The problem, it would seem, is that people who develop for the PS3 are too interested in "getting the most out of the technology" (which, ironically, they fail miserably at) to make good games. They seem to overlook the fact that, at the end of the day, somebody is going to have to play the thing. At the end of the day it really doesn't matter quite so much how good your graphics are if your gameplay is awful.

It's interesting to see how some of these games are coming out. For instance, I just finished the Uncharted: Drake's Fortune demo. I can't say I'm that impressed. Halo 3 looked better. Gears of War looked better. Heck, Tomb Raider looked better. Everything is far too shiny, the controls are derivative, the storyline, at least from what the demo seems to be showing, is weak. I had originally intended to purchase this, but after this demo, I'm having second thoughts about that pre-order.

Haze seems like the most derivative game ever. Even if they hadn't "revealed" that the main character would switch sides, you could probably guess it anyway. Let's face it, when the "plot twist" comes, you're probably thinking, "Wow. That's ... predicable." The graphics, at least from the videos that I have witnessed, seem about on par with Call of Duty 4. The storyline is derivative, the whole NECTAR thing is gimmicky, and I honestly can't even say that the "awesome graphics" isn't strictly ho-hum. If dude-raider is a maybe-cancel, Haze is looking more and more like a must-cancel.

Killzone 2 is looking more like Lair every day. Remember how Lair was hyped? It was the graphics that hooked us, it was the graphics that we were hyperventilating about, and because of that we completely ignored the fact that the controls sucked, the storyline was complete garbage, and the whole game just didn't cut it as entertainment. Killzone 2 is now being hyped because of its graphics, which do appear to be quite good. But what about the rest of it? Can it match the dark, disturbing gameplay of Half-Life? Can it match the epic battles of Halo 3? Or how about the dangerous, gritty claustrophobic combat of Call of Duty 4? I doubt it.

LittleBigPlanet tries to be the next Katamari Damacy. It isn't. It doesn't have Katamari's charm, or subtle humor. It's just beanie bag creatures running about, putting stickers on felt trees. If you like enviromental puzzles why not play Mario? It's better, and it has a good pedigree. Or Metroid, or Zelda ... heck just go buy a Wii. The problem with making "unique" games like this is that attempts to make them unique ends up cannibalizing the important parts of the game, like say gameplay. Gameplay's important right?

Final Fantasy XIII is going to suck. Everyone knows it. The truth of the matter is that Final Fantasy hasn't been good since X. Some would even say VIII. Final Fantasy XII was a joke and everyone knew it, they just didn't dare say anything bad about that sacred cow. The lack of random encounters, the lack of any romance subline which had been a part of every Final Fantasy before it, and the fact that the game completely removed the concept of classes and allowing a tiny girl character to be a melee specialist, is just absolutely lucdicrous to the extreme. They'll probably do the same thing in XIII, not to mention the fact that their graphics, at least from the videos, seem about on par with XII. Come on guys, FF XII was a PS2 game. You can do better than that.

Metal Gear Solid 4 seems to be a solid game (pardon the pun). The graphics are decent, and MGS has always been a good series. But it got delayed to next year. How many times has a delay ever benefitted a game? I really think they should've released it on-time, because I highly doubt this delay will help them at all. Timeshift got delayed so many times it's ridiculous. Well it bombed hard, and it'll be lucky to recoup the money it took to make the game. This delay for MGS4 doesn't bode well for the game. Not well at all.

It's interesting to note that the Playstation 3 doesn't have any truly great games in its library. Resistance is one of the most ho-hum shooters ever made, Warhawk has no single player, and if Heavenly Sword had been any shorter it would've been a movie. And I won't even mention Lair. If Baysian logic is to be followed, based on prior behaviour, it would seem that the PS3 won't ever get a single AAA or even AA game, in the near or far future. Most of its games stubbornly refuse to do anything unique or interesting, and those that do try so hard to be unique that they end up cannibalizing other important aspects, like say gameplay or level design.

Before you lemmings start cheering, though, let me just say that while the 360 lineup is better, I am already starting to see cracks in the seams. For instance, the turbo-hyped Mass Effect is looking more and more like KOTOR-for-the-modern-age. It may or may not have a good storyline (BioWare is a good company but it just got bought by the devil, e.g. EA Games). But gameplay-wise it doesn't do anything interesting. And that wheel idea seems overly complex. You shouldn't have to go through that many steps to do something as simple as use a biotic power.

Please don't get me wrong, I don't want any game to fail. That's ultimately counterproductive, because if games fail, I won't have anything to play. But sometimes you just have to be realistic, and the truth is that the Playstation 3 may very well go the way of the Dreamcast. Not to worry though; the PS2 looks like it's still going to be selling even when the last PS3 leaves store shelves.

