Video Games

[Maxus]

In the Chocobo races you can also cheat by holding the shoulder buttons to regain stamina really quickly.

Don't I wish.

Oh, yeah, I dsagree with you on Wakka. I could care less about him as a character (Well, okay, he's a decent guy; he's patient with Tidus early on when Tidus doesn't know jack about what's going on. But he's not very interesting), but he's pretty good in the battles, given he's got high HP, really high accuracy, good strength and speed...He's useful enough.

[Murtak]

Oh, yeah, I dsagree with you on Wakka. I could care less about him as a character (Well, okay, he's a decent guy; he's patient with Tidus early on when Tidus doesn't know jack about what's going on. But he's not very interesting), but he's pretty good in the battles, given he's got high HP, really high accuracy, good strength and speed...He's useful enough.

His slot machine overdrive is insane, probably the most damaging attack in the game.

[Maxus]

Oh, yeah, I dsagree with you on Wakka. I could care less about him as a character (Well, okay, he's a decent guy; he's patient with Tidus early on when Tidus doesn't know jack about what's going on. But he's not very interesting), but he's pretty good in the battles, given he's got high HP, really high accuracy, good strength and speed...He's useful enough.

His slot machine overdrive is insane, probably the most damaging attack in the game.

Heh.

Well, I might need your help getting it...I tried a tournament and got sacrificed to the Ronso Blitzball Gods in the second round.

[RandomCasualty2]

I tried Blitzball and I'm wondering how the hell you can win without extensive recruiting.

Basically you get XP for passing the ball, so what you do is just sit back and keep passing the ball around to level up your characters. It's pretty boring, but it works. You just avoid taking shots on goal and instead power level early on.

[NativeJovian]

In fact, I just found this:

Times Online interview with Sony Chairman and Group CEO Kazuo Hirai[/url]]It’s well known that Sony loses money on every PS3 it sells. Will that still be the case with the new machine?
If you're just talking about the hardware alone, the quick answer is yes. That makes good headlines, but I don't actually know that that's the true nature of the business that we're all in, whether it's PlayStation, Xbox or the Wii.

This is from Sony's CEO, so its pretty much from the horse's mouth, although it may just be the PS3 Slim he's talking about.

She doesn't technically need to this time, any more than she needs to cite sources that fighters are underpowered or that the easter bunny actually doesn't exist. The idea of consoles being sold as a loss is a faerie tale. they're sold very close to production costs, but they don't lose anything.

I find this juxtaposition to be hilarious.

[Crissa]

Well, that's different than his answer last year when they were announcing Sony @Home and their new 'open source' SDK for helping developers use the PS3's unique platform.

They denied losing money on every PS3 sold. And they claimed that the PSOne and PS2 slims were profit generators. That is probably not true for the PS3 slim.

-Crissa

PS: It violates wiki procedure, but because TimesOnline gets more interviews with CEOs than I do doesn't mean I'm not there several times a year listening to their announcements in person. It's my job.

[Starmaker]

Don't consoles generate money from videogames sold and are only sort of expensive because giving them for free wouldn't motivate people to buy games? (Like plastic cards generate income when used for purchases.)

[Count Arioch the 28th]

Early on, Wakka's good. When enemies start becoming immune to status effects, Wakka starts lagging due to his mediocre stats all around. He does have really good overdrive attacks if you can be arsed to unlock them, you can unlock attack reels right away, and later you get the useless status reels and the decent aurochs reels which is good if you have all the original besaid aurochs members on your team.

[Count Arioch the 28th]

Oh, yeah, I dsagree with you on Wakka. I could care less about him as a character (Well, okay, he's a decent guy; he's patient with Tidus early on when Tidus doesn't know jack about what's going on. But he's not very interesting), but he's pretty good in the battles, given he's got high HP, really high accuracy, good strength and speed...He's useful enough.

His slot machine overdrive is insane, probably the most damaging attack in the game.

Heh.

Well, I might need your help getting it...I tried a tournament and got sacrificed to the Ronso Blitzball Gods in the second round.

