Work on the next generation PlayStation 4 console is starting now to ensure that game developers and software creators to have advance access to the creation process. Future platform related activities are being discussed which could be hard on software creators who have struggled in the past to really make use of what the previous consoles by Sony were capable of. This makes it possible for better games to be created sooner with the release of the console launch which has been a major hassle for gaming consoles from Sony and its competitors.

The advanced access to the future generation PlayStation 4 console will make a very large selection of games possible with amazingly advanced graphics and capabilities. The game selection from a greater diversity of game developers will be possible sooner. Licensing for such games can also be done sooner and provide fewer legality issues by allowing access to copywriting sooner for games developed for the system in advance. This is all possibly by building upon the current universal game engine as well as using new technologies which are currently being developed for the PlayStation 3, the PlayStation Portable/Go system and even advanced controller technologies such as the PlayStation move.

It will be interesting to see what the next version of consoles looks like from the major developers. With the Playstation Move coming out soon, which is Sony’s answer to the Nintendo Wii and Microsoft Kinect, it will be very interesting to see what the next version ships with. Will traditional controllers go away or will they stay with their roots and incorporate the movement gaming into the system like they did with generation of consoles (minus the Wii). It is hard to imagine graphics getting better, I am perfectly happy with my current generation console, but I am sure the move will be towards 3D completely.

This year’s E3 was the first in a while where no one at Sony said “This is going to be the year of the Playstation”, and ironically, this is the first year in a long while where we would have agreed with that statement. Sony brought something to the show fer every type of gamer. They showed off Playstation Move, Playstation Plus, and a wide variety of new games, including one big surprise – Twisted Metal for the PS3.

Playstation Move might look like a Wiimote with a ball on the end, but Sony is packing some serious punch into the device. Playstation Move will support all of the mini games you’ve come to expect from a motion controller, but it’s also going to be used in some clever ways in more traditional games. One such game demoed at E3 was Sorcery, in which Move is used as a magic wand. By doing different gestures with Playstation Move, spells can be cast in different ways. Spells can also be stacked on top of one another to create different effects. The example shown during E3 was a flaming tornado created by first casting a wall of fire, and then sending a wind spell through it. Take it from us,  any game with a flaming tornado of doom is sure to be a hit.

Rumors had been swirling for a long time about a premium Playstation Network service, and Sony finally made the announcement at E3. Playstation Plus will cost $50 USD per year, or $18 USD for three months, and as a member you’ll get early access to demos, access to beta tests, full free PSN games, free Playstation Minis, and the ability to automatically download all Playstation Plus content.

Screenshot of Sorcery being played with Playstation Move from Sony's E3 press conference.

Hardcore gamers will be happy to hear that Gran Turismo 5 finally has an official release date: November 2nd. Killzone 3 also has a release date, though it’s a little more vague; that game is due to hit store shelves sometime in February 2011. The big surprise for hardcore Sony fans was the announcement of a new Twisted Metal game headed to the PS3. Very few details were given about the game, but we do know that it will feature a wide variety of new game modes and vehicles, including flying vehicles.

The PS3 is going to have a lot of big, successful, exclusive games over the course of the next year or so. Sony had a top-notch showing at E3, and we can’t wait to get our hands on Playstation Move later this year. We’ll be sure to bring you more information on all the games Sony had to show at E3 as it becomes available.

Joe Danger ps3 is available on PSN. Imagine if Excitebike and Trials HD got together and totally did it. Their baby would be Joe Danger. It’s a stunt motorcycle game that combines the physics play of Trials with the cartoon presentation and level editor of Excitebike.

According to a highly-placed source, Sony will announce a large-scale monetizing scheme for PSN at the LA show, but we’re assured nothing planned will impact the service’s current free aspects.

A string of features will be revealed, apparently costing “less than £50 per year”.

Sony will confirm plans to give all subscribers one free PSN game per month, from a choice of “two to four” every month.

“If you work it out, PSN games cost an average of £6-9 each, so over a year you’re basically going to be breaking even,” said our source.

A streaming music application similar to Spotify will be announced in Sony’s press conference on June 15. It’s thought that this can run in the background while playing games.

Rumours that cross-game voice chat is being saved as a paid feature are apparently not true, we were told.

“I can tell you now, 100 percent, that that’s not the case,” our man continued.

“There’s nothing in the premium package which will gimp regular PSN users.”

The PSN premium services announcement is thought to be a major part of Sony’s E3 conference, which will also heavily feature Move.

