Phil Harrison has said that Sony will be making some exclusive announcements at GDC next month. (If I remember correctly, GDC runs March 5th to March 10th.)

I’ve been thinking about this and I’m not sure what he means by “exclusive”. Does it mean that he’ll reveal game titles that will only be on the PS3? Or is he just saying the the announcement will be “special”, which for some reason some people use the word “exclusive” for?

I just hope that lots of the issues I brought up in yesterday’s poll are addressed.

Exclusive Sony announcements primed for GDC

Sony plans on updating the store today. New downloads will include a demo of Full Auto 2: Battlelines for the PS3, and another Playstation 1 game, Destruction Derby which will run you $5.99.

Released back in 1995 for the PS1, Destruction Derby was developed by Studio 33 and Reflections.

Motorized Mayhem Meets the PlayStation Store

Okay guys, here’s a loaded question. Sony’s PS3 is upgradable, and we’ve seen several updates already. What do you want to see most in a future update?

1. Background downloading.
2. System-wide chat support.
3. In-game support for PS3-stored songs.
4. Global buddy lists, invite friends to game.
5. Global ranking support.
6. Better file/folder management (media).
7. Improved Bluetooth headset support.
8. Bluetooth keyboard/mouse support.
9. Global remote play.
10. Better internet browser.
11. Fix for 1080i/720p problem.
12. Better PS2 memory card support.

Hey, I think that’s the most options I’ve ever put in a poll! Tell me if I missed something.

Last poll’s results:

What are your BD on PS3 viewing habits?

* I buy BD movies for my PS3.: 36% (52)
* I rent BD movies.: 10% (14)
* I rent and buy.: 20% (29)
* I don’t watch BD on my PS3.: 6% (9)
* I don’t own a PS3.: 28% (40)

Total Votes : 144

At DICE 2007 Phil Harrison demoed SingStar on PS3. One of the cool features is that you can upload videos for other people to view and rate, similar to YouTube.

Here is part of a interview with Phil Harrison that was interesting.

Though SingStar is not expected for some time, Sony is going to begin its community initiative very soon. “I think you’ll see that [community] innovation in the next five weeks,” Harrison said. That would likely mean a grand unveiling of new functionality during Harrison’s keynote speech at GDC on March 7.

Hopefully this “community” innovation will be out in time for the European PS3 launch.

Phil Harrison: The Future is Now

NFS: Carbon and Ridge Racer 7 both support Logitech steering wheels with full force feedback effects (yes, I’ve personally confirmed both). Why doesn’t GT:HD support force feedback? This was a big feature with GT 3+4, it’s talked about endlessly on the forums, yet there is absolutely no official word on this? Even weirder, many people report that Japanse PS3 owners get full force feedback effects. Why the heck would that be?

Why doesn’t F1 Racing support steering wheel controllers at all? It can’t be that hard to program support for these controllers and racing fans love them. This just doesn’t make any sense at all.

And why is it such a pain to get my Logitech Driving Force Pro to work in PS2 emulation? Is this just a bug?

Can anyone explain this?

I want to post a about a few PlayStation “mysteries”. By mystery, I mean some long standing questions that many PlayStation fans want to know the answer to that never get answered or even asked in interviews.

Starting with…

Hobbyist Game Development

Linux is great and Flash support is great. I don’t want to downplay that. Heck, Flash is the biggest hobbyist game dev platform ever made. But beyond that: why aren’t there better tools for making C/C++ games or even game builder type tools (like Torque) that run on the PS3 OS and the PSP OS and take full advantage of the hardware? I bet the answer involves copyright infringement issues. While I completely support any efforts to stop emulators and copyright infringement, there must be a dozen ways to allow legitimate hobbyist development while stopping the bad. Even if it’s a tightly controlled system like Microsoft’s where hobbyists can only run in development mode with a dev PC attached and can only distribute to regular console owners after going through a manual review process where copyright infringing content can be blocked.

However, what about gray area content like emulators? 99% of the people using ROM emulators use them for blatantly copyright infringing purposes, but emulators can potentially be completely legit. And that guise may make them hard to ban.

I also wonder how much PSP/PS3 piracy potential full hobbyist developer access would pose? It wasn’t hard to pirate PS2 content, but it required hardware modifications, and that was enough of a barrier to prevent all but a few people from doing it. However, if some free software download made PS3 piracy fairly simple, that would be a disaster and could single handedly destroy the Playstation.

However, I’m still not convinced that there aren’t safe solutions to legality and copyright concerns. What’s the real answer?

(On a related note that isn’t 100% PlayStation or Sony related, why aren’t there any publically available Java development tools for Blu-Ray interactivity?)

If you are one of the first 500,000 people to register your PS3 on the PLAYSTATION Network after it’s March 23rd EU release, you will get Casino Royale on BD. This has been rumoured for a while now and I’m glad they are offering us Europeans a decent film, and a little sweetener, to be amongst the first 500,000 to register with the PLAYSTATION Network.

You have to use your actual PS3 to access the PLAYSTATION Network so it doesn’t apply to people like me who have registered their user IDs:

Don’t assume that because you’ve pre-registered via the website for Player ID that you will automatically be signed up for the Casino Royale Promotion. To get Casino Royale you must connect your PS3 to the network and register your console.

Good news for a change and if you look at the cost of Casino Royale, it almost takes the price of the PS3 below the £400 mark, depending on how much Casino Royale retails for and if you’re actually interested in the film.

Casino Royale offered to the first 500,000 registered EU PS3 owners