400,000 units at launch in November, with Japan at 100,000 units. Go Sony.
no surprise then (Score:5, Insightful)
It is their fault (Score:5, Insightful)
The only reason they're using Blu-ray in the PS3 is to try and take over the HD media market. So, yes, this is their fault. If the stuck with DVD which is more than adequate for next-gen gaming, they wouldn't be having this problem and the PS3 might have already launched.
But their insistance on trying to abuse a monopoly they don't actually have is causing them to become more and more of a joke and less and less likely to be even relevant this generation. If it winds up being a choice between a $300 Wii now and a $600 PS3 months from now the choice of which to buy becomes even easier than it was before.
Re:no surprise then (Score:3, Insightful)
So basically (Score:5, Insightful)
The PS3 was originally not going to be released in Europe until Q1 2007
It then got brought forward to November 2006
It then got put back to March 2007
Not really much of a delay in my opinion...
infeasible (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:What the heck is with Sony? (Score:5, Insightful)
They are nothing less than the victims of their own unrealistic promises.
-Eric
Re:What the heck is with Sony? (Score:5, Insightful)
ME! the wii, I'm an anti-nintendo guy, I don't like kiddy games (it's a generalisation I know there's a few normal ones) and heck I'm a tech geek, so it's underpowered for me - the controller is a gimmick and they focus primarily on party / mp games whereas I'm a single player gamer who likes storyline.
None the less! Somehow the Wii is the most interesting, it seems like they are the only console manufacturer who haven't lost their minds!
MS rushed the X360 (in my opinion) for Xmas and ended up making too many faulties plus they dropped the old Xbox 1 like a hot potato, hence treating their customers like shit.
Sony, well see my post - they are nutcases
Nintendo, well despite most of the stuff I said above they STILL sound the best overall, cheap, simple and likely fun - plus hell it'll be the cheapest so I can always re-sell it, PLUS I never owned a gamecube, so this gets me 2 consoles in one kind of.
It's a wiin wiin situation for me.
Re:Who Cares? (Score:0, Insightful)
-Tim
Re:What the heck is with Sony? (Score:5, Insightful)
As for trying such advanced technology, they've been raving and ranting about this bloody Cell CPU for what 3, 4 YEARS! is it actually that good anymore, by todays standards?
Oh here's another snippet of their bullshit
Quote from shacknews.com
"One of the more unorthadox features discussed in the interview is the planned ability for PSP to serve as a remote terminal for PS3, such that PSP users could watch PS3 content and interact with a PS3 over a network. Apparently, the PS3's Cell processor is what makes this possible. "The power of the Cell will be put to use," said Kawanishi. "If you don't have this much power, this cannot be realized." It is unclear if players would actually be able to engage in PS3 gameplay remotely using a PSP. Issues such as how content would be appropriately scaled down to accomodate the lower-resolution PSP screen were not discussed"
What a load of cobblers, the feature they are discussing requires good software, it has NOTHING to do with the power of the processor in the PS3. It's these kind of marketing / pr bullshit spins which makes me take everything they say with a large serving of salt.
Re:no surprise then (Score:3, Insightful)
If they didn't learn their lesson from mini-disc then I'm sure UMD was never on their mind as well. Looks like Blu-Ray will be losing this battle.
Re:Europe more important than the US? (Score:3, Insightful)
But it's the Americans who buy the shitload of Madden 2007, after having bought a shitload of Madden 2006, after having bought a shitload of Madden 2005... ... ...
A company who makes a new-gen console which is the same old stuff but more powerful won't care about Katamaries and Loco Rocos, they only care about a nicer looking Madden.
Re:What the heck is with Sony? (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not just hype, they actually believe it. Did they really plan to release a next-gen console 1.5 years after Microsoft did? They seemed to have believed that including a BluRay with every PS3 wasn't going to be too expensive of a loss leader, yet here they are, stopping shipments of blue lasers to everyone else until, what, mid 2007? just to be able to include a BluRay drive in every PS3 sold, even though the vast majority of people don't have HDTV's. That's got to be a huge opportunity cost right there. And they're trying to force another pet proprietary format on the market, when they have a large obvious history of failing those attempts.
It's one thing to hype yourself to the press, it's another to drink your own koolaid.
Re:It is their fault (Score:5, Insightful)
Whether it's a wise decision to futureproof this much remains to be seen.
Re:What the heck is with Sony? (Score:2, Insightful)
Even though I've got a HDTV, I'm going where the fun games are at a price I can afford.
