Kaz Hirai Q&A: PS3 VS 360, PlayStation Network, Blu-ray & More

Here is part of the interview:

HiHD: What are the primary erroneous points of information/misconceptions out there in blogger-land about PS3 in general and vs Xbox?

HIRAI: I have heard many people say our competitors' systems are just as powerful as PS3. That simply is not true. No other next-generation entertainment system pushes the envelope on advanced technology like PS3. I have heard people say that a high-capacity game delivery vehicle like Blu-ray isn't necessary in a next-generation computer entertainment system. You just can't expect that the 9 GBs of storage capacity found on today's DVDs are going to have enough space to hold tomorrow's games. Developers have already pushed the DVD to its limits in terms of space used. We had games like 'Resistance: Fall of Man' coming in 16 GBs at launch. That game simply wouldn't be possible on any other system without using multiple discs. There is no doubt in my mind that you need more capacity on discs for truly next-generation gaming, and Blu-ray gives us that space.

[THC CELL]

ok lets put it this way

This is a message to other next gen consoles you have seen nothing yet. ps3 is here to stay

They are going by the word

Future proof

[TheSMART]

PlayStation 3 is future proof and here to stay.

[nasim]

with 399$ ps3 SONY takes back the no 1 crown from NINTENDO.

the ps3 is roughly around 5--10x as powerful as the x360.

OCTOBER sees the death of x360 in EU and JAPAN

and DECEMBER sees the end in NA

[drtysouf21]

rumored 40GB $399 PS3 on the horizon things are looking up for Sony. It'll be interesting to see where things are by this time next year!

[TheSMART]

will be next year! With system seller franchises such as Metal Gear Solid 4, Final Fantasy XIII series, Gran Turismo, lower priced PlayStaion 3 and more even the hardcore 360 fans have to admit the PlayStation 3 will eventually surpass the 360. You 360 fans have had your time in the spot light but its time for the veteran champ to take over. Don't get me wrong the 360 has had a great run but you surely must have known this time would come. It was inevitable.

[jackfatal]

i love the way u write it! its exactly how i think and how any human that have an idea of the playstation and with logical brain think!!
its because they were so terrified of this moment that made them keep making all the gaming site so boring with their comments saying the ps3 and sony is dead!!

[MarioFromTexas]

They don't mind switching disc and save $100 but spend $250 more to play online when PC and PS3 are free.

[DrRage77]

i'd rather switch discs on great games rather than play mediocre 6 hour long games that take up 20gb LMFAO...oh wait, i don't have to with games like Mass Effect that are 40 hours long and fit on a 9gb DVD!!!!

[WilliamRLBaker]

hmmm tomorrows games...would mean next gen which means that current gen dvds are good enough? he needs to learn how to word things better.

Oh and Resistance? uncompressed crap, it came in at 16 gigs because of that and only that.

and where is the truely next gen gaming on the ps3? they've yet to release any thing that pushes the envelope in terms of gameplay, sound...ect only graphics have been pushed and they are easily matched and surpassed by the 360 and PC's.

Edit: need to clearify that I dont think resistance is crap, but that its uncompressed all most all the way through, I've yet to find any insomniac folks saying how much if at all compression they used on the title....So no resistance isn't crap i've played it and like it, but its uncompressed and thats the only reason it clocked in at 16 gigs.

[jlytle1234]

just remember that whatever you compress has to be decompressed before you can play it. That increases loading time. Or your going to compress it on a dvd and decompress it onto the harddrive before you play. But MS already screwed themselves on that. They released a sku without a harddrive and devs dont want to cut out gamers by making a game that requires a harddrive. So I guess the old loading wars from last gen are going to come back into effect before long.

[TheSMART]

hates on the PlayStation 3. You guys are short sighted and have a short attention span. You can not grasp or comprehend that Sony has built the PlayStation 3 to stand the test of time. You constantly bash the PlayStation 3 saying it has no games and its to highly priced yet you have no plans on purchasing one. You claim Sony hasn't shown what differentiates the PlayStation 3 from the 360. Well no one but you expected the PlayStation 3 to come out of the gate and completely dominate and so when it didn't you quickly jumped on the band wagon of claiming the PlayStation 3 is doomed. Its only 10 months old and has yet to release a known system selling franchise i.e. FFXIII MGS4, Gran Turismo. but has still sold pretty well in the face of competition from the Wii and 360 with a high price point. What do you think is going to happen when the 2 lame arguments (Price/Lack of Games) gets rectified? The PlayStation 3 will start to dominate.

Here are some factors that you 360 fans completely forget.

