WEBVTT - A Tough Start for the PS3 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:07.800 Welcome to text Tuff, a production from I Heart Radio. 0:00:12.080 --> 0:00:14.800 Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, 0:00:14.960 --> 0:00:17.720 Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart Radio 0:00:18.000 --> 0:00:21.360 and I love all things tech, and it is time 0:00:21.400 --> 0:00:24.960 to continue our dive into the history and evolution of 0:00:25.000 --> 0:00:29.680 the PlayStation line of consoles. In our last episode in 0:00:29.720 --> 0:00:33.080 this series, which was the second one, I talked about 0:00:33.120 --> 0:00:36.000 how the success of the PS one led right into 0:00:36.080 --> 0:00:39.920 the even bigger success of the PS two. This is 0:00:39.960 --> 0:00:43.840 one of those rare cases where the sequel outperforms the original. 0:00:44.320 --> 0:00:48.160 The PlayStation two was a phenomenal success. I also talked 0:00:48.159 --> 0:00:51.360 about how the dual shock controller debut late into the 0:00:51.400 --> 0:00:54.320 life cycle of the PS one, and that the PS 0:00:54.360 --> 0:00:58.160 two version became the real basis for all dual shock 0:00:58.280 --> 0:01:02.480 style controllers moving for word with some exceptions. But I 0:01:02.520 --> 0:01:06.280 didn't spend any time talking about how those controllers actually work, 0:01:06.680 --> 0:01:08.800 so I thought I should give a moment to do 0:01:08.840 --> 0:01:10.959 that before we continue down the path of the history 0:01:11.000 --> 0:01:13.280 of the consoles. Because this is tech stuff, we do 0:01:13.400 --> 0:01:17.039 talk about how tech works. And besides, I like using 0:01:17.080 --> 0:01:20.080 these histories as a way to introduce people to different 0:01:20.080 --> 0:01:25.600 types of technologies. So the original PlayStation one controller did 0:01:25.640 --> 0:01:30.399 not have the analog thumbsticks. It had fourteen buttons, and 0:01:30.440 --> 0:01:32.920 those were the eight that I've already mentioned in the 0:01:32.920 --> 0:01:35.759 previous episode, the four direction buttons on the left side 0:01:35.840 --> 0:01:38.280 and the four action buttons on the right side. Can't 0:01:38.280 --> 0:01:40.839 wait for people to yell at me for calling something 0:01:40.880 --> 0:01:45.559 that was pink red or whatever. But I was looking 0:01:45.560 --> 0:01:47.319 at a really bad photo and I didn't have my 0:01:47.319 --> 0:01:49.280 PlayStation controller in front of me, and this just tells 0:01:49.320 --> 0:01:52.800 you I don't play the PlayStation very much anyway. The 0:01:52.840 --> 0:01:56.160 action that the buttons did all depended on the game. 0:01:56.400 --> 0:01:58.919 Right it might be a jump button or a weapon button, 0:01:59.200 --> 0:02:02.560 or it might have you speak or whatever. In between 0:02:02.600 --> 0:02:05.279 those two banks of buttons are a pair of buttons 0:02:05.400 --> 0:02:09.600 labeled start and select, and typically games would map these 0:02:09.639 --> 0:02:13.240 two functions like pause or an inventory button, or to 0:02:13.280 --> 0:02:16.280 back out of a menu or something similar to that. Then, 0:02:16.440 --> 0:02:18.760 on the back of the controller, or rather on the 0:02:18.760 --> 0:02:20.960 the side of the controller that faces the television. Some 0:02:21.000 --> 0:02:24.200 people call it the front of the controller, um, but anyway, 0:02:24.240 --> 0:02:26.520 it's facing the same way you are toward the TV. 0:02:27.240 --> 0:02:29.680 There are four shoulder buttons, two on the left and 0:02:29.680 --> 0:02:33.040 two on the right, mounted in a top button bottom configuration, 0:02:33.480 --> 0:02:38.280 and under each button inside the controller is a metal disc. 0:02:38.800 --> 0:02:42.480 Pressing on the button means that the button presses against 0:02:42.480 --> 0:02:46.880 the metal disc, which deforms, and a thin conductive strip 0:02:46.960 --> 0:02:50.280 that's mounted above a circuit board inside the controller is 0:02:50.320 --> 0:02:53.640 pushed so that it makes some contact with that circuit board, 0:02:53.680 --> 0:02:55.919 