Quote:I still think that the PS3's overall lifetime price is probably lower than the 360's though...)
You get what you pay for. As it is, PSN can't hold a candle to Xbox Live. Until it does, Live is the standard, and if that commands a cost to the user then so be it. The service is unmatched in terms of being a unified community with so many features. Keep in mind that Live is accessible without a subscription, and you only need Gold if you're going to play against others online.
As for all the other stuff that Sony pushes on you with its all-one-box...I don't like it. Blu-ray has yet to prove itself as a necessary game medium and I could live without wi-fi. PSN needs some MAJOR work done on it.
Quote:You get what you pay for. As it is, PSN can't hold a candle to Xbox Live. Until it does, Live is the standard, and if that commands a cost to the user then so be it. The service is unmatched in terms of being a unified community with so many features. Keep in mind that Live is accessible without a subscription, and you only need Gold if you're going to play against others online.
True... PSN does manage to beat the Nintendo network, but that's only because they actually HAVE a network beyond the online store... and yes, Xbox Live clearly is better than the Playstation Network. Still, it's expensive... feature-equivilance on the PC costs nothing, not $50 a year.
Quote:As for all the other stuff that Sony pushes on you with its all-one-box...I don't like it. Blu-ray has yet to prove itself as a necessary game medium and I could live without wi-fi. PSN needs some MAJOR work done on it.
Agreed here. But it makes sense... as an addon Blu-Ray would be mostly ignored, but as an integral part of the system it moves a lot more Blu-Ray drives to sell their movies on! Sony didn't think that people would abandon them just because the price was double the starting price for their last system... :)
In a related note, Sony loves Europe...
http://kotaku.com/gaming/sony/pal-ps3-ba...239076.php
... so much that they think Europeans will by the PS2 even if it doesn't have full PS1/PS2 backwards compatibility, because they've removed most of the PS2 chipset from the European PS3 and are relying on software emulation like the 360 has.
Of course, this comes after last week some online UK stores said 'preorders for the PS3 are very, very strong', so... we'll see if Europe actually punishes Sony for all this stuff (not that historically Nintendo has been any better of course... they've been just as bad... still though, that doesn't make what Sony did okay, even if they did obviously do it just to save money on a losing product.)