Major Nelson on the PS3

For the past few weeks, Major Nelson, the Xbox Live Director of Programming, has been running a special segment on his podcasts regarding Sony's PlayStation 3. So what does one of the most well known figures in the industry think of his employer's main rival?

In regards to this week's podcast, fast forward to the 43rd minute mark in the MP3.

[Meus Renaissance]

Came on the Insomniac podcast last week to advertise this new segment in his show. He said it was a good thing for the fans to hear about what people in the industry think of each other, etc. But I've been listening to his podcasts for some time now and there is no real PS3 segment. Instead, they have a few minutes where they say "oh I got a PS3 the other day". Interestingly enough, you'd think they'd actually comment on the console and it's games.

Um, no.

Do they speak about the differences? Um, not exactly. Well they always refer to it as a "good Blu Ray player" and that's as far as it goes. Other than that, they usually criticise it, talk about how frustrating it was to install it with Major responding "No way" "What?!" "It was that frustrating? "You wanted to take it back didn't you?". And last week he talked about some multiplatform games, like TimeShift and says its coming out on the 360 and PC. He gets corrected and told it comes on the PS3 too and responds "yeah that too, when..? who knows lool" It's like fuel for fanboys.

And thats what it is. I was shocked by it, I expected that tone from the Xbox forums where you can expect that type of bias towards the 360 but what is the point of holding a segment, advertising that to PlayStation sources, and then only mocking the console and speaking in derogative terms about it?

If I was an Xbox owner only and listened to the Major's podcasts, I'd be laughing at PlayStation 3 owners. In fact, I wouldn't think the console had a decent game worth playing and its just a glorified movie player.

I have sent an email to the Major with the hope he reads that - suggesting that he should keep to his word and actually talk about the console. If he wants to talk about Blu Ray as opposed to the Xbox 360, then he should call it the Blu-Ray segment.

It's an insult to professionalism and Sony to hear this guy weekly bash the console under the blank statement that its "just a discussion of other platforms". Discussion my ass. Why not talk about Sony's price drop and how it could affect the market? Why not talk about their 1st party games? Hey I have an idea, why not actually have a discussion? I don't expect them to praise the damn thing but I do expect to hear some mature adult stuff from those in the industry.

No. All you want to talk about is how great Viva Pinata is and how "good a Blu Ray player" the PS3 is.

[IdontTakeSides]

Great answer Meus...bubbles for that response..!!

[Ps3Fanboy777]

He's nothing more then Bill Gates workhorse for the 360. Feel sorry for this guy.

Wonder if hes married and wonder how his wife views him?

Garbage article/podcast.... NEXT....

Oh and where are the freakin RPG games Microsoft? I jumped in for the 4th time and not much is on this console. Atleast Ninja Gaiden 2 is coming. SPare me the mass effect hype.. That game looks horrible.

[ShiftyLookingCow]

"If I was an Xbox owner only and listened to the Major's podcasts, I'd be laughing at PlayStation 3 owners."
you have to be a total retard of a fanboy to laugh at this anyway even if you owned only a 360 as installation problems like this are not the PS3's fault or even the TV's fault rather its problem with the HDMI handshake mechanism. Dont overgeneralize 360 only owners with fanboys.

btw this podcast was not newsworthy its more flamebait and it was a waste of time, its too late for me to take away my approval

edit: yeah you are right, he did reference it so it is sort of newsworthy. I was just mad I wasted 25 minutes.

[ATLRoAcH]

If I could give you another bubble I would but I already gave it to you.lol.I'm tired of all the hating.Its stupid to hate just to hate.

[Meus Renaissance]

My topic isn't flamebait as its just reporting what the man has said. I haven't put words into his mouth; if you consider this flamebait then it speaks volumes about his segment in the podcast.

My general criticism over him was not based on this weeks podcasts but a collection of them. Unfortunately as they are so long, I can't pinpoint the exact time frames of his derogative comments. It would take hours to produce that on my part.

I said "If I was an Xbox owner only and listened to the Major's podcasts, I'd be laughing at PlayStation 3 owners." That's based on me, not Xbox owners. I sincerely for a moment became frustrated with the PS3 after listening to this. I even forgot I owned one and was very happy with it. Just listening to the frustration and disbelief in their voices, their mocking tones, their giggles - its derogative and its immature considering they are official representatives of Xbox.

