Entertainment Electronics Blog

Sony revealed a way to extend your PlayStation 3 or PlayStation Portable’s warranty earlier this year with the PlayStation Protection Plan. You can now easily purchase the plan for your PS3 through the PlayStation Store, and PlayStation Plus members can even receive a discount.

The plan comes in one- or two-year varities costing $44.99 and $59.99, respectively. Plus members will be able to get the two-year plan at a 25% discount, meaning you’ll pay $44.99, effectively giving you two years for the price of one. Among the features a protection plan provides are free shipping on repairs and no fee for qualified claims.

You can’t apply the plan to any older PS3 systems, so that precious backwards-compatible 60GB unit is almost certainly not eligible. Only systems that are still within their original one-year warranty can have a PlayStation Protection Plan applied to them.

Here’s some potential bad news for Heavy Rain fans still eager to learn more about the game’s abundant cast of characters. Speaking to Game Informer at E3 earlier this week (via VG247), Quantic Dream co-founder Guillame de Fondaumière said that future DLC for the game has been put on “indefinite hold,” as Sony instead encouraged the developer to focus on implementing Move controls in the game.

Those Move controls will come as both a free patch for those who already purchased Heavy Rain, and a re-release of the game with the Move controls on-disc. But it looks like additional Heavy Rain DLC may be a casualty of the added controls, as de Fondaumière also said to Game Informer that while they may go back to producing more DLC afterward, it’s more likely they’ll just move on to their next project instead.

Quantic Dream’s original plan was to release a number of “episodes” for Heavy Rain — calling the whole thing the Heavy Rain Chronicles — with each episode focusing on one of the characters in the game. But it looks like The Taxidermist, released back in April, may end up being the only episode to see release after all.

E3 attendees don’t always have all the fun. Before the booths in LA could even be fully taken down, Sony gave PlayStation Move its public debut this weekend at Japan’s World Hobby Fair, a bi-annual event that features the latest games, manga, and anime. We were on hand to check out public reaction as well as the two featured games, EyePet and Kung Fu Rider.

The World Hobby Fair is free to the public and the games on display usually cater to a younger demographic. Judging by the length of the lines at Sony’s booth, interest in the device isn’t particularly high. ModNation Racers attracted twice the attention of Sony’s motion controller. Meanwhile, Mario Galaxy 2, a game that’s been out in Japan for nearly a month, had the longest lines of the show. Those that did try Move walked away looking impressed, and the reason for the relative apathy towards the device remains unclear.

We stood in line for about an hour (one of the shorter lines at the show) in order to get our chance to play Kung Fu Rider. The game is played with a single Move controller. You control a bespectacled man in suspenders sliding down the road in an office chair. In his way stand everything from milk crates and road signs to yakuza and old ladies. The goal of the game is to avoid the organized criminals and roadblocks and reach the end of the course. You steer your character by moving the controller from side to side. Gently whipping the controller will speed him up. Pressing the T trigger on the back of the Move controller will make the character on screen duck back in the chair like he’s in a limbo competition. Throwing the controller up will make him jump, and pressing the Move button on the front of the device will unleash an attack on an unsuspecting gangster or strolling granny.

Kung Fu Rider is a simple game that doesn’t make use of the fidelity the Move controller is capable of. There was nothing in the demo we played that couldn’t or hasn’t been done on the Wii. The demo that Sony displayed at the World Hobby Fair played and looked more like a $15 PSN game, not a $39.99 retail product ready for release this September.

Scotland-based game developer Cohort Studios has a thing or two to say about the next wave of motion controllers. The studio is currently hard at work on The Shoot, an on-rails shooter designed for the PlayStation Move, and it’s pretty safe to say Cohort’s sold on the tech.

“The PlayStation Move is a great piece of hardware,” Cohort CEO Lol Scragg told Develop in a recent interview. “It has a fantastic feel to it and it’s incredibly accurate. We’ve had no issues with it, and the hardware and the libraries have come on well.”

But how does Sony’s device stack up against the competition? “Having used both controllers a lot, I’d say it was clear that the Move controller is so much more accurate [than the Wii remote],” Scragg said. “And it’s not just across the X and Y-axis either, the Z-axis is really accurate as well.”

The CEO went on to discuss the negative perception of motion control among hardcore gamers. “I understand that, if you read any of the forums, you’ll [see] people state they don’t need motion control, but that’s because they’ve likened motion control to the Wii,” he explained, adding, “Once Sony and Microsoft start releasing their own games for their motion controllers, I think the core will come round to it.”

