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Post by VulcanElf on Jan 9, 2009 2:02:10 GMT
The First gen PS3s did have backwards compatibility with PS2 and PS1 games. Really not sure about why they stopped making them PS2 compatible. The reason they stopped was because they were not finding it cost effective. It cost them too much in the hardware and engineering, and they weren't making it back in retail. So they just snazzed up the next generation of PS3s and gave them even more memory and hoped people wouldn't care. Spirits Within was definitely a colossal mistake. And it's so visually pretty, too. It's a shame they couldn't work up a decent storyline.
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Post by kajnrig on Jan 9, 2009 4:42:41 GMT
The First gen PS3s did have backwards compatibility with PS2 and PS1 games. Really not sure about why they stopped making them PS2 compatible. To add onto what Vulcan said, the first-generation PS3s actually have the PS2 chip installed onto the motherboard, and this chip did most of the PS2 emulation. (This method of emulation is called hardware emulation.) A few "second-generation" models didn't have this chip because it was too costly to produce - a five, ten-year old chip? The PS2 chipset was ancient. Anyway, these new PS3s used what's called "software emulation," in which a program in the PS3 emulated a PS2 machine. This way's a lot more buggy than the hardware emulation method because now the PS3 has to emulate the main processor of the PS2 (ie the processing chip). But anyway, all the new models no longer have any sort of PS2 emulation going on, though it's always possible that Sony will allow you to download a PS2 software emulator through its firmware updates... but that's technical mumbo jumbo, and nobody needs to care about that. Anyway.
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Post by sixthlimb on Jan 9, 2009 4:49:56 GMT
lmao, I feel like a dumb/jack ass after Vulcan's post. XD;; But I suppose either way works.
And to make this post seem relevant... I liked Spirits Within. I think its only flaw was somewhat dry dialogue. Why, I remember my experience seeing it at theaters. It was nowhere near packed but whatever. My dad snoring off to my left because...he was...old. At the time. And that one scene where Aki's going all Space Invader on the, what was it, Phantom virus thing in somebody's body and this random guy just totally broke into applause when it was done. For what it was worth...
SW was a very risky step in business, and while it fell short of its goal, perhaps monumentally, I couldn't say it was a mistake so much as at least it opened new doors for things, both good and unfortunately bad...blah blah blah.
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Post by t3hmaniac on Jan 9, 2009 13:36:35 GMT
which is a shame considering much worse movies with budgets the size of England have made profits
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Post by kajnrig on Jan 9, 2009 19:26:08 GMT
Like ahemSpiderManTroiscoughcoughhack.
Lessee, another fault... well, I guess if you consider and are old enough to remember Final Fantasy Mystic Quest to be a fault, then there you go...
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Post by iknowthewords on Jan 9, 2009 19:59:17 GMT
Lessee, another fault... well, I guess if you consider and are old enough to remember Final Fantasy Mystic Quest to be a fault, then there you go... I remember that!! But I was pretty young at the time and so the simplicity and horribleness of the game didn't bother me as much as it should have... I remember being excited about Spirits Within, but I was really disappointed when it turned out to be a sci-fi melodrama (it really bugged me that everybody got killed off). I was thinking they would have been better off using FFVI or FFVII's story. And I knew it was going to be ridiculed up and down. I remember when the movie was starting and the "Square Pictures" logo was on the screen... some guy behind us in the theater said, "That's a rectangle, sh*t-head." That was only the beginning... *le sigh*
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Post by T. Costa on Jan 22, 2009 0:47:51 GMT
Well, then, people should realize that a stripped-down Xbox 360 (which is what the $200 package more or less is) costs just as much as a PS3 once you get it to actually be able to play games (ie purchasing a hard drive for it). If you buy a game console, you expect to be able to play games on it right away. Having to purchase an additional piece of hardware just to be able to start gaming sort of defeats the purpose of the game console in the first place. Ummm, I dunno where you're getting your 360's, but mine cost $250 and it came with the hard drive, ethernet, wireless and all that other nummy stuffs (for fifty dollars more) - the only thing it DIDN'T come with was an HDMI cable, which I don't need as I don't have an HDTV. It even came with a free subscription to Xbox Live. Much better deal than the PS3 (which I still eventually want to get just for multimedia purposes). The basic version is like $190 and seriously not worth it, at all. I honestly don't know a single person who has actually bought the 360 Arcade (which is that stripped-down version you're describing). Most people who buy the things are aware of the fact that they suck - in fact, most of the places you BUY them from will let you know from the get-go that they suck, so Grandma probably won't make that mistake, either. So $250 - which is what I paid in a store - versus...lemme dig it up on Amazon....$400....for equivalent gameplay, and more available games. I'm gonna be honest, I've played some pretty awesome games on that 360, despite my hesitance at getting the thing in the first place. Fallout 3? Really superbly awesome RPG with first-person gameplay. Even my husband - who hates RPG's - loved that game. Call Of Duty 4 is probably my favorite first-person shooter with online gameplay, ever, and it renders amazingly on the 360. Add into it that it acts as a Netflix-to-TV device (I don't have cable so we use Netflix Streaming), and the 360 is nearly worth that $250. Don't get me wrong, I'm a HUGE Sony fangirl, but I don't know a single idiot that would go for the price tag of $60 less just to lose all functionality. Very few of them do - go to any Game Crazy or GameStop and they'll tell you how many of the Arcade's they actually sell. It's not a lot. I want a PS3 - but I'm biding my time, like I did with the PS2, for the price to go down. It's gone down a lot (from when I covered the release party for my newspaper - can you BELIEVE those suckers sent me to San Francisco just to cover the thing? Awesome), but not enough for my tastes. The only reason I got the 360, tbh, is because my husband begged, but I haven't regretted it once. Also, to keep this on tangent, I think the biggest mistake Square has EVER made was merging with Enix. And I actually liked The Spirits Within, so pthphpth.
