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Create a LittleBigPlanet contraption, win a PSP Go
Want to flex your LittleBigPlanet creative muscle? Want to a win a prize doing so? Sony Computer Entertainment Europe is giving away a PSP Go system to one ingenious inventor that is able to create a specific "contraption": a vehicle that can operate on both land and water. To enter, log onto LittleBigPlanet (PS3 only) and find the level "CC10 - Template." Copy the level to your Moon, and create a contraption within it. Once you're done, publish your creation with the prefix CC10 in the level title. One winner be selected to win a PSP Go. You'll have to hurry, though: The competition ends on February 28th. Good luck!
Select Minis on sale in Europe
For a limited time, select Minis (playable on PSP and PS3) will be on sale in the European PlayStation Store. Sony Computer Entertainment Europe will discount these eight games from February 4–18: Fieldrunners - €3.99/£3.49 Kahoots - €1.99/£1.74 Vempire - €1.99/£1.74 Breakquest - €1.99/£1.74 Pinball Fantasies - €3.99/£3.49 Bloons - €2.49/£1.99 Mahjongg Artifacts: Chapter 2 - €1.99/£1.74 Dracula - Undead Awakening - €1.99/£1.74 SCEE is also promising to update its YouTube channel with new videos of the Minis. It's not quite as good as playable demos, but it's better than nothing, right?
Report: Half of Studio Liverpool staff laid off
According to a report from Develop citing inside sources, Sony has terminated half of all employees at Studio Liverpool -- the team behind the WipEout franchise. In January 2009, Sony merged Studio Liverpool (formerly Psygnosis) with Evolution Studios and last week announced plans to restructure the new team. In its report of the restructuring, GamesIndustry.biz noted redundancies "may be necessary;" however, Sony has yet to confirm how many positions were affected by the decision. Within the comments of GI's original article, a user registered as SCEE programmer Paul Ripley wrote "I would estimate about at least 50% of Studio Liverpool has [just] been culled (myself included). Hard to work out exact numbers at the moment." Develop's inside source relayed similar information, noting Sony's layoff plans for the studio were "looking heavy." Joystiq has reached out to Sony for comment, but has yet to hear back as of this publishing. If you work/worked for Studio Liverpool and would like to speak to us on or off the record, we're all ears.
Sony 'restructuring' Studio Liverpool
Things sound pretty rough for Sony's SCE Studio Liverpool. Following the merging of Wipeout HD developer Studio Liverpool (formerly Psygnosis) with Evolution Studios, Sony Computer Entertainment announced that it is "restructuring" the studio. According to GamesIndustry.biz, it is currently unknown how many jobs will be affected. Evidently, Sony is looking to relocate staff rather than lay them off, though, as GI puts it, "some redundancies may be necessary." In a statement, SCE said that "production on a number of projects within Studio Liverpool will cease immediately due to project prioritisation," and assured that "this decision will have no impact of the role that the North West Studio Group will play in the future of all PlayStation platforms." Except, of course, for the part of its role that included making those unspecified projects.
God of War Collection to release separately in Europe [update]
Since it hasn't been released there, we had assumed that the only shot our friends in the UK [Update: We've been told by SCEE that this is coming to all of Europe!] would have at the God of War Collection would be contained inside the monstrous "Ultimate Trilogy Edition." However, VG247 has relayed a quote from Sony, stating that "there are plans to release the GOW Collection separately" after all. It's uncertain just when those plans will come to fruition, but it counts as good news for people who don't want to lay out the cash for the limited edition box set ... or those who would prefer not to have a screaming visage of demonic horror on their mantles.
UK PS3 sales surpass 3 million
Sony Computer Entertainment Europe has announced that sales of the PlayStation 3 have eclipsed three million units in the United Kingdom. Speaking to MCV, an SCEE spokesperson noted that the company is "delighted" by the news. Pointing to a strong lineup of software, including God of War III and Heavy Rain -- both rumored to be receiving PS3 bundles in Europe -- as well as the upcoming PS3 motion controller, the rep added that the three million milestone is "a great way to start the year." So, once again, the price cut seems like it was probably a pretty good idea. Assuming Sony can keep up the momentum and deliver on a few promises, 2010 just might be a banner year for the PlayStation 3.
