Jump to content
NEurope
Aneres11

PlayStation Vita Console Discussion

Recommended Posts

The PS3 launch price was £429 actually.

 

Though I prefer to say £399 as it dropped after about a week.

 

Don't forget that if the PS3 came out now, it'd cost at least £550.

It'll be cheaper globally, but you guys will be screwed by the £'s decay.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Surprise surprise, Zechs turns up and the IQ spirals into single digits.

 

 

The Playstaion Suite is an SDK. It'll have Sony for quality control but it isn't even limited to games. It's basically exactly like the Aplle App Store, except with Sony doing quality control. It's a platform and it doesn't require that much effort on Sony's part but the pay off is massive. Sony aren't the sole developer, anyone can be. I suspect it'll also lead to dev kits with the same accessibility as the iPhone's.

 

It should be heading to PS3, too.

 

I'm not arguing with your point, my point was for it to be a success the support needs to be out there in terms of Android devices that can best take advantage of the Playstation Suite. I'm meaning devices that easily run every game. Sure the risk is relatively minimal for Sony like you said.

 

Also if it comes to PS3 as well will we see cheap 59p-£2 apps? This is crucial in order for it to truly be a success in the Android market space and a genuine challenger to Apple's App Store success. It's something neither Nintendo or Sony have quite managed to get to grips with via DSiWare or Minis. I guess the PS3 version could be similar to the recently released Mac app store with more expensive prices.

 

Also if it comes to PS3 that will be yet another distribution system through the console to go along with PSN (Games and Movie stores), Quiriocity, Lovefilm, Mubi, Vidzone. Now is this good that it has all these different ways ways of getting gaming/video/music content either free,paid or subscription OR is it just plain confusing for casual gamers?

 

Also it seems odd that PSP2 doesn't directly use PSN, you have Live Area that interacts with PSN essentially.

 

I know like I sound like I'm knocking everything but I'm actually more intrigued and potentially excited by this all than I am by 3DS.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Yeah, I wasn't knocking what you said. It's a real advantage Apple pretty much have a unified setup with the iOS devices. Obviously, I have no idea how the PSS is going to turn out. The main bit I was pointing out was that suddenly access to the NGP and the PS3 might become very cheap and easy, which would be amazing.

 

I think more services are better. It's competition. It gives the consumer a choice which is never a bad thing. Is it confusing?...Dunno.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Yeah, I wasn't knocking what you said. It's a real advantage Apple pretty much have a unified setup with the iOS devices. Obviously, I have no idea how the PSS is going to turn out. The main bit I was pointing out was that suddenly access to the NGP and the PS3 might become very cheap and easy, which would be amazing.

 

I think more services are better. It's competition. It gives the consumer a choice which is never a bad thing. Is it confusing?...Dunno.

 

Yeah I mean I don't find it confusing and I'm sure the majority of users on here wouldn't they'd know where to go to get each of these services and the pros and cons of each.

 

So for example PSN lets you rent/buy movies whereas Lovefilm lets you choose from a selection of "free" films included in your subscription or pay for other movies. Or that minis games will work on both PSP and PS3 whereas standard downloadable PSN game won't (with few exceptions that allow remote play), its a question how easy these services are to identify and compare for the more casual user?

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Yeah, I think a bit of reorganisation is needed for the XMB. I'm sure that would help a bit.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Yeah, I think a bit of reorganisation is needed for the XMB. I'm sure that would help a bit.

 

Yeah agreed. I said it much earlier in the thread, I wouldn't mind if Live Area replaced XMB or a version of it. I think having these feeds of what your friends have done in games etc... is the way forward for further developing a sense of a properly functioning community. It would be so much better than the current system of comparing trophies or relying on people to have their PSN attached to facebook and feed your trophy achievements in. Look at games such as NFS Hot Pursuits Autolog and what that does for competition/comparison etc...

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I hope they dump the XMB. I hate everything about it and I still find it difficult to change the fucking settings on me PS3.

 

Someone really needs to show them how to make a UI.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I love the XMB but it just need a bit of clearing up. Btw, if you want to change the settings, its the penultimate column to the left.

