So, PlayStation Home is out. Many of you have experienced connection issues, but many others have managed to jump into the long-delayed online environment. We're wondering what you think about Home -- is it everything you hoped for? Or, do you agree with what Penny Arcade says: "it is nothing more than a cumbersome menu, a rampart over which you must hoist yourself to accomplish the most basic tasks." (That's incorrect! Where else can you have the joy of Quincy-ing? [video after the break])
Granted, this is an "Open Beta," which means many services and events just aren't available yet. There's a good deal of potential, as evidenced by Jem's recent visit to a Home press event. So, while we wait for the Spike VGAs, let us know what you think about Home in our poll.
Did anyone else notice that with the latest firmware update, the PLAYSTATION Store and PLAYSTATION Network have reverted back to the less-loud PlayStation Store and PlayStation Network. Does this mean the PS3 is now PlayStation 3 (it's officially spelled PLAYSTATION 3)? What do you prefer?
It's another week for the Poll Police to roll into town and get your take on a random, but relevant, issue that has come up over the past few days. While there are tons of new things on the PlayStation Store, we're most interested to see if you've tried the new offering from Q Games, the folks who brought the acclaimed PixelJunk Monsters. Their new title, PixelJunk Eden, has a demo up on the store right now that allows for a surprising amount of play. Have you tried it?
Our opinion? We've tried it out and we're pretty sure it's going to be a fun game. It's simple to pick up and play, has an excellent musical feel to it, and just plain makes us smile. Even though the full game isn't out yet, we're very excited to see what Q Games has in store for us after this game. You can check out the results from last week's poll after the cut.
It's over. E3 has come to an end and the Sony camp has stolen the show. To some people. To others, they did nothing. Still others claim their opinion lies somewhere in the middle. Today, the Poll Police are putting these different opinions to the test: will more people think back on E3 positively or negatively? How did you feel about this year's E3 for Sony?
We looked back at everything that was announced or displayed at the Sony press conference and there actually was quite a bit worthwhile mentioned. However, did the Final Fantasy XIII announcement overshadow a smattering of decently good things? Were the Sony offerings not your cup of tea? Whatever your reason, it is justified simply because it is your opinion. That's what matters. Our last poll relied on your opinions, too, and look how that turned out.
[Update: we had a snafu where two polls were displayed. The error has been corrected and we apologize for any inconvenience and confusion.]
The Poll Police want to check on something this week since all squad members at HQ (being we, the bloggers) did not have any issues with the 2.40 firmware update. Was the faulty firmware widespread, or limited to enough people that it was a minor issue, but the internet was set on fire anyway because it's fun to rain on somebody's parade? That's probably a loaded question, so let's reword that in the form of a poll.
As noted earlier, none of us had any issues with it and it'll be interesting to see just how many of you intrepid readers have experienced whatever negative issues came with the firmware. What about the results from our last poll? Check 'em out after the 'continue reading' cut below.
The biggest games of the summer have launched. Grand Theft Auto IV and Metal Gear Solid 4 have found places on the shelves of millions of gamers and all is well and good. Or is it? What will you do when these games are finished, in your eyes? Is there more to be had this summer, or is it time to pull out the ol' SNES and finally master that F-Zero track? Maybe even crack out the ol' NES and finally realize games have become much simpler since the days of Battletoads?
We've always got plenty of use for our PS3 -- it's playing our movies, music, and anything we've got stuck on our external hard drives. There are a ton of games to rent and even more in our backlog. While there aren't any big releases until later on in the year, we'll be plenty busy until then. Want to know last week's poll results? Take a look after the cut.
It's time for one last push for Metal Gear Solid 4. Really, nothing else this week was as big or important as finally seeing the release of one of PlayStation's biggest titles. So now that you've had some time with it, what do you think? What are your impressions of the game?
If you're leaving a comment in addition to voting, make sure you remain spoiler-free for all those who may not have gotten nearly as far as you. This is one game where not knowing where the story will go is a very important part of the experience. Speaking of experiences, last week's poll results deal with your experience in purchasing the game. See how many of your colleagues were out at midnight with you, or how many of you are sitting back with a scowl, as you ignore the game completely.
It's another poll! The Poll Police are asking a pretty obvious one this week, as the PS3 faces its most ambitious software release so far (arguably). Metal Gear Solid 4 hits the streets on June 12, with some lucky souls getting copies early somehow, and we want to know if you're going out there to get it when the time comes.
We know we'll be out there for the midnight release -- even if there isn't one, we'll still sit outside our local gaming store and claw pitifully at the door until we're either chased away with a broom or given a plate of hot cereal and welcomed inside. Although, it's over 100 degrees where we are, so hot cereal could be replaced with "breakfast ice cream". It exists, surely. Last week's poll results are up next, so why not take a look at those as well?
We don't normally fall into the "sign this petition" realm of things. However, many of the staff at PS3 Fanboy have felt the reason they bought a PS3, aside from their blind love for the console by itself, has been ignored. This reason is what made the PS One and PS2 so successful (believe it or not): the JRPG. Only a few have been announced, even fewer coming stateside. While we probably won't see the likes of Agarest Senki or Tears to Tiara here, we'll see Disgaea 3 and Valkyria Chronicles before the end of the year -- however, these all are SRPG's.
Over at the PS3Forums, a petition has started and is getting swirled around to many different places, with its final destination being Sony itself. The petition is to get an answer about Sony's stance on the JRPG this generation -- are announcements coming? Will we see White Knight Story, Star Ocean 4, the oft-rumored Shin Megami Tensei PS3 title at all this year? If you love JRPG's, sign their petition. It only takes a few seconds and who knows -- it might actually get us a pretty detailed answer. Especially now that Sony is more eager to secure exclusives from third party developers.
