Each passing day gets us closer to P-day (aka Feb 26th) when millions (perhaps trillions) of you will rhythmically march (perhaps even chanting “pata-pata-pata-pon?”) to your local retailers for a minty new copy of Patapon … so, with much fanfare, whistles and drums, I’d like to officially start the Patapon launch countdown … just 4 little weeks to go!
What being closer to launch also means is we’re free to divulge some secrets we’ve been sitting on… so to answer a question posted on the first Pata-post (and insistently echoed by everybody!):
Where’s the demo? What about the demo? When are we going to get a demo? Why no demo? Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we there yet?
So to answer: no, we will not have a demo.
At least not your run-of-the-mill-this-is-meh demo … we couldn’t do that for Patapon. That would be – as Rolito would say – tre passé. So instead we’ve conjured up some mad PSP Juju and created the first ever demo-to-final save technology, also includes a demo-only exclusive: The Spear of Protection, an ultra-rare pon-weapon.
Here’s how it’ll work:
1. Get your hands on the demo (available at your local GameStop when you pre-order Patapon).
2. Play through the demo, save your progress.
3. Play, replay and replay everyday until Feb 26th (ok, you don’t really have to do this).
4. Come Feb. 26th, pick up a retail copy (you can pick one up for a friend too… its just 20 ka-ching).
5. Load save file, and start off where the demo ended.
6. Point and laugh at everybody else who didn’t play the demo and will have to start from the beginning AND they won’t have the super-cool-demo-only “SPEAR OF PROTECTION” that will transfer to the final game once you load the save data.
7. Progress onto Earthend.
8. Check “must play Patapon” off things-to-accomplish-this-year list.
There you have it folks – demo, new weapons, PSP Juju and some showboating. Now you’ll all be able to experience the goodness that is Patapon, learn a few commands, customize your troops, fight a few battles, collect some ka-ching and slay a dragon (or two… well, just one really).
That about wraps it up for this week – until next!
UPDATE: PATAPON DEMOS LOST IN TRANSIT
Err… not really lost, but still in transit; seems like I got my copy early and was misinformed by the distribution center (the wrong date was confirmed — darn you human error!). After further investigation, we got word that the demos will be arriving within the next one to two weeks.
What? But gamestop is like here and i live………………………………………………………………………… over here, dont do this to me put it on PSn please!
Definitely will go preorder when I know Gamestop have the Demo disc there! This game will rock my psp hard!
good thing about this is someone who gets the demo can just upload the save on gamefaq.com or something and everybody can get it lol. hopefully that is allowed.
Bring on P-Day!
Gotta say making us buy (preorder) the game just to play the demo is quite stupid!
How will I know if i like the game? I’m not going to preorder a game I might not like!
duh!
@Frito. tell me about the rest of the people that preorder games that they never played before.
@ Frito, you pre-order the game for 5 dollars and get a demo. If you don’t like it then you have 5 dollars credit. That’s how my GameStop works, not sure about teh credit thing in other stores call and ask.
all right lets go. jst be sure to get it out before spring break. im gonna have to go on a band trip to flordia and all im gonna need is Patapwn and a couple more PSP batteries.
I am going to buy a PSP for this game. ^-^
Also, as a Gamestop employee, thank you! It’s much easier to get preorders for a game when you offer a neat gift like this.
@FoxKit
Yea you would be thankful, and ladi-dadi-dah, I used to work at EBgames, and like I said before whenever we had these kind of offers, all it ever did was serve the chain of stores it was paired with, I personally think that above all else, sales of the actual game will increase due to a public web based release of the demo for psp, We gamers come from a world where demo disks used to have anywhere from 4-13 demos of games on them every month for free… merely by buying a magazine we enjoyed reading.
Yea the demo situation needs adjusting, I’ve noticed a lot of companies offering demos of their games only upon pre-purchase or pre-order, and I think it’s especially ridiculous for a newly developed IP or would be IP, I think you’re limiting the sales of the final product by not giving access of the demo to all psp owners that are at the minimum “Paying Attention” and even then, that’s considering they’re even paying attention at all.
Why not toss it up on the PSNs both ps3 and pc for psp download, I’m still not really sure whether this is a game for me, let alone even my gf (she’s a fairly avid gamer as well), I’m just not that enticed… It looks interesting in it’s own little way, but I really don’t know if I’m going to pick it up or not, and I usually buy everything Sony has to offer.
Oversaturating the market will destroy the industry… demos of games help the gamers feel like the market isn’t oversaturated, and hence they can pick and choose their games wisely instead of blindly jumping into stuff that may not agree with their stomachs so to speak.
As game developers that are seemingly excited about your product to the max’.(I’ve seen it before on good games, and bad) I think you should be part of the solution, and not part of the problem, concerning demos, and distribution, or attention of the masses.
I’m so busy that I’m lucky if I even get to game at all lately… So when I’m home… I’m home… and that’s it.
I’d really like to try this, before I even leave my house to go to the store let alone… leave the house to do a pre-order.
