If you haven't heard, the PlayStation Wii is so successful, it pretty much prints money. Wait, Sony didn't make the Wii? Then how did the market analysts of DFC Intelligence come to the conclusion that "Sony was saved by the success of the Wii?"

According to DFC, the Wii's mainstream appeal forced Microsoft into a successful, but not entirely dominant position. "The main danger Sony faced was that the Xbox 360 would become embedded as the system of choice. Instead consumers flocked to the Nintendo Wii. The Xbox 360 had solid sales, but they have not been enough to give Microsoft anywhere near a breakout market position," the report explains.

Should enthusiasm for the Wii wane this holiday season, the recent price drop, coupled with with impending release of God of War III, finally positions the PS3 as a viable choice for mainstream consumers, the report notes. EEDAR's Jesse Divnich agrees, pointing out that Sony can finally utilize its leverage from the previous generation. "People who purchase a PS2 are more likely to purchase a PS3 in the future. Consumers, believe it or not, are pretty loyal."

Three years after the launch of the PS3, Blu-ray is also finally becoming a marketable feature for mainstream consumers, the report argues. "This holiday season Blu-ray movies are finally getting a major focus at retail ... Blu-ray clearly now becomes a strong selling point for the PlayStation 3." Undoubtedly, SCEA will create an ad that focuses on this aspect of the system that "only does everything."

While DFC's report comes off as incredibly bullish, it's understandable to see why there's some doubt over Sony's ability to capitalize on the moment. Let's not forget, this is a company that managed to fall from first to last place in the course of a year. "The cards are in Sony's favor and now is the time to make the most of them ... Now is the time for Sony to shine ... or else."

[Via CVG]

Source - Is it Time for the PlayStation 3 to Shine?
Source - How the venerable PlayStation 2 made it to 9 years old

Japan Studios has had little impact on the PlayStation software library this generation. The platform's greatest hits so far have, instead, come from America and Europe. Titles like Uncharted, Killzone, LittleBigPlanet, Ratchet & Clank, Resistance, God of War, and WipEout all come from various studios at SCEA and SCEE. But what has Japan Studio created thus far? Siren, Trash Panic, and The Eye of Judgment -- noteworthy games perhaps, but hardly a collection of system-selling blockbusters.

Sony Worldwide Studios boss Shuhei Yoshida explained to Gamasutra that "their focus was shifted onto the PSP, which reflects the success of the PSP as a platform in Japan ... It's completely opposite of the way how US and European teams moved onto working on the PS3 and we see the fruits of those efforts, while Japan studios shifted their focus onto the PSP." Of course, handheld owners have much to be thankful for: system-defining hits like Patapon and LocoRoco were created out of Japan Studio's dedication to the platform.

However, the next year (and beyond) should be very different for Sony's Japanese developers. With The Last Guardian and Gran Turismo 5 coming from Sony's other Japanese studios, the pressure is on for other developers to follow suit. "We are now re-energizing teams and coming up with new ideas for PS3 development," Yoshida said. "We'll be able to show fruits of this work sometime next year."

One of the most attractive promised features of PlayStation Home was the ability to meet up with friends in Sony's virtual space, pick a PS3 title and join in the multiplayer offerings of said title as a group. Sony's delivered on that promise by adding this functionality for a few select titles, such as MotorStorm and Street Fighter IV. However, these capabilities are going "universal" with the release of Home Patch 1.3, which will add "simplified game launching" to the service.

No, this form of launching won't allow you to group up with friends in Home and jump into a game of your choosing as a single, conglomerated entity. Rather, it lets you ... well, launch your games without having to return to the XMB. It was a wise choice to cut the middle man out of the game-booting equation, but it seems for the "full" game launching experience, Sony's going to have to add that functionality one title at a time.

Also added in the update is an in-game camera, in-store item previewing, new categories of clothing, new emotes, new spaces, and whole lot more. Check out PlayStation.Blog for the full scoop on the update.

From: Dwight Slappe, marketing intern
To: Jeff Bukovinski, head of Rockstar marketing

NARRATION V.O. COPY FOR BEATERATOR PROMO, FIRST DRAFT:

"Do you have an awful friend named Jason who's constantly tapping on stuff and making your life a waking hell? Well, now you can put Beaterator into his awful stupid hands for a few, precious moments of respite from his oppressive tooliness.

But be forewarned, at the end of your brief reprieve, Jason, swollen with grotesque pride, will return with his miserable creation, and force you to listen to it repeatedly in its entirety, providing the final impetus you need to shear off his awful haircut and smother him with it.

Beaterator: It'll make you kill your friends!"

