failing to contain ourselves yet again

Failing to contain ourselves yet again, I see, what with three--count 'em--three PS3 delights shipping our way as of this writing: Little Big Planet, Soul Caliber IV, and Motorstorm: Pacific Rift. Well, what else would we do with our November? Aside from continuing my addiction to Wipeout HD, Pixeljunk Eden, and the amazing The Last Guy, that is.

And speaking of Sony, here's a credo for the Portable: I hear future PSP releases will be sold both as UMD and simultaneously available via the PSN store as electronic downloads, a trend I heartily encourage. There's no reason to lug about all those freaking discs. Let me fill up a memory stick with games upon games and travel light! Thus I pledge to never, ever, buy a UMD game again. Actually, this is an easy pledge at present, as there is nothing in the piles and piles of crappy PSP game library currently that has the slightest appeal to me. (Granted, some of the backlist might have some appeal if priced fairly and available as electronic downloads. The PSN store is beginning to see the light on this front, oh so slowly.) Right now the only games I play on the damn thing are Echochrome and flOw anyway, and they're PS3 ports. It is pretty sad when (the still incredible) Loco Roco remains the best PSP game I own, some two years after its release. Where are the killer PSP games, darn it? It's a no-brainer when I am packing for travel these days: the PSP is the first device pitched overboard when the luggage starts to fill. With iPhone and iPod nano games in such abundance, who needs a bulky PSP along for the ride, particularly when there is nothing of interest to play on it? (Now, Loco Roco 2 is coming, so I hear. That will, naturally, cause much flying of dust, late night marathons, and twitching of gamer fingers. Until then though: meh.)

Semi-related kvetching: when exactly did iPods and iPhones game crashes become the acceptable norm? My lovely, lovely new iPod nano (silver with black scroll wheel, natch) can't make it through jack squat on the gaming front without crashing repeatedly. I mean, c'mon Cupertino. It's only friggin' Monopoly. Fix this crap! And for iPhone-related crash complaints, see my previous posts. It's too painful to relive again. Some two months after the major daily crashes stopped, I still walk on eggshells fearing the phone will crash anew. Once bitten and all...

Related kvetch to above: And why in sam hell would all my previously purchased iPod 5G scroll wheel games not be compatible with the nano? Same scroll wheel, supposedly newer & better innards. You telling me those 15-20 games I bought last year are just dead & gone now as far as the new device is concerned? (I've since sold the only iPod that would play them.) I submit the only reason the newer iPod nanos don't play the older games is crass, cold-hearted capitalism: because Steve-o wants to sell us the same dreck again and again. Not cool. I bought my Zuma once for iPod, I should not have to buy it again for what's a minor update in the hardware side. It's not like I expect my scroll wheel games to play on the Touch or the iPhone, but this is another scroll wheel device sold less than two years after the last device. Sure, the screen dimensions are a little different, but it's called scaling, guys. With 25 billion in the bank, Apple can't spare an engineer to make the new devices backwards compatible? Yeah right. Very very Microsoft, Apple. Tsk tsk.