 

Sony NGP: 19 killer facts

 

1. British company ARM, which has built NGP's CPU, usually gears its creations towards good battery life, according to TechRadar. Sony's pitching battery life between 4-6 hours.

 

2. NGP contains an ARM Cortex-A9 core (4 core) CPU. This is well ahead of other recent mobile devices, whose manufactures have only recently begun installing Dual Core in the latest handsets. The iPad also uses ARM Cortex designs in its system on a chip (SOC).

 

3. Sony has dubbed the curvaceous chassis of NGP 'Super Oval Design'. The platform holder claims it has been specially created to ensure more comfort in longer play sessions than PSP1.

 

4. Sony claims that the combination of two touchpads and thumbsticks allows for "touch, grab, trace, push and pull" moves of the fingers.

 

5. NGP's GPU - SGX543MP4+ quad-core - is built by Imagination Technologies, another British company based in Hertfordshire.

 

6. NGP's quad-core GPU setup is four times as powerful as top-of-the-range current mobile platforms, according to Epic.

 

7. Every game for NGP will be provided with Sony's LiveArea, where users can share info and communicate other players. Additionally, NGP users will be able to view an Activity log, constantly updated with accomplishments from those playing the same game.

 

8. NGP has a five inch, 960 x 544, 16:9 OLED screen. In terms of resolution, that's almost the same as the native rendering resolution of both Alan Wake on Xbox 360 and Call of Duty: Black Ops on PS3. The original PSP sported a 480 x 272 display, for those of you who love to compare.

 

9. The NGP resolution is in the same ballpark as the iPhone 4's Retina Display, which is 960x640. The Apple phone has a much higher pixel density though, since its screen is only 3.5 inches.

 

10. NGP operates with more than 2.5 times as many pixels as the Nintendo 3DS. That's even when you consider the 800x240 stereoscopic resolution of the Ninty handheld.

 

11.The console packs a Six-Axis motion sensing system behind its screen. That includes a three-axis gyroscope and a three-axis accelerometer - that's one motion sensor more than the iPad (which is missing a gyroscope) and one less than the PlayStation Move, which also houses a Terrestrial Magnetic Field sensor.

 

12. Sony has dropped the UMD format in favour of Flash cards, which can store the full software titles plus add-on game content or the game save data directly.

 

13. Flash cards with more capacity will be made available in the future to allow for bigger games, according to Sony.

 

14. Despite all this killer tech, Sony said NGP won't cost as much as $599 - the price at which the PS3 launched.

 

15. 82 third-party developers have already signed up to work on the NGP. That's 48 in Japan, 16 from North America and 18 from Europe

 

16. You might not get it by Christmas: Sony has only confirmed that "at least one" territory will see a pre-Xmas launch.

 

17. There are 14 titles confirmed so far, including iterations of Killzone, Call of Duty, Uncharted, LittleBigPlanet, Resistance and WipEout.

 

18. It's here for the long term. Yoshida-san told Kotaku: "The portable is a totally different beast. It's still emerging and in a transitional stage. We are developing a platform to last a long time."

 

19. Its size is 182mm x 18.6mm x 83.5mm. Let's compare and contrast to other console lengths: the original PSP is 169mm, the DSi is 137mm, the 3DS takes up 134mm and Apple's diddy little iPhone 4 is just 115.2mm.

 

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/286124/features/sony-ngp-19-killer-facts/

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
18. It's here for the long term. Yoshida-san told Kotaku: "The portable is a totally different beast. It's still emerging and in a transitional stage. We are developing a platform to last a long time."

 

Besides the myriad of control options, this is the main thing compelling me to buy one. Sure itll be expensive out of the gate, but hopefully they get it right the first time and wont subject us to yearly hardware updates

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

While that's all awesome, the one thing I have a problem with is the sixaxis comparison to iPad. iPad is a year old now, and the iPad 2 will almost certainly have a gyroscope as well as a accelerometer when it is released in a few months. It will still MATCH the iPad and iPhone in terms of motion sensing, but saying it has more sensors than the iPad is a slightly unfair comparison when it's old tech now, as the iPhone 4 has shown.

