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Sony The Almighty Buck Entertainment Games

PS3 Price, Compatibility In Question 62

Posted by Zonk from the what-will-they-do? dept.
Lots of rumours out there right now about the next-gen consoles. It's in question, right now, exactly how backwards compatible the PS3 will be. Gamespot reports: "When responding to questions about whether or not the SCPH-75000's backwards-compatibility issues heralded similar problems with Sony's next-gen console, she demurred. 'It's hard to say the PlayStation 3 will be 100 percent backwards compatible but as we said earlier this year we aim to make it so as much as possible,' Sakamoto said," Meanwhile, 1up.com wonders exactly how pricey the console will be. From that article: "In the past months, the Japanese blog CoolGamer has been a dependable source of early information regarding the Japanese game market. Not once has their news turned out to be a false lead, so that's why it was pretty important today when the site updated with a small notice saying 'PS3 price set below 40000 Yen,' which is about $400 at current exchange rates."
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PS3 Price, Compatibility In Question More

PS3 Price, Compatibility In Question

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  • Wait for it. (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Mr.Dippy ( 613292 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @09:42AM (#13888496)
    Maybe there is something wrong with me, but I'm not very excited about PS3 or XBox360. I've seen too many console releases come and go over since the 1990's. Every single time a console comes out it usually takes about 6 months to a year before anything seems worth wild to buy and for the initial price to come down. I got a DS for Christmas and that thing was $150 and it took about 8 months for any must have games to come out for it. Now the thing is selling for something like 120-130 dollars. I should have just waited to buy the DS in July. I guess my point is that I'm not concerned about the PS3 price because if I buy one it won't be until next Christmas or even sometime in early 2007.
    • i feel the same way, but maybe its my atari 2600/oric-1 heritage .. i'm only going to get consoles that let me make my own games on them, as well, and not just act as a push-/publishing platform for fat rich media execs.

      like this one, for example... [gpx2.com]

      i hope there will be others. xbox/ps3 boxen might be 'sexy hardware', but its crap to only be able to run games that other people 'allow' you to run .. or write. or not.
    • Some random guy isn't excited about the PS3 or Xbox 360 and that's "interesting?" The crack-smoking moderators are back! If anything, it should be moderated "insanely boring" or "completely off-topic" or "if you're not interested, why the hell did you even read the article, much less comment on it?"

  • Masters of the obvious (Score:5, Funny)

    by ivan256 ( 17499 ) * on Thursday October 27, 2005 @09:42AM (#13888497)
    Wow, speculation that the price of a next-gen technology will be about the same as the price of next-gen technology that was already announced by a competitor, and speculation that there will be minor incompatibilities with older software on new hardware.

    In other news, when the cloudiness clears up the sky will probably be blue.

    • Re:Masters of the obvious (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      This isn't speculating that the PS3 is going to be the same price as the Xbox360. The PS2 launched in Japan for something around 39,000Y, which is close to $400US. Exactly the same as the PS1 launched for in Japan, and what the PS3 is rumored to be aiming for in its price point. Here's the thing: Sony also launched those two consoles in the US for $299. If this trend was followed, it would make a fully capable PS3 cost less than a fully capable Xbox360 (and don't nod to the crippled $299 version, since
      • This isn't speculating that the PS3 is going to be the same price as the Xbox360.

        Yes it is (in Japan). The 360 will cost about 38,000 yen. Otherwise known as slightly under 40,000 yen. Otherwise known as exactly what this article is talking about...

        The real question is how a blogger on 1up.com drawing conclusions on information from another blogger who is apparently purely speculating (albiet with data that is a safe bet) considered interesting enough to be "news"?
  • My venerated PS2 is getting flaky after 4 years (some games don't recognize the controller anymore, like Burnout 3). I was willing to hold off on getting a new one until the PS3 comes out, but I'm not happy to hear that months of waiting might not give me what I want after all.
    • Doesn't it concern you a bit that this has happened? When I was a kid you expected your consoles to last, and they did, my NES still boots up fine and every games works (after I've brushed off the dust) the same with my spectrum 48k! But my XBox died after just 2 years of abuse.

