Lowyat.NET: Latest topics by eleshoe

Game Console Fair 2010

eleshoe — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 12:06:53 +0800

Game Console Fair @ Digital Mall

p/s: i didn't see anyone post this (or there is)

Household download index

eleshoe — Wed, 26 May 2010 12:47:26 +0800

Let's check how our country is doing compare to other countries in the world.

All countries

Malaysia

Blu-ray vs DVD

eleshoe — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 13:37:29 +0800

» Click to show Spoiler - click again to hide... «

Source

PS3 portable

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 07:30:00 +0800

PS3 portable

eleshoe — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 11:22:34 +0800

The latest project from a modder named Techknott, boasts some pretty impressive capabilities. Basically, the handheld sends control signals to a PS3, which transmits video signals back to the device.
According to the modder’s post the device will soon be available for purchase.

[YOUTUBE]MHA7EqaVbk4[/YOUTUBE]

Source

If moderator think i should not create a new topic, just move it to wherever suitable.

Analysis of PS3 and Xbox 360 in depth

eleshoe — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 09:10:21 +0800

Ok guys, no intention to start any flames here, just to share something i saw on the net on the analysis of PS3 and Xbox360.

Round 1: Controller
[YOUTUBE]fARdxkovMhQ[/YOUTUBE]

Rounds 2 & 3: Hardware
[YOUTUBE]m_gGAHYBKT4[/YOUTUBE]

Round 4: CPU
[YOUTUBE]zmHY_VnuDdE[/YOUTUBE]

Round 5: GPU
[YOUTUBE]dEXro9yZpZs[/YOUTUBE]

Round 6: User Interface

Round 7: Online Experience

Round 8: Media playback

Round 9: Multi-Platform Games

Round 10: Exclusive Games (Part 1)
[YOUTUBE]5-ezdt8dj4Q[/YOUTUBE]

Round 10: Exclusive Games (Part 2)
[YOUTUBE]P5l4JNYnLgI[/YOUTUBE]

Round 11: The Future

Round 12: The Finale

Source

PS3 Fan's Shouts of Bias

eleshoe — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 10:56:24 +0800

A good article to read.

» Click to show Spoiler - click again to hide... «

Wow! This generation of gaming has seen the harshest and most heated console war ever. The words “fanboy” and “bias” have been over used strenuously by both gamers and the media. Fans of the PS3 shout the word “bias” more than anyone else. However, I usually can find myself agreeing with the majority of their logic. I feel that sometimes these levelheaded PS3 fans get lumped in with all the fanboys in the comment section. I honestly don’t know how they can be called fanboys when they defend what they say with evidence as to what they believe, why they believe. And you know what else I’ve discovered? I too am a PS3 fan, because I’m also sickened of the media’s double standards and oversights, though they are subliminal. I will try to make some of you see things from the PS3 fans’ perspectives. Read more for the full article.

I would like to touch on why PS3 gamers call some websites “biased”, so I’ll start with IGN first. IGN recently scored Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 on PS3 (8.4), lower than the XBOX 360 version, Ninja Gaiden 2 (8.7). Now I know many of you will say that games have progressed since the release of Ninja Gaiden 2 and you are correct, games should be judged against the progress that has been made in the market. However, when the situations were parallel like they were with Virtua Fighter 5, the PS3 version of VF5 (8.8) scored lower than its 360 counterpart, Virtua Fighter 5 (9.0) which included online. Also, to prove even more how the situations are parallel, both Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 and VF5 with online were released after their previous versions on the opposing console and both had graphical tweaks and added online elements. However, if you read both reviews, the 360 review of VF5 mentions all the graphical improvements made to the game over the previous PS3 version; things like improved lighting, clean lines (better anti-aliasing), better environmental effects, and better gameplay tweaking. Now look at the PS3 review of Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2, they hardly allude to any of the benefits the PS3 version holds over the 360 version; things like: increased resolution to native 720p, improved lighting, and better texture detail. So again, this raises red flags amongst some PS3 fans when you mention graphical improvements in a 360 review of a re-release and don’t do the same for PS3 re-release of a game. Also, how do you explain the scoring differences, though minor in both cases? I mean are not both of these games situations parallel? Yet, VF5 with online on 360 scored higher than the PS3 version of Virtua Fighter 5. Now when the situation is parallel for the PS3 then the rules change and Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 scores lower than the previous 360 release of Ninja Gaiden 2, despite being a clearly superior game. I’m not saying IGN was wrong; I’m just pointing out the double standard here folks. IGN needs to be clear across the board with gamers going over the site now with a fine toothed comb in this heated console war.