1. Over 200 million sold of PlayStation branded systems which means hundreds of millions of people know and are familiar with the PlayStation brand.
2. Consumers are starting to upgrade their standard def tv's to high def and when they do this they will be looking for a high definition player to play those movies. Those that have families will see that Disney exclusively supports Blu-ray and will opt to go with that format.
3. Price and Game selection will be a mute point starting in the coming weeks.

Some things to note.

Sony has about half of the 360 user base in 10 months while facing:

Other competition Wii & 360
Negative news and Media attention
High price point
Small software selection
Barely any marketing and advertising
No guaranteed system sellers i.e. FFXIII MGS4 GT

So that shows that when all those factors come into play the PlayStation 3 will outsell the 360 this generation beginning in 2008.

360 is NOW but the PLAYSTATION 3 is the FUTURE!

[jaja1434]

Well to be fair alot of the 5 mil people who bought the PS3 are people who are Sony loyal. Now I might poke fun about how silly it is to buy any product based on name brand but thats just me and truth be told, I'm the minority in this.

But aways the whole "test of time" argument is just silly. I'm sure that in 2011 or whatever year that MS releases their next system, Sony will release theirs because as you saw this time around, you really can't afford to go last.

And someone said it was "future proof". Now this is has nothing to do with Sony, but there is not one frekin thing in this world that is "future proof" especially electronics. So stop saying that it is.

[TheSMART]

You are closed minded and let me show you why. Do you really think their are only 5 million Sony loyal? About 120 million PS2 owners disagree with you. Their are Sony loyal who don't have the budget to afford the PS3 at its current price point, their are Sony loyal whose favorite games have not been released for the PS3 yet. MGS4 FFXII GT. Their are Sony loyal who are just waiting for the right time to upgrade. Yes Microsoft brought out the 360 first this generation but Sony began the PlayStation brand long before Microsoft and that is why they have the biggest advantage. Its is silly to say that Everyone that has already purchased the PS3 are Sony Loyalists. Its silly to say their aren't millions more Sony loyalists waiting for the right price and game selection to purchase the PS3.

@ Will what you fail to realize is that even if only 25% of PS2 owners are loyal thats still enough PS3 sales to put the PS3 ahead of the 360.

@ jaja you just proved my point your waiting for the right price and right selection of games but you will eventually get one which is exactly the mindset of many PS2 owners out their. So like i said PS2 owners will eventually upgrade when the game selection and price is right.

[WilliamRLBaker]

if you believe that all 120m are loyal sony hardcore gamers....yeah no they are casuals a good 80% of the ps1's user base and the ps2's are Casual gamers and this is fact.

Or are you gonna tell me that there are 120 hardcore gamers out there? *laughs hard*

[jaja1434]

Did I say that there were only 5 mil loyalist or that everyone who bought one is? And as far as your 120 mil would disagree, umm no. Hell I bought my PS2 5 years ago. And yet I don't own a PS3, though mostly because 600$ is to much for any gaming machine and its CURRENT lack of games. Maybe in 2 or 3 years, I'll pick it up when its in the 150$ range.

And actually you know what, I don't care. Your just going to try and nit pick what I say. So...

[occamsrazor]

Yeah buddy, learn to do some maths....If 80% are casual, that still leaves 24 mil. hardcore gamers. - Add the few casuals and the people who buy this console based purely on its media playback capabilities, and you're looking at market dominance. (That's according to your maths anyway...Hmmm. Come to think of it, I do like your maths...)

[Marty8370]

WilliamRLBaker - The only thing that will be uncompressed on R:FOM is audio. As it has high quality 7.1 audio that takes more room as it's not compressed. Games like Dirt had 7.1 audio on PS3 as well. Which is not a bad thing. It's just a next gen thing. And something that 360 can't handle. lol.

[Bathyj]

Are people so afraid to move on to BR just because XB doesn't have it?

Face it, bigger is better.

We've seen games filling up DVD last Gen and we've seen game suffering from DVD this Gen.

We up graded RAM, CPU's, GPU's controllers output connections HD space, everything. Why should optical media stand still?

Not having the guts to commit in the console industry means you're stuck with what you choose for the next 5 or 6 years, unless M$ aren't planning on staying that long this gen. Maybe they plan to leave early again before they lose their lead, claim victory and rush the next XB out this time with a new media since they see that BR is actually beneficial.

Tell me this, if M$ do use a bigger disk next gen, why? What would have changed to deem it neccessary then but not now?

[jaja1434]

To your last statement. Why did Sony deem it "last-gen" and then decide to make it a speech point at TGS? What deemed it necessary now and not months ago? See how stupid it sounds when I turn it around?

Look I have nothing against BR/HD-DVD. They are both great medias and the extra size they have is fantastic. But it is not needed yet. As long as I see games that look and sound just as good on the 360 then there is no compelling reason that BR is a must. A please with the 7.1, 99.99% of the worlds population can't even tell the difference than with 5.1. And even then only the wealthy people even own a sound system capable of 7.1.

