On one hand, I can't think of a single person, publication, and even retail salesperson not discussing GTA IV. To my shock, it was even brought up as a fun fact at a my work, which is for a popular auto web site! Needless to say, there's plenty of clutter on this game and normally I would skip it altogether. At the same time, for the same reason I didn't skip buying it (which I was planning on doing), it would be stupid not to mention it for my loyal readers (which is, basically, me...great). I haven't played enough to even hint at a review, and I feel any user who's writing one that hasn't been home without work or sleep the whole time, should either. And even if you have, you're in no condition to write a review, skip it, come back to it in a week. No one reads more than one user review anyway and a game like this will have people writing reviews about it on an hourly (or more) basis. I will, however, share my initial thoughts after about 2 hours of play.

What I like:

-My number one golden star to this installment is that the city is smaller. I don't know about everyone else, but San Andreas was so much pointless driving and dying just to get back to a local hospital that I gave up on it altogether. I liked the compacted cities in GTA III and Vice City, which were still large but not wastes of space, and there were plenty of those in San Andreas.

-I like the quicker routes in the game, that outline a path via GPS to get you from point a to point b without constantly pausing and looking at the map.

-The cell phone customization and utilization is most likely a plus, but I don't know how this will play out later. It may later be a con. Love the personal ringtones and text messaging!

-The crowd interaction cracks me up. I like how the random pedestrians that are criminals or jerks will come up and pick a fight with you, even if you're standing still! It's more realistic. Got arrested my first time because I stood still and got up to get more water, came back to me standing outside the police station getting hassled again!

-The writing flows, is solid, and keeps my interest. I keep playing on just to learn more about the situations of the characters.

What I didn't like:

-Traffic, both vehicle and pedestrian seems light. I know there's a lot in this game, but I expected more people. It's possible that I haven't been to enough areas yet, so I'll keep my eye open.

-Controls are a little complicated in the beginning. You are given information as you play, but sometimes situations occur before those situations that you could have preferred knowing the controls for. I also hate the endless combinations of controls to do certain things. Probably more used to the Playstation controls as I've never played on Xbox before.

-Game is a little jerky. I must admit, I have no idea how they got the framerate/jerkyness to this point without a 360 install and probably explains why the PS3 runs smoother (although I heard of crashing/freezing issues). Doesn't bother me much, but I still feel like i'm watching something that's 24 fps in 30 fps, with a few frozen frames. Now that we see the world in 1080p, this is more obvious.

Those are my first impressions of the game. One way or the other, the GTA franchise is a huge hit and I've loved and played all of them. I was quite skeptical when I saw the condition of San Andreas that I would skip this one, but now that I purchased it I see that I made the right choice. They seemed to return to the gritty world of GTA III, which for all intents and purposes, is still the best of the previous three in my opinion. I think I'd choose to say, "believe the hype, get this game!"

It's the little people you have to appreciate, and whenever a great video game goes on sale, those little people are us. It doesn't matter if you're a millionare businessman, a lowly teenager, or even a video game website editor, we are all lumped in the same group on the midnight releases of extremely popular games. It's during this moment that video game store managers become the guardians of the gates of our entertainment. I've done my fair share of camping for video games, probably moreso than the average player, so I know what to expect and don't freak out when I see long lines. I also know better than to not have a pre-order ready (although that doesn't mean you don't have to sit in the long line).

I think the key to the overall experience is who manages the store you are going to and how they intend to manage the crowd that appears. Of course, for many obvious reasons, you need to judge the game and audience and adjust appropriately. For example, as a store manager I would probably be more lenient at the midnight release of Mario Galaxy than GTA IV or Halo 3, but again, that's just a personal preference. There's really three different types of managers and how they handle popular games and I'm sure any midnight buyer has seen all three within the last two generations.

1.) The manager that doesn't do a midnight release. Simple. The guy is obviously not very into the job he has or keeping it, as skipping the midnight release of any game that has a large number of presales means that your store won't get the revenue from the midnight release (and it's always all about the midnight release) and will fall behind those that do, you'll suck, yada yada...
Basically, these duchebags ruin the opportunities for local gamers to waste an entire 8 hours (approx) before morning. They don't count as they won't be in business, or employed at that business, long.