      We should be upgrading because the new console offers something that we need (better gameplay more realisitic deaths, whatever floats your boat) not because the hardware is 'flaky' after just a few short years.
      • It may be just me but I've had the opposite experience. My Atari's, NES, and Family Com's were always dying on me, mainly from changing cartridges. The cartridges themselves would also go bad fairly quickly. Thanks to MAME I can still play these classics that I have sitting in my closet.

        My XBox has not died on me once. I find it to be much more reliable than the old hardware.

        That being said, at the costs at which Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo, etc. have to sell the console systems, I'm sure they buy the che
        • Cartridges don't just "go bad".

          Either your unit and/or cart needed cleaned, or you should stay off the carpet, sparky.

      • "my NES still boots up fine"

        Really? My NES didn't boot up fine after about a month of use. It started acting REALLY flaky with the whole front-leading scheme they used that was so bad no one ever dared use it again. A few years ago, I managed to fashion a wiring harness using a sawed-off JAMMA connector and a Game Genie that let me play bypass that bulky black piece of carp. Now there's a group of wires running out the front of the console to a connector sitting on top of the machine that works 99% of t
      • By golly, you're right. DAMN YOU SONY! *shakes fist in anger*

        A friend of mine did share with me that he had athe same problem. He cranked open his PS2 and blew it out with air. Worked like a charm after that. I need to find my compressed air cans...
  • The key thing is, will it be compatible all the way back to PS1 or just PS2? I can live with just ps2. In fact, I still have my PS1, and they're only $20 used. And what about the hard drive? You're telling me decent emulator software can't run off of a hd on the PS3 hardware? I think there are guys on this site who could do better, so Sony better have this fixed prior to release.
    • You should know that every used psx ever has laser alignment issues, meaning it will barely run games, lag up fmvs and audio, or just refuse to load discs. Even purchased refurbished, you can count on a problem not long after, if not immediately.

      It is possible to crack them open and realign the laser yourself, however. I just wish I could still remember the specific process, but it should be somewhere online. When in doubt, tilt that sucker 45 degrees on its side.

      Also, emulators get "decent" after about a y

  • doesn't need to be 100% (Score:4, Insightful)

    by FadedTimes ( 581715 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @09:56AM (#13888571)
    Even the PS2 wasn't 100% backwards compatible with all the PS1 games. If the PS3 plays 75%+ of PS2 games and 50%+ of PS1 games, in my opinion that would be 'ok' with me. Even if Sony only hit those %'s it will already be much better than xbox360 compatibility with xbox games. I'm holding out on my opinion of Nintendo comparisons because they've only said it will play gamecube games, and haven't had any words on price for playing other past generation games (hopefully it will be free).

    As far as the price I think PS3 will come out high, but by the holidays it should come down, as long as it comes out 6months before the holidays.

    All this is just opinion with no real basis rather than what I preceive as reality.
    • Free? Yea right.. My guess is $1 for NES games 5 for SNES games 10 for N64 games, of course these prices will be for highend games, discount games will be had for much less. Hell I'd pay $20 for the original SNES NBA JAMS.
      • Nintendo has confirmed it's all free (the NES games and online play, at least). Just buy, connect online, download, and play.

        Nintendo:
        Putting the 'R' back in free!
        • Simple google search shows this to be a rumor that Nintendo has not officially confirmed. They have implied many games may be free and or offered as part of promotions and ultimatly its up to the individual game developer. Personally a dollar (or .99 cents most likly) will hit that magic hotspot that iTunes has. Afterall bandwidth cost too, free would cost them money in the long run.
    • Nintendo's GameCube was their first non cartridge-based system, so supporting it's games is feasible. How could they support older cartridge-based games on an optical disc system?
      • Speculation is (and I don't think that this has been confirmed, but someone will correct me if it has) that the Revolution will allow players to download ROMs of NES, SNES, and N64 games onto the internal storage (probably about a 1GB flash drive) from a Nintendo service.
      • Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • I found this list on a german site about what games the new PS2 has problems with playing. http://www.klamm.de/partner/unter_news.php?l_id=12 &news_id=11461 [klamm.de] Of those, I only have a single game (Chrono Cross.) There were more PS1 games they did not list however. I suspect that the list of games the PS3 will have problems with will resemble the above list to some degree, because it's likely games where the authors did some non-standard tricks or flubbed some part of the code against the specs because it

