u l t r a m o o k i e

For my grad, dad and birthday gift, my wife got me a spanking new Playstation 3.
Thank you wifey for such a cool gift!  You are a kick-ass wife and the PS3 is a kick-ass gift!
I wanted a PS3 mainly so that I can watch Bluray movies — we already pay for Netflix, so it would [...]

For my grad, dad and birthday gift, my wife got me a spanking new Playstation 3.

Thank you wifey for such a cool gift!  You are a kick-ass wife and the PS3 is a kick-ass gift!

I wanted a PS3 mainly so that I can watch Bluray movies — we already pay for Netflix, so it would be better to take advantage of the Bluray selection, rather than pay a whole lot more for HD satellite feeds.  I must say, the PS3 is quite impressive — although, I guess I could be a bit biased as an ex-Sony employee.

Observations about the PS3:

• Now that Bluray has won the high definition format war — finally — the PS3 has an upper-hand when compared with the Xbox 360.  Whether it really plays out, I don’t know.  But, that was the whole reason why I wanted a PS3:  Bluray.
• Brilliant move pricing the lowest priced Bluray player the same price as the PS3.  It just makes people think that they are getting a “free” game console with the Bluray player.
• Demos on the Playstation Network (PSN) are great!  Usually, I don’t play through a whole game unless I can really get into it — and there are not many games that I can get into.  So, playing a demo from start to finish is usually enough to make me satisfied.
• PSN network speed is horrendous.  It takes forever to download something from the PSN.  I tried downloading the PS3 update from PSN and it ran ~160kBps, which is terrible (my DSL line is a 3Mbps line so I get around 300kBps max).  Sony needs to invest into more bandwidth (or stop throttling).
• Even though Sony is out to sell Bluray discs, there is still a market for downloadable video and audio content.  So where is it Sony?  Sony has a whole library of movies, TV shows and music that it can sell online.  They should get on the ball and start doing it — Microsoft does it with the Xbox 360 and Apple does it with the AppleTV already.
• The PS3 hardware itself is beautiful.  When Alice lent me her Xbox 360, I was surprised by the size of the total package — most importantly that the power brick was the same size as the Xbox 360 console!  The PS3 is all enclosed, the only thing that sticks out are the HDMI and power cables, no fugly external power brick here.
• The PS3 is quiet.  Alice’s Xbox 360 was loud — not just the fans, but the drive also.  And not just “kind of loud”, more on the “this is distracting my gameplay loud?.
• I’m kind of disappointed at the lack of 1080p games.  Most games seem to run at 720p, which is fine, but I figured the PS3 was powerful enough to squeeze out 1080p gaming easily.
• The DVD upscaler (software) does not do as good of a job as a dedicated DVD upscaler.  When compared to the old Pioneer DV-400V upscaling DVD player that we had, the PS3’s upscaled DVD output is a little disappointing.
• The SixAxis controller is lighter than I thought.  Also, I don’t like having to pay for Sony’s stubborness when it comes to rumble.  Sony should have swapped out the SixAxis controllers the minute they settled the lawsuit against them.  One of these days, I’ll get a Dual Shock, but not right now.  I’m fine with the SixAxis.
• The lack of PS2 backwards compatibility is a disappointment, but not that big of one.  It is not like I have played any of my old PS2 games recently and that I would pop one back into play anytime soon.  I still have my slim PS2 in the garage and can pull it out to use when I want.  It would be nice to have the backwards compatibility, but not a requirement.  What is hugely disappointing is the actual reason why Sony stripped out the backwards compatibility from the 40GB PS3.  Sony reasons that “by omitting the option of playing PS2 games, Sony hopes that new customers will instead spend their money on more PS3 games.”
• The one game that my wife got me was Burnout Paradise — because I’m a huge Burnout fan, I have all of the games on either the PS2 or PSP.  Burnout, Burnout 2: Point of Impact, Burnout 3: Takedown and Burnout Revenge on the PS2.  Burnout Legends and Burnout Dominator on the PSP.  Now, Burnout Paradise on the PS3.  Fantastic game.  The only thing that has be a bit frustrated right now is that I still don’t know my way around Paradise City and that makes doing races a bit difficult — as sometimes I find that I have turned on the wrong street and am going the wrong way.  If only Criterion would have made the minimap like a GPS device — mark out a general route (that skips shortcuts) for the player, if the player gets off route, then “reroute” based on where they are heading.  This would help lessen the frustration of being lost in the city — there are subtle hints that Criterion threw in like the blinker on the car will give you a hint where to go.
• The one movie that my wife got me was Casino Royale.  The movie is a gorgeous showoff film for Bluray.  The scene where Bond and the bombmaker are fighting it out on the crane really shows off the resolution of Bluray movies (as the water sparkles brilliantly in the background while the helicopter-mounted camera revolves around the two from a long distance).
• Remote Play functionality — where the PSP can take control of the PS3 and display media (and some games) — works really well.  I was surprised at how easy it was to setup and get going.
• Although the PS3 has no PS2 support, it, ironically has psOne support.  The support works and there are some “enhancement” technologies to try to make the old games look new again — like texture smoothing.  The psOne games I have tried on the system (Gran Turismo 2 and Metal Gear Solid) both work well and look…well, like the are ten years old.
• Netflix continues to amaze.  I sent back movies the day that I got the PS3.  That night, I logged into my Netflix account and flipped on the Bluray option and moved some Bluray discs to the top of my queue.  The next day, Netflix received my DVDs and sent Bluray discs to me.  I got the Bluray discs the following day.  That is normal operating style for Netflix and it continues to amaze me.  Now, if only Netflix to adapt their “Watch Now” feature to stream HD content and stream it to a PS3, that would completely knock me out of my chair.
• The PS3 is made as a media center.  What I love is how the harddrive is easily user-replaceable (which I will do with an old, larger notebook drive.  What I also love is that the PS3 can play all sorts of media — including MP3, WMA, AAC, DVIX, XVID and H.264 AVC.  And all of this can either reside locally, on a USB thumbdrive, on a DVD-RW disc, or can be streamed over the network (from a DLNA server or, as Alice tells me and I have to test out, an Apache server).  The PS3 is surprisingly open for a product that has come out from Sony.
• The PS3 can also take Linux, but I don’t know if I’ll go down that route.  I have enough Linux boxes at home (yes, one can actually have “enough” Linux boxes).  I don’t really want to turn my PS3 into a semi-Linux box also.

