Hi again! It’s great to see the positive reaction to the unveiling of system software update v2.40. We can’t wait for you to finally go hands-on with XMB access in-game and the Trophy system – and it’s less than 2 days away. Not surprisingly, a number of you have posed questions both here and on other forums. Here are answers to the most frequently asked questions.
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Will voice-messaging/private chat be featured in 2.40 as well? If not, can we expect to see this feature added in the future?
We are evaluating the opportunity to offer voice chat, but for this update, we wanted to focus on text messaging as the key priority for communications that our users have asked for.
Can you use the web browser in game?
No, you must exit the game before browsing the internet.
Will In-Game XMB come up during playback of PS2 games, Blu-Ray discs, and DVDs?
The XMB is an exclusive feature for PS3 game titles. Accessing the XMB during gameplay was the top request from our users, which we focused on for this update. However, we continually engage PS3 owners for feedback and will evaluate the opportunity to offer XMB access during movie playback in the future.
Can we go to the display settings and change anything there in-game (resolution, input, etc)?
No, you must exit the game before changing these settings.
Will it be possible to change in-game the sound output?
Yes, sound output changes are supported.
Will we be able to access the PLAYSTATION Store while in-game?
No, but you can view your downloads in progress.
Will we be able to stream music (either via media server or USB drive) for custom soundtracks or is it relegated to music stored on the HDD?
Currently only music stored on the HDD is accessible in games that support this feature. We’d also like to reiterate that Firmware v2.40 merely enables custom soundtracks. It’s up to developers to include this feature in upcoming games (or to patch existing ones).
Does 2.4 enable cross game invites? Will it down the line?
No, cross-game invites are not available in this system software update. We are evaluating opportunities to expand on the new features delivered in 2.40.
Will trophies be mandatory for all games release here on out?
We are working with developers to ensure that Trophies are supported across the board in the future.
Where is each player’s trophy stat info held? I am going to upgrade my hard drive and I don’t know if the trophies will still be on my account if I earn some and then get a new hard drive.
Trophies will be attached to users’ PSN ID. Trophy data needs to be synchronized to the online account on PSN to be transferred to the new PS3 system.
Will the patch automatically allocate unlocked trophies according to your saved files or would you have to do it again?
No, Trophies aren’t retroactive.
Can we view PSN profiles/Trophies from a PC using a Web browser? Will there be an API for web developers to access the PSN data, so online profiles can be created?
We’re evaluating these opportunities to expand where Trophies can be experienced.
Can you only compare trophies with friends that are online?
As long as a friend has a PSN account, you can compare trophies with them regardless of their online status.
Is there a limit to how many trophies the devs can put set by Sony?
There’s not a limit on number of trophies, but there’s a value assigned to each trophy. Developers must balance out the trophies that are available to stay within an overall value based on whether the game is considered large-scope or small-scope. Essentially, a user that has unlocked every trophy in one game would have the same level as a user that unlocked every trophy in another title, all titles (depending on scope) have the same overall impact on a users’ level.
Will new games have a cool little icon on the back saying “trophy compatible?”
We’re currently working on how Trophy support will be messaged to the consumer on our software packaging.
When you get a trophy, does it make a noise?
Currently, no.How quickly things can change – there *will* be a sound effect when you unlock a Trophy.
What is Eric’s favorite cheese?
Mozzarella
Once again, we will continue to evaluate opportunities to enhance the PLAYSTATION 3’s system software throughout the console’s life cycle. Consumer feedback has contributed greatly to the contents of Firmware v2.40, and continues to be appreciated. Don’t forget, this Firmware will be available for download on July 2nd.
by you guyz expecting this update @ 12:01am just goes to show how unfamiliar you guyz are with the way SONY handles its updates and is only going to mean you’ll be right here @12:02 complaining and asking where the update is…one day you will learn
expect the update between the hours of 12:01am and 11:59pm
cross game invites is dumb honestly, its stupid. jus focus on in game voice/video chat. please tell me why cross game invites would be better then the full custom soundtrack ablity?
well XD9 speak for yourself the updates that come out over here ill get it between 12 am -4 am either way ill be gettn blazed and playing somthing. as i wait, not be here complaining :p LOL
@CBK_CH4RLEZ
LOL
like your gravatar didnt give that away
OK this really isn’t about the firmware update, but why can’t i watch the blog videos on my PS3, even though we can go to it on the PS3s default homepage? i only check the blog from my ps3 and can’t view most videos. Do you not encurage us to use our PS3s to read the blogs?
