Sony Home - The official thread*

[patsu]

Kotaku played with the PixelJunk Home space and annotated the screenshots with interesting tidbits:
http://kotaku.com/5379621/in-pixeljunk-home-a-mix-of-flirting-innuendo-and-success/gallery/

Q-Games chief Dylan Cuthbert told Kotaku that the popularity of his company's just-launched PlayStation Home space nearly crushed his team's servers.

Don't think it's a money maker for Q-Games. it sounds like a humble and self-sustaining way to connect with their fans though.

 

[deathindustrial]

Q-Games chief Dylan Cuthbert told Kotaku that the popularity of his company's just-launched PlayStation Home space nearly crushed his team's servers.

Um. . .what? So each space has its own dedicated servers? Do non-Sony spaces require that the developers actually maintain these servers? Are they hosted elsewhere? Strange.

 

[tha_con]

Mine still crashes each and every time I try to get on. Sooo...I'm done

 

[patsu]

According to a hacker who reverse engineered v0.8 beta, the Home application is a HTTP client. XML files and 3D assets are downloaded/streamed from HTTP servers. When a Home user signs in, the Home HTTP app server assigns a temporary directory containing visible objects for up to 64 users to him/her. In this manner, these users can "see" each other.

The Home worldmap is essentially a directory of these HTTP servers. The default spaces (Central Plaza, Mall, Theater, ...) are hosted by Sony. The rest seems to be hosted by the developers. In this manner, Home is like the web.

I don't know if all the Home requests have to go through Sony (proxy) servers first.

Then, there are game servers for hosting the mini-games. Starting with v1.3, the users can queue their requests for occupied mini-games. No idea whether these game servers are hosted by Sony or the game developers.

Mine still crashes each and every time I try to get on. Sooo...I'm done

Yeah, I believe a lot of users will abandon Home due to v1.3. It will probably take a long time for these people to come back -- unless Home has a breakthrough. People are running out of patience.

 

[phat]

I constantly have to delete my Harbour Studio save to get back into Home after 1.30. I keep my avatar, but my apartment is obviously reset.

Does PS3 phone home its crashes? It should!

 

[patsu]

Does PS3 phone home its crashes? It should!

??? What do you mean ?

Sony's new Aino phone supports some RemotePlay capability but there is no PS3 phone home.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I think he means report over PSN the crash, like Windows' error reporting. Would be good for Sony's debugging, and way more effective than Windows as the hardware amd software is closed and well known.

 

[patsu]

Sony Home team adjusts strategy, making Home a game platform instead of social network play:
http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/newsa_index.php?story=25567

"In the early days when we built Home, we really were building a social network for gamers... through that, over the last year, it's developed into a game platform, first and foremost," says Buser.

"Home is developed based on community feedback, and we've been very good about that," says Buser. When it comes to Home's transformation as a service, he also adds, "This happened organically. I'd like to say that 'this was all planned from the get-go,' but it's what happened."

This revelation was fueled by seeing what developers did with the platform, he says. In particular, EA's EA Sports space implemented a Texas Hold 'Em poker game that made the team realize the potential of Home to host games -- including what Buser describes as "mini MMOs."

...

Haven't read the whole thing yet. Sounds like an reasonable move.

EDIT: Oh, it's social gaming platform. I'd say they should also be a meta gaming platform, on top of other PS3 games.

 

[Asher]

Years later and they still lack a specific vision. It shows...

 

[Arwin]

I think at least the U.S. is getting Ratchet & Clank home space today, which includes three games, the biggest / deepest one being apparently a tower defense game. I'm guessing it's probably up now, may be worth a look:

http://blog.eu.playstation.com/2009/10/14/ratchet-clank-move-into-playstation-home/

 

[Nesh]

Years later and they still lack a specific vision. It shows...

That doesnt sound lile lack of specific vision. That sounds more like adjusting the vision to the feedback received from users. And thats what we want

 

[deathindustrial]

It's hard to know really what the users want with Home since the basics are so poorly implemented. When the basic social aspects are gimped (following the source of conversations in Home is still a mess) and the engine itself is kludgy (the Home theatre is a perfect example with its x10 download dialogues for <7MB files) it should not be a surprise that users want something else to do. Ghosts + download dialogues do not a social network make.