You can't get a PC for $400 though. Can't even get one for $500. At least, not one that's any good. Even if you build your own computer, and salvage as much as you can from your old one, you're still looking at least $600 or so (this is assuming you're building a gaming rig, which if you're on GameSpot forums you probably are). For instance, a motherboard is already $100+. The best PS3 SKU so far is the $500 60GB one if you can find one. It is 100% backwards compatible, comes with everything else the 80GB version comes with, and doesn't come prepackaged with Motorstorm, which may or may not be good for you.

Personally, I'd suggest getting the 60GB one if at all. Otherwise, save up a few hundred more dollars, and pimp out your gaming computer with new processor, GPU, etc :).

Get a PS3. Here's why:

Halo: started on Xbox. Came to the PC.

Halo 2: started on Xbox. Came to the PC.

Fable: started on Xbox. Came to the PC with extra stuff!

Gears of War: started on Xbox 360, just came out on PC, with extra stuff!

KOTOR: started on the Xbox, came to the PC.

Do you see a pattern here? If you wait long enough, Halo 3, Fable 2, and Mass Effect WILL be on the PC. It may take a few years but it will happen. Every game previous in series came to the PC, so it's pretty much a given these will too. Just be patient. Think a few years is too long? Don't worry! You have your PS3 + MGS4. Heck if it's a few years in porting to the PC, you might even get to play MGS5 too...

So recently at my local gamestop the clerk at the counter claimed she was a huge Gears of War fan, and that she played all the time. The conversation went like this.

Clerk: "Oh you're buying Gears of War? 'Bout time. That's an awesome game, you'll totally love it."
Me: "You play Gears?"
Clerk: "Yup! Love it. I play it all the time."
Me: "Interesting. I've been on Halo for a while now, and I just never hear of any female gamers on that game. Either they never talk, or they're just shy, or something, but there doesn't seem to be any ladies on Halo 3..."
Female customer that just walked in: "I play Halo 3 every night. I talk plenty!"
Me: "Really?"

At this point I was really curious. In the space of less than 2 minutes I had met 2 gamer chicks, and yet in the space of a month I had yet to meet a single one on Halo 3. In the space of 2 years, the number of female gamers I had met on Halo 2 could be counted on a single hand. So what's up? Was I just a statistical outlier? Did I just happen to not meet any gamer chicks by sheer coincidence? Pretty big coincidence if they're as prevalent as the two gamer chicks in GameStop would have me believe. (The clerk even said she was the leader of an all female GoW clan. It was the first I ever heard of such a thing!)

Do females actually play these kinds of games? If so where are you? I've been on Gears of War for a while now and still haven't met any other females besides that clerk. Are you in hiding? Just shy? Don't like talking? What's the deal? I guess it could be explained by saying that unlike guys, females stick together more, i.e. gamer chicks usually only hang out with other gamer chicks and don't like to go into battle against guys. Is that true?

Although I really can't blame you ladies for not wanting to play with us guys. I've gotten called every name that the English language has, even some that don't even apply to me like the N-word (I'm Chinese, not even part-black). If it's that bad for me I can only imagine what happens to girls when they go online. Or especially when that girl beats a guy in a game.

I'm puzzled!! While playing the crysis demo i run task manager, and it says my processor is being pushed to 80%, its a pentium 4 with hyper threading (fake dual core) I-like-sticks

Well first, hyper threading doesn't hold a candle to actual dual cores. So, if you want an actual multi-core experience, you'll have to spring money for actual multiple cores.

it has 1mb of cache and runs at 3ghz. Now i woulda thought it was the weakest component in my computer i'm getting about 10fps at all high settings, i have 2gb of ram running at 667mhz and a nvidia geforce 7900gtx. Is my ram letting me down?? I think the demo thinks i have a real dual core if that makes any difference.I-like-sticks

You graphics card is a bit weak ... 7900 isn't the best there is. For DX9, 7950 is about as good as it gets, and you'll want to get an 8800 if you want to see really great graphics.

Look, with your setup, I'm afraid you'll never be able to get the highest graphics settings going, I'm afraid. At low settings, though, you could play Crysis just fine I imagine. Just be aware however that the whole selling point of Crysis is its graphics so there's no point if you can't see them. :( sorry for the bad news.

On the bright side, the newly released nVIDIA GeForce 8800GT is around $250-$300 and is an amazing deal. It has almost the ability of the best card that nVIDIA has, at nearly half the price.