PUBLIC MARKS from mrongos with tags ps3 & "PS3 Rumors"

Don’t ask why we were surfing the 360 forums. It’s a long, painful story. Even more painful is the sorry reason that Microsoft has decided to hop onto the legal train and sue Sony (besides the fear instilled upon Microsoft by the PS3… or so we’d like to believe). Now, many of us have probably seen the “controversial” list we’ve got at the top of the page. Is it misleading? If you’re ignorant. Here’s why.

Can’t wait to get your hands on another version of the gritty, grim, grimy, greasy (?) battles of World War II? Didn’t get enough of that insane FPS action in the last Call of Duty or Medal of Honor title? Even so… is the thrill of playing through, arguably, the same battles in a different lens not enough? How about some massive online

In the latest PSM podcast, a little tidbit slips out about the PS3’s ability to support audio files. A lot of people have been rolling their eyes, saying Sony limits themselves to the proprietary ATRAC format (if anyone else has a Vaio that came equipped with Sonic Stage

We’ll transcribe the worthwhile questions and answers from the FiringSquad interview with a Sony spokesperson because we’re lazy — besides, not much else to say other than what was asked/answered.

The United Kingdom’s largest videogame retailer, GAME, has apparently received some information regarding PS3 game pricing.

Last week, I went to GameStop to pick up a fresh copy of Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria and while I was there, asked about pre-ordering a Playstation 3. I got a clever smirk and “isn’t that the popular question this month?” It sure is. The manager of the store told me there was a meeting in Texas to discuss

So we got a lot of comments asking what this “Remote Play” feature was on the PS3 as listed on its translated interface menu. Thanks to our fellow Sony-addicts over at PSPFanboy, we’ve got a little more to tell you. With “Remote Play”, you can stream data

How does “whenever you feel like it and can afford to drop the necessary amount of money on it” sound? No? Damn, C-net, what do you think, then? Isn’t it our choice to decide when it’s “safe” to buy a console? No? Damn. Fine, why don’t you twist the news and alter the minds of your readers? Let’s go…

We all know that it is highly likely that the PS3 will come bundled with some Blu-Ray movie love. Afterall, what better way to get all 6 people that own 1080p TVs hooked on the superiority of Sony’s latest format? When word broke at TGS that the XBox 360HD-DVD player would come bundled with King Kong, the guessing game for the PS3’s pack-in reached its peek.

As rumored. As speculated. As hinted…. 5 sweet, sweet words… The Elders Scrollls IV: Oblivion. It is the “secret” PS3 launch title.

The fine folks over at EvilAvatar and MagicBox are reporting that the low-end PS3 isn’t the only PS3 to gain an HDMI port. According to their TGS information, the 60GB version will now have not one, but two HDMI ports. Like me, you maybe asking yourself: “What the hell?” Here’s Sony’s alleged answer.

Well, Sega is awesome. Sega is also putting up their entire gaming library up for grabs on the Nintendo Whaa Wii. But… will Sega also let the lovely owners of the lovely PS3 have access to Vectorman, Phantasy Star II-IV, Shinobi, Sonic, and so on (a personal underground favorite of mine is Sub Terrania… emulate it and try it out! It’s very hard)? On this topic, they’ve issued a resounding “maybe”. More accurately, they issued a “it is a stage being zealously examined now.” Which we can hope will turn into a very positive result. Would any of you guys take advantage of the Sega library? Just a ballpark shot in the dark guesstimation, let’s say Master System games were $3, Genesis $5, Saturn $7 (this is assuming they go all out and include every system). Oh, and Dreamcast… $10. But I don’t count the Dreamcast as dead. Because it’s turned on right now, loaded with the port of Elemental Gimmick Gear. Pretty bad translation in that game… but mind-numbingly fun.

If you happen to stroll into your local Best Buy at or after October 20th, there is some evidence on the Neogaf forums that clue you in to what you should expect. What should you expect? PS3 stuff. Lots of PS3 stuff. How would you like to demo the Playstation 3 on a 46″ Sony Bravia flat-panel TV at 1080p? Sit on some Lay-Z-Boy couches while doing so and enjoying the Sony 7.1 Component Home Theater System? Yeah. That’d be pretty excellent. Now, this is just a rumor, but the slides seem fairly authentic (from personal Best Buy experiences) and the setup is fairly… er, large. So large, in fact, the 360 kiosks may be removed entirely. But PS3’s may be downsized on October 25th when the Wii moves out (maybe not). This is a great rumor to hope for as fact because being able to get our hands on the Playstation 3 nearly a month before its release is bliss — and may push those teetering on the edge of a purchase over to the “yes!” side. So, uh, who’s planning a Best Buy field trip? We are, since we couldn’t get to the Tokyo Game Show.