Personally, the last thing I want is more Home spaces to download and tiles to cache. I would much rather have fewer, better implemented areas with a smoother, less annoying GUI (and support the joystick in the PDA menu already!) If the point is no longer to make friends or meet up for game launching then we would all be better off firing up a real game instead of wading through loading screens to play something 10 rungs below "minesweeper" or wait 5 minutes to see a pixelated, uninformative infomercial repeat ad nasueam.

There is very little useful information in Home. For example, why is the entire Playstation blog not presented somewhere in Home as a screen or presentation? Why isn't the Life stuff integrated since they already have that available? Might at least instigate some discussions beyond the usual Quincying. Sony want to push their products so why not at least integrate their usual promotion verbiage somewhere a la an enGadget style channel?

And still the only way to customize your experience is to buy horse armour. Obviously the Home crew hasn't played much LBP.

=)

IMHO of course.

Cheers

 

[tha_con]

Years later and they still lack a specific vision. It shows...

Seems pretty specific to me. A virtual community for gamers to be social.

Or did you not understand that from the onset? It was pretty clear to anyone paying attention.

 

[patsu]

Japan Home to get LocoRoco personal space on 1st Nov:
http://www.andriasang.com/e/blog/2009/10/16/loco_roco_home

The LocoRoco personal space is designed in the image of a southern island and features 3D LocoRoco models along with other elements from the game. Sony says to expect "gimmicks" from the game that will give the LocoRoco space a unique feel from other personal spaces

Screen caps in the link above.

 

[patsu]

Uncharted 2 Home Space mini-games preview:

the space features a collection of mini-games, but most importantly a huge multiplayer turn-based card game with expectations to be expanded with new card sets available in the future.

 

[patsu]

Home v1.32 this Thursday

This client update will address many of the issues that the community has reported to us post-1.3. You should find that gaining access to the service is much, much, MUCH easier.

Uncharted 2, Tekken 6 and Street Fight IV spaces coming this Thursday. U2 is described above. The other 2 are here:

We also have two new game spaces launching this Thursday that are sure to appeal to all of you fighting fans out there. That’s right – Tekken 6 and Street Fighter IV are getting their own dedicated game spaces. These game spaces come loaded with Tekken 6 and Street Fighter IV-related content and will serve as the perfect hubs for all of you bare-knuckled brawlers and PlayStation 3 pugilists that are looking for areas to organize game launching tournaments (or just looking for a new opponent to quickly pummel). To top it all off, 25 Street Fighter IV alternate costumes will also be released tomorrow, so head to the Mall to guile up and then get to swinging.

Source: http://blog.us.playstation.com/2009...ation-home-tekken-6-street-fighter-iv-spaces/

 

[wco81]

How is game-launching coming along?

I was talking to a colleague who expressed frustration at the inability to get into games with friends on PSN.

Sure you can see on your PSN Friends list what your friends are doing. But how do you find them, even if you're both in the same game?

Maybe Sony should work on something like that than Home. After the initial hype, is there still that much momentum behind home? Sure they're filling it out but really, selling clothes to dress up your avatar is so missing the point.

The game spaces sound like little more than promotional content. If they improved the usability of online gaming (like launching online games specifically with the people you want), great.

But if they're trying to make their own social networking thing, Sony is losing the eyes on the prize. By now, people are going to use Facebook and Twitter to do social networking. The landscape has changed since the announcement of Home, like what, 3 years ago now?

Use those developmental resources to get PSN usability up to snuff.

 

[patsu]

How is game-launching coming along?

It works. ^_^
However for basic launching, you still need to join the same party manually.

I was talking to a colleague who expressed frustration at the inability to get into games with friends on PSN.

Sure you can see on your PSN Friends list what your friends are doing. But how do you find them, even if you're both in the same game?

(A) Use Home for games that support advanced game launching.
(B) Send an in-game invite to friend using his PSN ID (But this depends on the game).

Maybe Sony should work on something like that than Home. After the initial hype, is there still that much momentum behind home? Sure they're filling it out but really, selling clothes to dress up your avatar is so missing the point.

I'm thinking it may be stagnating due to churn. Their last flawed update and repeated redownload have probably chased quite a few people away.

The system is opt-in, so if they don't execute well, they suffer the consequences.

