Remember all the furore back in August, when Microsoft announced they’d locked up Netflix movie streaming for the Xbox 360 and basically told us it was an “exclusive” partnership? Well, that exclusivity seems to have been short-lived; Sony have announced that from November Netflix subscribers will be able to stream content on their PS3.
I’d love to have been a fly on the wall at Sony Australia when they came up with this one. ”Guys, it’s a worldwide recession, we need a promotion to keep people buying the PS3 and BRAVIA HDTVs. I know some of you want to run a competition and give the darned things away, but I think we’d be far better off firing one against the other and sticking it up on YouTube.” Hence how we end up with a video of a PS3 being launched at 22 meters per second toward a poor, defenceless flat-panel TV.
We have been enjoying the new cheaper PS3 Slim in the US and other countries for a while now. In fact we are already looking forward to the 250GB PS3 Slim coming stateside next month. In Malaysia, gamers have not been able to get their hands on the PS3 Slim yet. Sony announced today that the PS3 Slim would hit the Malaysian market on October 31.
It’s not just the Japanese getting some 250GB PlayStation3 love; Sony US have announced that there’s a 250GB version of the PS3 Slim incoming for their gamers too. The 250GB PS3 Slim will land on November 3rd, and be functionally identical to its existing 120GB sibling; unlike in Japan, there’ll be no bundled games or unusual color editions.
Sony have come clean with some more details regarding its upcoming Motion Controller, while Joystiq managed to snap a shot of the movement-tracking peripheral at the company’s Tokyo Game Show keynote. According to Sony, the controller – which may well be renamed before launch next year – should meet the “stringent” demands of hardcore gamers, thanks to its combination of two motion sensors, three axes gyroscope and three axes accelerometer.
Sony’s PS3 Slim may have only been on sale for three weeks – the compact console arrived on September 1st – but they’ve already shifted one million units worldwide. The PS3 Slim simultaneously hit shelves in North America, Europe, Asia and Japan for $299, €299 or 29,980 yen respectively, complete with a 120GB hard-drive and Full HD 1080p support. To celebrate – or perhaps just as a nice coincidence – Sony Japan have announced a 250GB PS3 Slim bundle, with a “ceramic white” console and Final Fantasy XIII Lightning Edition.
Sony may have denied the existence of any imminent 250GB PS3 Slim bundles, but obviously nobody told retailer GameStop in Norway. According to an apparent leak from their inventory system, several 250GB SKUs – bundling titles like Need for Speed: Shift, FIFA 10, Uncharted 2 and Assassin’s Creed 2 – are incoming to the store.
Netflix CEO Reed Hastings has confirmed that the company does not see its movie streaming service as remaining exclusively locked to Microsoft’s Xbox 360 console, and that one day they envisage access from every games console, Blu-ray player and internet-connected TV. Speaking to Reuters this week, Hastings also suggested that an iPhone Netflix service was “likely to come over time”, though the company’s focus is not yet on mobile.
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Nintendo regularly quash Wii HD rumors, but they keep on coming back. Latest to reignite the speculation is none other than Square Enix chief Yoichi Wada, who has stuck his neck out and suggested 2011 as the launch window for the reworked console. Wada tips the new Wii HD as having many of the features as the Xbox 360 and PS3, to which we're assuming he's referring to media-centric functionality.
Spawn Labs have announced their HD-720 remote gaming adapter, and from the sound of it they’re trying to do to console games what Slingbox did for TV. The HD-720 hooks up to your console – both Xbox 360 and PS3 are natively supported, with adapters for other versions – and then streams gameplay over WiFi to your PC. While that might not seem much use if you’re at home, it does mean you can keep up with your favorite game while on the road without having to lug your console along with you.
Video overview after the cut
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