and that acts like an on switch in a regular 0:02:55.919 --> 0:02:59.400 old circuit. It completes a circuit. So when you press 0:02:59.480 --> 0:03:02.200 down on the button, you complete that circuit. You let 0:03:02.240 --> 0:03:04.760 current move through that particular path, and that sends a 0:03:04.800 --> 0:03:08.400 signal to the game system that that specific button has 0:03:08.440 --> 0:03:11.840 been pressed and that the game maps that to whatever 0:03:11.919 --> 0:03:16.200 input it's uh it's it's keyed to, so that your 0:03:16.360 --> 0:03:18.960 character or whatever in the game does whatever it is 0:03:19.000 --> 0:03:22.799 supposed to do. The PS two's dual shock two controllers 0:03:23.120 --> 0:03:27.520 introduced a new feature with those buttons. They were pressure sensitive, 0:03:27.680 --> 0:03:29.440 so it wasn't just that you could push the buttons, 0:03:29.639 --> 0:03:32.640 it was how you push the buttons that would determine 0:03:32.800 --> 0:03:36.640 actions in certain games. So game developers could actually design 0:03:36.720 --> 0:03:40.040 games in which the gameplay would change depending on how 0:03:40.080 --> 0:03:42.880 hard they pressed a button. So a game developer could 0:03:42.880 --> 0:03:45.280 program a game so that if you tapped on a button, 0:03:45.360 --> 0:03:47.760 you might do a little hop in the game, but 0:03:47.880 --> 0:03:50.560 pushing harder on the button would make your character do 0:03:50.640 --> 0:03:53.600 a full jump in the game. Or you could map 0:03:53.640 --> 0:03:56.080 a melee attack buttons so that if you tapped on it, 0:03:56.200 --> 0:03:58.760 you just give a little love tap to somebody, and 0:03:58.800 --> 0:04:01.080 if you held the button down nice and hard, you 0:04:01.120 --> 0:04:03.880 to really wallop them. So how did they do that 0:04:04.040 --> 0:04:06.520 from a tech perspective, Well, it's similar to what I 0:04:06.560 --> 0:04:09.880 already described, except when you push lightly on the button, 0:04:10.080 --> 0:04:14.240 only a small portion of that conductive strip would make 0:04:14.360 --> 0:04:17.080 contact with the circuit would be pressed down and make 0:04:17.120 --> 0:04:19.400 a light point of contact on the circuit. If you 0:04:19.440 --> 0:04:23.120 pressed harder than more of the conductive strip would make 0:04:23.160 --> 0:04:26.279 more of a contact with a circuit board, and the 0:04:26.360 --> 0:04:29.640 change in conductivity gets registered by the PS two. It's 0:04:29.680 --> 0:04:33.520 essentially metering them, it's measuring it. So the PS two 0:04:33.560 --> 0:04:36.400 is looking not just from a for a signal and 0:04:36.440 --> 0:04:39.400 where it's from, but how strong that signal is if 0:04:39.440 --> 0:04:41.640 you can think of it that way and then interprets 0:04:41.680 --> 0:04:46.600 that as the appropriate in game action. Now I should 0:04:46.600 --> 0:04:48.920 add that this is a feature that wouldn't last through 0:04:49.000 --> 0:04:53.720 all dual shock controllers after the dual Shock too, Sony 0:04:53.760 --> 0:04:56.440 would end up dropping this further down the line, and 0:04:56.480 --> 0:04:59.600 that caused some gamers frustration because it meant that if 0:04:59.600 --> 0:05:03.680 they were playing older games on newer consoles. Let's say 0:05:03.720 --> 0:05:06.280 you buy a new console that's got some backwards compatibility 0:05:06.279 --> 0:05:09.320 to it and you want to play an old game 0:05:09.400 --> 0:05:12.159 that had this capability build into it. Well, your current 0:05:12.200 --> 0:05:16.479 controller no longer has that function, so their game is 0:05:16.680 --> 0:05:20.320 somewhat hampered because of it. That's one of the risks 0:05:20.720 --> 0:05:24.800 of including new features in hardware, because further down the line, 0:05:24.839 --> 0:05:28.640 in a future iteration, you might drop that feature and 0:05:28.720 --> 0:05:32.800 you might lose some access to legacy software. This supplies 0:05:32.839 --> 0:05:36.760 not just to video game consoles, to everything really anyway. 