I reported it so people would know about this. What here can cause a flamebait? His "PS3 segments" are a waste but it annoys the hell out of me because he the balls to go to PlayStation sources, and say "hey guys listen to my segment on my podcast". So PS3 owners go and listen to it and they're welcomed to that. And this is coming from Major Nelson, not some random member on a forum.

That's relevant to gaming news.

[Ri0tSquad]

When hes not on xbox live, not at work, but all alone at home with his door locked, blinds closed up, lights off, playing ratchet and clank or GT5 demo and just melting over the amazing 1080p 60 fps games the ps3 can do without sounding like an jet engine. Guarantee it.

[ruibing]

Pure propaganda from beginning till the end. It makes me wish more and more than Google will replace MS soon.

[IGNFTW]

MAJOR NELSON IS ALRIGHT BUT SOMETIMES HE ANNOYS ME TOO MUCH

[FPS nut]

^^^^^Whiners Club^^^^^

[shelbygt33]

He works for Microsoft for heaven's sake. What do you want him to go say: "I love this PS3 - everyone should go buy one."

So I'm just not sure where you get off on sounding all "high and mighty" and so "fair and balanced". It's a company, trying to push a product and catering to its fan base. Nothing new here, just common business practice.

[ikkokucrisis]

period.

[ravinash]

It means i don't have to waste 25 minutes of my life listening to this dribble. We get enough of that in the comments of this site.
its a shame that someone who calls him self a professional can't view these thing objectively.
Maybe it just shows M$ attitude to the industry these days.

[miganda]

i dont get it, even though i used to be a devote fanboy once too. yes i was that rare kid who owned a turbografx16. everyone talks about their system's of choice like their talking about some other country or something.like if this major dude dose'nt give out proper info on the ps3 that sony is some how doomed.i mean where talking about PS3! who dosent know just about everything there is to know about it? ps3 dosent need some xbox employee to sell it. it sells and speaks for itself. and before anyone says something stupid, yes im an 360 owner. (who could tell)but im not a 360 only head. im a gamer who will have all 3 systems soon because they all have games i want to play.but some of you people act like sony is a plauge and xbox is a bad omen. i mean get real. none of us were born with a system. last i checked i cant claim 360 on my tax return.ive owned all the sony systems from day one and have nothing against them. hell if the makers of wonderbread made a system and it had good games i would get that too. the point im making is that i made the mistake of being too loyal to my fav system once and missed out on all that the other two had to offer.(snes and genesis)my big mistake.since then, i have tried to get my hands on whatever i could so i could just play the best games out there. thats what gamers do. i dont care which system its on. how would it benefit me if say i only supported 1 system? if i dont get a wii and ps3 soon, then there' gonna be alot of top games that i'm missing out on. we gamers should stop acting like the rap industry. thats the only music where artist always hate on each other. you dont see that anywhere else because it F'ing stupid.xbox owners should give credit where its due. if it wasnt for sony games wouldnt be as big in the entertainment arena as it is. so microsoft owes them a debt of grattitude. and sony's fans should give props to microsoft for raising the bar this generation. who knows. if sony jumped out the gate and dominated everyone again they might have become complaicent. so what we have here is all the companies are giving their top efforts and us gamers should be reaping the rewards, not back stabing each other and picking sides. why limit ourselv'es. think about it.

[dfcm2003]

Is getting his paycheck each week from MS. How much GOOD do you really think he is going to give the PS3? GET REAL

[Kratosnake]

recap of the PS3 comment:
- but how frustrating was hooking it up?
--OHHH SOOOOOO FRUSTRATING, LIKE SOOOOOOO FRUSTRATING
-really? why?
--I don't know, but SOOOOOOO FRUSTRATING.... SOOOOOO...
-man, oh... man....
--but the blu-ray movies were, um..good.. it was fine.
-but how frustrating was it??!!
--SOOOOOOOOO FRUSTRATING
-oh how were the games?
--um.. i didn't play any yet, but it sure was FRUSTRATING hooking the system up.
- you know what we haven't talked enough about? how frustrating it was to hook it up.. lets talk more about that before we move on to more xbox stuff.