The system wasn't the only thing that got smaller when Sony officially unveiled the slimmer PS3. The entire PlayStation branding has been reworked: the system is no longer PLAYSTATION 3 (all caps), it's PlayStation 3. The logo no longer uses the Spider-Man font to spell out the entire system name. Instead, marketing materials now feature three simple characters: "PS3."

Kaz Hirai explained the meaning behind the change to Times Online. The new logo represents a "reset" of sorts. Hirai explains that he wanted it to represent "going back to our roots."

There are practical applications to a revised logo, as well. "When you have PlayStation 3 spelt out, the aspect ratio was such that if you wanted it on a billboard it became tiny. It didn't work in terms of visibility," he admitted. We took a look back to this Call of Duty 4 TV ad to emphasize the difference: the Xbox 360 logo is more than twice as large as the now-outdated PLAYSTATION 3 logo. If you watched this ad on a SDTV, you probably wouldn't even notice the PS3 logo at all! While we're not entirely sure the new logo will have an effect on sales, we (and other games bloggers) are glad to finally give our CAPS LOCK keys a break. Thanks, Sony.

Now here's some Kojima-related news worth counting down to. The fan translation patch for Hideo Kojima's sci-fi graphical text adventure, Policenauts, is now complete and available for download. The game, originally planned for official release on the Sega Saturn in 1996, was never released in English by Konami, so a group of fans worked to localize and patch the files.

Policenauts is an adventure game in a similar style to Kojima's Snatcher, consisting of mostly still images with fully-voiced dialogue and a text-based menu interface. The game follows Jonathan Ingram, a one-time policeman on an extraterrestrial Earth colony, who drifted into space and returned to Earth 25 years later, having been saved by a "cold sleep" system in his suit. Following his return, he works as a private investigator and attempts to solve a murder and a mysterious disappearance.

The patch requires a copy of the Japanese PlayStation version of the game and a PlayStation that can play CD-R discs -- that's because you have to rip the game files, apply the patch, and then burn it to another disc. Finally, a reason to dust off that PlayStation you modded to play Beatmania ten years ago!

[Thanks, Mike]

Judging by the hundreds of reader-submitted tips we've received in August pointing to "totally conclusive evidence" of the existence of a slimmer, sexier version of Sony's home console, we think it's safe to say that PS3 Slim pontification has reached a fever pitch. As video game news conduits, we've frequently been forced to gaze into this swirling maw of speculation in an attempt to gin the might-be-reals out of the most-assuredly-fakes.

One of the prevailing pieces of gossip regarding the hardware is the moment of its unveiling: Tomorrow at 12:30 p.m. EST, during Sony's GamesCom press conference. Before we arrive at that potentially auspicious hour, we're going to look through the brief annals of the PS3 Slim's history, analyzing the big pieces of evidence, debunking the obvious mockups, and interpreting data from a poll we conducted over this past weekend.

If you're looking for a "final word" on the subject, you'll find none here. That's for tomorrow's Sony presentation to determine -- or depending on which way the tides of fate turn, to obfuscate even further.

Yet another trademark has got the gaming community talking. SCEA filed a trademark application (#77794416) for a serviced called "P.S. Thanks." Considering this is a Sony trademark, we'll let you figure out what "P.S." could possibly stand for.

According to the application, "P.S. Thanks" is meant to be an "incentive rewards program geared toward quantifying, identifying and motivating top consumer base with the goal of promotion and sale of video game hardware and software." In short, Sony wants to create a PlayStation loyalty program.

IGN hypothesizes a few possibilities. The service could be a program akin to Club Nintendo that awards frequent buyers with rewards. (Most recently, top-tier Club Nintendo members were awarded an exclusive downloadable game, calendar, and Mario hat.) "P.S. Thanks" could also refer to a Trophy reward program, one that has been rumored since the inception of Trophies in the PS3 firmware. Certainly, that's something a-certain-someone would love to see. Update: SCEA offers a comment: "As you know, we have a long history of creating unique loyalty programs such as PlayStation Underground which started with the original PlayStation and has evolved into the Gamer Advisory Panel (GAP). We continue to look for ways to expand this program and simply are evaluating new naming conventions for this evolution."

[Thanks, Jeff B.]

Masaya Matsuura isn't a household name for PlayStation fans, but his games are: PaRappa the Rapper and (to a lesser extent) Vib-Ribbon became icons of the early era of PlayStation. However, since the release of Vib-Ripple in 2004, Matsuura hasn't touched a single PlayStation platform, choosing to work on various Nintendo games, most recently Major Minor's Majestic March for Wii.