0:05:37.040 --> 0:05:38.720 At that point, you could argue that some of those 0:05:38.720 --> 0:05:41.120 games would turn into abandoned ware because you couldn't play 0:05:41.200 --> 0:05:45.200 them properly. Getting back to the controller, the thumbsticks are 0:05:45.240 --> 0:05:49.159 analog and they rely on potentiometers, which in turn are 0:05:49.440 --> 0:05:54.360 variable resistors, and that means that these components create electrical 0:05:54.520 --> 0:05:58.120 resistance in a circuit. And these components are adjustable so 0:05:58.160 --> 0:06:01.200 that you can change the amount of electrical resistance that 0:06:01.360 --> 0:06:04.760 is applied and yeah, if you're like me, a sense 0:06:04.800 --> 0:06:07.200 like that doesn't necessarily clear stuff up right away, So 0:06:07.279 --> 0:06:10.800 let's break it all down. Resistance is what it sounds like. 0:06:10.880 --> 0:06:14.640 It describes how a particular material resists the flow of 0:06:14.720 --> 0:06:18.400 electricity through it. And it's kind of like friction. If 0:06:18.440 --> 0:06:20.480 you think of a surface, like a rough surface, having 0:06:20.520 --> 0:06:23.359 a lot of friction, trying to push something across it 0:06:23.400 --> 0:06:26.279 is really hard. Trying to push something across a very 0:06:26.320 --> 0:06:29.240 smooth surface is much easier. You still have friction, but 0:06:29.360 --> 0:06:32.520 not nearly as much. Well, the same is true with 0:06:32.560 --> 0:06:37.200 electrical conductivity. Conductive materials have some level of electrical resistance. 0:06:37.560 --> 0:06:40.160 Some of them allow electricity to pass through pretty easily 0:06:40.560 --> 0:06:45.720 and some don't. And like friction, typically the byproduct you get, 0:06:46.000 --> 0:06:49.039 you know, because you're losing that energy somehow. Energy cannot 0:06:49.040 --> 0:06:52.280 be created or destroyed, but it can be converted. Instead 0:06:52.279 --> 0:06:54.599 of that being electrical energy, you're losing it in the 0:06:54.640 --> 0:06:58.240 form of heat. So your electronics heat up because they're 0:06:58.279 --> 0:07:01.680 not perfect conductors. And uh so that's that's kind of 0:07:01.680 --> 0:07:04.520 a basic description of electrical resistance, and a lot of 0:07:04.560 --> 0:07:09.520 stuff can affect the resistance of a particular type of material. 0:07:10.080 --> 0:07:12.800 You know, you can't just say that copper has a 0:07:12.880 --> 0:07:17.520 specific electrical resistance, because things like the thickness of a 0:07:17.560 --> 0:07:21.440 copper wire can determine that the thinner a copper wire, 0:07:21.480 --> 0:07:23.520 the higher the resistance. So if you have a thick 0:07:23.640 --> 0:07:27.000 copper cable has a much lower electrical resistance than a 0:07:27.040 --> 0:07:30.400 thin copper wire. But also temperature can affect it. If 0:07:30.440 --> 0:07:35.800 you cool conductors down, then their resistance decreases. That's why 0:07:35.840 --> 0:07:39.000 things like the large Hadron collider have these super cooled 0:07:39.920 --> 0:07:43.920 elements to make super conductors, and those are conductors in 0:07:43.960 --> 0:07:47.520 which you don't lose any electrical energy at all to heat. 0:07:47.520 --> 0:07:49.640 They just what you put in is what's getting out 0:07:49.680 --> 0:07:55.480 the other side. Essentially, potentiometers are slightly different. They have 0:07:55.600 --> 0:07:59.040 components that let you adjust the amount of resistance that's 0:07:59.040 --> 0:08:00.760 in a circuit. You can turn it up or turn 0:08:00.800 --> 0:08:03.520 it down, and that allows you to control the amount 0:08:03.520 --> 0:08:05.840 of current flowing through a circuit, assuming you've got a 0:08:05.880 --> 0:08:08.680 constant voltage. And if you want to think about it 0:08:08.720 --> 0:08:11.960 in terms of pipes and water, a potentiometer is kind 0:08:12.000 --> 0:08:14.760 of like an adjustable valve that can either let more 0:08:14.960 --> 0:08:18.240 or less water through it. And I'm oversimplifying here just 0:08:18.320 --> 0:08:20.520 to kind of give you an analogy, but you get 0:08:20.560 --> 0:08:23.760 the point. So back to the controller. The thumbsticks on 0:08:23.800 --> 0:08:27.920 the dual shock controller have two potentiometers each, and they're 0:08:28.280 --> 0:08:31.160 under the controllers and they're mounted at right angles to 0:08:31.200 --> 0:08:35.000 one another. And the what happens is when you move 0:08:35.040 --> 0:08:39.920 the thumbstick, it changes the potentiometers slightly, and current flows 0:08:39.960 --> 0:08:42.720 through these at a steady rate. As you move the thumbstick, 0:08:42.800 --> 0:08:46.720 it changes the resistance in those potentiometers. And by monitoring 0:08:46.920 --> 0:08:50.240 the current flowing through these circuits, the PlayStation can determine 0:08:50.240 --> 0:08:53.760 the exact position of that thumbstick. So moving it one 0:08:53.800 --> 0:08:57.000 way might affect the electrical resistance of one of those 0:08:57.000 --> 0:09:00.760 two potentiometers and not the other. But owing that, the 0:09:00.800 --> 0:09:03.880 PlayStation knows which way the thumbstick was moved and exactly 0:09:03.920 --> 0:09:06.600 how far it was moved, because this is in degrees, right, 0:09:07.679 --> 0:09:10.720 Maybe you move it one way, both potentiometers increase the 0:09:10.720 --> 0:09:13.960 electrical resistance. You move it another way, both the potentiometers 0:09:14.040 --> 0:09:17.160 decrease the electrical resistance. All of this is invisible to 0:09:17.240 --> 0:09:19.480 the player. You know, we would not be aware of it, 0:09:19.720 --> 0:09:21.960 but this is how the PlayStation is able to determine 0:09:22.000 --> 0:09:25.160 exactly where the thumbstick is at any given moment, and 0:09:25.200 --> 0:09:29.400 it gives very precise controls to the player. So a 0:09:29.480 --> 0:09:32.560 game developer can create a game where you can have 0:09:32.640 --> 0:09:38.080 these very precise requirements for players to maneuver their characters through. 0:09:38.400 --> 0:09:41.760 It's really what allowed game developers to create that frame 0:09:41.960 --> 0:09:46.760 perfect kind of rage inducing platforming game that I am 0:09:46.840 --> 0:09:51.400 so bad at. Anyway, that's how the thumbsticks work, and 0:09:51.520 --> 0:09:54.840 it's all about converting that information into essentially a location 0:09:54.880 --> 0:09:57.000 on an X Y access. It's just the same as 0:09:57.000 --> 0:09:58.600 if you were to get a bunch of chart paper 0:09:59.160 --> 0:10:01.720 and you were to start plotting points on the chart. 0:10:02.240 --> 0:10:04.040 It's the same sort of thing. The points would represent 0:10:04.080 --> 0:10:06.800 the position of the thumbsticks. It's pretty neat and and 0:10:07.400 --> 0:10:11.520 I think it was a clever way to engineer these 0:10:11.600 --> 0:10:15.160 uh these thumbsticks in an analog way. Now, not all 0:10:15.240 --> 0:10:20.080 games support this feature, right Like some games might have 0:10:20.120 --> 0:10:21.600 it where you have a character and if you push 0:10:21.679 --> 0:10:24.280 the thumbstick a little bit, your character starts to creep 0:10:24.320 --> 0:10:27.079 across the screen, and if you push the thumbstick all 0:10:27.080 --> 0:10:30.400 the way to its stopping point, then your character will 0:10:30.400 --> 0:10:32.920 break out into a run. But some games take a 0:10:32.960 --> 0:10:37.520 more digital approach, meaning it's either happening or it's not happening. 0:10:37.559 --> 0:10:40.080 So if you push the thumbstick a little or a lot, 0:10:40.160 --> 0:10:44.200 your character moves the same either way that that sometimes happens. 0:10:44.200 --> 0:10:46.640 That's that's sort of a good way of understanding the 0:10:46.640 --> 0:10:49.760 difference between digital and analog. Analog is a is a 0:10:49.840 --> 0:10:55.320 nice smooth curve, right, it's it's degrees, it's uh, you're 0:10:55.360 --> 0:10:59.280 moving in a nice smooth motion from one state to another. 