Played the PS3 today
11-04-2006, 12:22 AM
#1
sup
Thread Starter
Played the PS3 today
So I heard that Sony was having an event today in NYC where your average joe could come on in and play some ps3. Actually the event has been going on for a few days now, but previously, it was only open to journalists and people who had connections. Tonight, however, it was open to the public, and I decided to show up and try to get in.
And get in I did. It was actually ridiculously easy. They were holding it on Houston and Wooster St. I went to the side door, got a ticket, and walked in. I figure I'll give a little account/review of what I saw and what I did, just in case anyone is curious.
I played a bunch of games, including F1, resistance:fall of man, NHL 2k7, and Lair. I also saw a whole bunch of other games, including sony's NBA game, also NBA 2k7, sonic, fight night, tony hawk, and motorstorm. but more of that to come.
The firs thing I did was go to one of three setups where Sony had the PS3 hooked up to small-ish LCD TVs displaying the XMB user interface....he OS if you will. These PS3s were lacking controllers, but they had a keyboard and mouse hooked up to them. I had no idea what keys did what on the keyboard, but I messed around with it for awhile. Enter wa select, the arrow keys moved around, the F1 button pulled up the menu, and so on. If you saw the engadget movie, there's not much else to see here.
The interface looks just like the PSP interface, just with more options. You can create a username on the left, and there is a settings sub-menu. You can play mp3s on the unit. The one I was using had two sample songs on it. It played the mp3s....not much to it in this arena. You could display a visualization, but it was pretty crappy. However, it's an mp3 player, you're probably not going to use it for the visuals.
What was really cool was the photo viewer. Pictures looked great on the screen in high def, but what really impressed me were the slideshow options....there were 4 different optinos...a normal slide show, one that slid pictures over smoothly, one that faded pictures in and out and sort of zoomed the picture in random places. There was also a setting called "photobook" or something like that. It displays a white background and "drops" actual 4x6 prints of your photos onto the screen. it arranges they by date. So a virual pen writes teh date, the camera pans right, and your photos are dropped in 4x6 and polarioid formats onto the screen. It looks very professional and cool. Sort of a novelty, and probably not too useful, but it looks slick.
The ps3 can also display video, which doens't require much explanation except for the one noticable fact that al the tumbnails show clips of footage
I also tested out the internet browser. Their internt connection must have been really slow becuase everything took forever to load. I'm not sure actually if this was the connection or the browser, but as I thought about it more, it was probably the connection. Anyways, I went to YouTube and watched a Borat movie. I also checked my gmail. The rez obviously wasn't as good as a computer screen, but it was much improved over a regular tv, as I could actually read text. You can open up multiple tabs and whatnot. This is where the mouse worked really well. Worked just like.....a regular mouse.
Now on to the games. The firs thing I noticed is that some games look freaking amazing and some looked just very good (xbox ish). Then I realized that they were all being displayed on 1080p TVs, and some games were 1080, and some were 720. Those of us who have only 720p/1080i tvs wont realy have to worry about thiswhich is nice. But the 1080p games really looked spectacular. Most notably, Sony's NBA game looked SOOOO much better than NBA 2k7. due to the fact that the sony game was in 1080 and the 2k7 game was in 720. But this is to be expected: 720 content on a 1080p TV will also look a little sub-par due to upscaling
F1: Fun as shit. My favorite game out of them all. Too bad it won't be available at launch. I will definitely getting this as soon as it comes out. Graphically, it is fantastic. When you run over grass, you can see blades of grass stick to your tire. There are like 6 differnet camera modes. My favorate ones were right above the driver (but still unable to see the actual driver) and from the driver's exact perspective. You feel the sheer speed and acceleration of the car. When you are going fast in one of these two camera angles, the camera starts to shake as it would if you were actually in the car. You can tollge damage on or off. I tried both. Having the damage is fun and great addition (finally) to a racing game. I kicked ass in the dry weather. Then I tried heavy rain. This was obviously much harder. The rain effects on the camera were awesome. When you were in teh driver's point of view, you coudln't see shit becuase of the water kick up from the cars in front of you...just like in reality. There are also on screen guides (which can be turned off) that help you know when to brake and accelerate for the ideal path around the track. Fun game.