Heavy Rain demo to fall on Europe February 11
As promised, a Heavy Rain demo is coming to the PlayStation Store. SCEE's Mike Kebby told readers of the PlayStation.Blog to expect a demo on February 11th. While not guaranteed, it's likely that Sony will release the demo of one of its biggest first-party titles worldwide. Of course, you could always make an extra European PSN account just in case. Don't worry, Sony doesn't seem to mind. [Via VG247]
European Heavy Rain special edition looks wet, classy
If you're still a little incensed about the totally boobular North American box art for Heavy Rain, you might want to skip right past this post. See, Sony Europe recently revealed the EU-only special edition bundle for Quantic Dream's mystery/thriller, and it looks pretty wonderful. It's got stylish fold-out packaging covered in realistic, imprinted raindrops, and comes with a DLC voucher, a page covered in helpful notes and some do-it-yourself origami. More importantly, the front of the game doesn't look terrible. Europe's current ratio of not-terrible Heavy Rain covers to terrible Heavy Rain covers is an impressive 2:0. They are batting 1000, as far as not-terrible Heavy Rain covers are concerned.
Housemarque explains tech behind 3D Super Stardust HD
3D gaming isn't entirely new, but will be a big focal point for Sony this year -- and what better way to show that than by turning one of 2007's bright spots into a full 3D experience. Super Stardust HD is undergoing a HD facelift right now and during an interview with Digital Foundry (via Eurogamer), engine lead Seppo Halonen and creative director Harri Tikkanen talked about adapting the game to 3D and some of the technological leaps and bounds made by Housemarque Games. What makes SSHD different than other 3D experiences -- specifically, Avatar and other 3D games like Invincible Tiger -- is that it'll be running at a native resolution of 720p at 120 frames per second, 60 frames per each eye, and doesn't use low-res buffers to create the effect. Housemarque accomplished this by having the engine render everything twice, added stereoscopic cameras and moved the vertex processing from the GPU to the SPU. This took up about 50 percent of the SPU's resources, leaving them with enough to pre-process a lot of the game, allowing things to render much faster than before. As for future Housemarque games on PS3, don't necessarily expect those titles to be in 3D. Tikkanen says that because some titles "lend themselves better to 3D than others," all future 3D compatibility will be decided "on a game by game basis."
PSN survey hints at upcoming subscription-based features
Sony's European team has sent out a survey to some of its UK PSN members asking them yet again about possible subscription models for the service. The survey is run by a market research company called Ipsos, and appears to offer up a list of possible member benefits for a few different plan tiers, along with pricing for each. The benefits range from more tame ideas like exclusive and early access to content to more interesting options like "free title trials" (first hour of a game for free), user-to-user challenges, "token wagering" and a service called "catch-up TV." Oh, and since it's Sony we're talking about, there's even a listed option for "cloud storage space for games." You can find the full list of possible features after the jump. The price options differ from plan to plan, but they go as cheap as £2.99 (about $5 U.S.) up to £14.99 (about $25) for monthly fees, with annual fees also listed for 55% less than you'd pay month to month (so around £19.99 up to £99.99, or $32 to $160). Note that just because all of these things are on a survey doesn't mean that Sony has them up and running -- it only means that they're testing the water in terms of what UK members are willing to pay for certain features. But you can just add this to the growing mountain of evidence that Sony is planning some sort of premium subscription service. [Thanks Marc and everyone who sent this in!]
Egg-man will teach you about PSN security
Sony Computer Entertainment Europe has just launched a new website catered to parents looking for tips and tutorials on safe gaming for younger players. PS-PlaySafeOnline.com includes explanations of the PS3's parental control settings function, security features for registered PSN Online IDs, and advice on what to do when faced with online jerks. The entire site is wrapped around a strange (and way too cheery) Egg-man character, who seems to waver been non-threatening and subversively creepy. Our only real gripe? There is no glossary term for PlayStation Home's "Quincying" phenomenon. Everyone must be warned.