2.) The big box manager. These guys are a little more understandable. These managers are usually older, probably more focused on sales and management than they are on playing video games, therefore they lack the passion of the local guy. They don't care that GTA IV is coming out, they won't buy it, and they have no problem blocking people from buying it. Sales of software probably bring in a decent profit, but even if they sell 1,000 units, Best Buy will turn a large enough profit without the launch. Most managers in this category are more annoyed by the fact that they have to be present and deal with avid gamers at midnight, and being an avid gamer that camped out by a Wal-Mart for 2 days for the PS3, I don't blame them. We're hardly a positive reflection of their store. These guys are dicks, don't care what happens to you in line, and pretty much don't want to deal with you. In their defense, I wouldn't want to either.

3.) The local store manager. This includes all your small gamestops as well, since lets face it, those guys have taken over the local video game market. They've got almost as many locations as Starbucks in some cities! These guys are usually cool because they love video games as much as you. They're great at controlling the crowd and they've done this many times before. It's usually the most controlled, quick, and best behaved group of people, which means a lot when you've got a line a block and a half long to purchase a game that's all about robbery and violence.

Last night, the store manager at my local gamestop had an awesome and controlled environment that moved like an army bootcamp. At 11:45 he moved everyone out of the store and to the sidewalk (which was kind because it was freezing out) and lined us up. He made sure everyone was full pre-rung up and he even offered a quicker, shorter line if you wanted to buy a strategy guide (how the hell else is he gonna move those things and when you can jump ahead of 100 people, $18 isn't so bad). He set up the products and set two controlled lines with the best two register people in charge. He then had one guy outside for crowd control (and that guy probably had a cell phone to call the cops in crazy situations) and that guy sent people in 5 at a time, confirming receipts while the others get rung up. I had my game by 12:04 and that manager called me later and successfully moved over 150 presales in less than an hour. He was in bed by 1:30. I tip my hat to him, he knows how to run a store. It's situations like that that make me appreciate the local store manager, without them it'd just be a rough mosh pit outside Best Buy.

If you're heavy into any merchandising industry, you're probably familiar with the day of the week that it releases new products. Whether it's DVDs and video games on tuesdays or comics on wednesdays or even new movies in the theatres on fridays (with the occassional wednesday release and the high profile thursday release), if you're into it you know what day to check for new releases. This is also true now in the digital download world as well. Everyone who's a virtual console fan knows that Mondays are the day to check in! Rock Band has made tuesdays a lot like Christmas (for both good and bad reasons) with its releases. And everyone knows that Wednesdays are for Xbox Live Arcade and Thursdays for Playstation Network/Store. The problem is when release dates get staggered by higher and higher demand for products and shipping delays, that now you don't purchase games off the shelf like you used to in the Nintendo days, you pre-purchase and nearly own the game weeks or even months before it drops.

So what's the big deal with release dates, anyway? Are they more important now because they're scheduled and maintained better? Is demand now just much higher and therefore we care more? I remember back in the days of both the NES and Sega Genesis/SNES, I would see an ad in a gaming mag, want the game, and go to the store and find it there. Nowadays is this happens, you probably find out that you can't find your game because it's sold out. What if you didn't know that Halo 3 was coming out on Tuesday. What if you had to wait for your friday paycheck to purchase Rock Band. Tough, you've missed your chance. it's gotten so bad that at any given time I could have 2-8 games reserved as early as six months in advance. A lot of people say that reservations aren't worth it, but honestly the amount of games printed can often be like the stock market, you never know what's going to happen. I remember the day that Bioshock came out and seeing the store shelves empty. I was worried about getting jumped in the parking lot the day I brought home my Rock Band bundle for the 360 on release day. I even remember getting offered $100 for my brand new sealed copy of Assassin's Creed on the 360. It's crazy! I also remember pre-ordering Halo 3 and COD4, only to see better deals and tons of copies in every major retailer. I got nothing extra for my copy of COD4 from Gamestop, but had I bought it at Circuit City I'd have gotten COD3 and a poster of all the multiplayer maps for FREE! Like I said, it's all a gamble.

