Providing a free service can only get a company so far. At some point they will have to monetize their investment if they wish to continue its operation. When looking to implement a premium service to the network most users are afraid that the existing free-to-play multiplayer will go away in likes of Microsoft’s Xbox Live pay-to-play online service. Sony has stated before that existing free services will remain free, so users can relax and know that the free-to-play model will remain. So then you have to wonder, what are they thinking about adding as premium features?

Possible Premium Features

Cloud Storage Space for Games

Store your game saves on a virtual secure saver. This would allow you to access your game saves at any point in time, and from any PlayStation 3 or PSP console you are logged in on.

Free Access to PSOne Classics, PSP Minis, and PS3/PSP Themes

Get a fixed number of PSOne Classic games, PSP Minis (bite-sized games), and PS3/PSP themes per month to keep for free for as long as you are a subscriber. The PlayStation Store offers these types of content for $2-6 each.

Catch-up TV

Get access to popular TV shows and movies through service providers such as Hulu, simply by clicking an icon on your PS3 XrossMedia navigation bar.

Cross-game Voice Chat Access

Get exclusive member-only access to cross-game voice chat. This is the ability to use your headset to voice chat with friends on your PS3 regardless of what they are doing on the PS3.

Online Music Service

Get a streaming music service that allows you to choose your channel based on music style, artist type, etc. and listen to an unlimited number of tracks. This service would be for use outside of playing a game and similar to Pandora or a Last.fm.

Issues Defining A Premium Service

Launching a premium service 3 years into a systems life can be challenging. Sony will have to find a balance and actually provide “additional” services and avoid bundling core features. One such feature, cross-game voice chat, is listed in their survey. This has been a highly requested feature from the PS3 community and I can imagine that it won’t be taken too well if they require a subscription fee to use this feature. With that said, Sony is doing right by keeping existing free features free, so users can continue to enjoy online multiplayer.

Are You Interested?

Keep in mind that the above possible features are for survey purposes and in no way mean that Sony has finalized their offerings and prices.  With that said, do you think what they have listed so far works? Should they also include offerings from the Video store? What about Qore? What combination of features would be worth it to you?

See full list and descriptions at Engadget.

PSNation - “Gameplay between the 4 characters is as unique as the characters themselves. They all have human flaws that you have to deal with when controlling their actions. Control can be construed as quicktime’ish in nature, but it goes much deeper than what you’ve experienced in the past. Depending on what is happening, and where the interaction is happening in association with where your hands etc are to the situation, the button presses, action on the controller, or stick movement is based on that interaction contextually.“

Kotaku – “What was building by the time my preview build reached its end was a decent mystery about who this killer was but also a deeper interest, in me, as to how these four main characters would wind up. I want to know what happens next, what I can make them do and where their emotional journeys will land them.“

Joystiq – “When people find out I’ve been playing Heavy Rain, the first question that generally pops up is, “Is it anything but a series of Quick-Time Events?” The problem with that question is that it inherently assumes that a QTE necessitates a lack of player control. While it’s true that the majority of player input is done via on-screen indicators, to simply call them quick-time events is a bit derogatory, ignoring the innovations that developer Quantic Dream has made.“

Eurogamer – “To my great delight as well – Heavy Rain isn’t a mature game because it has unhappy families and moody lighting, it’s a mature game because it anticipates an adult response from the player and is prepared to receive it.“

Interested? Hit up any of the above sites and find out more about Heavy Rain!

Developer: Pandemic Studios
Publisher: EA
Release Date: 12/8/09

Set to be the last big retail release this year, I have been keeping my eye on The Saboteur. Unfortunately, there is some bad things surrounding the game. One being the closure/absorption of Pandemic Studios. The other being a new IP during the holiday season. Don’t worry! I’ve peaked at some of the reviews coming in and here are what some of them are saying:

Eurogamer: “While most of the missions are fairly uninspiring, that often goes with open-world territory, and some of the larger events Pandemic has thought up are actually pretty entertaining: fighting through a castle and up onto a burning Zeppelin was always going to be fun, even if the game’s guns are a little toothless.” 6/10

MTV Multiplayer: “Contrary to games like “Call of Duty: World at War” or “Medal of Honor,” “The Saboteur takes a very different stylistic angle on World War II. The game isn’t very realistic, with buxom blonde spies, evil Nazi race car drivers and over-the-top airborne zeppelin escapes. It’s basically a comic book take on the war, and it adds a lot of charm and newness to a genre that’s been played to death. ”

Wired: “Saboteur is a big game — I played 15 hours and finished about 75 percent of the main and side missions. You get rewarded for going out and destroying the hundreds and hundreds of Nazi guard towers, tanks and miscellany that dot the landscape.” 6/10

