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Off-topic forums => Completely Unrelated => Topic started by: Otokoshi on 2007-02-23 21:56:07

Title: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Otokoshi on 2007-02-23 21:56:07
Sony...come on! (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070223-8912.html)

Don't know what else to say but...that really bites.  It may come out good for the consumer since Sony is cutting production costs.  But will they cut the price?  If Sony's updates give better backwards compatability and soon, they can avoid a potential blunder.  Will they?  Look at their track record and decide for yourself I guess.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Synergy Blades on 2007-02-23 22:25:21
The Emotion Engine's removal was always going to happen eventually... but someone in Sony's PR department needs to be fired. Quickly. Be like politicians and spin it positively... "a limited selection"? Anyone could come up with something better at that, and then to crown it off with a comment about not keeping up with compatibility via firmware and focusing on the new generation really was head-shake-inducing (something about ongoing support PlayStation fans and a long-term target of better compatibility than current PS2-in-PS3 h/w would at least have gone down well). Withholding the compatibility list until release seems entirely unfair, too; I have visions of them currently ploughing through testing and getting the software emulator up to speed. I suspect if it's anything less than 75, 80% of PS2 titles Sony's in for a riot.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Darkness on 2007-02-23 22:27:29
Who would buy a ps3 anyway, right? :P
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Jari on 2007-02-23 22:35:34
Quote from: Synergy Blades on 2007-02-23 22:25:21
Withholding the compatibility list until release seems entirely unfair, too; I have visions of them currently ploughing through testing and getting the software emulator up to speed.

I believe that that is exactly what they are doing. Sony's head of UK PR David Wilson has this to say (http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=158696):

Quote
We have been assessing the extent of backward compatibility, and will continue to do so right up until launch. It is therefore not possible to provide a specific number of backwards compatible titles at this stage.

Personally I think that Sony is providing great entertainment beyond any measure, but then again I'm not in the market for a PS3. :P

I'd have totally set up a campaign to Googlebomb "failure" to point to PS3 product page, but Google has tweaked their algos and even removed the old Googlebombs. *sniff* WHY GOOGLE, WHY?!?! WE NEED A GOOGLEBOMB NOW MORE THAN EVER!!!111
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: James Pond on 2007-02-24 12:44:06
Why anyone would want that piece of shit excuse for Backwards Compatability is beyond me.

Its a pisstake at how BAD it handles the up-scaling.

Colour loss
Jaggies galore
low framerates where the originals were fine.


If it fixes this, the PS3 may not completely fail in the UK.

Admittedly Microsoft are slow on the backwards compatability, but at least the games which have been cleared (Around 200+ now I believe...viewable here http://www.xbox.com/en-US/games/backwardcompatibilitygameslist.htm (http://www.xbox.com/en-US/games/backwardcompatibilitygameslist.htm)) all work flawlessly.


The 360 has won this generations war before it had even started, Sony fucked up big time going for another obscure format imo.  You ask people in the street, "which of the brand names do you know : Blu-Ray - HD-DVD", 85% of the general public ages 18-45 knew what HD-DVD was, only 35% knew what Blu-Ray was. for the same matter, only 6% of those asked knew what a UMD was.


Sony seem, at least to me, to have lost the foothold they gained with the success of the PS2, and its going to cost them big...
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Synergy Blades on 2007-02-24 13:10:26
I assume you're talking about the backwards compatibility before the 1.51 firmware update this month, that fixed the terrible upscaling problems that were there since launch. Also, those numbers do seem rather plucked straight out of the air, considering the number of people that know about HD DVD or Blu-ray in this country is very low - what with less than 10% of households actually owning an HDTV. It will be interesting to see after the launch how many people know about Blu-ray; like it or not, the PS3 will increase awareness of it, as can be seen with the increasing sales numbers for Blu-ray in the States, very strong corporate support for the format, and the decisions of retailers in the states and Australia (JB Hi-fi, Blockbuster) to only stock Blu-ray. Don't forget a free Casino Royale for PS3 registrants.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Synergy Blades on 2007-02-24 13:22:44
It seems the software emulator is to handle upscaling better than straight hardware emulation by rendering straight out to 720/1080p. FFXII looks pretty good.