Not too bad is about the extent of it. While one price shouldn’t be indicative of any other game prices, there’s at least a little comfort in the recently announced pricing of Resistance: Fall of Man, Motorstorm, and Genji. 5980 yen. Roughly $50 US. That’s really cool, should the prices remain the same upon the North American release. Will they? Maybe. Maybe not. No use guessing, but we can pray to the almighty lords of gaming to make it so. Let’s not forget that Sega also released some prices a few weeks ago: Sega Golf Club and Sonic are both being priced at 7140 yen (about $60)… the expected next-gen pricing, but didn’t someone see Sonic for cheap somewhere? Maybe that was a dream. Seems the pricing will be stuck around $50-$70. Oh well. Is anyone unnaturally bent out of shape about this?

First, Crytek wanted people for it’s PS3 version of Crysis. Then, they said the consoles can’t handle their oh-so-perfect game. Now they say that they can easily port the game to consoles? Now, just as a personal moral standpoint, one may feel this game should be ignored since the creators obviously can’t decide what they want to do with their creation, but let’s give them another chance. Lead artist Michael Khaimzon said this tidbit: “I don’t think there would be any problem to convert anything we work on to the next-gen consoles if we decided to…We have enough power here, with programmers and artists, to be able to do such a thing. It’s just a matter of making the decision.” So it could be done, there just hasn’t been an official word on it yet. Sort of. The wanting PS3 programmers is fairly… well, it’s something to think about. We’ll keep you posted if any more “official” announcements are made.

Sony can’t catch a break. This time the rumors and innuendo have cost them. Literally. Earlier this week, Macquarie Equities analyst, David Gibson, put the hurt on Sony by apparently stating that “he had heard” that several PS3s on the show floor at TGS “operated erratically and had to be repeatedly reset.” According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, “The problem seems to stem from consoles running too hot and then shutting down. Sony has claimed that it was simply a case of not having the proper ventilation at the kiosks where the consoles were played. It’s possible, but Sony stock was down almost 3 percent by Wednesday from the revelations.” To put that into perspective, a 3% drop in Sony’s stock price on the NYSE represents a drop in Sony’s value by more than $1 billion dollars! Yes, I said “billion.” Of course, stocks rise and fall everyday… sometimes by less than 3% and sometimes by much, much more. What’s interesting is that with this drop attributed to PS3 overheating “news,” it appears that shareholders (specifically, institutional investors), are watching the PS3 launch very, very closely. Everyday, my appreciation for the PS3’s potential to make or break Sony grows. On the bright side of things, and based on the picture to the right, the PS3 can double as a mirror! That should drive Sony’s market cap up a few hundred million.

Or is it? Says Nina Kristensen, Ninja Theory’s co-founder, “We’ve always been a launch window title so it hasn’t affected us at all,” referring to the PS3 delay in Europe. However, lead animator Guy Midgley said “No, it’s going to be next year…but we haven’t announced a specific date yet.” So… it’s a launch window title (which should be before 2007, right?) but it’s not coming out until next year in the US? Oh. Launch window for Europe! Well, if you put it that way, it makes sense. So, for those of you wondering, Heavenly Sword hasn’t been moved forward in the launch frame, nor has it been delayed. The difference between Japan/North Ameria launch window and the European launch window might have caused a few rumors to spark into existence, only to be snuffed out by a little bit of common sense.

This time, we’re hearing from analyst P.J. McNealy who claims the PS3 is in the final stages of production and will be able to ship 2 million units by the end of the year. Chew on this hefty quote McNealy uses to back his thoughts: “It is our opinion that given the 13 weeks or so of production time, SNE can still come close to its forecast of 2MM units worldwide by the end of December. We believe this likely means a split of 60/40 (1.2MM/800k) for North America/Japan for shipments, which are counted when invoiced off the SNE factory floor. Our research indicates that typically 10-20% of the unit shipment forecast will likely still be in the channel (en route) at the end of December and not installed in homes yet. The low end of that range is more likely simply because SNE will likely still be air-freighting and not tanker-shipping PS3s at that point.” Is it safe to say the 10-20% spread en route will be more focused on North America? Even if Japan has production in other Asian countries, Japan is still closer. Whatever. Math. The article at GameDaily also mentions the (rolling eyes whilst typing) overheating PS3 units, but we all know that’s a bunch of biased media crap. Go ahead — turn off your air conditioning and put your 360, GameCube, or PS2 into an unventilated plastic box and let it run a game for two days. If nothing happens, congratulations. Your system has no soul… and neither do you, for doing such a thing to it. Does it follow then, that Sony has no soul? Sure, because Sony is a legal entity, but not an actual one. It doesn’t need to have a soul.

Recall the horror game, Siren? Kinda sorta? It was one of those games this clever blogger always had a plan to buy, but never had the budget or the properly operating memory to get into. Supposedly, it was pretty good. So good, there are actually two Siren titles in Japan. Well, guess what? A third/second one is in the works for the PS3. There will be more details later this week… so if you liked Fatal Frame but didn’t exactly love the whole taking pictures thing, perhaps Siren is worth seeking out at your used game store. This guy’s going to look for it online right now.