Playstation 3 sees sales jump

'Grand Theft Auto' sales hit 8.5 million units

"Grand Theft Auto IV" and Nintendo were kings of the videogame kingdom again in May, but Sony surprised the biz by landing in second place for the month in console sales.

Sony's PlayStation 3 sold 209,000 units domestically in May, according to the NPD Group. That's well ahead of Microsoft's Xbox 360, which has generally been a solid No. 2 behind Nintendo's Wii.

Earlier in the year, the PS3 briefly outsold Xbox 360, but Microsoft blamed that on supply constraints following the holidays. In May there were no supply issues, nor were there any big PS3-exclusive games. A combination of last year's price cuts, the built-in Blu-ray player and a growing library of games appear to be giving Sony an advantage over its competitor.

However, neither console got much of a sales boost out of the release of "Grand Theft Auto IV," as they had been hoping. PS3's 209,000 units sold is up moderately from April and down from March, while Xbox 360 sales fell for the second month in a row to 187,000 units.

Meanwhile, Nintendo Wii sales also slipped, though the lower-priced console was still a dominant No. 1 at 675,000 units.

"Grand Theft Auto IV" took the Nos. 1 and 4 game sales spots for its 360 and PS3 versions, respectively. Game sold 1.3 million units in April and has sold a total of 4.2 million, according to NPD. Publisher Take-Two Interactive recently said the game has sold 8.5 million units worldwide.

Nintendo's "Mario Kart Wii" was No. 2 for the second month in a row, selling 788,000 units and bringing its total to almost 2 million.

"Wii Fit," the new exercise game from Nintendo, had a very strong debut despite its high $90 price and unique balance board peripheral. Game sold 688,000 units in its first month, landing it at No. 3.

The only other new game to hit the top 10 was Sega's adaptation of "Iron Man." PlayStation 2 version sold a decent 131,000 units.

Several other high-profile new games didn't manage to sell the minimum of 102,000 units to break into NPD's top 10 for May, including Electronic Arts' "Boom Blox," developed with Steven Spielberg, and Disney Interactive's "The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian."

Read the whole article @ Variety

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10 Best PlayStation Ads

Perhaps our previous feature on the ten worst PlayStation ads has left you with sleepless nights? We apologize for any bodily harm or psychological damage we may have caused you. You just need to remember that the history of PlayStation ads and campaigns is rich and rife with content. Sometimes these ads can be undeniable hits ... and sometimes they can be wayward misses. You just have to learn to take the good with the bad.

Like we promised, we're now presenting our top ten best PlayStation brand ads to balance out our previous feature. Are these good ones as memorable as the awful ones? Or are they not shocking enough to deserve your attention? You'll find out soon, won't you?

10. PS3 - Universe of Entertainment


November 2, 2007 signaled a whole new direction for our beloved PlayStation 3. We saw hardware revisions for the launching of the 40 GB SKU, the introduction of a new low price point, and the re-imaging of the console. Holiday season 2007 was a huge turn around seeing success in multiple markets. There were a lot of factors in making this positive change happen; however, without a doubt, a big part of this success was attributed to the re-imaging that was achieved with a new ad campaign.

That campaign brought forth the "Universe of Entertainment" and "Play On" television spots by Superfad for agency TBWA \ Chiat \ Day. Senior vice president of marketing & PlayStation Network, Peter Dille, had said about the new campaign: "we wanted to move beyond ... with a more high-energy, entertainment driven focus for the PS3. The games are here ... and we wanted to make the news loud and clear." Indeed, the message was both loud and clear as stylish visuals blended in with the no-frills promotions for Blu-ray, PSN, and, most of all, the games.

However, looking back, perhaps these commercials are not necessarily "top ten" material on their own merit. What boosts these TV spots onto this list is the context in which we first saw them -- as a breath of fresh air after being smothered with flop marketing. It was like a light going off in people's heads, "Oh, so that's what they've been trying to tell me all along."

