Dualshock 3 controller hurts

Seriously... is it just me or is the Dualshock 3 controller downright *painful* to play with? I've been trying to rack up some major gaming time with Resident Evil 6, most notably the Mercenaries minigame mode... but man, holding the DS3 for any extended length of time seems to lead to hand pain, even-- bizarrely enough-- pain in my forearms!

My middle, ring and pinky fingers on my right hand get particularly sore after holding the controller. The two "wings" aren't very ergonomic at all. The problem is, the Dualshock as not changed since the Playstation 1. In over 15 years, the same basic design of the controller persists. Have you ever seen controllers from old game systems like Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis, Dreamcast, etc.? Can you imagine Nintendo trying to use those same controllers now?

The problem is, Sony seems to think the look of the Dualshock is more important than the function. It's supposed to be held in the hands and allow for pressing the face buttons, D-pad, trigger buttons and analogue sticks comfortably. But Sony thinks the look of the Dualshock adds to the branding of the Playstation system. And to be fair, it does. You see a Dualshock and you KNOW it's Sony Playstation. I know that Sony tried to float a ridiculous radical "batarang" controller design for the PS3 early on. Compared to that, it is better that they stuck with the Dualshock design. But really what they SHOULD have done was to refine the design to be much more ergonomic and comfortable in the hands.

The first times I held an Xbox controller S, I was impressed by how molded it felt to my hands. It's not perfect, but it feels like someone went to a lot of trouble to make it ergonomic and sculpted.

So I am trying to find a PS3 controller that mimics the Xbox feel and shape, or at least is more COMFORTABLE than the Dualshock. I ordered this controller from Futureshop, the Dreamgear Phenom Wireless PS3 Controller. But I am always wary of 3rd party gaming  accessories, especially controllers. They are almost always worse than the original ones. So I don't know if this one is any good.... I just hope it plays as good as it looks....


later
don

Resident Evil Revelations

I've been trying to play through Resident Evil: Revelations again... I bought the game awhile ago and finished the campaign once. This game is truly heartbreaking in how souless it is.

I have to say, on my first playthrough, Resident Evil: Revelations was... ok. It started off really good for about the first half of the campaign, but not much action. Unfortunately, when it does get to the action in the latter half, the game just falls apart. The water levels where you're either wading through or swimming are just TEDIOUS and terrible, despite the actual swimming mechanic being based on the Syphon Filter: Logan's Shadow PSP game... which works well for the most part. It's the aggravating little-girl-sounding dolphin monsters that break the gameplay during this section-- which goes on way longer than anyone would ever want it to. I had a wretched time slogging through this crap.

Then they throw in a timer section that is nigh-impossible to do without running out of time on the first run, and turret missions, and Resident Evil: Revelations just runs out of any real sense of fun that it was building to in the first half.

What pisses me off is that they are porting it to the consoles, and all the crap gaming sites are acting like it will be the second coming or something; they are pounding out article after article about Resident Evil: Revelations, as if it is a really good game. Yes, Resident Evil: Revelations does look and sound very good. But compared to Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D, Resident Evil: Revelations unfortunately doesn't hold a candle to it,  because of the stale pacing of the gameplay and the broken campaign, there is even LESS replay value than there is in the notoriously-light-on-content Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D. That's just sad.

I hope people who haven't played the 3DS version of Resident Evil: Revelations aren't fooled into thinking that it's a really good game, based on all the inexplicably good press the console port is getting-- that, by the way, as of this writing hasn't even come out yet.

I'm currently playing Resident Evil 6 on PS3, and it is a better game than Revelations. Unfortunately, RE6 has a unnecessarily convoluted control scheme that damages the gameplay considerably.



later
don

Sound Shapes broken

I recently bought Sound Shapes from the PSN, it was on sale for $10.00 or so... and wow. While it looks pretty, there are some fundamental gameplay issues.

I got stuck a few times during a Jim Guthrie/Superbrothers level called Purgatory. My little round guy got stuck at the beginning of the level, where I couldn't move. Right on the intro screen! Bad sign if the a player gets glitched before the level actually begins. Later, my guy got stuck again on something that it NEEDED to press as part of the level. This isn't even going off on wild tangents, or pushing into every corner of a level. This is just following the direct path of the gameplay it gets stuck & glitched.

And the PS3 version... I downloaded it, as soon as I try to play it it demands ANOTHER download update. Ok, par for the course for PS3 games. So I download that and try to start. It gets to the title screen, then goes blank. I have to turn off the PS3. So I try it again, and again it just goes blank. After looking up the issue online I find a message board posting saying that I need to delete the save file it created when I first tried to start it. Holy cow, is there NO actual testing of these games by Sony or the developer? How can a player know this without chancing upon a message board posting, and why hasn't it been fixed?

I don't know if this is Sony being too lazy with quality control with their PSN titles. Or that the  "Superbrothers" are seen as rock stars of the indy games scene and are actually not good game creators, as in, a game first and foremost NEEDS to be NOT BROKEN.

Did I waste $10.00 for this?


later
don