How are all these installs managed? Are they cumulative, gradually gobbling up HDD space, or are they limited to a fixed partition? Do you have the option to undelete game installs, and if so, where does that option hang out?
At the top of the Game section lies the "Game Data Utility," which is where I'm pulling out my numbers. These can all be deleted, but most-if-not-all of them cannot be copied, because that's where the game-specific downloadable content lives. (Which I'm guessing they don't want freely handed out.)
Obviously I'm not counting large totals from the likes of Rock Band (which for me is at 600MB) or Motorstorm (372MB), as I know that that's from--I HAVE downloaded a bunch of content. People can all check their own totals, but since my Rock Band game data has grown as I add songs, and I have all the extra Motorstorm maps and cars (which have to live somewhere), I'm pretty sure that's where it all lies, and that people will get varied numbers.
For R&C I have a 417MB block, which COULD--I suppose--come from things like videos and commentary and such instead of being a "forced game-data install," but I'm not sure why they'd store that locally. All I know is that I downloaded no R&C content (I'm not even aware if there IS any...?) and don't remember it mentioning any kind of install, so I assume it's a semi-perminant cache. Who knows, it MAY automatically disappear if I ever need the space, but so far that hasn't come up.
Warhawk, I know, installed a 789MB file up there, but since that's pretty much exactly the network download size...? I own the retail box and don't recall authorizing an install, but do require some extra "setup" time it needed. I don't mind, but that being the case I'm a bit miffed that they still require me to put the disk in, since they tossed on all the game data anyway. Heh...
Heavenly Sword has a 2GB block, and I DO remember it specifically needing to install that before I could do anything. What I don't specifically recall is if it asked me a Y/N question beforehand; I would certainly have said yes. I don't THINK it did, but...
I assume all patch-related and update-related content will end up in the Game Data Utility section as well, so SOMEthing for each game is to be expected. (Though Uncharted seems to have left no trace, which is odd. Considering how good the game looks and how well it runs, though, obviously it shows that there's nothing wrong with BR technically... Devs just need to devote the time to the platform.) Genji tossed on, like, a dozen megs... Burnout has 25MB, but in there is probably the Gamestop car and the extra pre-order one...
It would certainly be nice to know which games force what, and what they're used for, though. There is a "Details" section in the information you can look up about each game's data cache, but they're almost universally empty. Even "Version" is frequently left blank.
Anyone can freely play around with this, though, as even demos can leave a trace. (Possibly not many, though. I think I may have just gotten random free content for games I only own in demo form.)
