David Reeves, President and CEO of SCEE, has a little opinion piece on MCV.co.uk and he’s revealed a couple of interesting bits of info for PAL PS3 owners (or would be owners). Firstly, don’t expect to see either the 20GB or 80GB PS3 released over here. Ever. There simply isn’t the market for either versions in PAL territories, unlike the Korean market where high broadband speeds are the norm.

I also think a few people would be rightly annoyed if either version (especially the 80GB) were released over here.

He also states that Sony has hit the 1m PS3s sold mark in PAL territories:

I’m happy to say that early last week we broke through the one million sell-through mark on PS3. That was sell-through across all PAL territories – and we achieved that in nine and a half weeks. That’s faster than both PS2 and PSone.

Pretty impressive stuff. It’s just a shame that it’s doing so poorly in Japan and North America in comparison.

One last bit of info that is not quite so good is that Home will not be out until Christmas in Europe, if David Reeves is to be believed. Yeah, great.

David Reeves talks stuff

Up until now, we’ve heard very little about Sony’s Espionage MMO. Now, we finally get an official title, some cool concept art and a limited preview. The game sounds like it has real potential to be something unique. Often it’s hard to make these unique titles turn out as fun and exciting as they sound on paper, but regardless, I can’t wait to see more!

Do these concept pieces remind anyone else of Shadowrun? Is it just all the talk about Microsoft’s Shadowrun game that has that on my mind or do these pictures genuinely remind anyone else of the classic pen and paper RPG? The punk influenced aesthetic, the futuristic industrial setting run by huge corporations, the technology and gadgets, the exotic weapons, and the stealth? All that’s missing is the magic and the trolls and shaman. Really, those pictures look like they were taken directly from the old Shadowrun manual.

They have the cyberpunk look down pat. I’m really excited about this one.

IGN Preview

[Update: well, the MotorStorm and Resistance updates won’t be coming today after all. ]

What have we to look forward to on the PS Store this month? Well tonight we should get the Resistance update which includes global servers, removal of Chimera v Chimera matches, expanded XMB support (?), the ability to report cheaters and have an online moderator monitor said cheaters.

The two new maps should also be available for purchase from the PS Store or from the game itself for $7.99 (for both?) and Euros 4.49, although I don’t know if it’s 4.49 per map or for both.

Go! Puzzle should arrive June 14th in North America followed by the MotorStorm updates (June 15th?), a Lair demo and the arrival of Super Stardust HD, all later this month on the NA PS Store.

We Europeans can finally look forward to PSone games such as Crash Bandicoot, Syphon Filter, WipEout, Everybody’s Golf, Jumping Flash! and Medievil, on June 22nd. More will obviously follow. I want Resident Evil and Destruction Derby!!

Calling All Cars should also arrive June 22nd priced at Euro 7.99 followed by Nucleus on July 6th also priced Euro 7.99. The MotorStorm update should arrive on EU PS Stores June 15th.

PS Store Release list

It’s a Japanese game called Mainichi Issyo. It’s a free download on the Japanese
PlayStation Store. You can play this game on your PSP via remote play, you can even access the PS Store in-game to purchase extra content for Mainichi Issyo. The game is about a cat doing whatever you tell it to. No sudden movements really, just menu driven mostly. So it doesn’t matter if there is a lag in the connection. This has great potential, hopefully they’ll be more games that have this feature.

Japanese PS3 game available via Remote Play

PSPtwo over at the Playstation Forums found something interesting about this game too. In-game messaging works with this title. Not positive if it works with remote play, but I don’t see why not.

In-game messaging already running on PS3..do it by yourself now

Hopefully this rumor won’t come up again. Here is what Hashimito said: “For the Wii, we have FF Crystal Chronicles in production. As for FF on the Xbox 360, it’s currently a completely blank page.”

So no Final Fantasy XIII or Final Fantasy Versus XIII for the XBox 360. At least now we know that the PS3 will get Square’s full attention. And fully use the PS3 and Blu-ray to the limits. I’m looking forward to the demos

No Final Fantasy for Xbox 360 … period

This is an entertaining montage of the PlayStation network.

This is mostly composed of footage that we’ve seen before, however, there are a few pieces I don’t recall seeing elesewhere. Has anyone seen Aqua Vita or Sky Blue or Snake Ball before?

Higher res version on GameTrailers

Finally we’re getting some decent information about Pelican’s new PS2 - PS3 controller adapter. The big thing about this thing was that it was supposed to make using Guitar Hero I and Guitar Hero II work on the PS3.

Well, it got it half right.

According to Gizmodo, GH1 works fine, but they heard lots of reports that GH2 didn’t work. (They couldn’t test GH2.) GH2 is the acid test for me, because I couldn’t use GH1 anyway because of the extreme lag introduce by the PS3 out the HDMI output. GH2, on the other hand, has a lag compensator, so theoretically I’d be able to play that on my PS3. But not with this adapter.

Phooey.

Pelican’s PS2 to PS3 Controller Adapter Hands-On