Sony Home - The official thread*

[patsu]

Haha, you can try to beat our scores in the Red Bull Air Race. I think on B3D, tuna's score is the highest. I am second (Yay !), cthellis is third. Arwin is just warming up though.

 

[-tkf-]

. Everyone could send questions via text chat. Jeff Rubenstein moderated the content and flow of the questions.

I bought the minikeypad, mainly for being able to answer people in Home

My plan was to buy a standard blutetooth keyboard, but while i was shopping for music.. it was there.. so i grabbed it. And it saves me alot of space that i don´t have

 

[catisfit]

Haha, you can try to beat our scores in the Red Bull Air Race. I think on B3D, tuna's score is the highest. I am second (Yay !), cthellis is third. Arwin is just warming up though.

I need to get some of you added to compete (not that I'm particularly good )

PSN: catisfit

 

[patsu]

Should be "catisfit" (catisift didn't work ;-))

BTW, you can embed your PSN id in your B3D profile if you want to.

 

[Arwin]

Should be "catisfit" (catisift didn't work ;-))

BTW, you can embed your PSN id in your B3D profile if you want to.

With the huge advantage that suddenly you'll see the PSN of all the other members who did as well, so that you don't have to ask for them.

 

[tuna]

Patsu beat me at Red Bull....will try again later....

 

[patsu]

I need to get some of you added to compete (not that I'm particularly good )

Ah ! catisfit beat both of us by a wide margin, tuna.
[size=-2]0:54.55s[/size]

 

[catisfit]

Should be "catisfit" (catisift didn't work ;-))

See my edit

BTW, you can embed your PSN id in your B3D profile if you want to.

With the huge advantage that suddenly you'll see the PSN of all the other members who did as well, so that you don't have to ask for them.

I guess. I don't have many friend slots left on PSN so I like to be a little more restrictive , and I don't have XBL Gold so friends on there are a bit pointless.

 

[patsu]

I see. Nonetheless, thanks to you, I found out the Air Race is not a simple Flash game with advertisement. The plane follows law of physics (Banking the plane will speed up turns and make the turning radius smaller). I have achieved a higher score now

EDIT: There should be a Home 1.11 patch tomorrow. Warhawk space is targeted for release tomorrow too.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

The plane follows law of physics

That's quite a stretch! Played it last night, and it's so simplistic and clunky, I don't really see the point. Yes, there's the competition aspect, bit if the activity itself isn't actually fun, why compete at that instead of something else?! Likewise the Far Cry 2 space was utterly uninspiring, barely more than a change of scenery from the Central Plaza. Hopefully the Warhawk space will be as realised as early talk suggested, and will actually bring some (pretty useless!) depth to Home.

 

[Arwin]

I guess. I don't have many friend slots left on PSN so I like to be a little more restrictive , and I don't have XBL Gold so friends on there are a bit pointless.

I like the 'last-logged-in' feature, it helps clean up friend slots. But I haven't really needed that yet.

For XBL, I still like friends there even without Gold functionality simply to have some 'normal' people to compare scores with when I'm definitely not going to be competitive with the leaderboards worldwide (which is almost always, obviously).

 

[patsu]

That's quite a stretch! Played it last night, and it's so simplistic and clunky, I don't really see the point. Yes, there's the competition aspect, bit if the activity itself isn't actually fun, why compete at that instead of something else?! Likewise the Far Cry 2 space was utterly uninspiring, barely more than a change of scenery from the Central Plaza. Hopefully the Warhawk space will be as realised as early talk suggested, and will actually bring some (pretty useless!) depth to Home.

Ha ha, not so. I used to pilot the plane like a tank. My timing was in the minutes.

Now that I roll the plane "organically", I can zip past the cones and pivot around them tighter. If I turn without rolling the plane, the turning radius and speed are much larger. My timing is now less than a minute (overtook catisfit ). It's simple but effective. The game doesn't feel clunky to me at all.

The Far Cry space is indeed barren. I don't visit it anymore; didn't even download it after installing 1.10.

