Stringer: 'Actual innovation' and PSN expansion in Sony's future

After almost three years of restructuring, Sony's über Chief Executive Howard Stringer says the company's "next cycle is actual innovation." Heavy on promise but light on details, Stringer says the PlayStation Network will expand to offer other kinds of content. This is exciting, if only for the fact that if Sony actually puts some major drive behind PSN now and delivers something comparable to Xbox Live, we can finally say goodbye to the competition's yearly fee.

Stringer notes that PS3 sales have become steady since price cuts were announced, a fact aided by constant Wii shortages. It seems 200k machines are now sold weekly in Europe, while 40k to 50k are sold each week in Japan. Poetically, Stringer says that the company has "momentum," which we hope gives Sony the push needed to catch up to what Microsoft has spent years establishing and tweaking with Xbox Live.

Reader Comments (66)

Smooth sailing ahead for Sony? The magic 8-Ball says...
"WATCHUSMOKIN'?"

Uh, those products you mentioned all improved on the base design. AND they freely admitted where they took another product and changed it.

Sony, OTOH, says things like Motion controls are teh Ghey, then they bring out sixaxis like it is an unheard of phenomina. Then they outright lie about their consoles being the only one with BC, and that it's more "innovation".

At the others:

I really hate that I can't set the zero on it. I hold my controller with the R & L buttons almost vertical, and for the first few seconds of motion controlling it really fucks everything up. You know, unless I am Trying to send a Twing Twang into orbit. Same with R&C on those falling parts I usually hit 1 or 2 enemies before I realize that yet again I am holding the controller in a way the developer doesan't like. And Motorstorm??? Unless they have a level you have to just do donuts for about an hour, I turn the motion controls off.

I find the sensitivity between slightly nudging something and wrneching to the left or right is off somehow. On the Wii, the controls feel easy to steer with and pretty sensitive, on the PS3 I am always either too soft or too jerky in the turning motions especially.

I know what your saying about holding the controller at certain angles, but it's the same on the Wii. There are certain situations where you have the hold the controller level (see the ray racing in Galaxy) or hold it perfectly vertical as a starting position. The only way around those situations would be, as you say, to allow for some sort of calibration where you get to set the home position.

Also, I do know what you're talking about in terms of sensitivity. It just seems like in some games the motion controls aren't implemented very well. But again, once you get outside of the 1st party games on the Wii, there are LOTS of poorly implented motion controls. I will say though that I find the controls very smooth in R&C. I had no issues during the falling sequences or when trying to hack locks.

There should be a set zero, I agree. As for the ramp up of response, really depends upon the software. For example, sixaxis steering in Ridge Racer is fine, Motorstorm is far too sensitive. But I will say this, learn to use motion sensing in vehicles on Warhawk. Warhawks have gun turrets which can ONLY be independently aimed with motion control and let me tell you, the extra control it gives you a distinct advantage if you can handle it.

To me, I'm torn on the issue. I like when it's subtle uses like controlling the arch of grenades in Uncharted (very easy to quickly line up the arch, much faster for me than gears) or when it's isolated as it's own aspect (Twing-Twang), but when it's in just to be in (Lair, NGS), it gets annoying. But hey, DS had this period as does Wii. Eventually developers will start to realize when it is and is not appropriate to use.

I'm not ready to give up Sixaxis yet as somethimes it's very, very fun.

Actually, only thing that annoys me about Wii controls has more to do with the controllers themselves. On PS3 and 360, you can turn off a controller to swap with a charged one or even reassign slots. If Wii controllers have this functionality, I've yet to find it. But I could just be overlooking something.

The only thing I'm seeing is though that the games I have are all first party. I know I give sony a lot of shit, but seriously, maybe if they hadn't tried cramming in a feature nobody cared about so late into the development to try to compete with EVERY feasture the other systems offered, it wouldn't be so crappy.

And in Twing Twang, they could have also tweaked the collision detection, I hate when the arrows sometimes pass through a limb.

FUCK YOU JOYSTIQ speaking of poor implementation, when are you going to fix the damn reply system????

