I held off all week, but this morning I decided to pick up Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots. Circuit City has the game on sale for $49.99 and you get a $10 Gift Card to boot! Pretty good deal. For $52.79 I get the last great PS3 exclusive (for now).
Impressions later, but right now I have a backlog of gaming goodness in front of me. The Circuit City deal ends today, so hurry fast to effectively get $20 off of Metal Gear Solid 4. I am sure that will help boost sales figures.
Coming at you fast, furious, and with half the verbosity.
First up, last night I download the Super Stardust HD Team Expansion. It was $4.99, but I have read that a couple of articles that hint that somehow it is included with release 4.0. Not sure WTF that means except that I may have just spent 5 unnecessary duckets.
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Are you kidding? 4 player slowdown for $4.99? |
I am looking forward to split screen, but not looking forward to the slowdown that is apparently present in the new multiplayer modes.
Next up is Remote Play. I still cannot get it to work correctly, but since it worked once, there is hope that it will work again. The PS3 is not automagically turning on, and then disabling Remote Play Start, but the handy-dandy Remote Play green light does not always come on if I turn the PS3 off (and then on) using the power switch on the back of the system. Router settings? Firmware settings? Not sure where to turn next.
Speaking of remote play, it is a total travesty that Qore is not Remote Play enabled. Why not? Seems like a perfect way to take this video magazine on the go. Hell, why not stream it to the PSP to take advantage of its pretty wide screen?
The fleecing of America continues. What is the world coming to when a Belgian company can come in and swoop up the King of Beers? With the sale of Anheuser-Busch to InBev is complete, Pabst Brewing Company will be the largest American brewery. That’s right, this PBR is for you.
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Support Pabst. Drink American owned beer! |
Finally we move on to NCAA Football 09, the release of which is riddled with enough bugs to be considered a complete goat fuck. Seriously, this OS NCAA Football 09 gameplay thread says it all.
I am going to save further NCAA Football 09 comments for a later post.
Now featuring 15 days of consecutive posting. That has got to be the most for me since the Golden Days of yore. Happy Saturday!
Lies. Damn lies. Statistics. Regular readers know that I have a PS3, but no 360, so it probably naturally comes across as a somewhat Sony biased site. I am sure it would be the same if I had a 360 and no PS3. I also have a Wii (really it is mostly for the kids), so I guess that makes me anti-Microsoft.
Not really my intentions, but I am sure that is the way things come across. The Xbox never captivated me, and the same goes for the 360. I guess that does make me a Sony homer of sorts, but I digress.
What do the latest numbers from thestreet.com tell us?
“Sony sold 405,500 PS3s, compared to 219,800 Xbox 360s but still has a long way to go before it catches up with the Wii, which sold 666,700 systems last month.
It’s the second month that the PS3 has stayed ahead of the Xbox 360.
Sony still has a long way to go before it beats Nintendo. The Nintendo Wii has now become the best-selling console among its peers, with 10.9 million units sold year-to-date in the U.S.”
It is interesting that the PS3 has managed to outpace the 360 two months in a row. May can be attributed to GTA IV; even if more units were sold on the 360, the franchise is traditionally associated with Sony. June is squarely on Metal Gear Solid 4: Gun of The Patriots, which is currently a PS3 exclusive.
“Sony is making concerted efforts to regain its footing. Earlier this week, it shaved $100 off the price of the PS3. Sony said the 80-gigabyte version of the PS3 will retail at $400, down from $500, while discontinuing the 40-GB version of the console.
Microsoft also dropped $50 off the price of the Xbox 360 and said the basic 20-GB model of the console will retail at $299.”
Summer is typically slow for moving videogames, and I assume the same games for systems. If the PS3 remains in front of the 360 for three months in a row some sort of trend may be at work. Until then, Nintendo and their Wii continues to kick Microsoft and Sony in their collective nuts. Think Sony needs to get Jesse on the payroll to take care of business?
There was not much of anything exciting coming out of E3 this year, but one thing of note was that Sony is going to a single PS3 SKU – 80GB, no PS2 hardware backwards compatibility.
