Game Launching in Home not Sony’s Responsibility
It's ours apparently.Published 22/07/2009 at 14:00 by BioEye
GAME Moonbase Announced For Home [38]
Home Reaches 12 Million Users [17]
Uncharted 2 Wins More Awards [17]
For anyone hoping Game launching were more broadened out in PlayStation Home, a recent blog comment by the American Home Manager, Locust_Star told members of the PlayStation community that it was down to developers to support game-launching, not Sony. While a number of Home spaces now support game launching, including Resistance 2 and Everybody’s Golf, it’s still not the norm for every PS3 game to have support for Home, as was suggested in Sony’s 2007 E3 presentation.
We’ve built the game launching feature in on our end. It is up to the developers of these titles to implement on their end. If you want to encourage a developer to patch their title to support game launching in Home, we fully encourage you to email them, leave a message on their forums/blogs, etc.
So while Sony may be contacting some developers, requesting Home support, it appears Sony would rather point the finger at the Home users themselves for not encouraging it enough to the developers. It is true that a developer would feel more under pressure to support game-launching in Home if many members of the community were to demand it from them, but the approach taken here seems somewhat ignorant of the fact that many PS3 users have deleted Home from their console for the very reason of lack of features. To ask the same people to be responsible for encouraging developers to support Home seems a little farfetched.
How do you feel about this? Do you think Sony should be pushing developers more for Home support, or that we as a community should be encouraging game developers to support game-launching from the virtual online world?
Source: Official US PlayStation Blog via Official EU PlayStation Forum
Comments
Please note that all comments are the opinion of the individual author and not TheSixthAxis.
Tuffcub | 22/07/2009 14:04
Team TSA: Writer
4070 TSA Points | Member since: Dec 2008
Does anybody even use it?
X_Yoshy_X | 22/07/2009 15:32
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505 TSA Points | Member since: Feb 2009
yer i do but only if im on home eny way
on another note can eny one Game Launch Farcry 2? because if you look under Game Dater Utility/Farcry 2/Update History it says home Game Launch support. i tried it and i cant launch FC2 from home
BlingOnMyWrist | 22/07/2009 17:03
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1488 TSA Points | Member since: Oct 2008
I don’t think there’s any reason to have it at the moment. Not until we get TVs in our apartments.
BioEye | 22/07/2009 17:10
Team TSA: Writer
904 TSA Points | Member since: Forever
I’ve been using it recently because I really like the Buzz space. But since Xi ended, I haven’t been on much.
Carl | 23/07/2009 11:57
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734 TSA Points | Member since: Jan 2009
What the hell happened? I am pretty sure i remember ANY game being HOME launchable when it was in closed beta
PsyWood | 22/07/2009 14:04
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105 TSA Points | Member since: May 2009
What is this game launching? Is it just starting the game off whilst you’re still in Home so you don’t have to want the first thirty seconds of credits or does it do something more?
BioEye | 22/07/2009 17:11
Team TSA: Writer
904 TSA Points | Member since: Forever
Yup. You meet up with people in Home, ask them if they want to play a game. You shove the disc in the PS3 and select it from within Home, and everyone who wants to play is thrown into the same multiplayer game. As soon as its finished, you return straight to Home. So you’ve never left Home.
waddo_89 | 22/07/2009 22:26
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494 TSA Points | Member since: Mar 2009
I’ve used it a couple of times with Warhawk, but it’s still got nothing on Live’s cross game party system
Bilbo_bobbins | 22/07/2009 14:06
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1406 TSA Points | Member since: Jun 2009
Personally I think Home is a wasted application. I want a console to play games, so therefore I wont demand Home launching on any games. I fear this could be the case for most casual gamers out there?
Many older generation gamers (myself 28) wont have time for Home anyway, so it’s sort of pointless.
Bilbo_bobbins | 22/07/2009 14:07
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1406 TSA Points | Member since: Jun 2009
I say older, I mean, it’s not that old, but I meant older than the younger generation of school kids
flatspikes | 22/07/2009 14:49
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586 TSA Points | Member since: May 2009
I’m 30 next year then I can be old! Home seems to have great potential but has so far failed to do anything that grabs me… seems a like a bit of a shame really…
Paranoimia | 22/07/2009 21:13
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482 TSA Points | Member since: Aug 2008
I’m 38 and have a lot of time for Home itself, but I’m not fussed about Game Launching at all.
