Sony and Microsoft yesterday held their presentations at the annual Consumer Electronics Show, which runs from January 8 to the 11. The show featured several major announcements from electronics companies, in addition to the obligatory trumpeting of sales numbers. While more will certainly be revealed in the coming days, Sony and Microsoft both offered up several new pieces of information at their respective keynote addresses.
According to Shacknews, Sony announced that over 1 million PlayStation 3s were shipped to retail in 2006–faster than either the PS1 or PS2. Surveys indicate that 90% of PS3 owners have used the Blu-ray technology found in PS3 consoles. Sony also announced that the PSP has sold over 20 million units worldwide, and reconfirmed that the PS3 and PSP will have network integration over Wi-Fi.
The PS3’s first downloadable game, fl0w, will be released later this month, and according to Sony, downloadable games will be full game experiences–not just mini-games.
Second up was Microsoft’s presentation. Microsoft first showcased a slew of Windows Vista games, including Massive Entertainment’s RTS game World in Conflict, Flagship Studios’ action/RPG Hellgate: London, Gas Powered Games’ RTS Supreme Commander, Bungie’s FPS port of Halo 2, Funcom’s MMORPG Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures, and Crytek’s FPS Crysis. One surprise game announcement for Windows was Geometry Wars, an arcade-style shooter originally released on the Xbox Live Arcade.
Following these announcements was the demonstration of Live Anywhere on Windows Vista. Live Anywhere is the Windows equivalent of Xbox Live for the PC; it features cross-platform gaming with Xbox Live users, tracking of friends’ statuses, messaging capabilities, and access to the Xbox Live Arcade. Along with Uno, other planned cross-platform games include Halo 2 and Shadowrun. Ending the presentation was information on HD content, and the planned IPTV service.
One of the biggest stories from Microsoft’s presentation was Halo 2‘s Live Anywhere functionality. Many questions have been raised in the wake of this development, such as how the controlling (keyboard and mouse compared to a Xbox controller) will divide the playing field between the two platforms. With Halo 2 available on the Xbox for over two years, the accessibility of Xbox controllers on PCs, and the fact that Halo 2 is the second most played game on Xbox Live, the gameplay may end up balanced across both platforms.
Another of the major stories was the continuing "war" between Microsoft and Sony on providing HDTV and HD movies. Even though Sony is leading the HDTV market, Microsoft will be providing at least three ways of getting HD movies through the Xbox 360–the HD-DVD player, streaming from Media Center-enabled PCs, and IPTV.