 

*works for an Apple-centric magazine* :p

 

(I also realise that is totally not the main point here. All the rest of the stuff sounds interesting, apart from the potential release date which I would expect to be march-ish time now)

 

 

ANYWAY.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
8. NGP has a five inch' date=' 960 x 544, [b']16:9[/b] OLED screen.

 

Admittedly it's pretty close, but unless pixels will appear wider than they are high, it's still not 16:9, but 30:17. It's only 4 rows of pixels more than a 16:9 aspect ratio though, which makes me wonder why they chose such dimensions.

Edited by Burny

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

New NGP details emerge at private event

 

During a presentation to around 20 UK developers at its headquarters in London yesterday, Sony shared a wide range of information about its new handheld platform, revealing significant new details on launch plans, hardware specifications, networking features and more.

 

One attendee, speaking to Eurogamer this morning under condition of anonymity, said: "NGP is a developer's dream – Sony is finally doing the things developers have been crying out for for years."

 

Studios had been expecting to collect development kits at the event, but were told "late shipments from Japan" meant SCEE would now be "prioritising". According to the source, for a kit to be delivered before April a studio must supply a "20-page concept document on a game they want to release at launch".

 

Eurogamer understands that key UK studios have had early kits for almost a year. But the source claimed the new shipment of kits would be "the first to have the final GPU in them".

 

Sony has not yet dated the system beyond plans to begin rollout worldwide by the end of 2011. But during yesterday's presentation, Sony listed the Wi-Fi only edition of NGP as "2011", while the Wi-Fi plus 3G version was listed as "Holiday Season 2011", implying that the 3G-enabled console would not be available day one.

 

SCEE did not share any solid information on date or price, only adding that details would be revealed "very soon".

Sony staff demoed a handful of upcoming first-party NGP titles, including Uncharted, Little Deviants and WipEout. The source said the latter was "the WipEout HD PS3 engine running on PS3 with no changes to the art platform. That means full resolution, full 60 frames per second. It looks exactly the same as it does on PS3 – all the shader effects are in there".

 

With Sony urging developers to create releases that work across PS3 and NGP, the implications of this are significant. "They want us to do cross-platform," said the source, explaining that the submission process has been streamlined, with only a single submission required for a title on PSN and NGP.

 

And developers were told: "All games at launch available on flash [the physical storage medium] would also be on PSN."

 

However, Sony is also insisting that it "does not want exactly the same game" on NGP and PS3 – there "has to be a reason for the NGP title". "They want at least some kind of interactivity between the two versions with NGP-only extras," the source added.

 

The rumoured addition of 'cloud saving' – seen as key for enabling gamers to switch easily between a game on PS3 and NGP – was raised by developers, but SCEE would not officially confirm it.

 

The publisher also moved to reassure developers that the technical hurdles of cross-platform development were being kept as low as possible.

 

"Any shaders for PS3 stuff will just work," said the source. "We won't have to rewrite. What would have taken two-to-three months before looks like it could take just one-to-two weeks now. The architecture is obviously different, but it's the same development environment."

 

Elsewhere with the hardware, it was confirmed that NGP features three gyroscopes, compared with one in PS3's controller, allowing for more accurate movement. And the front and rear touch panels are both capable of six-point multi-touch.

 

"The touch pad on the back is fantastic," the source said. "It does feel second nature, like you're having a real impact on the world." As an example of the potential, SCEE described squeezing an object in-game by pinching the front and the back simultaneously.

 

SCEE further outlined its vision for the first five years of the platform and its target audience, with year one focused on "hardcore" and year two on "hardcore and teens", with the expectation that the audience will expand younger and older after that.

 

Social networking and location-based features were also highlighted for their gaming potential. SCEE suggested, for instance, that "clues could be put on the social networking side" that could lead to "virtual gifts", that could in turn make use of the camera and augmented reality capabilities to distribute "new skins and avatars".

