My wife and I are looking for a house, and before we blow all of our savings on a down payment, closing costs, paint, carpets, and whatever else we end up needing, I wanted to “future proof” my house with the latest tech. She agreed to let me buy an HDTV (because she secretly wanted one too), but I was also able to worm a Playstation 3 into the mix. Personally, I had zero plans to buy a next gen system until some major price cuts started. I was perfectly fine relying on my Wii to get my gaming on. Besides, my wife basically told me no more video game systems after I bought a Wii (yeah, right). Anyway, a week ago Best Buy had a deal going on where if you purchase a 40-inch 1080p Sony HDTV, and a PS3 together, and you’ll save 600 bucks. For the first time ever, I wanted to own a video game system for something other than video games. I explained to my wife that if we get a 1080p set, we might as well take advantage of it with a Blu-ray player, that player being the PS3. She agreed, and I went into Best Buy later that week and bought the TV and the PS3. Unfortunately, the TV was back ordered, but I was able to walk out with the PS3. I didn’t mind, because I don’t have anywhere to put the TV right now anyway.

With the “deal” I was forced into buying one of two PS3 games, either Motorstorm, or some baseball game. Naturally I picked Motorstorm, which is really a fine game (and it looks amazing) but I decided I didn’t want Motorstorm. I thought about doing the old switcheroo at Gamestop (if they take advantage of us, we can take advantage of them) and getting Virtua Fighter 5 instead. Then I remembered just how much I wanted to play Odin Sphere for the PS2, so I went to Gamestop and traded Motorstorm for Odin Sphere and Resident Evil 4: Wii Edition, paying only a 10 dollar difference. I couldn’t be happier, but the result is that I now had no game to play on my shiny (really shiny) Playstation 3. Before people go crazy, I know Motorstorm is a good game, but my thought is that in a year from now Odin Sphere is going to be 60 bucks on eBay, while I’ll be able to find Motorstorm as a Greatest Hits for 20 bucks at any store.

After spending a day or two downloading a bunch of different demos to get a feel for what the system had to offer, the machine sat on my floor for a week and I haven’t touched it since. One problem is that I have a million systems hooked up to multiple TVs right now. I had thought about replacing the PS2 with the PS3 (much like I replaced my PS1 with the PS2 all those years ago), but then I’d have to buy additional hardware just to transfer my saves, and plug in my old controllers, not to mention the fact I can’t play Guitar Hero on it regardless (since it doesn’t recognize the guitar). On top of that, I don’t own any games for it, and since I don’t have the TV, I won’t be watching any Blu-Ray movies for a while. Coupled with the fact that I’m finally getting into Final Fantasy 12, it looks like I won’t be playing the PS3 for quite a while. As a result, when I came home from work today I packed it all up and put it away.

By no means is this intended to bash the PS3, as I’m looking forward to plenty of games for the thing. Uncharted looks really cool, Home sounds interesting, LittleBigPlanet looks fantastic, and of course Metal Gear Solid 4 is boner worthy. I’m also positive that when I get the machine running on my new TV, I’m going to be smiling ear to ear. However, I still stand by the fact that 600 dollars for a piece of hardware is steep. Had I not saved 400 bucks on the unit (Best Buy marked the PS3 down to 200, and took another 200 off the TV, therefore “saving” you the 600 dollars) I would never have purchased it. The fact of the matter is that not only is the thing damn expensive (though cheap for a Blu-ray player), it just doesn’t have absolutely compelling software on it yet. Sure, VF5 looks amazing, Motorstorm and Resistance are fun, but I don’t think these items are worth the 60 dollar price point on top of all the money you’re going to spend just to play them. As much as I love the medium, they’re just video games after all, not something people should be murdering their wallets over.

Despite what Microsoft and Sony tells us, I guess the more I think about it, I just don’t “need” these things like I thought I did. Sure, ideally I’d love to own all three major platforms, but as an adult it’s tough to find time to play games like I used to, let alone shell out the money for these things. The steep prices of these machines, and the new 60 dollar game standard are a major turn off. I’m finding it harder and harder to get excited for new games, instead opting to wait for the inevitable price drop. If these companies are serious about getting people on board the HD wagon, they best start thinking of some new strategies, because the current ones don’t seem to be doing the trick. Regardless, I still look forward to having fun with the PS3 in the near future, but for now, I have plenty of PS2 games to get through.