And on that note, what is it with playing a game early? On eBay I saw a copy of Halo 3 for sale a week before it was released for over $600. $600! For a week?!? Really?!? Is it really that imperative? And the worst part is the guy who bought it beat it in about 10 hours and turned and complained for the rest of that week that it wasn't worth the money. I know someone who paid $200 to have Army of Two a week early. Hell, if you monitor the forums on Xbox.com, you can see people with 1,000 achievement points for a game not 2 days after it comes out (for many it's only a few hours after release). I knew guys that went to the Monday night launch parties for Halo 3 and had 800 or more achievement points by morning. Isn't this all just burning games out too quickly? Do you feel better that you got it before everyone else? And now that many games have an online multiplayer element, these games aren't much fun to play unless everyone's got the game so that you can have some competition.

I was listening to a gaming podcast the other day and the girl (I'm keeping this anonymous on purpose) on there was complaining about the fact that Gran Tourismo 5 Prologue was on store shelves on Wednesday but that it didn't hit the PS Store until Thursday. She thought it was stupid because a digital download requires a lot less planning and distribution and should have been available, at least, at the same time as the tangible disc. The other two male hosts responded to her by saying, "But everyone knows that the PS Store releases new content on Thursday." She tried to protest this case, but they were stern with simply restating exactly what I was thinking, which is that PS Store updates on Thursday. If Rock Band sold their new songs in disc form and they reached a store shelf on Monday, I would still expect that the download wouldn't be available until Tuesday. This is what I find compelling, it's a big deal when you have to go out to the store and pick up a game at midnight, but we're totally cool with waiting an extra day for the download service to update. Maybe going purely digital downloads would be better, if for no other reason than to make life more consistent and so that we never have to worry about anything selling out.

Thanks to the miracle of the Internet, blogs, and podcasts, anyone can quickly go from being a nobody and become a "citizen journalist". This term really means that someone without the proper training, authority, or money to be a journalist basically takes on the role. The problem these days is that everyone is taking on the role (like all of the many members of gamespot) and blogging, reviewing, and forum posting all day. The only problem is that no one's reading them! I've got this blog, but trust me, it's not for anyone's benefit but my own. No one reads it, except maybe a few friends, and I don't even think THEY read this blog. I spend plenty of time and effort blogging, reviewing, and giving my spin, but no one cares. Its the saturation of content that prevents popularity and prevents the message from getting to an audience.

Probably the biggest reason no one reads my blog is that they probably assume my blog is just like most users' blogs: it just regurgitates information and theories that already exist. If I'm on gamespot.com and blogging, I probably shouldn't be blogging about, for example, news on GTA IV. Where do you think I got that information? Probably from the very web site that hosts my blog! People who regurgitate information in a blog are probably the most useless bloggers on the planet, since they really don't do more than plagiarize. In order to be a good blogger, and remember this will have nothing to do with your audience number, you need to give readers something they can't get elsewhere. News, given all the other places to search for video game news, is probably your worst place to do this. This also is the same for reviews or release dates. Everyone has those, skip them. Try getting to the root of something interesting in the video game community. Take that interest, research it, and expand. A video game journalist would love to do nothing but feature stories, which is what a blog allows you to do. News, reviews, previews, it's all cool to read, but relatively (at least in my opinion) more bland than feature stories. I only write reviews to boost my points on gamespot, because I know there have to be at least 100 other user reviews and that probably NO ONE will ever read it. Additionally, what am I going to say that plenty of others haven't already said? On the other hand, I had a blog on the fun experience of camping outside stores to get a Wii and it was really successful. Why? People can't find that info anywhere else and there's a decent lot of people who have camped out and would read an article like that.