Resistance: FOM:
Alslo fun. The graphics were great, even running at 720 p. Good textures, good framerate. I was initially worried about the controller, but it wasn't uncomfortable. Left stick controlled movement, right controlled view, R1 and L1 were primary and secondary fire, R2 was change weapon, and the buttons were jump, gernade, mele attack, and soemething else that I forgot. However, I sucked ass at this game. Still fun though. There were so many enemies. You really started in the middle of a freaking battle. I got owned, but it was definitely enjoyable. Plenty of blood to make you happy.
NHL 2K7:
This was fun, but I was never really a huge fan of hockey games. I don't think I would buy this, but I'm sure someone who likes hokey games would like this. Graphics were great...the ice not only reflected properly, but you also saw your skate marks in the ice. Very cool.
Lair:
Lair was one of the few games showcasing the motion control part of the controller. The person in front of me was having a really hard time. I opted for the training mission instaed of jumping right into batle. It took a little getting used to, but after a few min, I got the hang of it. The controller was very responsive. You just have to be careful to pay attention to how you are tilting the controller, which is something I think most people are't used to. Anyways, for those who don't know, in this game you control a dragon (who is controlled by a dude on his back) and kill people and other dragons. In the beginning, I few through some hoops, which got me used to the motion control. Then it showed me how to lock on to enemy dragons and attack. It was pretty cool....you hold L1 and speed up to an ememy, and then when you get close, you jolt the controller towards your enemy to ram him. After a few hits, the edge of the screen gets bloody, and you button mash to have you guy hop off your dragon, on to the eneymy dragon, and perform some sort of kill move. The game was still in the early phases, so I didn't get too deep into it, but it looks fun.
I also watched a few people play some games. I was really excited to see NBA 2k7. It looked okay....a little pixelated running at 720p on a 1080p monitor...actually i was downright disapointed at the graphics. It looked very XBOX 360 ish. I was originally excited becuase I read an article about how they were optimizing the game for the PS3 processor. For example, they used one of the cells on the processor to control the movement of the players' clothing. Indeed the movement was very realistic and impressive. But overall, it looked just okay. Then I saw the sony NBA game. Damn, did this look good! Graphics looked much better, as did the gameplay. There was a crowd around this game watching, while NBA 2k7 had like one or two guys watching. While NBA in 2k7, players exhibited the oh-so-common "skating effect" that a lot of recent NBA games have (while players make running motions, it almost looks like they are skating and sliding across the court), player movements in the game were more realistic (although to 2K7's credit, clothing effects didnt look as good in the sony version as the 2K7 version). At first this seemed wierd becuase players werne't moving around as fast, but then i realized that this was in fact more realistic.
Fight Night;
Looked incredible. However, I was never one for boxing games. Looked like a lot of fun, but I knew that for me, it just wouldn't be worth it in the long run.
Tony Hawk:
Also looked incredible. Also looked like a tony hawk game. If you are cool with more of the same, with insane graphics and cool close ups, slow mo shots, and replays, this game is for you
Sonic:
Meh. Looked good, but looked just as good as Sonic for gamecube on a CRT. I just never really got into the whole 3D sonic thing. It looks like a graphically upgraded sonic from the gamecube version (although since I didn't play it, I can't judege entirely)
Motorstorm:
one of the best looking games out there. Textres were great, details in the map was great. You played on this desert level that looks amazing. However, the game itself doens't look like that much fun. It seems difficult, and while fun for the first few hours, I feel like this would be one of those short gameplay games. Like wipeout. I bought wipeout for PS1, PC, and PSP, and every time, I would play for a fair amout of hours, and the become completely bored with it. But such is the genre. It looks like a good game, but it won't last you....i.e. the appeal will wear of
Call of Duty 3:
Didn't get a chance to play, but this looked pretty damn sweet. Traditional call of duty, with all the action you have come to expect, on the PS3. Running at 720p, it looked decent on the 1080 TVs, but not as polished as resistance. I expect this too look exactly the same on the 360.
There were a few other games on show, but I didn't end up paying much attention to them given that I didn't have unlimited time and they didn't interest me as much. I walked by marvel, and it looked meh. I also skipped NFS becuase I decided to spend my time with other games.
Some people are worrying that the controller is too light without rumble. I had no problem with the controller. I didn't feel light to me, just normal. Although I don't really play PS2 very much, so its not like I'm used to the weight.
