The most valuable supply of worthlessness on the web
Any gaming post.
A friend sent me this link to a history of home consoles via images. I’m managed to pick a few of the losing consoles in that history – in particular, the TurboGraphx-16, the TurboDuo, and the Dreamcast. All systems I liked, and which I believe were the best available at the time, but which failed commercially. If you aren’t familiar with the TurboGraphx-16 and TurboDuo, check out what they were like via the MagicEngine emulator.
[tags]A history of consoles, Console evolution[/tags]
Continuing the apparently intractable path to PS3 irrelevance, Sony’s Ken Kuraragi is promising a PlayStation 3 based media center console.
In other words, audio and video capabilities first, gaming second (if at all), in a device built around the Cell-processor platform. Ken says that the device would certainly be more expensive, reflecting the prices and margins expected on high-end consumer electronic devices such as TVs, Blu-ray personal video recorders, etc. — not the relatively cheap, but powerful gaming rigs sold at a loss under Sony’s Computer Entertainment division. Impress speculates that the device could cost as much as Â¥300,000 or about $2,500.
More expensive? Wow. Because really, there were just too damned many people buying the PlayStation 3 since it came out at an impulse buy price.
[tags]Sony promises more unnecessary/unwanted features in PS3 based AV center[/tags]
Now this is the kind of quality predictions for the year we need more of. An unavoidably true prediction combined with humor and an insult to a massive number of people. I’m on board.
[tags]2007 gaming prediction – with humor[/tags]
So, here we are in the new year and just weeks past the launch of the next-gen systems PlayStation 3 and Nintendo Wii. For gamers and those who care about the business side of the console war, the site VG Charts has the sales numbers you want to see.
Check the numbers. In less than 2 months Nintendo has sold nearly 45% the number of consoles that Microsoft has sold since launching the Xbox360 late last year. I believe this bodes well for Nintendo. Sony trails both companies by, well, a lot. But Sony has admitted having manufacturing issues initially, and hopefully those have been resolved now as blue-ray lasers become more available.
Just for kicks, you can check out the portable systems chart while at VG Charts. It’s on the same page, and shows the DS up on the PSP about 35.6 million to 19.1 million. Given the lead Nintendo had, it’s not surprising to see the DS in the lead by a good chunk. But I think those numbers show that this round isn’t as easily won by Nintendo as past hand-held competitions have been.
[tags]Next-gen console sales numbers[/tags]
This has to be one of the neatest uses of eye tracking I’ve seen. With the recent increase in real-world advertising in online games, and the talk of advertisers and game distributors working on bringing in more, it seems at least one company has decided to check on the effectiveness of this move. And the results don’t look promising for advertisers or distributors banking on this.
End of the year review time, hot shot. Here are a number of sites giving out their top XX games of 2006 virtual awards and a sampling of their awards. Check some out and see with which you agree.
Some random guy on Amazon.com:
1. Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Collector’s Edition (DVD-ROM) by 2K Games
10. Black by Electronic Arts (Whaaaaa? Note: Does not match up with the view of most of the rest of the gaming community)
16. Guitar Hero 1 Bundle (with Guitar) by REDOCTANE
CBS News on top portable games:
There are plenty more such lists out there if you take the time to look. It’s interesting to see how much overlap there is and how many unique entries there are per list. You’ll see Oblivion and the various Guitar Hero incarnations on most lists, I think, but otherwise it is all up in the air.
[tags]Top games of 2006[/tags]
I love pointing out the failures of others. So when I see a site like Next Generation cover the gaming industry’s top 10 blunders of 2006, I have to pass that on.
5. Gizmondo Crashes, Exec Follows Suit
In January the underdog handheld company Gizmondo imploded and threw itself at the mercy of its creditors. At the time no one suspected that the most fascinating part of the Gizmondo story was still to come. In February Stefan Eriksson, former executive at Gizmondo, taught his Ferrari Enzo how to fly on a stretch of the Pacific Coast Highway, slicing the million-dollar car neatly in half, and creating the world’s first performance art re-enactment of the rise and fall of a videogame company.
Of course, it wasn’t really Eriksson’s fault. As he told it, a mysterious German named Dietrich was driving the doomed sportscar when it crashed. Eriksson was just innocently sitting in the passenger seat of a flying Ferrari when it collided with a pole and blood flew off his lip and onto the driver-side airbag. Happens all the time, really.
That’s my favorite. In fact, the others aren’t even that interesting. But hey, faults is faults, and I’m all about them’s getting the faultification highlightingism they deservify.
[tags]Gaming Industry’s biggest blunders 2006[/tags]
Laser news!!! W00 w0000! Sharp Corporation will be investing significant sums into facilities for blue diode laser production. This should help in Blu-ray disc production, which I would imagine will help Sony with PS3 production, as well. Also, a fast ramp-up in blue diode laser production could help Sony shave a bit off the cost per PS3 produced in the near future, which would be welcome I’m sure.
Sharp Corp., Japan’s largest maker of liquid-crystal display televisions, will start producing blue laser diodes used in high-definition DVD devices such as those made by Sony Corp. and Toshiba Corp.
Sharp will spend “several billion yen” to build a dedicated line for the diodes at its Mihara factory in Hiroshima, southwestern Japan, spokeswoman Miyuki Nakayama said today, confirming an earlier report by the Nikkei newspaper. Production will begin this year with about 150,000 units a month and will be expanded to 500,000 units by September 2007, she said.