0:10:59.679 --> 0:11:03.480 Dig All is much more step like. It's either on 0:11:03.640 --> 0:11:07.560 or off, or it's in steps, so it has a 0:11:07.640 --> 0:11:12.040 discrete amount that is added with each step. It's not 0:11:12.200 --> 0:11:14.640 something that's a smooth curve. Now, you can have lots 0:11:14.679 --> 0:11:17.640 of tiny little steps, and if you have enough tiny 0:11:17.679 --> 0:11:21.079 little steps, you can simulate a smooth curve. But in reality, 0:11:21.080 --> 0:11:22.800 if you were to zoom weigh in, you would see 0:11:22.800 --> 0:11:25.160 it's more like a staircase, not a not an unbroken 0:11:25.160 --> 0:11:29.280 curve the way analog is. Then there's the vibrating component 0:11:29.320 --> 0:11:31.400 to the dual shot controller and this works the same 0:11:31.440 --> 0:11:34.240 way vibrating motors work and stuff like cell phones, and 0:11:34.240 --> 0:11:37.720 it's pretty simple gun electric motor or in the case 0:11:37.760 --> 0:11:40.520 of a dual shot controller, you actually have two electric motors. 0:11:40.520 --> 0:11:43.400 They're both in the base on either side of the 0:11:43.440 --> 0:11:47.160 controller where your your hands go, and on the shaft 0:11:47.280 --> 0:11:51.760 of this electric motor is a slightly offset unbalanced weight, 0:11:52.320 --> 0:11:55.720 and so as the shaft spins, that unbalanced weight causes 0:11:55.800 --> 0:11:59.319 some wobble in the electric motor. Except the electric motor 0:11:59.400 --> 0:12:02.600 is actually firmly mounted inside the controller, it can't wobble 0:12:02.640 --> 0:12:06.760 because it's mounted to a larger structure. However, that wobble 0:12:06.800 --> 0:12:09.520 then gets transmitted to the controller as a whole as 0:12:09.559 --> 0:12:13.240 this sort of vibrating, buzzing thing. And that's where that 0:12:13.400 --> 0:12:16.439 technology comes from as how it works, and it's used 0:12:16.440 --> 0:12:18.800 in all sorts of stuff like cell phones, for example, 0:12:18.880 --> 0:12:20.959 have these If you have a cellphone with a vibrate function, 0:12:21.240 --> 0:12:23.679 that's what's happening. So let's jump back to the PS 0:12:23.720 --> 0:12:26.480 two now. As I mentioned in the last episode, the 0:12:26.520 --> 0:12:29.000 PS two had a phenomenal launch and it would go 0:12:29.040 --> 0:12:32.320 on to become the best selling home console of all 0:12:32.440 --> 0:12:35.160 time as of the recording of this podcast, And in 0:12:35.200 --> 0:12:38.239 case you're wondering, second place would go to the Nintendo 0:12:38.440 --> 0:12:42.480 d S handheld system. And even that's about a million 0:12:42.559 --> 0:12:46.320 units behind the PlayStation two. Pretty phenomenal, especially when you 0:12:46.360 --> 0:12:49.360 look at the you know, the expense of both of 0:12:49.400 --> 0:12:53.400 those consoles, and the fact that the handheld one being portable, 0:12:53.480 --> 0:12:56.720 has its own level of of pros and cons to it. 0:12:57.240 --> 0:12:59.720 I mentioned in the previous episode that Sony did not 0:13:00.040 --> 0:13:03.080 jump on the internet bandwagon right away. Back during the 0:13:03.080 --> 0:13:06.719 original PlayStation days, Sony did introduce a link cable that 0:13:06.800 --> 0:13:11.280 would let players link to PlayStation systems together for network play. 0:13:11.320 --> 0:13:13.960 You could do system to system play. However, that also 0:13:14.040 --> 0:13:16.720 required both of these consoles to be connected to their 0:13:16.720 --> 0:13:20.000 own respective television sets, so you would need to PS 0:13:20.080 --> 0:13:22.680 ones and two televisions to make this work, but it 0:13:22.760 --> 0:13:26.280 wasn't capable of connecting online. The PS two initially didn't 0:13:26.320 --> 0:13:29.680 come out with any way to connect to the internet either. Instead, 0:13:29.960 --> 0:13:33.320 two years after they launched the system, Sony released a 0:13:33.360 --> 0:13:36.720 modem as a peripheral most of the PlayStation two models, 0:13:36.800 --> 0:13:38.880 and keep in mind there were a lot of different 0:13:38.880 --> 0:13:41.920 PlayStation two models. You can say PlayStation two and you've 0:13:41.920 --> 0:13:44.480 got the same basic idea of what it is, but 0:13:44.520 --> 0:13:47.480 there are a lot of variations. The company would refine 0:13:47.679 --> 0:13:51.319 the design and production largely in an effort to streamline 0:13:51.360 --> 0:13:53.800 things and