http://img249.imageshack.us/img249/634/highresko6.jpg
http://img249.imageshack.us/img249/7133/highres2in9.jpg
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: James Pond on 2007-02-24 13:35:36
Quote from: Synergy Blades on 2007-02-24 13:10:26
I assume you're talking about the backwards compatibility before the 1.51 firmware update this month, that fixed the terrible upscaling problems that were there since launch. Also, those numbers do seem rather plucked straight out of the air, considering the number of people that know about HD DVD or Blu-ray in this country is very low

Yes - And no, they wern't "Plucked out of the air", It was in the tabloids a few weeks ago.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Jari on 2007-02-24 15:00:14
I suppose the real stickler here are Sony's talking points lies, like:


I mean, the correct way of doing it would have been to supply every market with consoles having hardware bc, then start offering improved bc via emulation and then removing EE and (possibly) GS.

Mark my words, Sony planned this all along, and this is one of the main reasons for shutting down Lik-Sang and getting a precedent about how importing (for sale) is illegal.


PS. Just you wait a year or two, the rollers in those slot-in drives will wear down and the drives start failing - and scratching discs. More class action suits for Fony. :)
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Borde on 2007-02-24 19:15:47
So it seems Jari. Who could have imagined this? Now that movement makes sens. Certainly Sony is insulting european with every move they make. If the Ps3 manages somehow to end up dominating the market, it will be a real shame for Nintendo and Microsoft because Sony is giving them the biggest possible adventage.
As for the graphical upgrade possible through emulation... well, it's certainly nice (I bet it could look better since AA seems to be turned off in those shoots). But how easy will be to achive such a thing with an emulator without graphical glitches? Has anyone around here tested PCSX2? Even FFX (wich plays quiet well) has some evident clipping problems. Microsoft went with emulation and they are having a hard time trying to emulate an XBOX which is not very different from a PC. There have been PC emulators for ages, but how many PS2 emulators have you seen? Yes, of course it will be easier for Sony to emulate that system than it has been for the PCSX2 team (how long took them? 5 years to get something that can finally run decently a few games?), but I'm pretty sure it will take them time (and not a short time) to make a decent emulator.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: James Pond on 2007-02-24 21:35:53
You do realise the PS3 outside of EU actually had a PS2 IN it dont you.  Thats how backwards compatability was done, not via software, but a physical PS2 processor in the PS3.

Untill the update, it simply upscaled the gfx to "HD", if thats what you can call it.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Skillster/RedSarg99 on 2007-02-25 21:49:42
Sony for many years have Pi**ed on its EU client base, I really hate them for doing so.
Supposedly the EU console will have a redesigned Case, now I wonder if anything will be missing (ports etc).
If ever I get a PS3 - maybe when I am forced to by game designer's choices to go exculsively to Sony - I will have Linux on their and find something usefull for it to do while it sits on the shelve (email/file/counter strike server?) and make use of the £400 or so I have to shell out for it.
Not to mention the fact it is larger then the old console (what ever happened to general thinking in technology that more advanced usually equals smaller?).
Sony have not won a fan in me that is for sure.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Synergy Blades on 2007-02-25 21:56:09
No vanishing ports (http://www.threespeech.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2007/01/PS3%20Hardware.jpg). No case redesign either, though the internal chassis may be built differently which won't affect actual functioning.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: James Pond on 2007-02-25 23:49:57
I will only buy one for MGS4, and not before its been about about 2 years.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Skillster/RedSarg99 on 2007-02-26 06:47:18
Ahmen to that.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Jari on 2007-03-01 16:05:56
And how much is one un-emulated European PS2 game worth to Fony?

Somewhere between one and two cents. That's what they save by not emulating them.

Today came the announcement about PS3's software emulation situation: "The situation is changing every day, but on March 23, we expect the list to include over 1,000 PS2 titles". Of about 2000 to 2500 European PS2 titles. Compared to the (supposed) 98% emulation achieved by hardware - even it has glitches and lots of times these glitches just happen to be on big titles. So, Europeans are missing 1000 to 1500 titles. For a saving of 15 to 30 dollars - per console of course - consumer doesn't care how much Fony saves. And actually no saving from consumer's viewpoint, since Fony hasn't lowered the European price one bit, in fact they raised it!