Interesting strategy on Sony’s part. The PS2 is still selling well, and the PS3 is picking up momentum. Seems to me that the two systems would cannibalize each other. It has been a while since I bought a PS2 game, but I have a lot of PS2 (and original PlayStation) games in my library. The last thing I want is have to hook up a PS2 and PS3 system in my entertainment system. The first thing I did with my PS2, after hooking up my PS3, was to put it up on eBay. Hardware backwards compatibility rules!
If someone is struggling with the idea of purchasing a PS3 for $399, they could easily turn to a PS2 for $129. They would be happy with the huge library of PS2 games, but at some point they would long for a PS3 (or maybe a 360 at $299). I doubt they would go all in and throw $528 + tax at both systems.
Sony must expect PS2 sales to remain strong one more holiday season. I predict that within two years there will be another PS3 SKU, this time with PS2 hardware backwards compatibility. “Play all your PS2 games on a PS3. Get it while it lasts!” Seriously. My hardware backwards compatible PS3 has already proven that Sony knows how to get her done. It will all be done under the guise of manufacturing improvements, with no mention of declining PS2 sales.
For those of you that want to upgrade your PS3 HDD, BG Gaming posted a nice little guide
“In the XMB go to Settings > System Settings > Backup and backup your current drive to an external USB drive. I suggest making your backup as lean as possible. Delete any game cache files (seeing as they usually weigh in at about 5 GB apiece) and any demos or other items you can always re-download later. Once you run through the backup process you are ready to go to work. My biggest piece of advice is to replace your hard drive before it reaches the limit, which was not the case for me.”
At some point I am going to have to get brave and try this because my 40GB HDD is rapidly filling up.
Nothing really significant to post on the gameplay front because I have only played one game.
First of all, I think this year’s game is better in every way compared to last year: gameplay, pace of game, controls, menu system, everything. With that said, my next impression is that the game pisses me off as soon as I start to break down plays by watching instant replay.
For my first game was Texas Tech vs. Georgia (me, of course). I wanted an all red and black game. Georgia is ranked number one, and rated 99 across the board. Are you kidding me? They are going to be good, but not that good. EA Sports was also kind of enough to put in the now famous black jerseys. Cool beans!
I played the game on all default settings, with 4 minute quarters. Please, no comments on how much I suck.
I quickly jumped out to a 3-0 lead, but found myself trailing 14-3 at the half, and 21-10 at the end of the 3rd quarter. I decided to “super sim” the rest of the game. Texas Tech 28 – UGA 18. Ouch.
I could not get a running game going; Knowshon Moreno only had 22 yards on 10 attempts. Matthew Stafford completed 76% of his passes, with two TDs and 1 INT (my fault; threw into triple coverage). Unfortunately the CPU completed 75% of their passes, but did not even bother to run the ball (5 total attempts). No other turnovers, but my defensive players dropped two sure-fire interceptions. Disappointing, but it may be a better alternative than too many turnovers.
I recently wrote that I was not going to go off on to a tangent of looking for every little thing wrong with the game (i.e. nitpicking, reviewing the game, etc). Instead I was just going to concentrate on fun factor. OK, I suck. I cannot help myself. I love football games, and a big part of it is how the AI performs. I have to look at the replays to see how the CPU reacts to plays, my movements, etc.
Two examples of things that piss me off from my first game…
I am sure there will be other complaints as I continue to breakdown the game, but if I can remember to put fun factor first, hopefully the game will not completely piss me off.
Late last night (or early this morning depending on your perspective and time zone) I also made the mistake of starting to look at messageboards. I could not help myself. I am 100% convinced that the majority of players would not find most of the stuff that is currently being posted by a handful of gamers. In other words, I bet that 2% of the gamers (messageboard posters) find 95% of the issues, but everyone piles on with how much the game sucks, how EA should have better quality control, etc. NCAA Football fans are clearly passionate.
More updates later.
This year was the first year in forever that I did not preorder NCAA Football, and pay for next day shipping. So I did not get it day one, and somehow or another the sun still came up today. Amazing!
My wife was good enough to pick up the game for me today, so in a little while it will be time to crack open a High Life or two and see what this year’s game has to offer.
