My poor eyes, Sony!

So its E3 this week and all the major console makers are announcing their new gaming hardware or software and Sony has thoughtfully decided to put E3 announcements and trailers up for download in HD on their Store interface from the PS3/PSP. For some reason however, they've changed the background to be mostly white so that the list interface is now essentially white on white making it practically illegible on my very bright HD CRT. The normally slick and easy to use interface is almost impossible to read now:

Excuse the redraw effect, its hard to take photos of a CRT and I was in a rush to get this posted. You know, there's a place for interfaces like this. I'll have comments about what I see when I figure out what I've chosen to download and can see again.

Home, its real, honest

There's no secret to the fact that I enjoy my Playstation 3 immensely, but the long drawn out saga that has been Sony's new Home feature is almost embarrassing at this point. Announced well over a year ago, Sony promised an open Beta by last summer and that never materialized. A website purporting to have instructions 'soon' about how to enter the beta process is now very stale. Some users who got into the closed beta have been leaking information about the state of Home as it goes along, but Sony has been very tight-lipped about it.

Well now it seems there's a new way to get into the beta testing, if you're wanting to do that. Simply download the new PS Home theme from the Playstation Store tonight and you'll be entered automatically. I'm sure quite a few people will jump at that opportunity, despite not knowing the size of this lottery nor how many will make it. I know I will.

Sony E3 PSP video announcement

So it would seem that Sony has just announced their new downloadable video content for the store is to be available tonight, and transferable to the PSP. Its not quite my wishlist item, but its very cool nonetheless. From their live casting of the presentation:

• 12.23 - Jack talks about the new video download service. On Day 1 - Sony Pictures, Fox, MGM, Lions Gate, Warner Brothers, Disney, and more will have content available. A huge differentiator - you can take movies and tv on the go via PSP.
• 12.25 - Eric Lempel takes the stage (you remember him, right), to show a live demo of the video download service - it’s part of the existing PLAYSTATION Store - there’s a new video tab. Each studio has a page. Eric shows how to buy, rent, or preview a movie.
• 12.29 - “How long will it take to download an SD movie?” The answer is about an hour for a 2 hour movie. However, with progressive downloading, you can begin watching your video almost instantaneously.
• 12.30 - Eric demonstrates how to copy movies to the PSP. You can do this either through a PS3, or through the PC Store. BTW, this video download service will be available TONIGHT (applause). We’ll be adding new titles each week.

You have to admit that's pretty cool. Its not exactly Netflix on the 360, but its a good start, and we'll see how it goes. Having PSP integration for watching movies on the go is awesome though.

In-game XMB will have to wait

Well it would appear that Sony heeded my advice and took down the PS3 2.40 patch. Now, according to Sony, it wasn't to give us something to complain about, but rather because people were complaining anyway. It seems the firmware didn't take for all users, and gave a few some problems, so they took it back down for debugging. Maybe it'll be back up soon, maybe not.

Personally, I was somewhat anxious to check out trophies so I was online Wednesday morning checking for the update and got it just fine, as well as the Super Stardust update with Trophy support. I've been working on unlocking them ever since (PSN ID Maluraq if you'd like to compare).

The in-game XMB access is pretty cool and very smooth I might add. Its not as fast as when you're not playing a game, but I can scroll through my trophies and friends list and look at music titles and such while a car slowly rotates in the background (the live 'screensaver' view from Gran Turismo 5: Prologue). In fact, that's what most impressed me -- the XMB does not automatically pause the game that you're playing, but instead leaves it running (unless the game itself chooses to pause as a result) which makes for some cool background graphics in the case of GT5:P or when running Folding@Home.

I'll be getting those trophies before anyone else can while you guys wait for the firmware to be available again :-)

In-game XMB ruins blog

Seriously, now what will the readers of Sony's official blog whine about? In case you haven't heard, Sony has announced the much-anticipated Playstation 3 firmware version 2.40 for July 2nd of this year (that's 2008 for you time-travelers). The first video details the in-game XMB feature, allowing contact with other gamers as well as some settings and direct launching of other games from within a first game and the second introduces the new trophy system.

Trophies, I'm excited about. In-game XMB, only so much but being able to set up my bluetooth headset while already in-game (Warhawk!) would be much appreciated. I can't wait to check my friends to see what they've actually achieved in some games, and to compare our mad skillz. I hope that already released games with built-in accomplishments of various forms will port their old rewards to the new trophy system though (I mean you, Insomniac and Naughty Dog).

Well, here's to seeing what the next big complaint will be.

Open letter to PS3 haters

What is with you haters? The PS3 has quite a few good games, none of which required Sony to pay anyone anything. Microsoft is the one who pays for exclusives, not Sony. Microsoft bought all of Bungie back in the day to keep Halo exclusive even.

Resistance, Resistance 2 and Ratchet & Clank are exclusives for the PS3 from Insomniac Games. Drake's Fortune is a gorgeous exclusive from Naughty Dog. Heavenly Sword is exclusive and very fun, Warhawk is exclusive and I love the excellent online 32 player battles. Metal Gear Solid 4 is one of the best games of the year, easily, and is exclusive to the PS3 (good luck making a 50GiB game on the 360).