Euro retailers point to Feb. 26 release for Heavy Rain
European retailers have updated their pages for Heavy Rain, predicting the game will fall on European store shelves on February 26. For those of you keeping score at home, Famitsu said the game is releasing to Japan in February as well, lending some credibility to the proposed February 26 release in Europe. We contacted SCEE -- who gave us the cold shoulder -- but we also sent word to SCEA, who said: "We haven't announced a release date for North America ... but stay tuned as we will have a release date soon." Source - GAME Source - Gamestation Source - Play.com
Europe gets more incentive to purchase PSP Go with new bundle
Alright, Europe. We're not sure what you did to get into Sony's good graces, but we wish you'd share that information with your pals in the States. Not only do you guys have access to the PSP Go incentive program, which grants owners of UMDs three free game downloads through March 31, but Sony Europe just went ahead and threw another complimentary game on the pile. Anyone living in Europe who owns a PSP Go is eligible to receive a free copy of Gran Turismo, MotorStorm: Arctic Edge or Assassin's Creed: Bloodlines (or, in Germany, LittleBigPlanet) until January 10. For more details on the promotion, visit Sony Europe's official site. We've contacted Sony America to find out if we'll be getting a similar offer stateside.
PSPgo dips to £149 in the UK, have cooler heads prevailed?
While we might think of the $250 PSPgo pricetag in the States as a criminal act on the part of an out-of-touch and-yet-malicious multinational corporation, we can only imagine how our unfortunate counterparts in the UK felt, staring down a £225 list price (about $371 US). Luckily, that quickly dropped to £200 after a week of sales, and now the console can be had for as low as £149 at UK entertainment retailer HMV. That converts rather tidily to $245 US, which is unfortunately about as far as the console has been discounted around these parts. There's no way to tell how many more months of dour faces and crossed arms pointed in the general direction of Sony Computer Entertainment America it'll take to get that price down to something more realistic Stateside, at which point we can start this whole UK / US price disparity drama all over again.
PSP Go isn't cannablizing PSP sales, House says
For those of you out there on your third or fourth sleepless night, unable to catch some Zs for worry that Sony is losing money on its physical-media PSP models to the PSP Go, it's time to rest easy. Sony Europe head Andrew House recently told GamesIndustry.biz that digitally distributed titles are "additive to the business." Better yet, newer PSPs aren't eating older ones. "I don't think there's been a huge amount of cannibalization." Okay, okay, he's talking about PSP Go sales proverbially "eating up" PSP-3000 sales.He even goes as far as to state that "those sales [PSP Go sales] have come in and lifted overall PSP sales" – something we've heard stated before by execs at Sony Europe. We're not exactly sure what the strategy is behind using your new $250 PSP to sell your old (and arguably more feature-rich) PSP-3000, but we're still hopeful that Sony sees a long-term plan where we see a really expensive, download-only handheld.
Sony replaces faulty Assassin's Creed: Bloodlines download
"Yes, there was an issue with the original download," a Sony Europe spokesperson has told Eurogamer. Said issue, which rendered PAL digital copies of Assassin's Creed: Bloodlines dead on arrival, was rectified by replacing the PSP file on the European PlayStation store -- though this came at a cost to those who had already been greeted by the defective copy's never-ending loading screen. According to the spokesperson, "It was pulled from the store and we are issuing replacement codes for those people who purchased the content before 12PM GMT on November 20." Developed by Griptonite Games, Bloodlines follows the protagonist of 2007's Assassin's Creed, complete with 3D free-running and an Altair native control scheme.
