The Home Open Beta has now been out for about two months now and PS3 owners have had plenty of time to check it out and see what it is all about. We constantly hear people complaining about the service and saying that Home is a waste of time and money. Well is this true?
Home is still in BETA, meaning that it is not a finished product. Just like any other BETA, it lacks most of the content and contains many problems due to testing. Without betas, finished products would release with more issues and would lead to consumers having to wait for the game developers to release a patch. Even a patch/s sometimes does not fix it and the true online experience is missing for months (*cough* LittleBigPlanet *cough*). Sony has been running the Home BETA for a little over two years now and it has been improving very slowly but ever since the Home BETA launched, there has been many great things added. It is still not to the point that it should be, but seeing amazing spaces like the EA space shows what the service has coming in the future. Sony is playing it smart because they know that this service is crucial to the PS3 and they have spent a lot of time and money on it. If they were to release the final version of the service and claim it as the “final version”, people would be greatly disappointed. Many people say they are losing interest in Home because it is constantly getting delayed and pushed back, but wouldn’t you rather them do this than to the release the full service and it be like it is now?
Home has great potential for everyone; it just is not there yet because it is still in BETA and Sony is busy working on other things. Also, if you call Home a waste of money, you are obviously clueless to how much money Sony is making with the service. For example, Sony made more money in the first three days of the beta than the whole first week of the video store. So in conclusion, Home cannot be fully judged yet as it is not a finished product and is looking to have a great future. Please comment with your thoughts.
Source... www.thebitbag.com
The Leisure Suit Larry Box Office Bust video game gives gamers an all-access pass to the glitz, glamour and gorgeous women of Tinseltown. In this 3rd person adventure game, Larry takes a summer job working on his uncle Larry's movie lot doing odd jobs and trying to uncover a mole from another studio who threatens to air the studio's dirty laundry in the tabloids.
Leisure Suit Larry Box Office Bust is a rollicking, innuendo-laden lampoon of Hollywood that features open world sand box game play that includes exploration, platforming, racing and puzzle-solving to complete missions. Additionally, the game will feature an all-new Directors Game that allows the player to create their very own "Larry Feature."
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True to form, Leisure Suit Larry Box Office Bust will feature sophomoric comedy and bombshell babes thanks to the writing talents of Allen Covert (Happy Madison Productions) and an All-Star cast of actors and actresses, including Jay Mohr (Last Comic Standing), Dave Attell (Insomniac), Shannon Elizabeth (American Pie), Carmen Electra (Starsky and Hutch), Artie Lange (Mad TV), Patrick Warburton (Family Guy), Jeffrey Tambor (Arrested Development), Nikki Cox (Las Vegas), Peter Graves (Mission Impossible), Jane Lynch (The 40 Year Old Virgin) and Josh Keaton (The Spectacular Spider-Man) as the voice of Larry Loveage.
"Leisure Suit Larry is an entertaining adventure that places gamers in the middle of Hollywood's tabloid-filled mayhem to create a fun gaming experience," said Al Simone, senior vice president of Global Marketing for Sierra Entertainment. "The collaborative efforts of Allen Covert and cast make this the most amusing and immersive Leisure Suit Larry video game yet."
Leisure Suit Larry Box Office Bust, rated M for Mature, is developed by Team 17 and scheduled for 2009.
Source... www.worthplaying.com
Price is always a concern when talking about the PlayStation 3, and even though analysts are predicting a price cut some time this year, Sony admits that they will probably always have the most expensive console.
In a recent Eurogamer interview, SCEE's David Reeves said that although there's the possibility of a price drop at some point in the near future, they have no plans for an immediate cut "due to the current economic downturn." Eurogamer than asked if Reeves thought the PS3 would always be the priciest system out there, and he replied:
"I think it will, yes. I'm not saying there are going to be any price cuts at all in the short term or the medium term. I'm not saying we don't need to do it - we are expensive. It is possible that as the cost [of manufacturing] comes down, we will be able to do it.
