Anti PS3 Rants From The Web

Ok, so I’m a 360 boy, but that doesn’t mean I would turn down a free PS3, nor would I buy one just to smash it to pieces in front of long line of Ps3 fan boys, but smashmyps3 does make a funny video…



And to make matters worse for Sony, one of their own PS3 games gets slammed by Wired’s Game Life reviewer:

So PlayStation 3 reviewers got an email this afternoon with helpful tips for Genji, straight from the development team. That's a real interesting coincidence, because I was playing Genji when I got that email and I was coming up with some tips of my own for the development team. Tips like:

• When making a third-person action game, try to develop a camera system that lets the player actually see what's going on around him
• Try to avoid creating puzzles with solutions that involve hitting unseen objects that lie off the boundaries of the screen
• You might want to avoid leaving major bugs in the game that ruin your saved progress and force you to restart the whole thing

So I wasn't too too far into Genji -- I was right at the part where you get the lady warrior Shizuka, about two hours in. And I'd been putting up with unclear mission goals for pretty much the whole time. The game's camera system isn't really good for determining where important, key pieces of scenery are in relation to you. At one point you have to smash a cart so it rolls up to a locked gate, then use it to jump over. But since the camera keeps flipping between two fixed viewpoints, it's tough to tell that the cart would even go up to the gate if you were to push it.

That's minor compared to what happened next. I had to hit two doohickeys that were on top of a roof. But I could only see them in the initial cut scene that set up what I had to do, and even then the camera angle was such that I couldn't see where they were placed in relation to the ground. Checking GameFAQs after getting really frustrated, it turned out that yes, I had to stand underneath the thingamabobs while on the ground, and swing my weapon upwards to hit them.

Not that the game ever told me that I had an upward-facing weapon strike.

Not that there was any way, at all, to see the whatsits, meaning I had to just swing around like an idiot until I randomly hit them.

(Correction: Apparently, what you're supposed to do for this puzzle is get the key, as described below, and use it to enter the building and climb to the roof to hit them. But as I said -- the key was gone!)

But even that wasn't so bad when you compare it to the fact that I didn't know what to do next, and I wasn't finding anything because there was nothing to find. So it was back to GameFAQs' board, but this time there was no solution. Just confirmation that there was supposed to be an item for me to pick up, but due to a glitch in the game it disappears after a certain point. And of course, I'd been diligent and saved my game, meaning I was completely screwed. I'd have to start the game over.

That is, until I realized that -- through sheer coincidence -- I'd copied my old Genji save to a USB thumb drive when testing that feature of PS3. So I loaded it up, worked my way back to where I was, and there was the item I needed. Had I not realized that I had an old save, I wouldn't have bothered. But this is unacceptable, anyway. Simply outrageous that something this obvious would make it through QA.

Ouch.

And this from Geek.com:

Poor Sony. It's bad enough that the PlayStation 3 went through several delays and production shortages to finally see the light of day ... one would think that PS3 launch day would bring a little emotional relief for the electronic entertainment company, right? Not so fast.

Of course everyone knows that the launch of the PS3 was a little chaotic around the U.S. In Boston, however, the mayhem was a little over the top, where 500 hundred customers at Copley Plaza rushed the doors when they were opened at 5 A.M. The resulting riot resulted in damaged property and several injuries from trampling. In the end 12 police squad cars were summoned to control the rampage and many arrests were made.

When the dust settled Boston Mayor Thomas Menino was none too pleased with the carnage, and he directly blames Sony for the problem. In his opinion the riot was caused by Sony keeping the exact number of PS3s at Copley Plaza a secret and not helping to enforce crowd control. So, Mayor Menino has decided to send Sony a bill for the police services needed to bring the PS3-crazy crowd under control.

There are no details of the bill's total or Sony's response to Boston's mayor.

Oh dear.

And then there’s the PS3 720p output issues…

Apparently Sony's kicking off an early Thanksgiving break tomorrow, as they seem to be exhausting themselves today in preparation. After breaking the news that PSP Spots are US bound, floating the PSP 3.0 firmware out, and probably dealing with that massive invoice they just received from Thomas Menino and friends, the company is issuing a quasi-promise that the 1080i / 720p output problems plaguing some distraught PS3 owners will be fixed. Interestingly enough, Sony places a slightly unbelievable amount of blame on "antiquated HDTVs," as if having an HDTV that supports 720p is some sort of hidden requirement to operate a PlayStation 3. While we fully understand that most HDTV sets purchased today will indeed play nice with 720p signals, where's the love for folks who snagged those first generations sets produced by yours truly? According to Sony, a fix is on the way, but it doesn't sound like you'll be getting served with a smile.