Now if your one of those people, great! But fact is most people are not, so its just wasted space.

Now I will say this one last time. Is BR a wonderful thing for the PS3. Well hell yea. Its a terrific, fantastic, and other such adjectives, but it is not necessary. Next Gen, sure. But not now.

[demolitionX]

arguing with u 360 fans is just a headache. u guys don't like 1080p, 7.1 BD 50GB (possibly 100GB). i u like driving a Kia, don't bash someone driving a Benz.

MS has really good low IQ fan base. I swear i never met someone with high IQ owns 360.

[jaja1434]

My god did you read my post? I said I think all the things the PS3 has, such as 7.1 is great. So either you didn't read my post or you had trouble comprehending it. And your calling me the one with an IQ problem.

ohh I'm also a PS3 fan. Loved HS, RFoM, and am looking forward to FF13. At least watching my friend play it on his :/

[artman]

jaja, the only reason people who can't find the differences is because they haven't experience something better, before vcd is enough to watch movie, but after watch dvd, I'm not sure I can enjoy vcd like I used to again, then blu-ray and hd-dvd come out... more you experience it, then you will feel dvd like crap, and this is happen when you have HDTV already, if no, then you won't have different experience.
I don't have HDTV, dvd is still fine now for me. But I watch blu-ray movies at my friend's house... with aquos 52", when I went home, then I feel my TVs and DVD is not enough anymore.

My first pc had 450Mb harddrive, it was spacy back then, now... it can't even enough to take photos with my SLR.

Now, who want to join the future? or just stay the same? is not about I'm loyalty to sony, you see, I'm just a user, I don't care it's nikon or canon, mac or windows, Honda or Toyota, Hyundai or BMW, ps3 or 360, as long I can use it well and feel great about the results. That's the way I live.

[HBK]

Blu-ray got space, HD DVD got space too and a WOMD in their hands. If this get approved, Sony is in a world of pain. I can see VHS and Beta Max all over again for Sony.

"The DVD Forum hope to introduce a new, one-sided HD DVD Combo disc later this year.

The disc will be a triple-layered disc that will contain two DVD layers and one HD DVD layer.

It will allow for an HD and a standard edition of a film being on the same side of a disc.

A normal DVD player will play the DVD layers and an HD DVD player will play the HD DVD layer.

The DVD Forum hope to have the new disc approved before year's end."

Sony is in dead last, they might as well go home to save their embarrassment.

[WilliamRLBaker]

""That increases loading time.""
Wrong, It is proven fact that compressed data that is then uncompressed is faster to load then uncompressed data, Because you see the DVD drive or blu ray or cd or hd dvd has a finite ammount of transfer speed the smaller the data you have to transfer the less time it takes.

Uncompressing that data on the otherhand is lightning fast and takes minimal time, Which is why Load times for 360 pretty much 80% of the time beat out the ps3's load times, the only times they dont is when the ps3 requires a game to cache data *of which there are many that load nearly a gig or more of data to speed up load times*

@PS3 fan: and where is the article that says this? where is the article that has Insomniac execs saying we used this compression, and that compression...ect Becasue I've found none, and in reality no nearly every thing is uncompressed on resistance.

@Smart: ""Well no one but you expected the PlayStation 3 to come out of the gate and completely dominate and so when it didn't you quickly jumped on the band wagon of claiming the PlayStation 3 is doomed.""

Oh really? so I cannot point to many ps3 fanboys on a variety of sites, Gamespot.com, Ign.com That claimed the ps3 would dominate and surpass 360 sales upon release right? I never claimed the ps3 would dominate and never claimed it wouldn't, the Ps3fanboys did though, Look at your own kind MR.*PS3 1st Place in 2008* for predictions of ps3 dominace in the first months after release.

1. Over 200 million sold of PlayStation branded systems which means hundreds of millions of people know and are familiar with the PlayStation brand.
*means nothing if your system doesn't have the games this gen, Nintendo dominated for 2 gens and lost the same an happen to sony*
2. Consumers are starting to upgrade their standard def tv's to high def and when they do this they will be looking for a high definition player to play those movies. Those that have families will see that Disney exclusively supports Blu-ray and will opt to go with that format.
*Wrong, HDTV adoption is still at an low point, Most people dont know what HD IS, and most people have no idea what blu ray or HD DVD is, but they know what DVD is and know that DVD is cheaper to get a player for, and media for*
3. Price and Game selection will be a mute point starting in the coming weeks.
*Oh really so the 360 will stop selling games, stop making games in a few weeks right? thats laughable cow inreality 360 can lower its price, and it has better games comming out, microsoft can match price for price more easily then sony can because microsoft doesn't lose something like 100 dollars or more still on production and sales of its console*

That shows nothing, If that was the case then the n64 would have won and not the ps1, the ps1 was plauged with bad press for a new system, it had many problems within the first few years when it came to hardware quality.