1UP: “It may not look impressive most of the time, but the overall art direction is still one of The Saboteur’s most impressive features. Wherever the Nazi occupation is strongest, the world is cast in a dreary slate grey, then, like Prince of Persia or Okami, you bring color back to the world by accomplishing missions. And the cut-scenes add just the right amount of vibrancy in the characters’s looks (like green eyes or a red scarf) to draw your eye. Paired with the soundtrack, a too-small mix of tracks from roughly around WWII, and you’ll sometimes feel like you’re in this stylized Parisian world.” B-

Getting Started

Upon boot-up you will be shown your most recently read comic with the option to resume. You can also browse your collection, view recently added comics, view unread comics as well as bookmarks you set. The app is very fast and responsive to your selections.

The first comic I started with was Astro Boy, followed by a little of Aleister and Star Trek. Considering I only finished Astro Boy, I was impressed by the autoflow presentation of zooming in and out of comics. This allowed me to read the panels in order as they are meant to be read. It wasn’t until I got into Transformers where I really became impressed.

The Transformers comic continued the panel zoom in as the others did. It also moved throughout panels like you would expect in a motion comic. When it got to a panel where there was an explosion and people running, the Digital Comic app, shook the screen to simulate what was happening in the comic. That is when I responded “Now THAT is cool”. It’s the little things that gets me going.

The reader also allows you to play music from your memory card while reading. I didn’t test this out as all my music is on the iPhone and my PSP memory card isn’t that big. The only problem I have with the reader is that I am left without more comics to read until December.

Redeemable Codes (US codes only. Expire 12/16/09)

• Transformers: All Hail Megatron #1: EC2N-9HBR-HJD6
• Astro Boy #1: FF3N-H7B6-M2JF
• Aleister Arcane #1: 63N8-R2BF-9E4D
• Star Trek Year Four: The Enterprise Experiment #1: 724K-A4BG-JLD7

*Warning: The codes must be redeemed on your PSP itself and not through your PS3 or Media Go!

Story

The story continues from Q4B with your search for Clank. Insomniac does a nice recap for those who may not have played ToD or Q4B. They continue the story with expanding on Clank and Ratchet’s origins. I don’t want to give much away but the writing is very good and I have found myself laughing out loud a few times.

Game Play

The game play is much improved and varied over ToD and Q4B as you play as both Ratchet and Clank. As Ratchet, you travel from planet to planet with its varied platforming sections and 3rd person shooting. A nice bonus is that in-between planet travel, you can travel to little spherical moons and collect Zoni or gold bolts. A nice way to offer up some side missions as this time we get to explore space a little.

As Clank, you are tasked with time puzzles as they introduce a new mechanic for play. Clank can record himself performing an action and play back that recording as he does something else. This allows Clank to perform a two (or more) person job. Clank also fixes planets which have been affected negatively by Time. If I must say so myself, I certainly enjoy Clanks game play as it is more puzzle based and they are starting to move up in difficulty.

Community

It may not have online play, and that is great for a single player guy like myself, but ACiT features a community section where you are able to modify your character, check leaderboards and compare your stats to others. Here is what I amassed in nearly four hours of play:

Access your stats here

My initial thoughts are good and for Ratchet fans, this is certainly the game you were expecting with ToD. For platforming fans, what are you waiting for? It is $49.99 at Amazon right now!

What Is It About?
The game is based on the Marvel Civil War in which the Superhuman Registration Act (SRA) is put into place by the government after a horrible incident occurred killing hundreds of innocents. From this act, two groups are formed; those for the registration and those against. Iron Man was the leader for those for the registration and Captain America was for those against it.

How Does It Play?
You play with a team of 4 characters. With these characters you can switch between them anytime by using the directional button on your keypad. This allows you to keep things fresh by not sticking with the same character. You are also able to switch out your characters anytime giving you constant variation within your team. With the right combination of characters, you can get team bonuses that increase energy, health, or even damage regained as health.

As you play you gain experience points (xp) and pip points which allows your character(s) to level up. You may spend the pip points on leveling your characters 4 main abilities, and the xp points towards fine tuning your character. Let’s take my main character, Storm, for example. Her 4 abilities were lightning, hail, gail winds, and funnel cloud. Lightning was my most spammed ability as you could chain the strikes and it was great for finishing bosses. The xp went to improving her concentration for sustained power use, team leadership for increased fusion damage, and electric fists for powerful hand-to-hand attacks. Some additional tuning were only available if I went pro-registration.

Another “ability” are fusion attacks. It takes your active character and combines their powers with another team members power to deal massive damage to crowds of enemies. For Storm, this was generally a tornado infused with grenades (Deadpool), fire (human torch), ice (IceMan), and exploding cards (Gambit). Some of the fusion attacks were the same so I didn’t experiment much with the characters.

