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[KAGE360]

i never noticed this as i havent seen the entire sony press conference yet (need a lot of coffee to stay awake for it   ) but some things have been popping on the net about its vague online description....

QUOTE

As you can imagine, I look at an online gaming service with a pretty close eye. So imagine my surprise when I was reviewing Sony’s briefing from earlier this week where they announced more details of their online service, and noticed a glaring omission. Sony has said that their online service is free but on the slide they showed during the briefing, where they listed all of the free services, I did not see match-making or online play mentioned. Thus, it seems quite likely that Sony's free service is merely the equivalent of the Xbox Live Silver level of membership, which is also free. So, if I’m right then Sony’s cost advantage for their online service is non-existent.

http://www.gamersrep....com/news/2603/

this november will be interesting indeed.

[incognegro]

well duh! if they arent handling the servers then how could it possibly be free?............nothing in life is free. I dont know how ppl can think its gonna be free. Are the servers gonna pay for themselves? Sony never said online gaming was fgree (cause they can't promise that). They just said their "online services" were free!  

[Deftech]

QUOTE(incognegro @ May 18 2006, 11:23 PM)

well duh! if they arent handling the servers then how could it possibly be free?............nothing in life is free. I dont know how ppl can think its gonna be free. Are the servers gonna pay for themselves? Sony never said online gaming was fgree (cause they can't promise that). They just said their "online services" were free!  

you have a point, never realized that.

[twistedsymphony]

Tricky Tricky...

-They said before they were going to leave online gaming up to the game developers (apparently they WEREN'T lying)
-They siad they were matching XBL feature for feature... then again they never said WHICH XBL

You've realy got to hand it to them... Sony is just the MASTER of marketing. It's amazing how even inteligent people can become easily confused in such a way that they come off with bolstered false premses.

Most people think Sony is offering a Gold level service at Silver prices, even once the dust settles on this I'm sure you'll see lots of "Sony's service is free, XBL is $50..." Tricky Tricky

[tomeaine]

QUOTE(j666* @ May 19 2006, 10:46 PM)

av  never played  any of sony games  online  does this mean  ps3 owners will need multiple  acoounts  from  publishers  to play  online  games  ie  one  for  ea  games  other  for epic  games?

IMO
I think they will have what silver has.
Make up your user name, establish your self on there network to do odds and ends.
once you want to play a game then you "Might" have to pay a subscription fee.
So think of it as a terminal to connect to other sources.
Maybe the fees are sharded between sonys services and the publishers?

But why would the publishers want to even tangle with things like that?
I think if Sony wants to play liek Live they should simply make it like live, charge gamers like Live does and see what happens

[incognegro]

One way or the other they WILL find a way for you to pay for those servers. no doubt about that. Atleast MS is honest and isn't going around the bush. They tell you upfront that it isn't free while sony use smoke and mirrors.

[Calel]

I heard somewhere (don't crucify me I really did) that sony planned free gaming for SCEA and SCEE developed games, but they couldn't make any promises for third party. This is good, and bad. It means we'll get some pretty decent games for free like killzone, but sports fans are gonna have to shell out if EA is running servers, MMORPGs fuggetaboutit. We might even see a few pricing issues for titles because they in-clude "free" online play.

[incognegro]

QUOTE(Calel @ May 23 2006, 02:14 PM)

I heard somewhere (don't crucify me I really did) that sony planned free gaming for SCEA and SCEE developed games, but they couldn't make any promises for third party. This is good, and bad. It means we'll get some pretty decent games for free like killzone, but sports fans are gonna have to shell out if EA is running servers, MMORPGs fuggetaboutit. We might even see a few pricing issues for titles because they in-clude "free" online play.

Relax, your on point with that comment. Thats exactly whats going on.

[JustDanMI]

Here's a little quote from Sony about their online gaming to be free:

PS3 site PS3Land is reporting that despite the myriad rumours to the contrary, Sony's PS3 online offering will indeed be completely free out of the box. Indeed, an unnamed Sony Computer Entertainment America PR Manager said:-

"Please note that online gaming will be free right out of the box."

And that was it. We're thinking of filing this one in the big box marked "Internet Reports (Unlikely)", but we'll keep an open mind for now. We, alongside every other site on the planet, is trying to get you confirmation of the pricing structure as you read this.

And here's the link to the site that posted this:

http://www.rewiredmi...ecompletelyfree

It'll be interesting to see if Sony can keep their word     What was I thinking, this is Sony were talking about.

Here are some more things I found:

During a Q&A session with media over lunch after yesterday's GDC keynote, Sony's Phil Harrison confirmed that PS3 software will be region free and that multiplayer gaming will also be free.

That was at this link:  


http://www.joystiq.c...ayer-confirmed/

And here's one more:

Sony have quashed rumours that the online gaming aspect of the PS3's live service will cost to play , it will in fact be totally free.

A Sony Computer Entertainment America PR Manager had this to say: "Please note that online gaming will be free right out of the box."

And here's the link to that site:

http://gaming.hexus....m.php?item=5665

[incognegro]

PS3 online gaming free? yeah right, and next thing ull be telling me is that they'll be promising 4D games....oh.....wait........

ok, let me open my mind a little bit for sony's sake.......hmmm........maybe they'll use a tunnelling service to make it free. That'll be interesting......lol

[STICKY_BUD]

if it will be free, it will be ad supported in some sort of way. i assume this is where the premium service fits in. if you pay for the service, it might be ad free, but if you actually do pay for premium level, i would guess it will be more like xbl gold. you pay to play and you can download movie trailers(which are definitely ads) if you want to, but you are not required to download or view them ever.

my guess is that not only will the non-premium user will be forced to view these ads while their game is loading, but they will also be required to store the ads on the local ps3 hard drive. you can bet those ads will be conveniently downloaded in the background while you play a game offline(connected) or if you leave the console unattended(connected). if you never do either of those, you will be constantly watching the same ads. similar to free video clips or free software or anything else that is free, it is not free, someone is paying for the service in exchange for access to your 30-60 seconds of load time.

[Mr Invader]

the ps2 online was free once the harddrive was bought, so it might not be impossible for Sony to make it free. But it will most likely be a terrible online service if there isnt a charge for it

Is it me? or does an entire year of Xbox live for $50 seem almost as good as a free service? $50 is amazingly cheap for online fees considering the games hardly lag on the 360 and on halo 2

[Foe-hammer]

QUOTE(Mr Invader @ May 28 2006, 08:30 PM)

... considering the games hardly lag on the 360 and on halo 2

Well that's entirely dependent on your connection and the games net coding, and not the actual xbl service.

[Reaper527]

QUOTE(STICKY_BUD @ May 26 2006, 05:06 PM)

if it will be free, it will be ad supported in some sort of way. i assume this is where the premium service fits in. if you pay for the service, it might be ad free, but if you actually do pay for premium level, i would guess it will be more like xbl gold. you pay to play and you can download movie trailers(which are definitely ads) if you want to, but you are not required to download or view them ever.

my guess is that not only will the non-premium user will be forced to view these ads while their game is loading, but they will also be required to store the ads on the local ps3 hard drive. you can bet those ads will be conveniently downloaded in the background while you play a game offline(connected) or if you leave the console unattended(connected). if you never do either of those, you will be constantly watching the same ads. similar to free video clips or free software or anything else that is free, it is not free, someone is paying for the service in exchange for access to your 30-60 seconds of load time.

source instead of speculation?