I’m beginning to think some people get more pleasure out of finding things to criticize the console manufactures about than they do out of the consoles themselves.
How exciting it was for them to discover, and gleefully announce Microsoft’s difficulties in meeting the demand for their fabulous new Xbox360, and they were delighted in pointing out that the ever secretive Nintendo would not bring their new Revolution out till late, late, oh so late this year. And now they’re almost beside themselves with giddiness in telling us (because they think we can’t read press releases) how the fantastic PS3 is going to fantastically late and not ship till November. I can’t help but think these commentators must be unpleasant people who dress poorly, can’t get a date, and are probably overweight. They are the kind of people who point the bad wardrobe choices Angelina Jolie makes, ah huh.
So now we know, the PS3 will be available in November. Great! I can’t wait. And it’s not like I’ve played every game there is (or even that I have) on my PS2, or my Cube, or Xbox 360, lest we forget the SLI FX60 and Crossfire FX60, and the nifty PSP. Am I losing sleep or entertainment because the next generation super computer disguised as a console isn’t on the shelves of my local 7-11? Oh, and how about the BIG news that the PS3 would REQUIRE a hard disk? You’re kidding, right? You want a super computer that runs off of, oh, what, CARTRIDGES? Uoo, Uoo, I know, flash, you want a console that uses flash memory. Right. We have one, it’s called a PSP.
I remember when we were agitating Sony to add a hard disk to the PS2. We want speed, and storage. Not only do I want the PS3 to have a hard disk, I want a really big one, and not only that, I want an I/O connector so I can hang and even bigger disk on it. Hell, while we’re at it, let me add some graphics memory too. I want the power.
Stop and think about what Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony are doing for us. We can buy (well, maybe in some places) a computer called an Xbox 360 with the a state of the art processor and amazing graphics engine and a hard disk that can drive a HD screen, and operate across the Internet for what, less than $400? Do you know what you’d pay for that machine if you assembled the components and bought it? Now look at the PS3 – an honest to god supercomputer with a read-write HD, and optical disk drive, for under $500 – are you kidding me? The console suppliers are still supporting this subsidized business model of (almost) giving away the razor and selling the blades, and we’re going whine about them NEEDING a disk drive, or not shipping until November, jeeze, talk about needing a life, if you want something to bitch or whine about go read the newspaper about world events.
The half empty glass folks need to find another line of work. I don’t want these Luddites wasting my bandwidth with their negativity and nasty comments about how the world is about to end and that we can’t trust these new fangled things.
We have entered, with the introduction of the Xbox360, and soon to be joined by the PS3 and Revolution, the next generation of game consoles. These are machines built on a new SIMD processor from IBM with design concepts from each console builder. They have amazing new graphics engines, some radically different from our PCs, and one of them has the most advanced optical disk system in the world. This is a time for great rejoicing. This is a moment of history that you have gotten to observe, and some of you participate in. Let’s look for the joy and excitement of these new machines and not sour the milk with nasty remarks about how they don’t do this or do that or aren’t here yet.
The only thing that can ruin the experience, and really disappoint will be the games. We are looking forward to new cinematic experiences with lifelike actions and characters, canny and deadly AI opponents, breath- taking models, and fast, full physic action, lots of fast action, and on an HD screen.
So if you want to sniff out something interesting, and get us excited before the delivery date, be a superstar snoop, then tell us about the games, the content, the titles. Otherwise keep your nasty little opinions to yourselves; we all know what the deal is on the hardware.