Reason for Being Considered Bias: Scoring Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 on PS3 lower then Ninja Gaiden 2 on XBOX 360 despite it being a superior experience and then in a parallel situation they scored Virtua Fighter 5 with online on 360 higher than VF5 on PS3 when it was a superior experience. So IGN don’t be IGNorant and get your review discrepancies ironed out.

Next, I want to look at another site that has been called biased against the PS3 and that was GamesRadar. The months leading up to the release of Killzone 2, GamesRadar was running lots of negative or cynical pieces about Killzone 2 and many of the fans on NeoGAF were ripping on their articles and calling them biased. So one of GamesRadar’s editors asked the forum members why they were ripping on their articles and one of them took the bait, Private Hoffman. Private Hoffman showed in great detail as to why forum members considered GamesRadar biased. To be honest, their coverage of Killzone 2 was atrocious at best and reeked of cynicism. I definitely could see how Sony fans could start to think that GamesRadar was biased. GamesRadar’s coverage of Microsoft’s games, Gears of War 2 and Halo 3, was fairly positive and helped show those games in a good light; however, this was in stark contrast to their coverage of Killzone 2. Here is the link to the conversation.

Reason for Being Considered Bias: Lopsided and atrocious coverage of Killzone 2, in comparison to rival shooters on Microsoft’s platform.

The last gaming site I would like to mention that many PS3 fans feel are biased is GameTrailers. The site had a blunder when they did their video comparison of GRID. GameTrailers accidentally submitted the PS3 footage twice in their comparison video. Now, while this is funny, things got sketchy when the PS3 footage that was labeled on the 360 side of the head to head comparison had better crash scenes, as if someone purposely chose better crash scenes with the intent of having them showcase the 360 version in a better light. Also, another thing that led to PS3 fans growing weary of GameTrailers’ head to head videos was the fact that they never turned on the PS3’s Full Range HDMI settings which was known to improve contrast in the images. Once they enabled Full Range on the PS3, it eliminated the washed out look that many gamers believed to be inherent of the PS3 itself. Also, another thing that made PS3 gamers feel like GameTrailers’ was biased is when a video editor name D-Block went on a rant about how the 360 is better than the PS3. The thing is, all the stuff he was saying was subjective and juvenile at best.

Reason for Being Considered Bias: Botched up video comparison where they put the PS3 version of GRID running side by side; however, somehow the side that was mistakenly labeled XBOX 360 still had better crash scenes. How is that possible if both are from the same game? Then another thing that killed their credibility with PS3 fans was letting D-Block spout off at the mouth about his love for Microsoft. You know what’s even funnier? Where is this guy’s love for the PS3 now? Because their exclusive content this year has vastly outstripped Microsoft’s exclusive offerings this year. Where are you at D-Block?

Also, just to gloss over a couple more reasons why PS3 fans feels gaming journalism is somewhat biased towards PS3 is because reviews don’t add up sometimes from sites like EDGE, who have also been considered bias by PS3 fans. The reason that they are always called into question by PS3 fans is because their review scores for high profile PS3 games like Killzone 2 (7/10) and MGS 4 (8/10) both garnered scores lower than similar games on the 360 like Halo 3 ( 10/10) and Gears of War 2 (9/10). While I’m not questioning their review methods because everyone is different, I feel like a review is more than any person’s opinion. It should be an objective analysis by one or more people. When you review a game, you take on a certain responsibility to the gamer. So even if, say a game may not be your style, but you can tell that it’s still has the production essentials (intended example: good graphics, great control, great story, good multiplayer, etc…) to get a high review score, then you should set your preference aside and acknowledge what the game does well. Reviewers need to take their own opinions more serious because their reviews have an effect on the perception of a game to the masses, and if it is bad, well it could be detrimental to the developer, who may lose their job if the game doesn’t score well. That is why I feel that it is a reviewer’s responsibly to balance out his opinion, while still maintaining an objective viewpoint. I feel at some point you have to acknowledge what’s in the package as well because developers still put in time to polish all those modes. In the case of Killzone 2 and MGS 4, their production values were at the very least equal to those of Halo 3 and Gears of War 2.

