27th October 2004, 10:21 PM
Anyway, as I had said a bit ago, great price move, bad on battery life. ABF, battery life HAS made massive technological strides, and still is. It's just that you can't just FORCE creativity. Jobs of thinking are different from physical labor jobs. In physical labor, more money will get it done, you can always brute force it. With thinking, you can't brute force a solution. What are ya gonna do, take a running start to the drawing board like Homer Simpson did? It just takes time and exposing yourself to as much information as possible.
Anyway, li-ion is a recent example, and look what it's done for things. Ni-ca batteries always sucked. I mean, remember having toys with those batteries where you had half an hour of charge and it took 10 hours to restore it? Yeah, that's about right, they sucked. li-ion batteries are a great advancement, but it's just that they aren't quite enough for moving parts when they are as small as they need to be to be portable. Problem is, the next battery advancement, fuel cells, will have instant recharge, but it'll take going to the store and getting more methanol and such. Methanol is cheap, and there is just no way someone can monopolize it to the point where they are charging ridiculous prices (though different companies can always claim "purity" ), but you'll need to go shopping every now and then for a few barrels of the stuff. That's right, we be goin' back to barrels!
Oh right, with this price, the DS and the PSP are almost on even grounds. ABF, I completely forgot about the need for a memory card (shoulda figured that out myself really), but that's still only a bit more than $50 for the system compaired to the DS. Price has done wonders now and then for the GCN though... Eh, anyway, I'd say that the battery life may make a difference, but actually I have to wonder exactly how much people care about battery life any more... It's always been taken for granted that the GG's horrid sales were a result of the battery life, but it's also the games it had. Well, horrid sales were to blame for the poor game selection, and it DID have Sonic the Hedgehog which shoulda given it some decent sales for at least a while. Yeah, the battery life was to blame. I know that that's the first time I'd hear other kids talking in a money saving tone when discussing which one was better . "No way, that thing sucks, it needs 6 batteries and my batteries all died before I even got to my grandma's!" you'd hear the kids say, not in first person of course, oh goodness no, I sat alone because I just wasn't that popular (I'm a nerd you see).
But anyway, recharging does add something to it, but like I said, if the system is plugged in half the time, it's not being a portable gaming system. I'd say it might matter, but it all depends on whether or not the people buying it, in the majority, think of it as major or not. I kinda think they will, I know that's been the deal breaker for various family members getting laptops anyway. (My mother HATES her laptop entirely because the battery life is so poor she can't play Syberia 2 on the go for more than a few hours without needing a recharge. Wow, that was pretty applicable... The fact that the battery is only a small part of the technology didn't matter to her. For her, the whole system is one big thing, and any single component acting up destroys the worth of the whole thing, much in the same way as a flat tire destroys the worth of an entire car. Another "major flaw" is a plastic bit that broke off the ethernet port which means cables won't stay put without tape. Again, she doesn't care that it's "only a bit of plastic, look at all da powers of da system!", it's the fact that she has this huge hassle doing one of the two things she even wants the computer for, and really, that's a very honest way to see things. If you can't do what you wanted to do, it really doesn't matter that it's such a minor part that's getting in the way, you can't do it.)
The price was a major worry of pretty much all of us. Most of us were "sure" the thing wouldn't be released at near the price of the DS due sheerly to the loss, only admitting that "oh, Sony MIGHT do it, but they would have to bleed money!". It doesn't matter that we had that back door though, we genuinly thought it would be more expensive, thanks in part to, well, everything we knew about it and everything Sony was saying about "different markets". It's certainly pretty expensive, and before the DS was announced, we were pretty right in the price, but $300 it is not. It's actually AFFORDABLE. Yahoo!
For those of you "worried", well, I would say it's not much to worry about. I've shown the systems to all my relatives (some of them really seemed like they were just humoring me... and of those, a few were kids... talk about feeling like a huge geek...), but for those who actually, when I left, started watching the movies I pulled the page up for on their own, the general consensus was they really wanted the DS more than the PSP. The two screens, in and of themselves, ARE a freaking gimic. There's not much reason aside from price in construction that those screens can't just be one big screen that the software divides up to do different things. That's what games already do after all, and two screens does nothing more than add extra space, something that making a really big screen would also do. But, BUT, the touch screen IS a major component. And, from what I've seen, it's an attention grabber. Kids love it! More than that, so do a lot of not so tech savvy adults! I mean, watching little movies like that does sorta grab at you. I decided not to mention the power of the systems, though I'm sure Sony WILL be pushing that. They won't revert to the old days I don't think... (remember, in this generation, none of the companies have had a "graphics ad campaign" where they just advertise their system as the most powerful thing since super powered 4 toast toasting toasters with a small oven in it, for TOAST), but I bet Sony will be showing all sorts of super high graphics scenes from the games in such a way that they don't have to actually say their's is more powerful.
And with that, Peter Griffin.
