It's not often we report on Sony news here but you can't really avoid this - especially with its implications for Nintendo. In a Japanese Press Conference held last night especially for the PS3, Ken Kutaragi announced the delay of the PS3, originally set to launch in Japan in Spring, and the fact that it will now be launching simultaneously worldwide this November.
Unfortunately, any price-points have still been left unanswered but Sony did confirm that the 60GB HardDrive will be a requirement of the system and so you're unlikely to see any cheaper 'Core' systems. Which wouldn't necessarily be any serious competition to the Xbox 360 but considering you'd be lucky to find anything other than a Core system at the moment it does weigh in slightly positively for Sony in that respect. As does the full backwards compatability of PS2 and PS1 titles, unlike the 360's patching system for specific games.
Of course, we've been here before. The Playstation Portable was announced to be released worldwide at the end of 2004 but didn't see American shores until Spring 2005 nor European shelves until 9 months later last September.
It's clear that they're trying to take on Microsoft at their game of getting out worldwide simultaneously and best of luck to them to actually get it done without the train-wreck that became the 360 launch.
The most important thing about this is that it leaves Nintendo alone with no release schedule and even worse, with the possibility of a standard staggered release that could leave Europeans without a Revolution until 2007.
Certainly, considering the cheaper nature of the Revolution, it should be a lot easier for Nintendo to acheive a simultaneous worldwide launch but even if they do, the last reports for an approximate launch date anywhere for the system put them at November too. Going head-to-head with the PS3 could well ruin the Revolution before it even gets started.
We're unlikely to see or hear anything about the Revolution dates or launch plans until E3 in 2 months time, but if we're lucky we might get some clues at least from next week's GDC.
In other Sony news I now have a reason to KEEP my Playstation Portable. For one thing, the price is going down next week so i'll get less money for it if I sell it off. For another thing there's a slew of interesting updates coming for it, not least of all including the ability to play Macromedia Flash animations on the Web Browser (which may or may not be available on the Opera DS browser) and a downloadable back-catalogue of PS1 games to download directly to your memory stick.
Also coming the PSPs way is a GPS system with a new Everybody's Golf title set to be one of the launch titles for the GPS peripheral... somehow. And an EyeToy specially made for the PSP and released in September that will not only be used in an EyeToy game coming up for the system but for a video chat system, while free video and voice-over-IP services will appear in October.
The games downloading intrigues me muchly. If they can put a copy of Tomb Raider 2 or Grand Theft Auto or even the original Spyro in my PSP I will finally have games worth playing on the little black brick. It's a genius notion considering how void of actual playable games the PSP library actually is but does help show up the fact that on one hand you have downloadable OLD PS1 games and on the other you have PS2 ports you have to go out and buy, (Although no doubt that like the Nintendo Back-Catalogue system, you'll have to pay a small fee to download too) with actual fresh, new and PSP exclusive titles numbering about as many as you can count with your fingers and toes, if that much.
So it's lie in wait time again. Lie in wait to see what the PS3 manages to do this November and what it offers in games. Lie in wait to see how the PSP downloads work out and lie in wait to see, most importantly really, what Nintendo does now that the spotlight is firmly fixed on them to say their piece at last.
Discuss. ^^
