Month: July 2007

I came across an interesting article about Sony’s strategy with the PS3. Of course Sony has been telling us since day one that the PS3 is not just a gaming console. This article pretty much drives the point home. The bottom line is that Sony is putting all it’s eggs in the Blu-ray basket. Once again, this is nothing new, but it is rather revealing to see the strategy laid out so clearly.

Should PS3 owners be concerned about Sony’s PS3 strategy?

The bottom line: Sony’s PS3 serves multiple Sony goals, only one of which is being the big platform in the the gaming console market. It doesn’t have to outsell the Nintendo Wii or the XBox 360 for it to be successful; it only has to establish itself as a viable high-definition platform for next-generation developers, gamers, and movie watchers.

Another telling point is that Sony’s overall high-def strategy is working.

Sony’s Bravia line recently became the best selling LCD brand on a revenue basis, despite being third on a unit basis.

A couple of months ago I made a decision to purchase a PS3, not because of the current gaming library (as of May 2007), but because I wanted to take advantage of my Sony BRAVIA KDL-40V2500. That is not to say that I only wanted the PS3 for Blu-ray, but it Blu-ray played a significant factor in my purchase decision. At some point I knew the games would come. After reading this article PS3 owners have to wonder what happens to the PS3 if Microsoft and Nintendo decide to reload in 3-4 years with new consoles? Unless Sony can get major market share in a hurry, PS3 owners should be concerned.

Some of you reading this may not understand why baseball is such a great game. If you get the chance, watch an HBO documentary called “Brooklyn Dodgers: Ghosts” and I think you get a pretty good idea why so many people love this pastime. I hate the Yankees and am tired of hearing Red Sox fans whine about curses, so this was a refreshing take on being a baseball fan and what that really means to people.

Sometimes the good folks of the internet post the collective wisdom of the past. Case in point, Sony Corporation and the PS3. Next-Generation Systems has an excellent summary of the collective pearls of wisdom that dribbled from the lips of various folks about products during yesteryear.

You can’t make this stuff up it is so funny.

It seems that Sony is all over the map. First there was a leaked price cut, but it was not really a price cut. Not that big of a deal because rumors are often denied. Then there was a price cut, but now it may really be more of a price reduction of a system no longer being manufactured. Price cut confusion oh my.

I thought one of the interesting stories from E3 was a Codemasters’ interview that states that the PS3 will receive the best version of DiRT.

Listening to the interview makes me sound brilliant. Earlier this week I wrote that “they [Sony] are going to have to start offering free consulting services to the third party developers to help them with their porting efforts.” I have no idea how much money changed hands, but this is the right tactic for Sony. Help the third party developers make better games, but much like the price cut fiasco, it looks like Sony is sending mixed messages when it comes to third party support:

“If the games don’t look good on the platform, consumers aren’t going to buy them. As I said, we can’t control what third parties are going to do,” explained Tretton. “We can try to evangelize the technology and assist those guys in development and try to convince them that it is in their best interests to take advantage of the technology.”

“At some point, what’s the point of porting it over to another platform if it is not going to look as good on a platform that is more expensive? Why waste any money in development doing that?”

Can Gran Turismo 5: Prolog really look this good?

I have not had much time to post the last couple of days, but I have plenty of things I want to post about.  E3, Super Stardust HD, PS3 DVD upconverting/upscaling, crap from video game magazines, and then some.

I just saw that ebgames.com is running a $5 off coupon, for today only, on one game priced $49.99 or higher.  I think I may use this as incentive to finally preorder NCAA Football 2008 or Madden 2008.  Maybe.  Probably need to write about that as well, but right now I am out of time.

I’m not talking about World of Warcraft this time. I had Sprint as a carrier many years ago. I left very quickly and was a long time Cingular customer until my office got a deal from Nextel. I was happy with Nextel until Sprint purchased them and I went back to Cingular.

Now comes this article that shows why Sprint sucks. I hate that company.

Price cut aside, Sony needs to do some serious work at E3 to get some momentum for the PS3, but more on that after we get the price cut business out of the way. A $100 price cut will help improve sales, but by how much? I believe that there are millions of loyal Sony fans still playing their PS2 because the entry point for a PS3 is just too steep. A PS3 for $499 will not entice the majority of these gamers; $299 is more reasonable. With that said, the price drop will help move some systems, because a $100 price drop will be enough incentive for some gamers sitting on the fence. I have no idea how much of a bump the price drop will provide PS3 sells; maybe an extra 5K per week leading into Thanksgiving weekend.

In other words, a price drop alone will not be enough for Sony to make significant progress. Then again, the price drop is still speculative. Sony is still denying the rumors, but surely they have been caught with their pants down.