As others have pointed out, a number of the new games are being designed directly for the PS3 now and then being ported to the XBox 360, not the other way around (like LucasArts. That includes Burnout Paradise, which is including software scaling for 1080i support on the PS3 in their next update without losing their 60fps speed, because the Cell has a lot of power left over.

Do I love my PS3? Yes. Do I have anything against the 360? Not really -- but the 9GiB disc limit is a pain, although XBL and achievements are pretty cool. As far as achievements go though, most of the games I like playing have them built-in anyway (see list above) so its not really relevant to me. Just stop claiming the PS3 has no good games, just like the 360 had no good games when it launched either.

Feeling the Escher love

Well if you've been following this blog (and I can't imagine why you wouldn't), you'd know I love the PSN downloadable game Echochrome. If you didn't read my previous post about this game, Echochrome is a cool little 2D/3D black and white puzzle game reminiscent of (and inspired by) M.C. Escher's impossible geometry paintings.

One of the interesting features of Echochrome (and one of the primary reasons I bought it) is that it includes a level editor that allows you to create your own levels which you can then send to friends on the Playstation Network or upload to the servers of the game designers for review and possible inclusion in future updates.

I'll admit, I haven't played the game for as many hours as I thought I might, partly due to being busy, partly because Burnout Paradise and Hot Shots Golf were taking up so much of my time, and partly because some of the more difficult levels required me to take a mental break after beating them. That said, I found myself dreaming up new and interesting level shapes I could build in the level editor. I made four or five basic levels, nothing too fancy, just to try out my skills and figure out the controls and possibilities afforded me. I uploaded the few that seemed to work as I figured, "why not share?"

So just today I see that the Echochrome devs have posted on the Playstation Blog and that there are 30 new levels coming to the game from North America (the USA, Canada and Malta in fact) in the next downloadable update and I figure "ah, some new content" and figured I ought to browse the level diagrams on Flickr and see what's new and interesting. Well imagine my surprise as I'm scrolling through the photos and I recognize one of my levels is being included in the update, rated a difficulty of 2. A quick "Woohoo!" goes through my head and I call my wife to brag about having made one of the thirty included levels when I notice that another of my levels, this one rated a 3, is also being included.

Yes, I'm bragging. Leave me alone, it feels good. My head should shrink back down by tonight when I'm trying to sneak past the automatic sentry machines in MGS4.

Echochrome

I love a good puzzle game. I buy those little metal Chinese puzzles whenever possible. My wife is still bitter from the first such 3D puzzle she bought me that I solved in an hour or so. Its just a function of how my brain works, and I really enjoy exercising it. As such, I'm very excited about tonight's release of Echochrome in North America on the PSN (on the Sony Playstation Network Store). Its a very cool 3D puzzle game based lightly on the work of Escher.

You basically have control of a 3D view of a simple line-drawn environment with one or more little figures walking around in essentially straight lines on it. There are obstacles and jumping pads and holes in the floor and gaps to cross, all without any direct control of the characters. The really interesting part is that the rotating of the image such that a path looks connected (because the gap is hidden by another piece of the foreground) causes th path to be connected, at least until you rotate it again. The same goes for hiding obstacles or for how jumping and falling work.

Tell you what, try Youtube for a video of it instead, it'll make much more sense.

Watch the latest videos on YouTube.com

Now you get it? A little maybe? Very cool, don't you think? Now here's the really cool part -- you can create your own levels in the game, then either share them with friends or upload them directly back to the game makers and let them possibly include your creation(s) in future (free) updates to the game. Check out the official blog entry for more information.

Axis of Evil: Sony vs. Microsoft

I don't think any two technology companies have taken as much flak in my lifetime as Sony and Microsoft. Sony and Microsoft are both huge corporations with a large workforce and a very broad product base. While Sony is an older company, Microsoft has grown very rapidly and made its own enemies even faster in my opinion. Now each seems to earn their own fair share of criticism for perfectly valid reasons. The DOJ's case against Microsoft for anti-trust behaviours lead to a findings of fact that included a number of corporate sins against competitors, partners and consumers alike. Sony has historically promised more than they can deliver with their electronics products and has a bad habit of leaving consumers high and dry with obsolete and unsupported hardware. What gets to me is how some people (and in my experience, its often gamers) will grow a specific bias toward or against one company or the other because of past transgressions that have nothing to do with the product at hand. For example, some people wouldn't buy a PlayStation 3 over an XBox 360 because Sony's Beta and Minidisc formats faded into obscurity in their view. Others swing the other way and won't touch an XBox because they don't like the Windows operating system. Sure, within the music listening populace, Sony Music made some enemies putting DRM functionality on some of its CDs that used rootkit software (which is bad), but they fixed it and backed away from that mistake after being called on it. The Sony PS3 on the other hand allows users to rip CDs to its hard drive and even share them with memory sticks or USB drives. Microsoft has a history of being involved in really draconian DRM systems as well. Their own PlaysForSure music won't play on their newer Zune products (ironic, considering the original name). My advice is to look at the actual capabilities of a system you're interested in. If you're worried about sponsoring a company that's "evil" at a corporate level, feel free to protest with your wallet become a monk or go join an anti-technology religious community because otherwise you'll go crazy trying to make product decisions. If you want to know which of those systems I prefer, feel free to stick around for another instalment, I'm sure it'll come up eventually.