So you have proven nothing so far.

Edit: all ready one disagree and the person didn't even read the whole thing.

Edit2: I did very well in school stuntman mike, and im off to play halo 3:)

[TheSMART]

your still living in the past and thats why you fail to see what Sony and I and every other PlayStation fan sees. Why do you think their motto is Play Beyond?

1. The system does and will have games this gen. That was stupid of you to even reply that way.

2. HD TV adoption has grown in percentage year over year and will continue to grow whether its slow or not its still growing isn't it.

3. Microsoft lacks the brand power for the 360 that the PlayStaion has and the price of the PS3 will continue to drop and even if only 25% of PS2 owners upgrade to the PS3 it will still be more consoles then microsoft has ever sold.

I'm not going to argue with you because obviously like i stated earlier you all are short sighted and live with the mentality of whats happened in the past and whats happening in the present.

Talk to me in 2008 when the PlayStation 3 has a higher installed base then 360.

[Rooftrellen]

"1. The system does and will have games this gen. That was stupid of you to even reply that way."

Some developers are complaining about the low install base. With games being more expensive to make for the PS3 than the 360, and up to twice as expensive as for the Wii, you better have a great install base if you want people to make a lot of good games for you.

There is a good chance that the PS3 will have the smallest selection of games, if it stays on the track it is on right now.

"2. HD TV adoption has grown in percentage year over year and will continue to grow whether its slow or not its still growing isn't it."

It will grow, but I don't see this as a big advantage for the PS3. Most people have no idea what bluray is, and anyone buying a HD player will most likely get a standalone player, not a PS3. The 360 has the HD DVD addon, as well, so its no more of an advantage for the PS3 than the 360, but, still, HD TV adoption will hardly effect the sales of any consoles this gen.

"3. Microsoft lacks the brand power for the 360 that the PlayStaion has and the price of the PS3 will continue to drop and even if only 25% of PS2 owners upgrade to the PS3 it will still be more consoles then microsoft has ever sold."

I'm sure more people know of MICROSOFT Windows than Sony Playstation, actually, which gives MS the stronger brand power. Among gamers, Playstation may be the stronger name, but Xbox isn't weak. Among the rest of the world's population, though, MS has Sony beat, I think, because of Windows. Sure, everyone knows Sony for making electronics, but when someone is thinking of which console to buy, Nintendo and MS have the thoughts for games just because Nintendo only does games and MS has Windows, and they've likely played some games on their computer.

You can talk about the future all you want, but early adopters decide how a generation turns out. If the PS3 lasts for 10 years and only manages to sell 10 million consoles by the time the 360 has moved 15 million and the Wii has moved 20 million, the PS3 will go many years without developers using it to make games due to low install base and high costs of development.

[Lumbo]

Why yes Rooftrellen, lotsa people know Microsoft for their OS, indeed. They know it for its Blue screens, hang ups, constantly breaking document format (try to write a long document including pictures and footnotes, as often needed in science and business and you are in for living hell, miserable performance (vista, the sales flop of 2007), for horrid activation issues, for getting locked out and called software thief when Microsofts WGA server again have a bluescreen them self, not to surprising as the servers use windows as OS, its build to crash.

So you rightly stated that most people know Microsoft, but sadly not for being a great company, quite the contrary: they know Microsoft for being a monopolistic competition hating creator of faulty goods. For someone who puts out beta level wares and sells them for finished goods prices. And unsurprisingly they managed to strengthen that appeal with the X-Box360 due to a failure rate thats so beyond any reasonable level that they had to throw enough money down the warranty fundings to buy back every third X-Box360 sold. Thats 4 million units minimum they expect to defect from the shabby manufatoring/design if they have to replace it with a brand new unit. And at a maximum the money would be enough to repair EVERY single unit sold today for $150 cost. That shows you how much trust they place into their quality console, none at all to be precise, they know that all units have the design/manufatoring flaw and won't manage the 3 years they give you in warranty now.

To add injury to insult, they even replace your faulty unit with a refurb faulty "new" one. Making it likely that you get hit multiple times in a row. Right now i know no other electronic device in history that had a defect rate up to this, except maybe IBM Deskstar HDD's (also known as "IBM Deathstar")

[gerrard]

You'll find actually that the Playstation brand is very recognizable indeed. Now your stupid argument about developers complaining about small user base and how difficult and expensive it is blah blah blah.
Rubbish: Thats lazy dev talk. And comparing it to Wii is like comparing a Jaguar to a Ford.

