Lots of people have been poo-pooing Sony for not including rumble in the PS3 controller. I was playing F1 2001 last night with my friend Steve, and I had to admit that I liked the rumble as I went over the curbs. On the other hand, as I’ve previously stated, I’d much prefer to try out this cool motion sensing idea if I had to make a choice between the two.

On the other hand, why can’t we have both? Sony says that the rumble interferes with the motion sensing. Immersion Technologies that’s hogwash, and that they have a new technology called TouchSense that lets the two features exist harmoniously together. Of course, Sony would have to pay Immersion for this technology. And since Sony doesn’t seem too willing to give up on the lawsuit about rumble in the PS2 controller, things don’t look good on that front.

So I’m wondering. Should Sony pay Immersion the $92 million it’s asking for? (For some reason that number is stuck in my head. Please correct me if I’m wrong.) And on top of that, should Sony license the new TouchSense technology? In other words, do you want Sony to pay for this stuff, knowing that the cost will eventually be passed on to you in some shape or form?

IGN - Immersion Offers to Rumble PS3

Major Nelson noticed that Sony has a podcast up. I haven’t listened to it, but from all accounts, it sounds like it might not be so good. The production quality is very high, but it’s very staid. And the background music plays throughout the whole thing, which is kinda tacky.

Has anybody here given this thing a listen? I’ve been so busy lately I don’t want to devote a lot of time listening to a podcast that by all accounts is a waste of time. In particular, I wonder if there’s any PS3 news.

Xbox Live’s Major Nelson - Official Sony SOE Podcast

It’s funny that we were just talking about this the other day. The Court of Appeal in the UK has ruled that the PS2 is not a “digital processing unit” - it’s a games console. My view, of course, is that it’s both, and I don’t really see how the court of appeal can deny that it’s a digital processing unit. Because it’s a unit that does processing digitally. Duh!

I’m just going out on a limb here, by my guess is that the Court of Appeal just doesn’t want to give Sony their £34.2m import duties back. In 2001 the import duty for games consoles was 1.7%. It fell to 0% by 2004.

Supposedly Sony’s lawyers were also quite shameful in their filings too, saying not-so-nice things about the jude. Tsk tsk Sony!

Reg Hardware - PlayStation 2 is not a PC, says Court of Appeal

I know that E3 is long past, but print magazines are only catching up now, as evidenced by the fact that Next Generation website is giving the scoop on a post-E3 interview with Phil Harrison.

Be that as it may, I’m reporting on it because Mr. Harrison makes an interesting comment. Well, to be precise, he does a side-step. We all remember last year when he said that he wouldn’t confuse the consumer like that when he saw that the Xbox 360 would come in two configurations. When challenged on that, now that we know the PS3 will come in two configurations as well, Mr. Harrison does a little dance. Mr. Harrisons says that this is what he originally said: “OK, what I said, unambiguously, was that we would never give the consumer cause for confusion, and that we would be very clear about our product offering.” And then goes on to claim that having two PS3 versions is not the same as having two Xbox 360 versions. There’ll be an HDD in both. Yeah, okay Phil. But there are other differences Phil. Otherwise you’d have one SKU instead of two. It’s still confusing to the users, even if Sony’s approach is easier on the developers. (They can count on the existence of an HDD.) So Mr. Phil tried to sidestep the question, but really, who’s he kidding?

But in the end, I personally don’t care. I know which one I want. And I’m gonna get it. Incidentally, speaking of getting the PS3, on the weekend I was in a SonyStyle store, and they said that they’d only start taking pre-orders in October. I still have to find a store that’ll take a pre-order (as a backup to my pre-order at Toys ‘R’ Us) and I still haven’t found one here in Ottawa that’s taking pre-orders now.

Next Generation - Harrison Talks PS3 Reaction & Controllers

I’ve been incredibly busy lately & have been unable to write about a lot of news related to the PS3 so I’ll try to cover what I’ve missed. Here goes:

Hit PSP game Lumines, could make an appearance for the PS3 according to Eurogamer.