WipEout HD in-game ads return, still affect load times
Fans of Sony's blistering anti-grav racer WipEout HD will no doubt recall the game's update to version 2.0 back in August. That's because one of the additions came in the form of advertisements that would play during race loading screens. Having to see ads in a game you've paid full price for is one thing, the fact that they nearly doubled load times is another. Thankfully, Sony responded to an outpouring of ire over the ads by yanking them. Well, as we were warned last month, they're back. The 2.10 update for WipEout HD boldly proclaims that "Changes have been made so that any adverts shown during loading screens will not adversely affect the loading times" upon first launch. OK, ads are back, but at least they don't increase load times -- right? Not so fast. When loading a particular race, we perceived some degree of delay while the ad (in this case for Fat Princess) played. Wanting to make sure it wan't just in our ads-in-our-games-can-leave-now-please heads, we timed it. Lo and behold, the same course loads in 16.9 seconds without the ad and 21.7 with it -- an almost five second difference. The results were more or less the same for every track we tried, with smaller venues loading faster, naturally. So, despite assurances otherwise, load times are being affected by the re-instated ads. We're working to get in touch with Sony and the game's developer, SCEE Studio Liverpool, to find out exactly what gives. [Thanks, Ken!]
VidZone expanding to 11 more European countries
Europe's totally awesome (and totally exclusive) VidZone service is finally expanding its reach. Sorry Americans, but this free music video streaming service isn't coming our way. Instead, eleven new European countries will be able to join the party by year's end. Here's the roll-out schedule: Thursday 26th November: Netherlands, Portugal, Austria Thursday 3rd December: Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland Thursday 10th December: Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland, New Zealand According to PlayStation.Blog, new users will have to wait upwards of 15 minutes when initially launching the service. Why? Apparently, there's so just that much content to load when the application is launched for the first time. Each subsequent visit will only take seconds -- good, because we're confident you'll be coming back for more.
Rumor: Sony leaks screens of next PS3 firmware, Facebook integration
Click to enlarge Earlier today, website Scrawl stumbled upon what appears to be an unintentional first glimpse at a major PS3 firmware update. The somewhat tiny images Scrawl found buried, yet publicly accessible on Sony Computer Entertainment Europe's website, seem to hint at native Facebook integration on the console, along with the ability to change "gamer card" colors (as if the current friends list wasn't obnoxious enough) and view thumbnails of photos in a grid layout.The images are still up as of this posting, but we'd imagine Sony will be pulling them before too long -- legit or not. After all, these could simply be mock-ups of design ideas meant for internal eyes only, just ... bungled. The one element that isn't design-related, the Facebook settings subsection of User Accounts, has us thinking there's a higher than average chance these aren't simple mock-ups, but rather the result on a Sony slip-up. We contacted SCEE regarding the images and were told by a spokesperson that the company "doesn't comment on rumor or speculation."[Thanks Alex!]
Everyone agrees: new IP needed for industry 'to survive'
What do Sony's Michael Denny, Square Enix's Yoichi Wada, and Codemasters' Rod Cousens have in common? Okay, they're all middle-aged men that happen to work in the video games industry -- but they also share a common belief in pursuing original IP. "For me the answer is clear, simply, we must support new IP creation to survive as an industry. Consumers crave new things. If we want to stay relevant in an increasingly competitive marketplace, we have to continue to produce new experiences," Denny told GI.biz. Certainly, SCEE has been pushing a lot of new IPs this generation, with Denny overseeing games like Heavy Rain and EyePet. Wada agrees with Denny's sentiment, noting that "as an entertainment company the business won't be viable if we don't continue to nurture new IPs." This may be ironic coming from a company that's releasing a game called Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles: The Crystal Bearers this holiday, and both Final Fantasy XIII and Final Fantasy XIV next year, but we can credit them for making The World Ends With You, right? Cousens goes a step further, saying innovation has always been at the heart of the industry. "From day one since we walked in the door we've always tried to be experimental, to be innovative, to take things into new areas and to make it interesting." Obviously, the reason why publishers need to invest in new IPs is clear -- let's not forget that games like Madden used to be an original IP at one point. Source - Sony: Industry needs new IP to survive Source - Wada: Business 'not viable' without new IP Source - Cousens: Industry must pursue new IP