  • The price is very reasonable. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Kaldaien ( 676190 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @09:59AM (#13888586)
    $400 is a steal assuming Bluray Discs become the defacto HD format. Out of the PS3 and the XBOX 360, only one has a shot of playing HD video; HDCP (High Definition Copy Protection) only supports digital output (i.e. HDMI/DVI). The XBOX 360 does not have support for HDMI or DVI currently - Microsoft will have to make revisions to future models in order to play HD video. The PS3, however, does have HDMI output (in fact, it has TWO HDMI outputs) and ships with a Bluray drive already. I'd pay the $400 for the HD video player alone.
    • Even if it doesn't become the defacto HD format, it won't hurt the system as a gaming platform. And the games are what's going to sell the machines of this next generation, not the hardware capabilities alone. That being said, it makes it awfully appealing to those who want to have an all-in-one package, like the PS2 was with its DVD support. But the lack of standardized media has never really hurt a platform all that much. The PSP is selling fine and UMD movie sales are much higher than anticipated. T
    • The Xbox most definitely supports HD. In fact I believe every game is required to support at least 720p. While I don't know about HDMI or DVI output, it must have HD output of some type. It may be analog, but that will work on most HD tv's. The XBox also supports streaming from a Windows Media Center PC. I would assume you can stream HD from there.
    • Heh, it's even better than $400(well, depending on the exchange rate I suppose). If you were given a perfect exchange rate, at today's rates, 1 dollar = 115 yen. 40,000 yen would be a tiny bit less than $350....
    • I consider myself a pretty techie guy. But I'm not rich. I have an oldskool 26 inch tube tv (remember those?), a decent enough sound system ($250 at the time), and a sprawling DVD and video game collection.

      While you generously provide the acronym meanings, that doesn't help me in knowing what the hell they are. What I'm saying Kaldaien is that you're a rare breed. I just don't see any of those acronyms and features mattering to that many people, especially the single mother looking for a video game system
    • "Out of the PS3 and the XBOX 360, only one has a shot of playing HD video; HDCP (High Definition Copy Protection) only supports digital output (i.e. HDMI/DVI)."

      Given Sony's record with DVD playback on the PS2, it's a pretty safe bet that the DVD playback on the PS3 with be plagued with bugs. Despite multiple revisions, the PS2 still has trouble with simple things like layer transitions, chapter changes, and video/audio artifacts during playback. If Sony can't even fix those simple things - things that Chine

      • Given Sony's record with DVD playback on the PS2, it's a pretty safe bet that the DVD playback on the PS3 with be plagued with bugs. Despite multiple revisions, the PS2 still has trouble with simple things like layer transitions, chapter changes, and video/audio artifacts during playback. If Sony can't even fix those simple things - things that Chinese manufacturers with far smaller budgets and few skilled laborers can do - it's a safe bet that the PS3 is going to suck for movie playback.

        Well, as a long

    • If the PS3 actually ships with everything that has been promised, then yes the price will be quite reasonable, if not a "steal". But seeing how we're at least 6 months away (at best) for a Japan launch, and realistically, a year away from a US one ... I think its still too early for this type of conjecture. (Plus by then, the Xbox 360 will have reduced in price anyway)
  • The pricing is now interesting, as one interpritation could be that Sony over-sold the fact that PS3 was going to require you to work overtime to afford so that Microsoft would debut the Xbox360 at a high price point. Now they come in at a similar price point, with a Blue Ray drive and it looks cheap. When, of course, its as expensive as it was ever going to be.
    If this was a press release in a few weeks I'd definately suspect shenanigans.
  • I bought into the hype of PS2, how it would be an awesome console, with more polygons than your computer. I had some fun with a handful of games. This time around it will be different. I'll wait for a couple awesome games to come out, then I'll buy my system. I'll always have computer gaming and emulation to play with to tide me over. Dungeons and Dragons Online Alpha is quite fun. Action speed RPG is superior to click and wait MMORPGS of the past. I mean its not like you can't do everything you ever
    • You have some good plans, waiting for games you want to play before buying the console is a much better idea than snapping it up in the "OMG" phase at launch. However, "The only thing next gen consoles will have to offer is better graphics" is very, very wrong. Next gen, games are going to change a lot. The way developers create games is going to change, with middleware becoming the "way things are done now" so that they can concentrate on content over building game engines etc. This isn't just spin, this
      • The middleware you speak of is what I meant when I said that dev houses are maturing in their software tools. I really don't know the specifics, but I know its happening.
  • It's more like $350. Even google agrees [google.com]. $50 is going to be quite a difference when it comes to console pricing too.