I guess that’s a long-winded enough posting for now about the PS3.  I’m sure I’ll have more later.  Do you own a PS3?  What do you think about it?  And what’s your PSN name?  I want to add you to my friends list!

In what could be the lamest marketing ploy, Microsoft released a Halo 3 Special Edition Xbox 360.  What’s so special about this Xbox 360?  It is green, it has a green controller, it has the Halo 3 logo on it and it costs $50 more than the comparable white Xbox 360.  Well, you say, that [...]

In what could be the lamest marketing ploy, Microsoft released a Halo 3 Special Edition Xbox 360.  What’s so special about this Xbox 360?  It is green, it has a green controller, it has the Halo 3 logo on it and it costs $50 more than the comparable white Xbox 360.  Well, you say, that $50 is because they have bundled Halo 3 in with this special edition Xbox 360.  WRONG.  In a run away show of lameness, Microsoft has released a special edition system based on a game WITHOUT THE GAME it is based on.  Sorry, that’s just stupid.

Here’s what I’m playing right now:

Burnout Dominator (PSP):  You gotta love the Burnout series!
Cooking Mama (DS):  Just.  Plain.  Fun.  And no dishes, pots or pans to clean up after cooking.
Rayman Raving Rabbids (Wii):  Hee-larious and very fun game!
Super Paper Mario (Wii):  A great re-imagining of the Mario series.  I really like the small touches they’ve [...]

Here’s what I’m playing right now:

• Burnout Dominator (PSP):  You gotta love the Burnout series!
• Cooking Mama (DS):  Just.  Plain.  Fun.  And no dishes, pots or pans to clean up after cooking.
• Rayman Raving Rabbids (Wii):  Hee-larious and very fun game!
• Super Paper Mario (Wii):  A great re-imagining of the Mario series.  I really like the small touches they’ve added like the “flipping”.

I watched a bunch of videos from E3 and here are some games that I would love to play:

• Halo 3 (Xbox 360):  I have played and finished Halo and Halo 2 on my Xbox.  Halo 3 looks really great, but I am hesitant to cough up $460 to play Halo 3 ($400 for an Xbox 360 and $60 for Halo 3).
• Killzone 2 (PS3):  This game looks fantastic and was the talk of E3.  Again, I don’t know if I would want to cough up $560 to play it though ($500 for PS3  and $60 for Killzone 2).
• Super Mario Galaxy (Wii):  I can’t wait for this one to come out.  I want it for my Wii.
• Metroid 3:  Corruption (Wii):  Looks interesting, I just hope it doesn’t have the “I finished the level, now I have to backtrack through the whole level on a timer” thing.

