This is everything you will hear at any other Playstation2 site, all rolled up into one, sweet little package. (Well, it’s actually very big.) Up to date to July 29th, 2000. Only facts as well, none of those annoying rumors or hear-say to confuse you. Have fun.

What's the new system called?
PlayStation2. Or for short, PS2.

When is the PS2 coming out in the United States?
The official North American and European release date for the PS2 is October 26, 2000. Australian and South American release dates were not specified at Sony's E3 conference, and have yet to be disclosed. In Japan, the official launch date was Saturday, March 4, 2000.

What is the price for the PS2?
In North America the PlayStation2 was officially announced as $299.99, the exact same price as the PlayStation was slated as in fall 1995. In Europe, the price will be converted into the equivalent of $299. The price for the PS2 in Japan is 39,800 yen (about $360-$370 U.S. dollar).

Will PS2 games run on the first generation Playstation?
No, The original Playstation will not be able to play any Playstation2 games. These games are being designed to run on Playstation2 , and as powerful as the original Playstation is, it won't be able to handle the new games. Playstation2 games will be written specifically for the Playstation2 hardware, and the current PlayStation will not recognize the instructions on a Playstation2 game disc.

Will it be backward compatible with all older PlayStation games?
Yes, the Playstation2 will be able to play most original PlayStation games (SCEI has reported that not every single title release will play on the Playstation2, but these games appear to be minimal and not wide spread). Because the system's I/O (input/output) processor is basically the core (main processor) of the original PlayStation, the system will use this processor to insure backward compatibility with all existing PlayStation games. Sony will most likely continue to institute the territorial lockout to make sure that only US Playstation2s play original US PlayStation games.

Answers to questions as to whether or not the Playstation2 will "enhance" original games with effects like a high-resolution mode and texture filtering have been answered. Sony has actually changed its earlier stance, and the games will indeed be enhanced or altered, depending on the game. Also, depending on the game, original PlayStation games also may be slightly altered in speed and playability, too.

Will it use existing PlayStation peripherals, like controllers and memory cards?
Yes. While the Playstation2 will have its own specific controllers, memory cards and peripherals, all original PlayStation memory cards, controllers -- even the PocketStation -- will work on the Playstation2. This will insure 100% backward-compatibility. The three officially announced peripherals are the new PS2 Analog Dual Shock controller (MSRP $34), the 8-MB Memory Card (MSRP $34), and the PS2 Multiap (MSRP $34). Also, North America and Europe also will see a change in the architecture of the PS2, with a big dock in the back of the system that fits a Hard Disc Drive (HDD). SCEA has announced that the HDD will arrive sometime in 2001, and will enable consumers to download games, music, and movies onto their PlayStation2. Fair warning on the “100% backwards compatibility” for peripherials has a catch. The catch is that peripherials, primarily the Dual Shock, will only work with those PS2 games that do not require that the original digital buttons (X,O, Square, Triangle, the d-pad) be analog, or pressure sensative. For example, a PS2 game that will be DS2-required will be Gran Turismo 2000.

How does the North American PS2 differ from the Japanese, and what does it matter?
The North American PS2 was physically altered to enable Sony to plug a Hard Disc Drive into the system's rear portion. This was done to enable players to eventually buy a separate HDD, for downloading movies, games, music, and other data. The PCMCIA card slot has been removed, and is now part and parcel with the new HDD, which still enables Internet access. The external Japanese Hard Disk Drive (HDD) was shown at E3, note that the U.S. version will not require an external drive, because of the presence of the internal port.

The new system configuration helps Sony get past the nagging DVD copyright problems that has plagued the early version of the Japanese PS2. The New North American version has DVD drivers built into the hardware itself, instead of using the software drivers placed on the Memory Cards themselves. This is the reason why a PS2 Memory Card has been excluded from the “in-box” goodies that come with the console. This will hopefully prevent copying from DVD to other media, and solves data corruption problems on the PS2 Memory Cards, too.