The game spaces sound like little more than promotional content. If they improved the usability of online gaming (like launching online games specifically with the people you want), great.

It's mostly a collection of mini-games these days, and chatting. It helps to remember who's who compared to a large friends list. Home won't help to improve the usability until they work out all the UI kinks. I'd like to see how much v1.32 and the larger cache speed up loading before commenting.

But if they're trying to make their own social networking thing, Sony is losing the eyes on the prize. By now, people are going to use Facebook and Twitter to do social networking. The landscape has changed since the announcement of Home, like what, 3 years ago now?

I think they serve different audience. Facebooks and Twitters are great for real life social networking. I have friends who prefer not to use them because the services tend to confuse work and personal matters. A separate gaming social network entity is still a viable move -- if they can execute well.

Use those developmental resources to get PSN usability up to snuff.

Perhaps. I think they should clarify their goals first. Asher mentioned something about losing direction in Home. There is some element of truth there. Once they nail down their focii, then Home should be optimized for those goals.

PSN usability should be addressed separately without Home specific features. Although I'd love it if XMB supports Home's XMB game launching in the chat room.

 

[wco81]

It works. ^_^
However for basic launching, you still need to join the same party manually.



(A) Use Home for games that support advanced game launching.
(B) Send an in-game invite to friend using his PSN ID (But this depends on the game).

For multiplayer games, you want to be in a game with friends and some other people.

I haven't seen a way to collect a group of people yet in any of the PS3 games I've tried.

I guess shooters with clan and party systems probably do this better.

But they need to have some more uniform interface.

In the PS2 days, EA made their own friends list and you could see where your EA friends were, so it was easy to gather in the same place to launch into the same game. It also told you where your friends were in their games, like how close to finishing.

So PS3 comes along with a universal PSN friends list. But it's useless right now. You see friends are signed on playing a certain game but nothing else.

In this case, it would have been better if EA implemented their own system for their PS3 games. But either Sony won't let them or they thought the PSN system was going to support at least the same features they had on their PS2 setup.

It's ridiculous that the PS3 system is actually inferior to what they had on the PS2. And it's been what, 3 full years since launch?

Yeah I know they made a lot of changes with firmware updates. The last one was in-game PSN access. But it seems that momentum has stopped.

My suspicion is that Sony doesn't care about online beyond saying they will do just enough to offer a decent alternative to XBL. PSN is free so people should have lower expectations. But if they can't come up to par, then move out of the way and let developers roll their own.

Only now, since X360 dominates multiplatform sales, EA isn't going to bother doing extra work on the PS3 versions.

Talk about bumbling.

 

[patsu]

For multiplayer games, you want to be in a game with friends and some other people.

I haven't seen a way to collect a group of people yet in any of the PS3 games I've tried.

Uncharted 2 does that. You can party up in the game. RFOM too. KZ2 doesn't. Warhawk supports dedicated server (so you create a password for your game first to get your friends in).

For those that support advanced game launching (e.g., MotorStorm 2), you can gather in a space, and launch into the same session right away.

So PS3 comes along with a universal PSN friends list. But it's useless right now. You see friends are signed on playing a certain game but nothing else.

In XMB, the congregation point is the chatroom. People tend to coordinate MP session that way when a game does not support partying (e.g., KZ2). IMHO, the best course of action for Sony is to implement Home's game launching service into the chatroom itself. BUT it's not done.

In this case, it would have been better if EA implemented their own system for their PS3 games. But either Sony won't let them or they thought the PSN system was going to support at least the same features they had on their PS2 setup.

It's ridiculous that the PS3 system is actually inferior to what they had on the PS2. And it's been what, 3 full years since launch?

Yeah I know they made a lot of changes with firmware updates. The last one was in-game PSN access. But it seems that momentum has stopped.

My suspicion is that Sony doesn't care about online beyond saying they will do just enough to offer a decent alternative to XBL. PSN is free so people should have lower expectations. But if they can't come up to par, then move out of the way and let developers roll their own.

Doubt it. The chat room is a great addition. Cross game voice chat has been confirmed by a ND developer.

Only now, since X360 dominates multiplatform sales, EA isn't going to bother doing extra work on the PS3 versions.

The sales is proportional to the population.