The changing state of the PS3: What stays and what goes?

There is a lot of information in Game Informer's interview with Sony's VP of marketing Peter Dille. One discussion point is the rumble feature mentioned by Cory Barlog for God of War III. Dille passes over the question because there currently is no rumble feature in the PS3 controller -- but it's obviously coming. The rumor of a redesigned PS3 has been floating out there for a bit and seems probable given all the changes occurring with the system (coupled with poor sales). It might be time to wonder what the PS3 redesign will entail.

We know that rumble controllers are going to be in this redesign. Sony and Immersion buried the hatchet, which prevented the PS3 from shaking in the first place, and Sony is currenly "working closely with them" to explore "new and innovative ways to utilize this technology in PlayStation products."

There's been some significant changes in the storage capacity of various PS3 models and how the company has dealt with them. Today the 80GB model was announced for Korea, a global release shouldn't be unexpected. The lack of a European 20GB model was the harbinger of its North American death and we're still waiting for the official Japanese death, but like we said before, we expect that to happen when the 80GB model is officially announced for the region. Plus, each model released during this incremental launch has been slightly different than the last. We can watch the evolution (and the survival of the fittest) in progress.

Part of that evolution is the issue of backwards compatibility. An internal change was made during the Euro launch, switching compatibility over from a chip to software emulation in a move to reduce overall cost -- for Sony, not for Europeans. We're still waiting for Sony to drop the same hammer on the non-PAL units, hopefully only after the compatibility rates are in the 90% range. We're also just going to skip over the whole pricing issue here, because that's another paragraph on its own.

There's been a lot of changes in the PS3 over its short life and a lot of changes expected that haven't manifested. Any other random bits and pieces we may have missed about what's in the pipeline? We also only mentioned internal changes, what about a totally different look on the outside? Sony's PS3 isn't going to go down without a good fight and early indicators are hardly a measure of what eventually happens. The PS3 may be a great system in time, but there are some obvious changes foreshadowed both inside and outside the console that are going to happen before too long.