The company is challenging Nichia Corp. and other companies that make the devices in a market that’s expected to expand as consumers switch to high-definition discs that offer sharper picture quality and greater recording capacity. Sony, which backs the Blu-ray DVD standard against Toshiba’s HD DVD, has said a shortage of the diodes for use in its PlayStation 3 console forced it to delay the product’s debut in Europe.
Sales of the diodes at Sharp will reach 15 billion yen ($127 million) in the first fiscal year, the report said, without specifying. Nakayama declined to confirm or deny the revenue target, calling the figure “speculation” by the Nikkei.
If I’m doing my yen to dollars exchange-rate conversion correctly, this means at least a three or four thousand dollar investment. But I’m always bad about converting yen to dollar…
But more seriously, more blue diodes lasers can only be good. Because more lasers is always better than less lasers.
[tags]Sharp to increase blue diode laser production, Good news for Sony on the blue laser front[/tags]
There’s been a lot of negativity around the PlayStation 3 (I’m guilty of some, since there have been a lot of problems with the PS3 so far), but here’s something that honestly seems like good news to me (if it is true). According to an Electronics Arts exec, current games for the PS3 are only using around 20% of the consoles potential. That means that these games, as good as they look and as well as the play, are truly just a very early glimpse at what PS3 owners have to look forward to. Given the difficulties of developing for the PS3 that I’ve read, I’m inclined to believe this. Maybe 20% is a low guess, but it is potentially accurate. So think what the PS3 will be offering you in 3-5 years.
“The whole industry knows it’s been a challenge; the PS3’s a very complex piece of equipment. On one hand it’s a challenge, on the other hand there’s tremendous potential in that box. I think it’s going to take developers a little while to figure out how to unlock that power.
We’ve got games coming out now where we feel we’ve hit maybe 20 per cent of the potential of PlayStation 3. We know the power’s there, but like any new platform it’s going to take us a little bit of time to unleash it.
So we shall see what 2nd and 3rd wave games are like and see how accurate this is, shall we not? (via Kotaku)
[tags]PS3 games well short of full system potential[/tags]
Well, that title might be giving lefties too much credit, but some researchers are saying lefties are better for some tasks – gaming and flying jets, for example.
Continue reading “We’re not just smarter, we’re evolutionarily *better*”
Word over on 1Up.com is that Sony still plans to have 1 million PlayStation 3s for North America by Dec. 31.
We will continue to utilize airfreight delivery for the PLAYSTATION 3 to assure a steady stream of systems for North American consumers through the end of the year. And while initial day-one launch shipment goals weren’t achievable due to early manufacturing issues, those problems have been resolved and we do remain focused on having one million PS3’s in the pipeline by December 31, 2006.
Of course, aside from the improbability of this actually being true, note the “in the pipeline” part there. If Sony doesn’t have 1 million in stores by Dec. 31, they can just claim everything that is in transit to North America as being in the pipeline. And while currently Sony is shipping every PS3 air direct over here, who knows when that will stop. If the shipping method changes on Dec. 30 and another quarter million ship the last day of the year that will take 12 days to get here, it still counts in the Sony counting method. Given that Sony only sold 197,000 PS3s in November (down from their 1 million, errr, 600,000, ummmmm, 400,000 at launch claims made earlier this year), I’m skeptical. Also:
The six-year old PlayStation 2 continues to dominate the market, outselling all other consoles in November, including much newer systems from the competition.
For values of “all other consoles” which don’t include the Nintendo DS, this is true. However, the DS selss as many systems as all other consoles combined in the typical month. Some don’t count the DS as a console, in which case this info doesn’t apply to them, but I think it is just another console for this sale information.ÂÂ
Ultimately, I think Microsoft and Sony botched their respective console launches. Only Nintendo really pulled of the launch well, and even there some troubles were seen. (via Kotaku)
[tags]Sony to get 1 million PS3s in pipeline by year end[/tags]
Color me skeptical, but Smarthouse has a story in which a Sony exec says Sony will release to PlayStation 4 possibly in 2010, with significant firmware upgrades to the PlayStation 3 between now and then. I think Sony really needs to get a grip on sufficient PlayStation 3 numbers before focusing too much on the PS4. But I guess that’s why I’m not an executive at one of the largest electronics and entertainment companies in the world.
A PS4 will be launched by Sony but not until at least 2010 claims the Vice President of Technology for Sony Computer Entertainment Europe, Paul Holman.
What will happen between then and now is that Sony will introduce a series of firmware upgrades that will give the PS3 more media centre capability while allowing for the introduction of third party applications and hardware “Such as interactive controllers” similar to the Nintendo Wii he said.
“To say that there will be no PS4 because of a management change is a bit far fetched: he said.
I hadn’t even heard talk that the recent change of management at Sony’s entertainment division would mean no PS4, so I think most people will just be focusing on the “not until at least 2010” part. I’m guessing a lot of people think Sony expects to have their next generation console out in 3.5-4 years. To me, this says no earlier than 3.5-4, and certainly leaves the door wide open to a much later launch date. And I just don’t see 2010 as a viable release time for Sony, given the current PS3 manufacturing problems. (via TechEBlog)
[tags]PlayStation 4 in 2010?[/tags]