[shine1396]

LOL and a half

[SmokeyMcBear]

you know what tells me a lot, the fact that he spent 2 hours trying to get his tv to recognize the ps3, the fact that the tv wasnt set up to the correct input the ps3 was connected to. Either that or the ps3 was already set up on a sd tv. I had that problem, going from a high def hdmi cable to the stardard and not seeing a pic, but you know what i did that took, me 5 minutes to figure out what was going on... read the trouble shooting booklet. easy peasy, these guys shouldnt even be talking about the ps3.

[Shadow Man]

either that or he's an idiot. When i got my hdmi i hooked it up to my tv while keeping the sd cables plugged in changed the settings in 2 min and it was good to go. No i'm not a fanboy i have both 360 and PS3 for the record for any of you haters.

[Meus Renaissance]

I couldn't find the specific time frame for where he referred to Timeshift's PS3 release date in his other podcast. I've listened to a couple podcasts and I tried to pinpoint that remark but each podcast is an hour and a half man. Sorry about that; just take my word for it.

[wangdiddy82]

looks like a child molester

[BloodySinner]

If that's the case, one could only wonder how you look like.

[marinelife9]

Now that you say it that pic does make him look like a weirdo.

[Anego Montoya FTMFW]

i was just think the same thing.

don`t worry about BLOODYSINNER.

he wants to give MAJOR NELSON some DOME.

[PirateThom]

Well, I for one am glad to see people working for Microsoft are above the level of the Microsoft fanboys...

[mighty_douche]

remember this is a war between 2 companies conles, whats basically a toy, its not political warfar.

[Close_Second]

I can't believe how emotional people can get over a plastic box you sit under a TV. What has Sony or Microsoft ever done for the everyday consumer to make people go to the extremes they do defending them?

I was once an avid Commodore Amiga 500 owner and loved everything Amiga. However, when Commodore went under did they ever care about the many fans like me that had invested so much time and money supporting them? I'm guessing no. The same goes for Sony and MS, they only care to the point where it will generate sales and in turn revenue for their shareholders.

Do you think Sony will apologize to PS3 owners if Blu-Ray flops? Will they refund the purchase price for all the stand alone Blu-Ray players and movies sold? Of course not. It amazes me that people give away their loyalty so easily at same time they part with their hard earned cash.

We all need to remember that in the global scheme of things, these little distractions mean absolutely nothing. When most of us are lying on our death bed we won't be saying "I wish I had spent more time playing on my Playstation or Xbox".

[shelbygt33]

Close Second, I agree. It goes for all sides - it's just a product.

[gameforall]

Why the F*&^ will anyone expect a Microsoft employee to give an unbiased opinion on a rival product.

[Edwin1989]

wow a MS dude who can't get a ps3 to work and negatively speaks about it in his podcast.. yeah right

and can someone please hit him with a Xbox 360 every time he says "WHAT!?" very gay??

and if you set your PS3 to HDMI for AUDIO AND VIDEO, your audio will not work via optical.. DUH

[DZNetworks]

He got it to work, what the heck would he get it to work with?

[wangdiddy82]

You know what i look like, You see me every day.. Im your dad FOOL... lol jk.. test tube baby.. lol jk again..

But he does look like a child molester in that pic.. If he worked for sony i would say the same thing..

[Eimmij]

Major Nelson is doing his job he gets money do say that stuff if it was a sony guy doing the xbox 360 he whould say the same stuff this crap is getin old play what you want i have bouth and like them bouth buck Major Nelson and any body els who whould do some stuff like on bouth sides of the fence one more time buck Major Nelson

[PimpHandHappy]

Chris Hannsen from MSNBC interviewed right b4 he got hog tied by the cops

[Douchebaggery]

Unfortunately this is pretty much what you get from the majority of the gaming press, unless you're listening to Sony focus media it's almost impossible to get a positive impression of the PS3.

Every positive PS3 news is countered by a negative remark example;
-Ratchet & Clank is amazing, yeah but it's the only thing to play on the console.
-Wow Sony dropped the PS3 price to 399$, yeah but there's nothing to play on it.
-Rumble is coming back, yeah but it's same as last gen.