Heh, I get that problem too. Here's the issue. If you post a reply, it brings you back to the thread. However, if you click reply from that standpoint, it won't detect your reply click. You can click that reply twice to get past it but that doesn't always work.

That's the thing, I really don't think their implementation is crappy. I think the big difference you see with the Wii is the pointer. Using the pointer to aim in Zelda and Metroid or to pick up up star bits Galaxy is indeed very smooth. The PS3 doesn't have the pointer so it can't do the same things. But when you talking about the actual motion controls... where you shake the Wiimote to spin attack in Galaxy or steer in ExciteTruck... I think those are very comparable to how the same controls are used in PS3 games. Some games have better implementations that others, but in games that do it well they seem to work just fine.

well im not sold on the PS3 motion controls either actually. im not sure if its the games themselves or the technology because the controls dont always feel very responsive. i used the analog stick on alot of the motion stuff in Ratchet & Clank because the controls just dont feel anywhere close to 1:1 like i feel they should. i mean i know it wont have Wii accuracy since it doesnt have a pointer but i though some of the Wii games handled well just using the accelerometer.

very true vidikron

"...if Sony actually puts some major drive behind PSN now and delivers something comparable to Xbox Live, we can finally say goodbye to the competition's yearly fee."

I disagree with this conclusion. If Sony were able to deliver a service comparable to LIVE for free, they would already be doing it. However, if they do finally deliver on that promise I would still pay $5 /month for LIVE to stay connected and play games with my XBOX friends.

I also doubt that Microsoft would make LIVE a free service. They're already offering a premium service at a bargain price. If anything, I expect the price to go up one day.

I second that. Even if Sony manages to make the psn equal to live without a subscription (I still doubt that it's possible) I'm not going to jump ship. And I think alot of people here will agree with me.

Goddammit Sony, give me a real reason why I should buy a PS3.

It's one of those consoles I WANT to like, but I can't. It has Blu-Ray, it is an open platform (installing Linux = yes), it has PSN (free online play) and it has high definition graphics.

They keep saying that it's GOING to be good. But I'm just waiting for that future to arrive, that moment when it would be appropriate to get a PS3, getting dusty somewhere on a shop shelf.

I don't want to buy a console based on promises. The wii for example, I'd buy it when Super Smash comes out.

What are you on about? If you buy a PS3 now there are lots of games for you to play on it. If you don't feel its suited to you then it just might be the case. You probably don't feel compelled to buy one coz of the negative comments being posted.

You know what I find funny lots of people like saying:

"PS3 has loads of good games, Wii has no games worth buying"

When on paper since launch Wii has had 12ish games that have sold over 1 million.

The PS3 has had 2, possibly 3, games thats sold over 1 million, and the 2 definite games to sell over 1 million were both launch titles...

So on paper, that equates to in the last 12 months, there hasn't been any games worthwhile enough for the majority of PS3 buyers to buy, while the Wii has on average released 1 game every 1-2 months thats sold in shed loads.

Go figure... looks like people actually do enjoy the games on the Wii they bought, as opposed to people playing on the PS3...

Stringer: 'Actual innovation' and PSN expansion in Sony's future

Reader Comments (66)

Posted: Dec 11th 2007 4:39PM Batzarro The worlds WOrst Detect said

Posted: Dec 11th 2007 4:48PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Dec 11th 2007 4:58PM Vidikron said

Posted: Dec 11th 2007 5:07PM SheppyReturns said

Posted: Dec 11th 2007 5:10PM SheppyReturns said

Posted: Dec 11th 2007 5:12PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Dec 11th 2007 5:12PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Dec 11th 2007 5:16PM SheppyReturns said

Posted: Dec 11th 2007 5:20PM Vidikron said

Posted: Dec 11th 2007 8:49PM SoCoolCurt said

Posted: Dec 11th 2007 5:40PM arrrgh said

Posted: Dec 11th 2007 5:57PM Ironhammer said

Posted: Dec 11th 2007 5:58PM Vegeta has a ps3 said

Posted: Dec 11th 2007 11:57PM ThornedVenom said

Posted: Dec 12th 2007 7:38AM (Unverified) said

Posted: Dec 13th 2007 9:05AM (Unverified) said

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