B1GbOnG | 22/07/2009 21:27
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143 TSA Points | Member since: Jun 2009
lol older gamer 28 LMFAO
Hicko | 22/07/2009 23:48
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143 TSA Points | Member since: Feb 2009
This is like gamers anonymous! My names Hicko I’m 28 and I’m a……gamer!!! At 38 is Paranoimia the oldest TSA member? Just wondered?
MarkSawbo | 22/07/2009 14:10
Member
218 TSA Points | Member since: Sep 2008
In my personal opinion sony should enforce everything. Why should the buyer be responsible at all? It makes no sense. From next year sony should make the following things mandatory:
Trophies (already done)
Custom Soundtracks
Friends List/Party/Invite support (Resident Evil 5 system)
Home inrtergration (be it a space or game luanching and unlockables from the game e.g. RE5)
Bumpman | 22/07/2009 14:13
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52 TSA Points | Member since: Jul 2009
I’m inclined to agree, although I’m sure it’d be helpful if Sony made code available to ease up the implementation of those features.
paxpacis | 22/07/2009 14:25
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561 TSA Points | Member since: Forever
And let them look at LBP/ModNationRacers/Boku and let us create our own spaces
Also trophies within Home spaces/games would be nice..
Chimpanzee | 22/07/2009 14:16
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482 TSA Points | Member since: Forever
I can’t believe LBP hasn’t got ANY Home support. It seems like a perfect game to support game launching and because it’s only four-player, I don’t imagine it would be particularly complicated, technically.
Chimpanzee | 22/07/2009 14:17
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482 TSA Points | Member since: Forever
On the other end of the spectrum, it would be pretty impressive if they manage to find a way of launching 256-player games of MAG.
Milereb | 22/07/2009 14:18
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82 TSA Points | Member since: Jun 2009
I think Sony should encourage it more. I mean it all goes two ways. Lets say a Killzone clan; we meet up on Home, in our visari space, chat over our tactics and launch straight into our clan match. Right now we are better of just using a PSNchat and deleting Home to save space.
And to think I was all excited with the Warhawk space where you could talk strategies and then launch straight into a game. Booting up Warhawk straight from the xmb is so much easier, not to mention quicker.
deepmenace | 22/07/2009 15:14
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264 TSA Points | Member since: Forever
This is EXACTLY it.
Somehow ( and i think this will prove to be impossible ) they need a sub 15 second home start time in my humblest of opinions.
what it offers at present doesnt warrent 90 seconds of loading before you’re wandering around…let alone meeting your mates and loading up a meeting space.
and god help you if u’ve got a 30mb patch to download!
Phillip_J_Fry | 22/07/2009 14:20
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1 TSA Points | Member since: Jul 2009
Something’s fishy here… I was in the early Beta and Game Launching was available – for every single game on my hard drive and every disc based game that I put in. I used it a number of times and was raving to my co-workers about how easy it would be to meet up in Home and all jump into a game together.
After one of the updates the functionality was removed and it’s now slowly being brought back to us on a game by game basis. Now Sony says it’s up to the devs?!? What gives?
Roarster | 22/07/2009 14:28
Member
148 TSA Points | Member since: Sep 2008
Did this allow you to all jump straight into the same multiplayer game direct from Home? Pretty impressive, if it did. Not sure why they’d take that out…
Phillip_J_Fry | 22/07/2009 15:42
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1 TSA Points | Member since: Jul 2009
Yes it actually did, we were using it for the original Motorstorm, Resistance and even Go Sudoku believe it or not.
Roarster | 22/07/2009 14:25
Member
148 TSA Points | Member since: Sep 2008
Assuming this is only referring to patching old games, then I guess he has a point. It’s doubtful Sony can actually force a developer to patch an already released game.
