Welcome to Coffee Talk! Let’s start off the day by discussing whatever is on your (nerd chic) mind. Every morning I’ll kick off a discussion and I’m counting on you to participate in it. If you’re not feelin’ my topic, feel free to start a chat with your fellow readers and see where it takes you. Whether you’re talking about videogames, Roger Federer falling at the Australian Open, 15-year olds dominating American Idol (so far), or looking forward to seeing Jay Mohr, Coffee Talk is the place to do it.
Before I start today’s column, please remind me to never switch to a new keyboard the same night a console company unveils new hardware. That was…not so smart. Anyway, the console wars have heated up with Nintendo’s announcement of the 3DS’ global launch dates and Sony unveiling the (codename) NGP. As I mentioned back in September 2010, this is going to be an amazing year for portable gaming.
The upcoming round of console wars also feels a bit familiar. I had an exchange with my friend Giant Bomb Jeff about the matter. He said, “It’s still kind of crazy to see Sony go tech and Nintendo go quirk considering how it all panned out last time.” I replied, “I see it as Sony being the electronics company and Nintendo being the game company. They gots roots!” On several levels, it’s the same story as before. Sony has the superior tech and third-party partnerships. Nintendo has the more obvious gimmick and beloved first-party games. Yet these wars have played out differently in the past. PlayStation vs. Nintendo 64, PlayStation 2 vs. GameCube, PlayStation Portable vs. Nintendo DS, and PlayStation 3 vs. Nintendo Wii were all very different battles. How do you think Nintendo 3DS vs. Sony NGP will pan out?
Certainly it’s too early to tell…but it’s still fun to see if you can do a better job than Michael Pachter. Based on what you know so far, how do you think the upcoming portable console war will play out? Will Nintendo’s longtime dominance in the handheld space and eye-catching 3D gimmick help the company maintain its dominance? Or will Sony’s modern social features, motion controls, and superior hardware win the day? Perhaps you’ll go with the safe option of predicting that the Nintendo 3DS will do worse that the Nintendo DS while the NGP will perform better than the PSP? Put on your videogame analyst hat and let me know (please)!
I say the 3DS outperforms the PSPNGP (makes me think of NBE1) hands down in terms of sales. I don't see Sony shipping the NGP cheaper than the 3DS. Nintendo has already proven that price plays a huge factor in moving a consumer electronic.
I think Sony will sell more of NGP than their older PSP models though. Two analog sticks will bring in new customers as will the homebrew community be looking forward to a quadcore with 3G built in.
I'd also like to add that after I looked at the list of games being developed for NGP…I feel that I'd rather play those games on my bigscreen TV or computer. I don't think the experience will be nearly as good for Uncharted on NGP as opposed to my PS3 and surround.
So the 3DS has that going for it…3D without glasses. Something I can't do on my existing hardware.
I don't know, a lot of people say that the last GOW on the PSP was better than GOW3 and MGS Peace Walker on the PSP was better than MGS4. But I think you're saying that you would just rather play them on the big screen and I totally agree.
@RROD
Yep. Two analog interface and crisp gfx I'd much rather use my home setup.
I think Snakeater was the best entry in MGS. God of War 1 was the best in that series as well.
I think the 3DS will do better than the NGP. The games do look appealing on the NGP, but like Smartguy said all of those games look more appealing on a home console rather than on a handheld. Also, I feel like the NGP will be higher priced than the 3DS which will help push 3DS sales forward as well.
On another note, I have started getting mixed feelings about the 3DS. I want one, but I am being discouraged by how gimmicky I feel the 3D features will be. I want one for great new games, but I don't feel like I will be using the 3D feature that much- and that is the main reason for the price increase. Now that I convinced my fiance that I should get one at launch, I am starting to tell myself that it won't be worth the steep price. I will probably still pre-order one at launch, but I don't see myself getting rid of my DSi quite yet either. I want a system for the games, not a gimmick which, until I see otherwise, 3D still is to me.
The 3DS will definitely sell more. This is what I really like about Sony. They are an electronics company who sets the bar for tech in gaming and it's clear that sales are not they're first and only priority or else the PSP2 would not have all of those features that ensures at least a $300 minimum price tag which gives it no chance to beat the 3DS in sales. The Kinect could have been better but MS took out the processor in order to cut cost. I respect the fact that Sony don't cut corners with their tech to be able to release their products at a cheaper price. They know the PSP2 won't sell like the 3DS and they are sticking to their tech guns anyway. It's all about the products with Sony. They also fully back games like Heavy Rain and The Last Guardian knowing that they won't sell huge numbers. You may not like Sony but gamers should respect them for these things or else we would only have watered down consoles and handhelds with mainly shooters and Mario to play.