Phew. Anyways, take from this what you will, but this made me more excited about the console. My first two games will be resistance and the sony NBA game, followed up by the F1 game. Lair had potential, and I'm excited to see GTA HD as well as Warhawk. Plus Raibow Six: Vegas looks like it will be freaking sweet. So with that lineup, I think the games are pretty strong for most tastes.
And get in I did. It was actually ridiculously easy. They were holding it on Houston and Wooster St. I went to the side door, got a ticket, and walked in. I figure I'll give a little account/review of what I saw and what I did, just in case anyone is curious.
I played a bunch of games, including F1, resistance:fall of man, NHL 2k7, and Lair. I also saw a whole bunch of other games, including sony's NBA game, also NBA 2k7, sonic, fight night, tony hawk, and motorstorm. but more of that to come.
The firs thing I did was go to one of three setups where Sony had the PS3 hooked up to small-ish LCD TVs displaying the XMB user interface....he OS if you will. These PS3s were lacking controllers, but they had a keyboard and mouse hooked up to them. I had no idea what keys did what on the keyboard, but I messed around with it for awhile. Enter wa select, the arrow keys moved around, the F1 button pulled up the menu, and so on. If you saw the engadget movie, there's not much else to see here.
The interface looks just like the PSP interface, just with more options. You can create a username on the left, and there is a settings sub-menu. You can play mp3s on the unit. The one I was using had two sample songs on it. It played the mp3s....not much to it in this arena. You could display a visualization, but it was pretty crappy. However, it's an mp3 player, you're probably not going to use it for the visuals.
What was really cool was the photo viewer. Pictures looked great on the screen in high def, but what really impressed me were the slideshow options....there were 4 different optinos...a normal slide show, one that slid pictures over smoothly, one that faded pictures in and out and sort of zoomed the picture in random places. There was also a setting called "photobook" or something like that. It displays a white background and "drops" actual 4x6 prints of your photos onto the screen. it arranges they by date. So a virual pen writes teh date, the camera pans right, and your photos are dropped in 4x6 and polarioid formats onto the screen. It looks very professional and cool. Sort of a novelty, and probably not too useful, but it looks slick.
The ps3 can also display video, which doens't require much explanation except for the one noticable fact that al the tumbnails show clips of footage
I also tested out the internet browser. Their internt connection must have been really slow becuase everything took forever to load. I'm not sure actually if this was the connection or the browser, but as I thought about it more, it was probably the connection. Anyways, I went to YouTube and watched a Borat movie. I also checked my gmail. The rez obviously wasn't as good as a computer screen, but it was much improved over a regular tv, as I could actually read text. You can open up multiple tabs and whatnot. This is where the mouse worked really well. Worked just like.....a regular mouse.
Now on to the games. The firs thing I noticed is that some games look freaking amazing and some looked just very good (xbox ish). Then I realized that they were all being displayed on 1080p TVs, and some games were 1080, and some were 720. Those of us who have only 720p/1080i tvs wont realy have to worry about thiswhich is nice. But the 1080p games really looked spectacular. Most notably, Sony's NBA game looked SOOOO much better than NBA 2k7. due to the fact that the sony game was in 1080 and the 2k7 game was in 720. But this is to be expected: 720 content on a 1080p TV will also look a little sub-par due to upscaling
F1: Fun as shit. My favorite game out of them all. Too bad it won't be available at launch. I will definitely getting this as soon as it comes out. Graphically, it is fantastic. When you run over grass, you can see blades of grass stick to your tire. There are like 6 differnet camera modes. My favorate ones were right above the driver (but still unable to see the actual driver) and from the driver's exact perspective. You feel the sheer speed and acceleration of the car. When you are going fast in one of these two camera angles, the camera starts to shake as it would if you were actually in the car. You can tollge damage on or off. I tried both. Having the damage is fun and great addition (finally) to a racing game. I kicked ass in the dry weather. Then I tried heavy rain. This was obviously much harder. The rain effects on the camera were awesome. When you were in teh driver's point of view, you coudln't see shit becuase of the water kick up from the cars in front of you...just like in reality. There are also on screen guides (which can be turned off) that help you know when to brake and accelerate for the ideal path around the track. Fun game.
