The Koopatorivm

Could there be something fundamentally wrong with the PS3?

Consider, if you will, the following facts:

 1) Of the three newest consoles, both the XBox 360 and Wii have shown rather dramatic defects near release. A few of the 360s were known to overheat to the point of lighting themselves on fire. A few burnt apartments and lawsuits later, a recall was issued, and we learned that these select few systems overheated because they didn't have fans. On the one hand, you'd think that fans would be a rather important part of the picture and somebody would have caught this. On the other hand, if you can play enough time playing Halo 2 to the point where you cause your XBox to melt, there's probably something fundamentally wrong with you.

And then the Wii. It seems that there's a slight problem with the Wii wriststraps- they break at the worst possible times. I would have thought that there would have been some sort of playtesting involved on the straps, but maybe the playtesters committed the grave mistake of reading the instruction manual, which clearly states, "Please do not imitate an epileptic on Las Vegas' Strip at nighttime while holding the controller, you moron".

There's one shoe...

(read more after the jump) 

Consider, if you will, the following facts:

 1) Of the three newest consoles, both the XBox 360 and Wii have shown rather dramatic defects near release. A few of the 360s were known to overheat to the point of lighting themselves on fire. A few burnt apartments and lawsuits later, a recall was issued, and we learned that these select few systems overheated because they didn't have fans. On the one hand, you'd think that fans would be a rather important part of the picture and somebody would have caught this. On the other hand, if you can play enough time playing Halo 2 to the point where you cause your XBox to melt, there's probably something fundamentally wrong with you.

And then the Wii. It seems that there's a slight problem with the Wii wriststraps- they break at the worst possible times. I would have thought that there would have been some sort of playtesting involved on the straps, but maybe the playtesters committed the grave mistake of reading the instruction manual, which clearly states, "Please do not imitate an epileptic on Las Vegas' Strip at nighttime while holding the controller, you moron".

There's one shoe...

2) Sony seems to be doing something wrong with its gaming division. There's plenty of rumors flying around; apparently, every PS3 is being sold at a loss, and Sony expects to lost $1.7 billion by the end of Q1 2007. (A scathing, not-work-safe report can be found here.) Whereas once everybody wanted a Sony of their own-y, they sound like they're having problems lately. Look at the PS2- oftentimes the disc reader would fold its arms, pout out its lip, and tell you that it wasn't readin' no more discs. Some people also got suckered into buying stands so that their PS2s could stand on their sides, which, while supposedly making your clunk of hardware look sexier, also encouraged it to permanently ruin your game discs. Between the shoddy work in its little brother and the current finacial stress on the compan, it seems likely that there may be some poor work in the PS3 as well.

...And there's the other.

The PS3 has the great misfortune of not being part of a 'cursed' console lineup, but also being released by a 'cursed' company. The signs tell us that something wicked this way comes for our friend, the Sony PlayStation 3.

The only question that remains: What is it?

Well, if Sony's television adverts are to be believed, the PS3 has four main capabilities: It can hatch eggs, solve Rubik's Cubes, mesmerize really creepy electronic baby dolls, and leak. I'd be most worried about that last one. What seems now like an innocent and novel feature could go drastically wrong, causing the PS3 to do anything from peeing on your carpet to flooding your basement.

In the event that the PS3 is recalled on the account of causing floods, you'd be wise to put it next to your XBox 360, so that it can put out the fires that your naughty XBox will create.