What hardware is available for the PS2?
These are the four officially announced SCEA peripherals. There are several companies, such as Mad Catz, Interact, Nyko, Nuby, and others that are developing everything from remote controllers, steering wheels, and Memory Cards for the PS2.

What are the unofficially announced peripherals?
One item that's been unofficially confirmed is a Headset and Voice-Recognition system, which Sony won't speak about yet.

What is the Utility Disc for the PS2 for?
The Utility disc has the DVD drivers on it, along with probably some other software to be used with the Playstation2. Note that the Japanese Utility Disc will not be included in the U.S. box, because the DVD drivers have been pre-loaded onto the U.S. PS2. Speculation has it that Sony will replace the Utility Disc with a Demo disc of some sort, although nothing has been officially confirmed.

What was the official game lineup in Japan?
In Japan the official launch lineup consisted of 12 games, ranging from RPGs to racers to fighting games and strategies. The lineup is:
Ridge Racer V (Racing Namco)
Eternal Ring (Adventure, From Software)
Kessen (Strategic sim, KOEI)
Popolocrois 3 ("Romantic anime," Sony)
Unison (Dance action and sim, Tecmo)
Drum Mania (Action, Konami)
Den Sen Electric Lines (Action, Sony)
A-Train (Sim, Artdink)
Street Fighter EX3 (Fighter, Capcom)
Morita Shogi (Strategy, Yuki Enterprise)
Kakinoki Shogi (Strategy, Ascii Entertainment)
Doukyu Billiards 2 (Simulation, Ask)
Stepping Selection (Dancing Arcade, Jaleco)

These games came soon after (or will come soon) in Japan:
Dark Cloud (RPG, Sony)
Gran Turismo 2000 (Racing, Sony)
The Bouncer (Fighting-action, Square)
Tekken Tag Tournament (Fighting, Namco)
Golf Paradise (T&E Soft)
Jikkyou World Soccer 2000 (Sports, Konami)
Fantavision (Action, Sony Computer Entertainment)
American Arcade Pinball (Action, Astroll)
Driving Emotion Type-S (Racing, Square)
Ex Billiards (Sports, Takara)
I.Q. Remix + (Puzzle, Sony Computer Entertainment)
Evergrace (RPG, From Software)
Street Mah-Jongg 2 (Strategy, SunSoft)
Sky Surfer (Action, TBA)
Crossfire Square (Action, EA)
Dead or Alive 2 (Fighting, Tecmo)
Gekikuukan Pro Baseball: At The End Of The Century 1999 (Sports, Square)
SSX (Sports, Electronic Arts Canada)
Primal Image (Simulation, Atlus Software)

Will it have a modem?
Sony has officially stated it will not ship the machine with a modem. However, the system will use a modem for several purposes. Sony will enable gamers to choose from USB, IEEE 1394 (identified as "i-Link" by Sony) and PCMCIA PC card interfaces, with a modem slot. Note that the Sony “modem” will be broadband, either a DSL set-up or cable. A few third-party companies have rumored development of a USB-based 56Kbps narrowband modem for simple internet connection.

I know that Sony has some sort of internet and online gaming plans. When will the first online game come out?
Sony is planning to make the PS2 able to download information, including add-ons for games released, scores to compete against other players, etc., more details are being released on this daily as the Playstation2 reaches its release overseas. Think “DexDrive” on a much larger scale.

SCEI has recently announced it’s aquisition of Verant Interactive, developer of the online-hit Everquest, to form a new division of SCEI titled Sony Online Entertainment. SOE will handle the development of the broadband network.

What about multiplayer games? Will there be online multiplayer games? 
Sony has officially announced that a new PS2 multitap will ship at launch, which means at least four-player support. No currently announced games have multiplayer capabilities for more than four players. Sony will announce a more comprehensive online strategy later on in 2000, and may announce multiplayer online gaming then.