Anything Else?
The story was decent but I feel they could have done more towards the end. Graphics, nothing to put here. First and foremost I am all about the gaming experience and this made me feel as I was really unleashing all my mutant fury on anyone that crossed my path. When Storm speaks “You are not my equal!”, I loved it because no one could go up against my mega powered Storm. That truly made me believe that I had no equal.

Given that I beat the game in an estimated 8hrs, I think I may just replay on Legendary. Maybe I will explore the environments, experiment with more characters or play a mission online.

Developer: Sidhe
Platform: PlayStation Network
Price: $7.99
Demo Availability: None

[podcast]http://tirminyl.net/blog/podcast/Tirmcast_EP2_Shatter.mp3[/podcast]

Supporting Links

• Soundtrack
• PSNation Impressions (I reference Glenn & Mark)
• IGN Full Review

So during my time off from work I decided it was time to relax a bit. My move took a lot of my time and I figured I just needed some game time before classes start again so I decided to finish Wolverine Origins.

Previously I spoke of playing the demo and compared the intro in the demo to the opening of the movie Wolverine. I stand by what I said, the intro in the game is better than the entire Wolverine movie. It truly is an uncaged Wolverine as you see him gut soldiers, amputate limbs, and crush skulls. Simply a great way to bring you into the game.

The combat in the game was OK. I didn’t find myself button mashing through it but instead tried to use some of the combos provided. That brings me to one of my gripes with the game, the enemies. As you play through the game you are being thrown between current day missions where Wolverine is trying to track down Stryker and Sabretooth and the past set in Africa. Doing this helps them provide a varied amount of enemies but the over using of the bosses drove me insane! My issue with the bosses were not that they used them a lot it was the fact that there wasn’t any variance in the combat. When you are in the jungle fighting this large rock monster, you must roll out of their way and then launch onto their back and cut them. Rinse and repeat. When you are placed in the present day you are fighting these huge monsters that are modified soldiers. You rinse and repeat the same method you used to defeat the rock monsters. This got very old, very fast.

Overall, I think the game was a lot of fun despite my issue with some of the larger enemies and my apparent dislike for the 360 controller. The story loosely follows the movie but keeps up the pace by transitioning you from his past mission in Africa and the present day. Seeing how the enemies can become extremely annoying to fight and how some of the transitions in scenes can be a bit jarring I couldn’t help but wish the game was over so I could stop playing it. Therefore I would definitely say rent it. Being as I was late to the party with this game, my advice probably doesn’t matter now.

What makes me love this game is just how fun it is to play. The abilities you gain throughout the game comes at a very good pace. When I yearn for more power to destroy targets, I gain the ability to rain lightning from the sky. When I become annoyed by being shot, I gain the ability to project a polarity shield. There is a great variety of abilities given to you and it is such a joy to put them to work, if you are evil that is. Being good only gives you a set of specific abilities or specific variations of that ability. Most are contained and thus you find yourself containing your ability even more by not hurting bystanders. With evil abilities, you get more wild and crazy variations. Electric bombs that split off into multiple mini-bombs on impact. It is such a delight to see several constant explosions happen. To top it off, the red lightning looks much more badass!

As for the story, I thought it was great. I love the comic book style and presentation. I love how intertwined the story was in giving you abilities. Not only did the story presentation keep me coming back to do the missions, but the abilities you gained when performing those missions were a great tie in. Unlike other open world games, I typically get bored because nothing keeps me locked into the story and this one somehow did. Once the game ended, I was locked in, and loving the ending and I am completely ready for a sequel.

This is the very first time I have ever completed a sandbox game! Sucker Punch, you have truly done something amazing here.

After getting 20% through the game I find that I am much more interested in completing it compared to other sandbox games. GTA, I get bored shortly after getting the game and I never finish the story because I get bored. What I like about inFAMOUS, so far, is that the reward for me to do the missions and some of the side missions is to gain new abilities, open up new levels and get more power! So I find that I am skipping the side missions to stick with the story to find out what is going on and gain new abilities. I also must say the powers that are given come in very good intervals. It seems right when I need something a mission gives me a new ability. That is just great pacing as far as upgrades and story.

One thing that I am having a big issue with is…staying good. I can’t power drop in fear of killing innocents. I have to becareful throwing cars around, and throwing bombs so I don’t hit any citizens. I have to restrain myself and not succumb to the power. Is this what Cole is going through? Reminds me of my all time comic favorite, the Phoenix Saga. Jean trying to contain the power that is surging within. Like the Phoenix, I want total destruction.