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Sony Playstation 2
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Revised review as of May,
2002, after major price drops...
When first released, some cynics pondered whether the system was truly "available" or not.
Well, that time
has passed; the Playstation 2 is available everywhere, with some nice exclusive
games and a far larger selection of products than the other, later
arrivals to the video game system wars. It's a great system choice, even for those who would look at the
Gamecube
and X-Box as the "newer" consoles. While chronologically this is
the case, there are perks to the PS2 unit that those other systems do not
have (and vice versa)...
 First,
the unit itself. The overall look and feel of the Playstation 2 is not
unlike a small VCR. This makes it quite easy to stack atop your VCR and/or
DVD player, with little difficulty. Accessories allow for it to be placed
on its side, though given that this would mean discs are also inserted
vertically, I'd recommend against this, due to how easy it is to drop and
stain the discs from that angle. In the front, there's the CD tray, two
game controller ports (which can be multiplied with an accessory), two
memory card ports, two USB slots and a firewire-type port with Sony's
"I" logo (meaning, I guess, the system can be linked to Sony's
digital cameras/camcorders with that same logo, for what that's worth). While nearly one-quarter of the rear of the unit is
reserved for an expansion bay (with a cover on it for safekeeping), there
is room for the system fan, the power switch, the AC plug, an optical
digital out port, and the multi use AV-out port.
The first plus of the system is complete downward compatibility. Not
unlike buying a new PC, none of your old PS-1 games are "obsolete"
upon purchasing this system, so Playstation (now referred to as "PS
One") games work as well as Playstation 2 games. Of course, no
'upgrade" of the graphics is visible on old games, though it's nice
to know that you don't have to reserve space for both old and new systems,
which all older game systems used to force you to do (Remember the Atari
2600, 5200, and 7800?).
Several little details enhance the unit. For one, the CDs are inserted
via a front-loading tray, and not via a top "lid" design. Anyone
who has played games for more than 2 years knows the pluses of this, since
less dust is likely to enter the disc tray via a front-loading design.
This is not only a plus from the former PS-One unit, though the Gamecube
as well. One added detail; the system is fully DVD compatible right out of
the box, with the choice of using the controller to navigate discs, or to
purchase the DVD remote control accessory.
As for games, the true success of PS-One was how easily game designers
could design a game cross-platform, between PC and PS-One. The same seems
to apply to PS-2, with games that range from No
One Lines Forever (complete with four levels unique to this
version) to the sequel of Drakkan,
which
Sony liked so much, they purchased the rights to, making it exclusive to the system.
The age old question is always, "What system should I buy, if I
can only buy one?" That's a tough call, depending on 1) how many
games you like to buy per month/season, and 2) how cool you think an
internal hard drive is on an X-Box. If 8 (or so) Gigabytes
of storage for game saves doesn't sound fabulous to you, by all means buy
the PS-2; its one year older release means its total list of available games will
consistently be higher than X-Box or Gamecube (particularly when downward
compatible with PS-One as well). I also have been consistently more
impressed with Playstation's choices of exclusive games, which aside from Halo
have always been better than the competition by leaps and bounds.
This can all change in at little as a year, though if you decide to buy a
PS-2 in 2002, it is a very wise choice.
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Final Rating :
Deep Impact. While without the cool hard drive and Ethernet port of
the newer X-Box, this system's quantity of titles --as well as its
larger games than the mini-disc GameCube-- make it still a major
competitor. |
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