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P L A Y S T A T I O N 3
- SCE president Ken Kutagari announced that the PlayStation 3 launch will be delayed to November 2006, due to Blu-Ray spec finalization, mainly for copyright protection. The PS3 will launch in November 2006 worldwide, before Thanksgiving in all territories. Sony plans to produce at least one million units of PS3 each month, and the goal is to ship 6 million units worldwide by the end of March 2007.
- PlayStaton 3 will launch with the new PlayStation Network Platform service, which offers online gaming services similar to Xbox Live. The new service will be "free".
- PlayStation 3 will have a built-in 60GB 2.5" hard drive, which will be preloaded with Linux operating system. The hard drive can be used as a home server, it will be fully upgradable. Kutaragi told software developers that every PS3 will have a hard drive installed, as it is mandatory. Sony has not decided whether the hard drive will be sold as a separate (mandatory) peripheral or bundled with the console.
- Sony confirmed that all PS3 games will be released only on Blu-Ray discs, as DVDs are too easy being duplicated. PS3 is still capable to play DVDs and CDs, and fully backward compatible with PS2 and PSone.
- Sony announced that the final PS3 development kits will be shipping out to production studios in June; currently more than 15 companies are development middleware and dev-tools for PS3.
P S P
- Sony announced a US price drop of PSP to $199 on March 22, the new package will only include the PSP, AC adaptor and battery. Currently 15 million units of PSP were shipped worldwide, the PSP generated US$1.6 billion in 2005, more than both Xbox 360 and Nintendo DS combined.
- Sony announced that the PSP will support video voice over IP (i.e. video chat) in October 2006, a new mini EyeToy digital camera add-on will be released at the same time, which supports motion JPEGs.
- Sony is working on a new emulation software which allows PSP to play original PSone games, PSone games will be digitally distributed to PSP online.
- Ken Kutaragi announced that PSP will have an upgrade to allow the system to run games written in Macromedia Flash. Future firmware upgrade would also support RSS feeds and GPS locator functionality.
- Sony announced that more than 107 games and 347 films, TV programs and videos for PSP will be available in US by the end of March.
P L A Y S T A T I O N 2
- Sony announced that the worldwide shipment of PlayStation 2 has passed 100 million units.
- Sony loses the patent infringement verdict to Immersion on vibrating game controllers. The company may need to pay over $90.7 million and up to 5% quarterly revenue from PlayStation sales to Immersion after the lawsuit concluded later this month.
N I N T E N D O D S
- Nintendo will release the DS action game New Super Mario Bros. in Japan on May 25, 2006.
M U L T I
- Here are the latest Japanese console game review scores:
PlayStation 2:
Ace Combat Zero: The Belkan War (Namco): 9, 9, 8, 9 - (35/40)
Shin Sangoku Musou 4 Empires (Koei): 8, 8, 8, 8 - (32/40)
Harukanaru Toki no Uchi de 3: Unmei no Meikyuu (Koei): 8, 9, 8, 8 - (33/40)
Mahou Sensei Negima! Kagai Jugyou (Konami): 8, 7, 7, 7 - (29/40)
Memories Off: Sorekara Again (Kid): 7, 7, 6, 5 - (25/40)
Shakugan no Shana (Media Works): 6, 7, 6, 5 - (24/40)
Xbox 360:
Shin Sangoku Musou 4 Empires (Koei): 9, 8, 8, 9 - (34/40)
Tengai Makyou Ziria: Harkuanaru Jipang (Koei): 8, 8, 7, 6 - (29/40)
Dreamcast:
Under Defeat (Sega): 8, 6, 7, 6 - (27/40)
GameBoy Advance:
Mahou Sensei Negima! Private Lesson 2 (Marvelous): 6, 7, 6, 7 - (26/40)
Powerful Poke Dash (Konami): 8, 8, 8, 8 - (32/40)
Yggdra Union (Sting): 9, 10, 8, 8 - (35/40)
Nintendo DS:
Cooking Mama (Taito): 7, 7, 7, 7 - (28/40)
Deep Labyrinth (Interactive Brains): 8, 6, 6, 6 - (26/40)
Minna de Wai Wai Kokoto Kart (Kemco): 5, 7, 5, 7 - (24/40)
Monster Bomber (Taito): 8, 6, 5, 6 - (25/40)
Pokemon Rangers: Diamond-Pearl eno Michi (Nintendo): 8, 8, 8, 8 - (32/40)
Ys Strategy (Marvelous): 6, 5, 7, 7 - (25/40)
PSP:
Shanghai (SunSoft): 7, 6, 6, 6 - (25/40)
Shin Sangoku Musou: 2nd Evolution (Koei): 8, 8, 7, 8 - (31/40)
Ultra Puzzle Bobble (Taito): 6, 6, 6, 6 - (24/40)
Untold Legends: Brotherhood of the Blade (Konami): 8, 7, 6, 7 - (28/40)
Viewtiful Joe: Battle Carnival (Capcom): 8, 7, 7, 8 - (30/40)
- Level 5 announced they are working on a new role playing game in the "OORPG" genre, details are unclear right now. However, the company is also working on another non-RPG project.
- Square Enix mentioned that the company is working on a next-gen MMORPG title during the Final Fantasy XI Fan Festival.
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