Read the whole article @ PS3 Fanboy

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They say it got smart: a 2008 review of the PS3

The revolution will not be televised, it will be downloaded an update at a time

Back in the crazy days before the current generation of gaming consoles, the console you bought at retail was the console you had for the life of the hardware. My SNES acts exactly the same now as it did when it was first released, and outside of the addition of Xbox Live, the first Xbox system remained largely unchanged throughout the hardware's life cycle. Those days are long over, and now which version of Sony's PlayStation 3 that you bought is only one part of the equation: welcome to the firmware wars.

The PS3's Protean design

No console system has changed so dramatically in the time since its launch as the PlayStation 3. We rather notoriously gave the 60GB model a six when it was first released, and we stand by that rating—the system just felt undercooked. What player of high-definition media can't display content in 720p? Also, the lack of background downloading felt like a drag when we tried to use the online store. And the games were mostly terrible; there wasn't anything that looked as good as the titles on the then-mature Xbox 360, much less any evidence that the PS3 was as powerful as Sony had promised. Remember, this was the system that had been hyped from here to eternity, so it was easy to feel let down by Sony's anemic launch offerings. The PS3 never became hard to find, the price cuts began sooner than expected, and the system has been trailing both the Xbox 360 and the Nintendo Wii almost every month since it has been released.

It may sound a bit dire when you sum it up like that, but something has been happening with the PlayStation 3 since launch. The firmware has received update after update. The Blu-ray capability has become much stronger, and it may in fact be the most affordable and fully-featured high definition disc player on the market. The price has come down to a much more palatable $400 for the 40GB model, and the game selection continues to improve, with strong multiplatform support and a wide selection of exclusive games. Finally, the Sixaxis has been discontinued, and in its place now sits the Dual Shock 3: a controller with both motion-sensing capabilities and rumble.

Sony has done an amazing job of rallying behind its flagship system, and where there used to be arrogance there is a now a more realistic sense of what needs to be done, as well as a more open approach to dealing with the press and bloggers alike. Sony launched its own blog to speak directly to the consumers, for instance, and both the PlayStation blog in the US and ThreeSpeech in the UK do a great job of providing news; both sites also have many developers and publishers interacting directly with the comments. Even the commercials for the system have gotten better. This approach seems to be saying one thing to console gamers like us, who were unimpressed with the system at launch: "We're different now. We understand what went wrong. Come home to the PlayStation you know."

So today, in light of all that has changed since the system's launch, we're going to re-review the PlayStation 3 by taking a look at the system you'll get if you buy one today, not the system that launched in November of 2006. Trust us, it's no longer a six.

Read the whole article @ ARS Technica

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PlayStation 3 games with in-game dynamic ads

Sony introduces dynamically served shills to latest console; IGA Worldwide first to party with exclusive deal for EA games.

Dynamically served in-game ads may be old hat on the PC and Xbox 360, but Sony announced today its first partner in bringing the adaptable advertising technique to the PlayStation 3. Though Sony will be working with other partners, it has selected IGA Worldwide as its first intermediary for marketers and publishers.

IGA Worldwide in turn announced that it has reached an exclusive deal with Electronic Arts to manage dynamic in-game ad services for the publisher's PS3 lineup for the next two years. The deal encompasses not just the EA Sports label with its advertising-rich properties, but also racing franchises such as Need for Speed and Burnout.

Electronic Arts and IGA Worldwide have done dynamic ad business before, given that the firm managed controversial spots for Battlefield 2142 on the PC. The exclusivity portion of the deal is notable because IGA competitor Massive previously handled in-game ads for the Xbox 360 and PC editions of Need for Speed Carbon.

Dynamic in-game ads can be scheduled like TV ads, switched out, or updated on the fly, letting publishers reap additional income by promoting a wider array of products (including time-sensitive movie launches) over a longer period of time. To date, the PS3 has made use of static in-game ads, in which the spots are present on the game disc at the time of shipping and don't change after release.

[UPDATE]: A Sony representative confirmed for GameSpot that dynamically served ads have previously appeared on the PS3, specifically in the Japanese release Mainichi Issho.

Read the whole article @ GameSpot

Get a Free Playstation 3! Yes, that is correct! Stay away from the hassles of waiting in long lineups for you can get it the simple way .... straight to your doorstep! Free! Interested? Then find out how to get a Free PS3!