This comes to my next point. Be interesting. Don't overwrite, but don't be too vague either. You want to keep your article short, but sweet, and very entertaining. For bloggers like me, it's my opinion on things that cracks people up and keeps them interested. If you're fun to read, people may even read your version of the same story everyone else has purely because you wrote it (but take care not to do this too often, be original).

I've now decided it's time to start becoming an all in one journalist. I'm reviewing all the new games as they come out, in user reviews, if for no other reason than for the practice. I try not to read any other reviews and try to keep my reviews distinct and short. I'm also blogging, trying to bring up current but unique issues and give my own spin. I'll also be shortly starting a podcast, which I will be whoring to the whole community in the hopes that I can get a decent audience. I'll have various sections split up. One for modern gaming, complete with news and games, possibly even reviews, but with a fun take, like you're discussing everything with me over a beer. I'll also do a brief stint with DVDs/Blu-Rays and technology, and finally one for retro gaming. I'll keep my main podcast to around an hour, hour and a half, and then make the DVD and retro podcasts about 30 minutes each. And because no podcast about technology is complete without a hot girl to give her take, I'll have my gorgeous and witty fiance on the show to give a female gamer perspective. They'll come out weekly and premiere soon, so look for updates in this blog!

I wrote this article half as a declaration to commit to my own form of journalism and half to reach out to the one or two people reading this. I want to encourage them to add a new spin on gaming journalism and use citizen journalism to actually be beneficial. How many times have I read another boring GTA IV blog ridden with sarcastic rants and info I already know only to hit a forum and see the same guy talking about something that I find quite interesting and cool. I'm always in awe how many great ideas come out of the forums, but die because no one else wants to discuss them. I'm telling you all, just flip them. Rant and wax philosophical about GTA in the forums, where you'll get a discussion going, then be unique in your blog, where the audience is passive.

PS: I am mildly qualified to do this, however, as I do boast a bachelor of science in Journalism, but like Darth Vader, I went to the dark side and pursued a career in advertising.

The news is ablaze with the great Chicago -> Grand Theft Auto IV connection because, basically, too many people have been shot for every influence under the sun to not fall under scrutiny. For those that don't know the story, the Cliff's Notes version is basically that Chicago has seen a bunch of inner city shootings in the last week and this recent weekend that just passed saw approximately 30 shootings (not all lethal, but that doesn't matter too much to those that were shot). Well the CTA (Chicago Transit Authority), which is in charge of public transportation in the inner city including the subway/elevated train and bus systems, has allowed Rockstar/Take-Two to purchase a $90,000 media buy in the city to advertise Grand Theft Auto IV. Since those that are heavy in influence as well as those most likely to be blamed for crime issues (politicians and high officers of the police force) are being questioned, the urge to blame others (namely GTA IV) has become too overwhelming. It was so bad that in Chicago, Fox news actually made a connection between seeing a banner ad on a bus for GTA IV to the actual street violence.

Okay, when Jack Thompson went nuts over Mortal Kombat and Night Trap, it was actually a positive thing: video games were no longer seen as "playthings" and rather seen as an interactive force of influence. Truthfully, no one other than those who were heavy in the industry really took notice. Then Grand Theft Auto came along and the blame game, in true form, began. Now it has expanded into a vast empire of blame and guilt that, sadly, has come to nothing but negatives in the video game realm. Here's why:

1.) Video Games Are Still Seen As A Toy - Sounds stupid to us, but most people who aren't from the golden age of video games (and didn't go from game geeks to influential members of the professional world) still view video games as toys. Intended for kids, toys. How many people in my life have told me that I'm just playing with "kids stuff"! It's funny, too, because these people don't have a steady, well-paying job (like I do), a wonderful person who loves and supports them (like I do), and they will never own property like a house or condo (like I soon will). Who's really being the kid? All **** aside, video games still aren't seen to society as a whole as intended for, or targeted at, adults. It's like the cigarette debate that claims that cigarettes are only targeted at kids, it's just that adults happen to smoke them. Oh wait, except that the danger of playing video games is mostly in the judgemental person's head.

