At GamesCom, the PS3 wasn’t the only thing that got smaller. The entire PlayStation 3 branding was revamped to improve visibility. According to Kazuo Hirai, “when you have PlayStation 3 spelt out, the aspect ratio was such that if you wanted it on a billboard it became tiny. It didn’t work in terms of visibility.” The logo no longer uses the Spiderman font to sell out the entire system name; instead, it is now just “PS3” and uses a new font.
The first TV ads for Sony’s new PS3 Slim have surfaced online. This Japanese campaign focuses on the fun your face is having while you play video games. When we mean fun, we mean all kinds of people from different age groups and lifestyles, grunting, laughing, climaxing, what-have-you. This isn’t the first time Sony has released a odd advert to promote its products. Check out the adverts below.
The PlayStation Network will be undergoing maintenance tomorrow, Tuesday the 25th of August. As a result you will be unable to sign in to the PSN between 4:15pm and 9:05pm UK time. The maintenance window is global. If you’re already signed in before the maintenance begins, however, you should be able to stay connected to the PSN servers. It is likely that you’ll be disconnected and required to sign back in once the PSN comes back up at 9:05pm, though.
Speaking to the Times Online at GamesCom, Sony head Kazuo Hirai confirmed that Sony’s answer to Microsoft’s Project Natal is set for a spring launch next year. The motion controller from Sony was originally announced at E3 in July this year. The device, which uses the PSEye to track 3D movement and accelerometer within the device itself to track movement, is expected to be a major step up on Nintendo’s Wiimote.
PlayStation Network Cards are coming to Europe this September in £20 / €20 and £50 / €50 denominations. If you don’t own a credit card, this is a simple and easy way to add credit to your PSN Wallet. Once aspect about these cards is different from the US PSN Cards, however. The European PSN Cards will come inside a PlayStation 3 games case, as shown on PlayStation.com (see below).
SOCOM: Confrontation will be updated this Tuesday when Patch v1.50 deploys. Patch 1.50 includes many new and diverse features including but not limited to: Clan Ladders, Tournaments, Calendar, Follow-A-Friend, and Private Games. Along with these features there are many optimizations, enhancements and fixes. The changelog for this update is huge (see below). The update will be live Tuesday morning, Pacific time.
More and more details about the PS3 Slim are starting to emerge as we edge closer to the release date. The latest tech news out of Japan indicates that the PS3 Slim will bitstream Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio direct to your receiver. The HDMI chip on the older PS3 models bitstream new high-def codecs like Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD MA, having to decode it internally and then sending the data to your receiver via LPCM.
Despite what rumors are suggesting, backwards compatibility will not be returning to the PS3 suggests John Koller, Director of Hardware at SCEA. “It’s not coming back, so let me put that on the table,” said Koller when asked about backwards compatibility. He also added that despite what people may think, backwards compatibility isn’t really that big of a draw for the PS3. “It’s not as big as a purchase intent driver as you may be hearing,” he claimed. Currently, only the early PS3 models are able to play PS2 games. The 60GB launch models have hardware emulation to play PS2 games – this hardware was removed in newer models.
Meet Detective Shelby, a brand new Heavy Rain character revealed and demoed at Gamescom Cologne. David Cage, writer/director for the game and Founder/CEO of French development studio Quantic Dream, plays through the demo in the video below. Details about the plot of Heavy Rain remain scarce. Cage has stated that Heavy Rain would be “a very dark film noir thriller with mature themes”, without any supernatural elements, and that “the real message [of the game] is about how far you’re willing to go to save someone you love.
As you may already know, the MAG Private Beta is currently taking place, and it will soon be rolling out to the public. On September 17th 2009, MAG will launch into public beta, allowing regular players to take part in huge 128-player and 256-player skirmishes online. We at XTREME PS3 are lucky enough to be taking part in the Private Beta, and let me tell you, its a very impressive game. Unfortunately, due to a NDA we cannot post up any videos or information about the game until the public beta launches.