So, what does this mean? The currently claimed success rate is between 40% and 50%, which is pretty good, 360 has a lower one. Compared to 98% and lower price of US PS3, it's not good at all, though.

Then couple of things I realised lately; supposedly PAL PS3 is lacking Emotion Engine (no wonder, it would be crying if it had one), but it does have the GS. So, say byebye to higher resolutions, FSAA and other such things; it's emulating only the emotions, graphics still come from the same old hardware. And perhaps more importantly; Fony's track record at limiting imports... what do you think, will the software emulation play NTSC PS2 titles? I think not. And making it play them can range from being fairly easy (think PSP security), to not easy at all (think 360 security), depending on if Fony has learned anything about security.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Synergy Blades on 2007-03-01 16:55:50
Quote
will the software emulation play NTSC PS2 titles?

No, but region-locked backwards compatibility has been stated since the outset, EE/GS onboard or not.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Jari on 2007-03-02 03:59:51
Heh, yeah, that would make sense. :)

I guess I have just grown so accustomed to my HDLoader (for PS2, of course), that the idea of hardware based locking didn't seem much of an obstacle.

Anyway, in the other news today, Fony found out that pride is a bitter pill to swallow, to the tone of $91 million and no rumble for PS3. Or if you want that in English; Fony finally paid up and made up with Immersion. Basically all that Fony achieved with their "we are not going to pay" was a rumble-less PS3. But it would have been technically impossible to have both motion control and rumble anyway, that's what Fony said. :P

And then Fony tried to blackball Kotaku for posting a rumor (they post something else too?!?), but that didn't end so well. Note to Fony execs; public relation exercises in the tune of "we ain't going to talk to you anymore" don't work out, if the other party has considerably more public goodwill than you do. Currently entities having more goodwill than Fony probably include Hitler and Stalin, too.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Skillster/RedSarg99 on 2007-03-02 04:34:12
HD loader was a god send. But kudos goes to the independence exploit which really made it all happen with the mode 9 hack (or something along those lines).
Took me an age to learn it all and get the files I needed onto my memory card, but its been well worth it ever since. Mind you I do this to get rid of my DVDs so I can throw them out or sell them, I wish you could do the same with PSX games, it would save the effort of using ISOs with an emulator, Hope someone finds a way to run HD loader on PS3 (mind you with backwards compatibility issue, would PS3 run FFXI with the hard drive? I doubt it).
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: L. Spiro on 2007-03-02 05:59:01
PlayStation® 3 Song (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-XxUHLXEwM).

My coworkers won’t stop singing it.


エル　スパイロ
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Jedimark on 2007-03-02 07:09:01
That song is hillarious!
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: ChaosControl on 2007-03-02 13:29:07
Hahahaha,
That made my day :P
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Jari on 2007-03-07 19:40:24
Sony unveiled Home at GDC07:

http://kotaku.com/gaming/clips/gdc07-clip-the-ps3s-home-242341.php
http://kotaku.com/gaming/gdc07/gdc07-sony-unveils-home-242332.php

Personally I love the comments on the video piece; fickle is the mind of a fanboy. :-P First they were bashing Sony about everything - not that Fony wouldn't have deserved it - and now... now they seem to be gushing about Second Life clone / really awkward GUI for online multiplayer.

I'm of the "Now, why do I want to do this?"-mind.

It looks pretty and all... but why? If I wanted to play with virtual doll house, I'd just get Second Life and go yiffing with the furries. Because unlike here, there you can actually create your own stuff, instead of downloading buying (notice how many times they say that you can download this or that from PlayStation Store? Notice the Store in that sentence? Notice how they are avoiding the word buy? :P).

Lobby for online games? Hello Sony, didn't anyone ever tell you anything about UI-design? Namely about things how too many levels of links are baaaad? So, in order to play an online title (I'd imagine that you can do it like you do it now, too. I'd certainly hope so.), I'd first have to log into Home, hoping that the servers are up and running and not lagging horribly. Then I'd start the game? Umm, no thanks.

Does Sony think that I'd actually want to socialize with the people who play games online? Hellll-ooo? We are talking about largely <18 crowd, whose greatest accomplishment is to yell to their mom, because they can't get their motherfucking chocolate milk. Apologies for swearing, but that's what the kid said. I'm sure you have seen the video I'm talking about.

