Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you a rant of epic proportions. It will be one that will go down in history as one of the best rants ever. It will be the Filet Mignon of editorials. No other editorial will come close to this one.

I present to you the rant about.....HYPE!

...right after the jump....

After hyping up this article, I hope that you will not be too disappointed. Will this be the apex of editorial writing as we know it? Sadly, this is not the case. I will not be able to live up to the hype that I myself have created. It will disappoint some of you and yet some of you will revel in my failure. I assume there will be more of the latter than the former though. Although, maybe I can get a PR gig out of my hype building, one never knows.

Everything these days has hype these days, from energy drinks to the newest luxury car; our culture thrives on the latest and greatest. The marketing teams for companies or those hire by companies know this and fully intend to exploit it. They push the boundaries of realism to unheard of heights. Let's take Red Bull, for example, since it supposedly gives you "wings". If you've ever been either a) drunk, b) very tired, or c) a combination of both then you know that when you drink a red bull, you don't all of the sudden feel fresh and energetic. It's quite the contrary, you still feel like complete crap but instead of getting to sleep it off like most people do, you get to spend an extra hour or so in misery. It's great I tell you. What does this have to do with gaming you might ask? I'm getting to that. I just wanted to show an example of how hype is getting out of control for all products not just entertainment ones. Who can name the newest Coca-Cola produced energy drink...........................?

Vault

I bet most of you got it before even looking down to see it. Why? It's because every magazine you read, or every channel that you watch is plastered with advertising for the latest and greatest energy drink to hit the market.

This brings me to the gaming companies who constantly promise the latest graphics, sound, innovations, etc. for their newest games even if it's just a sequel to a game and truthfully is only a minor upgrade across the board. They do this because casual gamers still buy into the idea and even some hardcore ones do too. It's a sad state of affairs but it's what happens when you hear things that you want to believe so eventually you hear it so much that you DO believe it. Some people are more susceptible to this "spell" than others but most of us have fallen under it at least a dozen times before. Occasionally a game or product breaks through the hype and actually deliver what we feel was promised to us but more often than not, said product leaves us disappointed and wanting more. We go back and frantically look at all the previews to make sure that we weren't imagining the features that were going to be in the product. Take Fable, for example, a very good game in its own right. It had a massive hype build up. It was supposed to be the ultimate sandbox game for RPGs even eclipsing the stellar Morrowind. You were supposed to be able to have a family, grow old, and get scars during battle that stayed with you throughout the game. These features were either missing or scaled down for the final game and the whole sandbox idea was pretty much replaced with a linear story design. It was a good game that took a lot of unnecessary flak because it was hyped to be different than what it actually turned out to be. It would be like hyping up Madden to be the ultimate NFL "simulation", then picking up your copy, and it plays like Blitz. Is it fun to play? Probably but you are let down because it is not what you were expecting to get. As long as society and gamers buy into companies marketing schemes then they will continue to try and tell us what they think we want to here just to make the suits funding them happy.

We've just witnessed the good and the bad that hype can do to a hardware launch. The 360 sold out upon launch but it also created a shortage. The games as a WHOLE weren't stellar. Most of the sports titles were either ported or half-assed due to time constraints. Lots of people wanted the machine during the holidays and were unable to get one; even the people who had put their hard earned money down way back in June were left out in the cold. The whole situation was created out of hype. If there was no hype for the machine then only hardcore gamers who knew it was coming would have grabbed one. Eventually hype would build due to word of mouth and there wouldn't have been long lines at your favorite electronic store waiting to get their hands on one. Due to the hype, however, there were long lines filled with hardcore gamers, parents, and people who just had to get their hands on the latest gadget no matter what. You might believe all of the hype and you might not but if the marketing that is put out can burn the thought of their product into your brain then they have done what they set out to do. They don't really expect everyone to believe everything they say about a product. The most important they have to do is leave a lasting impression about that product. So when you see something similar, you might think "I remember that ad for such and such...blah blah blah". Something that you recognize is more than likely to be bought than something you just see sitting on the shelf in which you have no information about whatsoever.

This brings me full circle or maybe a semi-circle, who cares at this point, to the PS3 hype or lack thereof depending on your point of view. I've never seen anyone play their cards this close to the vest when they are supposed to launch in a matter of months. Yes, MS was coy about the 360 but they at least threw the occasional bone to the masses. Sony is basically shutting everyone out...want a playable game? nah....want to see something more than the prototype of the console itself? Good luck....want to see if we changed the batarang controller? Fat chance. They haven't answered a damn thing as of late. Quite frankly, it's scary and annoying at the same time. Here we are supposed to be getting hyped for the launch of the machine that will start the "HD-era" according to them but when pressed they refuse to answer a damn thing about their plans for the machine. They told us a spring launch which most, probably correctly, assumed would be a Japanese launch. Some people still believe this is going to occur but my question is how much hype have they been building in Japan as of late and what's the Yen price of the machine. I mean surely to god if Sony was going to launch the PS3 in Japan this spring then they would give a number for Japanese gamers to save up for. You know the noise I hear coming from Japan?....I'll give you a hint; it's the same noise I hear coming from the US from Sony.

Give up?

*CRICKETS*

That's the sound I hear. Even after the Merrill-Lynch report, all Sony could do was give us a coy "our plans are still on course" or something like that. That's all well and good but we have no idea which plans you are talking about. We haven't heard anything about plans since E3 and this year's E3 is quickly approaching. I hope for Sony's sake that they have an Ace up their sleeve because if they don't, they just might get toppled from the top. I don't want to see Sony fail miserably because we need competition in this market but I don't think that they are building a whole lot of trust within their own fan base right now. I'm starting to see people in forums who were waiting for the PS3 start to say they might pick up a 360 if comes to fruition that the PS3 will indeed not come out until 2007. MS has set the standard high in Europe as well especially after the PSP debacle for Sony over there. Europe is traditionally very loyal to Sony but that feeling is starting to change and it will change very adversely if Sony waits a full year after the launch in the US to launch in Europe.

The ball is in your court Sony...the 24 second clock is winding down...it's time to take your best shot...win, lose, or draw.

-Brad