It’s thought that a PSP2 announcement, for this reason, is unlikely, and will be saved for either gamescom or TGS later this year. Get more detail on that here.

On the last episode of the CheapAssGamer podcast, CheapyD stated that he knows that Sony will show a PS3 XMB redesign at E3.

He doesn’t delve into what changes will be implemented or if it’ll have new features like cross-game chat, but it’s certainly something forward to.

If true, they’ll likely release the firmware the same night of the announcement.

To quote CheapyD: “I’ve heard that the Sony PS3 is getting a completely redesigned XrossMediaBar. Like totally new, not just like new columns and stuff like – totally redone.”

Finally, below are some XMB redesign concept designs to compliment the previously released PSN Profile and Friend’s List pictures.

Stay tuned for more PS3 Hacks news. Also be sure to drop by the PS3 Hacks Forum for updates!

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When pegged with a couple of questions that desperately needed some answers, Xbox 360 product manager Aaron Greenberg only defaulted to old Project-Natal news from X10 heard earlier this year. Clearly, Microsoft is holding back on any major revelations until June.

Where was Sony hardware? Marketing director, John Koller, and I shared our own very intimate moments when we talked shop, and their contender for the “Motion Controller Wars” the PlayStation Move. He laughed at all my awful jokes, but he was a straight shooter when I asked him the most important question … Is the PlayStation Move better than Project-Natal?


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His reasoning is that both the Wii and Move controllers are so alike, and the fact that the PS3 will allow to play games in HD and the Wii doesnt, basically means that Playstation Move is the Nintendo Wii HD that many gamers have been waiting for. Well he isn’t entirely wrong is he?

Eurogamer: What happened with The Agent?

Michael Pachter: When Microsoft paid Take-Two to make GTA IV non-exclusive… In other words, GTA IV was going to be a PS3 exclusive, but Microsoft paid Rockstar and Take-Two to make it a non-exclusive, and they paid them a lot. The number I’ve heard, and I’m sure this is right, is $75m, and that probably includes the funding for the first DLC packs too. It’s more than the $50m that people talk about.

And Sony – I’m not sure if they had a firm agreement but they may have had a handshake – said to Take-Two, “You’ve got to give us something else.” And the “something else” was a zombie game that Rockstar wanted to work on. But while Rockstar was in the planning phase, Dead Rising came out and Left 4 Dead was announced. Rockstar realised they were up against a saturated market and Valve, and, “What can we possibly do that will be any better than what Valve’s done?” They started again and that’s when they came up with the idea of The Agent, which nobody actually knows what it is. That is the back story.

There’s stuff that’s in the pipeline now, of course, but a publisher would be foolish to sign an exclusive deal. A developer could do it. I’ve told the Insomniac guys repeatedly. They don’t own the Ratchet & Clank IP or the Resistance IP but they’re such good developers. I’m like, “Why aren’t you guys doing multi-platform? Your games would sell.” As if those guys couldn’t create something – of course they could. It’s not like Sony came up with the art and graphics on Ratchet & Clank. The Insomniac guys are nuts not to do multi-platform. But they like their deal with Sony, so they’ll keep doing exclusives. LittleBigPlanet guys, Media Molecule, I feel the same way. What were they thinking selling to Sony? They must be Liberal Democrats!

Eurogamer: Let’s talk about E3. Who would you rather be: Nintendo, Microsoft or Sony?

Michael Pachter: It really depends on this 3DS and how good it is, because I don’t think Nintendo has anything else. Nintendo is on the verge of – certainly not dropping into third place or anything – losing its dominance, because I really truly believe that Sony Move is the Wii HD. I really believe it. That’s been my quote: I told everyone a Wii HD was coming this year, it just happens to say PS3 on the box. It is the Wii HD.

That’s a very easy upsell for Sony to say, “If you have a Wii and you really want to play high-def games on your new big high-def TV, we’ve got ‘em.” Sony is a winner and Nintendo is a loser on the console side, because the Wii Vitality Sensor isn’t going to excite anybody. But the 3DS will. If you look at Nintendo’s line-up, everything we care about is either out or known by now.

People are going to like Microsoft more than we expect. Microsoft isn’t concerned about the gaming community with Natal, they’re concerned about the gaming community’s mothers and girlfriends. I really do think the gaming press has completely missed the mark on this one, that Natal is not intended for you to get up there and pretend you’re holding a rifle and playing Call of Duty. It’s intended for your mum to use the frickin’ 360 to download a movie or watch Netflix and to make it less intimidating. The cool thing about Natal is the voice command. “Xbox on.” I mean, that’s cool. People will really like it when they see it and they begin to appreciate what it is.

