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The time is at hand, fellow PS3 owners. First, we saw a purported list of the v2.40 update’s features, and a proposal of a release date: three weeks. The very next day, a tip arose from the murky depths of NeoGAF; it said that we’d see an official announcement and a video walkthrough from Sony on June 30th. It’s funny just how true some rumors turn out to be. The forumite over at Le GAF was proven correct early this morning: shortly before 3 AM EDT, a five-and-a-half-minute video walkthrough of how in-game XMB will work was posted on the Official PlayStation Blog (see above). This is Part 1 of the walkthrough; the next video, which will demo the new Trophies feature, is coming “shortly.”

The walkthrough cautions that this isn’t necessarily the way it’s going to look or work in the release of the update, but the video was put up to give us “a good idea” of what to expect when the update hits. First, Lempel brings up the XMB while playing Gran Turismo 5 Prologue (an interesting note is that hitting the “Home” button to access the XMB doesn’t automatically pause the game, so you can have it running in the background). We’ll see the full XMB, as it would appear upon powering on the PS3. All the capabilities -- e.g., messaging/friends list, download manager, and settings -- are available.

As I predicted, having the Game tab of the XMB available means that you’ll be able to launch games directly from the XMB without having to manually quit out of the game you’re currently playing. Photo thumbnails show up, but if you want to view them fullscreen (e.g., in a slideshow), the system will ask you to quit out to the XMB. The great thing about having the Settings tab accessible is the ability to set up your Bluetooth headset from within a game. Sony has also added a clock, with date, to the in-game XMB.

The last major feature is a long-awaited one: music that’s on your PS3’s hard drive can be played instead of the in-game soundtrack. The playback tool offers standard functions (change tracks, stop, repeat, shuffle, volume control). Finally, v2.40 will bring a Google Search function to the XMB’s Network tab, just as in the PSP v4.00 firmware. Curiously, Lempel says that in-game XMB will “support the majority of games available for PS3,” but frankly, I’m not worried about that right now. All I know is that seeing v2.40 in action was so beautiful that it nearly brought a tear to my eye...

[Via PlayStation.Blog]








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Samit Sarkar is a founding Destructoid editor and go-to Sports guy. Samit was the son of the Duke of Knees, rescued from a burning village in the afghan desert by a golden condor. He is an ace Backgammon player and lost both legs in a whaling tour. He lives for free in a nursery in Scotland where he teaches monks how to capture butterflies without hurting them. Likes Confuse Ray, Feel My Blade A Mabari War Hound, Snot, Spiral Arrow, Argo, Dan Smith's critical hit bark, Rolling things up into my life Meet the rest of the team



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19 comments | showing # 1 to 19
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Simmy's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 06:18
Simmy
I'm actually impressed with Sony for once.
I didn't expect there to be so much available with the In game XMB.
Hopefully I'll be impressed with the Trophies system too.
wardrox's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 06:27
wardrox
Wow, it can do stuff I wasn't expecting. In-game switching? Om nom nom. Very cool.
linuxguy's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 06:27
linuxguy
love the way it's a full XMB!
my bet E3 week
Mars of Neptune's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 06:37
Mars of Neptune
Freaking sweet. =D Mmm..
matmanx1's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 07:44
matmanx1
SWEEEET. Sorry, having trouble containing myself. THANK YOU SONY.
Ichigo Style's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 07:47
Ichigo Style
By god! A Feature I've had on my 360 for over two years now!
melocholly's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 08:12
melocholly
Actually no Ichigo Style, While the 360 does have access to the XBL dashboard, it only can do Music and friends list. PS3 however will have access to every feature in the XMB. Friends list, Music, Settings, Video ect.
loki d20's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 08:13
loki d20
So, does it notify you when you get a message from a friend while you're playing a game? Or at least have a setting to choose to be notified as such?

Good work, probably nothing I'll ever use, but it seems to make those of you who aren't in an intimate relationship with your 360s happy.
bipolar beers's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 08:13
bipolar beers
sweet cant wait for this to be released. finally! looks good.
Samit Sarkar's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 08:24
Samit Sarkar
@The Wrath: Thanks for the heads-up! My post on the second video is now up.

@loki d20: Um, your PS3 already notifies you when you get a message from a friend while you’re doing anything (playing game, watching movie, etc.). You know, the little gray bubble that pops up in the top right-hand corner?
Takeshi's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 08:25
Takeshi
@The Wrath
You better be right about that bro!

@Ichigo
And how many RROD's during that 2 years? Old news is old dude. Just like my comment.

@Loki
Sure, you can set it up anyway you like.
Brad Rice's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 09:37
Brad Rice
So I can finally have Snake listen to Bon Jovi while killing terrorists. Thanks, Sony. You did what Konami almost promised to do with the iPod.
bhive01's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 09:53
bhive01
The only thing left is in-game invites and audio messages (because typing with a d-pad is a pain in the ass).
Ichigo Style's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 10:00
Ichigo Style
@melocholly point taken, but honestly, would it kill you to hit y than a to get to the dashboard to start a new game? Everything useful I need is accessed with the guide button.

I'm not saying it's a bad move for Sony, it'll be nice to finally access things from ingame with my PS3, but sadly, I don't play online with my PS3, so most of these features are moot, and we're good design from the beginning, begging the question why the PS3 never shipped with these to begin with, it's not that hard to implement.
king3vbo's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 10:15
king3vbo
Its... amazing... Its just like my 360... OMG PONIES

That being said, this update is a long time coming.
Alexradl's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 10:17
Alexradl
In-game music FTW. Anyway, I don't know why but, it's not really what I pictured it to look like. Accessing the settings was a big deal for me, so I'm glad they added that in. Yay Sony!
Quest's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 11:52
Quest
this is great .... except those M$ fanboys comment
mix's Avatar - Comment posted on 06/30/2008 13:25
mix
So many added features, reeeeel nice!
kawitchate's Avatar - Comment posted on 07/01/2008 01:52
kawitchate
i was also a little worried by the "support the majority of games available for PS3" comment. oh, and i guess this means it won't work for PS2 games huh... oh well. didn't think it would.
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