@Sony in General
Please don’t take my previous comment as harmful criticism, If any company is guilty of Oversaturating the market, it’s definitely not the likes of Sony… I’m just stating as a very open-minded, Hardcore Gamer, that I usually love the games flowing out of your affiliates, and in-house devs, and I guess it’s closely related to a future vision of the industry, and I really don’t want to see this happen a lot in the future… It would be nice to try almost everything your company has to offer before I buy, and a Demo for a 5$ pre-order even if refundable, seems like a major hoop to put millions of people through… no?
It’s a hoop I’m going lead by example by, and not jump through. Even if I’m the only one who doesn’t do a pre-order, I hope I make a difference.
I don’t want to see a future where we have to pay to try a game that we might end up buying for full price(Anywhere from $10-$100+) eventually.
Awesome news on the demo. I’ve already got my copy preordered and paid in full. I’ll have to check my store for the demo next week.
Anyone out there know if this demo will be shipped to those of us who pre-order online?
Thanks
Sony!! You do realize not everyone has access to a gamestop store right? The closest one to me is at least 2 hours away. I’m not driving 2 hours just to pre-order a game and get the demo!! What’s wrong with a downloadable demo? Of course not everyone has access to the internet right? Still… This gamestop/ebgames exclusive CRAP has got to STOP!! You’re excluding many of us w/o access to… and online doesn’t work unless it’s some trivial DLC…
Postively, i like patapon when i watch its online gameplay video.
There is a demo come out that is great news but it is difficult for people to get one
I have tried to use my psp to access internet and it totally looks differently.
I felt that a demo should be dowloadable by a psp in a period of time to commericial and benefit for people to recognize and enjoy it.
Finally, I pre-order this game at EBgames in Kingston, Canada and now I hope it will able to get a demo for me from gamestop.
Hi I have the same problem as #15, 17 and 23
Im from Mexico (that means I payed what would be like $550 dollars to get my psp1000 or “fatty”, like $1,000 for my day one ps3 and like $50 dollars for psp games and $80 for any ps3 games AND there is no gamestop, we exist too! )
so is there a way that we, who dont have any gamestop in our country, will be able to download
oh well the game looks great so i will buy it, but it is really frustrating not to be able to get the spear
::::off topic::::
when is DMC 4 coming out?
@verdantalan
:::off topic:::
Really flippin’ soon, I played the DMC4 demo from the PSN, I was going to put it off and buy burnout first, but now I’ve decided I’ll be buying both at the same time, DMC4 even though multi-platform now, is definitely worth my $$$, and not to stab at the article we’re typing in or anything…
… I tried the demo on the PSN, so I know it’s not just a series rehash of old DMC mechanics etc…
…In retrospect a new IP should definitely have an open public demo.
I got an idea, how about… anyone who buys a new psp game, gets a demo of Patapon, no matter what store… or vendor it’s from? And after that, whatever demo you are running then, and so on, and so forth… I could see a snowball effect like what happened with the PlayStation2…
Any positions in marketing or PR open atm? argh! wait, I might be a little to abraisive for PR… but I’m observant enough for marketing. And I’m temporarily available.
With PSN and the PSP Store, why isn’t this made available via download? It’s seems interesting but not worth stepping into a GameStop…
Correction. At the current exchange rate UK gamers have to pay the equivalent of *FIFTY DOLLARS* for this game.
Gee, thanks Sony. Europe is leading the PS3 fight back for you and we still have to pay double or more for all your PS products.
And we still don’t get PSN bowling……….
Well, after not finding an answer to my question about Patapon orders online (#63) I drove all the way to a GameStop to try to get an answer. WHAT A WASTE!!! I will NEVER shop at GameStop in person or online again – exclusive demo or not!
The only employee in the store had no interest at all in helping me with anything! All my questions were answered with”Um…I don’t know, I guess not…”
Plus, the DS Download Station in the store was not working, and when I asked the employee what was wrong he said that I was doing it wrong, but that he didn’t know the right way – and he had no interest in finding out. I finally found a poster hidden on a wall behind a stack of junk, and sure enough – I was doing it right. When I pointed this out to the employee his response was “Huh.” I was the ONLY customer in the store, and he had no interest in helping me out .
What’s the problem with them??? GameStop’s prices aren’t great, so customer service is all they have to distinguish themselves from the competition – and their customer service STINKS!
As much as I would love the Patapon demo I guess, like so many of you, I’ll have to wait until someone uploads a gamesave somewhere. What a disappointment. You can be sure I’ll be sending this to GameStop as well…
@ kedaro
I completely agree with your suggestion but it should include as many countries as possible BTW thanks for the info about DMC downloading demo right now
I finally got my demo and I am more than happy with it. Can’t wait to sink my teeth in the final build. Thanks goes out to all those involved in the making of this excellent game.
Just finished the demo and…..
I ABSOLUTELY LOVE IT!!!!!
Great job on this game and great idea on the “demo-to-final-save-technology”! Please do this for future games as well, I really love the idea.
Just wanted to say how much I appreciate you guys sending out these physical media demos in an age where everything is downloads, downloads, downloads, an actual disc with some nice packaging is so refreshing.