Then again, I think that MySpace servers should be blown up, all users killed and the inventors killed, resurrected and killed again for few thousand times. At least long enough that they'll repent. So, maybe this shit just ain't for me. :)

That being said, it does look pretty.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: James Pond on 2007-03-07 23:28:12
Oi, I have a myspace >_>
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Jari on 2007-03-07 23:47:14
I'll call the death squad. :-D

EDIT: PAL PS3 Backwards Compatability Progress Update (http://kotaku.com/gaming/eragon/pal-ps3-backwards-compatability-progress-update-244005.php)

Mad lulz. :-D
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: ice_cold513 on 2007-03-14 10:02:43
Well my mate getting the PS3 when it comes out in the UK. Mate won't got any updates till i go up there and do them for him.
I don't like how Sony messed around the one coming out here.
Will new PS3 that come's out in USA and Japan in a year be like the ones out here now??

But i'm staying out of this Gen-War for a year or two
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Jari on 2007-03-20 15:34:38
MAD LULZ!

The list is out: http://faq.eu.playstation.com/bc/

FFX, FFX-2, Okami and latest FIFA versions barely run.

But get this... the PSX compatiblity list - which was supposed to be 100% - is lacking... fanfare please ...Final Fantasy VII. And I mean completely lacking. As in it won't run at all.

Additionally they instruct you - among other things - to skip FMVs. Because they might be corrupted. And disconnect your USB devices.

:-D

Teh ironing! It's delicious!  :-D
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Borde on 2007-03-20 17:17:06
What the... what's wrong with Sony? Can't they make a decent PSX emulator at least? Man, If they have problems with this, I don't want to know how long will they take to run some PS2 games on their emulator.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: James Pond on 2007-03-21 00:19:48
Oh my christ.


Im actually crying with laughter at that list, how shit can you possibly do?

Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Jari on 2007-03-22 00:14:57
...and FFXIII going multiplatform (http://kotaku.com/gaming/ffxiii/rumour-ffxiii-exclusivity-up-in-the-air-246094.php)?

Quote from: SCEE VP Georges Fornay
Enfin, pour Final Fantasy XIII, je peux vous dire que l'exclusivité est en discussion (Lastly, for Final Fantasy XIII, I can say to you that exclusiveness is under discussion).

I actually do believe that this is either merely unfortunate choice of words on Fornay's part, or translation mishap... but it goes to show that with friends like these, Sony really doesn't need any enemies.

I mean, just before the European launch?

Having said that, I'd certainly welcome FF-games on 360, even though I don't have one.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: James Pond on 2007-03-22 09:14:01
Well, sony recently lost Devil May Cry 4 to the 360 and PC, lets hope for more to follow.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Skillster/RedSarg99 on 2007-03-22 13:42:43
Wasn't it sony's intention to release FF7 as a downloadable game, at least for the PSP - that could be why it won't work.
Possibly in the future they might release selected PS2 games for purchase thus blocking them from working with it's PS2 emulator.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Jari on 2007-03-22 14:54:38
...that is so evil plan, that Sony might actually do it.

How nice of them, if that is indeed the reason. :|
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Otokoshi on 2007-03-28 16:39:35
It's funny how things work out, huh?

UK PS3 Launch Success (http://arstechnica.com/journals/thumbs.ars/2007/03/27/sony-breaks-sales-records-with-uk-playstation-3-launch)
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Jari on 2007-03-28 20:07:33
Fanboys are obviously a sick, masochistic bunch (and totally deserving of every rip-off Fony can come up with)... but if I was writing for Ars Technica, I'd think twice before quoting an unsourced figure from BBC.

It wouldn't be the first time BBC is talking out of its ass (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/153988.stm) (this report is even sourced - and it still has no connection to reality. I was surprised enough by the Helsinki figures to dig out an actual stats from police and interior ministry. The figure quoted by BBC is "only" several times too large. *shrugs*)


Only (at least somewhat) verifiable source I have is this: http://www.verkkokauppa.com/popups/prodinfo.php?id=6798 and it would seem to suggest that while it sells, it doesn't sell particularly well. When reading that, you have to keep in mind that they'll show all figures larger than 25 as "more than 25" instead of the actual number - to hide some information from competition, I suppose.