You say you don't see the advantage PS3 has for those who have HDTV? Ok i'll make simple for a simple minded fool. It's a HD medium that plays games and movies in HD something Microsoft is sadly lacking and don't tell me HD DVD add on is an advantage because this cheap crap doesn't do games and is incompatible to a majority 1080p TV's via VGA. And HD cannot be done on DVD9 because there's not enough space on the disc to handle it otherwise Sony wouldn't bother with Bluray if that was the case.

And the case that the Microsoft brand will have the advantage over Sony brand PLEASE DON'T MAKE ME LAUGH Sony has existed much longer than Microsoft has and the pathetic 360 is only doing well in the US and UK but its poor in japan Australia and the rest of Europe. And Microsoft isn't doing itself any favors with its vista debacle either and as for Zune, nuff said.

As for the future it'll take care of itself, Lets talk about now so far Ps3 is matching and will surpass 360 in every way. Games like Halo 3 for example doesn't match Resistance in the graphics department or gameplay
online play Halo3 16, Resistance 40 I rest my case on that one. Motorstorm I've yet to see any 360 game that can match in the graphics stake. So as for developers not using it let me enlighten you on this one Konami, Capcom, Sega, Epic, Free Radical Design, Insomniac, Square Enix, Codemasters,Naughty Dogs e.t.c, these people have shown what can be done on the PS3.

And if your gonna tell me about games that looks better on 360 than ps3 forget it, Because Oblivion for example one of the best games of this current gen is better on the PS3 Due to developers doing a proper job on the PS3. The rest are lazy developers

With prices coming down, games Like Uncharted Drakes Fortune, Haze, UT3 & Rachet and Clank on their way this fall & in 2008 Kill Zone 2, Metal Gears Solid 4, Dualshock 3 controller, Play tv and Hd streaming to come, this war is far from over.

So go back and play your inferior 360

[Rooftrellen]

"So go back and play your inferior 360"

I refuse to buy a 360 right now, thank you. Maybe if they can get the price down a little more and make me confident they're not going to change anything else, I'll consider it.

Heck, right now I'm even avoiding my friends that have a 360 because I really don't want to play Halo 3.

I find it funny that anyone who says things about the PS3 that aren't worshiping it much be 360 fanboys though, right? Or maybe I said I have a 360 by mistake...if so, please quote me on that, and I will appologize publicly for the mistake.

It is MUCH more likely I will own a PS3 in my lifetime than a 360, actually, but keep beliving that every time someone says something bad about the PS3, they must be a MS fanboy, because obviously any logical, neutral person would worship the PS3, eh?

Guess what, not everyone is a fanboy!

[gerrard]

If I suggested that your a 360 owner then I do apologize, and its not that I have anything against 360 owners, but I'm sick and tired of xbots who bash the Ps3 on unfounded facts or so called bad news , my problem with you was that you suggested that Sony wasn't going anywhere with Ps3(please correct me if I'm wrong). It's only Ps3 first year and whatever setbacks they did have they seem to be putting them right. So it's too early to judge the Ps3 right now, and if the situation remains the same this time next year, then I will agree with the negative comments because there'll be no more excuses left from Sony.

[stuntman_mike]

its nice to see someone at sony is enthusiastic about ps3, wish a few more companies and people involved with them were more like this.

[stuntman_mike]

my god where do some of you people get this stuff, writing essays on the sales growth of consoles i bet your parents wished you put that effort in at school. lol

[jaja1434]

Hey before I wrote my essay I spent 8 hours doing Ca II and Physics. I've earned my time to write my essay about silly topics!

[stuntman_mike]

you liar i bet you were on xbox fragging someones ass, when you should have been studying lol.

[jaja1434]

Ha...I wish that I had been...damm intervals.

[Figboy]

is that the console has sold 4 million units at a $500/$600 asking price.

what do you honestly think it's going to sell at a $400 asking price?

what's even more interesting, is that not all of the diehard Playstation 3 fans jumped on board this past 10 months *BECAUSE of that $500/$600 asking price.

but $400? i still have hardcore Playstation friends of mine simply *WAITING for that price drop to happen. my buddy had his 360 die on him, then it got stolen by some kids who were friends of the repair-shop people (lesson: *DON'T go to a shady-looking repair-shop kids). he didn't get a PS3 because $500/$600 was too much for him, but $400? that's less than an Elite, and he can swap out the hard drive for something bigger if he needs it.

X Box 360 is a great machine for the gamer that just wants games.

but the Playstation 3 is the *BEST system out there for the gamer that not only wants the games, but likes to surf the net, watch HD movies, and enjoys Sony games, all in one box.

[joydestroy]

i am a big FPS fan. &i really hope that the PS3 continues to kick some out because i don't want to buy a system because it's awesome and then have nothing to play on it and end up still playing more on my 360.

