Technology, Gadgets, IT, Games

Since Sony’s announcement that the long and eagerly anticipated PS3 is launching here in the UK on the 23rdMarch, the guys over at ThreeSpeech (semi-official PS3 blog) have been quick to do a little number crunching.

Based on how much of the UK accounts for European business they have confidently predicted that at the word “go” UK retailers will have around 300,000 units. In comparison using the same math this figure should equate to more than the combined number of Wii and 360 consoles that were initially shipped.

If you want to get your hands on one you will have to get that pre-order in sooner rather than later. What has yet to be confirmed is whether Sony is going to do the allocation as was the case with PS2 (i.e. you only get one if you have your official letter from Sony). Watch this space for more information. Read more

The Nintendo DS in less than two years has become the fastest games console in European history with units sold hitting 10 million. To highlight the growing success of the DS, the console managed to prise open 1.7 million wallets during December of 2006.

Driven by Nintendo”s range of Touch! Generations” games, targeting non-traditional audiences, titles such as Nintendogs and Dr Kawashima”s Brain Training: How old is your brain? have proved to be massive hits whilst traditional titles including New Super Mario Bros, Mario Kart DS, and Animal Crossing have all proved to be successful.

Nintendo fans can look forward to a host of new games during 2007 including Mario Slam Basketball, Star Fox Command, Actionloop, and the highly anticipated legendary Final Fantasy III from Square-Enix. Read more

23rd of March 2007 is the date gamers across the UK and Europe have been waiting for. Sony has today confirmed the 23rd as the official launch of the Playstation 3. This is the last in the trio of next generation consoles, gamers have been waiting for, following on from the Xbox 360 launched in November 2005 and the Nintendo Wii in November 2006.

The Playstation 3 has been available since early November over in the US and Japan but Sony saw fit to make European gamers wait just a little long “” due mainly to a problem with the manufacturing of lasers for the Blue Ray disc drives.

Due to demand from both Retailers and Consumers only the 60GB (WiFi ready) console will available at a cost of £429 “” this move was likely influenced by Microsoft”s launch of the Xbox 360 who launched with both their Premium (Incl. of Hard-drive) and Core packs which led to an unexpected demand for peripherals which they struggled to cope with. Later on in the year depending on demand we can expect to see a 20GB version on the shelves. Read more

Following suit from Sony’s decision that the PS3 would keep its price tag for a while to come, Microsoft has dismissed claims that the Xbox 360 is going to undergo a price cut in the near future. It was widely expected that Microsoft would bring the price of their latest gaming console down to even further undercut its newest competitor in the PS3.

“There are no plans [for a cut]. We”re offering outstanding value and choice “” especially when you compare us to our soon-to-be competitor,”

- Chris Lewis
Regional VP of Microsoft EMEA Home+Ents

Although the Xbox 360 is already £200 cheaper than the PS3, Microsoft has been forced to lower its sales estimates from 13/15 million units by June down to ‘just’ 12 million. At these kinds of differences, is a £20 discount really going to change things?

This news comes on the same day as Sony declare they are only shipping 220,000 PS3s to the UK – that is 30,000 less than their previous lowest estimate. Their excuse is that the UK market is about 22% of the 1 million PAL units they will sell. £425 on March 23rd. Read more

The current king of the graphics world is undoubtedly the nVidia GeForce 8800 GTX. However, ATI are just a couple of weeks away from releasing their takeover bid for the top spot in the form of their brand new R600 chip. Lvl505 managed to get their mits on a pre-release version to pit against to 8800, and the results were startling.

Using a modified version of 32-bit Vista (not an ideal Operating System) on an Intel Core 2 Extreme QX6700 machine with 2GB of RAM, the R600 absolutely trounced the 8800 in pretty much every available benchmark. Everyday applications didn’t yield a massive gain, but startling increases in game quality were observed – Half Life 2: Lost Coast hiked up 10% but 1701 AD gained a massive 42%.

These gains were so marked that the reviewers actually suggested you return your NVIDIA card as soon as possible, in waiting for the R600′s release on January 22nd, when you can say goodbye to $630 or so for your very own. One problem is that this card requires all of 230W to work, so your electricity bill could suffer. but its a small price to pay for the very best the industry has to offer.

We’ll try and get our hands on one of these bad boys over the next few weeks, but keep your eyes out for some reviews on the final unit before you shell out and ditch your nVidia. Read more

Opera announced that it’ll release a trial version of a browser for the Wii gaming console. It’ll be available on the 22st of December.

Users who download the browser get the opportunity to activate the ‘Internet Channel’ in the Wii menu, that way, they’ll able to surf on their Wii. The Wii-remote will work as mouse and with an on screen keyboard you’ll be able to type some text too. The final version will be released in March 2007. It’ll be free for download till June. After June you’ll have to pay 500 Wii-points.

By releasing a browser, Nintendo hopes to retrieve more people who’ll buy the Wii. They hope that the Wii will be seen as an entertainmentcenter, and not only a game console.

Check out their wicked cartoon too!
Read more

The above is a graph showing past games sales and a prediction for the future. This graph predicts that Xbox 360 game sales will increase for a few years, with sales for the Wii and PS3 staying roughly the same. The Xbox 360 is predicted to do singificantly better than the other two consoles, with the PS3 behind the Wii. Around 2009, sales for all the consoles will decline.

At this time, we would expect a new generation of consoles to be born, or else we could be facing a complete crash in the gaming industry. It is a known fact that selling consoles lose a lot of money for the manufacturers (although not the Wii), and they make their money through selling accessories and licenced games. Even the games themselves don’t make profits for the developers, and piracy plays a big part in that.

Do you think Microsoft/Nintendo/Sony are going to keep making consoles, and that developers are going to keep coming up with new games? Or do you think that games as we know them are just not worth making anymore, and that there’s a risk that we could be without them in a few years?

Leave your comments at The GTA Place
Source: BBC