The next-gen version of Guitar Hero is set to incorporate online functions in a big way believes RedOctane co-founder Kai Huang according to C&VG

You’ve probably read that the PS3 was going to be downgraded & Sony has confirmed to Eurogamer that this won’t be happening. No surprise there then.

The Cell chip inside the PS3 will apparantley be reduced from 90nm to 65nm sometime during 2007. This should, in theory, lead to a cheaper & smaller PS3 in the future according to gamesindustry.biz. Too late for the PS3’s launch but expect cheaper PS3s before the end of 2007. I know I’m stating the obvious.

IGN has some HD images of Smackdown v Raw 2007 & MGS4 for you to feast your eyes upon. Man they all look sweet especially MGS4. There is also the news that John Woo Presents Stranglehold is being targeted as a launch game for the PS3.

PS3Land has some gameplay details about Call of Duty 3 courtesy of the latest issue of EGM. Online gamers seem to be well catered for.

This is a treat for all MGS fans. Kojima Production’s Show Maybe? is a must read & is very entertaining!

GamerNode has some snippets of info direct from the mouth of Ken Kutaragi & he believes the world has “underestimated our progress in software development.” He also has high hopes for Eye of Judgment, the Yu Gi Oh alike card game that uses EyeToy to make the cards come alive.

Famitsu has some more screens of FFXIII & man does it look fantastic!! Famitsu also has screens of Final Fantasy Versus XIII & the images also look great although I’m not sure if they are in-game screens.

It’s a next-gen DVD player according to European Xbox chief Neil Thompson in an interview with Spong.com:

“I think [Sony] has missed the ball, in that it’s not really a next-generation games player – it’s a next-generation DVD player. For us, that’s great news, because we think we make the next-generation games console. If gamers are desperate to get the next-generation DVD player, then they’ll start considering Blu-Ray and the PS3. But Sony is the company that brought us Betamax, MiniDisc and UMD – I’m not convinced people today will go and bet the farm on buying a Blu-Ray disc.”

*sigh*

How is the PS3 not a next-gen games system? Can someone please explain this comment to me because I’m having great difficulty comprehending what Mr Thompson is saying.

The PS3 plays games doesn’t it? The PS3 is home to some incredible looking games like MGS4, Resistance: Fall of Man, Heavenly Sword, Assassin’s Creed right? And all those games have next-gen visuals that are at least on a par with anything the 360 has to offer right? So how is the PS3 not a next-gen gaming system?

If anything the PS3 is more of a next-gen games console than the 360, what with the ability of using Blu-ray for all games on PS3.

Sony also brought us the Walkman, the PlayStation & excellent TVs, DVD players/recorders etc & that doesn’t mean they will automatically ‘win’, nor will using Betamax, UMD or Mini Disc as reasons why Blu-ray will ‘fail’.

Comments like that only further proves that Microsoft are worried about the PS3 & are trying to damage Sony’s reputation with scare tactics & utter rubbish.

Spong.com - PS3 Not A Next-gen Games System

Mr. Ken Kutaragi, through GameDaily BIZ, has given us a small piece of information that may or may not mean that the PS3 will have an external power supply:

“We’ll use heat pipes and a custom cooling solution, but the methods used will be common,” he said. “We definitely aren’t using any proprietary methods… We certainly couldn’t fit a liquid cooling system [inside the PS3]… We’re spending a lot on heat and electromagnetic interference [management]. The power supply could almost be sold separately.“

Many people complained about the Xbox 360’s menhir-sized power supply. If you move your console about from place to place, I can see why it would be a pain. But personally, I don’t plan to do that. I’ve got a spot where I plan to put my PS3, and I don’t plan to remove it from that spot until I finish building my basement. So to me, an external power supply is no big deal, even a big one.

What do you guys think?

Kutaragi On Cell’s Future, Hints at External PS3 Power Supply

Results of previous poll:

Will you have an HDTV or standard definition TV for PS3 gaming?

* HDTV: 66% (98)
* Std Def: 34% (50)

Total Votes : 148