[beavis4play]

unreal tournament, haze, COD and killzone.....

lock and load.

[Figboy]

there's some pretty solid FPS games coming, and pretty solid FPS games out.

if you don't own a 360, but have a PS3, there's

The Darkness (cool story and atmosphere; also a rather unique FPS due to Jackie's powers)
Rainbow Six Vegas
Ghost Recon: AW 2 (not an FPS, but 3rdPS; still really good. it's basically a 3rd person Rainbow Six)
Call of Duty 4

then there's the PS3 exclusives
Haze (made by Free Radical, who made such great FPSes as Goldeneye and Timesplitters)
Unreal Tournament 3 (probably the best online multi-player game on the PC, now coming to consoles. the PS3 also supports mouse and keyboard, though i hear the controller support is awesome)
Resistance and eventually Resistance 2
Killzone 2 (looking amazing, and it seems like Guerilla Games learned from their mistakes with the first Killzone game; that is to say, over-reaching with the technology, pushing it beyond it's capabilities too soon).

and who knows what else is going to be announced in the future.

i don't think you have anything to worry about this time around on the PS3 when it comes to FPSes. it's not like the PS2 days, when the console was weak for shooters.

[Myth]

I'll buy Gears of War on my PC it's a better version anyway.

The game will feature five new singleplayer chapters, a new "King of the Hill" multiplayer game mode, three new multiplayer maps, a game editor, and the first and last showdown with the infamous Brumak boss. "Once you fire it up on the PC...it's almost like an entirely new game," remarked Bleszinski. the Windows version's singleplayer campaign-- which Bleszinski compared to a director's cut DVD--can be started from Act 5, allowing those who have already played the original to dig right into the five new chapters. With this extra content heading only to the PC, the question arises: will it ever be coming to Xbox 360 owners? The answer, it turns out, is complicated. So much has changed to the engine for Gears PC that it would need to be entirely reworked again in order to port it back to the Xbox 360. "Putting that content back on the Xbox 360 would be a huge hurdle," said Fergusson.

Playing Bioshock right now on my PC and I have to say it's about a 7.5.
So again why am I buying a 360?

[razer]

I was just going to ignore you but you are cutting and pasting this same crap in any article that mentions the 360.

Who gives a crap if you buy a 360 or not.. Nobody is going to try and convince you! Buy a PS3 or a Wii or jump on your PC and download more drivers..

Why would I buy a 360? Because I don't want to spend $1000 to build a PC to play these games on settings that are accomplished on the 360 for half the price. Also, I want to be able to play the games from my living room and not hunched over a PC like a fat nerd.

Now that you know.. please STFU and stop spamming this site..

[Myth]

Sorry to tell you my friend but my PC is Pre 360. Built it about a year before 360 came out and I can play Bioshock on max setttings and I'm sure I will be able to play Gears as well.

AMD Athlon 64 2.4
1.5 Ram
6800 Geforce AGP
Could built that for pretty cheap now days.

Don't get mad cause I make some valid points. Why don't you try and make some?

[ElementX]

I'm just waiting for more PS3 games. I'm buying Orange Box on 360 because I'm sure it'll run better. Ratchet and Clank looks sweet, I have it pre-ordered.

[Dark_king]

OK first the blu-ray disc size is already being used buy many games just look at heavenly sword a game that is rather short yet contains more data then halo and gears.And one most wonder when Final Fantasy XIII comes out how large it will be.I am sure SE will make sure this game has near a hundred hours of play time using the full ability of the current blu-ray disc.However they may not use the current disc and since there are already larger disc being made and from what I have head there is a 100 gig disc that the ps3 could run with nothing more then a system update.

One can claim that thats far to large but they would be the fools.This Gen of games are not just slightly larger then the last gen,there massively larger.We could be seeing games hitting the fifty gig mark as soon as spring of 08.Then they could even hit the 75 gig mark at the end of 08.I know a few people are going to read my comment and think I am full of it,but think about how great FF XIII looks in game action looks beautiful making even heavenly sword look dull and bland.And this is a Final Fantasy game so you have to expect it to be the largest game ever made before.

And its time the multi platform dev get it though there heads that the 360 is holding this gen back.Forcing games to fit on a dvd that should take up twice the space is just ignorance.They are making games for both thinking they will make more money.When in the end they could make twice as much if they just made the very best game they can for the ps3.Use the system to its fullest and really show off what you can do as a dev.Because like this article say the ps3 is the best system on the market and it not just a little better.I know the current problem with the devs will slowly stop after they are shown what the ps3 can really do.But releasing half assed games is hurting the entire industry.