EDIT: Now that I think about it... You should be able to launch Warhawk from Home without entering the Warhawk space. As more games support the game launching feature, Sony should definitely enhance the friend finding capability in Home (e.g., automatically group people in the same Home instance if they have overlapping games in their BR drives and HDD).

 

[patsu]

Shifty, I checked the Air Race again and noticed that you didn't complete the mini-game. You should try it once. If your timing is far from 1 minute, then you're playing it wrong like I used to

I think the only way to get good timing is to manage the turn "realistically" (Not too much momentum, but not too stiff either). It's hard to explain. The game is simple, no doubt; but it is certainly not a simplistic "Flash game" that I originally assumed so.

EDIT 2: I was going to look for some gameplay video to show you what I meant. Instead I found out that the Red Bull Air Race is a real annual event.

EDIT: Sony says Home has 4M users: http://www.virtualworldsnews.com/2009/02/quick-stat-home-hits-4m-users.html

Sony announced today that its console-based virtual world, Home, has surpassed 4 million users.

Not sure what it measures. Would be more interesting to report active number of users instead of Home downloaded.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Shifty, I checked the Air Race again and noticed that you didn't complete the mini-game. You should try it once. If your timing is far from 1 minute, then you're playing it wrong like I used to

Played it on friend's PS3, and got about 1.20 or thereabouts. Tried crashing into the crowds too but to no avail . The problem I have is the control is kinda digital. You turn left or not, without a progressive degree of turn. Off the back of Warhawk's fluid motion controls, I don't see any appeal in what feels like a 16 bit arcade game.

 

[Arwin]

Played it on friend's PS3, and got about 1.20 or thereabouts. Tried crashing into the crowds too but to no avail . The problem I have is the control is kinda digital. You turn left or not, without a progressive degree of turn. Off the back of Warhawk's fluid motion controls, I don't see any appeal in what feels like a 16 bit arcade game.

There's a bit more subtlety available than just that apparently, but it certainly felt that way to me ... Still, even 16 bit arcade games can have some appeal when combined with the right leaderboards.

Anyway, I think this is partly why it is exciting to know that sixaxis support will be integrated into Home in the near future. It would be cool for games like these, as well as for sackboy like antics with the avatars.

EDIT: I just noticed that people are actually unlocking Home items from Street Fighter IV, although so far it's just been t-shirts - I haven't found a complete list yet, and it seems to be a pretty well kept secret. But it's in there, in a third party game, and it's working, so that's cool. I really liked that in the Namco Museum beta on the Japan store and now it's really out there. Apparently Resident Evil 5 will have this as well.

 

[patsu]

Played it on friend's PS3, and got about 1.20 or thereabouts. Tried crashing into the crowds too but to no avail . The problem I have is the control is kinda digital. You turn left or not, without a progressive degree of turn. Off the back of Warhawk's fluid motion controls, I don't see any appeal in what feels like a 16 bit arcade game.

The control is variable if you vary the degree/timing you held down the trigger. That way the player waste less time getting the plane ready for the next pylon. But yes, it felt digital. That's why initially I played it wrong because I thought the control is discrete.

There's a bit more subtlety available than just that apparently, but it certainly felt that way to me ... Still, even 16 bit arcade games can have some appeal when combined with the right leaderboards.

Anyway, I think this is partly why it is exciting to know that sixaxis support will be integrated into Home in the near future. It would be cool for games like these, as well as for sackboy like antics with the avatars.

SIXAXIS (e.g., Flower style control) would be nice but timing may suffer.

EDIT: I just noticed that people are actually unlocking Home items from Street Fighter IV, although so far it's just been t-shirts - I haven't found a complete list yet, and it seems to be a pretty well kept secret. But it's in there, in a third party game, and it's working, so that's cool. I really liked that in the Namco Museum beta on the Japan store and now it's really out there. Apparently Resident Evil 5 will have this as well.

Yap RE5 T-shirts and about 4 SF4 costumes. Will provide links later.