This will make you frown and laugh all at the same time…..and wish you had a bunch of guns for the zombie apocalypse.
http://gizmodo.com/5744796/utah-bioweapon-defense…
Some of the comments were pretty funny, especially the one quoting Glados.
-M
I'm going to play it safe and say that the 3DS will be a big hit with kids, parents, and girls of all ages, while the NGP will be a hit with hardcore, portable gamers. Based on that premise, I say the rugrats, soccer moms and tweens will annoy their parents enough to buy the 3DS more than the less populous hardcore gaming market will purchase the NGP on their own or save up for it.
3DS wins.
Of course, this is coming from the same guy that predicted the Patriots and the Falcons in the Super Bowl this year.
-M
Wow… slow day.
PSA: XBL is having a Rockstar/2K sale extravaganza this week. A lot of DLC is on sale at half off the regular price for popular games like Red Dead Redemption, Borderlands, Bioshock 2, Grand Theft Auto 4 and more!
I got my wish and bought Minerva's Den (and later, the Rapture Metro Map pack) for half off. See, It pays to be patient.
-M
The grand theft auto 4 DLC sounds tempting, but I'm not sure I wanna start playing that game again.
Why not? Did you not like the game or was it too addictive for you?
In any case, if you only pick up the game one more time, I would suggest Ballad of Gay Tony. The length is good, the variety is good, the way it ties into the original GTA 4 story is good, and the characters are f'n awesome.
Stay away from The Lost and Damned, though. It sucked. Plus, there's a guy's penis in it.
-M
It wasn't addicting enough. My parents were never fans of the GTA series when I was in high school, and I never really got a good chance to play any of it when I was at a friend's house or anything-so I thought I would really like GTA4 when I got the chance to play. It was good enough and I probably got a good 50 hours or so out of it, but it was mostly unsatisfying after the story was over. Nothing about the story drew me in too much, so I wanted to be addicted to it a lot more than I was.
Turned on my PS3 at 6pm CST….mandatory update to access PSN started at 6:01….at 47% at 6:13. Just going from a recent firmware update to 3.56.
I think I am def not buying anything else made by Sony that plays a video game. It's not my ISP or any of my network settings. Nothing else is choked like this. In fact, if my PS2 still worked so I could play MGS-MGS3 I'd sell this f'n machine and buy a cheap bluray player.
Have you tried calling Sony customer support about this? Is it just your machine, or does this happen for everybody? Maybe there are some online forums you could browse through to get some help.
-M
@iceman
i don't think it's his machine this time. I had issues downloading the update. i was trying Wednesday night around 7P CST and it didn't go through until like 8 something. it stalled out on me 6 or 7 times, saying to check my internet connection which is lame because i was on xbl 30 mins before that.
@Iceman
I have emailed customer support. Got a copy and paste from their FAQ about it. I give up on them though. Unless I turn that machine on everyday before I leave for work to check for an update I have a delay in wanting to use it whenever I turn it on. I guess they don't know how to do one update every 6 months like the competition or they change something just so in order to stop ppl from pirating crap.
The thing is, I'm not pirating anything. However I'm the one catching crap because of it. Conundrum?
i didnt have any problems updating…that really sux SG
Thanks for asking about how well the system is, and not which is better. That sort of question tends to ignite the flames of war.
I think the 3DS will do better. I just don't see anybody's portable systems really posing a threat to the Nintendo handheld gaming empire. I like Sony's PSP better than Nintendo's DS, and I (think) I like the NGP better than the 3DS, but we need to be honest here. Nintendo's got a nice lineup of new features and games. Almost ALL of their most popular 1st-Party developers are getting games out around Christmas, including Zelda, Star Fox, Kid Icarus, and Mario. At the moment, Sony's lineup can't compete with that. I think that, just as much as Sony planned to steal some attention from the 3DS's release by announcing the NGP, Nintendo is trying to steal Sony's release with a flood of amazing games.
We really don't have flame wars here, Rpad thinks that (not having one) is a bad thing lol.
Nintendo has to compete with iOS now though. That's a huge piece of competition.
That's actually tomorrow's column. Apple's event timing is…interesting.
excellent. Can't wait to see what I have to buy tomorrow.
Thanks for the comment Lunias and welcome! I hope to see you around more. You see, originally I was going to say, "I hope I see more of you.", but that might encourage you to post naked pictures of yourself.
Thanks for the welcome. I've seen the iOS mentioned elsewhere, and first I thought it was other people saying Apple would beat out other companies in gaming, but then I actually looked it up; it actually has more games in its library than every gaming system combined! I was, in fact, shocked about that. I'll have to look some more.
You'll probably see my posts on other gaming articles, maybe even other sites. I use the same username for most of my stuff.