Well, I hope I have illuminated some of the reasons why PS3 fans are the one’s shouting “bias” most of the time. I mean how can they not, with such double standards and oversights going around? I gladly support the death of these discrepancies in the media and to be honest, these discrepancies are why I started writing in the first place. One thing is for certain, the media needs to straighten up its act. These discrepancies in the media almost always end up with the PS3 gamer on the short end of the stick. I’ll challenge the internet to find me an article where a major publication is being biased against the 360 where the double standard is apparent.

Source

PSP Go

eleshoe — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 12:52:08 +0800

PSP Go is coming, at least we know it is coming to our neighbour, anyone planning to get one?

[YOUTUBE]qbcSDEDXtH8[/YOUTUBE]

New gaming console

eleshoe — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 10:37:39 +0800

Startup company MechaWorks has been developing a new gaming console in stealth mode over the past two years. Code-named Full Circle, the console is being introduced at GDC to give developers a first look at the platform.

Taking a new approach to gaming consoles, the platform eschews both streaming and subscription-based platforms, in favor of a more traditional approach to cloud-based console gaming. Full Circle combines revolutionary software for Mac and PC, with what the company touts as the most powerful hardware console built to-date. For the first time, cutting-edge games will be able to be played across Mac and PC, as well as the Full Circle Console.

"You'll be able to buy a game once, and play it anywhere." said Christopher Price, MechaWorks CEO. "Streaming is unreliable and unattractive to most consumers. People want to take their games on the go, with their notebook, and simply sync back to their console when they get home."

Full Circle takes advantage of modern PC architecture to deliver a consistent gaming experience, and single build targets, across Mac, PC, and HDTV. System Rating technology allows gamers to finally bypass the myriad of complex system requirements. Each computer is assigned a simple low-end, mid-range, or high-end rating. Developers can then maximize discreet, baseline specifications for each target audience.

Instead of running inside the operating system, Full Circle intelligently removes Windows and Mac OS X from memory, allowing games to run with maximum performance. The operating environment will be fully open-sourced.

"Game developers will be able to finally not have to buffer PC games with all the performance limitations that they encounter on the average, mis-managed PC. We bypass Windows completely, and then bring the gamer right back to what they were doing when done gaming. That's not entirely new, Chrome OS is taking a similar tact, but we're going to make it painless for an ordinary user to install, and get up and running."

WIth support for up to three HDTVs simultaneously, the Full Circle Console will extend games even further, with the first mainstream support for multiple HDTVs in a console. Combined with optional Blu-Ray support, Full Circle Console will enable users to combine games, widgets, and HD movies on multiple screens.

MechaWorks is combining the introduction of Full Circle, with the announcement of a Crowdsourcing initiative. The company will be offering rewards for those willing to tackle projects on various open-source tasks. Full Circle will be one Crowdsourcing project, but the company also hopes to give back to the open-source community, by rewarding various open-source projects with results-oriented improvements.

Source

Sega Announces Dreamcast 2

eleshoe — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 13:26:18 +0800

Confirming years of rampant speculation, Sega today announced the next-generation Dreamcast2 entertainment console for worldwide release in Q1 2010. This marks Sega's first return to hardware manufacture since the original Dreamcast was discontinued in March 2001.

Source

10 years ago today, 9.9.99

eleshoe — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 12:53:16 +0800

Top 10 Dreamcast games

Do you want something like this with your console?

eleshoe — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 14:36:41 +0800

A Louisiana man is getting closer to creating what lazy gamers everywhere have been dreaming of for a long time – an accessory that will change game discs for you, called “X-Changer”.

According to the press release:

‘The X-Changer will be easy to utilize and cost-effective to purchase as an add-on accessory. It will save users both the time and hassle involved in changing games on a constant basis. With its wide array of obviously redeeming qualities, the X-Changer should easily recommend itself to consumers through outlets and catalogues selling video game accessories.’

James R., the man behind the not-so-original concept, is currently shipping the idea around manufacturers and is hoping to have the product hit the market in ‘the very near future’.

People buy them for their car stereos, but would you actually do it for your games console? The changing of discs is the most exercise some of us get at the weekends…

Source

Future console?

eleshoe — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 17:48:06 +0800

Australia-based designer Tai Chiem's bugged-out next-gen gaming systems take it to the next level. Above, his X-Box 720; below, a Playstation 4 with a glass touchscreen panel, and bottom, the coup de grace--a PSP with a flexible, roll-out OLED screen.