@1105
Yes, most they are complaining about is really not needed. Even in-game chat isn’t a must either to me at least and I explained why at comment 691 @ 698.
@At everyone else and Sony for the latter part.
People here are unimaginative and lack creativity, they demand features yet they don’t explain why they want them nor do they want Sony to improve on them.
Hear me people, Microsoft has a policy that games can’t install on the hard drive, Sony allows games to install parts on the hard drive. Cross game invites is totally useless on the Xbox and the person still has to quit out of their game and put in the game their friends want to play with them. If you really need that feature for Sony, then at least ask them to improve upon it and for online games, the online part can be installed on the hard drive so say I am playing a single player game and my friend wants to play online, with what I am talking about a push of the button would stop the game I am playing (With the disc inside the drive) and load up the online part of the game on the hard drive and automatically brings me to where they want to play rather it’s FPS or whatever, now that is innovative and it’s useful.
I feel a lot of people here have mob mentality and they don’t really know what they are complaining about but see people are complaining and join in.
@HighRule
the PS3 “browser” isnt a real browser at all and doesnt support flash player…so basically no i dont think anyone would encourage you to use the PS3 browser for that
i’ve had luck watching youTube videos though :)
@1109 I disagree with you there, cross game invites are not completely useless. When you send an invite to a friend they will accept or decline said invite. If they accept they will be thrown directly onto the server that their friend is playing on.
Its a pain in the ass having to try and find out what server your friends are on.
2.40 will be a great update but whith regards to 2.41 they need to get the features which will actually need the game to be patched in as soon as possible. If they concentrate on other features that do not require patches first then they will only create a situation where the gamers will have less games compatible with the feature set of the ps3.
Yet again 2.40 is a great update but that doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t get some encouragement to improve and prioritize.
ps. I have brought it up many times on this blog that they should open another site like dell idea storm but targeted at the ps3.
The response I received from the blog maintainers was that is what this blog is partially for.
I still think that maybe another site should be dedicated to this because some people are obviously getting frustrated with constructive feedback.
Maybe you haven’t realized that the reason 2.40 i here is because of the feedback they have received on this blog.
I think they should completely erase the chat feature, 100%, and replace it with something called the ‘Lobby’ system. You can create a lobby, invite up to 10 friends, stream any form of media you guys have on your PS3, chat with a headset, or use the PS Eye to video chat, and even do stuff like compare trophies on the spot while in the lobby, against all the lobby members. From the lobby, you can instantly jump into a game. Select the ‘Launch Game’ feature in the lobby, and this will send all of you into a game, such as Warhawk. In this olbby you can set up the game before you even launch the game. Like in Home, but 2D. Set up the map, players, private server, etc. all while still on the XMB in this lobby. Now once you create the game, and everyone approves to launch the game, you instantly go from the XMB, to the PS3 logo, to the games loading screen. Once its done loading, BAM, you are playing the game. The most amazing part of all, is that you are all still chatting in the lobby, just bring up the XMB, and return to the lobby to chat without playing. Quit the game, and you will be brought to the XMB, all while still being in the said lobby. Also, the lobby will not only have media charing and voice/video chat, but also text chat.
Theres an idea, eh? I have pages of ideas like that, I wish I worked as the the ‘Director of PS3 XrossMediaBar Operations’. :(
Ok now all I need is to be able to play music, and surf the web while in a chat room. That’d seriously help out a lot.
Did we mention an RSS reader as a suggestion for a future update?
why do you need to surf the web while in a game, that feature request baffles me.
you guys manage time do ADD THE
XMB IN GAME VOICE CHAT CROSS GAME/BROWNSER/PHOTOS/VIDEOS
XMB IN GAME VOICE CHAT CROSS GAME/BROWNSER/PHOTOS/VIDEOS
XMB IN GAME VOICE CHAT CROSS GAME/BROWNSER/PHOTOS/VIDEOS
XMB IN GAME VOICE CHAT CROSS GAME/BROWNSER/PHOTOS/VIDEOS
XMB IN GAME VOICE CHAT CROSS GAME/BROWNSER/PHOTOS/VIDEOS
Come on, 2 days was enough, took 2 years to do the XMB in game, 2 days is nothing
XMB IN GAME VOICE CHAT CROSS GAME/BROWNSER/PHOTOS/VIDEOS
@1112
Come on, they still have to change discs and such as said, we can do that now (With PS3) with a message and a invite when they are in game. like said it’s not a must. If they are going to implement that feature do as I describe that will give meaning to it.
Although I have to give you props on finally getting this to us I must say 2 things.