Will Sony start to die now? (Score:5, Insightful)
* Rootkit CDs
* Exploding batteries
* Delays and Failures associated with their new proprietary DVD format
* Delays and Failures resulting from the previously mentioned DVD stuff
Sony used to be widely held up as the gold standard for quality and innovative design. As far as I was concerned, Sony "invented" everything. (I know that's not true, but still.) But with all this crap going on, it would seem that the company is not unified and is pulling itself apart by having too many leaders. Solutions that would seem obvious to everyone else, Sony is just too thick-headed to make happen. For example: Put out the PS3 with a REMOVABLE DVD drive that can later me upgraded to BlueRay when it's available. They can virtually sell the thing twice! Seems pretty obvious to me and I'm just a consumer with a worthless opinion and no experience in the industry.
Yay more antisony fanboyism (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:What the heck is with Sony? (Score:1, Insightful)
Is it BlueRay? Meh, it's unnecessary really, developers seem to be able to deliver big games on a single DVD for the XBox360. Bigger hard drive? Wireless controllers? HDMI? I'm not sure what makes the PS3 more innovative than the XBox360.
The Cell processor? Why is that more innovative than a custom Triple PowerPC core?
I'm finding it difficult what makes the PS3 so much more innovative than the XBox360...Maybe I'm uneducated when it comes to the unit, I find the Wii much more innovative than either of the two units.
Re:It is their fault (Score:3, Insightful)
Now is the time... (Score:4, Insightful)
Nintendo has a perfect opportunity here to dominate a market it's been trailing behind in for the last decade, especially with folks like those who are holding out against the XBox 360 as their next game console. But they need to act quickly on this before anymore addictive next gen titles (like Dead Rising) end up falling into Microsoft's lap.
Needless to say, I'm keeping a close eye on sites like EBGames for the instant they open the pre-order floodgates on the Wii.
Re:It is their fault (Score:3, Insightful)
Given that many games really fun to play take only a few megabytes, I cannot believe that any reasonnable game would require more than a DVD until some years.
Re:What the heck is with Sony? (Score:3, Insightful)
Beefed up gamecube with brand new CPU and GPU? Give me a break.
Or 1080p. Indeed, the aim of the Wii is that every game runs at 60fps in 480p.
"Look fine"?
The GameCube was the most powerful console of it's generation (just compare RE4/Wii and RE4/PS2). And remember that the PS3 and the Xbox360 need to be hugely powerful to display watchable graphics, because they're running from 720p to 1080p. You need much less graphics power to display amazing games in 480p.
Every Wii conf has been with Wiis hooked up to HDTV, and I haven't heard much about the so called crappy graphics of the Wii (unless it was in Wii Sports, which isn't quite supposed to display amazing graphics).
Of course we'll know when we see them, but I'm confident that the Wii will be more than enough capable.
Re:It is their fault (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:It is their fault (Score:5, Insightful)
Gameplay has stagnated in the past 10 years - since the Playstation era. There have been no new innovations in gameplay in that time, only improved graphics. The only games which come to mind with innovative gameplay are games like Guitar Hero with its specialty hardware. Of course, Wii is looking to change all that.
Re:It is their fault (Score:3, Insightful)
Say what you want about graphics, but the better they become, the smaller the gap between system becomes, and the more irrelevant graphics become as a selling point.
Not the biggest news today (Score:5, Insightful)
Japan: 100,000 units
North America: 400,000 units
To put that in perspective, the Nintendo DS handheld system is selling at an average of 125,000 units per week in Japan right now. If the numbers keep up, the PS3 will not even be top hardware seller on its launch week.
I can't think of a single thing Sony has done right in this launch.
Re:It is their fault (Score:3, Insightful)
I can't think of any Xbox games that needed more then one disc, some came with a 2nd disc but those were typically special features discs for limited edition games. The only PS2 games I can think of that used a 2nd discs were pressed on DVD5s and COULD have fit on a single disc if they wanted. Not to mention I can count on one hand the number of Xbox 1 games that even needed the 2nd layer for storage. Sure a lot of those games USED it but not many actually needed it once you cut out foreign language cut-scenes, demo games, game trailers etc. In my opinion even with DVD we're getting a disc upgrade, we had DVD5 last gen and DVD9 this gen
Not to mention the performance prowess of the new consoles is good enough that we shouldn't need to use pre-rendered cut-scenes anymore, which will save a ton of space right there. Audio compression is fantastic these days and if you're only doing speech you can easily make it mono and crank up the compression before it looses any perceived quality, not to mention you should be using the consoles to appropriately place the voices in the sound stage anyway. Audio really hasn't gotten any better then it was last generation anyway. Every console since the dreamcast has supported some form of surround sound, and we've had wav style audio available since the Playstation 1. Really Textures are the the only thing that are getting a boost in size this generation but you'd have to be making some huge friggin textures that they would fill and significantly surpass the space you saved being able to get rid of the pre-rendered cut-scenes.
I think Oblivion stands as the best example, case and point why DVD9 is more then sufficient for next gen games. Hours and hours and hours and hours of audio, drop dead gorgeous graphics across some of the most massive gaming environments and no need for pre-rendered cut-scenes. and the game doesn't fill a DVD9. I think if a game developer was struggling with space constraints and saw Oblivion you'd have to question what you were doing wrong with your own game.