Second:being able to download games and movies is a great idea in theory when your downloading over over twenty gigs it takes time and lots of hardrive space which is extremely limited right now.With the largest hardrive the ps3 can install being 250 gigs.(Thats only 12 movies Iand I sure that you can think of far more then 12 movies that you would like to watch)So unless Sony develops a 500 gig hardrive,downloading movies in hd going to waste allot of space.However Sony should be able to stream hd content to us.

I could go on but ill end this for now right here.

[razer]

and PC games which look better than anything on consoles is using what??? What is that?? DVD9

So stop it with your BS comment that it's the 360 holding games back.. Are you freaking kidding me?? How about developement costs? developement cycles??

Some of you Sony fanboys are so egotistical that you will blame all the PS3 faults on the 360.

I won't argue that more space is always better, but there are means to deal with it and the good developers are doing it. Take a look at COD4, which so far looks better than anything on either console as of now. How is the 360 holding that back??

Here is a ladder to get off your high horse

[andy001]

Remember that a PC game really is just a disc full of compressed data and it uncompresses on your hard drive. You can't do this on the 360 as the hard drive really only has about 12GB free, if you have a hard drive at all. It is a limitation on the 360. You might not care, or think it matters, but its a limitation all the same.

I suspect we shall see many PC games in 2008 requiring a lot more than 9GB. Stranglehold on the PC uses at least 15GB I think. The way they will do this is simply with multiple discs, as the % of PC's with bigger Optical Media drives will be far too small.

[IdontTakeSides]

I think Sony made the right decision to include Blu-Ray in the ps3...DVD9 will just not do this generation..I remember a game called GTA San Andreas which came out in 2004...pushed DVD..limits really hard imagine GTA4...yeah yeah it's on the 360 also..but im pretty sure that played a major part in the game getting delayed..

[neogeo]

I like to look a little farther into the future. Sony lost a ton of money as first making the Cell, then even more waiting for the blueray laser to come down. Now the cell is dropping in price and blueray is cheap. Why is that bad for Microsoft? Because Sony owns the factory to make cell chips. While Microsoft owns nothing. The cell is just getting started. Read up and you don't wont any good source not complementing the Cell as a serious monster! The programming tools are just getting started for the cell, I believe that it will really start to shine in about two years time. This is very very bad news for Microsoft because MS own no hardware what so ever. When the decided to dump the 360 and get something new, they will AGAIN need to pay mutable company's to put there Xbox 720 together. That means It will need to be much better then PS3. THAT MEANS ANOTHER $$$$$ NEW SYSTEM to compete with PS3,
So PS3 will be less then $199.99 then with a thousand great games.
Sony decides to make PS4

PS4 specs in 2012
200gig blueray= low cost
32 core low power 45nm cell processors =low cost
Solid state hard drive for very fast loading times= Median cost by then
32 gigs of XDR3 RAM=medium coast.

You see the long term investment into the cell and blueray will pay off big time for PS4
as for MS there pretty much screwed, unless they buy some big hardware company's.

[Enigma_2099]

I'm just gonna have to accept this... this site is fanboy central...

[Firestorm]

If ps3 really is more powerful, hurry up and show it Sony

[SuperSaiyan4]

Oh look Kaz at it again...Gears of war is on 1 disc and blows Resistance out of the water in gameplay and graphics.

HALO 3 beats everything on the PS3 and thats 1 disc.

NONE of the 2 games mentioned used up all the space on the disc.

If blu-ray is the key to TRUE next gen gaming and the PS3 is SOO powerful why are 99% of the PS3 ports crap? Why is the 360 the leading platform for 99% of the multiplatform games?

The Xbox 360 is a superior games console, end of the GPU is unmatched and the total system memory available is more in the 360 than the PS3.

[andy001]

There haven't been 100 ports yet so your percentages will need adjusting slightly :o) It is easy to see why some of the ports have not been so good on the PS3 and that is because of the way you need to program for the SPE's. EA games are the notable ports where there are differences, but their game releases are patchy quality at best.

The latest quality multi platform releases such as Assassins Creed may shed some new light on it, now that the companies are sorting their skills out.

I would just buy both consoles (oh, I already did!), that way you can pick the best and not worry about any console war :o)

Also bear in mind that many third party companies will use 'off the shelf' engines which do various stuff, like Havoc, Unreal Engine, and there is an engine coming from id (John Carmack) which reportedly runs the same on all platforms (360, PS3, PC) so it seems that for the multiplatform titles we can look forward to equal performance. The exclusive titles will be the platform differentiators, and were the 'war' is won or lost I think.

[Dark_king]

SuperSaiyan4

First your comparing a lunch title with gears,thats not fair lets compare it to heavenly sword in looks and see how well it stacks up.

halo doesn't beat everything on the ps3 warhawk kicks halos ass if you actully played it you would understand.I will give you halo looks better but looks are not everything.