2.) There's A Rating System - Don't get me wrong, there should be a rating system. In order to prevent censorship in this country, there needs to be a third party police or we'll see our content stripped against our will quicker than you can say, "1st amendment". On the other hand, the moment there is a rating system is the moment it is taken apart to it's core, criticized, and blamed for the sake of bad parenting. Video games aren't alone in this realm, either, for the ratings board on movies (MPAA) is highly scrutinized as well. Only difference is that society accepts that movies can be made for adults, which is why AO is available but banned by all hardware manufacturers and XXX DVDs are one of the highest selling products in America today.

3.) Bad Parenting - I don't know if you have kids (but perhaps you have parents you can relate this to), but there is one cardinal rule when dealing with parents or being a parent yourself: You have no right to tell anyone how they should parent their child. Accept it, you don't. Do you want to raise that kid from now on? Then who the hell do you think you are to judge anyone. On top of that, the parents and people that usually say this have kids that are breaking into my apartment and stealing my hard-earned property! At the same time, I think all parents are responsible for their kids. Hey, I roll my eyes with the person who has 130 out of their 135 cable channels blocked to their kids. The person who actually sets up a parental code, but has no movie over PG to require a parental code in the first place, or the person who won't have sex at home in case their kids walk in. Not the lifestyle I'd lead, but live and let live, right? At least these people take responsability for their actions! At least they are TRYING to decide what their kid should and shouldn't do, should and shouldn't be exposed to. The parents that go out and buy their kid a copy of Rainbow Six: Vegas 2 at 13 and just hand it over without question is the only reason we deal with this crap. Trust me, I've played online, some of these kids are even my "friends" on XBL and PSN, but you can just tell when playing with them that they are some spoiled little jerk and if he went nuts and shot up a school, his parents would be the first to blame video games.

These are the three solid things that have screwed all video games out of being taken seriously to the point that people are cliaming the words "Grand Theft Auto" is influential enough in the minds of kids to cause them to shoot each other. It's also influential enough that when 3 24-year-olds beat an 80 year old man to death with more than 40 blows that he's innocent because a video game tarnished his mind. And the words "Mortal Kombat", so age old and poorly spelled, is still influential enough to justify two 17-year-olds violently beating a 6-year-old child to death, one of the teens being the child's sister, and because they blame the game, society considers giving them a pardon. Let's cut the crap people. Video games are no more responsible for violence and sex than any other media source. We were having sex, seeking perversion, watching disgusting acts, and committing violence on each other way before the word "medium" even meant something. That is, unless Jack Thompson wants to start claiming that video games influenced mankind even before the Bible was written.

Just to stay on topic with what my previous blog was about, I've decided to now briefly analyze how the other half lives. What will become of the 360 when games just become too big and powerful for it to handle? How long can the Wii really hang on? Does it mean that either of these consoles are doomed as well? I don't think so, and given the fact that I own all three, I sure hope not! :|

The initial problem with the 360 is that it's quickly becoming a niche system. While it may not be the leader in sales (I'm not sure if it is or not), it's definitely the one stop shop for today's gamer. Now mind you, I said "gamer", not a casual system for drunken parties in the college dorm WII!. The first two sentances in this paragraph may seem contradictory, but at the moment they are both true. If you've got $500 and want to figure out what to buy, looking at simple pros and cons, then the 360 should be what you come up with. Very few games right now are exclusive to any one system, and the 360 clearly has a much larger library. It will satisfy the HD and non-HD gamer and has plenty of solid budget titles that don't require an internet connection. In the future, though, the only distinguishing feature about the 360 is that it will (if it isn't already) be dedicated to the world of online shooters. The FPSer is the only person who's a die hard 360 fan to the point that they'd purposely turn their back on the PS3. I knew this full and well when everytime I get online and play "Rock Band" or "Dead Rising" I get about 50 invites to play "Rainbow Six Vegas 2" or "Call of Duty 4". Then you get BS comments like "rock band sucks" or "killing zombies is so much more pathetic than taking down humans". Clearly this system, and many of its hardcore fans, lean to the FPS online deathmatch.

