I mainly bought this for a bluray player and also to check out some downloadable games. I don't plan on getting many retail games and will trade-in the one I got included with the console.
Impressions:
1. No remote in box, boo, I guess there wasn't with the xbox though...
2. Only rubbish cables in the box, lucky I have my PS2 component cables hanging about.
3. The controller is really light! And doesn't need AA batteries, it comes with a usb cable you stick in the front of the machine to charge it. And it has motion controls, swoosh. The d-pad is a lot better than the xbox's but I can't imagine doing hadokens with it. The sticks are in the wrong place and the triggers are absolutely terrible (I think because they are convex).
4. It makes a nice orchestra warming-up sound on startup. The menu is uncluttered and shows you the full background picture of your choice (the Katamari theme is horrible though)
5. The internet browsing is good as its in HD and its fast (oh, and its wifi so no cables either), youtube is rubbish quality though iPlayer is awesome and almost as good as watching TV (well better quality than some of the rubbish freeview channels).
6. Home had a really long tutorial and makes you download a lot of things and is basically just advertising and reminds me of what I think Second Life would be like. I don't think I'll load it up again.
7. The online store takes some getting used to but prices are all in real pounds and pence. No stupid points and points cards. But it has a minimum spend of £5 (but you can save the change to spend later), which I guess is like a lot of shops.
So, I thought I'd try out LocoRoco CocoReccho as it was only £1.99, (so spent £3.19 on mr.katamari's game which I have yet to try). And its excellent. Very Katamari like in simple bright colours and an awesome soundtrack. And it’s a great little game that opens up new areas every time you play and makes great use of analogue stick + button + motion controls. I played it for far too long.
Well, that’s that. It'll be good to have blu-rays, though they cost more than DVDs. I also found out that you can get a freeview tuner for 50 quid which turns the ps3 into a sky+ like recorder box. Which is good as I no longer have sky+ or even a freeview box and browsing normal telly is rubbish. So it makes sense now why the ps3 has a 120GB hard disc.