PS2 now an 'open platform' in Europe

[Captain Wrong]

Not sure what he would have to rant about. It's not like Sony did this at the peak of the console's lifetime or anything. Other than a few last Atlus and NIS RPGs, nothing major is scheduled to come out for the PS2 after Christmas of this year. The console is basically commercially dead for full-price releases.

Yeah, but based on the past speed at which Working Designs releases tended to happen, I'd bet they'd still have at least one more than full-price release waiting in the pipeline even at this stage in the console's life. If they were still in business, that is.

Anyway, I think people are jumping the gun a bit as this is for Europe, right? Plus, it doesn't necessarily mean a bunch of cool games from Japan are going to get licensed. I'd wager it means more crap along the Phoenix/Empire lines. Just a guess.

[Poofta!]

i didnt see this mentioned, but about a week or so ago, sony announced that the ps2 is now a free, open platform. any company can develop anything they want for it without need for sony's approval or to pay them royalties. a ps2 dev system is still necessary.

i am kinda excited about this, think we'll start seeing really obscure games? XXX themed games?

whatre your feelings.

[Hitman Tyler]

i didnt see this mentioned, but about a week or so ago, sony announced that the ps2 is now a free, open platform. any company can develop anything they want for it without need for sony's approval or to pay them royalties. a ps2 dev system is still necessary.

i am kinda excited about this,

This is great... I wondering wat kinda games people will create. I feel all the games that had to be corrected for too violent,etc sould put them out now.
hmmm maybe they will finally make Indigo Prophecy Director's Cut, for PS2 . Question, is the PS1 and open platform?

[CosmicMonkey]

Original thread

[PapaStu]

Merged with the original.

Continue the discussion.

I highly doubt that this will happen in the US anytime soon. They never open sourced the PlayStation.

[c0ldb33r]

I wonder why it's only in Europe.

[CosmicMonkey]

It's all to do with this whole 'emerging markets' business in countries like Russia, Brazil and India. The PS2 is also getting an official Brazilian release in 2009 with domestically made machines; I expect this whole 'open system' thing will apply there too. They currently have to survive on either rediculously expensive import consoles or Famiclones/Master Systems/Megadrives. So 2009: Brazillian-made PlayStation2 vs Zeebo.....

[c0ldb33r]

The PS2 is also getting an official Brazilian release in 2009 with domestically made machines; I expect this whole 'open system' thing will apply there too.

Really? The PS2 hasn't been released in Brazil yet? I had no idea.

I'd assumed that by this point it's been released everywhere.

[thom_m]

They currently have to survive on either rediculously expensive import consoles or Famiclones/Master Systems/Megadrives. So 2009: Brazillian-made PlayStation2 vs Zeebo.....

Poor Zeebo. I guess Tec Toy didn't see THAT coming.

OR NOT? Well, I wouldn't be surprised if those smartasses at Sony tried to sell us the brazilian PS2 (AND the games) for the same price of the imports, and blame in on the brazilian product taxes - which are huge, but wouldn't justify a national ps2 going for the same 400, 500 (brazilian) clams. Nintendo did this: the brazilian NES, which came out really late here too, was really expensive, as far as I remember.

This good be an advantage for Zeebo, even though it's presumably going to be weaker than the PS2. Tec Toy is promising to sell R$10 games. If they're really working with big developers, as they claim to be, the whole thing is even more promising. However, I read somewhere that the estimated price tag is around R$600 ...

[c0ldb33r]

However, I read somewhere that the estimated price tag is around R$600 ...

Yeah it sounds neat.

How much is R$600 converted to US Dollars or Euros?

[megasdkirby]

Yeah it sounds neat.

How much is R$600 converted to US Dollars or Euros?

269.784 USD if it's Brazilian Reais.

[thom_m]

How much is R$600 converted to US Dollars or Euros?

As for 11/14: 1 dolar = R$2,27; 1 euro = R$2,79. That makes the Zeebo worth US$ 264,31/€215,05.

Even so, I don't think these sound like exciting price tags. And R$600 is definitely expensive - I'd say prohibitive - for most brazilians. As far as I know, you can get a PS2 with two controllers, memory cards, and tons of games for that.

But, once again, there's the "cheap, original, physical media-less games" thing announced by Tec Toy...lets' wait and see what happens. It's gonna be interesting...

EDIT: Geez, I'm late! And I guess my math is all wrong, as usual...