PS3???

[TheOogieBoogieMan]

Anyone have one? Are they worth buying?

I'm probably going to be spending the many gift cards I received yesterday this weekend, and I'm really tempted to get a PS3. The biggest draws for me are GTA IV and LittleBigPlanet (among others), but also the Blu-ray player and the fact that, theoretically, I could also pick up and play PS1 and PS2 games as well (I miss Crash Bandicoot Warped like you wouldn't believe).

So a couple more questions: How backwards compatible is the PS3? and will there be a price drop on it sometime next year that I should know about?

[PoolMan]

I'll admit I don't know a ton about the PS3 other than sales have been horrid despite the fact that the PS2 was probably the most successful console yet.

As far as backward compatibility, check out this video. I don't know if these issues have been fixed, but if not, yikes. That's ugly! (language warning)

[Hucklebubba]

I always wondered what my PS2 games would look like if I were playing them through a rainy window.

[rabidmonkeys]

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Playstation_3#Software

If you go down to 'Retail Configurations', it says that none of the PS3 models currently in production support any backward compatibility. If thats what you want, your best bet would be to go used, though I know that the old ones are being sold for hugely inflated prices now, because of the backward compatibility.

btw Uncharted: Drakes Fortune is supposed to be one of the best games on PS3

[TheOogieBoogieMan]

Thanks for your help, guys.

I, er...ended up buying an Xbox.

I came to the conclusion that LittleBigPlanet wasn't worth the hassle I was going through trying to get a not-ridiculously-expensive backwards-compatible PS3 on eBay.

So, yay, I have an Xbox!

[PoolMan]

I would say it's a good policy to never buy a console for a single game. When that console costs north of $600, doubly so.

[TheLuckyOne]

I'm just curious, why is the PS3 no longer backwards compatible? Sony has to realize that it's one of the big draws of next gen consoles, almost expected in this day and age. You'd think that with consoles as successful as the PS1 and PS2 (and as unsuccessful as the PS3 has been so far), they'd want to emphasize connections to their earlier consoles, not downplay them.

-D

[DTH]

Here's a story for you:

I bought the PSOne about 6 months after it came out. It was awesome. Well impressed with it.

So I took a look at the forthcoming catalogue for the PS2 and thought "Yikes, this looks too good to be true!". So I saved my pennies and bought a PS2 a few months after release date.

After a week, I was unimpressed: most of the games I wanted had slipped their release dates and the dang thing was difficult to code for, so the games which did come out, weren't great.

A few of my mates bought Dreamcasts and after playing Powerstone, Wacky Races and Phantasy Star Online, I was sold. Add in the fact that it was a lot cheaper than its peers and it was too good to be true.

I bought the DC and played PSO to death, along with Spawn and some other choice titles. It was a wonderful little machine and I was gutted when Sega decided they were no longer supporting it.

So I went back to my PS2. The game I was waiting for, Half-Life (I'm huge HL fan and the PS2 version had a campaign I hadn't played!) came out and it was AWFUL. *sigh* I would go on to buy a handful of games (some D & D thing, some Everquest thing, Transformers and Guitar Hero 1 & 2) but that, my friends, was that.

Then the Xbox came out. I looked at what was forthcoming and I was sorely tempted. Yet, having had my fingers burnt with the PS2, I held off. When I did finally succumb, I bought Halo and 4 pads and this turned out to be the best investment evah!

I still use my Xbox today (it has a fantastic DVD player in it) and I'm really pleased I got it. I still have my PS2, which gathers dust somewhere in my house...

When the next generation of consoles came out, I was very reluctant to purchase any.

All my mates bought 360s and/or Wiis (it is surprising how many people I know have a Wii and another console). I held off and held off. It was nearly a year before I finally picked up a new console.

The PS3 came out and I know ONE person who picked it up (chiefly for the Blu-Ray player). What I've seen of it, I'd say its an ok machine but the number of issues with the European version are too numerous to mention. It just isn't a worthwhile investment over here, as far as I am concerned.

Rock Band came out on the 360 and that sold that machine for me. In fact, I only had that single game for months until I purchased Lego Star Wars.

Suffice to say, the 360 is awesome and I love it.

I'm looking forward to playing Last Remnant (I also have Infinite Undiscovery but Last Remnant looks way cooler) when I'm done with Spider-man: Web of Shadows.

Feel free to add my gamertag, DTHz!

[TheLuckyOne]

Jan 13, 2009 4:06:23 GMT -5 DTH said:

All my mates bought 360s and/or Wiis (it is surprising how many people I know have a Wii and another console).