I could go on and on. I've tried listening to multiple podcasts even N4G's and the only one that i like are 1up's and IGN cuz they have "fanboys" from the 3 major companies so it all balance itself out.

P.S. Major Nelson's podcast is f*cking boring it's just PR bullsh!t.

[DARK WITNESS]

i own a 360...and a ps3, i am more of a 360 fan, but even i am not interested in what he has to say..

i mean it should be obvious that he is not going to say anything intelligent or have a real debate on the subject.

[goodganja]

Once again. Sony delivers itself with class. The figures currently employed with Sony do not feel the need to bash other consoles because Micro$hit will bash the 360 on it's own with it's unjust actions.

You'll never hear Phil Harrison or Kaz Hirai downgrade other consoles for the simple fact that Sony is only worried about Sony. Micro$hit and all of it's fanboys pay too much attention to what Sony does.

Micro$hit is not a proactive company, they're reactive. Meaning, they wait and see what Sony does before making a move on their own. And when they feel they are being cornered by a surge of the Sony Juggernaut, they go to their last ditch effort...BASH THE SYSTEM AND GET FANBOYS BEHIND THEM.

Sorry, the truth is in the specs and PS3 has crapbox 360 beat by a thousand miles. Micro$hit, you've officialy lost.

GAME OVER

R.I.P Micro$hit 360
Rest In Piss

P L A Y B 3 Y O N D

[Lord2008]

@goodganja44 -

That’s funny because didn’t Phil Harrison once say Sony was "unlikely" to offer two versions of PS3, and that XBOX 360 has create confusion for consumers with two versions of the systems. http://www.gamesindustry.bi...

And how can you say Microsoft is a reactive when all Fony seem to do is look what’s out there any and copy it, Sixaxes anyone.

The simple fact is the Fony PS3 is simply not doing as well as it should be and the fact that you now have some healthy competition you don’t like it.

And what the hell is G A Y B 3 Y O N D sorry i mean P L A Y B 3 Y O N D

[cr33ping_death]

G A Y B E Y O N D i believe is what your father does....he goes BEYOND your mothers back to go G A Y.....?

[AnalFace]

You know something, i play games and i never care about people like this or their damn opinions.... Maybe i have sense? hmmm?

[JokesOnYou]

I never listen to stupid podcasts from biased sites, I definitely favor the 360 but I prefer to get my news from neutral (or less biased) gaming sites, this guy is paid to be pro 360 and everyone knows this= his audience is most likely 90% loyal 360 owners and the other 10% are likely people "interested" in buying a 360, why in the hell do you think this guy would praise the ps3?= his primary purpose is to ADVERTISE/HYPE the 360, in other words micro pays him to sell the 360, so why on god's earth would you expect him to "keep to his word and actually talk about the console." as you said, Yes of course he will do a ps3 segment, and even judging by your comments I dont see him going on some all out hate filled rant about the ps3, but its not like he's NOT going to take diggs at the ps3 and definitely NOT point make it look favorably compared to the 360, at least unlike spg and most other sonyfans or sony sponsored site, he doesn't spend the majority of his time digging up dirt against the ps3. You sonykids need to get a grip on reality=

JOY

[bluebrad1974]

SPG is the scourge of the gaming industry.

[KakashiDX]

Eh. Major Nelson's a tool, but at least he's paid.

[Awesomeo3000]

he works for m$ like were suppose to take anything he says about ps3 personally i mean seriously even if he did have something to say hed prob be fired if he said it so who cares wat this guy has to say if u own a ps3 u kno for a fact its good and way more then a just a blu ray player so no worries this guy is a douche

[SL1M DADDY]

Whoever has that many problems with setting up the PS3 must have never seen the instruction manual that came with the system. There is more ways to setup the PS3 than any other console and it is a wise idea to read up on it while installing it. Sorry, but I took a ten minute glance at my instruction manual and had my PS3 up and running in HDMI and Optical Audio in about five minutes. Three cords, one console, and a kick arse experience. This guy in the interview is a tard. He even admits to having his old lady situate the cords for him! What a dork.

