Sony Launches Official PlayStation Blog

Sony has announced the official launch of the PlayStation.blog. Intended, perhaps, to combat the current monopoly on internet-based PR Microsoft seems to have, the blog looks to be a place where high-ranked Sony employees can have their say. There are just a few posts up so far, but they're already asking for freedback. One by Eric Lampell, Senior Manager for the PlayStation Network, caught my eye. It discusses the recent PS3 firmware update, and features the upgrades included in that patch. As you can tell by the language, they still need to work on the site's tone. "That's one of the best things about PS3 - it's constantly being updated with new features. With 1.80, you can now upscale PlayStation® and PlayStation®2 games and DVD movies, up to 1080p if your TV supports it. You home theater buffs are probably all over this upgrade already, but if you don't have an HDTV just yet, check out what upscaling does for God of War II and Shadow of the Colossus - games that were already gorgeous-looking to begin with - in these comparison screens." At least they're trying.

Late to the party?

[shoptroll]

Well MS has Nelson. Nintendo has a handful of people posting content on their main webpage, not sure if that's technically blogging but sometimes there's blog-esque postings... I always assumed Sony had something similar already.

What monopoly?

[rob1980]

You make it sound as though Sony has never engaged in "internet-based PR" [videogamesblogger.com]

Re:

[iainl]

That, however, was a lying campaign by someone claiming to be a random member of the public who really, really wanted a Sony product because it is "cool".

This looks to be closer to the Sony equivalent of Major Nelson that they've needed for ages. A voice, with official ties to get the information that they're printing reliable, but just independant enough to sound like a real person and not just a script from the PR department, who lets console owners know what the new things available are, and even more i

Honesty is the best policy

[ChowRiit]

If it's obviously marketing and rhetoric, noone is going to take it seriously. They need to be honest and open if they want anyone to find their blog interesting or worthwhile, and maybe make it actually interesting, rather than an obvious gimmick done to try and shift a few more PS3s. Honestly, how long will it be before major corporations realise this? Do they honestly not think, and just try to get in on new trends without considering whether they're doing WELL?

Stop me if you've heard this one

[jollyreaper]

"When the blog rolls over, we'll all be dead!"

Sony fanboys, mod this +5 Inciteful.

An Open Blog

[ewhac]

Anyone can contribute to the blog, but if you want your posts to have formatting, hyperlinks, non-Latin characters, and paragraph breaks, you need to become an official licensed Sony developer and sign an NDA.

</snark>,
Schwab

Re:

[Drey]

A veritable drought of publishable Oracularities does tend to make one snarky.

I can see it now...

[AKAImBatman]

..."All I want for Christmas is my Pee-Ess-Three"

*groan*

Sung by the ever talented Kaz Harai!

*bigger groan*

Now remixed by a rap legend (that no one has ever heard of) to include a techno beat and "RIIIIIIIIDGE RACERRR!" screams in the background!

*just shoot me now*

Re:

[adona1]

I also gather they're planning to spraypaint [wikipedia.org] the blog's URL all over town. The kids dig reading their blogs and interwebs when they have cred, man ;)

First blog post

[gad_zuki!]

First entry:

mood: sad music: something depressing

Subject: haterz

peeps say i cost too much, like wtf i only cost like 100 more than xbox (boo!) and I come with a
bluray playuer!!!@!#! suckit haterz!! ('-'*)

--sony

comparison shots

[Gogo0]

I know that upscaling can make things look nicer, but those pics they used to show it off sucked ass!
It looks to me like the PS3 just blurs the picture, I'm sure they could do a better job on comparison pics than what is up there now.

Re:

[DrXym]

I don't know what the fuss is about with PS2 upscaling. Any modern TV set should be able to upscale for itself. The only place where it would be any use would be to transform an interlaced game into progressive scan or if the set is broken. That might make it worthwhile.

What would be REALLY COOL is if the PS2 rendered at a higher resolution, i.e. transform and render all data into 1080p graphics buffer rather than upscaling a smaller one. It wouldn't do much for bitmaps and textures but polygons would be

Re:comparison shots

[Pluvius]

I don't know what the fuss is about with PS2 upscaling. Any modern TV set should be able to upscale for itself.

The PS3 upscaler is better than the upscaler on many TVs. Same thing with the DVD upscaler.