Resistance: FOM:
Alslo fun. The graphics were great, even running at 720 p. Good textures, good framerate. I was initially worried about the controller, but it wasn't uncomfortable. Left stick controlled movement, right controlled view, R1 and L1 were primary and secondary fire, R2 was change weapon, and the buttons were jump, gernade, mele attack, and soemething else that I forgot. However, I sucked ass at this game. Still fun though. There were so many enemies. You really started in the middle of a freaking battle. I got owned, but it was definitely enjoyable. Plenty of blood to make you happy.
NHL 2K7:
This was fun, but I was never really a huge fan of hockey games. I don't think I would buy this, but I'm sure someone who likes hokey games would like this. Graphics were great...the ice not only reflected properly, but you also saw your skate marks in the ice. Very cool.
Lair:
Lair was one of the few games showcasing the motion control part of the controller. The person in front of me was having a really hard time. I opted for the training mission instaed of jumping right into batle. It took a little getting used to, but after a few min, I got the hang of it. The controller was very responsive. You just have to be careful to pay attention to how you are tilting the controller, which is something I think most people are't used to. Anyways, for those who don't know, in this game you control a dragon (who is controlled by a dude on his back) and kill people and other dragons. In the beginning, I few through some hoops, which got me used to the motion control. Then it showed me how to lock on to enemy dragons and attack. It was pretty cool....you hold L1 and speed up to an ememy, and then when you get close, you jolt the controller towards your enemy to ram him. After a few hits, the edge of the screen gets bloody, and you button mash to have you guy hop off your dragon, on to the eneymy dragon, and perform some sort of kill move. The game was still in the early phases, so I didn't get too deep into it, but it looks fun.
I also watched a few people play some games. I was really excited to see NBA 2k7. It looked okay....a little pixelated running at 720p on a 1080p monitor...actually i was downright disapointed at the graphics. It looked very XBOX 360 ish. I was originally excited becuase I read an article about how they were optimizing the game for the PS3 processor. For example, they used one of the cells on the processor to control the movement of the players' clothing. Indeed the movement was very realistic and impressive. But overall, it looked just okay. Then I saw the sony NBA game. Damn, did this look good! Graphics looked much better, as did the gameplay. There was a crowd around this game watching, while NBA 2k7 had like one or two guys watching. While NBA in 2k7, players exhibited the oh-so-common "skating effect" that a lot of recent NBA games have (while players make running motions, it almost looks like they are skating and sliding across the court), player movements in the game were more realistic (although to 2K7's credit, clothing effects didnt look as good in the sony version as the 2K7 version). At first this seemed wierd becuase players werne't moving around as fast, but then i realized that this was in fact more realistic.
Fight Night;
Looked incredible. However, I was never one for boxing games. Looked like a lot of fun, but I knew that for me, it just wouldn't be worth it in the long run.
Tony Hawk:
Also looked incredible. Also looked like a tony hawk game. If you are cool with more of the same, with insane graphics and cool close ups, slow mo shots, and replays, this game is for you
Sonic:
Meh. Looked good, but looked just as good as Sonic for gamecube on a CRT. I just never really got into the whole 3D sonic thing. It looks like a graphically upgraded sonic from the gamecube version (although since I didn't play it, I can't judege entirely)
Motorstorm:
one of the best looking games out there. Textres were great, details in the map was great. You played on this desert level that looks amazing. However, the game itself doens't look like that much fun. It seems difficult, and while fun for the first few hours, I feel like this would be one of those short gameplay games. Like wipeout. I bought wipeout for PS1, PC, and PSP, and every time, I would play for a fair amout of hours, and the become completely bored with it. But such is the genre. It looks like a good game, but it won't last you....i.e. the appeal will wear of
Call of Duty 3:
Didn't get a chance to play, but this looked pretty damn sweet. Traditional call of duty, with all the action you have come to expect, on the PS3. Running at 720p, it looked decent on the 1080 TVs, but not as polished as resistance. I expect this too look exactly the same on the 360.
There were a few other games on show, but I didn't end up paying much attention to them given that I didn't have unlimited time and they didn't interest me as much. I walked by marvel, and it looked meh. I also skipped NFS becuase I decided to spend my time with other games.
Some people are worrying that the controller is too light without rumble. I had no problem with the controller. I didn't feel light to me, just normal. Although I don't really play PS2 very much, so its not like I'm used to the weight.