Any games spark your interest from this year’s E3?

In business it is a calculated risk when it comes to cutting costs. Microsoft just announced that they are taking a $1 billion (yes, with a “b” not “m”) loss because of the repairs and warranty extensions for their Xbox 360. I am sure this has all to do with cost cutting while [...]

In business it is a calculated risk when it comes to cutting costs. Microsoft just announced that they are taking a $1 billion (yes, with a “b” not “m”) loss because of the repairs and warranty extensions for their Xbox 360. I am sure this has all to do with cost cutting while designing the Xbox 360. The hardware failures seem to be quite widespread with people returning their Xbox 360s multiple times for repairs.

Not only is the entertainment division of Microsoft in the hole $6 billion since 2002, now it has this huge PR
loss — to which no monetary value can be attached. Robbie Bach has said that the company has made some manufacturing and production changes to lessen the hardware failures. The keyword is “lessen”, not eliminate. That is unfortunate since this kind of thing will stick in the back of a consumer’s mind when they are out shopping.

See an Xbox 360 on a shelf? You might just associate it as the Ford Pinto of gaming consoles.

I finally got a Wii! This morning, while I was with Eileen and Jacob visiting his grandparents, I told Eileen, “I’m getting tired of the hunt for a Wii. Maybe I’ll just get a PS3 and enjoy some Blu-ray movies. Lets go to Fry’s and check out the PS3.” So, Eileen [...]

I finally got a Wii! This morning, while I was with Eileen and Jacob visiting his grandparents, I told Eileen, “I’m getting tired of the hunt for a Wii. Maybe I’ll just get a PS3 and enjoy some Blu-ray movies. Lets go to Fry’s and check out the PS3.” So, Eileen humored me and we went to Fry’s. Walking by the desk for software, we saw a sign, “Wii Bundle, Wii + Two Games, $349.” Yea, right, I thought. They actually have Wii’s in stock. So, I asked, out of frustration, “You have the Wii in stock?”

“Yup.”

Whoa. Our off chance visit to Brokaw Fry’s has netted me a Wii! I got the Wii, Wii Play ($10 game, $40 Wii-mote) and WarioWare. I totally forgot that the Wii only includes the composite cables for video. I still need to get some component cables for the Wii.

Eileen and I spent a good chunk of the afternoon playing Wii together while Jacob was sleeping. She loves WarioWare (single player). And we love to play Tennis and Bowling together! What fun! The Wii might not have the shiny graphics or Blu-ray player of the PS3. The Wii might not have the shiny graphics of the Xbox 360. But, the Wii certainly has more fun stuff to do than either of the two “next generation” gaming consoles.

Nintendo was smart to bundle Wii Sports with the Wii. Wii Sports really shows off the capabilities of the Wii. Yes, the graphics are so last generation. But, the fun is so, the next generation. The PS3 and Xbox 360 platforms seem to concentrate on next-gen graphics and…well, FPS games. There’s nothing wrong with that, except that I am kind of tired of the FPS genre.

I got the Opera browser from the Wii Store. It…works…GREAT. Fantastic having a browser for a 10ft interface. Even if I’m not going to use it all the time, just having it is great. The Photos Channel is actually pretty good also. I tried it briefly with an SD card full of photos. Very nice indeed.

Anyways, I think the Wii, like the DS, is a great reinvention of what a gaming console can be. Yes, it may not be for hardcore gamers — who will most likely flock towards the PS3 and Xbox 360 — but as a mass-market gaming device, the Wii is really showing the gaming industry that it is all about the fun, not about the graphics.

This is Mookie speaking as Mookie-the-individual.  This is not Mookie speaking as Mookie-the-Yahoo!-employee. I don’t know any more than you all. So, don’t go selling/buying stock because of what I say here. You have been warned.
So, everyone I guess is aware of those rumors that Microsoft was in talks, then not in [...]

This is Mookie speaking as Mookie-the-individual.  This is not Mookie speaking as Mookie-the-Yahoo!-employee. I don’t know any more than you all. So, don’t go selling/buying stock because of what I say here. You have been warned.

So, everyone I guess is aware of those rumors that Microsoft was in talks, then not in talks to buy up Yahoo!. That rumor has been circulating around for a while, each time it has been shot down — and each time, someone has gotten very rich from it, since the rumor seems to drive up YHOO every time it comes around.