also to cut down on costs over the 0:13:53.960 --> 0:13:56.320 entire course of the life cycle of PlayStation two. Anyway, 0:13:56.640 --> 0:13:59.360 the original ones had an expansion bay on the back 0:13:59.360 --> 0:14:01.240 of the console. So if you looked at the back 0:14:01.280 --> 0:14:02.920 of the console, you would see that there was a cover, 0:14:03.280 --> 0:14:04.840 and you could take the cover off and it would 0:14:04.840 --> 0:14:08.040 remove that cover to the bay. You could see the bay. 0:14:08.040 --> 0:14:10.080 It was a compartment that was large enough to hold 0:14:10.120 --> 0:14:12.920 a hard drive. Sony would also introduce hard drives that 0:14:12.960 --> 0:14:17.440 you could purchase in addition to the base console, and 0:14:17.440 --> 0:14:20.560 it also had a port that the cover would cover up. 0:14:20.880 --> 0:14:24.320 Sony offered up a network adapter, which in North America 0:14:24.360 --> 0:14:26.760 had a phone jack and an Ethernet port on it. 0:14:26.800 --> 0:14:29.480 Everywhere else pretty much just stuck with the Ethernet port 0:14:29.960 --> 0:14:32.640 and it would fit on the back of the console. 0:14:32.960 --> 0:14:35.640 It would just plug directly into that that port, that 0:14:35.760 --> 0:14:38.040 outlet I had talked about a second ago in the 0:14:38.080 --> 0:14:40.560 back of the PS two. It did not fill up 0:14:40.600 --> 0:14:43.240 the bay. It just covered up the bay. However, if 0:14:43.240 --> 0:14:45.560 you wanted to get a hard drive, you would need 0:14:45.600 --> 0:14:48.720 the network adapter and the hard drive. You would connect 0:14:48.920 --> 0:14:51.760 the hard drive to the network adapter. Then you would 0:14:51.760 --> 0:14:54.360 slide the hard drive into the bay. It would be 0:14:54.400 --> 0:14:57.080 nestled in there. The network adapter would plug into the 0:14:57.080 --> 0:15:00.320 outlet in the PS two, so the network adapter acted 0:15:00.320 --> 0:15:03.400 as its own outlet for the hard drive. You couldn't 0:15:03.440 --> 0:15:06.320 just bypass it. There were third party companies that would 0:15:06.320 --> 0:15:11.720 make a type of UH plug that essentially acted like 0:15:11.760 --> 0:15:14.400 the network adapter, except it didn't have a network adapter 0:15:14.520 --> 0:15:16.240 in it. It was just the plug so that you 0:15:16.240 --> 0:15:19.200 could use your own hard drive. But that's another story. 0:15:19.480 --> 0:15:22.840 But now you could have online capabilities after running a 0:15:22.840 --> 0:15:25.720 special startup disc that is in your PS two, and 0:15:25.760 --> 0:15:28.800 you could play games online, certain ones, very few not 0:15:28.840 --> 0:15:31.840 only if you had online capability, the hard drive would 0:15:31.880 --> 0:15:35.680 let the PS to load more game data into the 0:15:35.720 --> 0:15:39.360 memory area. Essentially, it was acting like memory and it 0:15:39.400 --> 0:15:43.520 would bring loading times down during game play, and it 0:15:43.560 --> 0:15:45.360 could also be used as a memory card. You could 0:15:45.440 --> 0:15:49.400 store saves to the hard drive, for example. Some enterprising 0:15:49.440 --> 0:15:52.960 gamers even figured out how to load full games onto 0:15:52.960 --> 0:15:55.960 the hard drive using this system, and that removed the 0:15:55.960 --> 0:15:58.240 need to have a disk to run certain games. It 0:15:58.320 --> 0:16:02.040 also circumvented copy part action, so that would become something 0:16:02.080 --> 0:16:04.120 of a headache for Sony down the line, but not 0:16:04.240 --> 0:16:06.000 many people did it. The people who knew how to 0:16:06.000 --> 0:16:08.160 do it, we're doing it like crazy, but but that 0:16:08.240 --> 0:16:11.400 was a small percentage of the overall population. The PS 0:16:11.440 --> 0:16:14.400 two would also feature an innovation that Sony would build 0:16:14.400 --> 0:16:17.000 on later, and that would be the Eye Toy, and 0:16:17.080 --> 0:16:19.880 that debut in two thousand three. The Eye Toy was 0:16:19.960 --> 0:16:23.359 essentially a webcam. You would set it on your television 0:16:23.480 --> 0:16:25.520 or a shell or whatever. You plug it into the 0:16:25.520 --> 0:16:28.040 PS two. You would have to adjust the focus manually. 