[Enigma_2099]

... This is gotta be some bad joke...

[Daytona]

Can't take the competition so ya come to the Xbox 360 podcast posting to vent, LOL!!

[Enigma_2099]

... and you get a cookie...

fanboys bait fanboys...

that being said, have a nice cup of STFU...

[zonetrooper5]

Just like Phil Harrison talks postive stuff about the PS3 and not the 360. Major Nelson is working for MS, do you expect him to say, "OMG GUISE, GET A PS3 NAO COS ITS SO SEXY AND ITS MORE POWERFUL!"

No he want, now stop being fanboys guys and making stupid comments.

[Fizban]

Nothing new. Someone from M$ = someone that talks bad about PS3. Ok, who's the next one? Bill himself?

[The_Engineer]

Bill was quoted as saying that the PS3 will "never" surpass the 360 graphically. Proven wrong in the PS3's first year, CLASSIC.

instead of dumping billions in trying to take out Sony maybe he could feed hungry kids. People might actually like him for that.

[Ps3Fanboy777]

What is wrong with his face? I hope thats not how he looks. Can we find a different picture?

His opinion = NOT IMPORTANT. Major Nelson... lol... Probably the only thing he will ever be known for.

[DZNetworks]

Major Nelson will make more money in one week than you will make in one year.

[Coke-a-Cola]

Insomniac had M. Nelson on the Moonshow ( 14 ) and He was a most charming guest
But don't expect Microsoft to extol the virtues of Sony.

[razer]

He said some very nice things to say about the system. Or how about when he had the creator of Threespeech.com on? That was a great one, where they actually admitted to making up FUD (ahh Sony) about Major and the 360 to get hits.

How many PS3 podcast's are inviting Xbox rep's or Major on their show?? Maybe 1?? He has an open invitation to any Sony rep that wants to come on and talk about the PS3 but all have declined..

If you REALLY are a listener of his podcast you know that he avoids getting into deep discussions on the "console war" and he doesn't go on his podcast saying XBOX IS THE BEST. Hell, he avoids a lot of the tough questions from the 360 userbase that face the 360 because he doesn't want to get into the fanboy wars. So you can't expect some deep comparison of the system's on his show. Of course he is on the MS payroll so he is biased but what the hell do you expect?? He is representing MS and the things he say can get him into trouble..(duh!)

[Sean14233]

What a bunch of little PS3 babies. Major is right, the ps3 is junk, what don't you girls get? Buy a 360 and get over it, if you ask nicely maybe santa will bring you a real console this yr instead of having to turn on that blugay player again!

[Z501]

Tool!

^^^^^
Above
Ofcourse PS3 owners(sole owners who don't need/want another console) could buy a 360 or 2,but you know what,we don't need/want to.
It's that simple.

[djroberts]

What an idiot. Hold the power button lol. Let's get a Sony employee in an interview to talk about setting up media center integration on 360 or dealing with the red ring of death.

Check out around 49:30 where the interviewer jokes about wrapping it in a towel (obvious 360 red ring of death reference).

He calls it a fine hi-def moive player but admitts he hasn't even tried to play games on it.

This is a bit more frustrating:
http://uk.youtube.com/watch...

[Sean14233]

Games worth playing? Oh i am sorry i wasn't aware of a single game the ps3 has that is worth playing, please enlighten us. It's a glorified blugay player as major nelson points out time and time again.

[cheapness1]

There are a few Ps3 exclusive devs that while maybe not complimenting the 360 directly DO make positive comments about 360 exclusive games like Halo and Gears of War and DO even mention how they set standards!

Surely games like Heavenly Sword, Motorstorm, Resistance, Uncharted, Killzone, Warhawk & Little Big Planet which are all first-gen games from their respective developers built on their own game engines show that the Ps3 is worth more than all the negative comments (despite being hard to develop for!)

It's kinda lame that this dude would advertise his rather juvenile Ps3 hate segment to playstation owners!