What about online games? What has Sony said about online games for PlayStation2?
Star Trek Conquest Online
Final Fantasy X
Final Fantasy XI
Gekikuukan Pro Baseball: At The End Of The Century 1999
Driving Emotion Type-S (Square)

How many controller ports does the system have?
Surprisingly, there are two controller ports on the system. That's right, just two. Again, Sony announced a multitap for PS2, which will enable four players to join in on one game. Also, expect online options to play a big part of Sony's future. Note that the reason for Sony to only have 2 controller ports is that 90% of games are 2 players or fewer, and the addition of 2 additional memory card ports and 2 additional controller ports would have been very costly, with the cost moving to the comsumer. That means you would have paid a lot more to be able to play 10% more games.

In real-world numbers, how many polygons can the Playstation2 handle on screen?

Since a 3D object is constructed of pieces (known as polygons), the number of polygons per second a system can process indicates how detailed the 3D graphics can be, and how smoothly they can animate.

Officially, the maximum number the system can process is 75 million polygons per second. But this number doesn't take into account texture maps (images wrapped onto the polygon set), filtering (making the textures look clean, natural, and unpixelated), and lighting (giving the object a more 3D look with realistic shadows and light effects). With all this into place, the Playstation2 can process 20 million polygons per second. Again, this number will be affected by in-game physics, character artificial intelligence, audio, and other processor-intensive effects. We'll take a conservative estimate and saying initial games will push around eight to ten million polygons per second - and believe us when we say that this number is still no slouch, since the original Playstation could only push 150,000 polys and the Sega Dreamcast tops out at about 3 million polys.

What kind of effects is the Playstation2 capable of?
Obviously the system will be capable of mip-mapping, bi-linear filtering, anti-aliasing, texture-correction, and Z-buffering (check IGN.com for definitions)

Sony has also touted that the system will handle Bezier surfacing, a technique that decides how many polygons are needed to make an object have smoother surfacing. Bezier surfacing also assists in telling the object to use as many or as few polygons as the system can handle at that processing moment. Developers can easily insert Bezier-surfaced CG models into the Playstation2 and the system will be able to render the object in real-time.

The PlayStation will also have techniques to create flowing hair and cloth for added realism, as seen in Tekken Tag Tournament.

How does the Playstation2's power compare to other systems, including the Dreamcast, N64, and the original PlayStation?

• PlayStation 2: Around 20 million polygons per second
• Project Dolphin: "As fast as our friends at Sony have," said a wry Nintendo Chairman Howard Lincoln.
• Dreamcast: Around 3 million polygons per second
• Nintendo 64: Around 150,000 polygons per second
• PlayStation: Around 360,000 polygons per second (lacks comparable effects)

• PlayStation 2: 300MHz (294.912 to be exact)
• Project Dolphin: 400MHz
• Dreamcast: 200MHz
• Nintendo 64: 93.75MHz
• PlayStation: 33.86MHz

Memory

• PlayStation 2: 32MB Direct Rambus RAM
• Project Dolphin: Unannounced, but comparable to PlayStation 2
• Dreamcast: 16MB (plus 8MB Video RAM, 2MB Sound RAM)
• Nintendo 64: 4MB (+parity) Rambus D-RAM (expandable to 8MB)
• PlayStation: 2MB (plus 1MB Video RAM, 512kb Sound RAM)

Memory Bus Bandwidth

• PlayStation 2: 3.2 GB/s (Gigabytes per second)
• Project Dolphin: Not announced yet
• Dreamcast: N/A
• Nintendo 64: 500 MB/s (Megabytes per second) or about 0.5 GB/s
• PlayStation: 132 MB/s (Megabytes per second)

Will it use CDs or DVDs?
The PlayStation2 will have a DVD drive that is capable of reading both CD-formatted (650 megabytes) discs as well as DVD-formatted discs (4.7 gigabytes). Most of the initial games will be straight CD games, however, as time progresses, more and more games will be produced on DVD. The first DVD game is by Koei, entitled Kessen. Sony announced that it has developed a specially designed spindle that can read both DVDs and CDs from the same laser. Normal DVD readers have two sets of lasers -- one to read CDs, and one to read the finer pits of a DVD. This measure of combining the laser functionality will reduce the cost of the Playstation2's manufacturing in the long run. This work has been passed on to the consumer through cheaper production costs which helps all of us.