Here's some things that might help. First off, don't use the original Aurochs except Tidus and maybe Wakka, they all pretty much suck. To beat the Ronsos, all you need is someone fast. The Fangs are tough, and hit like trucks, but as a rule they are all slower than crap. I recommend recruiting the guard to the right of the Blitzball stadium (I forget if it's Wedge or Biggs, it's the one on the right). He's pretty fast. If you have the airship, then recruit Brother instead of Biggs, he's got one of the highest speeds in the game. You'll swim circles around the Ronsos.

To get better defense, try to recruit the Psyche's goalie, he's the best in the game. I forget how long his contract is, but if you keep scouting him with the square button, the Al Bhed are less likely to resign him at the end, where you swoop on in and grab him. Early in the game try to use Keepa as a defense, and keep passing the ball to and from him to level him up.

The rest are less threatening. The Glories have high speed and high stats, but they drop the ball when you speak too loudly near them. The Goers are pathetic when the computer isn't cheating to make them win like in the tournament (If you score a goal they will immediately score one too, and there's nothing you can do about it due to the random number generator being fixed to their advantage during the story fight). Expect to mop the floor with the Goers every time you play them. The Beasts start easy but get really good later in the game as they level and tech up. The Psyches have a really awesome goalie and little else noteworthy, and once you recruit their goalie you can ignore them.

Also, once you have all Wakka's crap, go ahead and re-recruit the original aurochs so Aurochs reels is better. Or not, once you start hitting one of the two limits (9,999 or 99,999), attack reels is superior in every way.

Like I said, I know Blitzball. I just don't like it.

[Maxus]

Thanks, Count. I'll try that.

[NativeJovian]

They denied losing money on every PS3 sold.

They're not, but that doesn't mean they aren't selling the PS3 at a loss.

Everyone who buys a PS3 also buys PS3 games. Buying PS3 games puts money in Sony's pocket, regardless of who made the game, because of licensing fees and whatnot. Thus, selling PS3s sells PS3 games, which makes them money overall despite the fact that they're selling PS3s for less than it costs to make them.

Unless people are using the PS3 as a Blu-Ray player and not buying PS3 games at all. Which is what was fucking Sony over for a while (though not, presumably, anymore).

[Murtak]

Here's some things that might help. First off, don't use the original Aurochs except Tidus and maybe Wakka, they all pretty much suck. To beat the Ronsos, all you need is someone fast. The Fangs are tough, and hit like trucks, but as a rule they are all slower than crap. I recommend recruiting the guard to the right of the Blitzball stadium (I forget if it's Wedge or Biggs, it's the one on the right). He's pretty fast. If you have the airship, then recruit Brother instead of Biggs, he's got one of the highest speeds in the game. You'll swim circles around the Ronsos.

Seconded. You can beat many teams just by having a couple players with a high speed and stringing them out, then passing to a shooter to score. Also get Tidus' Jecht shot, probably the best shot in the game. You might want to try this FAQ. Very long but also very in-depth.

[Parthenon]

I'm no longer sure what to believe. It's either some kind of Schrödinger's profit, iSuppli is very biased against Sony, or one side is using profit over lifetime and the other is just console.

The over lifetime and just console makes sense though since in this interview he specifies "the hardware alone".

[Crissa]

Except Sony makes money from having Blu-Ray beat HD-DVD, which it did. They make money on every Blu-Ray sold, as well as every game.

-Crissa

[Parthenon]

But, but, thats moving the goalposts, surely? You're now talking about sales of Blu-Ray discs when we were talking about console hardware. And Blu-Ray sales would cover all the other Blu-Ray players and so can't be easily used to see the cost effectiveness of PS3s.

I think that theres no disagreement that PS3s are expected to make money overall during the lifespan of each machine, especially since they get cheaper over time and the earlier, more costly to make consoles have a longer period to buy games and films for them.

Its Xbox 360s that get really screwed over since they lose money on each that gets bought and the RRoD means that several consoles get replaced without being bought.

[Crissa]

Yeah, I can only report what they say, and there was much speculation last year they sold their machines at a predatory level and Sony denied that as well.