So with strong FPS games like "Haze" and "Crysis" appearing to be PS3 exclusives and the fact that frag-fest "Unreal Tournament III" has at least 6 months, if not a year, on the PS3 over the 360, Sony is proving that it can appease that crowd. The 360 doesn't really have any solid platformers to offer, though. What does the 360 have to compete against "Uncharted" or "Heavenly Sword" or even "Super Mario Galaxy"? Conan? (which is on PS3 too) Maybe the future-bound Banjo Kazooee? This is where Sony has always won out and why the Xbox lost the previous console war (in sales, there's no true "war" because most of us buy 2 or 3 systems). Platformers. They are still super popular and they are the one department that the 360 can't seem to tap.

Couple this with the lack of space on a 9GB DVD disc (this has already hindered a few games' ability to make it to the 360) and the small hard drive almost assure that eventually games will be too big to handle. The PS3 is well-equipped for the future, which makes it the "right" system instead of the "right now" system. Don't get me wrong, though, the 360 has legs and can hold its own, even with this against it. At this point, though, I can't help but notice that my little shiny black box that has barely seen more than 30 hours powered up might quickly become the front runner. If the 360 can make it well into 2009 without falling too far from grace (in the limelight of "MGS4", "Killzone 2", potentially "Crysis", and "Home") then it'll be just fine for this generation. It does beg the question, knowing that currently Microsoft assures us that it will only use the DVD drive with no upgrades to play games, so what's their backup plan? A new system? Really? Hope not. I've taken my $1,000 hit for this generation and I'm not ready to take another.

The other question is what is to become of the Wii? At this point it appears that Nintendo was dead on with the observation that the Wii wouldn't be competing this generation because the Wii is completely different from the PS3/360. They're right, it is. Hardcore gamers don't appear to like the Wii that much. Not for design and not enough to not own it, but really, what does the Wii have to offer hardcore gamers when compared to the 360/PS3? I just don't think that "Smash Brothers Brawl", "Mario Galaxy" and "Twighlight Princess", while great games, is enough to satisfy the appetite for great new games. Luckily the Wii is more for the casual gamer, and therefore it's staying alive with strong sales because it's not only cheap, but also the same experience on standard or high def, in surround sound or stereo. It's a simple unit that's simple to operate with relatively simple games. But how long will it last? Most people I know only own "Smash Brothers", "Wii Play" and "Wii Sports" (the latter comes free with the system). That's bad for Nintendo's software sales, but it stays alive with the presence of the Virtual Console, a novel idea from Nintendo. Essentially they are tapping into the hearts of the retro gamer, which has me and many of my friends going wild. No more do I have to hunt down a rare NES that actually works only to pay $20 more for "Super Mario Bros. 3". Now all I have to do is go to my system, drop $5, and I'm playing in less than 10 minutes. It's a novel idea that is definitely one of the strongest factors keeping the Wii alive in the software department.

As for the so-called "console wars" I think we're seeing now, more than ever, that there is no such thing. Consoles were never at war, even in times where the market was so obviously split that households referred to themselves as Sega or Nintendo houses. The console war is just a marketing campaign and its target is to build brand appeal and judge it through sales. This is why the Wii claims the be the "winning system" when it has so few solid titles. All 3 companies are doing just fine from an income perspective and these days the hardcore gamers aren't choosing Sega or Nintendo, they are choosing everything, and playing everything. The war is over, and the winner is everyone. The only question is, who will out live who? In the past it's clearly been Sony. Do they have what it takes to repeat history for a third time?

The Playstation 3 was one of the most hyped (if not THE most hyped) game system to date. Everyone thought they wanted it, and the demand was much higher than the supply, resulting the eBay price of a PS3 to start around $1,000 and peak at nearly $3,000 (I'm sure there were some lower and higher, but that's about what I saw). There was a problem, though: it wasn't worth the hype. At least not yet, it wasn't. With a killer launch, the PS3 started full speed ahead (save the extreme lack of inventory) and then died instantly. Weak launch titles that were next gen installments of PSP games and weak multi-platform releases (while cool, I'm sure no one will consider Madden '07 to be the killer app of the PS3). The only savior was a little Sony FPSer by the name of "Resistence:Fall of Man", but sadly this, too, was just a little too similar to the thriving WWII shooters that Epic's "Gears of War" drove it into the ground.