If you want to use the system standing up, how does the CD stay in the tray? I seen lots of pictures of it but I don't know how it works.
It works the same way as a car cd changer, it's is a sized slot so it doesn't have the room to go anywhere so it can be read sideways, upside-down, etc.

Will some of the dissapointing launch games (i.e. SFEX3, Eternal Ring) get a facelift before launching in the U.S. this fall?
Sadly the only differences so far on the majority of these games will be the language translation. Namco has comfirmed that they are adding anti-aliasing to Ridge Racer 5 and Tekken Tag Tournament. Square said they are working on improving the massively dissappointing Driving Emotion Type-S as well.

What do the different colored discs mean?
There are three colored discs.
Blue = CD-ROM
Silver = DVD
Black = Original PlayStation Disc

What's the speed on the drive? Will there be load times?
CD-ROM = 24X speed
DVD-ROM = 4X speed
As with any disc drive, there will be load times, but rest assured, load times are far less likely to surpass PlayStation's current 15-30 second load times.

Will it play DVD movies?
Sony has said that, right out of the box, the Playstation2 will indeed have the ability to play DVD movies. Sony has official plans to release a hard drive-like peripheral in the year 2001 to coincide with its broader e-commerce scheme. This will enable players to buy games, or perhaps update games, as well as movies, and music online. The system has MPEG2 capabilities, too.

I heard that the PS2 has Mpeg capabilities. Does this mean that I can burn a CD with my Mpeg movies files on it and play them with my PS2? Or maybe play them from the harddrive once it comes out?
More then likely the Mpeg reference is simply referring to the ability to play DVD movies and the such. You may be able to, but more then likely not. We'll find out soon.

Does PS2 have cooling fans?
Yes the PS2 does have a fan! (thank God!) It'll probably have a bit of an odd hum, like the Dreamcast, but you'll get used to it.

Does the blue horizontal base come packaged with the system? I always assumed that it was since all of the pictures of the system have it. But at the Playstation2000 Festival, the display case that showed off was you would be getting when you got the system sported a PS2 with no horizontal base on it.
The Horizontal base is not included and will cost you 8 dollars (In Japan), the vertical base is also not included and will cost you 15 dollars (Again, In Japan). The Horizontal stand isn’t required for the PS2, it’s usage is purely superficial. The Vertical stand is recommended as it provides substantially more stability to the PS2.

On some newer models of the current Playstation, when one plays a music CD there are images that follow the music as it plays in real time. Will this hold true for the Playstation2, and if so, will it differ any?
The PS2 Music CD interface is VERY simple. It includes everything a Discman included and nothing else. Play, Rewind, Fast Foward, Skip Track, Back Track. It has been confirmed that the Japanese Playstation2 does not have the “light show”, but nothing has been confirmed for the U.S. version. We wouldn’t recommend holding your breath, though.

What sports games are coming out for the PS2?
EA is bringing it's full line of titles over to the PS2 this fall. You can be sure to expect Sony's lineup as well. Konami is also working on some Soccer titles and a baseball game. Oh, and Square is making a baseball game.

I was wondering if the Japanese version of the PS2 will play US DVDs? If not, will there be a converter so that you can play US DVDs on the PS2? 
Technically the PS2 in Japan is only supposed to play Japanese DVDs, but the first one million shipped had a "glitch" in them that allowed one to play US DVDs just by holding the up button on an original PSX controller. Sony has fixed this "glitch" on the next shipments of the system. The “glitched” DVD driver is found on Version 1.00 of the Utility Disc, then un-glitched DVD driver is found on Version 1.01.

What about games? What games will be made for the Playstation2?
Plenty of developers are hard at work on Playstation2 software. We suggest keeping an eye on our News Section for the latest info and shots.