GDC 2007: Phil Harrison Speaks, Sony Steps Up
Today GDC kicked off in full form, with a crowd ten times as large as the previous days, with lines snaking around the venue, hundreds of designers, gamesters and press folk (including an absolutely darling cutie from JeuxFrance) – all awaiting the keynote address by Phil Harrison.
Miraculously, Boy of Tomorrow and I scored front row seats – and he snuck up to the front of the stage to snap a series of great pics you can view at our Flicker gallery. I took notice of the stage, which was more theatrical than a KISS concert: the esplanade decked out like an Disneyworld theme park ride: a giant spinning cog next to what looked like a large orange. Across stage, a tree stood beside an enormous soccer ball. Midstage beneath three spotlights on three spotless white pedestals, stood a trio of PS3s.
Then came more soccer balls, like giant beach balls that the crowd began punching in the air - which would have been fun except that I’d done my hair, and nothing crushes a homohawk faster than a giant inflatable soccer ball directly on the noggin. Was this Phil Harrison’s way of getting even with the press – targeting our fancy camera tripods, or merely a distraction until the tardy Harrison made his appearance? Who can say...
When Harrison made his entrance, the show began with the unveiling of PlayStation Home, a virtual world that showed tremendous promise and also had nearly everyone around me muttering "Second Life all over again..." But if Harrison's address showed anything, it was enough ambition to dwarf the first-generation sandbox world of Second Life Like nobody's business.
Make the jump to learn why.
Sony's angle was "Game 3.0," which borrowed heavily from the same buzzwords one hears associated with web 2.0 - namely, convergence, user-created content, and interactivity with media of every stripe. Harrison pointed to Time’s Person of the Year (ie, YOU) as a pivotal moment for democratizing the internet and putting you in control, not so much with a set of rules but with a philosophy – one espoused by sites such as Flickr, MySpace, Skype, Blogger, YouTube, Digg, etc.
The focus was on active communities built on open standars, social interaction, collaboration - I heard lots of empty buzzwords but wondered how/if this will come to life in consumers hands? The answer, as it turns out, is the PlayStation Home service, which will launch for the PS3 later this year.
The Home universe is clearly inspired by Second Life, and begins in a picturesque lounge where you may customize your avatar and, of course, buy additional accessories; on a friendlier note, many other accessories and such will be unlocked by game achievements. If successful, this could trump the Xbox's Gamerscore achievements; if not, it could be Second Life all over again - but without the avant garde panache and sense of experimentation.
The graphics were terribly posh, as is to be expected, and most of the on-screen controls operated through a virtual PSP, which would pop up with navigational options, and so forth. But what does Home do? For communication, the Home universe includes voice chat or a selection of simple phrases as well as a full keyboard. In the demonstration, Phil's assistant meant to say "Hi," but instead he called Phil a “Ho.” It was accurate.
The main hub of Home seems to be the apartment - each user gets one, and just like the real world, if you work hard/pay, you can upgrade. Not unlike a next-gen version of Animal Crossing, you can customize your apartment with wallpaper, furniture, and Sony electronics on which you can display your own pictures and video. The idea seems to be one of personalized social interaction: we saw footage of simulated parties, and it isn't a terrible stretch of the imagination to picture a party of online gamers retiring to a sweet virtual pad after an intense gaming session, as a kind of "clan headquarters," as Harrison put it.
Home will have other virtual spaces, including a cinema with trailers and such - as well as still more user-generated content. Companies and other entities will be able to design their own Home spaces - one example we saw was a sports lounge: a hub for PS3 sports games as well as an in-world boxing ring, bowling alley, and so on.
It was all tremendously impressive as a presentation; whether it will work in the real world is something I'll have to bide my time to decide. While Sony's blunders have been legendary, so is their ambition: if Home lives up to its debut, it could be fantastic. If not, it could be another fantastic blunder. We shall see...
tiny dancer
Posted to Hot Stuff, Miscellany on 7 March 2007
· Comments (6)
Other stuff like this: gdc 2007, keynote, phil harrison, playstation home, sony
Certainly nice to see them trying something this ambitious. I'll try the beta in April and let you all know how it is :)
Yeah, sounds totally ambitious. It'll take time to build and I would be very interested in trying it.
Well, its been in private beta for a little while now, so alot of what was talked about is already in working order. As for what they showed, it seems to be a nice trump card for sony, a way of getting users engaged with their system.
I don't know if Phil made a home run but either way he just shattered his bat on base.
Personally, it reminds me of MySpace for PS3 than anything else.
Impressive but I'd rather wait for the beta testing feedback before rejoicing too much.
Too bad they couldn't have this ready for launch. Early adopters could have kept themselves busy while waiting for more good games to be released.