Entertainment Electronics Blog

God of War III caps off the trilogy that began in 2005, pitting Kratos against the gods of Mount Olympus in a whirling rampage of revenge. But with God of War continuing to be one of Sony’s strongest franchises, the end of the trilogy definitely won’t be the end of the series.
Sony Santa Monica director of product development John Hight told Gamervision as much in a recent interview, “This is not the end of God of War.”

“This is definitely the end of the trilogy, but we?re going to continue to do God of War games. We’re going to be very careful about what we do; we’re the keepers of the franchise and we don’t want to see it ruined or polluted.”

New screens hit the Internet yesterday, showing Kratos scaling the titan Gaia. The game itself will be out in March, with a more specific release date coming soon.

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.

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.

John Carmak, influential game desiner and technical director of id software, has predicted that Sony will be the first to make a move into the next generation of gaming hardware, probably to prevent “the same kind of 360 lag from happening to them again”.

“The whole jockeying for who’s going to release the first next-gen console is very interesting and pretty divorced from the technical side of things,” Carmack told CD-Action, as spotted by Eurogamer’s Digital Foundry.

“Whether Sony wants to jump the gun to prevent the same sort of 360 lag from happening to them again seems likely.

“As developers, we would really like to see this generation stretch as long as possible. We’d like to see it be quite a few more years before the next-gen consoles comes out, but I suspect one will end up shipping something earlier rather than later.”

One of the main reasons behind the success of Microsoft Xbox 360 is its release one year ahead of Sony PlayStation 3 as well as considerably lower pricing. Sony might want to release its PlayStation 4 ahead of its arch-rival. But anyway, I hope this generation could last a long time. I hate they force me to buy these new stuff.

In an exclusive interview with Play, Tecmo Koei president Kenji Matsubara revealed that the Ninja Gaiden series could be adapted to work with Sony’s motion control technology sometime in the future.

“I’m very interested in the new motion-control technology announced at E3, but we really need to know how responsive it is,” said Matsubara. “I’m sure that for casual games these motion controls will be very popular, but for action games like Ninja Gaiden we need quick responses and if you’re swinging your arms around like you’re using a sword you will soon be tired.”

He makes motion tech sound like something he wants to work up to: “Maybe we have to change the playing style and check the technology to see how quick it can be,” he said. “So, at first it will be casual games and then maybe hardcore games and we have to prepare for that and provide the games to satisfy that playing style.”

Since Nintendo’s Wii games, Motion-control gaming is getting more and more popular. Videogame publisher Electronic Arts (EA) has even committed itself to releasing titles for both Sony’s and Microsoft’s recently demoed motion-controlled gaming peripherals. Though no juicy details of any Project Natal or Motion Control videogames has been revealed yet, it’s widely expected both peripherals will appear towards the end of next year. We’d have to keep our patience. And here’s a picture about PS3 SIXAXIS Wireless Controller, which adds motion control, and actually the controller can sense six different movements.

By now, rumors about PS3 Slim have spread like wildfire. Whether they are true or fake, something is certainly happening in Sony land. Now let’s review these rumors:

• On Friday, July 31 Amazon Germany has the “PlayStation 3 Konsole Slim” listed but without price, picture or release date. But the list has been removed.

• On Monday, August 3 the Web site Kotaku posted what is said is a leaked memo from retailer Seven-Eleven( selling video games in Japan), saying it will no longer accept pre-orders for the black, white and silver 80-GB PlayStation 3 as of August 9.

• Another rumor is that Sony will reportedly make an announcement about the new Slim at the GamesCon conference in Germany on August 18.

All these rumors come at a time when Sony’s PS3 production cost has dropped 70 percent since its launch in 2006. So far none of that stuff has been confirmed. And I’m wondering that, why does the PS3 need to be slim? Personally, I’ll prefer fat PS3, as the slim one means cheaper making. So, I’d rather spend more time on my PS3 maintenance instead of those unconfirmed rumors.

It’s about time we got some extra colors! According to various US reports, SONY will release the DualShock 3 in “Deep Red” and “Metallic Blue”, the most patriotic dualshocks we’ve ever seen. Sony says they should be available this October.

It’s an irritating fact that Japan still get things that we never see here in North America, while we’re so limited in terms of color options when it comes to video game hardware and accessories. Maybe some players still prefer the black ones, because it’s classic. But, variety isn’t a bad thing. Anyway, here comes our own dualshocks, whose colors are from our national flag. And if you want to show American spirit, you can purchase all three red, white, and blue controllers available.