Firstly, intelligent readers will no doubt notice that there have been no posts since last Thursday, coincidentally the day that New Super Mario Bros. (which has sold a mildly astonishing 1 million copies in it’s first two weeks in Japan) was released in Australia. Ergo, I’ve been somewhat reluctant to do anything other than sit in bed playing it. Aside from trying to teach my girlfriend to play it, and pretending that I’m not TOTALLY OUTRAGED AND SHOCKED that she’s never played a Mario game before, and suffering crippling stomach cramps from weird ultra cheap Chinese food that is.
Secondly, someone needs to pass some sort of memo around the entire Sony corporation suggesting that anyone being interview might just want to consider not say ridiculously stupid things. If it sounds like I’m repeating myself here, then, well, it’s because I probably am.
There were two interviews out this weekend just gone - one with Richard Brunois, Director of Communications at Sony Computer Entertainment France, and the other with cuddly Phil Harrison, Executive Vice President of Sony Computer Entertainment Europe.
Phil in particular was in fine form, towing the company line about the Linux based PS3 as a computer, but then taking it one step further:
“We believe that the PS3 will be the place at which our users play games, watch films, browse the Web, and use other computer functions. The Playstation 3 is a computer. We do not need the PC.”
Super. Guess you can look forward to an influx of cheap second-hand PCs come November, then, since everyone will no longer need them - though I imagine this would come as something of a disappointment to Sony’s VAIO division.
Brunois took on the current favourite of praising Nintendo:
“Graphics are not enough…it is not that which makes the difference; it is the interest of the games. It is known that Nintendo has an enormous know-how for all that is gameplay.”
Only to go on the offensive later in the interview with that old favourite - Nintendo as kiddy company:
“They are aimed at children…that is their public.”
And then, after being asked whether he though that Nintendo was trying to change that with the appearance of titles like Ubisoft’s Red Steel on the Nintendo Wii:
“They said the same thing with GameCube and in the end, it was nevertheless children, in a very great majority, who bought it.”
I’d be curious to know where Brunois gets his figures for that. I don’t deny that this is certainly a stigma that’s been attatched to Nintendo for a while, and there’s no doubt that it did have some truth to it during the N64 days, but it just doesn’t seem relevant if Sony are claiming that games are what makes the system. Does it matter whether or not games are “mature”? I’d say not - my favourite games over the past few months have been New Super Mario Bros. and We Love Katamari, both of which are hardly “mature” games, although I have also been enjoying the rather more “adult” Hitman: Blood Money too.
But really, if I’ve got the choice between something “kiddy” like the upcoming Yoshi’s Island 2, or a “mature” game like True Crime: Streets of New York, or any of the other hundreds of Grand Theft Auto clones out there or “mature urban” shitfests (I’m looking at you, Marc Ecko), I know what I’m going for.
Anyway, the point is, I don’t want to feel this negatively about the PS3, because I want to play Final Fantasy XIII and Gradius VI but they’re making it so hard to like…
Respect to Kotaku for the links.