I am not much of a big E3 fans these days. For the most part, I think the show has lost its prominence. As much of the videogame world knows by now, yesterday Microsoft announced that Final Fantasy XIII would be released on the Xbox 360. Gasps! Gnashing of teeth! You heard it all yesterday from Sony fans. Buildings were burning, chaos ruled the day, messageboards crashed.
In the end does it matter? Third party exclusives are going the way of the dinosaur. At one point they would make or break a console, but these days, the prices of software development are so damn expensive that publishers have to release their software for multiple consoles. From Sony’s standpoint it has to matter in terms of sales and allowing key franchises from the PlayStation and PlayStation 2 days to slip away to their competitors. Grand Theft and Final Fantasy were synonymous with the PlayStation brand. [Yes, I am disregarding the fact that Final Fantasy was once a niche RPG franchise for Nintendo.]
For third party games, the only thing that really matters is the leading development platform, and how developers take advantage of a system’s key features. The Xbox continuously took it up the pipe because the inferior PS2 was the lead system. So far, the worm has turned, and the 360 has been the lead platform. Things are changing. In theory GTA IV is better on the PS3 and there are a handful of games including DiRT that fall into this category. Final Fantasy XIII should also take full advantage of the PS3’s capabilities.
Today we will hear all sorts of conspiracy theories on how Microsoft pulled off the Final Fantasy deal. No doubt, money bags are in order. Same thing apparently happened with GTA IV. Sony has done the same thing in the past, so it should not come as a surprise. What Sony fans should ask “is Sony is asleep at the wheel?” If Sony does not have a major response today, then they will come across as completely indifferent, incompetent, or worse.
So chin up Sony fans. The sun still came up this morning, and Final Fantasy XIII is still coming to your favorite system. Of course it may no longer look and smell like roses. Funny how a multiplatform release will do that to your favorite title.
Sony never ceases to amaze me. Their current marketing strategy is all over the map. How does Home fit in with Qore and the PlayStation Store? How about the OfficialPlay Station Magazine? I do not see how Sony is pushing any of the mediums; it is so damn ad hoc, that they appear to just be throwing up a bunch of junk to see what sticks.
As an example, the latest from Sony is that they are going to sell ad space in their games.
Sony announced Friday that it will start offering virtual advertising space in PlayStation 3 games as part of efforts to stem losses from the console.
Players may see the ads in spaces such as billboards and wall surfaces within the games, it said.
Not a huge surprise. We have already seen this in movies, and some games, and of course Qore is all about sponsorship.
In a move that may be more disappointing to Sony fans, it does not look like a price cut is imminent as a response to the recent Microsoft 360 price reduction of $50.
Sony has no plan to cut the price of its PlayStation 3 game console, the company’s chief financial officer Nobuyuki Oneda said Friday.
“This year, our strategy is not to sell more quantity for PS3 but to concentrate on profitability,” Oneda told a forum in Singapore. “Our plan is not to reduce the price.”
Interesting. I bet a price cut would ultimately help profitability (kind of like selling more Quarter Pounders with Cheese).
PS3 Fanboy is running a couple of different articles [link 1 and link 2] that show some “Greatest Hits” type titles are on the way for the PS3.
Game Positive+ also confirms that a “Greatest Hits” line is on the way.
“It should be interesting to see how prices compare to games in the Xbox 360’s Platinum Hits collection, which was started in 2006, and currently carries a general price range of around $30. Since the Platinum Hits line was introduced, it has accounted for more than 16% of all software sales on the popular console.”
Ratchet and Clank is a game that I really wanted to get, but I could never justify $60 bucks. Not because the game was not good, but at the time I already had spent close to $200 on games (F1CE, Resistance, and Oblivion). Throwing down another $60 was just too much, and besides, I knew that I would not find the time to really enjoy the game.
Things change when the price falls to $29.99. The articles mention Heavenly Sword and MotorStorm, which are two games I would also like to give a go. More so with Heavenly Sword. I would also like to give Conan a whirl, but I doubt it sold anywhere near enough to get into the Greatest Hits (or whatever they are call it) line.
I have been thinking about dumping Resistance for a while because I have never been able to get into it. Not really my cup of tea. Doubt I will be able to do much with it now, but maybe I can get near enough for one of the boobie games. If I have to spell out Heavenly Sword and Conan you should stop reading this blog.