But I will say Sony up, Microsoft neutral and Nintendo down on the console side.

If the 3DS is anything like those little 3D point-and-click cameras, because that screen technology is pretty cool and I’m sure it is that, it will really get people excited. Question is: what does it cost? If they get $189 for a DSi XL, do they think they’re going to get $300 for a 3DS? I don’t know. Maybe they will, but that’s a tough purchase for me. The 3DS is coming along at a really good time for them. I don’t think it’s good for the DSi XL. If they launch the thing [the 3DS] prior to holiday, I can’t imagine why anybody would buy a DSi XL this holiday.
Longer term, Nintendo does really start to look bad as Apple really starts to push the iPod Touch as a gaming device, and that’s happening this holiday. Again, the gaming press hasn’t figured it out. The gaming press doesn’t really understand the 12-year-old customer, nor do you guys care. Who plays DS games? Them, not us. Nintendo’s got problems this year but the 3DS will make them look great at E3.

That’s the manufacturer side. On the publisher side: Microsoft looks really good, they have a lot of content this year. People get psyched about Halo and Alan Wake will have just come out… Fable III. They have good content. I’m not sure who else anybody cares about. It’s all sequels: this year’s Call of Duty, etc. We’ve had a front-end-loaded year. We might see the Call of Duty action-adventure game but I don’t think anybody is going to get excited about that.

This is more a hardware show than in the past.

Eurogamer: Is Microsoft going to unveil an Xbox 360 Slim?

Michael Pachter: I’m certain that that is happening, I’m just not certain when. They told me a year ago, when I got my private Natal demo – a week before E3… I said something like, “Is this going to cost a lot of money? The big problem is retro-fitting every 360 and how are you going to get people to buy it?”

They said, and they said with great confidence, “We are going to pack it in every single Xbox 360.” A bundle? They said, “No, we are going to force people to buy it with every single Xbox 360.” And I said, “Oh that’s brilliant. That’s a great idea. If you could do it at a competitive price then the first year you’ll have eight million of them, the second year 16 million and after a couple of years it’ll be so ubiquitous everybody will make software for it. That’s smart.”

I’ve never heard them say that since. They didn’t say it at E3, they’ve never said it since. I don’t know if they still plan to do that or not. If they plan to do that, it makes sense to have… A current 360 costs them about $250 to make and the Arcade probably costs them $210 and they sell it for $200, so they’re right at break-even on the Arcade and making money on other SKUs.
If they can knock another $20 or $30 off the cost by using smaller components and smaller fans and cooler running components, get that cost down to $200 or $210 and then the Natal camera probably cost them $50 to make – they can actually bundle that whole thing and sell it at $299. That’s a pretty compelling offering. A lot of 360 owners will – especially guys who have the original – consider buying a new one. It will help them sell 360s.

I am certain that they’re working on a thinner model just to save money. They’d like to bundle Natal if they have the guts to pull it off and announce it at E3.

Eurogamer: What’s Apple up to?

Michael Pachter: The iPad, even though it looks like a super-large iPhone, actually has a pretty powerful processor. So the iPad is a PC. The quality of games you could offer on that are pretty amazing. The problem is, I can play Tetris on my laptop now, so I don’t really need to go buy another dedicated device to do that. Apple is not quite as ambitious as others think; they don’t think they have to dominate gaming tomorrow. They’ll work handhelds first. And then as all the kids who get iPod Touches graduate to iPhones and then to iPads, then they’ll start trying to encourage game development.

Problem is, Steve Jobs – who is certainly one of the greatest geniuses of our lifetime – has this odd phobia of buttons. Great. Guess what? We’re not going to be able to play flight sim games with no buttons. You have to provide the gamer the tools he needs to play the game. Nintendo carries it to the extreme with the Wii zapper and steering wheel and all that stuff. The controls have to fit the game. And the iPad can’t do that.

Michael Pachter is an analyst for Wedbush Morgan Securities.

Do you agree with Pachter’s views or not?

[Source via Source]

What’s more, Sony reps said that it also plans to integrate the stereoscopic 3D technology directly into the PS3 beginning in 2011 or 2012. Now, Sony has thrown its full corporate weight behind its intent to integrate stereoscopic 3D into the PS3 as part of a presentation given to media and investors today.

As part of a slide titled “5 Key Advantages of PlayStation 3,”Sony said all PS3 units would eventually be given a 3D display mode as part of a future firmware update. The company also said that it will release a line of 3D games that make use of the technology. However, it did not indicate when the firmware update or the 3D-compatible games would come to market.

