I wanted to play a game today with some friends and XBox Live is currently on it’s 15th day of completely bunked service that started with a DoS attack that is apparently still going on (and has been followed up by a class-action lawsuit).
Navigating around XBox Live will show you pretty quickly that the service is buggered… logging you off, you can’t chat, you can’t buy anything, you cannot play a game with friends, etc.
So a friend and I hopped on our PS3s and fired up the Burnout Paradise demo (which allows up to 8 players in multiplayer) and proceeded to have fun.
Besides have stupid-easy invite controls (hit Right, hit Right again, hit Right again, done) and seamless integration of other players into your world and vista versa the game also supports a dramatic “Takedown photo” of the driver you took down (smashed into and killed) if they have a USB camera.
My buddy wanted to try this, but neither of us had the PS3 Eye (PS3′s new camera):
but my buddy had one of the XBox Live Vision Cameras:
It’s a USB camera, but Microsoft’s history of creating universal devices without vendor lock-in is almost non-existent, but we tried it anyway.
Low and behold the PS3 detected the camera and immediately started using it, without so much as a hickup. Each time I took him down I got a nice shot of his face screaming (or his ass in one instance).
In addition to that, for voice, he busted out his Bluetooth Moto headset and used that while we played.
I am loving the fact that the PS3 is essentially a computer and supports generic computer peripherals. That allows you to decide how nice of a camera, mic or anything else you want to get to use with it.
Go Sony!
i think sony forgot to take the m$ drivers off their OS´s linux kernel xD.
ok, really my kudos to Sony for not making their proprietary platform so “proprietary”
i wonder if it will detect other normal web cams.
anyway about their servers being down… they have been “marketing” their server OS, software and firewall solutions to be the best in “security” of the industry compared to ummm…. yea, but this just proves they were dreaming…
i see them dropping their own software to use their competitors and get xbox live back online and prevent future attacks. (not kidding)
i don’t want to exaggerate but the truth is you can give m$ “trillions” of dollars to improve their software but it will always be crap …. o.0
Other Web Cams: It seems so, both the PS3 Eye Toy and other Web cams like the logitech series are all compatible. Just plug-and-play (Same goes for wireless mice, keyboards, USB drives, cameras, printers, etc.) it’s really sexy.
As far as MS goes… it’s so sad but true. When Vista first came out and was such a disaster and all those inside interviews with members from the Vista team came out, it explained everything. The culture inside Microsoft is *so* bureaucratic and full of red tape and higher ups out-screaming folks under neath them, and then those folks screaming at their subordinates and so on, until the programmers and project managers are so scared to do anything risky that they all implement the least-common-denominator of every feature.
The best was the guy from the Vista team that implemented the start menu. He talked about how it actually took 6 months… 6 MONTHS to implement the Shutdown buttons off the start menu because there were like 4 teams involved in that menu’s development and some of them didn’t agree where the buttons could go and they had meeting after meeting after meeting until the most retarded solution (what shipped in Vista) was implemented because it was the least-common-denominated between all the teams.
It’s just a joke over there.
My *guess* is that they know it’s a joke, and likely a year before Vista ever shipped, they took a 20 man team or so and partitioned them off into a closet somewhere to start working on what is code-named Windows 7 at this point.
It’s suppose to come out in 2 years, completely replacing Vista and word on the street is that *it* will be the release Vista was suppose to be. With the ergonomic desktop, file system improvements, integrated DB/metadata crap, super-searching, caching-up-the-ass and all those goodies.
Vista is nothing more than a super-service pack to XP as a hold over to battle Leopard in the marketing realm until Windows 7 can come out.
I’m sure Windows 7 will be sexy… but as with every MS operating system, I’m scared to death to even think of what it’s monitoring me doing and reporting back to MS servers.
oh wow, that thing about the menu is really funny. xD
i didn’t even knew about vista till it came out. weird i didn’t know anything about linux also till i tried vista.
anyway i wouldn’t hope too much for windows 7 or Vienna (sadly).
as i heard it will be like this (it’s a joke now but could be true…).
introducing Windows 7 (aka Vista II or win ME the third)
main features:
-DirectX 11 EXCLUSIVE (no port to other windows including the “aging” vista…)
-DRM revision 2 with added “fixes”
-Minimum Requirements: Double core processor + 1.5 gb ram (Morse’s law, every new windows has to use more resources than it’s predecessor)
-Improved aero interface (now has woobly windows like in a mac)
-improvements in Notepad and ms paint!
-Windows XP + service pack 4 preinstalled (switch between windows in a snap! amazing)
-Extended support of Windows XP to 2015
-Buy 2 ultimate get one basic free!
-Troublesome OS at first with nasty bugs and reduced performance, but all this gets better after the Vienna SP1!
——–
LOL, anyway like i said this might be a joke now, but this could be the reality after it comes out..
oh and uncle Bill just invested about 400 million on a Mexican Beer company (ummm does that mean m$ we will get beer coupons after purchasing a windows license?)
no seriously, even Bill Gates doesn’t see a bright future for their software anymore (their bubble is about to burst…or maybe it did already?).