0:16:28.080 --> 0:16:29.680 You know, you have to actually turn the lens to 0:16:29.880 --> 0:16:32.520 get it and focus. And you could play certain games 0:16:32.560 --> 0:16:36.000 through motion capture technology. One of my friends is actually 0:16:36.080 --> 0:16:38.240 married to a guy who worked on the Eye Toy 0:16:38.320 --> 0:16:39.800 back in the day, so I got to hear all 0:16:39.840 --> 0:16:41.680 about it back when it was first launching. That was 0:16:41.680 --> 0:16:45.280 pretty cool. A typical Eye Toy game would actually put 0:16:45.320 --> 0:16:47.800 you in the middle of the action. You would see 0:16:47.880 --> 0:16:51.800 a video image of yourself on the television. Your image 0:16:51.800 --> 0:16:53.400 was captured by the Eye Toy, and so as you 0:16:53.400 --> 0:16:56.120 would flail around on the screen, you would get attacked 0:16:56.160 --> 0:16:59.240 by flying monkeys or whatever. So you'd swatted stuff that 0:16:59.320 --> 0:17:02.680 you saw on the sreen and UH that's how gameplay 0:17:02.720 --> 0:17:06.119 typically would unfold. The Eye Toy also featured a microphone 0:17:06.160 --> 0:17:08.560 so it could pick up voice commands, so again it's 0:17:08.600 --> 0:17:13.000 a little prescient. This was years before Microsoft would introduce 0:17:13.040 --> 0:17:16.320 the Connect that wouldn't come out until The Eye Toy 0:17:16.600 --> 0:17:20.240 wasn't quite as sophisticated as the Connect. That's putting it lightly, 0:17:20.320 --> 0:17:23.080 but many of the same design concepts applied to both 0:17:23.119 --> 0:17:26.960 pieces of hardware. Both have cameras and software or firmware. 0:17:27.080 --> 0:17:30.080 They could interpret your movements as input commands for games, 0:17:30.560 --> 0:17:35.320 and both were you could argue, criminally undersupported. Games using 0:17:35.320 --> 0:17:38.000 the Sony Eye Toy were few and far between. From 0:17:38.000 --> 0:17:40.320 what I can tell, there were a fewer than thirty 0:17:40.359 --> 0:17:43.840 titles that actually required the Eye Toy, and only eight 0:17:43.880 --> 0:17:47.240 of those were ever available in the United States. There 0:17:47.240 --> 0:17:50.600 were some other games that included eye toy support so 0:17:50.680 --> 0:17:54.200 as an option, not a requirement, but those were more 0:17:54.240 --> 0:17:58.280 like games that had some added features. They weren't created 0:17:58.359 --> 0:18:01.640 with the Eye Toy experience mind, and most of those 0:18:01.680 --> 0:18:04.560 games would end up being really similar most of the 0:18:04.560 --> 0:18:07.159 Eye toy games that you could buy, they were all 0:18:07.240 --> 0:18:09.760 like variations on the same themes like rhythm games that 0:18:09.760 --> 0:18:14.000 would require you to reach towards certain points around you 0:18:14.080 --> 0:18:16.240 on a timed beat, so kind of like Beat Saber, 0:18:16.400 --> 0:18:19.119 but on a very primitive level. Or there might be 0:18:19.160 --> 0:18:21.920 a fighting game where you're you know, moving your arms around, 0:18:21.920 --> 0:18:24.680 flailing wildly trying to fight off a boxer or martial 0:18:24.800 --> 0:18:28.440 arts opponent. You know, the details changed from game to game, 0:18:28.520 --> 0:18:31.680 but the basic gameplay was really similar across the board. 0:18:32.160 --> 0:18:36.359 Microsoft would go through its own kind of the same 0:18:36.400 --> 0:18:39.359 story with the Connect years later, and also the Second 0:18:39.359 --> 0:18:43.320 Connect even after that, but that's a different story. Another 0:18:43.400 --> 0:18:46.600 game type debuted on the PS two and that required 0:18:46.640 --> 0:18:50.879 a peripheral and that would be singing games. Harmonics was 0:18:50.960 --> 0:18:53.719 the first to do this with Karaoke Revolution in two 0:18:53.800 --> 0:18:57.960 thousand three, which shipped with a Logitech headset that included 0:18:58.000 --> 0:19:01.639 a microphone. Later, game like sing Star would launch with 0:19:01.760 --> 0:19:04.639 a handheld USB mic or a pair of them, and 