PS3 Glitch Hits “Fatty” PS3 Worldwide: What Do We Know?

Sony’s PlayStation 3 appears to be in the throes of an inadvertent global gaming lock-down, suffering from an unidentified glitch that prevents gamers from playing specific games whether online or offline. The issue appears to be related to the month change between February and March, and occurs whether you’re connected to the Internet or not. The company isn’t responding to press emails at this time or detailing what the problem is, only that it’s working on an “issue” and attempting “to restore service to all.”

Are you affected? Here’s what we’ve learned so far:
-This glitch seems to only affect “fat” PS3s. No reports of a slim-line PS3 with a glitch have been reported.
-It really is GLOBAL, affecting Japan, Europe, and North America.
-This glitch prevents you from conencting to the PlayStation Network.
-Only games prevented from starting are trophy-enabled ones. Older PS3 games without trophies should work fine.
-The error codes vary from game to game, but all appear to be trophy related.
-This glitch occurs initially when powering on your PS3. This does not matter whether you are connected to the Internet or not.
-Manually resetting your PS3s time and date will not resolve the issue.
-Some report re-seating the internal battery will resolve this problem. These claims are NOT verified, but even if they were, I wouldn’t attempt this even with a no-fault insurance policy. Aside from voiding your warranty, this would require full disassembly of you PS3 system and meddling with the core components.

As of 9:55 PST, according to Sony’s Twitter page, this glitch should be fixed by 1 PM EST March 2nd, 2010:
“@JeffRubenstein: Summary: PS3 slim is good to go, older models should be fine within 24 hrs. Leave em off until then.”

[UPDATE]
It seems that as of 00:00 GMT, all PS3s seemed to have fixed themselves. Since then, I’ve booted mine and have had no problems throughout use. It seems this “nightmare” to some has ended, and it was just a small, technical glitch by Sony. But no hatin’, we’re all human, we all make mistakes. Everything’s back up and running: PSN is good, Netflix, trophy-enabled games… all good. So relax, release your paranoia, and feel free to power up and play! Kick back, and turn on your PS3!