Source: http://www.core77.com/blog/object_culture/...uture_14555.asp

Xbox360 Holding Back Playstation 3 Development May

eleshoe — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 15:57:26 +0800

» Click to show Spoiler - click again to hide... «

For sometime now fanboys, true gamers, game developers, often made claims about the Xbox360 capabilities and, also the bad ports that the Playstation 3 was recieving. Along with all of those factors just mentioned looking at the quality of Playstation 3 exclusive titles as opposed to the mult-platform comparisons, it’s kinda hard to understand how Sony’s platform never really outshine it’s Xbox360 rival although there’s more horsepower. People believe that the Xbox360 at times held back game quality from what the Playstation 3 can produce considering Microsofts lack of hard drive in every system as well as incorporating the DVD format instead of the Hi-Def standard blu-ray.

Game after game Xbox360 continued to show and prove not just from a multi-platform stand point but an exclusive standpoint with games like Gears Of War 2, Mass Effect, but even still looking at the quality of games like Killzone 2, and Uncharted 2 it’s still relevant to see that Sony’s machine has the edge in graphic fidelity. The Xbox360 so called holding back Playstation 3 may have some serious truth behind it now considering Microsoft has a new game development policy in terms of game quality and that’s the HD Standard which has now been compromised to the point where we may not always get the proper bang for our buck. The game quality at certain resolutions on the Xbox360 will drop so instead they use a less than Hi- Definition resolution to get better anti-aliasing for a smoother looking game. This is good if it makes the game run better but then again what will happen to the Playstation 3 versions of games that go this route for the sake of Xbox360 development. Will Sony have to suffer low resolution quality because of the Xbox360 or should we still receive a better version of the game on Playstation 3 since Sony doesn’t have that problem or require game devs to do this process.

Final Fantasy 13 was recently shown and people were disappointed to see the latest screenshots considering the drop in quality. The final game hasn’t released so this is probably jumping the gun but yet a situation like this has never came about until after the announcement of a Xbox360 version which may also ship on 4 DVD discs.

This Quote Comes From David Jefferies of Black Rock Studios

“By asserting that screen resolution is more important than anti-aliasing we’re leaving ourselves vulnerable when the customer’s LCD decides it’s going to rescale the image to a new resolution anyway,” said Jefferies. “If we instead assume that the LCD is going to rescale then, for some games, it might be more sensible to present it with a better anti-aliased but lower resolution image in the first place.”

This has been an ongoing argument in the game industry amongst various journalist, fanboys, and more. Microsoft issuing this statement on their platform shows that their must be some sore of limitations with their hardware and this may cause a major problem why? considering the Playstation 3 is 3 years in to their 10 year life cycle and games are getting better and better with higher quality and more 1080p titles as well, may give some developers a change of heart. The Playstation 3 is moving into striking position with that price and system value, along with the games library, and growing install base if this situation becomes big and significant Microsoft may see some serious trouble along the way and possibly miss out on games simply because of their hardware limitaions.

Question for the gamers – What are your thoughts with Microsoft advertising a HD Console but then turn around and request developers not to deliver what’s being promoted? Before you answer that question look at this footage below ok ” Splinter Cell comes out next year and it looks amazing, Uncharted 2 comes out this year and it also looks amazing, but when you compare the two only comes out victorious you chose”

Source: http://www.hiphopgamershow.com/2009/09/xbo...true-after-all/

Which Offers a Better Online Experience?

eleshoe — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 11:08:29 +0800

» Click to show Spoiler - click again to hide... «

Kingdom Under Fire II (PS3)

eleshoe — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 21:12:09 +0800

Video:
http://www.gametrailers.com/player/55224.html

This game looks awesome and massive!

This is a cool deal, don't you think so?

eleshoe — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 22:43:20 +0800

This is the "Ultimate Blu-Ray Movie Kit", a special PS3 bundle that's being offered at a major Australian retailer. It's got absolutely nothing to do with games, but still, it's an interesting retail proposition.

There are two of them available, both of which bundle two Blu-Ray movies along with a PS3 remote control. One offers you 300 & Batman Begins, the other offers 300 & 10,000 BC.

The interesting part comes in the retail price; both are sold for AUD$60 (USD$50), even though the remote retails for AUD$50 on its own and both Blu-Rays would set you back at least AUD$30 each.

So if you like any of the three movies on offer, and are without one of the excellent PS3 remotes (and are...in Australia), it's a pretty good deal.

