Why First Person Shooters fail on the PlayStation 3
If there has
been one trend this generation of video game consoles has shown us is
the first person shooters made for the PlayStation 3 will not
flourish. There will be some excellent games like Killzone 2 but
they'll see lack luster sales for the genre on the PS3. Now even
though the console is built to appeal to the most hard core FPS fans
it's one flaw will drive them away.
After spending several hours playing Call of Duty: World at War and Killzone 2 I have discovered why FPS just don't work on the PS3: the analog sticks. On the PS3 their analog sticks feel very loose and a bit floaty. I decided to compare the analog sticks to the ones on my Xbox 360 controller and there is a noticeable difference in how they respond. On the 360 controller there is more resistance on the analogs which I believe translates to a better overall feel when using the controller.
I first noticed this after playing the Killzone 2 demo. I tend to play more games on the 360 and have played a ton of Gears of War and Halo 3 so I'm no FPS novice. My first impression of playing Killzone 2's demo was the game looks good but I needed more time to get used to the controls. I ended up buying World at War to get some PS3 FPS action. While playing that game I was a bit annoyed at the controls but felt it was just the WWII weapons that sucked to use. Now that I have played a lot of Killzone 2 I'm convinced it's the controller's loose analog sticks that is dampening my gaming experience.
So far several first person shooters have come to the PlayStation 3 with lack luster sales. Most recently we've seen Killzone 2, Call of Duty: World at War, Haze and Orange Box all be released to mediocre results. Not one of those titles sold over anywhere near as their competition on the Xbox 360. The only games in that genera to gain any support have been Resistance and Call of Duty 4 which both broke a million units sold. Unfortunately their sequels did not gather the same support which I attribute to people not making the same mistake twice.
I would love to see how well the first person shooters that are exclusive to the PS3 would perform if they came out on the PC or Xbox 360. I enjoyed playing Resistance on the PS3 and Killzone 2 is a good game but I think these games would have been better received on other platforms. Ideally in this economy one would think having free online play would draw more people to the PS3 but bad controls ruin first person shooters. The loose analog stick on the PS3 make games like Killzone 2 almost unplayable and without a hardware redo I don't see any game turning this trend around.
After spending several hours playing Call of Duty: World at War and Killzone 2 I have discovered why FPS just don't work on the PS3: the analog sticks. On the PS3 their analog sticks feel very loose and a bit floaty. I decided to compare the analog sticks to the ones on my Xbox 360 controller and there is a noticeable difference in how they respond. On the 360 controller there is more resistance on the analogs which I believe translates to a better overall feel when using the controller.
I first noticed this after playing the Killzone 2 demo. I tend to play more games on the 360 and have played a ton of Gears of War and Halo 3 so I'm no FPS novice. My first impression of playing Killzone 2's demo was the game looks good but I needed more time to get used to the controls. I ended up buying World at War to get some PS3 FPS action. While playing that game I was a bit annoyed at the controls but felt it was just the WWII weapons that sucked to use. Now that I have played a lot of Killzone 2 I'm convinced it's the controller's loose analog sticks that is dampening my gaming experience.
So far several first person shooters have come to the PlayStation 3 with lack luster sales. Most recently we've seen Killzone 2, Call of Duty: World at War, Haze and Orange Box all be released to mediocre results. Not one of those titles sold over anywhere near as their competition on the Xbox 360. The only games in that genera to gain any support have been Resistance and Call of Duty 4 which both broke a million units sold. Unfortunately their sequels did not gather the same support which I attribute to people not making the same mistake twice.
I would love to see how well the first person shooters that are exclusive to the PS3 would perform if they came out on the PC or Xbox 360. I enjoyed playing Resistance on the PS3 and Killzone 2 is a good game but I think these games would have been better received on other platforms. Ideally in this economy one would think having free online play would draw more people to the PS3 but bad controls ruin first person shooters. The loose analog stick on the PS3 make games like Killzone 2 almost unplayable and without a hardware redo I don't see any game turning this trend around.
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