After this, there was plenty of speculation as to what the future of the PS3 held. Many Sony faithfuls had moved from the days of PS2 all-day shooters like "Socom" to be loyal 360 fans for the many intense 1st and 3rd person shooters that flooded the system, who's only true superiority was its online community. As with all competitions, the problems of the PS3 were clear: it offered no true distinction from the 360. Through most of 2007 the PS3 was basically the alternative to the 360, very much like Linux is to Windows (I'm keeping Mac out of this). Blu-Ray was not the dominant format, most games were coming out on both systems and true hardcore gamers that would drop the cash for a PS3 already had a 360 (no need to buy a PS3), and most exclusive titles that made the PS3 tempting became multi-platform (however on the flip side, "Halo 3" and "Gears of War", huge exclusives on the 360, remained exclusive). The PS3 was dying, and with no help from delays on MGS4 and Home (the online second life clone that promised to compete with Xbox Live), 2007 was a bad year for the PS3. Most people, including myself (even though I owned one), didn't find much use out of the system. Even games we wanted to get on PS3 instead of 360 (in my case, it was "Stranglehold") were plagued with delays of (on the better side) 2 weeks and (on the worse side) 1-2 months! So, now that a year has gone by (or at least 2 financial quarters), does the PS3 fair better? Here's how I see it.

Many things have changed for the better for both Sony and the PS3 that are helping its chances. We haven't seen many true 1080p titles coming out, but more than we used to (it seemed like EVERYTHING Sony released except for the horrid "Lair" was in 720p). Additionally Blu-Ray has become the universal HD format, making the now cheaper $400 PS3 the cheapest (and best) Blu-Ray player on the market. Home seems to finally be on its way and the online community is much larger and effective now than it was a mere six months ago. Additionally we're seeing a seemless transaction between PS3 and 360 release dates, assuring that titles on multiple platforms release at the same time. We've also seen some solid exclusives in "Heavenly Sword" and "Uncharted: Drake's Fortune". I've even played some games ("Uncharted" was the most obvious) that had their own form of Achievement points, so as to remove that from the 360 advantage AND Sony is going to introduce a trophy system with home that is very much like the Achievement system. Sony also learned it's lesson with the sixaxis controller and released the dual shock 3, removing motion controls and returning to the traditional rumble controls everyone missed. Couple that with the integration of more and more PSP -> PS3, and they've got a uniform home/portable system mover. They even took the risk of removing backwards compatability and still haven't seemed to hurt their sales.

In the end, though, it's really all about the games, right? With the huge storage space of Blu-Ray and an early prescidence of installing games on the system, Sony has some hardcore exclusives that prove that it may be the last system standing out of the current generation of systems. "Metal Gear Solid 4" is going to be a huge release, if only because of the hype. "Little Big Planet" is going to be a fun game for everyone from hardcore to casual. "Haze", now looking more an more like an exclusive, if only from technical limitations, and it, to me, looks like a killer FPSer. Other shooters like "Resistence 2" with many more additions that make it stand out and "Killzone 2" are well on their way. PS3 will also stand strong in the multiplatform realm with "GTA IV" and (hopefully) "Resident Evil 5". There are also rumors that the only system with the technical capabilities for "Crysis" is the PS3. Don't get me wrong, I love my 360 and it is currently the favorite on my LCD, but I do show some love to my PS3 and given what I've seen coming, it looks like by this holiday season, the PS3 will be the no-brainer purchase. My only fear, and what will really piss me off, is if developers push the 360 into another system too early. I think the 360 also has plenty of life in it as well, but very much like the PS2/Xbox wars, maybe it's time to give each their own exclusive worlds.