Granted, Scragg’s opinion may be somewhat skewed by his company’s investment in development for the PlayStation Move. It’s still nice to hear developers getting excited about new technology.

Sony has managed to stir up quite a controversy with the release of the PSP Go. Whether it’s because of its omission of physical media, the lack of a UMD-to-digital conversion program, the crappy “bonus” that North Americans got for purchasing one… there’s more than a few reasons that have caused gamers to complain about the newest iteration of the PlayStation Portable. Now even Reggie Fils-Aime, president of Nintendo of America, is questioning some of the choices that Sony has made.
Speaking with The Washington Post, Fils-Aime suggested the Go has a “fundamental concept problem in terms of ‘Who’s it for?’ and ‘What’s the benefit?’” And it’s difficult to provide solid answers to either of those questions. For current PSP owners, upgrading to the Go would leave their UMD collections worthless (and trust me, this is not a pleasant realization). Newcomers to the PSP are left to buy only games that are available on the PlayStation Store, and at the price that publishers set — no taking advantage of eBay, used games at GameStop, or a friend’s selection of games. And either way, $250 is awfully pricey.

Fils-Aime’s comments will ultimately only add fuel to the intense debate between the Goers and no-Goers out there. Don’t expect Sony to suddenly change directions because one its competitors doesn’t publicly agree with some of their decisions.

Sony has announced that LocoRoco Midnight Carnival will release on October 29 — just in time for Halloween — for $15 on the PlayStation Store (via Shacknews).
The game is more of an add-on of sorts than a sequel to LocoRoco, adding 16 new night-themed stages, two new mini-games, and new competitive and co-op multiplayer modes which Sony plans on detailing soon. The game will be a PlayStation Store-only release.

Elecom has released another set of keyboards with the TK-U01MAL series. Both are available in USB with a 3m long cord, and are available in black to match your PS3 and in white to match your Wii. Since these two keyboards are primarily made to be used with the two gamimg devices, they can also “stand-up” so that they take up as little space as gamers aren’t slobs and can be Ikea-net if they put their mind to it. Till now, nothing on pricing or whether the Elecom TK-U01MAL series keyboard will be available in the States.

But you can always import, if only you wish.

Finally comes Sony’s PS3 Slim: slick, black, with 120GB hard drive and for $299. This slimmer console is 36 per cent lighter and 33 per cent smaller and will consume around 30 per cent less energy. Uhm… It’s quite slimmer indeed. And because of its slimmer price, the current $399 PS3 model, with an 80-gigabyte drive is expected to cut price imminently. Now, it seems that getting slim is actually a good idea.

It’s reported that the new PlayStation 3 will become available in stores from September 1, 2009. Here are some pictures:

By using the PlayStation eye and microphone, Sony is going to detect and record your emotions, including laughter, anger, excitement, sadness, joy, and even boredom.

According to the patent filing, this technology identifies emotions by reading facial expressions, as well as group behavior such as two players high-fiving each other. As you watch a program or play a game, the PlayStation 3, hooked up to a camera and microphone, would analyze your face, body language and any sounds you make or actions you perform. This gets turned into metadata which is then sent back home to see how well a piece of media is being received.

It’s true that they could get more accurate reviews and data on the way people react to games or movies, but I don’t think it’s really needed. I think sales figures and gaming review sites already do a good enough job. On the other hand, I’m still wandering if it could detect players’ laughter at its ridiculous idea.

The sequel to the best selling first person action game in history, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, Modern Warfare 2: Call of Duty 4 is coming soon in November. Rumors have been spread over and over around the November release, saying that together with it will come the new developed accessories we still don’t know clear. Moreover, Mad Catz, leading third-party interactive entertainment accessory provider, has announced that they have partnered with Activision and Infinity Ward to develop a range of controllers and accessories. The release goes on to state that the company will develop accessories for all platforms currently announced for the title, which include Xbox 360, PC, and PlayStation 3 systems.

“Mad Catz’s innovation and fresh approach from Day 1 has been great,” said Vince Zampella, CEO of Infinity Ward. “Their team has really poured their hearts into the new line of accessories for Modern Warfare 2 and we can’t wait for our fans to have a chance to play for themselves this November.”

What indeed is Mad Catz building, the coolest ever in existence or the opposite? We can make a guess.Will they be new types of night-vision goggles, turbo controllers, or even a “special” keyboard and mouse for the game? Well, whatever, the answer is coming out soon.