Feeling special isn’t always a good thing
I had a feeling for a little while that I wanted to quit playing Ogame, but I wasn’t able to do so until I was able to identify exactly what it was that bothered me. At last, however, I was able to pinpoint it: real success requires you to mold your schedule around the game. I have a word for activities that require specific constraints on my time. It’s called “work,” and I expect them to pay ME and not the other way around. As a final “fuck you”, I put myself in vacation mode to deny other players the pleasure of looting my abandoned planets. I felt like I had brought passive aggression to the game, and that was kind of satisfying.
My continued PS3 use has opened the door for me to a world of really special screwing by Sony. In a way, I sort of admire them for it. Whereas when a company like EA dicks me, for example, I feel like it was merely the result of bad management, sloppy execution, and a general disinterest in their customer experience, Sony makes me feel like someone sat down and took the time to lovingly and carefully really put the screws to me individually. I mean, I’m not naive: I know that they have a lot of other customers they’re fucking, too, but I still can’t shake the feeling that I’m special to them.
Now, I wasn’t personally affected by having my multi-hundred dollar device bricked by an official firmware update, though I appreciate the irony. I’m not too miffed by their half-assed new XMB, which provides you the full list of dashboard XMB options even though you’re not allowed to access most of them from within a game. I’m not even terribly upset about how the highly touted new trophy system is essentially incompatible with their entire existing library. For me, the special treatment begins at a much earlier point: the remote control.
One of the biggest selling points on the PS3 has always been its capability as a Blu-ray player, which is in turn supposed to be the new king of HD media. One could infer then that they might want adoption from high-end A/V enthusiasts… you know, the sorts of people who dump thousands of dollars into home theater setups. So I was a little shocked upon purchasing the damn thing to discover that it doesn’t have an infrared port. This means that you can’t use any existing remote controls to control it, including the universal remotes that the aforementioned home theater enthusiasts all have. Your only option to control is a Bluetooth remote, and I’ll give you three guesses which is the only company that happens to manufacture one of those. It is, predictably, a terrible device lacking in backlighting or any other such modern amenity.
There’s a third party solution, of course. IR2BT is an apparently one-man operation that sells $50 devices that convert IR signals to the Bluetooth signal used by the PS3. Word on the Interweb-equivalent of the streets is that it’s a really easy, elegant solution… or at least it was, until last week’s 2.40 firmware update broke it. Ha ha! Oh, Sony. You guys are the best. In all seriousness, though, the most recent devices for sale have been updated to work with the latest firmware, and the proprietor promises to work out some sort of return/upgrade process for existing users. It’s something I intend to check out myself, once they’ve worked through their massive order backlog.
On a related note, however, Planet Earth in 1080p is really amazing. It’s the only time in my life I’ve ever had the opportunity to say “Wow! That’s the most wildebeests I’ve ever seen.”