0:19:04.680 --> 0:19:07.040 you could plug them into the PS two, and both 0:19:07.080 --> 0:19:09.560 games had players try to match the pitch of a 0:19:09.640 --> 0:19:12.440 song that's indicated on screen. The closer you were to 0:19:12.520 --> 0:19:15.639 being on pitch, the higher your score would be. Harmonics 0:19:15.680 --> 0:19:18.000 would follow this up in two thousand five with Guitar 0:19:18.080 --> 0:19:21.800 Hero and the iconic guitar shaped controller that debuted on 0:19:21.840 --> 0:19:25.639 the PS two. So a lot of very innovative style 0:19:25.720 --> 0:19:28.560 games were starting to make their first appearance on the 0:19:28.600 --> 0:19:31.359 PS two, and that really helped the console as well. 0:19:32.000 --> 0:19:36.840 They had tons of iconic games from established developers as 0:19:36.880 --> 0:19:39.920 well as uh. They were acting like a platform where 0:19:39.960 --> 0:19:44.120 you could find some really interesting or downright weird games 0:19:44.160 --> 0:19:47.120 from more obscure companies and developers, and that mix would 0:19:47.119 --> 0:19:49.520 be something that Sony would foster throughout the life cycle 0:19:49.560 --> 0:19:52.560 of the console and beyond. I'll talk more about them 0:19:52.600 --> 0:19:54.280 in a little bit later, and when we come back, 0:19:54.320 --> 0:19:56.600 i'll wrap up with the PS two, and then we'll 0:19:56.640 --> 0:19:58.480 start to look at the console that would follow in 0:19:58.520 --> 0:20:02.800 its footsteps by taking some pretty drastic changes to the model. 0:20:03.160 --> 0:20:14.119 But first let's take a quick break. So the PS 0:20:14.160 --> 0:20:18.280 two saw incredible success, that's loving it. Lightly huge games 0:20:18.320 --> 0:20:20.880 like God of War got their start on the PS two. 0:20:21.280 --> 0:20:24.119 Grand Theft Auto three, which, while it was the third 0:20:24.240 --> 0:20:27.240 entry in a series, took a game that had previously 0:20:27.280 --> 0:20:30.360 been a top down view game you were looking at 0:20:30.359 --> 0:20:33.080 the world from above and you would control a car 0:20:33.280 --> 0:20:36.680 that way. They switched it to a third person style game. 0:20:36.760 --> 0:20:40.199 They helped launch the sandbox game genre, not that it 0:20:40.280 --> 0:20:42.760 was the first or only one of its type, but 0:20:42.800 --> 0:20:44.399 it was one of the most popular ones, and it 0:20:44.560 --> 0:20:46.560 got a lot of other game developers getting into that 0:20:47.080 --> 0:20:50.000 realm of game, and we've seen so many since then. 0:20:50.640 --> 0:20:53.720 Shadow of the Colossus was a game that gave people 0:20:53.720 --> 0:20:56.440 who argued the video games are a form of art. 0:20:56.520 --> 0:20:58.800 They gave them a lot of momentum because that game 0:20:58.880 --> 0:21:03.199 is gorgeous. The Final Fantasy series continued to dominate on 0:21:03.280 --> 0:21:06.679 the PS two. Ratchett and Clank became a franchise on 0:21:06.720 --> 0:21:09.359 the PS two. The series would go on through many 0:21:09.400 --> 0:21:13.760 future generations of the PlayStation console. Katamari Demassi was one 0:21:13.760 --> 0:21:17.680 of the stranger games for the console that got mainstream support. 0:21:18.160 --> 0:21:20.480 So if you don't know what that game is, you 0:21:20.560 --> 0:21:23.359 are in charge of rolling around a little sticky ball 0:21:23.440 --> 0:21:25.760 that picks up stuff in game environments. The ball gets 0:21:25.800 --> 0:21:27.720 bigger as you do it, and you pick up bigger 0:21:27.760 --> 0:21:30.679 and bigger stuff. And it's also that you can rebuild 0:21:30.680 --> 0:21:33.400 the cosmos because your dad done blowed it up real 0:21:33.480 --> 0:21:38.720 good by accident. There are literally hundreds of popular titles 0:21:38.760 --> 0:21:41.320 on the PS two that either got their start there 0:21:41.760 --> 0:21:45.439 or they found incredible success there, and justice Sony had 0:21:45.480 --> 0:21:47.879 done with the PS one, the company would continue to 0:21:47.920 --> 0:21:51.920 support the PS two long after introducing the next generation 0:21:51.920 --> 0:21:56.280