Sony Apologizes To Manchester Cathedral

By Digital Trends Staff July 8, 2007

Sony Apologizes To Manchester Cathedral On Friday Sony issued a public apology for including a shootout in Manchester Cathedral as part of itsResistance: Fall of Man video game. The Church of England, outraged at the unauthorized use of the venue, had been putting pressure on the company. Not only had it wanted the apology, it haddemanded that Sony stop selling the game. The apology was published in the Manchester Evening News after Sony executives had met withChurch leaders. “It was never our intention to offend anyone in the making of this game, and we would like to apologize unreservedly to them for causing that offense, and to all parts ofthe wider community who we might also have offended,” Sony Computer Entertainment Europe President David A. Reeves said in the apology. He also promised that the cathedral would not be used inany future games. However, Sony also said that with the apology, they consider the matter closed. Although there was no comment from Church leaders, that must have raised their ire. Manchester is a center of gun crime in England, and the Church there has been working to try and halt the violence. One of the demands to Sony had been a donation to the Church’s educationdepartment, which helps the local community. Church officials have offered no more comment on the matter to date.

Editors' Recommendations

Digital Trends Staff

Digital Trends has a simple mission: to help readers easily understand how tech affects the way they live. We are your…

Gaming

Sony’s cloud handheld, the PlayStation Portal, will only stream certain games

Astro's Playroom booting up on the PlayStation Portal.

Sony has unveiled the price for its upcoming cloud gaming handheld, as well as an official name for the device: PlayStation Portal. However, one significant caveat to its functionality might sour people's interest in the handheld: It only supports PS4 and PS5 native games that the owner purchased.
PlayStation VR2 games can't be streamed to PlayStation Portal, which does make sense. More bafflingly, though, is the fact that the PlayStation Blog post states that "games that are streamed through PlayStation Plus Premium’s cloud streaming are not supported." That means you shouldn't pick up PlayStation Portal expecting to stream some PS3 and PS4 games available through PlayStation Plus Premium to the device. That's certainly an odd omission when it's currently PlayStation's most notable cloud gaming effort.
Although Microsoft is more closely associated with cloud gaming, Sony beat it to releasing a dedicated cloud gaming device. PlayStation Portal was first teased as Project Q during May's PlayStation showcase, but now, a PlayStation Blog post more clearly explains what we can actually expect from the handheld. Most importantly, we learned that PlayStation Portal will cost $200, which puts it underneath the cost of a Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series S, and other cloud gaming devices like the Logitech G Cloud Handheld.
As for what you're getting for that price tag, it's essentially a decent screen attached to two halves of a DualSense controller. The controllers on each side share all the functionality of the DualSense, including things like haptic feedback and adaptive triggers. In-between is an 8-inch LCD screen that streams games over Wi-Fi at up to a 1080p resolution and 60 frames per second. All in all, that's fairly solid for a cloud gaming handheld that is this cheap.
Sony confirmed that the PlayStation Portal will have a 3.5mm audio jack, but also used the same blog post to unveil two new wireless audio options. There's the Pulse Elite wireless headset that features a retractable boom mic and a charging hanger and Pulse Explore wireless earbuds that offer similar audio quality in earbud form.
None of these products are available for preorder or have a specific release date just yet, but they are all expected to launch before the end of the year.

Gaming

Naughty Dog confirms its working on a new single-player game in odd apology post

Abby screaming in The Last of Us Part II

The Last of Us developer Naughty Dog has confirmed that it's working on a new single-player game in a fairly odd manner. The news came in the middle of an apologetic post explaining why the studio didn't show its upcoming Last of Us multiplayer project during this week's PlayStation Showcase.

https://twitter.com/Naughty_Dog/status/1662166716892479488

Gaming

PlayStation Showcase teased Sony’s live service future, but I’m not impressed yet

playstation showcase live service games reveals marathon

Ahead of the May 2023 PlayStation Showcase, I wrote that the presentation needed to “elicit confidence in Sony’s future with live service.” Well, multiplayer-focused live service games did end up being a big part of the show, but I can’t say I’m that confident in them yet.
Between neat looks at single-player exclusives like Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 and Synapse, Sony revealed four live-service games that it's publishing. Those games are Haven Studios’ Fairgame$, Arrowhead Studios’ Helldivers 2, Bungie’s Marathon, and Firewalk Studios’ Concord. The fact that these accounted for almost every major first-party announcements of the show signals that we’re entering a new era for Sony: one where multiplayer rules.
Over the past year or so, PlayStation Studios has made it very clear that it’s trying to break into the games-as-a-service sector now that it’s perfected the single-player adventure with games like Horizon Forbidden West and God of War: Ragnarok. Unfortunately, these early live service announcements raised more concerns than hope, which isn’t a great start when it comes to establishing a new direction for PlayStation.
A live service showcase
Haven’s sci-fi PvPvE heist game Fairgame$ was the PlayStation Showcase’s opening, and honestly, it wasn’t a memorable first showing. The trailer was purely cinematic, but its shots were composed like they were live gameplay. That still feels misleading 18 years after Sony did it with Killzone 2, even if it clarified it at the start of the trailer. It also means I don’t have a good idea of how this game will be structured and when I’ll have a chance to play it. All I know is that this is an anti-capitalist game that will probably also be a heavily monetized live service experience. It wasn’t a strong show opener; at least, like all of the other titles on this list, it’s also coming to PC.

Fairgame$ was followed up by the long-awaited reveal of Helldivers 2, a sequel to an entertaining 2015 PS Plus sci-fi top-down shooter. To Helldivers 2’s credit, it had the most honest-feeling showing of these games, with a trailer that showed lots of impressive third-person action gameplay and even gave a 2023 release window. Even if its anti-capitalist undertones were a bit similar to Fairgame$, this was the style of reveal I was hoping to see from Sony’s live service announcements. Unfortunately, it was the only live service game reveal to feature any actual gameplay.
After a break from live service announcements, Bungie emerged to reveal that it was reviving Marathon as a sci-fi PvP extraction shooter. While it’s very surprising to see Marathon coming back and that Bungie is making something other than Destiny, it was a purely cinematic trailer that leaned into its techno-futuristic aesthetics -- much like Fairgame$’s reveal trailer. A dev diary released after the reveal also says that we’ll need to wait a while to learn more and see gameplay. But you can buy a $77 shirt based on this game we don’t know much about yet, though.