But saying that they need to sell games specifically for the PS3 is disingenuous. They make money off of Blu-Ray, and it has been awhile since Sony had a successful format battle... I really wish they'd give more credit to the PS3.

-Crissa

[Count Arioch the 28th]

Personally, I dislike the big black monoliths on general principle. They're big and clunky, take up too much cabinet real estate (big deal for me, as I like to keep things small so I can pack up and move if I need to), they're hotter than crap (yes, I know the 360 has overheating issues, maybe that's why the PS3 puts out more heat because it's better at getting it out of the box. Or something, I got a D in thermodynamics), and the president of Sony is a douche.

Bluray is pretty cool though, I'm getting a bluray burner for my computer.

[angelfromanotherpin]

On the subject of Blu-Ray, what do people think the odds are that it'll actually succeed? When DVDs replaced VCR tapes there was an enormous upgrade in terms of what the consumer got - instant scene skip, multiple sound and subtitle tracks, and so on. Blu-Ray doesn't add anything in that respect (that I'm aware of), except HD support. It feels to me like the public may just skip over Blu-Ray and go digital with their video needs.

[Count Arioch the 28th]

I don't think digital will be an option until American copywrite law is eradicated and replaced with something that doesn't bone people.

[Heath Robinson]

On the subject of Blu-Ray, what do people think the odds are that it'll actually succeed? When DVDs replaced VCR tapes there was an enormous upgrade in terms of what the consumer got - instant scene skip, multiple sound and subtitle tracks, and so on. Blu-Ray doesn't add anything in that respect (that I'm aware of), except HD support. It feels to me like the public may just skip over Blu-Ray and go digital with their video needs.

High Def, more room for additional languages, styled subs (I think), interactivity.

http://www.blu-ray.com/faq/
http://www.blue-ray.com/aboutblu-ray.html

[Murtak]

Also it adds support for fun stuff like DVDs that only play at midnight or more to the point, disc recorders that produce discs that can only play on the drive that recorded them, broadcasts your recorder can not record at all or discs which can only be played 10 times or only for one month. I hope Blu Ray and the entire HD standard will die a horrible, painful, whimpering death, but I don't think it especially likely, unless a new strictly superior standard comes out in the next 5 years.

[Crissa]

Oh, and discs that only play when they can phone home.

However, none of those features have been very popular. The downfall of Vista was a very telling show of how much loss of performance and control people were willing to tolerate.

(Vista basically hung itself on the security features that were required for Blu-Ray et al. Which is why you can burn Blu-Ray discs on any other platform, but not play them.)

-Crissa

[Lago PARANOIA]

I know Vista isn't a video game, but how is that OS doing anyway?

I know a lot of people hate it and tell folks to stick with XP if they must have Windoze. But I would appreciated a patented The Gaming Den Neelessly In-Depth Review.

[Maxus]

I know Vista isn't a video game, but how is that OS doing anyway?

I know a lot of people hate it and tell folks to stick with XP if they must have Windoze. But I would appreciated a patented The Gaming Den Neelessly In-Depth Review.

The computer I use has Vista. I think it's an older version, though (I bought the computer tower from a friend for $60 because he had a new one and this one is so much better than my laptop it's not funny).

1) They tried to make it more dummy-friendly. Which is fine; actually, it's nice to be able to type 'calculator' into the search bar that pops up at the bottom of the Start menu and have a link to the calculator pop up. Still, it takes getting used to.

2) There's a few quirks. Like there's a Smartfetch or whatever feature that notes your program usage and keeps the ones you use most often pre-loaded in the RAM. Which is okay for normal people, but it slows things down after a while, and it's a couple of hoops to jump through to turn it off.

3) Navigating folders is weird, because there's several different Download, Music, and Picture folders, spread out. One in your user name, one under the C: drive.

But I'm computer-literate, not computer-savvy, so my opinion might not count for much

[Heath Robinson]

Like there's a Smartfetch or whatever feature that notes your program usage and keeps the ones you use most often pre-loaded in the RAM. Which is okay for normal people, but it slows things down after a while, and it's a couple of hoops to jump through to turn it off.

This sounds like it could help me. Would you mind sharing how you turned it off?