Still doing the Remote Play thing; or at least trying to get it to work. I made some more updates to the PS3 and Router settings, and I was able to connect via internet and private network options, so things were working OK. By saying things “were working OK” I mean that the system was not randomly turning on (and off), and I was able to Remote Play inside my home network without any difficulties. I decided to take the PSP outside of my network to see what would happen.
After a short walk around the block (really just one street over behind my house), I found several unsecured wireless networks. I decided to try a Remote Play session, and I actually connected to my PS3! Success!
There was some serious lag, but I was able to browse via my PS3, stream my Shakira: Oral Fixation Tour video (because soft porn rules!), and play PixelJunk Monsters. Like I said, lag was awful, so I would not say that any of this was useful, but actually connecting to my PS3 gave me a fleeting feeling of success.
Alas, the connection was broken a couple of times, but I was able to reestablish a connection. Since the bandwidth was so poor, I continued my walk until I found a better connection. This would make three successful connections (PS3 was on for two of them because of the unexpected disconnections). The second network was much faster; Shakira audio and video was better. I finally ended Remote Play, and selected the option to turn the PS3 off.
After a short walk home, I noticed that the PS3 was still on. Hmmmm … something is still not working right. I tried to connect via the internet, but right as I started to attempt to connect, the PS3 turned off. Eventually I received a time out message. I noticed that the “green” light was not on, so I turned on my PS3, and checked the Remote Play section (start option was still enabled). Not sure what is what with this one, but something that was not supposed to happened. Needless to say, this is the kind of crap that I find so frustrating. I wish Remote Play worked without so much anguish.
I took a walk again, but could not establish a connection to my PS3. After returning home, I could not connect with the internet option, but I was able to connect via the Private Network option. I just turned the PS3 off (back of the system power switch) to see if that makes any difference next time. Maybe I can only connect once, which would suck, but it would be more than not being able to connect which is where I was at before today.
I will continue to experiment,. Remote Play is getting ever so close!
I have been looking for an excuse to throw up another Eye Candy post. Thanks to EA Sports I now have one, but I bet everyone would rather see some more body paint models. Talking about real eye candy!
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No doubt even prettier in Tiger Woods 09 |
While doing some Remote Play tests, I decided to down load the Tiger Woods 09 video. The video clip presents a side-by-side comparison of Tiger Woods 08 and Tiger Woods 09 graphics. No idea how it plays. Who cares? Sure looks pretty.
At the risk of this becoming a Remote Play sucks theme weekend, I still have a few comments to post on the subject, and undoubtedly will have a few more before the day is done. Friday night and Saturday morning everything with my Remote Play setup was working great. As I posted Saturday morning, I had high hopes that the new firmware updates would help me finally lick this problem once and for all. Not so much.
Saturday morning I took my PSP outside of my home network, to the nearest free open access wireless network I could find. I fully expected to connect to my PS3, but all I managed to get for my efforts was an ominous Time Out message.
After returning home I attempted to connect to the PS3; this is where the story gets strange. I got a couple of Time Out messages, but finally connected. Just for shits and giggles, I attempted a few more times, but could not connect. When I attempted to connect via the Private Network option, I could connect every time. Something is amiss, which is the reason for the previous “PS3 PSP Remote Play Black Magic” posts.
At this point desperation (or maybe depression) sat in. I decided to start fiddling with my router connections again. The reality is that I should not have to change anything; I had already managed to establish internet connectivity. The truth is that I only had connectivity from inside my home network, which means that there must be something setup incorrectly on my router.
I spent several hours changing settings – I disabled UPnP on the router, and the PS3, and tried combinations of enabling and disabling UPnP. I put the PS3 in a DMZ with a static IP and I took the PS3 out of the DMZ. I tried switching back and forth between a static IP and a dynamic IP, before settling back to a static IP, which is where I started. I setup port forwarding (9293) for UDP, TCP, and combinations of both settings. I turned on port triggering, etc. The reality is that I should not have to have port forwarding (and the rest) if I have the PS3 in a DMZ. Forget the fact that I should not have to have the PS3 in a DMZ, but I digress.
