Archive for August, 2005
Unsure Reason for Xbox 360 Release Date
Posted by Blackstaffer in Xbox 360 on August 29th, 2005
First mover advantage. Yup, gotta get that Xbox 360 out there before Sony gets theirs out there. It’ll make all the difference in the world! So says J Allard, at least. We’ve heard it so many times from all sorts of different sources that we know Microsoft believes this to be one of their two aces for the Xbox 360 launch (the other being Xbox Live). And frankly, I think they have a point, everything else being equal (which it rarely is).
Someone over at Microsoft forgot to tell Chris Lewis, regional vice president, Xbox, Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA). He says that the reasons for the release date are:
This is something that comes up a lot and I want to get this straight. The timing’s not about the competition. The timing’s about listening to what gamers want, and listening to what the market wants right now. It’s about giving people the next-generation of gaming, now. People want high definition, they want deeper gameplay, they want more riveting stories, and people want to do a whole lot more things. They want to connect their music, they want to rip tracks, they want to plug their iPod or PSP in, and I think it’s about giving people what they want, right now, in a scaleable way. If that works well in terms of timing, then great.
Well, I certainly want HD, but with only 10% or so of American homes having an HDTV, I don’t think it’s something gamers want right now.
But anyway, maybe Mr. Lewis just hasn’t read the memo yet.
No Posts for a Couple Days
Posted by Blackstaffer in Talk on August 26th, 2005
My wife is having a baby.
[Update: My son Grayson Heinrich Hoffmann was born on Thursday August 25th at 3:27pm weighing 7 lbs 13 oz. He and his mom are both doing well. He's so cute!]
Next-Gen Development Costs not so Bad After All
Posted by Blackstaffer in Software on August 25th, 2005
With all the talk about how next-gen development costs are going to skyrocket, it’s nice to see a developer actually give some numbers.
While discussing possible PS3 support by Tecmo, Tecmo president Junji Nakamura stated that Xbox 360 development will cost 20% more than for previous platforms. While 20% isn’t anything to sneeze at, especially since costs to produce a game are often multi-million dollar affairs, it’s still a number that’s a lot less than analysts have predicted.
Does this mean that prices will go up by 20%? Probably, yes. But if developers can increase the quality in the process, they’ll sell more copies, and therefore will not need to increase prices?
Wanna make any bets about the general quality of next-gen games versus current-gen?
Sorry About That
Posted by Blackstaffer in Talk on August 25th, 2005
Yesterday this site went whacky for several hours. I made a mistake with my config trying to figure out why AdSense sees my site differently when I use www.ps3blog.net/index.php instead of www.ps3blog.net. My experiments really messed things up.
But, all is right as rain now, so please forgive the interuption.
What to Do
Posted by Blackstaffer in Talk on August 24th, 2005
On June 13th I pulled all the console-related content from HDBlog.net and created a new website, PS3Blog.net. You’re reading it right now! PS3Blog.net has been up and running for more than two months now and has seen a slow but steady increase in readership. I’ve also given it a major redesign once and have been tweeking it ever since.
With so little PS3 news to report recently, I thought it was time to take stock.
So is there anything you would like to see? Is there anything you’d like to see done differently? I’m all ears, and want this site to be your place for PS3 news, discussion, and information. Whether that means new articles like the ones I post every weekday, or a page about the PS3 specs, or whatever. So please, reply to this post or use the contact page to send me suggestions. I’d love to hear from you.
Follow Us
Last 5 Comments