And why are ports so crappy,well there all not when the devs actully do there job and port them properly.When you take a game from a inferior machine and try to just shove it on a better machine without taking the time to understand how the thing works the games are not going to come out good thats just how it is.

the 360 superior where the hell are you getting that from.First it doesn't have more ram then the ps3 so maybe you should recheck your numbers.They both use 512 Mb of ram.And as if that is not enough the cell really doesn't require as much ram.The flame affect in your shinny halo game looks nice don't it,Sure but Bungie them selfs said how hard that was to get.And yet on the cell its a simple affect and comes out looking more real.Don't take my word just check out the flame affect on some of the killzone 2 vids.

Now for what you said razer.

How is the 360 holding the ps3 back.Well in truth it is and it isn't.Games like GTA 4 will not be near as good as they could have been will it.(this being proved very well by the fact that rockstar main focus being on the ps3 besides GTA4) And sure they are a few thing that can be done to improve this problem,and at least now MS will allow that solution by allowing devs to require a harddrive.

You see games that require around twenty to thirty gigs requires a special approach.And this I really shouldn't say but why do you think GTA4 delayed.Because they had to work a way to install a massive game on the harddrive of the 360 while still trying to keep most of the data on a disc.So you will see games that require you to install one disc to the harddrive then use another disc to play it.And this might sound real simple for the devs to do,but its not.You have to play around with what should be on the disc and what should be installed on the Harddrive while trying not to use to much of someone harddrive. Because lets face it when it comes to harddrives both systems are rather small compared to most pc.So that space is very important on a console.

And heavenly sword audio alone couldn't fit on a dvd and yes it was compressed so don't even try saying it.

And the ps3 is far more capable then what you seem to think because it will surpass what your pc is capable of by 09.Of course there will be a certain company releasing a monster pc using the cell around then that will blow what the ps3 can do out of the water.But until then all the ram in the world will not help a pc preform as well as what the ps3 can do right now.Sure pc are capable of higher resolution.But cant crunch numbers near as fast can they(don't think I am right,Then try doing some research).And what does that have to do with any thing,well everything the faster a machine can crunch numbers the more info it can process.

O and pc will almost always look better then console because of the ability they have to upscale content.However nothing on your pc for the next two years will look as polished as FFXIII is already looking.They can run at a higher resolution but its only upscaleing content.And why is it only upscaled content because its cheaper then to start out at the current highest resolution.

And your right the development cost are higher on the ps3 and the cycle is longer but the same could be said about the 360 compared to the xbox.When something has more power it takes more time and effort to use that power.

And how is the 360 hold COD4 back that should be very easy to get across to you.The better the game looks the shorter it will be and since its coming out on both systems they cant really use the ps3 extra space to further better the game.Because that would piss people off.Now lets say like gears it uses around two gigs a level,thats doesn't make it a very long game now does it with the maximum of around ten levels able to be compressed to fit the disc.while uncompressed you could have as many as twenty five on the standard blu-ray.So which system could you make the better game for.

Sorry to come across like a fanboy I am not.

But it should be so obvious that the 360 limits are also limiting many ps3 games.Because we do already have a game that are compressed and past the twenty gig mark.And this is not BS,So if one game has already went past two dvd's limits many more are soon to follow.However nothing that is on both console will be doing this because as the games get larger and larger on the ps3,the games on both will never want to cross the twenty gig mark.Which we have already passed and the next will be MGS coming in at around 30 to 35 gigs then ff XIII coming in at only god really could know,there only about twenty five percent done with it(just a guess last I heard they were fifteen percent and its been a few months so they should be somewhere around there.)But judging from what I seen they will for sure use above forty gigs of compressed data.

Can you ever expect a game around fifty gigs to hit the 360 because they will hit the ps3.If one did you would get pretty pissed if you had to change the disc that many times to play your game.

Again I will stop here.

[beardtm]

160mb of ram? ...too bad

[JCDenton]

People keep saying PS3 is "the best console", but I ask you to define "the best". You can't just say "Well, PS3 is the most powerful, so it's the best". Hardware specs doesn't mean anything (just ask SEGA).

What console is "the best" is ultimately decided by consumers, and so far conusmers said that Wii is the best.

If PS3 fans are going to look back at history, and say "Sony won last to generations, so it will win this one, too", then please look at SEGA and it's Saturn console. Saturn was the most powerful console (more powerful than PS1), SEGA had a brandname, and still Saturn failed. Why? Because it was WAY to difficult to develop for, so the games were not there. This is NOT about hardware, it's about SOFTWARE. Software has always driven hardware. If you don't have the software, the hardware will fail.

PS3 is a system which is ahead of it's time, and, ironically, that will probably be it's downfall.

[JCDenton]

-double post- sorry!