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Post by kajnrig on Jan 22, 2009 5:58:59 GMT
Costa, I am experiencing a paradox here. I want to shoot you for liking an inferior machine, but I also want to give you a big fat hug for being a first-person shootin' female. One of the elite few.
And if I could muster up the effort, I'd argue with you about the better machine for as long as you want, but... well, I can't muster up said effort. Dangit. You win this round, Mrs. Costa, but MARK MY WORDS.
...I liked Spirits Within, too.
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Post by Hope on Jan 22, 2009 13:40:35 GMT
...I liked Spirits Within, too. But all the characters that were vaguely interesting died halfway into the film! I bought an arcade. *Dies of shame*
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Post by T. Costa on Jan 22, 2009 19:17:15 GMT
Costa, I am experiencing a paradox here. I want to shoot you for liking an inferior machine, but I also want to give you a big fat hug for being a first-person shootin' female. One of the elite few. The guys on xbox live hate me. They'll be making fun of my husband and then I'll take over and start killing them all - even allies if I'm annoyed enough, although I generally don't - and I don't talk while I do it, just kill. Eventually they'll get to the "HE MUST HAVE US ON MUTE" thing, and I'll be like "Oh, no, I don't, you're just getting pwned by his wife now." Which, naturally, leads to things like "Oh, I've been a bad bad boy, punish me, baby." *rolls eyes* But they stop when I start knifing them from behind. Woot. I love COD4. ^_^ And if I could muster up the effort, I'd argue with you about the better machine for as long as you want, but... well, I can't muster up said effort. Dangit. You win this round, Mrs. Costa, but MARK MY WORDS. Hey, I didn't say the 360 was a superior machine - just that with all of the stuff you need to play included in the package, it costs $250 instead of $400. I WANT a PS3 - just waiting for the price to go down. I've used PS3's and they are awesome. I just feel that the 360 is a fun deal and a lot cheaper (at least it's not a Wii, although those can be fun). ...I liked Spirits Within, too. *hug* I don't understand why people hated it so much. I saw it before I played FF7, though, or really any Final Fantasy, so I guess that might be why. I wasn't expecting it to be Final Fantasy: The Movie. I just wanted to see a movie. I bought an arcade. *Dies of shame* Oh no, Hope. I don't know if I can be friends with you anymore. *baawwwwww* (Just kidding.)
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Post by Hope on Jan 23, 2009 12:31:17 GMT
Tbh as you said I was one of those who don't know any better. I tend to play one game at a time until its finished so I don't need masses of memory, and I thought 'oooh I can afford that!'. I didn't realise I'd have to pay a ton more for extras until later...
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Post by T. Costa on Jan 23, 2009 17:21:55 GMT
If you're not into online gaming or multimedia, and you really do only play one game at a time, the Arcade is actually probably best for you. We just really like online first-person shooters around here.
Although I'm not gonna lie, I do really want Rock Band. Like, a lot.
Anyway, back to Square - they aren't making a mistake with making FFXIII available on the 360, they're just trying to make more money. Marketshare wise, more people really do have a 360.
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Post by kajnrig on Jan 23, 2009 18:44:05 GMT
But if they're hoping to keep everything on a single disc, then they'll either have to a) make the game incredibly short, b) find some new awesome compression method for all that graphical shibang they're trying to pump out, c) decrease the general quality of the 360 version.
Because going simply by their ambition - which I hear is to create graphics that stream seamlessly from gameplay to cinematics to CG to gameplay to blah blah blah - it's going to take a LOT of memory to store all that information, and the 360's media of choice (dual-layer DVDs, about 9 gigabytes) simply won't be able to handle all of that. Metal Gear Solid 4, the most badass game EVAR, took up an entire dual-layer Blu-Ray disc, and that was over 5x the size of a dual-layer DVD. And while the graphical detail on that are astounding, they're certainly not of the same quality as Square's CG videos.
So I highly doubt that Square will be able to produce a game that looks that good AND can compress it all down to a single DVD. If they do manage to fit it all onto a single disc, then I can almost guarantee that many, many layers of polish will have to be taken off.
...but that's just me. I dunno, maybe it all works out. If it does, then kudos to them.
I still won't buy it.
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Post by T. Costa on Jan 24, 2009 8:17:02 GMT
Or they can take a leaf out of the PS3 book and make you install the game on the 360. XD One or the other, but I think it'll work out. I mean, you can fit a LOT of info on one disc. If they can make it so it caches some of the big stuff, or DOWNLOADS some of the big stuff and stores it on the hard drive....I think it'll work nicely.
In other news, my husband and I did preorder FFXIII for the 360 tonight when we bought Left4Dead. There's no release date yet but GameCrazy is taking preorders. Weird, huh?
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Post by kajnrig on Jan 24, 2009 14:58:28 GMT
No, not really. Big-name games like that usually get pre-orders waaaay in advance. Especially something like FFXIII, since it's part of such a big franchise.
On another note, Left 4 Dead is really, really fun. (But the 360? Shame. Shoulda gotten the PC version, for obvious reasons.)
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