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Friday, May 20, 2011

The Playstation Network Outage


If you keep up with even the slightest bit of gaming news (or own a PS3), you'll know about the Playstation Network outage that has plagued gamers for about a month now. It's been pretty much the biggest hub-bub in the gaming scene as of late. In case you haven't heard about it, the PSN was basically attacked by a hacker collective known as Anonymous due in part to the George Hotz incident. The personal data of millions of PSN users (including credit card information) was compromised, and Sony was forced to shut the entire network down until they could re-work their entire security infrastructure and make sure there were no loose ends.

In the beginning, Sony had claimed that they could get the network back in a week, but that was extended further and further until it reached a full month. Fans were understandably angry, and they issued apology after apology whilst preparing a welcome back package to compensate for the downtime. I wasn't part of that angry mob, however, and I'll tell you why...


I was barely affected by the outage at all. Though I love my PS3, I was away at college for the entire time the PSN was down, so I never even got to play my PS3 except for the occasional saturday. But even when I was playing, I don't play any online multiplayer and Netflix still worked, so it wasn't a bother at all. I do like checking the Playstation Store and downloading demos though, and I've been wanting to buy the new game Outland, which is apparently amazing, so that's been kind of bothering me (the store comes back on the 24th). 


What I'm trying to say is, I don't share everyone's rage about the whole incident. I understand it is ridiculous for the entire network to be gone for so long, but there are worse things than not being able to play Call of Duty deathmatches online. Sony is obviously not willing to take any shortcuts whatsoever in order to insure that their network is resistant to hackers. Xbox Live will throw in the occasional patch to fix loose ends in their network, and that won't take more than a day. But what Sony is doing is re-building the entire security network into something much stronger than before. As long as it is for the better, I'm willing to give them as much time as they need.

I hate hearing all this "I'll never trust Sony ever again!" bullshit. I mean, really? Grow the fuck up. Shit happens, and they're taking every precaution to make sure it doesn't happen again. It's not even like you're entitled to it (PSN is fucking free). People are letting their anger over not being able to play games online cloud their judgment. Its sad really. It's back up anyway, so hopefully the shit storm dies down as soon as the Playstation store is back up.

Well, at least we get some free stuff as compensation. I feel like I'm just getting a treat because I didn't even care about the outage. Along with a bunch of other meaningless things, every PSN user gets to pick 2 out of 5 games to download for free! It's not just third-rate shit either. The choices are...

                                        Wipeout HD                                         Dead Nation

                                               inFamous                                   LittleBigPlanet

                                                                   Super Stardust HD

The obvious choices here are infamous and LittleBigPlanet, as they are two of the PS3's most acclaimed titles. I don't have either of them and I've been wanting to try them, so they are my choices. I already own Dead Nation, and I actually highly recommend it to people who own the other two titles. It's tons of fun to play with a friend, and just a great alternative to Left 4 Dead. But yeah...free games!

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