My Thoughts On PlayStation's Home

I've been asked by a couple of people just what I thought of Home, Sony's virtual reality social gaming application (or whatever it's official tag is these days). I was invited to take part in the Beta two weeks ago today, and so I eagerly headed off to check it out.

You may be able to intuit just how impressed I was from a couple of facts:

1. This is the first I'm posting anything about it.
2. I've only launched Home twice over the ensuing two weeks.

To say that I was underwhelmed would not be an exaggeration.

Now, I'm not really sure what I expected, so perhaps disappointment is an unfair reaction. Yes, it does start you off with the creation of your very own avatar, which I'd rather enjoyed (for all of 15 minutes) when the same thing happened with the New XBox Experience earlier in November. Within the confines of Home, though, it just didn't feel as fun. Perhaps it was the fact that, despite having a category called "facial hair," there was no option that I could find to give my avatar a beard! Or possibly it was the general clunkiness of most of the choices, which left me with a character with whom I didn't relate in the least (unlike my XBox avatar who's a fairly-good representation of me).

Yes, it does provide you with your own "virtual home" (a lovely, though largely-undecorated apartment with a beautiful view). However, the options available to you for use in personalizing your "pad" seemed to be limited to a painting, a couple styles of lamps, a chair and a couch (I'm sure there must've been more than that, but when I saw just how small the list was, I lost interest). I don't know if more items will be included when Home becomes generally available, or whether those are all considered "pay to play" items that Sony expects gamers to lay cold hard cash down for.

Yes, it has a few virtual sites for you to visit, including a bowling alley and an outdoor mall area. I got to the former (after downloading the file for it) and then... did very little. This was my first exposure to a shared experience in Home, and I was a bit freaked out at first by how everyone else starts off looking like featureless ghosts! That must be part of a synch-up process as you join a new party, because not too long after that the people around me started taking on features and then things looked a lot more normal (for video game environments, at least). I saw other people bowling, and so I suspect you can "play" that there, but I couldn't find any way to get involved with a game myself, and was again somewhat let down. There were two small arcade areas in the bowling alley, leading me to try the two games offered there (Echochrome, which I couldn't figure out at all, and a more enjoyable one where you slide coloured train engines into slots and try to get 3 in a row). That distraction killed about 10 minutes but that was about it.

Now, had I known many (or even any) of the people inhabiting the bowling alley, I'm sure it would've been a richer experience. Also, I didn't have my headset on, so communicating outward was limited to typing messages on a virtual keyboard (I didn't bother). Therefore, I can see some potential if Home were inhabited with people I might actually want to interact with... which provides hope for the real deal, when it launches later this month (rumour has it, Dec 17th).

And at that time, when we get the full-fledged version, if it offers significantly more personalization choices than the Beta provides, I might get some entertainment out of it. Creating an avatar that actually looks like me, even if just in a caricature fashion, would probably help. That, and knowing that anyone who owns a PS/3 automatically has access to Home might actually be enough to sell me on the idea (as long as it doesn't actually cost me anything). Of course, had Home managed to come out before Microsoft's New XBox Experience, that also might've helped, providing more novelty value, if nothing else!