Playstation 3 Submitted Wednesday, January 10, 2007 - 4:27:35 PM by Klaitu
Yep. I finally got ahold of one. It was a little tricky, but I succeeded. I recently read over on Penny-Arcade about how PS3's were becoming un-rare suddenly, so I decided to take a local survey to see if this observation was true in my area.
So, I had my sweet Destiny call over to the local Best Buy, and they said they had 5 of them or so. So, after diverting my PS3 fundage into a spendable account, I let it rock and roll and Des took me down to that very same Best Buy, and there it was.. there was only one of them left.. and yours truly snagged it!
And, you know.. there is a certain amount of shame associated with carrying around a console so large the box has a handle like a suitcase.
So, I finally got it home. I connected it to my TV via a HDMI cable. Of course, I bought that seperately months ago.. It came with standard AV cables out of the box, the connector for S-video, component, and composite cables to the PS3 is the same one they used for the PS2. If you've already got the cables, they will still work.
The interface is pretty much exactly the same kind as the PSP uses. It even has the same ticks and clicks for navigation sounds. It makes more sense to me than the 360's interface, with it's nested menus and whatnot to access videos and media.
The sixaxis controller is almost ridiculously light, It's lighter than a PS2 controller, and it's way lighter than the 360's controllers.. even if you remove the battery pack thingy from them.
So far as functionality, it works the same as the 360.. the PS button turns the console on and off, sets which player the controller is and all that.
The only disadvantage I see is that to change the battery, you have to unscrew the rear panel of the sixaxis to get to it.
My 60GB model of the PS3 features Wi-Fi support, which is nice. it connected brilliantly to my existing network with no problems. It even supported WEP with no trouble.
The PS3 features a remote play feature with the PSP, it basically turns the PSP into a minature PS3 screen. any media you have on the PS3 can be shared on the PSP. This doesn't include games, however. While it's kind of a neat feature, I can't really see myself using it all that much.. the PSP has to be within wi-fi range of the PS3. If I'm in that range, then why do I need a portable screen? I will just watch it on my HDTV!
Maybe they plan on making the PS3 accessable through any hotspot. That might be useful.
The PS3's answer to Xbox Live Marketplace is the Playstation Network Store. While Live isn't hard to navigate, the PSN Store makes more sense to me. It's essentially a webpage where you click on whatever you like. Easy to get into because you've done it all before. Also, PSN uses real money, and not some silly points system. Live stomps the PSN on one thing, though. A download queue. On the 360, once you set something to downloading, you can go and browse for more stuff to download, or play a game or whatever. With PSN, you get to wait for the download to complete before you can do anything else. This is something that seriously needs fixing.
Due to the PSN, I was able to download neato PS3 demos, since I didn't have the cash for a game. The sales tax on the system alone was 50 bucks! I downloaded a bunch of them, but I'm going to focus on motorstorm, because its the only one I know of that uses the sixaxis motion sensing capability.
Motorstorm is an off-road racing game where you drive a truck or other kind of vehicle around a dusty track. You can use the analog sticks, or you can use the motion sensing ability of the sixaxis to drive.
The controller works great, it's super sensitive to your input, and is not broken or sluggish in any way. In fact, it may be a little too sensitive. I was overcorrecting all over the place at first. After about an hour or so, I had the hang of it.. or so I thought. I switched the controller into analog stick mode and I was instantly a lot better at driving.
The motion controls are novel, but not very practical.. at least, not in this particular game. I'd prefer the stick every single time.
So, what about the graphics? Everyone wants to know which looks better. The answer is.. it depends on the game. Gran Turismo HD puts anything the 360 has to shame, but most of the PS3's launch titles are not that swell looking. Resistance: Fall of Man looks like something you might see on the 360, for instance.
At any rate, it seems a solid system, and I look forward to more awesome games in the future!
Overall Score: 9 of 10
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