So here's the story.  It started with Madden '08 and PS3 customers were frustrated that their version of the game was HALF the framerate of the XBox 360 version.  EA came out to say something along the lines of having three years practice with XBox 360 developer kit, and only a year and a half with PS3.  In my opinion, framerate is one of those things you have to focus on at the beginning of development, not magically fix itself at the end.  Smells fishy.  Ubisoft and other developers agree, it's no excuse.  Developing for the PS3 is different from the XBox which is different from the Wii.

Now EA developers are coming out and saying PS3 just sucks.  (http://www.psxextreme.com/ps3-news/1767.html)  They say it's only as powerful as the XBox 360 and significantly harder to program.

Well, I read this recently and suddenly it all makes sense:  There is an ex-Microsoft bigwig taking control of EA sports, and an ex-EA bigwig taking control of Moore's vacated position at Microsoft. From the article: "Last week, Microsoft said its game chief, Peter Moore, will leave to become head of EA Sports. Moore's replacement at Microsoft will be Don Mattrick, a former EA executive who has been a high-level adviser for months."

So essentially, EA games are going to suck on the PS3 from now on, because the Microsoft lovers will purposefully cripple them to make their favoured console look better.

This also in the news concerning Microsoft: It has become apparent that when playing an mp3 (or any file with audio, including avi's) the network throughput gets capped at 10% in Vista.  No joke.  Microsoft came forward stating this was intentional, to provide a "glitch-free" multimedia experience.  Perhaps, unless you were streaming over the network I suppose.  Seems like another example of shoddy coding.  Every other OS on the planet can play an mp3 without throttling the network traffic.

Here's some more recent news about Microsoft: Shortly after it was announced that Blu-ray movies were outselling HD-DVD 2 to 1, and that Blockbuster had announced that it will ONLY carry Blu-ray, Dreamworks and Paramount pulled out of Blu-ray production and intends only to release HD-DVD from now on.  Does this sound smart?  Rumour has it Microsoft paid Paramount $50 Million and Dreamworks $100 Million to make the switch.  (http://www.deadlinehollywoodda.....ayhd-dvd-format-war/)  Microsoft sells an HD-DVD addon for the XBox 360, and provides an HD content download service, while Sony built Blu-ray into the PS3.  (By the way, the PS3 is currently the #1 Blu-ray player, and #1 DVD-upsampler available according to A/V enthusiasts)

Y'know, if they'd just release decent products, they wouldn't have to resort to these kinds of shenanigans!

I've always liked EA Sports, and I certainly feel they have been the only gaming company to continuously bring forth fun sports games year after year, season after season.  I am really disappointed in them and sincerely hope they smarten up and realizes the potential loss in profits they're facing by (seriously) developing games for only one system...

These aticles simply reinforce my dislike of Microsoft...

Microsoft trying to force out a competitor?  Wow does that happen?  Let's ask netscape...

Who?
...

This just means that there will be a vacuum with regard to first rate sports games on the PS3... Someone could step up and make a lot of money.  Then EA, which I think it's a stupid position to abandon a platform and therfore forego profits, will regret its decision when the next CEO comes in and is not affiliated with Microsoft.

Well, EA is still blaming their problems on lack of experience with PS3, but assures the public that next years titles will be 60 fps, just like the xbox versions.

But in the meantime, as Hawkeye suggests, 2K sports is filling the void.  Their games are getting recommended over EA titles by the reviewers.

I can't imagine the changes being so extreme for PS3 programming that EA, the BIGGEST gaming software company, can't wrap their heads around it.  We've gone through this transition what 4 or 5 times now. Atari, sega master system, nintendo, SNES, playstation 1, gamecube, ps2, wii, ps3!  Come on!  Are other software companies making as much complaints about PS3 programming?

Actually, some other software companies are making the same complaints, but surprise surprise, they're in bed with Microsoft too.  Rhetoric such as "There should only be one gaming platform" gets repeated a lot by such companies, and then they cite how Microsoft's dev kits for DirectX and XBox are so similar.

Wish I had some links on hand to back that up, but that's not actually what I wanted to post about.  I just read an article (http://www.electronista.com/articles/07/12/04/bay.on.microsoft.hd/) quoting Michael Bay (of Transformers movie) speculating about Microsoft's strategy for BluRay and HD-DVD.  According to him, they want BOTH formats to fail, and that's why they keep movie studios jumping brands.

Wow, but you know Microsoft could just be laying the ground work for its rivals in this regard.  Apple and TiVo are coming to Canada and Microsoft may be inadvertantly helping them, by causing havoc with the HDDVD and BluRay.