The slim PS2... Why did they ditch the HD?

[Attilitus]

I really cannot understand why Sony decided to ditch the HD. They no longer sell it, nor does their new "slim ps2" support it.

I can understand why they made the changes with the in-built network adapter and all... but I really feel that they could have done the same while maintaining the functionality of the HD.

Now I am stuck with an old PS2 which I cannot trade in for a new one because if I do I won't be able to play FF11 anymore, nor use the hundreds of gamesaves that I store on the HD.

[swetooth9]

I really cannot understand why Sony decided to ditch the HD. They no longer sell it, nor does their new "slim ps2" support it.

I can understand why they made the changes with the in-built network adapter and all... but I really feel that they could have done the same while maintaining the functionality of the HD.

Now I am stuck with an old PS2 which I cannot trade in for a new one because if I do I won't be able to play FF11 anymore, nor use the hundreds of gamesaves that I store on the HD.

i dont think many people bought the hd for the ps2...and i guess sony decided that it's best to just move on with what most people have already...when making the sleeker slim ps2, they could not fit the hd into the design, so they left that out...sony needed a new design to attract new customers :)

[Attilitus]

Well I know that alot of people who had Socom 2 bought it... Although the "promised" maps took a very long time to be delivered.

[Kill Phil]

The HDD failed. Few games even supported it and only the hardcore gamers decided to buy it. It wasn't widely used, so there wasn't much need for it. If they kept in internal HDD support, the PSTwo would be almost the same size as the PS2 (notice how big the HDD is?). A lot of useless functions of the PS2 have been removed over the years, such as the iLink connector. They weren't really needed.

[Attilitus]

Tons of people purchased the HD for FFXI...

I really wouldn't consider it a failure...

PS: What was the iLink connector?

[Kill Phil]

Tons? For the PC, yes. For the PS2 .. well .. not so much. There hasn't been an official count of the number of subscribers of FFXI, but it was around 500,000 last year (I assume it'd be at around 750,000 people this year). It's safe to assume that at least one-third of those people are playing on the PS2. I mean, why pay $100 for the game, plus $30 for the expansion pack when you could buy the game on the PC for $20? Even if all the PlayOnline members were on the PS2 version, it would still be a failure since very few other games supported it.

I'm not exactly sure what the iLink connector does, but I think it was a way to play multiplayer games with two PS2s and two TVs (Time Crisis 3 supported it). It was in some of the older model PS2s and was removed a couple of years ago.

[Yoshi]

i think it was because they wanted a new design and the hd didnt realy support that many games. so they just droped it

[ErikB]

i have the HD but it seriously didn't sell, only me and 15 other people in my area even bought it. On FFXI it seems less than 25% are on the ps2. Remember, the HD was supposed to be released when the ps2 launched, it was over 3 years late....

[oooooblah]

Well... i thought the new ps2 was a waste because most gamers already have a ps2 and didnt need another one. Those small ones have no fans in them so you can leave them on for long periods of time. But i think they made them for the casual gamers and make it look like a very sleek luxury. Those causual gamers prob. wont buy the xbox because it is way too big and ugly. I think that was the point of playstation making that sleeker ps2. But what really sucks is that it made it a little harder to find the old ps2s sence i live in a small town our walmart only supports the new ps2s.:P

[oooooblah]

Soooo... i think the target was the people that play every once and a while not the hard cores or the average video gamers.:P