Speaking of rumors, a popular one is that the Sixaxis controller will be replaced with a rumbled enabled Sixaxis controller. Great plan on Sony’s part, but retiring the current Sixaxis controller and bundling the rumored Sixaxis with rumble will not have a big impact PS3 sells. This rumor will come true; Sony set this precedent back in the original PlayStation days. The good news for Sony is that margins on accessories are normally huge, and I am sure that most PS3 owners will pick up a rumbled enabled Sixaxis controller before Christmas. I am sure I will; drone, tool, whatever … the new controller will be the default controller going forward.

Price drop. Check. New controller with rumble. Check. Neither will be enough. What else can Sony do? Free Blu-ray movies, game pack-in, quality games, and better third party development tools and support.

Sony is going to have to continue running free Blu-ray movie offers. One of the reasons I picked up my PS3 was for Blu-ray to compliment my Sony HD TV. I have to believe that there are some other PS3 owners in the same boat. It will be interesting to see what impact, if any, the current 5 free Blu-ray movies offer has on PS3 (and other Blu-ray player) sells. The back of the August 2007 PSM details the offer (pick one game from each category).

• The Guardian, Pearl Harbor, Invincible, Chicken Little
• Corpse Bride, Phantom of the Opera, Blazing Saddles
• Stealth, Resident Evil 2, Underworld Evolution, Stir of Echoes
• The Italian Job, Black Rain, Babel, Devil’s Rejects
• Kiss of the Dragon, Omen 666, The Transporter 2, Species, Hart’s War, The Last Waltz

Not really a great offer; I thought maybe you would get to pick any five Blu-ray movies that had a certain MSRP, but it is still a very nice bonus. I bet Species tops the list – something special about boobies in HD.

I really believe that Sony needs to pack in a game or have some sort of free game offer. I doubt they will do either, but offering a mail in rebate for certain PS3 games (see list below) would help spur sells.

What about the games? At E3 we are sure to learn more about Lair (it is really in trouble?), Heavenly Sword (God of War with a sexy female?), LittleBigPlanet (will not be out anytime soon), Ratchet and Clank Future: Tools of Destruction (looks incredible), Warhawk (should be popular for online gamers), and finally Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune. I may be the only gamer around that never played a Ratchet and Clank or Jack and Daxter game, but both of I bet I will try the new Ratchet, and Uncharted (from Naughty Dog) looks like a system seller.

I know there are a lot of PS3 fans excited about Home, but this is not something that really excites me. I have enough trouble keeping up this site, much less worrying about making my virtual PS3 home look exciting.

The biggest thing that Sony can do at E3 is announce some soft of software toolkit to help port games from PC/360 that allow developers to focus their efforts on taking advantage of the PS3 hardware. Or they are going to have to start offering free consulting services to the third party developers to help them with their porting efforts. Sony is not careful; they really run the risk of turning into the Nintendo 64 and Game Cube – great 1st party games, but no variety because of lack of third party support.

Will Sony get smart with third party support? That may be the biggest issue facing Sony, and the key factor in gaining some momentum for the PS3. Price drops are nice, free Blu-ray movies will help, a new rumble enabled Sixaxis controller will sell well, and a game pack in or mail in rebate would be an unexpected bonus. Helping out the third party developers and publishers is the only way I see for Sony to make up major numbers on Nintendo and Microsoft.

Next week should be darn interesting for PS3 owners.

When will FOX stop their tape delay coverage of F1 races?  I was looking forward to watching the British GP at Silverstone this morning, but just checked SPEED, and it is not going to be shown, which means FOX has it today at 1PM EST.  FOX had four consecutive events – Canadian GP, US GP, French GP, and British GP.  For some reason I was thinking last week was the end of FOX’s coverage, but it looks like I have to wait until July 22 (European GP) to return to live F1 action on SPEED.

What can happen in .005 seconds?  Last night, to end the Pepsi 400 is dramatic fashion; Jamie McMurray managed to nudge in front of Kyle Busch to win the race by .005 seconds.  Needless to say, that was an exciting finish.

Unfortunately I only got to watch Q1 and Q2 at Silverstone today (missing Q3 pretty much stinks), but I am looking forward to tomorrow’s race.  Hopefully we will see some passing action outside of the pitlane.  I did a little pre race prep by running some F1CE time trials at Silverstone.  Have I said lately how much I enjoy F1CE?

Of course tonight there is the Daytona night race, which is one of my favorite NASCAR events.  Say want you will about super speedway racing, but I think this will be entertaining.  It would be easy for me to say Junior, Gordon, or Stewart, but I do think one of those guys will win (in that order).  After watching the race I bet I will get a jones going for NASCAR 08.  I keep telling myself “no.”

Tomorrow we get to see the IRL boys (and girls) take on Watkins Glen.  I am really looking forward to this one, and I am keeping my fingers crossed that ABC will give this one some HD treatment, but I know that is not going to happen.

