Two quick points:

1) If this has already been blogged, apologies!
2) This may also apply to the EU in general, I don't know.

As some of you may already know we in the UK have had Gran Turismo TV as part of GT5 Prologue since release. It hasn't been particuarly good, with only 5 videos currently there to download other than the credits etc., and one of those is an advert for the stupid GT Academy competition. All of which are free.

Now, 3 of these videos (Nissan GT-R: The Legend, Parts 1/2/3) have been available to download for sometime, and from what I've seen aren't too shabby. But having just looked inside the News section, there was a post on the 29th of July saying that in the incoming update (amongst other things) that these videos will now be PPV - even if you've already downloaded them, you'll have to pay to watch.

WHAT.

How in the blue hell can they possibly be justified in charing for something that was already free, especially if you've already downloaded and viewed it? Consider as well the original cost of the game - £25. $50.

It may be a relatively small indiscretion on the part of SCEE compared to some other things they've done to Europe, but that list is growing weekly, and I for one am getting more and more annoyed with how we're being treated.

Thoughts?

[UPDATE:] I have to admit, I'm a tad confused now. Despite the notice on the news (which I have double, triple checked) the GTR videos are NOT PPV. You can't download them, because the servers are overloaded right now and you can't get anything downloaded other than the update. I sat 'downloading' 4 different videos for at least half an hour and didnt get beyond 0% completion.

However, something I don't like*, as I alluded to in my comments on the front page threads, is that we're being charged to view Top Gear content. For most of the EU I can understand this, but we in the UK already pay for BBC content via the TV license. I really, really, do not like paying twice for things, particuarly when it is easily accessible via the BBC website for free.

(other than the fact that we're paying for content I believe should be free after paying £25 for the game, but that's another debate altogether!)

First off, this is my first Blog post and may therefore be highly unpleasant to look at, I'll try to rectify problems as soon as I can.

Secondly, this will undoubtedly be a blatant whinge thread. Us Brits like a good bitch/moan! If you're going to be offended and/or bored, you may as well skip this and go back to making vodoo dolls of Rev Anthony, lest he live to criticise another video game.

Basically I'd like to vent my spleen here, over the shambles that is Konami's latest iteration of iits (usually) Pro Evolution Soccer series. As was well publicised at release, (5 months ago for the UK) the game had major problems with offline play, in that the framerate dropped heavily during actions of intensity. And by intensity I mean virtually every time the ball gets near the penalty area - a shame given that during any half-decent game the ball tends to spend a lot of time in that general area. Replays also suffered badly, meaning you had to watch them at around half speed in order to see what the hell actually happened. Being a rabid fanboy of the series I was willing to put up with these faults in anticipation of a patch, as promised by Konami. A matter of weeks after the release, said patch was released and lessened the problems, although they are still prevalent throughout.

But my main beef came with the online play, something that myself and virtually all other fans of the series were crying out for. (Yes, previous iterations had it but I'll damned if I can be arsed rearranging all my furniture around just to link up my PS2 with an ethernet cable!) Alas, we were majorly disappointed when it turned to be a complete sack of unplayable shit. The ball barely ever touched your feet, and when you think you've just about figured whats going on, your goal keeper has inexplicably dropped the ball from his hands and into the net. Great. (On a sidenote, I read the IGN UK review of the game, which failed to mention more or less all of the obvious problems with the game, so I was happy it would be a good buy. Turns out IGN sponsored the game and handily neglected to give it a proper review. Needless to say, I rarely visit IGN any more.)

Konami promised us a fix soon! They were hard at work sorting everything out - hurrah! The aforementioned patch did fuck all to help the online issues, and there has been nothing to sort it out thus far. 5 months of false promises from Konami, a highly respected - nay, exalted - name in the video game world. So those of us who can't stand FIFA are left with a full price game which is broken, and left wondering whether or not we should give up and switch to FIFA next year - something unheard of in recent years.

My question to you, Destructoiders - what the hell is going on with Konami and Pro Evo 2008? Will they ever patch it? Or have they just given up all hope and started work on 2009, in the hope that all of us who want a playable (maybe even enjoyable, strewth!) online game will just piss off and shut up? Either way Konami stands to lose a huge amount of revenue if they think that this is ok, along with a chunk of their previously golden reputation.