 

"Sony has made it completely developer-centric this time," the source added. "[The development kit] is really simple to plug in and use. It opens direct in Windows Explorer and you can see all systems on a network – so you could, for example, update the firmware of multiple NGPs at once.

 

"A PS3 dev station can take three hours to set-up. This looks like it will take under 20 mins. It just makes everything easier – they've really thought about it this time".

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

You didn't really bold some of the most important bits,

 

With Sony urging developers to create releases that work across PS3 and NGP, the implications of this are significant. "They want us to do cross-platform," said the source, explaining that the submission process has been streamlined, with only a single submission required for a title on PSN and NGP.

 

And developers were told: "All games at launch available on flash [the physical storage medium] would also be on PSN."

 

"Sony has made it completely developer-centric this time," the source added. "[The development kit] is really simple to plug in and use. It opens direct in Windows Explorer and you can see all systems on a network – so you could, for example, update the firmware of multiple NGPs at once.

 

"A PS3 dev station can take three hours to set-up. This looks like it will take under 20 mins. It just makes everything easier – they've really thought about it this time".

 

Looks like Sony have really listened to what developers want and need.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I'm happy about using flash as the medium. I took so long to pick up a PSP just because I'd have to pay out the ass for a PSP and then pay more to get a memory card to save games.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Looks like Sony have really listened to what developers want and need.

 

I'd definitely say so; Kaz is obviously making some good headway. Sony sound like they have finally learnt one of their biggest lessons in making games, which brings a very big smile to my face.

 

For 2.5 generations of hardware, they have been making systems that are very difficult to program for and that put them at a massive disadvantage near the beginning of each generation.

 

This approach will really give devs something to be excited about but I do worry about a lot of ports from the PS3. Maybe we will see "double play" versions of games like you get with Disney films so you can have the PS3 version AND the NGP version.

 

But then I worry.... my biggest gripe with the PSP (apart from the XMB) is that very few games were designed for a handheld experience. A lot of that came from the hardware itself (loading times, poor battery life) but many of the games completely forgot that you needed to be able to have a quick blast of fun. I see that being the same problem with ports from PS3.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Whilst I'm sure there will be games ill-suited to quick bursts of play, surely the trick is simply not to play those when you don't have the time? If I only had 15 minutes to play something on a console I wouldn't load up New Vegas, I'd jump into something befitting of the time available. I don't really see the handheld space as being any different.

 

Given the PSP2 — I can't be arsed with the rubbish codename any more — will support minis and other downloadable titles out of the box, I can't imagine you'll ever be stuck for something appropriate to play. That said I hope the sleep function is good and the Kojimas of this world allow you to pause sodding cutscenes! Hopefully there will be some baseline functionality in that regard when you press the PS button.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
That said I hope the sleep function is good and the Kojimas of this world allow you to pause sodding cutscenes! Hopefully there will be some baseline functionality in that regard when you press the PS button.

Turning your PSP off while a game is running does the same thing as closing the lid on your DS does (in other words, you can pick up exactly where you left off when you turn on the console again). I'd be very surprised if they removed this function for the PSP2. :smile:

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Turning your PSP off while a game is running does the same thing as closing the lid on your DS does (in other words, you can pick up exactly where you left off when you turn on the console again). I'd be very surprised if they removed this function for the PSP2. :smile:

 

Oh and another point.... I want the sleep mode to be easily distinguished from turning off. I rarely knew when my PSP was properly off and I found that it managed to run down the battery badly.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Oh and another point.... I want the sleep mode to be easily distinguished from turning off. I rarely knew when my PSP was properly off and I found that it managed to run down the battery badly.

 

I've turned my PSP off sometimes by accident because I forgot it was in sleep mode which was annoying.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Id buy 2 at that price. And by 2, i mean 1.

 

I'd buy one at that price. And by one I mean none. And by none I mean one. But seriously I would buy one at that price.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And by one I mean buy. One. I'd buy one. Yeah I'd get it. Get it? Lol.

 

 

 

I really would get one though.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Well probably.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

×