Re:Will Sony start to die now? (Score:3, Insightful)
They think this: "They make good TVs. They made the Walkman. I think my kid's CD player might be by them. Oh, and the Playstation? That's theirs too, right?"
Sony (along with Microsoft) is one of the most trusted brands in the world. The incessant cackling and yapping from informed or opinionated sources on the Internet is like a toy whistle blowing during a rocket launch. The general public knows very little, unfortunately. Just because $site_you_read talks about Sony (or Microsoft or anything) derisively, doesn't mean the general populace shares that opinion, even if your site has stories bashing these companies every day.
I'm glad this stuff is being reported and discussed but it amounts to near nothing in the grand scheme of things.
Re:What the heck is with Sony? (Score:2, Insightful)
Hey buddy... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Hey buddy... (Score:3, Insightful)
Out of all the above, they mostly only ever get nice graphics and nothing else, though.
Re:It is their fault (Score:2, Insightful)
My Glass Is Half Ruined By The Games Industry (Score:5, Insightful)
In a discussion about format size, an observation about format size is simply an on topic discussion. It has nothing to do with priorities and nor does it imply priority.
It's kind of like saying, in a discussion about dogs getting loose, "The thought of getting bitten is a real concern for me." and having someone leap forward with, "How can you worry about being bitten when babies are dying in Africa!"
I work for a games company too. I think more capacity, more power, more everything is a good thing. If you pay attention, you'll note I didn't say add "at the expense of gameplay" or "more so than gameplay." Gameplay remains a primary concern but it doesn't stop capacity from still being a good thing as an additional way to push the genre forward.
How many CDs did Pac Man fill?
And, given that Pacman is still released semi regularly for the Gameboy, as part of "classic" collections for the PS2/Xbox, etc., how much do people still play it?
Yeah, it was a great game for its time. Yeah, for its time it sucked in far more of our time than most modern games do. But, standing against modern games like say Oblivion with its wealth of content, it captures maybe half an hour of a modern gamer's interest. Now compare it to World Of Warcraft. Even in its heyday, did its median player play for anywhere near the amount of time the median player of a modern classic plays for?
At the end of the day, whilst gameplay is core, there's a reason why most gamers, exposed to what a whole DVD full of content can be like, play older games and quickly get bored, realizing PacMan is nothing more than repetition of the same concept, requiring four or five core strategies, repeated for 255 levels.
Were you frustrated when you scratched the disk of your Super Mario Brothers 3 cartridge?
No, we were frustrated when dust got in to it and no amount of blowing would get it to work again.
Gameplay has stagnated in the past 10 years - since the Playstation era. There have been no new innovations in gameplay in that time, only improved graphics.
To name the first few the immediately come to mind...
Tomb Raider (and its clones) - a genre of gaming that didn't exist before the PS1.
Massively Multiplayer online worlds with human to human interaction on a level of accessibility that text based systems never had.
Sandbox games like the Grand Theft Auto series (that, curiously, only become possible with enough depth of content that relies on the large storage you disdain).
The only games which come to mind with innovative gameplay are games like Guitar Hero with its specialty hardware.
Unlike the classic arcade games of yore. None of which required trackballs instead of joysticks, afterburner cabinets that turned upside down, VR headsets or lightguns.
Of course, Wii is looking to change all that.
The Wii is, by definition, specialty hardware. It introduces a new class of, admittedly more reusable than many, peripheral.
If you're determined to look at a single aspect of any given argument, you can confirm your beliefs. If one only looks at numbers of children killed, guns are bad. If one only looks at numbers of crimes stopped, guns are good. Neither is that impressive of an argument to more open minded people.
Similarly, you saw a game dev comment on storage with no mention of gameplay either way and saw it simply as a confirmation of your beliefs that tech is more important to him than gameplay - despite absolutely no supporting evidence. You complain about how easy modern discs may be to scratch, ignoring how easy cartridges were to get dust in to (I for one have had far less frustration with scratched discs than I ever had with 5.25" floppies that got fingerprints on them or 16K ram packs that fell out of the back of ZX81s everytime I typed hard). You lament
Re:It is their fault (Score:5, Insightful)
Christ. What we need on the Internet is some kind of device that can detect nostalgia and gives you a shock whenever you start to type a grumpy grandpa-type post like the parent's.
Oh, and of course, Nintendo is going to rise and save us all from our dreary fate... that's a staple of Slashdot posts.
Re:What the heck is with Sony? (Score:3, Insightful)
1) If you think Sony won't have the same percentage of faulties when the PS3 comes out, you're deluding yourself. Nintendo might have better quality control, but it might not.
2) What makes you think they've "dropped the XBox 1 like a hot potato?" There's still tons of games coming out for it, they keep Live and Live Arcade running for it... what exactly more do you want of them?