Months ago TechRadar released a list of 10 tricks that Sony hasn’t revealed to no one. Well guess what, that’s not all! There are now 16 PS3 tricks that Sony hasn’t mentioned to anyone. Are there still more secrets that Sony is trying to hide from us. We will find out soon...
(1) Play games from any country Harbouring a desire to play Super Gaiden Ninja XI? Now you can. In fact, you can handily play any PS3 game from any country. On holiday in the States and spot the latest release at a bargain dollar-to-pound price? Help yourself. So far, at least, PS3 games aren’t being region coded. That said PS2 and PS1 games are so you can’t play a US title on a Euro console.
And let’s not forget that Blu-ray movies are region-coded so the barriers aren’t completely down yet.
(2) The secret video reset One of the most annoying as... More »
As if there was ever any doubt. More Metal Gear Solid 4 reviews are starting to come in now, and the scores are high. From NeoGaf:
- PlayStation Official Magazine (UK): 10/10
- PlayStation Official Magazine (US): 10/10
- PlayStation Official Magazine (Italy): 10/10
- PlayStation Official Magazine (Dutch): 9.6/10
- LEVEL (Sweden): 10/10
- Joypad (France): 19/20
- Jeuxvideo Magazine (France): 18/20
And that middle-age is fast setting in... You used to play videogames all night. Your Quake prowess was unmatched; your skills at Command & Conquer unparalleled. You have a gaming history that stretches back beyond the PlayStation generation to the SNES, Megadrive, Amiga and ZX Spectrum. You were there at the dawn of gaming.
Tick-tock... Time passes. You've quietly come to realize that you're not the hard-core gamer you used to be. Even your Xbox 360 Gamertag seems far too 'sensible'. How do you know that a mid-life gaming crisis is setting in? Watch out for these warning signs:
You prefer playing against the computer
Online gaming against real people has become depressing – it exposes your faded, spoon-sharp reflexes and you abhor the trash-talk from 12-year old fanboys. You prefer playing offline against the computer because a game's algorithms are slightly more predictable. And, once you master the scripted patterns of play, you stand ... More »
Ok, ok. I get it. Not unlike the 'video games as art' argument morality is a tired topic when it comes to video games, but in the current climate of this new generation it is certainly one worth discussing.
Video games are changing, offering new experiences and interactions that both literally and figuratively take you to the next level. Better graphics, higher production values, a strong sense of immersion, realistic relations with more-human-than-ever characters. With such an evolution taking place in the creation process of each video game the question of morality is always ready to rear its ugly head.
It's a point of contention that's as old as the industry itself, constantly dissected and viewed from every angle. Since the first shot was fired in SpaceWar games have portrayed violent behavior in such a way that allows the player to define their own moral framework.
Not all video games are violent affairs, but an incredible amount will allow... More »
We love the Xbox 360. We really do. It has top games, a great online service, and it’s reasonably priced. In fact, last week we identified the 10 things the Xbox 360 does right. Yet we are not blind to its faults. There are many things it does wrong – dead wrong. Rising from a sea of quibbles are the following ten complaints. Serious complaints.
If Microsoft is to realise its grand corporate vision of total media dominance, then it’s going to have to stop doing things wrong, and start doing them right.
These ten points would be a great place to start.
1. Mass storage
This was a giant leap backwards for the Xbox 2.0 – baffling, and widely decried. The first Xbox had an internal HDD as standard, and that was great. There was just the one SKU that all developers could optimise their software for.
By making the hard drive an optional extra, Microsoft threw the development community into disarray.
The hype is warranted. From my time with Assassin's Creed, I would not be surprised if it is game of the year.
Screen Play spent a gripping day last week playing the game and chatting to effervescent Creative Director, Patrice Desilets, the self-proclaimed "best Assassin's Creed player in the entire universe right now" (and also the genius behind critical darling Prince of Persia Sands of Time).
Assassin's Creed, which will be released on November 15 on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 (and later on PC), has been four years in the making at Ubisoft's Montreal studio and promises to revolutionise the action adventure genre.
Similiar to our recent Mass Effect special, Screen Play will be sharing highlights from the game all this week.
Patrice says the team spent the two first years building a "brand new engine" for
Assassin's Creed and then the last two designing the game.
"The mandate we received back in January 2004 ... More »
The preview-alpha version of SNEmulDS 0.6 is now available for all the brave testers around the world! SNEmulDS is a very promising SNES emulator for the Nintendo DS. Most of the improvements this time relate to the GUI and multi language support.
- New GUI using framebuffer for sub screen
- Better human interface, improved file selector (alphabetical sorted), buttons, check boxes, multi choose zones, etc.
- New GUI supports joypad (joypad is not supported when emulator is running however).
- Multi language support (more than 10 supported, including katakan japanese !)
- Memory pak support (Opera RAM, Slot 2 card reader, etc. using libram) with paging or with large ROM mapping
- Scaling with pseudo bi-linear filtering and sprites squishing : full screen scaling (like snezzids), half scaling (half scaled and without sprites squishing), and no scaling (classic s... More »
We're all waiting for the new Dual Shock 3 controller to be (shock!) unveiled at this week's Tokyo Game Show. But after a little digging, we've uncovered info suggesting that Sony isn't limiting itself to mere rumbling. It has bigger ideas to work on.
Thanks to the wonderful public database of the United States Patent and Trademark Office, we've located an intriguing document filed by Sony back in September 2006. Buried within the interminable bureaucratic wordage are two high-potential projects: Voice-active consoles and pressure-sensitive buttons.
Voice-active consoles? The intention seems to be to use microphones housed on a console with voice-recognition software, for actions like analysing your voice to match you with a game's character, or recalling your personal config settings at the sound of your voice. There's even a suggestion that noise-making gizmos could be packaged in cereal boxes, with the specif... More »
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