New and unreleased games is a different matter, of course. In these cases Sony really need to “convince” the developers (either via lower royalties or even refusing certification) to include these features if they don’t want Home to be seen as a huge waste of time and money.
ghosthunter68 | 22/07/2009 14:34
Member
41 TSA Points | Member since: Jul 2009
I posted this on the official forums
I’n now going to judge Home game functionality with every gamers financial nightmare period of September to Xmas when all the titles appear. I’ve listed my personal list that I am considering buying so lets see how many have any Home intergration i.e game launching, not dull commodore 64 mini game areas with T-shirt unlockables.
Side note off subject, whats happened to the EU movie store (June / July), and are we ever going to get cross game chat.
Need for Speed Shift – (EA – so EA have an area but not game support in Home i.e Tiger Woods, Fight Night)
Gran Turismo 5 – ( Well if SCE have any sense this will have game launching and a area for release)
Tekken 6 – (Namco so possible)
Operation Flashpoint Dragon rising – ( Codemasters, no chance)
Colin McRae Dirt 2
Uncharted 2 – (havent got the orignal Uncharted space although people say its rubbish)
IL2 Sturmovik – (never happen)
FIFA 10 – (who knows)
Modern Warfare 2 – (who knows)
MAG – ( this game wouldn’t work with game launching 256 players)
May be i’ll be asking Santa for a 360.
falstaff30 | 22/07/2009 21:58
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13 TSA Points | Member since: Jun 2009
the Movie store is a big one for me. it’s unreal they haven’t sorted this out for europe in any form yet. Sometimes it seems Sony are determined to shoot themselves in both feet. surely this would be a nice revenue source for them. SCEE persistently fail to deliver services and games on time or in some cases it seems they’ll never appear at all.
An article I read questioned ps3 owners lust for parity of functionality with the 360. I’d be happy with parity of functionality for ps3’s across all the regions.
gibbodude | 22/07/2009 14:54
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172 TSA Points | Member since: May 2009
Fifa 10 Game launching should be available in EA complex. Also it should be there because the lobby system in the last two was cack so that would be well good.
bajere | 22/07/2009 14:57
Member
1068 TSA Points | Member since: Aug 2008
HOME = zzzzzzz
i thought it was a waste of time, and even SONY can no longer put up a fight for it!!! i would rather they used that time (and loads of money) wasted on HOME to develope more app’s like VidZone, give the EU a video store and better network connection (reduce lag on games)!!!
Alex_Assassin_08 | 22/07/2009 15:21
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749 TSA Points | Member since: Feb 2009
I like Home.
*puts on helmet*
Hicko | 22/07/2009 17:40
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143 TSA Points | Member since: Feb 2009
Wow you can write that small?!
I too like home!!!
Alex_Assassin_08 | 22/07/2009 19:24
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749 TSA Points | Member since: Feb 2009
hazzah!
deepmenace | 22/07/2009 15:26
Member
264 TSA Points | Member since: Forever
the problem is that no-one i know is ever in home. so whats my reason for ever want to go into it?
the only way that home will ever succeed is if when we turn on the ps3 we boot *straight* into it. they’re gonna need to sort out load time for that…
then – if u were surfing the net or watching a film or listening to music or playing a game your presence could still be in home.
i could switch my ps3 on – see that 4 mates are online. 1 playing a game, 2 surfing the net in our clubhouse and 1 watching trailers in his apartment.
i could then wander or transport the our clubhouse and sit and surf on the net while in voice chat with my 2 mates.
or i could ask if i could join my mate in his apartment watching trailers – we could chat about the trailers.
until this happens no content will truly make home what it should be.
marvzilla | 22/07/2009 16:01
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136 TSA Points | Member since: Aug 2008
“the approach taken here seems somewhat ignorant of the fact that many PS3 users have deleted Home from their console for the very reason of lack of features. To ask the same people to be responsible for encouraging developers to support Home seems a little farfetched”
Couldn’t have put it better myself.
imho they should bin it altogether but they probably love the income from virtual clothes and companies advertising too much for that. I booted it up the other day to see if it had improved, after the long install times I found its still really quite boring and though there were more mini-games, they are of poor standard. Much better flash games to be played free in your web browser in much less time.
IPiePie | 22/07/2009 17:01
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27 TSA Points | Member since: Jul 2009
Home is not worth my space on my harddrive.