It Must Be E3 Time: Two PS3 Games I Want In Two Days

SIZE DOESN'T MATTER...RIGHT?

Another PS3 game(s) to look out for:

The totally generic name may hide it, but there’s a reason this particular title is coming from a third party. Big 3 Gun Shooting includes three arcade gun shooting games: Time Crisis Razing Storm, Time Crisis 4, and Dead Storm Pirates. With all that quality Namco Bandai arcade shooting going into this package, it makes sense that Namco Bandai is publisher.

There’s also the PS3 port of Dead Rising: Extraction (which comes, allegedly, with Dead Space 2), but I don’t think I’m interested enough to bother with that again. (And I was just bored silly with Dead Space, so even if it’s ‘free’…I don’t care.)

Here’s some Deadstorm Pirates, arcade rev, courtesy Arcade Heroes:

I’m no expert, but I’m guessing this is going to have a deleterious effect on Namco’s attempt to sell the recently-released (in North America) arcade rev.

And Now It’s Sony’s Turn to Prove That They’re Not Serious

LOOK MA! NO NAV!

Move pricing will move you…to the exit:

Enough about that, how much!? The Move controller on its own will set you back $49.99 USD, while the Nunchuk– sorry, Navigation Controller – will cost $29.99 USD each. Sony will be releasing PlayStation Move bundles that will consist of a Move controller and Eye camera (which is required).

$99.99 USD gets you the Sports Championship game plus Move bundle, while $399.99 USD will let you have a PlayStation 3 console, Sports Championship and the Move bundle. Games will remain at the retail price of $39.99.

The bundle does not come with with the Navigation Controller. Let me repeat that so it’s painfully clear: The bundle does not come with the Navigation Controller. But it does come w/ the EyeToy. And the requisite WiiSports knock-off.

So why does this matter? Because it’s going to dilute an already split userbase, ensuring that there is never a critical mass reached in terms of users for the trio of devices (Move+EyeToy+Nav), thus eroding any potential software support going forward because devs can never be sure what combo of devices the end-user has access to: Move+Eyetoy-Nav; Move+Nav-EyeToy; Move-EyeToy-Nav; Move+EyeToy+Nav; Etc. (I do not envy Sony’s 3rd party relations department with a sale’s pitch like this.)

Also: the price is, like Kinect, ridiculous. $400 for the types of people that they’re trying to sway from purchasing a Wii at half the price is marketing suicide–essentially, like Kinect, Move is DOA.

Surprise! (no, not really): Nobody Is Much Interested in Natal

MICROSOFT AND SONY GET THE BAD NEWS

Or Move, for that matter:

Sony’s PlayStation Move and Xbox 360’s Project Natal motion control solutions have been garnering a lot of the spotlight from core gamers and the press, but a new study reflects currently low purchase intent for the new devices.

Research firm OTX’s U.S. tracking study GamePlan Insights polled a group of 2,000 gamers between May 23 and June 5, 2010, and found that 8 percent of the Xbox 360 market intends to buy Natal, and 6 percent of the PlayStation 3 market intends to purchase Move.

Of the people that are already planning on buying Natal and Move, 25 percent plan to preorder the controllers.

The low purchase intent figures reflect the current lack of information about compatible games for the devices. Microsoft and Sony are expected to reveal more motion-compatible games at next week’s E3 event in L.A., where the controllers will be a central attraction, after which purchase intent may rise.

I imagine nobody is at all surprised by this¹: these devices are going on machines that are infested with a particular type of gamer that is antithetical to an experience that has ‘cost them’ this battle–and perhaps the war–for the hearts and minds of consumers everywhere and can only, ultimately, result in less of the games they want to play being made.²

I do like the nice ray of light placed in that final paragraph (“after which purchase intent may rise”), though, because where PS360 are concerned there is always hope but with Wii there is never anything more than derision and gloom, with the big N just inches from sliding over the precipice into…the waiting arms of approaching 100 million people. The failures.

Also: don’t go into thinking that the dread ‘casuals’ are going to save these devices from obscurity because a little thing called barrier of entry (read: cost) is really going to throw a wrench into that particular, desperate, dream.

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^{1 Oh I’m sure some fanboys are but, deep down inside, they knew this was coming. More importantly, it’ll be real interesting to see how Sony and MS, eventually, spin their respective failures.
2 Thank God: more quality, less quantity, please.}

Will Wright Notes That the Emperor Has No Clothes

Wright on!

A game god that can still be reasonably called a game god has this to say about Natal (and Move):

“I doubt they’ll have the same impact the Wii had. In some sense, they feel like evolutions, or evolutionary technologies. I think Natal feels like a better EyeToy, which is going to have some interesting applications. I don’t think it’s going to change the face of gaming or anything. I think that having motion control, like in a Wii controller, is something that both Microsoft and Sony are catching up to, but again it almost suggests certain toy-like applications.”

First of all, Wright is hedging here by adding the qualifier “I doubt” instead of “I know”, probably because he’s a nice guy and wants to work with MS/Sony in the future. (I suffer from no such limitations and can say: “there’s no way in hell a Wiimore knock-off or a jacked-up EyeToy are going to have the same impact.” And you can quote me on that…again.)

What I do like, however, is that Wright, err, rightly points out that Natal is, basically, a streamlined, sexed-up, EyeToy, (which probably means the Molyneux killbots are on the march) and then he doubles-down and calls them “toys”. (Now, to be fair, Wright’s invocation of the fanboy’s favorite Wii slur does not quite mean what most people think it means, but it will drive the less astute Xbots to a fantrum of staggering size and scope should this story gain wider currency and, at the end of the day, that’s all I want. Please.)

I’m Not Moved

Old and beat: Sub-controller; New hotness: Navigation Controller

Really:

Wondering what Sony’s going to call that PlayStation Move sub-controller — you know, since “nunchuk” is already taken? Wonder no more. Sony part number CECH-ZCS1U just hit the FCC’s database, and “Navigation Controller” is written in nice bold letters right there on the label. It’s looking like this is official, as the Sony US website has been quietly updated with the change, and we think it makes a certain amount of sense, as most 3D games let you aim the camera with your dominant hand and relegate navigation to the other.

Once upon a time, you could have made the argument that Sony could sell sh*t to gamers and they’d lap it up (and you’d be right!) but nowadays, I’m seriously beginning still questioning if their heart is in it anymore.

Yes, I realize that if they give it a snappy name, the Xbots and Nintendorks will throw a fantrum (because, you see, they’d be ‘ripping off’ the nunchuck…somehow), but couldn’t they at least try and offer up something fun like PlayStation¹ or Walkman?

Some suggestions:

*The Nonchuck
*(Analog) Nubbed for Her (and his…I guess) Pleasure
*Makes Heavy Rain Fun Controller²

(And yes, KoG, I appreciate the irony of this post.)

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1 I always (seriously) thought this was an inspired name.
2 Impossible: even Miyamoto couldn’t manage that feat.

How to Speak Miyamoto

Miyamoto: “I Don’t Even Need My Hands to Take These Clowns Apart”

When asked what his thoughts were on Natal and Move, Miyamoto told CVG: “Nintendo should welcome the opportunity when or where something we have originally tried is intensified by somebody else, because that means that other people are trying to starting to show their appreciation for whatever endeavour we have made in the beginning.

“The user experience we have created is going to be intensified by the advent of new machines from other companies. It’s a new experience that we originated. So we really see it as a great honour.”

Roughly translated: “Go f*ck yourselves you unoriginal a**holes.”

H/T: CVG