During the plethora of changes, I decided to move PS3’s static IP address outside my allocated DHCP range. It makes sense that it should be in order to prevent an IP address from being assigned twice, but I have never ran into colliding IPs on my network because of limited devices (and the PS3 was fairly far back in the assignment list).
While I was testing various changes, I thought I had Remote Play working again, at least good enough to try an outside network, but I hit the same problem I experienced several months ago. My PS3 started randomly turning itself on, which means that it will disable Remote Play start if connectivity is established in a short period of time. Not sure which one of my changes triggered this response, but it must mean that the new firmware updates did not resolve this issue. Monkey nuts!
After reverting back to my original settings (only exception was a different static IP address for the PS3), things looked to be in working order, so I called it a night.
First thing this morning I attempted to connect via the internet option and received the standard
“A connection error has occurred. The connection to the PS3 system has timed out.”
Next I selected the Private Network option, but received the Time Out error message. The difference this time was that the PS3 actually turned out, so I attempted to connect again, but received the Time Out message again. Since the PS3 was still on, I tried again, and this time established a connection. The connection was so poor, that the PSP disconnected. When I attempted to connect once again I received
“A connection error has occurred. (08110482)”
The PS3 is still on, my network connectivity is excellent, so I am not sure what is a play. I connected again, quickly established a connection, but just as quickly got disconnected.
Back to network settings and router black magic. At least I now know why Sony is not marketing Remote Play. Great concept, but clearly not ready for the masses.
I am not going to go into a lot of detail right now because I have spent several frustrating hours attempting to get Remote Play working correctly. After trying numerous settings on router, I still cannot get internet connectivity (turning on the PS3 from the PSP) to work correctly. I am just not in the mood to elaborate.
This has gone over about as well as a turd in a punch bowl. Frankly, it stinks. Highly disappointing.
Last night I started tackling Remote Play again. My previous attempts were not very successful, and ended with some serious fits of frustrations. Yes, color me bitter. I wrote off Remote Play for 5-6 months, but I figured with the new PSP 4.01 and PS3 2.41 firmware updates, maybe things would end differently. Remote Play is a major feature that Sony should push very hard because it offers so many advantages. There are a ton of original PlayStation games out there just waiting to receive some Remote Play love.
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Get your remote play on … |
I went to the PS3 Settings menu and the selected the Remote Play Settings option. My PSP was still registered under the Register Device setting, so next up was the Remote Start section.
One of the things that immediately jumped out was the instructional text:
“Depending on the type of router, the PS3™ system may be started unintentionally if remote start is enabled. If a remote play connection is not established within a certain amount of time after the PS3™ system is started, the system will turn off automatically. To prevent this from happening, remote start via the Internet may be disabled automatically.”
I do not remember seeing text the last time I attempted to get Remote Play to work correctly, but the text perfectly describes the problems I encountered. Remote play works great, but it’s the whole connecting to the system ad hoc, remotely over the internet, that pretty much sucks.
This time things look much better. After putting the PS3 in Remote Play (Remote Start) mode, I turned off the PSP system. I then turned on the PSP and selected Remote Play, using the internet option. Within about 30-45 seconds I was viewing the PS3 XMB.
I did a few tests – I played PixelJunk Monsters, I went to the PlayStation Store, I streamed a few videos, and I surfed the internet via the PS3 browser. I made it this far in the past, so next up was the real test. I used my PSP to quit Remote Play, selecting the option to Quit and Turn Off the PS3 System.
I watched TV for a little while, and waited to see if the system would turn back on automagically, which would mean everything was for naught. The system stayed off. After a while I decided to get in a quick play session or two before calling it a night. After a couple of GT5 races and a few rounds of Super Stardust HD, I turned off the PS3 and went to bed. At this point I was keeping my fingers crossed that things would work correctly in the morning.
Bright and early I fired up my PS3, and selected Remote Play. Success! I connected to the PS3 without any issues. Happy dance time! It is very cool to stream content from my laptop to my PSP via my PS3. In theory, I can do this from anywhere in the world. Are you kidding me? If Sony can get Remote Play working flawlessly for the masses, Sony should market the shit out of this feature.
The final test will come later today. I need to see if I can connect the PSP to another wireless network and connect. If I can, I will be a happy camper. Baited breath.