But we're protecting ourselves with a very hard shell to get through the next one or two years of an economic situation. If you're experienced, you know you have to go into that mode - it's like being an armadillo. You have to be hard, and then you will come out when the sun comes out."
This is very similar to the stance many companies are taking these days, and it does make a great deal of sense. Furthermore, most analysts believe that when Sony does drop the price of the PS3, Microsoft will quickly follow suit and slash another $50 off the Xbox 360 to remain cheaper. But Reeves, along with other industry insiders, believes they can push through the upcoming months and enjoy another big surge later in 2009. Reeves finished-
"If, as an industry, we can get through the next six to seven months, we're going to find a massive uplift in September and October. I'm very optimistic about it."
Source... www.psxextreme.com
Sony will launch Buzz! Brain Of The UK on PS3, PS2 and PSP here this March.
Questions cover things that happen on our fair isles: bands, cities, sports personalities - or not, Michael Owen - telly, wildlife, food and so on and so forth.
The PS3 version has 4000 taxing teasers, and the results will be recorded for leaderboards so Sony can find out who the most knowledgeable person in the UK is. Stephen Fry. There; do I win something? Well, no; Sony told Eurogamer the only prize will be bragging rights.
Aside from the extra questions, Brain Of The UK will work the same as Buzz! PS3. There's no price yet, but Sony said the amount of content is akin to a full game rather than premium quiz pack. Pricey, maybe.
The PSP version, on the other hand, only has 1000 questions, but there's a pass the parcel-style multiplayer mode for six people. This should be perfect for making a friend look stupid when trivia weak-spots pop up. Sony doesn't expect leaderboard support to feature for the handheld.
Finally the PS2 has "thousands of questions on the UK" and works the same as every other Buzz! game on the console.
Head over to our Buzz! Brain Of The UK (PS3/PS2/PSP) galleries for a closer look.
Source... www.eurogamer.net
Sony says it sold 4.46 million PlayStation 3 games console in the Christmas quarter (October-December), which was down 9% from 4.9 million units in the same period last year. That's pretty unusual or, I suspect, totally unknown for a successful games machine.
But Sony scored a hat-trick of declines. PSP sales of 5.08 million units were down by 68,000, while sales of the old faithful PS2 more than halved: they were down by 2.88 million units to 2.52 million.
Sales of PSP game sales fell by 2.8 million units to 15.5 million, while sales of PS2 games plunged by 31.2 million to 29.7 million units. The only bright spot was that sales of PS3 games climbed by 14.8 million units to 40.8 million.
Not surprisingly, the games division's sales fell by a third to ¥393.8 billion ($4.36bn), while operating profits fell by 97% to ¥400 million ($4.42m).
The whole company didn't do much better. Sony's revenues fell by 25% to ¥2.15 trillion, and profits by 95% to ¥10.4 billion ($115.6m).
AP reports that Sony "also reiterated its forecast for a net loss of 150 billion yen ($1.67 billion) for the full fiscal year through March — its first loss in 14 years."
"From the second half of September last year, there has been a sudden deterioration in the economy, and with the effects of foreign exchange it has had severe consequences on our business," Chief Financial Officer Nobuyuki Oneda said.
The strength of the yen against the dollar had a devastating impact. Whether it should have been quite that bad is an interesting question. FinanceAsia.com says:
if you delve deeper into the figures, it does not seem possible that currency shifts were the principal cause of the company's losses. Sony's initial guidance for FY08 was ¥450 billion in operating profit, based on an exchange rate of ¥100 to the dollar. According to brokerage CLSA, yen appreciation would have had an impact of around ¥100 billion, meaning a profit of ¥350 billion. Instead, the company is now forecasting an operating loss of ¥260 billion, or a swing of ¥610 billion on top of the currency losses.
People who share this view may want Sony boss Sir Howard Stringer to be replaced.
Source... www.guardian.co.uk