Rob

Re:

[buffer-overflowed]

Only because the scaler is the thing they skimp on when you buy something that's a "good deal". Most HDTV scalers well, sucks ass. ESPECIALLY on cheaper sets, which most people buy. You can tell these people because they think the PS3 makes things look better.

Really, that's not saying much. If scaling was important to you(as it was to me), then you included it as a factor in which display your purchased. Not all of them are bad, and I wouldn't be surprised if the PS3s was not at the top of the charts,

Re:

[MikeBabcock]

Your post shows a severe lack of knowledge of upscaling technology. The best upscaling is impossible to achieve at the display end, after the image has been decoded and transmitted in a static form. The best upscaling for, say, a DVD should be done in the midst of decoding. You can use next frame data for example to infer more resolution than is actually encoded in any one frame, you can do a much better job of detecting (and fixing) macroblocking problems as well.

Now sure, you can get really good upscal

Re:

[buffer-overflowed]

DLP and LCD based televisions, computer displays, and projectors have to scale any image that isn't at their native resolution to their native resolution. The quality of this makes an enormous difference in image quality, and is worth looking into if you plan on ever watching anything on a given display that isn't at, or can't be scaled to, it's native resolution. The consequences of a display doing this poorly are clearly visible. This is what me and the now great-grandparent post were talking about. O

Re:

[edwdig]

What would be REALLY COOL is if the PS2 rendered at a higher resolution, i.e. transform and render all data into 1080p graphics buffer rather than upscaling a smaller one. It wouldn't do much for bitmaps and textures but polygons would be gorgeous at 1080p. Some of the screenshots [pcsx2.net] from the PCSX2 emulator show how lovely it could look. Unfortunately PCSX2 runs like a dog, but perhaps the PS3 has the capabilities to actually pull this off, at least for some games.

See Ocarina of Time on the GameCub

Re:

[donaldm]

The comparison shots IMHO are not very convincing and do look blurry however I do have a PS3 and a 37" 720p/1080i HDTV and the PS3 does upscale my PS1 and PS2 games via HDMI or component. Don't expect PS1 games to come out like PS2 games they won't however the output is such that my PS1 games are pleasing graphically although this does depend on the graphics quality of the game originally. For PS2 games the PS3 does a very good job in smoothing and up-scaling and to me this ads to the re-playability of the

What's next, add PS3 as a friend on MySpace?

[mattgreen]

I can't wait to get bulletins from a game console! "Hey everyone, I got my firmware updated today! Check it out!"

Re:

[ericrost]

just had to:

http://www.360voice.com/tag/bean1979 [360voice.com]

Re:

[donaldm]

I got mine (v1.8) when it came out and it is IMHO fantastic. I have an Australian PS3 and have only three PS2 games out of fifty that have issues, the rest just work (also includes 20 PS1 games) with smoothing and upscaling to my HDTV. Of course your post comes across as someone who can't afford a PS3 or is very anti PS3 so it is rather pointless explaining how to set up WiFi, Linux, Media Center, Communicating with your PC (Linux and MS Windows), using Flash cards, adding and using usb devices, retrofittin

Pretty patronizing

[HalAtWork]

It seems pretty patronizing, it takes standard PR and then paraphrase it in the tone of someone from their average demographic, at least as far as they can guess, and then they pat themselves on the back constantly. Does anyone actually want to read it? It's already enough of a pain in the ass trying to extract the information from press releases.

wait a minute...

[rupert0]

They have Digg this link but no /. !!
I say the hell with them !

Work on the tone?

[Pluvius]

As you can tell by the language, they still need to work on the site's tone.

Why? It looks like any other piece of official PR to me. The only reason you don't see this stuff on Major Nelson is because posts on there are only a couple of sentences long, and even then you see buzzwords like "groundbreaking" and "blockbuster."

Rob

PS3- Blog

[Trent Hawkins]

Day 1: Can't wait till Metal Gear Solid comes out!
Day 2: Still waiting for Metal Gear Solid!
Day 3: Oh man, I just saw a new screen shot from Metal Gear Solid!
Day 4: still waiting...

First post failure...

[earthbound kid]

I tried to get first post in the comments, but it costs $600! :-( At that rate, I'm not going to bother until they post on Metal Gear or GTA at least.

I can't figure it out

[DefenderThree]

How has the entire Sony marketing department not been fired by now? Is the marketing chair sleeping with Stringer or something?