I have my doubts that a Microsoft and Yahoo! combined entity would do any good. Why? Because #2 Yahoo! plus #3 Microsoft would still be a #2 MicroHoo! entity. The gap between Google and Yahoo! is pretty substantial, but the gap between Yahoo! and Microsoft? Even bigger. Putting together number two and three will not make much of a difference.

Then you look at Microsoft’s track record for internet properties. They have the dominate OS on the market. They play heavy-handed games because of this — like setting the default search engine in Internet Explorer to their own and setting the default homepage to their own. Yet, look where they are at with all this cheating: A far distant number three. If Microsoft has the cards stacked up like this on their side — with the OS domination and all — and yet still can’t do anything, what good would them buying up Yahoo! do? Nothing. They would only hinder Yahoo!. Here’s how I see it.

Microsoft is a packaged software company. That is what they are brilliant at doing (though lately, they have been pretty far off target). Their cash cows are Windows and Office. Everything they do has to benefit Windows and Office, period. Sell an Xbox 360? Gotta have a Windows tie-in somewhere (like Media Center). Sell a Zune? Gotta have it work only with Windows. But, what happens when Microsoft goes and tries to create an online version of Excel or Word? That will eat into their Office sales. No can do. What about moving applications that would only be Windows-based into an OS agnostic web browser? No can do. That would eat into their Windows sales — come on, who would use Windows if you could do most of your stuff in a centralized location that can be accessed by any machine, anywhere in the world?

So, what is Microsoft going to do? I am guessing that everything that happens in the MSN/Live division has to be run by the Windows/Office division — since you can’t have those online guys creating cool shit that will eat the lunch of the cash cow, right? Buying Yahoo! would only slow down Yahoo! (and, my guess only, drive us Unix-loving Yahoo! talent over to Google). No, buying Yahoo!, especially now that we have Panama up and running, is not the thing that Microsoft should do.

What Microsoft should do, getting in my now famous CEO armchair, is spin off MSN/Live. Let that small company run itself without the hands of the Windows/Office division touching anything. Isolate the MSN/Live people and let them do what they want, feed them money and let them go. Don’t worry about the cool stuff they create (and I have to admit, Live has some cool stuff like the Bird’s Eye View on their maps). That is the only way. If the MSN/Live group continues to be handicapped by the Windows/Office group, Microsoft should just sell off the MSN/Live group.

Will this ever happen? Hell no. I can’t see Microsoft spinning off MSN/Live anytime soon.  And that is unfortunate for them since I can’t even see Microsoft letting the MSN/Live group go and do their own thing without the heavy hand of the Windows/Office group pressuring them.  What is even more unfortunate is that the whole Windows/Office monopoly is coming to a slow death. There are great alternatives out there: Mac and Linux. Power-users find Linux better because it is free — free of charges for the most part and free of having to be treated like a criminal when installing it. Linux is open, reliable, safe, and does all that a geek needs to do.  Home-users are finding that Macs are better because they are easier to use, more reliable, and more fun.

Changing the course of a large company like Microsoft is like trying to turn the Titanic. I know this because I worked for a large company like Microsoft:  Sony. And when I was at Sony, they were trying hard to steer that massive ship in a different direction. It wasn’t happening though. So, my edumacated guess is that it will be a while before Microsoft changes its ways. But, the question is: Will it be too late for them?

I visited Micro Center yesterday at lunch (which curiously my wife asked, “They’re still in business?”) and I was quite surprised when I got into the store.  For those of you who haven’t been to a Micro Center — and that could be most of you — they have a huge book section in the [...]

I visited Micro Center yesterday at lunch (which curiously my wife asked, “They’re still in business?”) and I was quite surprised when I got into the store.  For those of you who haven’t been to a Micro Center — and that could be most of you — they have a huge book section in the store. I would say their book section was a good 15-20% of the floor space at a store. Well, not anymore. Yesterday, when I arrived at the book section, it had been sectioned off. The book section was now about 40% of its old self, the other 60% was dedicated to console gaming.

I can understand Micro Center doing this, as they are in business to make money and they will dedicate floor space to what is actually selling. But, it is a pretty sad reflection on our society that we have become so enamoured with the instant gratification of video games that books (and more importantly, reading) has taken a backseat.

On an off-note, I got to play Gears of War on the Xbox 360 finally and I must say:  Graphics, sound and music score are fantabulous!  Framerate?  Not so fantastic, after a few minutes of play I was feeling a bit nauseous — and this only happens to me with games that have bad framerates.