Reflections on Playstation Home

During my hiatus, I've pondered the launch of the Playstation Home. Having owned none of the Playstation consoles, I've never developed the love for Sony and the Playstation brand that grips much of the gaming community. As such, I've treated the failures of the Playstation 3 as a source of amusement, and initially dismissed Home as but another ill-conceived abortion to mar the Playstation name. But as I heard more and more people discuss their lackluster experiences on Home, I began to reconsider this dismissal.

Despite Microsoft's attempts to sell the Xbox 360 experience as "gaming with friends," the experience is rather solitary. While text and voice chat allows for a great deal of social interaction, I'm always struck by how incomplete the interation feels. There is something inherently physical about socialization, one that cannot be approximated in text and voice alone. It is the reason why we may miss a loved one dearly when we speak to them over the phone while we may form a bond while in physical proximity without ever muttering a word. Though their voice may dominate our audial sense, it is but a constant reminder that they are not here, but merely a disembodied voice emanating from a speaker.

It is here that I see Home's potential glory. Xbox Avatars and Nintendo's Miis are attempts to compensate for this physical disjunct. Yet, I find them wanting in this task. XNE Avatars do little more than wave innanely as you scroll through your buddylist, while Microsoft's attempt at showing players "gaming together" by having avatars of players in a party clumped around each other does little more than ask the player to imagine a genuine social interaction. As for Miis... well, I wonder if Wii owners even remember those poor creatures. Home, with its personal "apartments" and three-dimensional spaces, has the potential to actually bridge the disjunct. Off the top of my head, I can imagine a number of social features that would easily excite me. Imagine renting a movie on the Playstation Network, and being able to invite friends to your "apartment" to watch it with you. Imagine a party lobby implemented as a bachelor pad, allowing you and a friend to play retro games like Pong or Pac-Man while waiting for other members of your party to arrive. Hell, I was excited by the simple suggestion by an IGN editor that Home be set up like a college dorm, where I could walk up to a friend's door and see what he was up to or at least leave a message on his whiteboard. Even if virtual reality can never compensate for the physical, Home has the potential of offering a level of tangibility to everyday interactions over Live or PSN.

And that is what irritates me the most. Home has the potential of being something revolutionary, yet its implementation seems to be dooming it to a destiny of dancing idiots, griefing, and lackluster discussion rooms. It is like watching a monkey fucking a coconut - I am left stunned, bewildered, and profoundly confused, and I wish someone would stop it.

--Mike