Yesterday I likened the PSN disaster to the Gulf Oil Spill. Obviously one is much worse than the other, but the way the information has flowed seems identical. It was at first brushed under the rug as a temporary thing, but as time went on it still wasn't fixed and eventually we learned this was potentially a long term problem and a genuine disaster (in Sony's case the credit card info). Anyway this does have the makings to be one of the biggest fuck up the industry has ever seen.

So in that spirit let's share some other epic failures. Things that affected both the business and the consumers. Red Ring of Death would have to be up there, and maybe PS3 Apocalypse.  The only other things I can think of would be:

1. Sega abandoning the Saturn and ultimately their userbase.

2. Nintendo inviting Sony into the industry - though in fairness this was probably never a bad thing for the consumer and only Nintendo.

The way MS rushed the Xbox 360 out with little QA as to hardware quality, or maybe they knew and rushed it out anyway.  Either way the whole Next Gen of Hardware including PS3 is way too fragile.

_Bear said:

The way MS rushed the Xbox 360 out with little QA as to hardware quality, or maybe they knew and rushed it out anyway.  Either way the whole Next Gen of Hardware including PS3 is way too fragile.

They officially lost a billion USD on this one.  It has to be the biggest FU in gaming history in economic terms. At best Sony is only losing millions with the current outage.  They will lose more in console sales later because the following concept will be seared into gamer's minds, "Yeah you have to pay for XBL, but Microsoft knows how to handle online better".

What is similar to the apocalyPS3 and this PSN outage is the apparent cluelessness at Sony (or their inability to communicate with the customers).

The entire design and marketing of the Atari 5200 "SuperSystem." *shudders*

I still want one, though.

With the CC information stolen, I think this will now eclipse the Red Ring problems MS had.  If Sony has to pay for credit protection for millions of users, I can see the financial impact on this one going over a billion.

FYI, when a company is responsible for your personal information being accessible they are required by some executive agency to provide those exposed with a credit protection service for a few years.  Basically it puts your "account" on alert at Experian so that if anything negative shows up they investigate it -- or send you a note indicating you should check it out or challenge it.

That's hella paraphrased, but you get the idea.  Bottom line is Sony would have to pay for that service for millions of users for multiple years.

aspro said:

No you don't.  The AV hookup on that fucker is a pain in the ass.

Not on the two controller port model. Its the same as on the 2600.

I paid $20 for Shenmue. 30 minutes later, I wanted my money back.

It took you 30 minutes to get to that point. You're a patient man. You probably made it much further into Ico than I did.

Yeah I made it about an hour into ICO, and the Snail pace said ok your done. It did have beautiful art work, but the whole Co-op without another player thing drives me nuts. Playing coop with yourself meh.

I hope the dude who steals mine suffers with the shittiness of that turd of a game, Noby Noby Boy.