The Poll Police were off on a quest to protect and serve at a wedding last week, so consider yourselves off the hook for any unnecessary polling shenanigans. This week, however, we have a new issue to ask your opinion on – and by new, we mean something we've heard over and over again. A new firmware is on the horizon and with it, rumors of its contents. We've heard in-game XMB access, 2-D trophies on the XMB, murmurs of Blu-ray movie playability on the PSP, and more. None of it is confirmed and most of it is heresay, but there seems to be a lot of faith in this round of firmware rumors. What's your take?
Personally, we're feeling pretty good about this one. The firmware is supposedly scheduled to hit at or before the launch of Metal Gear Solid 4, so the timing would be rather convenient – a flagship PlayStation title with some sought-after features launching right with it. Sounds good, but is it too good to be true? Give us two weeks. Last week's poll results are after the cut, also.
This week we learned that Haze will demand you to free up 4GB of space on your PS3's hard drive so it can eliminate load times from the game completely. The internet set itself on fire when Capcom revealed Devil May Cry 4 would come with a PS3 install as part of the deal, but there's been little hubbub over this game. Is it due to its PS3 exclusivity? Either way, we want to gauge how you feel about these constant installs and if it's impacted your hard drive space at all.
We just slapped a 350GB hard drive into our PS3's at the Poll Police Headquarters, so we're not hurting for space. Our wallets, on the other hand, are a bit frazzled. Still, those who purchased a 20GB machine will either be forced to make a similar purchase, or selectively delete and re-install older games. If you want to see last week's poll results, they're right after the cut.
Finally! Something the Officers of Opinion can have pride in taking votes for has come to pass. Perhaps some of you are not aware of the most recent GameTrailers debacle, but it goes something like this: a new racing game called GRID got its chance at a video comparison on their site and from the video posted, the 360 was implied to have more dynamic and compelling footage. The PS3 version seemed like a prettied-up last-gen borefest. However! GameTrailers used PS3 footage for both sides of the comparison. Watch the above video, ripped from their site with some added narrative, to draw your own conclusions then tell us what you think.
First off, thanks to everyone who alerted us to this. The comparison video and all related comments have since been removed from their site, which is a telling sign they've recognized something had gone wrong. Whether it was their evil ploy foiled or an error in creating, posting, or citing the console for the video, we'll probably never know. But mass opinion is often heralded as universal truth for some odd reason, so your vote really does matter. Last week's poll results are also posted, so give them a look as well, if you're interested.
Speaking to Destructoid, Aaron Greenberg, Director of Product Management for Xbox 360 and Xbox Live, added fuel to the red-hot fanboy fire when discussing PS3's upcoming lineup for 2008. Greenberg's statement is certainly going to inspire some truly extraordinary comments from PS3 and Xbox 360 fans alike. While he is a Microsoft spokesperson, we wonder: do his complaints have merit? Read on:
"I know a lot of folks enjoy watching the console wars and we would never underestimate our competition. But answer to your question specifically, didn't Sony promise all of this last year including Home as well? We have been fighting Sony's promises from the day we entered the market and if you remember at that time it was all about PS2 being an online cybercity with partner announcements from the likes of RealNetworks and AOL. Then three years ago at E3 they showed what PS3 games would supposedly look like with the Killzone 2 video, that we are now learning will ship four years later. That means that we will have shipped Gears of War and Gears of War 2 before they can even get Killzone out the door," he said. "Think back to GDC 2007 when Sony promised to leap ahead in online with the Sony Home unveil. Here we are two years later and multiple delays for a product that appears to have little to no buzz. Where are the achievements? The friends list integration across all games? Where is the long-promised video store? Where are all the other products using and networking with their CELL chip? How come Blu-ray did not result in better games? What happened with Sixaxis and rumble? Where is the complete 1080p game library we were promised? If Blu-ray as they said would be such a catalyst to PS3 console sales, then why have PS3 sales over the past couple months not seen any lift since the format victory?"
Certainly, being a Playstation devotee has been frustrating. The system has been plagued by a slow start, and a number of key delays. Home and in-game XMB continue to be promises that have failed to materialize. This is a "ten year life cycle" on Sony's part -- but should that mean we should wait so long for the good stuff?
It's sort of sickening on the Poll Police's side of things -- we dig and dig through muck all day to uncover bits of news for your consumption. What makes this sickening is the recent trend for our fields o' news farming to get inundated with threads about people's problems with Grand Theft Auto IV. We don't mean problems in the game, beating a mission, or the like ... we mean the frequent freezing issues, console destruction tales, or horribly unstable online component. We know Rockstar has admitted to a few of these problems and issued their own hackneyed fix. We want to know if any of you actually did this just to play the game. We're not judging you. We're just curious.
A patch would be nice, but instead, we get to delete pretty much everything on our PS3 to make the game work? Sounds pretty pathetic to us, but hey, ostensible perfection demands sacrifice, right? Don't get us started. Last week's poll is after the jump, so check out those results while we have your attention!
It's still the buzz around the internet, despite the reviews trickling out for Grand Theft Auto IV. We're talking about Metal Gear Online, of course. While it shouldn't be taken as canon, the Poll Police have noticed people on their PlayStation Network buddy list citing their thoughts of the beta in their comments. Some enjoy it, others do not. So, as protectors of personal opinion, we ask you your feelings of the beta so far.
We'll probably be writing a big impression on the beta ourselves in the coming days or weeks -- so look forward to what we think as well! Of course, ours are only as valid an opinion as each and every one of you. We'd hate to pretend ours are more important when that's obviously foolish. Anyway, if you're curious about last week's poll related to Konami ID's, check out the results after the jump.
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