Warhawk Command Center will be released today too:
http://blog.us.playstation.com/2009/02/26/warhawk-playstation-home-space-walkthrough/

These are still tactical releases since they don't establish or deliver any strategic advantages as a whole.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

The control is variable if you vary the degree/timing you held down the trigger. That way the player waste less time getting the plane ready for the next pylon. But yes, it felt digital. That's why initially I played it wrong because I thought the control is discrete.

Comparing it to a typical flight game, the more left you hold on the stick, the more left your plane turns. But not in Red Bull which just has 'turn left yes/no?' mapped onto the stick. If they have a more sophisticated analogue mechanic, it's lost to me, and I wonder why they chose not to implement the traditional flight system? I'm guessing they view their audience as casual and wanted something very simple that anyone could fly, and then layer a degree of sophistication for those who want to compete for the top spot. Still made a pretty lousy minigame though

 

[catisfit]

Played it on friend's PS3, and got about 1.20 or thereabouts. Tried crashing into the crowds too but to no avail . The problem I have is the control is kinda digital. You turn left or not, without a progressive degree of turn. Off the back of Warhawk's fluid motion controls, I don't see any appeal in what feels like a 16 bit arcade game.

I don't know, it seemed I had reasonable analogue control, especially when flying sideways and finetuning my approach to gates to get the best angle out of them to the next gate. Adjusting the throttle also makes a difference. I set an okay time so I must have been doing something right

To be honest, I wasn't expecting much from such a Home minigame at all, especially not a control system polished to the extent of a retail game. I was pleasantly surprised by the game, running within the bounds it is (it's still a Home instance like any other - you can fly over the crowds and see them chatting away).

 

[patsu]

Comparing it to a typical flight game, the more left you hold on the stick, the more left your plane turns. But not in Red Bull which just has 'turn left yes/no?' mapped onto the stick. If they have a more sophisticated analogue mechanic, it's lost to me, and I wonder why they chose not to implement the traditional flight system? I'm guessing they view their audience as casual and wanted something very simple that anyone could fly, and then layer a degree of sophistication for those who want to compete for the top spot. Still made a pretty lousy minigame though

Ah, you can control the degree and speed of turn if you hold down the stick _and_ roll the plane at the same time (Remember you can vary the roll of the plane too). This is one of the "deceptions" in the game. Try it to see what I mean. Sorry to force you to go through the game when you dislike it but it's the only effective way to convey what I meant.


It's not award winning or what, but there are certain depths to the mini-game. Like catisfit, I am pleasantly surprised by the effort they put in. Although I'd love to have more things to do in each space. One mini-game per space is very thin... felt cheap. . One good mini-game doesn't change the big picture too (at least not this one).

 

[patsu]

EDIT: I just noticed that people are actually unlocking Home items from Street Fighter IV, although so far it's just been t-shirts - I haven't found a complete list yet, and it seems to be a pretty well kept secret. But it's in there, in a third party game, and it's working, so that's cool. I really liked that in the Namco Museum beta on the Japan store and now it's really out there. Apparently Resident Evil 5 will have this as well.

Yap RE5 T-shirts and about 4 SF4 costumes. Will provide links later.

They released it:
http://blog.us.playstation.com/2009...r-iv-live-qa-resident-evil-5-space-launching/

(1)
Live Q&A in Home with John Diamonon and Seth Killian from Capcom
7:00 – 9:00pm PST (10:00 – 11:00pm EST)

To start, John and Seth will be tackling the most popular questions culled from the official PlayStation Home forums (under the usernames “HIERO9D3” and “clothhand”), but will hold a brief open chat afterwards. These two gents will be “instance-jumping” throughout the event, so if you’re in the Gamer’s Lounge and you don’t see them, cool out and sit tight! They’ll be making the rounds.
To qualify for the private chat, make sure you attend the general Q&A decked out in the Dan Saikyo shirt (unlockable in Home). Attendees sporting this hot reward will be entered into a drawing and then chosen at random to participate. If you make the list, we’ll send you details via private message in your XrossMediaBar regarding the time and date of the follow-up session.

(2)

We’re launching the Resident Evil 5 game space tomorrow, March 5th