First off, its complete BS that trophies aren’t retroactive. I’m an avid gamer. Some would even go as far as to say addicted but whatever. Point is, I worked hard doing a lot of stuff on games. Hours and Hours and Hours of play. The fact that this system will not award me for the past 2 years of play is ridiculous. Now the only way to convince myself to do it all again is to delete the HD and convince myself it never happened. Anyways, I digress on that.
Secondly, I hate to say this but it kinda sorta looks like…trash? I love the compare concept but the actual stuff is quite insubstantial as to what I was expecting. I know whenever home was brought up there was talk about displaying trophies and whatnot and they were all 3d and modeled and cool looking…what I’m saying is that better happen.
Anyways, its time to play me some more MGS4(i just beat that no alterts/no kills…i’m going to hate doing that again for a trophy you sick people)
What people are doing isn’t encouragement. If you want to encourage Sony, use proper channels are speak in a respectable manner. I’m sure a hundred well thought out emails would go a lot further then these 1,000 posts of people doing what I described above in the quote, and the barrage of [DELETED] even when a post has nothing to do with the blog post.
What people are doing isn’t encouragement. If you want to encourage Sony, use proper channels are speak in a respectable manner. I’m sure a hundred well thought out emails would go a lot further then these 1,000 posts of people doing what I described above in the quote, and the barrage of complaining even when a post has nothing to do with the blog post.
The Quote
“I don’t know how many of you have kids but trying to get a kid to do something with complaining and ridiculing or threats and they will learn to not respect you and not do what you ask or make you do the biggest horse and pony show of your life for everything you want them to do and seeing the amount of posts of people and their comments I wouldn’t be surprised if Sony did just that.”
@1120
be secure in self and be happy of your accomplishments. If you can’t then replay the games so you can show what others have done. It’s a security feature so people can’t game saves there is no way around it for old saves get over it. If you’re so addicted as you say it shouldn’t be a problem for you.
@1110
Its a real browser. Its adobe’s fault for not updating the Linux Flash. If you try and watch the video in Linux the something happens and Sony cant update something it cant update.
To add on what goroflack said, the proper channel for a update is a respectable message to Adobe not complaining on a Sony blog.
Great Job Sony!!! Jeff could you please respond back to my question? My question is, when a friend logs in out out, can there be a sound, like when achieving a trophy, and also, could you please update the in-game xmb by puttng in in-game private chat, game invites, and voice messaging. With this PS3 could DOMINATE any console, and most users would really enjoy these features. please think about this and please respond!
P.S. Keep up the good work Sony!
@ 1120
Would you like trophies to be off of the game save then? OK, they will be retroactive. Oh look there is a game save on the internet that has beaten Uncharted on all game modes and unlocked all trophies, im going to download it. Hey, look at that, im a level 5 now!
That is what people will do, making the whole concept of trophies and leveling up, totally worthless.
And how in the world does the trophy system look like trash? LOL. I am a HUGE fan of the XMB, and practically know it all by heart, and I think this fits with the XMB and PSN very nicely.
@ 1118
WOW, videos, photos, and the internet browser in-game? In less then a day or two? Shows what you know bro. And cross game invites/voice chat/PS2&PS1 in-game XMB, are all coming, this is only the first phase, or wave.
Again, I wish to expand on someone’s post this time Sentry.
The problem with achievements is they can be unlocked when not connected to Live and if you see the top of board they are all game savers go through their games and you will see online achievements without a unlock game because they used game saves. I think to keep it clean as possible Sony should only let trophies unlock when you accomplish the trophy while connected to PSN so game saves aren’t a problem. Even if they try and lock it to a certain PS3 people can hex edit it to theirs and get the trophies.
Sorry “unlock game” should be unlock date.
I want to be pro-active in my reply before someone says the average user wouldn’t be able to hex edit a save game, the intelligent always document their exploits and tutorials will be on the web for the computer impaired.
@ 1128
Yes, your trophies are synchronized every time you get online/PSN, so that won’t be a problem.
i guess its a step forward but its still missing key features that the box has and we don’t
What really sucks id that I pulled an endurance MGS4 run last night and actually got the Big Boss Emblem. I’m sure there will be a trophy for that someday and i’m gonna have to do it all over again. (It isn’t EASY!)
Bummer…….
what time should i expect the update to be available to download?
sony why dont you answer us ? :(
I am totally hyped for this update!!! but the next update, I would love to see a total revamp of the chat room.. Voice mail and private chats would spectacular to have!! But beggers can’t be choosers. keep up the amazing work Sony.