It seems Matsuura is ready to end his years-long hiatus on PlayStation systems. He told Edge Online that PS3 is the platform he would "most like to explore at the moment" because "PS3 has a very high potential to appeal to the market." He notes that "very few people can do good creation for PS3. I think, for example, that Flower is a very good example. It requires a very high level of knowledge, experience and ambition to work on, so perhaps these kind of things are required for PlayStation."

The indie spirit seems to be drawing Matsuura to the house that Sony built, but he acknowledges that it is a company that "is struggling with its conservativeness." While Sony has made great strides in making PlayStation Network a burgeoning field for indie developers, he hopes to see Sony become even more aggressive. "If a company like Sony is not aggressive in the industry, it's very bad for the unique creator, like Jenova Chen or me."

We can't tell you the number of times we've been on a train or bus and thought, "Wow, I really wish I was playing (insert your favorite PSX game here, though we're going to assume it's Pepsiman because of course it is)." Engadget reports that super hacker ZodTTD has heard our silent prayer and brought PlayStation 1 emulation to the Palm Pre.

It's not quite perfect yet (and not just because you have to play the thing with a keyboard), but at least we know our dream of bringing refreshing Pepsi-Cola to the children of the world on the go is just a bit closer to fruition.

After David Jaffe got his independence from Sony, it seemed like a given he'd branch out to some other platforms. In a new video, the dev explains why he's still sticking with Sony, rather than a big, multi-platform third party. Not only does he just like the PS3 better, he added that "we have a great collaborative process going on when we make games [with Sony] and we have a lot of creative freedom."

Jaffe also says he believes that Sony's more likely than a third-party publisher to greenlight a game that may not necessarily be profitable, but pushes the platform brand forward, specifically mentioning Shadow of the Colossus, Ico and LittleBigPlanet. Lest there be any confusion, Jaffe says he's not working on anything like that. In fact, he describes his new project as a "big commercial game." We think we speak for everyone when we say we can't wait to see what he has cooking, no matter who's publishing it.

According to Enterbrain figures, the Xbox 360 and PS3 have both achieved milestones in Japan. As headlines would have you believe, the Xbox 360 has surpassed the one million mark for consoles sold, whereas the PS3 has done much more admirably, pushing over three million systems on the populace. The Xbox 360 achieved this after almost four years on the market (it released in Japan in December, 2005), wheras the PS3 claimed its figure nearly three years after launching in November, 2006.

Clearly, both consoles are big in Japan. Mostly because they're huge consoles.

[Via Kotaku]

PlayStation India is making big strides. SCEE will publish the first video game to be completely developed by an Indian game development team, Hanuman: Boy Warrior. This PS2 exclusive is about a young boy who must defeat enemies by freeing them of bad karma. "Good triumphs over evil," and it does so without the violence typical of most modern games.

Hanuman is rooted in Indian mythology and will be presented in both English and Hindi. "We are very proud to launch the first Indian game on PS2 with localized content, completely developed in India," said SCE's Atindriya Bose. "The launch of Hanuman: Boy Warrior has marked a very significant milestone in the Indian game development industry and also signifies the importance we attach to the Indian market and the Indian Game development industry."

Sony is one of the first companies in the industry to seriously focus on expanding the Indian gaming market. By investing in local development, Sony plans on making India a larger piece of the global gaming scene.

Not long after announcing that they'd be opening up three new Home space per month, Sony announced in conjunction with Activision today that "Backstage with Guitar Hero" would open up tomorrow in Home. It's a Guitar Hero-themed space (dur) that looks slightly like the stage at the House of Blues merged with a backstage area. Equipment cases are piled up all over the place, and it's cavernous enough to house plenty of rhythm-based music fans.

You'll be able to watch trailers for upcoming titles in the Guitar Hero franchise, as well as access "Behind the Scenes" footage" on a separate screen. There's also a VIP space in the back which is sealed off by a velvet rope, and Activision wants your feedback about what exactly should be behind it. We imagine there will be scads of votes for "champagne room" and/or "strippers.

Besides hobnobbing with your thrasher buddies, you can also play RockGod... a Simon-esque "match the chord" minigame, which you play by mashing the buttons along a to series of notes. Compete for top spots on the leaderboard, and sneer at your fellow Home-dwellers. Rock on! Check out video of the new space behind the break.

So what is Sony to do? It seems like the company is caught between a rock and a hard place. "They've been such a great, great partner," said Schofield. "I hope they get out of this and they figure it out and they're around for a long time." If outsiders like Schofield are worried for Sony ... imagine what its employees are feeling.