Sony bids farewell to the PS3
IT TURNS out 2021 is the year of digital destruction. While it's game over this week for a slew of Mario titles on Nintendo's store, it now turns out the clock is ticking for the PlayStation 3, with sources saying its online servers are set to yank down the virtual shutters this summer.
While Sony stopped production of the console in 2017, this is the death knell for a machine that's still gathering dust underneath many a telly.
To be fair, third time wasn't exactly the charm for Sony. The PS3 launched at a sky-high £425, while its processor proved a headache to program for, leading to the worst versions of multi-platform fare. Still, Sony's black beauty hosted nearly 3000 games. Here are some highlights to keep an eye out for before the coffin nails are hammered home this summer.
For all of Sony's pomp about the creative aspect of their LittleBigPlanet series, at its hessian heart this is brilliantly traditional platforming fare, and well worth an eBay bid. From the huggable visuals to Stephen Fry's unctuous narration and a bopping '50s jukebox soundtrack, you can't go wrong with any of this trilogy.
Set in an alternative timeline where 1950s Earth is overrun by space scum, the Resistance series blended arcade-happy gunplay and an astonishing arsenal boasting more munitions than a South Armagh landfill. Full Metal Jacket met War of the Worlds for a gritty tour of duty against bum-faced aliens in an inter-species throwdown.
While they say in space no one can hear you scream, playing Dead Space, the neighbours probably will. An interstellar scare machine where players filled the space boots of a tooled-up nutcase on a colony of space insects, this trilogy is guaranteed to coat your britches with fear.
Wrapped in a cowl of gothic cool, Arkham Asylum and City were the games Bat-fans had been yearning for as the Dark Knight used gadgets and cunning aplenty in doling out pain to a rogue's gallery in the titular nuthouse. But even grimmer was the grief-roasted Last of Us – a blockbuster with arthouse smarts as the grizzled Joel and tough-as-nails Ellie fought fungi-faced mutants on a trek across America.
For a lighter take on cinematic action, you could do worse than the Uncharted trilogy – derring-do simulators that channelled the thrill-soaked matinees of old. With Bioshock, The Shining met Jules Verne by way of Resident Evil amid crumbling art-deco landscapes in a trilogy of leaking undersea horror shows.
Set in the Half Life universe, Portal 2 was a description-defying brain-tickler that played fast and loose with spatial awareness in a lab-rat simulator that was, for my money, the PS3's greatest turn.
My advice, if you have the spare coins and hard drive space, is to stock up now before this summer's store closure relegates an entire generation's finest to the history books. They say you can't beat the old ones, but in a few months you won't even have the chance...