Peter: I know how to get outta this situation! Go go gadget rocket legs! *head becomes blimp* No, I said rocket legs, aaaaah aaahhh aaaaahhh!
Anyway, li-ion is a recent example, and look what it's done for things. Ni-ca batteries always sucked. I mean, remember having toys with those batteries where you had half an hour of charge and it took 10 hours to restore it? Yeah, that's about right, they sucked. li-ion batteries are a great advancement, but it's just that they aren't quite enough for moving parts when they are as small as they need to be to be portable. Problem is, the next battery advancement, fuel cells, will have instant recharge, but it'll take going to the store and getting more methanol and such. Methanol is cheap, and there is just no way someone can monopolize it to the point where they are charging ridiculous prices (though different companies can always claim "purity" ), but you'll need to go shopping every now and then for a few barrels of the stuff. That's right, we be goin' back to barrels!
Oh right, with this price, the DS and the PSP are almost on even grounds. ABF, I completely forgot about the need for a memory card (shoulda figured that out myself really), but that's still only a bit more than $50 for the system compaired to the DS. Price has done wonders now and then for the GCN though... Eh, anyway, I'd say that the battery life may make a difference, but actually I have to wonder exactly how much people care about battery life any more... It's always been taken for granted that the GG's horrid sales were a result of the battery life, but it's also the games it had. Well, horrid sales were to blame for the poor game selection, and it DID have Sonic the Hedgehog which shoulda given it some decent sales for at least a while. Yeah, the battery life was to blame. I know that that's the first time I'd hear other kids talking in a money saving tone when discussing which one was better . "No way, that thing sucks, it needs 6 batteries and my batteries all died before I even got to my grandma's!" you'd hear the kids say, not in first person of course, oh goodness no, I sat alone because I just wasn't that popular (I'm a nerd you see).
But anyway, recharging does add something to it, but like I said, if the system is plugged in half the time, it's not being a portable gaming system. I'd say it might matter, but it all depends on whether or not the people buying it, in the majority, think of it as major or not. I kinda think they will, I know that's been the deal breaker for various family members getting laptops anyway. (My mother HATES her laptop entirely because the battery life is so poor she can't play Syberia 2 on the go for more than a few hours without needing a recharge. Wow, that was pretty applicable... The fact that the battery is only a small part of the technology didn't matter to her. For her, the whole system is one big thing, and any single component acting up destroys the worth of the whole thing, much in the same way as a flat tire destroys the worth of an entire car. Another "major flaw" is a plastic bit that broke off the ethernet port which means cables won't stay put without tape. Again, she doesn't care that it's "only a bit of plastic, look at all da powers of da system!", it's the fact that she has this huge hassle doing one of the two things she even wants the computer for, and really, that's a very honest way to see things. If you can't do what you wanted to do, it really doesn't matter that it's such a minor part that's getting in the way, you can't do it.)
The price was a major worry of pretty much all of us. Most of us were "sure" the thing wouldn't be released at near the price of the DS due sheerly to the loss, only admitting that "oh, Sony MIGHT do it, but they would have to bleed money!". It doesn't matter that we had that back door though, we genuinly thought it would be more expensive, thanks in part to, well, everything we knew about it and everything Sony was saying about "different markets". It's certainly pretty expensive, and before the DS was announced, we were pretty right in the price, but $300 it is not. It's actually AFFORDABLE. Yahoo!
For those of you "worried", well, I would say it's not much to worry about. I've shown the systems to all my relatives (some of them really seemed like they were just humoring me... and of those, a few were kids... talk about feeling like a huge geek...), but for those who actually, when I left, started watching the movies I pulled the page up for on their own, the general consensus was they really wanted the DS more than the PSP. The two screens, in and of themselves, ARE a freaking gimic. There's not much reason aside from price in construction that those screens can't just be one big screen that the software divides up to do different things. That's what games already do after all, and two screens does nothing more than add extra space, something that making a really big screen would also do. But, BUT, the touch screen IS a major component. And, from what I've seen, it's an attention grabber. Kids love it! More than that, so do a lot of not so tech savvy adults! I mean, watching little movies like that does sorta grab at you. I decided not to mention the power of the systems, though I'm sure Sony WILL be pushing that. They won't revert to the old days I don't think... (remember, in this generation, none of the companies have had a "graphics ad campaign" where they just advertise their system as the most powerful thing since super powered 4 toast toasting toasters with a small oven in it, for TOAST), but I bet Sony will be showing all sorts of super high graphics scenes from the games in such a way that they don't have to actually say their's is more powerful.
And with that, Peter Griffin.
Peter: I know how to get outta this situation! Go go gadget rocket legs! *head becomes blimp* No, I said rocket legs, aaaaah aaahhh aaaaahhh!
"On two occasions, I have been asked [by members of Parliament], 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able to rightly apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question." ~ Charles Babbage (1791-1871)