[cheapness1]

#28 santa brought me a 360 last year and as much as I enjoyed Gears, Forza 2, Halo and probably will enjoy Mass Effect it really isn't the god send of consoles and definately has its own share of problems...the Ps3 is imo every bit as enjoyable despite being less than a year old, well in the UK ;)

[razer]

Both consoles are strong and have both good and bad points but neither are the "god send of consoles". Having both systems, now that does feel a little GOD like. =)

[Death]

Doesn't Major Nelson have a podcast pretty regularly? I guess we can have a weekly podcast overview on N4G every week. Unless the real reason for posting this "news" is so you can respond to it in a public forum? I dunno, I guess being in beta this is bound to happen. I wasn't aware that your opinion on someone elses opinion was news. I guess you must be an industry insider since this was approved...

-Death

[Dick_Mitchell]

*

I wrote TONS of articles on Major Nelson's website for Xbox Live, and I said a LOT of stuff sticking up for the Xbox 360...and Major Nelson was very happy to allow me to do so over the last two years.

BUT...

When I made a comment saying just ONE "potentially" bad thing about the Xbox 360, Major Nelson decided to Ban my IP Address from the website!!!

*

At the time, Sega was making up their mind on whether or not they should release the Xbox 360 in Japan, because of the poor Xbox 360 sales in Japan. But, I was actually sticking up for the Xbox 360 when I said that consumers in North America and Europe should NOT buy Virtua Fighter 5, because the people of Japan actually want Virtua Fighter 5 the most. I said that what Sega was planning was kind of like releasing a John Madden NFL Football game everywhere in the world, EXCEPT for the United States!!! And that was 100% true!!! If Sega would have decided to do such a thing, we should have NOT bought Virtua Fighter 5!!!

I even tried sending emails to Major Nelson at his real email address, and on Xbox Live...but he thinks he is Bill Gates, and he won't write me back, even though I am an editor, too!

*

Major Nelse is a fool...please, do NOT listen to what he has to say!

[StrboyM]

xbox good, ps3 baaad..... chunk hungry!

[Mr Marbles]

I had a hard time with my PS3 when I got it too, the 360 is plug and play, HDMI or whatever it works perfect with any TV.

Maybe Major has a point, Sony should have made the PS3 more user freindly, they did not so they get dinged for it, that is their problem, not you kids problem, quit hating on Major for pointing out the truth. We dont hang a guy everytime someone mentions the RROD.

[ukilnme]

I have all three and I had no trouble hooking any of them up. Major Nelson should check himself on this.

[shodown19]

I have 360 and PS3. No problems on hooking up neither.

[CRIMS0N_W0LF]

Kindly find attached video on how to use your X360.

[N4M3L355]

the RROD...BURNNNNNN!!!! I'm sorry, I couldn't resist, forgive me. I don't understand why a PS3 user would listen to a podcast by Major Nelson, or any other 360 employee. I read 360 news, but I would almost never listen to a 360 podcast. In case we have some lost PS3 users out there, get off the Major Nelson podcast and listen to Podcast BEYOND!

EDIT: @ SILV3R_
http://ps3.ign.com/articles...
BEYOND!

[SILV3R_]

new to me.. link please..

[PS3 Limps on and on]

Please... choose your photo's more carefully.

[HondaSIRowner]

Crap!

[N4M3L355]

Why did you remove your post and replace it with crap?

[Zhuk]

Major Nelson is my favourite podcaster, I listen to his show every week.

The character assassination that has been done here on this good man is nothing short of a joke, taking a segment out of his show completely out of context. Major Nelson has put out numerous offers for people from Sony to come on his show and have a chat and he has always said that he does not want any bad feelings between him and people/podcasts from Sony.

He was only on Insomniac's podcast last week, and as far as I am concerned they were far more hostile and 'fanboyish' in their treatment of Major Nelson than he ever would be to anyone from Sony

[mbmonk]

When the guy had problems he searched the internet. He 'bounced' back and for between "Live Search" and "Google". Live search is MS's search. These guys are such shills I can't even handle listening to it. Just because MS pays you doesn't mean they get your SOUL!

[DarthTigra]

how da heck is this guy getting mad about a small problem that rarely happen's and then only takes a few seconds to fix compared to 33 percent of all xbox 360's getting the red ring of death then having 2 wait at least 2 weeks to get it fixed M$ sickens me and i only have a 360 lol.