So, we know that they have received a minimum of 77 units. It could be lot more, of course. They might have received at least one shipment of 25 or more on Thursday too, I don't remember (it shows last 5 transactions on both received and sold, so it might be leaving the oldest ones out), so it might be more than 102.

They are still showing at least 25 unsold at their central warehouse, 3 in one of their actual stores (they do mostly e-retail via the Internets) and at least 25 in another of their stores (out of total of two stores).

Meaning that out of more than 77 received units, they still have more than 53 in stock.

They have sold more than 24, sure... I've been keeping an eye on the latest sales, and it looks like they sold maybe 10 to 20 yesterday and the day before that, maybe about 20 on Saturday and bit more than that on Friday. Today it seems to be that they have sold maybe only 5. That's for their internet sales, the actual stores have sold maybe a handful in that time.

This is the largest IT-etailer in Finland, but it's not very game oriented. Still, it's large enough to give some kind of impression about the actual sales.

I think that to reach 600,000 over the entire Europe, it would have to have almost record breaking sales in every country in Europe. England is the largest video game market in Europe (I believe, I'm not 100% sure), and the rest keep getting gradually smaller, some because of population, some because of purchasing power. While England is only about 10% of Europe population wise, the market is considerably larger in relation to say... Poland for example (which has about 80% of England's population, but purchasing power per capita is only 40% of England's... for now, at least).

At the very least it would have had to sell really well in Germany, and France, and I don't think that those two combined with England are anywhere large enough to account for 600,000 sales in total.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: James Pond on 2007-03-28 20:33:49
Figures are around 160k units for the UK.

So somewhere, another "440k" have to have been "sold" in the rest of the EU
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: Jari on 2007-03-28 21:34:42
Found this on ELSPA (http://www.elspa.com/?i=3471&s=1111&f=49&archive=f)'s page:

Quote
Compared to the rest of Europe, the UK console software market is larger than both France and Germany combined, despite the UK population being just under 60 million with the other two countries at over 140 million.

That article is couple of years old (and actually by now European video game market is the largest in the world, only reason why it's not more significant is that it's not homogenous like US or Japanese markets, where you have only one major language on each), but if that ratio is still true, I'm almost ready to bet real money that PS3 did not sell 600,000 units.


EDIT: I think I might know where the 600,000 comes from. BBC is probably extrapolating it from the 165,000, using table such as this (http://www.vgcharts.org/euroyearly.php) for basis.

If it's like that... well, then it pretty much would have had to break records in every country to reach 600,000, like I said earlier.


EDIT2: These are supposedly the numbers Sony claims for Europe:

From here (http://www.vgcharts.org/forum/thread.php?id=972).

Quote
UK: 173k
France: 78k
Spain: 75k
Germany: 72k
Italy: 64k
Scandanavia: 52k
Other regions: 60k

Total: 574k

If you assume that Chart Track was correct with their 165,000 for UK, and apply similar "correction" to the rest of the numbers, it adds up to about 547,000. Which in turn apparently is about 55% of the supposedly reserved one million.

There are other strange things about the figures, as well. One way to interpret this (http://www.n4g.com/industrynews/News-28715.aspx) article is that there were 40,000 PS3s reserved for Scandinavian launch... in which they supposedly sold 52,000. But technically it doesn't say anywhere in that article that that particular shipment would be the only one.

You might notice that I use word "supposedly" a lot, that's just because PS3 was supposed to do lots of things, but truth turned out to be stranger than fiction. I'd rather buy an used car from gypsy, than trust what Sony says. :P

Oh yeah, the PS3s on Ebay UK going for less than the list price is kinda amusing phenomena, too. Serves the scalpers right.

And oh yeah^2: I would like to congratulate European consumer for bending over and taking it up the ass for Sony. I hope you are happy with your choice, and I certainly think that you deserve what you got. :-D


EDIT3: Even those figures are estimates. And... well, you know what I think of Sony's estimates.
Title: Re: My European Friends...Sorry
Post by: James Pond on 2007-03-29 08:47:08
God bless the BBC for their educated intelligence.