PlayStation Mini - Amazing, or Out of Ideas?

And whilst initially jumping on the HYPE train, now that I've slept on it, I'm becoming less and less enthused.

Underwhelming lineup announced so far

It's exactly that. Jumping Flash, whilst being ground-breaking at the time (pun intended), has aged badly and never seems to make anyone's top 20 PlayStation lists. Wild Arms is a solid RPG which in 1997 was promptly usurped by the amazing Final Fantasy VII (the only standout game in this initial five, in my opinion). Ridge Racer Type 4 is a fun but limited racer, that pales in comparison to Gran Turismo, TOCA, Colin McRae etc. Tekken 3 is a good game, but my gut says that its predecessor should have gotten the nod (more fun, and I don't care much for Tekken Force).

The other thing to note is that the developers here are Namco, what was Squaresoft (now Square Enix of course) and Sony Computer Entertainment. This hints at minimal third-party involvement in the total lineup, will there be any of the great titles created by Capcom or Konami? Only time will tell.

No Dual Shock

Seriously. And the inclusion of Ridge Racer Type 4 (which as many have pointed out, was designed with analogue in mind) is a puzzling one to add into the mix bearing this in mind. The reasoning behind this could be more underhand than we're anticipating. Of course, less plastic equals less cost, that's a no brainer, but it's not as though the Dual Shock was a last minute introduction in the lifecycle of the original PlayStation. By removing analogue capability, the unit has controllers that are not compatible with any other device (it appears as though they have a custom attachment as opposed to USB). Imagine if you picked this up for £89.99 and it came with two controllers that used USB connectivity and were PS4 compatible? I don't think Sony's Finance dept would be particularly happy with that.

£89.99 and no adaptor included

Minor in comparison to my other points, and we've all got hundreds of Android adaptors lying about the house, but another corner cut to ensure the RRP for the product didn't top £100.

Less scope to hack and include as many games as you want

Nintendo have, purposely or not, made their mini NES and SNES easy to hack and there appears to be several ways to hack each unit. Clarification on each unit's internal memory would be useful here, but even given a standard 16 or 32GB SD this allows for full NES and SNES libraries to be added. The PlayStation is a CD-based system of course, with CD-quality sound. Any fans of emulation will tell you that even one-disc PS games will set you back a meaty 400 to 700MB, and my recent download of FF7 from the PS Store weighed in at just over 1GB. Therefore, there is a real possibility that the unit's storage will be taken up in its entirety by the 20 planned titles.

The unit has no USB sockets (as far as I can tell), unlike the C64 Mini, which eliminates the ability to store and play ROMs from an external flash drive or similar. The only way in appears to be the power socket, which is more problematic, but I'm sure not impossible for some of you fine people to get through.

Why have they done this?

Why not! Christmas is coming and us retrogamers need things to put on our lists. It's a collectible official product of a much-loved console and they'd be silly not to get on the bandwagon, which Sony are used to (harsh?).

What else could they have done with this console?

Many touted improvements would be solved with a purchase of a Vita or a slimline PSP... Joking aside, a key question surrounds the addition of HDMI out only. True aficionados will point out that this wasn't how the original console was enjoyed, and will also decrease the fog of a lot of the console's 3D titles, thus exposing how so many of them have aged badly over the years.

Will I get one?

Maybe. The fact remains that PS titles are freely available to purchase for Sony's handheld devices and if you picked up a second hand PSOne and those five titles mentioned it would probably cost you less than £90.

It's clear that the remaining 15 tba titles will have a big swing on the fence-sitters like myself but given the probable shallow net in regards to third-party involvement I don't hold out much hope. Will Sony risk putting some of the console's rarer titles on there? Or stick to the bread and butter of popular titles? Roll on December.

For gamers worldwide, the much anticipated newly developed Xbox One S is now on sale. For the more avid gamer that needs more space, the Xbox One S 2 TB edition is available now. With a plethora of features designed to make this the best Xbox ever made, it is the hottest system on the market currently to accommodate this year's onslaught of cutting edge 4k television systems. The added design and specs under the hood of this game system by far brings amazement and charm to this much anticipated gaming experience.

Design

The design of the Xbox One S is derived with idea of being easier to handle. By this concept, they made this Xbox One S 40% slimmer than the latest Xbox One's that have been released. Along with the sleek design comes the trimming down of accessories such as the power cord for the Xbox One which had a large ended power supply. This power supply has now been integrated internally in the console instead of being harnessed on the external power cord. To make things more competitive, the new Xbox One S has the ability to stand horizontally much like its competitor, the PlayStation 4, making a direct mark against this brand. The color of the Xbox One S is in a "Robot White" to bring a cleaner feel to this elegant design.

For Kinect users, which are used to the Xbox one having their Kinect port as part of the console, this has been a major change. The Xbox One S has no Kinect port and users that wish to use a Kinect will have to purchase an adapter in order to use this game experience on the Xbox One S. However, to replace this port, there is now a USB port on the front, with two in the back, and an IR blaster port in the front. For this reason, Xbox is currently offering a free Xbox Kinect Adapter for users that wish to connect their Kinect device.

Big Feature - 4K Ultra HD Compatible

The biggest feature improvement besides the sleek design is the support for 4K which previous models of the Xbox One did not support. Not only can you stream your favorite streaming networks on the Xbox One S, but you can also use its 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray Playback. For more people looking for a 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray player, the player alone costs between $150-500. This console with all its features comes in at $399 which is only about $100 difference between the currently selling Xbox One that is on sale. To completely see the 4K Ultra details, the only missing component is a 4K Ultra television to view the details of the graphics.

Hardware Details

The Xbox One S boasts its ability to handle 4K HDR visuals including a 2TB hard drive. Later models will come with the ability to purchase a 500BG or 1TB storage option which in essence will also change the pricing of this system when you go down in hard drive space. For users that care to scale down on the internal hard drive and scale up on an external hard drive, that option is still available with the Xbox One S which has a USB 3.0 HDD port, which is standard on current Xbox One models.

The wireless controller also gets an update with an advanced grip feature which allows users to better hold the controller and handle game accuracy during game play. These controllers now run on Bluetooth technology.

Related links:

• https://www.giantbomb.com/profile/en-eg-ep/blog/some-interesting-features-of-online-games/254575/
• https://www.giantbomb.com/profile/en-eg-ep/blog/perks-of-playing-online-games/254578/
• https://www.giantbomb.com/profile/en-eg-ep/blog/what-are-the-reasons-for-the-fame-of-online-games/254577/
• https://www.giantbomb.com/profile/en-eg-ep/blog/why-you-should-play-online-games/254576/