Source: http://kotaku.com/5347355/the-ps3-ultimate-blu+ray-movie-kit

Why there is no PS2 emulator in FW3.0 for PS3

eleshoe — Sat, 22 Aug 2009 13:57:32 +0800

» Click to show Spoiler - click again to hide... «

1. Most of the games need patching to make them run properly on PS3 hardware (bear in mind PS3 has no embedded EDRAM like PS2 did). Sony devs are saying it is not an easy task to make these patches. It is also quite easy to exploit these patches to run backed up PS2 games, so that is an issue they are working with.

2. PS2 is still selling good. Third party developers who are still releasing games on PS2 know that their games will sell better if PS2 is a separate console, as most people with a PS3 are going to primarily focus on buying PS3 games, which has a lot more games being released and therefore much more competition (even from the same publisher).

3. How to put games on PSN - Many PS2 games are discontinued right now, and it isn't easy for Sony to get copies of some games. Some games only have master copies available, which do not play on retail units and are not able to have the iso ripped from them. So, a retail disc must be re-authored in those cases. This is easier said than done, as many PS2 disc manufacturing systems have been taken down to make way for PS3 Blu-Ray manufacturing systems.

4. Memory card utility - Sony is not interested in producing many of them due to high cost of PS1/PS2 memory card slot. Apparently it's a low profit hassle that also (for the reasons listed in reason number 2) slows down the sales of third party PS2 games.

Also, one of our long time staff members who also happens to be a game developer (we call him cpiasminc) gave us a little more insight into why it is so difficult to emulate PS2 games:

"I have my doubts as to whether it can ever really happen per se. This is a case where technical hurdles are every bit as large as the financial hurdles.

I mean, that eDRAM framebuffer and texture cache allowed you to have not only extremely high bandwidth, but also extremely low latency, and in turn meant that one render pass was extremely fast. Many times more so than any chip made today where the focus of the architecture is towards doing more work per pixel in a single pass (but in turn making the drawing of a single pixel many times slower and more complicated than it was on the GS). There is quite simply more framebuffer and texture bandwidth on the PS2 than the PS3 has. And even the eDRAM of something like Xenos doesn't really help here because the latency is higher and it's explicitly a transient state holding buffer, rather than a final output field. GS not only allowed you to work in eDRAM, but that was the main VRAM itself... it stored the front and back buffer as well as working textures in there. On current chips, the backbuffer and frontbuffer have to go through a resolve step and are always stored in main VRAM. All these sorts of things are exploited rather explicitly in the vast majority of PS2 games.

Even aside from the peculiarities of the GS, there are peculiarities of the interaction between the EE and GS. For instance, it's quite common to have the render loop be in a race condition against the GPU. We'll issue a display list to the GS which tells it to start processing from a vertex list... except that vertex list hasn't been filled at this point. Instead, the VU will go through the equivalent of a vertex shader and actually fill vertex data into that list while the GS is reading the stream. The timing is just so that the VU stays constantly a few clock cycles ahead of the GS. That kind of tight timing resolution and synchronicity is 100% impossible on all current architectures because there is just not that kind of relationship between the components, nor is there quite so much constant predictability to the operating performance of any component (i.e. nothing ever *always* takes up x # of cycles anymore). Also, synchronization primitives for modern bus architectures are actually very strict, so some of these types of things which were perfectly valid on a PS2 would actually not work at all because the bus would detect that a memory page is dirty and therefore wait for a cache write from the CPU before it does anything. This is of course done because it makes for a machine that is infinitely more stable, but that wasn't really the case for the PS2 which was more of a pure console. This sort of restriction means codependent read-write operations must wait for the CPU to finish -- a delay of many hundreds of thousands of clock cycles, while the PS2 only had to wait about 5 or 6 clock cycles."

So, all in all it just does not make much business sense for Sony to bother with PS2 backwards compatibility yet. They are focusing on making PS3 better right now anyway, trying to get things like cross game voice chat worked out and such. When they finally discontinue the PS2, we might see backwards compatibility included for PS3 then (though probably on a limited per-game basis). Until then, PS2 is still selling.

Source: http://psinsider.e-mpire.com/index.php?cat..._articleid=1315

Wireless router

eleshoe — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 09:48:13 +0800

Hi, i have a question about wireless router, and i hope this is the right place to ask.

I have a DLink-2540T router modem which has no wireless capability, and now i want to have wireless access, so i would like to seek some advise and suggesstions on what wireless router to buy which has good compatibility with this router, or can i just buy an access point and hook up with this router?

Please advise.

Thanks.