Phew. Anyways, take from this what you will, but this made me more excited about the console. My first two games will be resistance and the sony NBA game, followed up by the F1 game. Lair had potential, and I'm excited to see GTA HD as well as Warhawk. Plus Raibow Six: Vegas looks like it will be freaking sweet. So with that lineup, I think the games are pretty strong for most tastes.
11-04-2006, 12:55 AM
#2
Senior Moderator
great writeup - thanks. it sounds like there is hope for PS3!
11-04-2006, 11:31 AM
#5
Big Block go VROOOM!
Kudos for the great writeup.
Did you happen to notice in F1 if there were any settings for different physics levels? No offense, but the fact that you were able jump on and do well your first time out leads me to believe this may end up just being an arcade racer.
Did you happen to notice in F1 if there were any settings for different physics levels? No offense, but the fact that you were able jump on and do well your first time out leads me to believe this may end up just being an arcade racer.
11-04-2006, 11:40 AM
#6
sup
Thread Starter
there were mutiple options, I set it to easy on the difficulty level, becuase I didn't want to be compeltely owned. Addition of crash damage will also change things. There were also other options, but i left them at the easy setting. The rain made things much harder...i think i spun out and crashed on that level.
11-06-2006, 10:44 AM
#7
There are supposed to be a TON of config options for F1 allowing the game to be as easy (arcadey) or hard (sim-like) as the player wants. This way it appeals to a broader audience since, in the end, the user can determine how real or arcade-like the game is.
Nice write-up! Too bad they didn't have Madden on display... just curious if it's the same as the 360 version or more along the lines of the PS2 version as far as gameplay and features. Guess it won't matter much though since I'll be getting mine next year, well after football season
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11-06-2006, 05:26 PM
#8
Senior Moderator
Thanks for the nice write-up!
<-------------
about F1...
<-------------
about F1...
11-16-2006, 03:56 PM
#12
Still trolling
Originally Posted by ViperrepiV
It looked okay....a little pixelated running at 720p on a 1080p monitor...actually i was downright disapointed at the graphics. It looked very XBOX 360 ish.
So you are going to stand on your soap box already that the PS3 is supposed to have superior graphics to the XBOX 360, all things being equal (game resolution)? I would suspect that a 720P game played on the 360 vs. the PS3 would be indiscernible in picture quality on the same television/monitor. The same would go for 1080P on either. Yes, the 360 now supports native 1080P via VGA for games and HD DVD, as well as upconverts lower HD resolutions to 1080P over VGA.
11-16-2006, 04:00 PM
#13
Still trolling
Oh and by the way, if you have a TV that does not support 720P, or 1080P, you will likely have your resolution shoved down to 480P instead of 1080i.
http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/11/16...esnt-do-1080i/
http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/11/16...esnt-do-1080i/
11-16-2006, 04:03 PM
#14
sup
Thread Starter
Originally Posted by suXor
So you are going to stand on your soap box already that the PS3 is supposed to have superior graphics to the XBOX 360, all things being equal (game resolution)? I would suspect that a 720P game played on the 360 vs. the PS3 would be indiscernible in picture quality on the same television/monitor. The same would go for 1080P on either. Yes, the 360 now supports native 1080P via VGA for games and HD DVD, as well as upconverts lower HD resolutions to 1080P over VGA.
Yeah, I must concede that the comment was a little fanboyish. I guess I was going in with some pre-concieved notions. The 360 can haul ass graphically, as we have seen with GoW
11-16-2006, 04:05 PM
#15
Still trolling
Originally Posted by ViperrepiV
Yeah, I must concede that the comment was a little fanboyish. I guess I was going in with some pre-concieved notions. The 360 can haul ass graphically, as we have seen with GoW
I still want to try out the PS3 for the motion part. I am a bit worried about the BT controllers. Did you notice any lag or issues there?
11-18-2006, 11:56 AM
#17
@ slide or die @
you sold me...
wait i already bought one!
o yeah. i already sold it on thebay.
i'll come back to this post later when i've played the ps3. Thanks for the game descript i'm very curious as to how it will compare to the 360.
wait i already bought one!
o yeah. i already sold it on thebay.
i'll come back to this post later when i've played the ps3. Thanks for the game descript i'm very curious as to how it will compare to the 360.
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