Here’s some uplifting video from the trainwreck Sony Home. In it, we see two female avatars being surrounded by male avatars doing little dances. Apparently this is happening all over the service. A lot.
The PlayStation Home Open Beta is out, and it’s simply the best way to taste what Sony has in store for the PS3 over the coming years. Here are the ten things you should know.
The PlayStation Home Open Beta (77MB) can now be downloaded onto your PS3 from the XMB (it’s not a firmware update). Enjoy your second third life.
AU: If it works, that is. My copy doesn’t want to kick past the “Don’t turn off the system while we’re writing to the hard drive” message. How about you guys?
We knew it was on the way, but last we’d heard, PlayStation Home was coming December 17th. Wrong! PS Home will actually launch worldwide tomorrow.
Just the other day the Times of London told us they thought PlayStation Home would arrive by December 17th. Well, it looks like Sony has a similar theory.
According to Times Online, the PlayStation Home open beta will hit on December 17th. From an article published yesterday:
PlayStation Home has long lost its lurid appeal, our relationship with it having transgressed from potential infatuation to being stood up at Applebee’s, sucking down some purple margarita that we’re beginning to suspect might be void of both alcohol and dignity. Regardless, PS Home director Jack Buster assures the world that the service will hit in 2008.
If you’re dying to start outfitting your virtual apartment in the PS3′s oft-delayed virtual world/XBLA-like community add-on, PlayStation Home, Sony has set it up so all downloaders of the November edition of Qore, a monthly video news feature available via the PS Store, will receive guaranteed access to the closed beta. You can still try your luck at getting a randomly-assigned invitation via a free downloadable PS Home theme, but if you’re impatient and don’t mind dropping $US3 on something that will eventually be free, grab the new Qore available soon. [Ars]
It’s not officially confirmed, but PS3Fanboy received this screenshot of the PSHome beta tester forums. In it, you can see that Home Manager “TedtheDog” explaining that a fix to Home crashes will most likely be coming “later” next month with the release firmware 2.5. And though some of the remaining text is cut off, it seems that he hints to the firmware timing coinciding with Home 1.0. Since its original announcement, Home has certainly lost some of the mystique as we collectively remember what keeps us away from Second Life, but we’ll still give it a whirl. [PS3Fanboy]
In case you’re curious as to the progress of the PS3′s upcoming PlayStation Home, the 3D Second Lifeish world in which you can interact with others, watch movie trailers, play games or just decorate a virtual apartment, one of our own readers was invited to participate in Sony’s closed beta program and then kindly drafted up his experience for the world to read. His account confirms our scepticism while painting a pretty clear picture of exactly how Home works. And if you’ve got a second and a PS3, read on for his account.
