14 DAY TRIAL // Many of you probably tried to play a little Motorstorm on the PS3 kiosks that are in some Best Buy, EB Games or GameStop stores. I said "tried" because, more likely, the damn thing froze up on you. Destructoid discovered that Sony made the PS3 kiosks freeze up on purpose, so that you won't play it all day long.
Nick Brutal from Destructoid was out on Christmas in an EB Games store when he spotted a Sony rep cleaning a PlayStation 3 kiosk. He approached him and started a conversation with him:
"Nick Brutal: Happy Holidays!
Sony Rep: Oh, hi! I'll be done here in one second and then I'll turn on the unit so you can get a glimpse of the future.
NB: Oh, I know all about it. I have the future at home. In my closet. Still in the box. Trying to sell it. No takers. So dude over there-pointing to the busy clerk-says he keeps the kiosk off because it keeps freezing up. SR: Nope. No it doesn't.
NB: Well, actually, yeah. It does. I've seen it happen myself.
SR: No. It doesn't. We did that on purpose..
NB: You make the entire console lock up on purpose because ... why?
SR: We do that so that people won't play it all day long. Specifically during Motorstorm, we made it freeze up a lot."
After the conversation ended and the Sony rep left, Nick Brutal stuck around and played some Motorstorm, and surprisingly, this time the kiosk didn't froze. If you were to ask me, this measure is a little bit drastic. Can't Sony rely on gaming common sense? Or they consider gamers to be rude and unable to step down from a game when asked?