  • 100% backwards compatibility not needed (Score:3, Informative)

    by RyoShin ( 610051 ) <tukaro.gmail@com> on Thursday October 27, 2005 @10:33AM (#13888808) Homepage Journal
    When the GBA was released, it was (and still is) touted for being able to play regular GB and GBC games. However, there were a handfull of games (I can't find the exact list right now) that were buggy or had sound problems on the GBA. This didn't matter, though, as the games were from the early GameBoy days and not that popular.

    I think we'll see similar things with the PS3, with the same result. Some of the early PS1 games and a few PS2 games won't work quite right on the PS3, but as long as they aren't any of the popular games, no one will really care (except those that own the then-useless games).
    • the Home Alone Gameboy game lost sound when played on a Game Boy Pocket, fortunately it was the most craptastic game ever played so no great loss
    • except those that own the then-useless games
      The only thing I'd add to what you said, with which I agree very much, is that old consoles don't magically stop working when you get a new one... presumably the people who owned these games have a console to play them on.
      • You do realize how many people trade those consoles in for $20 worth of credit at GameStop or EB, right?

        Every time a new console comes out, the market is flooded with older ones. Hell, it's even happened with variations - people trade in old PS2s for slimline models, or GBAs for SPs and, eventually, for a DS or Micro. It doesn't seem to occur to most of them that the return on your investment is so incredibly poor that you're better off just keeping the older system and games in case you'll ever want to

  • Though I wouldn't mind picking up a PS3 I am probably going to hold out for at least a few years to get one. The pricing of these consoles is just ridiculous. Who has 400 bucks to drop on just a system? After that you have to buy at least a game and then what, controllers and memory cards if there is no hard drive. Not to mention games are now going to cost $60 new rather than $50. The price of gaming is getting out of hand. I wish everyone could've ran with this generation a couple of more years seeing how
  • So does this mean the PS3 will be in that bunch of mindless jerks who will be the first against the wall when the Revolution comes?

  • Who needs backwards compatibility? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Andy_R ( 114137 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @11:22AM (#13889152) Homepage Journal
    If you have a library of PS2 games, then surely you also have a PS2 to play them on, and don;t really NEED backwards compatibility?

    I'll admit the backwards compatibility was a big influence on my decision to buy a PS2, but in reality I only used it 2 or 3 times to play old games, so this time round I'm not bothered at all.

    I was actually far more impressed with (and spent more money on) the improved re-makes of N64 Zelda games for the non-backwards-compatible Game Cube.
    • I use backwards compatability extensively. I have a PSone right now, but it's setup with the tiny LCD screen and it's more of a pain to swap it out to the TV than it's worth usually, especially when the PStwo is already hooked up there.

      The second reason is after I bought my PS2, I gave my old bulky PS1 to a relative. With backwards compatibility you really don't need to keep an old console laying around to play the old games. When I get my PS3, either my PS2 with the Linux kit or my PStwo will probably be g

  • Compatability, and a question (Score:4, Interesting)

    by wowbagger ( 69688 ) on Thursday October 27, 2005 @11:26AM (#13889181) Homepage Journal
    Both the PS3 and the Xbox360 have had questions raised about their backwards computability with the previous machines in their lineage.

    This raises an question in my mind. As I understand it, the OS within the Xbox is a stripped down Windows environment, and the games are written to that environment, which is basically DirectX.

    I've not seen anybody trying to hack Wine to provide that environment as a target, and I do not know if that is even possible. However, I do know that Wine has a DirectX layer that maps DirectX to APIs available under Linux.

    The PS3 will run Linux.

    So the question is, would it be possible to combine a modified Wine and a JIT x86 to Power compiler to allow the PS3 to run XBox games?

    Because if the PS3 were to be more compatible with old XBox games than the XBox360 I would have to have my ass reattached after I laughed it off.
    • Part of the problem with trying to run Xbox games with Wine on the PS3 is that the processors are on the same instruction set. Wine only works because the binaries are for the same chip, and the APIs can be translated on the fly.

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