We do, but we only paid for the Wii; if my father-in-law hadn't won the 360, we wouldn't have it. I'm glad we do have it (since the latest installments in the Silent Hill and Resident Evil series' are or will be coming out for it), but the Wii's what we really wanted. Never regretted it.

-D

[wdm0744]

I guess I should have weighed in before now, but, I have a PS3 and I've been very pleased with it.

The cross-platform games perform as well or better (in my experience) and the exclusives (like "Uncharted" and "Rachet and Clank") have been tons of fun.

The blu-ray player is not as much of a draw as it was in the past since stand-alone players are cheaper now, but the PS3 is still one of the best blu-ray players on the market. C-Net even uses it as their test model.

I did own a X-Box 360. Actually, I owned four of them. I experienced frequent crashes and freezes on all the models (and I treated them like gold, mind you - including placing the console and the power brick on seperate stools in the middle of the room so they could get plenty of air) and I had one completely tank on me after a faulty, mandatory update from Microsoft.

I finally got sick it and got the PS3 and I haven't looked back. Especially since this year looks to be a good one for Sony with slated exclusives (like Killzone 2 and God of War III, among others).

PS3 may be in third place, but with the extra compacity of blu-ray discs, I think that in the future, it will be advantagously situated to exploit the growing size of games, whereas 360 owners will be forced to play the same games on multiple dvds or play a drastically reduced version.

Bottom line: Tons of people have had similar experiences with their 360s. It is a notoriously faulty machine. In fact, it is pretty much a given that it will break on you at least once - to the point that some people have gone so far as to buy a backup 360 console to play while the broken one is in the shop.

The PS3 is a much, much more reliable console, it comes with a blu-ray player, built-in wi-fi, and online play is free. Yeah, I miss backwards compatiblity, but it's still a great deal when you figure for 360 you have to buy a wireless adapter ($100) and pay $50 a year for online play, and then your console will mostly likely still crap out on you.

[TheOogieBoogieMan]

Jan 13, 2009 0:42:18 GMT -5 TheLuckyOne said:

I'm just curious, why is the PS3 no longer backwards compatible?

As far as I know, the only way Sony could afford to lower the retail price was to remove the BC.

Considering that both consoles share a lot of the same games, the Xbox and PS3 were on more or less equal footing in my eyes for a while. The PS3 briefly had the advantage cause of LittleBigPlanet and backwards compatibility; remove the latter, and factor in that the Xbox Arcade is about $100 cheaper, and the scales tipped the other way.

Jan 13, 2009 9:23:50 GMT -5 wdm0744 said:

Bottom line: Tons of people have had similar experiences with their 360s. It is a notoriously faulty machine.

Yeah, the Red Ring of Death was considered when choosing, but at the same time, I know quite a few people, relatives and friends, who have had their 360's for a long time without any problems. So I'll just take my chances.

[wdm0744]

I hope yours does okay. I really do. I wouldn't wish my prediciment on anybody.

I know one guy who's never had any problems, but that is it. Everybody else I know (online and in real life) has had theirs tank at least once.

And, I actually never got the RROD. I had all kinds of other problems, but not that. Ultimately, the reliablitity factor is what is most important to me.

Question for you:

You went with the Arcade system. Do you plan to upgrade with a hard drive, wireless adapter, and Gold membership? If so, those upgrades will put you over the price of a PS3.

[TheOogieBoogieMan]

Jan 13, 2009 11:10:01 GMT -5 wdm0744 said:

Question for you:

You went with the Arcade system. Do you plan to upgrade with a hard drive, wireless adapter, and Gold membership? If so, those upgrades will put you over the price of a PS3.

I was able to buy a 20GB hard drive on eBay for about 40 bucks, which isn't bad, considering the retail price is $100. And it turns out I don't need the wireless adapter, cause I had a spare ethernet cable laying around, and I coincidentally set up the console near my router.

As for the Gold membership, I'm still on the fence. I have the free month-long trial, but beyond that, I don't think I'd get much use out of it. I'm not really an online-multiplayer kinda guy.

[wdm0744]

Cool. I'd say you got a good deal.

I'll say a prayer for the 360, though, just to be sure.

[PoolMan]

While I'm glad for all your various purchases, I have to say it still stuns me in this day and age of economic turmoil that people even have multiple consoles. I mean, to buy all three consoles (to say nothing of extra controllers, peripherals, or games) is about $1,000 USD. Toss in a few hundred bucks in trimmings to make each console worth playing.

So with the world crashing down around our ears, who has this kind of surplus cash to make these kinds of purchases, and how do they justify them? I don't mean to harp on anyone here, but there came a point where I just had to say to myself that maybe video gaming isn't as important to me as 30 nice dinners out, y'know?