[UPDATE] Sony’s entrance into the stereoscopic 3D market will come sometime next year. Speaking alongside the aforementioned presentation, Sony Computer Entertainment CEO Kaz Hirai confirmed that the PlayStation group will begin enacting its 3D strategy in 2010.

“Next year, in tandem with the Sony 3D TV product launch, PS3 also plans to launch 3D game titles–not just first party, but we are actively supporting third-party software developers 3D game development,” Hirai said. “Finally, I’d like to announce here today that all PS3 sold since the 2006 launch will support 3D through firmware update.”

“HDMi enables high-quality output of 3D video, and the cell processor’s SPU performs video decoding which allow us to support new codecs through a software update,” Hirai continued. “As a result, through a network software update, our customers will be able to instantly enjoy 3D games without replacing their existing PS3 consoles.”

Aside from new games, Sony has previously indicated that the 3D tech could also work with existing software. At the aforementioned German exhibition, Sony set up the prototype unit with a PS3 showing off existing games, like WipeOut HD, being played in 3D. Company reps said the technology on display was built into the HDTV itself, meaning it would work with preexisting PS3 games and consoles.

[UPDATE] Japanese electronics giant says all consoles will benefit from stereoscopic depth-of-field technology after downloadable patch.

[Via GameSpot]

Sony’s first two sets, which are 40- and 46-inch models, will come bundled with two pairs of 3D glasses and will cost ¥290,000 (US$3,215) and ¥350,000 respectively. In July it will launch six further sets: 52- and 60-inch models that come with 3D glasses and four “3D-ready” models that have 3D circuitry inside the set but require the purchase of glasses and an infrared transmitter.

The cheapest of the sets, a 40-inch model that requires the additional glasses and transmitter, will carry an estimated retail price of ¥220,000. The glasses will cost ¥12,000 per pair and the transmitter, which sends out a signal to synchronize electronic shutters in the glasses, will cost ¥5,000. All prices are Sony estimates and products can typically be found online for less.

Included in each set will be a real-time 2D-to-3D convertor, which can take a conventional 2D television image and simulate a 3D image from it. The technology was demonstrated on Tuesday with footage of figure skating, where the skater was in focus and some distance from spectators in the background, and appeared to work well. Sony didn’t offer demonstrations on any other footage.

Tuesday’s announcement fills out Sony’s 3D launch plans, which began in September last year when it became the first major consumer electronics maker to disclose plans to launch 3D televisions in 2010. It has subsequently been followed by other big names including Panasonic, Samsung and LG.

Two of those companies will manage to beat Sony to market with 3D sets. On Wednesday Panasonic plans to start selling 3D televisions through Best Buy stores in the U.S. and some retailers are already advertising availability of the first 3D TV from Samsung.

Sony has high hopes for 3D and expects sales of 3D-compatible sets to be about 2.5 million this year. That represents a 10 percent slice of its total TV sales target.

The two companies have signed a “memorandum of understanding” to cross-promote 3D technology. The deal initially covers an agreement to sell LG’s 3D televisions alongside Xbox 360 games consoles in South Korea, although the agreement could be extended to other countries in future.

It seems likely that Microsoft will be issuing a firmware update to add 3D support to the Xbox 360, in much the same way as Sony did for the PlayStation 3, and more details are expected to emerge at E3 next month, the annual gaming expo in Los Angeles.

“There are already 3D games available today on Xbox 360, and this selection will continue to evolve,” said Microsoft in a statement. “Today, you can buy a 3DTV and wear glasses to play games such as Avatar and Batman: Arkham Asylum. The promotional partnership announced in South Korea today is specific to the South Korean market, but is further evidence that as 3D adoption grows, Xbox 360 will support 3D games and entertainment.”

3D is seen as the next key battleground for games companies. Sony has issued a firmware upgrade for that PlayStation 3 that allows it to play 3D games, such as the forthcoming Wipeout and MotorStorm, while Nintendo has revealed that it is launching a new hand-held games console, the Nintendo 3DS, that will allow people to play 3D games without the need for special glasses.

Both Sony and Microsoft will also be going head-to-head with Nintendo with their new motion-sensing gaming systems. Sony’s PlayStation Move is similar to the Nintendo Wii, and uses a wand-style remote to control on-screen movement. Microsoft’s Project Natal system entirely does away with the need for a controller, instead using a camera to capture the movement of players and translate that in to on-screen action.