Sentry it is a problem because if you unlock trophies while offline (via game save) it will go on your PSN ID that you unlocked them same with Live when you really didn’t. It should be a online thing only.
People read my comment #1109, Live didn’t set no standards for online gaming, Sony has a lot of room to improve on even Live if you stop wasting time and complaining about being a clone to live.
I will quote what I said for those that won’t go up.
“Hear me people, Microsoft has a policy that games can’t install on the hard drive, Sony allows games to install parts on the hard drive. Cross game invites is totally useless on the Xbox and the person still has to quit out of their game and put in the game their friends want to play with them. If you really need that feature for Sony, then at least ask them to improve upon it and for online games, the online part can be installed on the hard drive so say I am playing a single player game and my friend wants to play online, with what I am talking about a push of the button would stop the game I am playing (With the disc inside the drive) and load up the online part of the game on the hard drive and automatically brings me to where they want to play rather it’s FPS or whatever, now that is innovative and it’s useful.”
@1135
Because this isn’t the proper channel. Know how tedious to reply to questions on the comment part of a blog with the amount of comments it gets? Use the proper channels and i’m sure you will get a reply.
Or someone will make a program which cracks the encryption on a game save and replaces the psn id with your psn id.
The average user doesn’t need to know what they are doing these days to cheat.
@DarkGeneral88 – I have used proper language and congratulated Sony on the release of 2.40 . As a developer I know how important it is to create infrastructure. If Sony’s infrastructure is a variable instead of a constant you are going to see problems.
Cross game invites is on peoples list of things they would like in a future update. Voice/video chat will not require the developers to create patches for the game so it should not be put in high priority. Getting a stable api for developers to use now is what should be in priority.
You may have people that want in game voice/video chat first and cross game chat later but I could put a bet that there will be a load of pissed off gamers if Sony listens and brings out that functionality first. You will just see increased incomparability with games.
@DarkGeneral88
This is the proper channel, the blog maintainers have said this many times when people requested a proper channel so stop spouting bull as fact.
@ 1135
Lol, well if you haven’t noticed there are 1,000 comments plus, I doubt they are still following us by now…
@ 1137
Actually, your PSN ID stats are linked THROUGH the gamesave. You have a gamesave, I can copy it and give it to you, but it will be worthless, because it can only be enabled/activated/work using MY PSN ID. Get it?
@1141 – if it were not being done the way it is being done there would be cheating.
It would be cracked within days just like everything else.
Why not allow XMB access with PS1 games? I can’t see how that would be a stretch.
If you can access the save file on a pc you can crack it. This is why the trophies will not be retroactive. I am a bit disappointed that burnout developers did what they did. And if your wondering why, wait until the update with trophies is released and people will crack their encryption method. The reason people haven’t done it already was because there was no incentive to do so.
Burnout will be one of the first games to receive trophies and as a result will have allot more attention then it has previously received.
I think they mean midnight pacific time. Like they did when they showed us the first video. So for me I’ll be waiting until 2 am in chicago. 3 am in new york.
Will you have to be online on PSN to unlock trophies OR can you play offline, then all the trophies you’ve unlocked while offline will be unlocked when you sign on to PSN???
because I can only have one thing online at once, I don’t have a router, so I have to keep switching between my PC and PS3.
PLEASE answer this!!! Thanks.
@1140
Source please, if this is the proper channel for us to speak to Sony it’s really not efficient. I can understand this is the way Sony wants to let us know what’s going on. I can understand if Sony was heavily attacked with useless contacts like I see on the comments and they gave a general place as such for people to complain. I don’t know, I do know no one is going to read every post nor I don’t know for fact but I think no manager would pay a worker to read every post it’s a waste of funds.
@ 1143
I believe it is because the PS3 runs an emulation, so just an emulation of the PS1, therefore not built into the OS of the PS3, like PS3 games. Same goes for PS2 games.
@ 1144
You are dissapointed at what they did with Burnout? Dude, BO runs off of the PSN ID, NOT the game save. That is why the trophies in Burnout will be retroactive. Did you not read his posts?
@ 1146
Yeah, the trophies you earned offline, will be synchronized into the system next time you get online/log into your PSN ID.
@1147 – I never said it was efficient and I have brought it up several times but Sony doesn’t seem to agree so I guess everyone is left giving feedback in an inefficient way.
I wont stop giving feedback because of this inefficiency though.
It would be good too if we could us our own Awatar
Don’t worry, Sony reads these comments, just because they don’t respond to every single one doesn’t mean they aren’t listening…