It’s time to look back at the year that was — gaming deal wise, that is.
I started tracking deals via GameDealsCanada back on May 1st and while that may not be the beginning of 2009, I’m confident with the choices I’ve made for this year’s awards. So without further delay, let’s get right down to it.
Both Microsoft and Sony have integrated Facebook into their consoles in some form or another. Some cry foul while others enthusiastically welcome these social networking hooks. I don’t have a Facebook account, so it doesn’t affect me in any way. I think it’s a neat integration and as long as it doesn’t get in the way of what I want to accomplish with my console, I don’t care.
I am not a fan of those auto generated status updates though. Sony’s 3.10 firmware will allow your PS3 to advertise what the hell you’re doing on your console. Trophy updates, purchase updates and all that other nonsense seems excessive. I’m cool with posting a status update when you obtain a Platinum Trophy or upload a piece of content to the web or something, but not the generic “everyday” stuff.
Unlike with the Xbox 360, the PlayStation 3 firmware will not have a dedicated application for Facebook since it already has a web browser. Twitter support is also absent from Sony’s platform. I don’t want a dedicated application for any of this stuff. Ideally, a Twitter client should be integrated into the XMB where I can quickly check the latest Tweets. If I have to launch an application, I might as well pick up my netbook an log on because a dedicated application will force me to exit my game.
Again, I don’t care if these are included into the consoles or not, but they’ve got to have it work without interfering with the console’s primary purpose: playing games.