So grab a cold one, lift up a glass, and get ready for a night of NASCAR racing, followed by some morning glory F1 action, and an afternoon nap before tuning into IRL at the Glen.

Me?  I am sipping on some Red Guitar, which is a rather unorthodox pre race drink, but it is enjoyable nonetheless.

It looks like a PS3 price drop is imminent no matter Sony does to deny that a price drop will be in full force by next weekend.  I think the current price point of $599 is much too expensive for the mass market.  Sony will only reach diehard fans (looking at myself in the mirror I suppose), gamers looking for a compliment to their shinny new HD TV (reflection in the mirror again), or maybe a high end Blu-ray system.

With the PS3 priced at $499, the system is still probably $100 to $150 to high for the mass market, but I think it will be enough of a price drop to help get Sony back on track.  I still think Sony needs to offer more incentives.  Once the price drops you will still be able to get 5 Blu-ray movies for free (use the search feature for the link), but I think Sony should offer a free game to really sweeten the pot.

Sony fans will have to wonder if the $100 price drop is enough.  Me?  I am comfortable with my purchase.  Not only do I have a great console, but I also have an awesome Blu-ray system to compliment my Sony BRAVIA KDL-40V2500.  There are a lot of interesting titles on the horizon, and I am sure that more info will come from E3.  No matter; Sony fans (you know the ones I am talking about) still have to worry because Microsoft and Nintendo have all the momentum.

Message boards run rampant with flames about how much money Sony is taking up the pipe with every PS3 system sold.  They are probably right, but does Sony have anything on the Microsoft charge back that is coming for the Xbox 360?  Earlier this week Microsoft announced that they are going to make things right for 360 owners that have had to pay for out of warranty repairs (for certain types of problems, cough, red right of death, cough).  In addition, Microsoft will extend their 360 warranty for up three years.  How much will this cost?  $1.05 to $1.15 billion.  Yes, billion.  Ouch.  Looks like console makers from Japan to Washington are taking it up the pipe.

For Microsoft, the worm has turned.  A few years ago, all developers led with PS2 games, followed by ports to the Xbox.  The Xbox ports often looked a little better, but it was usually a case of the developers not putting in the extra effort to really make the Xbox games shine.  The situation is now reversed.  Most major developers and publishers are developing for the 360, and porting to the PS3.  This is contributing to much anguish for PS3 owners.  While I cannot count frames, the whole of Sony-Nation is up in arms that NCAA Football 2008, Madden 2008, and 2K Sports non-NFL licensed entry all run at 30 FPS on the PS3, while running at 60 FPS on the 360.  Sony has already admitted that there is work to do when a game is ported to the PS3.  Why is Sony not helping the developers and publishers make their games shine on the PS3?  Seems like it would be money well spent.

I was going to comment on the Wii, but Q1 at Silverstone is almost over, so it is time to stop and get on with Saturday.
I do know one thing; next week will be very interesting for console fans.

Happy Saturday!

I thought Apple was serious about the cel phone market until I read this. My poor, poor parents.

All of the iPhone mania is very puzzling to me. I spent the week setting up my Treo 650 to work with our Microsoft Exchange server and it’s like I never used this year old phone before. Everything synchronizes quite nicely, I never have to do a cable connected synch with Microsoft Outlook, and I am as happy as a clam. I’m so happy that I think I will upgrade to the Treo 750 so that I can use (eventually) Windows Mobile 6.

What do I need an iPhone for?

It seems to me that the iPhone is a better (1) web browser and (2) media player. For those of us that use Exchange, almost any other PDA/smartphone is better at managing calendar, contacts, and email. So I am still scratching my head trying to figure out what all of the oohs and ahhs are about concerning the iPhone.

Let’s say that the iPhone makes it much easier and prettier to use the web on a cel phone. They key words in that sentence are “on a cel phone.” I can surf faster, easier, and have a full suite of internet applications on my lovely Dell Latitude. Plus, my eyes can handle the larger laptop screen. Since I can tether my Treo in areas that don’t have WIFI or just use WIFI in areas that give it away for free, why do I need better web browsing on a cel phone?

Scratch.

I own a 40GB iPod. It plays various things – video, music, etc. I spent a couple of hundred dollars for it. I make all of my CD rips using the lossless codec and can travel through airports and on airplanes with a good portion of my entire CD collection.

Scratch, scratch.

I guess it boils down to the “coolness” factor, something that people who actually use their cel phones for work can’t afford to invest in. I’d probably buy an iPhone for my college aged daughter since she is not gainfully employed. Until the iPhone gets its rumored integration with Microsoft Exchange AND people have verified that it actually works, I’m staying away from iPhone version 1.0.

I cannot claim to be a Guitar Hero fan; I am just not coordinated enough and I really do not have any musical talent. Air guitars are a different story – we can all play an air guitar, right? If you want an air guitar that actually plays music, this device may be for you.