Gaming Signal: PS/3's Home Thingy And Also A Bit On The Wii

PS/3's Home Thingy And Also A Bit On The Wii

So there I was listening to Gaming Steve's first podcast from this year's GDC. In it, Steve and Gamer Andy discuss the new PS/3 Home program and diss on the Wii.

First, Andy disses a bit on the Wii, saying he only really plays it when his girlfriend comes over, and that apart from Zelda, the Wii isn't any great shakes (paraphrased). I'm thinking that someone who calls themselves Gamer Andy and runs a gaming related website isn't the target audience for the Wii. It's aim is to get the non-gamers into playing games, and to do so with their friends, hence the plethora of part/mini-game titles. Again, not what the harder core gamer will be playing. Only time will tell how successful the Wii will be, but look at how incredibly well the DS is doing and it was nothing more than a small technology upgrade of the Gameboy Advance. The games will decide its ultimate fate.

Which is ironic considering Andy fawns all over the new Home service for the PS/3. Home is a cross between game achievements, Miis and a persistent world like Second Life. It isn't, in fact, a game at all. It's a way to interact with friends and show off your l33t game skillz and is really aimed at more casual gamers, in my opinion. The ones who don't mind just hanging out in a 3D chat program instead of, you know, playing games. The same casual gamers who seem to love the Wii. Now, while Home is rather interesting, I don't see it selling more PS/3s because the casual gamer isn't going to shell out $600 for it just to get Home. Again, it will be the games that cause people to buy it, and there are no casual games for the PS/3. Yet. So I'm confused as to why one can get all excited over Home, where people interact virtually, and pan the Wii, where people actually physically interact without any intervening technology.

As we all know, price sells cars. And consoles. The Wii is way ahead of the game here and Sony will have to do a lot more than Home persuade the millions of potential casual gamers to take a shot on their Blu-Ray test bed. The new Singstar may help, but it will take more than that. I see the Wii poised to lead a revolution for casual gamers. Nintendo should have stayed with that name...

Well, to be frank, the thing that pisses me off about the Wii-as-console-for-the-casual-gamer is that it's . . . true. As hard as it is to confess, I'm part of the target market. Where things go horribly wrong is when people confuse casual gamer with the "I want to play everything with my girlfriend" crowd. I want mature titles for my Wii. If God of War 2 can work on a PS2, then why don't we see it (or titles like it) on the Wii? Just because I don't have enough time to play a ton of titles out there doesn't mean I don't want to play a few of them. I hope the Wii caused more than a few developers out there to reconsider the Nintendo platform. I'm not going to buy another console, so toss me a few good mature titles will you?

Posted by Dean on Tuesday March 13, 2007 at 6:55 AM

Ah, the question of "mature" titles and Nintendo. Honestly, Nintendo does not necessarily make first party titles that would be considered mature. They leave that market to the Sony and Microsoft. With that in mind, there are games produced by the other publishers that would fall into that bucket. Let us not forget that Resident Evil was on the Gamecube first and that is definitely a mature title. The other thing to keep in mind is that the console just launched and is still in limited availablity (damn them), and as time progresses you will see a range of titles come out for this console.

Posted by Tim on Tuesday March 13, 2007 at 9:10 AM

Well the fact is I am about as hardcore a gamer as they come and ya know what? My family and I are still playing our Wii very regularly. We still might be in the novelty phase still but I think we are past it. My 3 year old son is even in to it with "Cars". Being that you hold the Wii-mote like a steering wheel and just tilt it to the left/right to steer it, this seems to be more than easy enough for Harrison to figure out and coupled with the fact that the Cars game is a big sandbox like area you can drive around in he is amused for hours. My daughter and I are still playing Wii Sports, but she can still get lost for hours in "Wario Ware: Smooth Moves" to the point that she could be ON FIRE and just dismiss it as "a flesh wound."

Along with Dean (didn't he say he was Frank?), I find myself playing a little gaming history on the Wii as well. I have downloaded via the Virtual Console "Toejam & Earl" and "Zelda: Occarina of Time" and actually play them.

I still need to hook up one of my Wavebird controllers from the Gamecube and finish Resident Evil someday. The game was a blast and I can truly say it took MS releasing the 360 to make me stop playing it. It is a glowing testament to the 360 that I forgot to pick Resident Evil back up and finish it.

So much to play... so little... wait... I've got plenty of time.

Posted by Trent on Tuesday March 13, 2007 at 9:39 AM

Guess I should have stayed on topic and hated on the PS3 Home topic a little, but ya know what. The PS3 is so irrelevant to my gaming needs I just don't have it in me to "take the mickey out of" the PS3 anymore. Wait... I think I just took a cheap shot at the PS3.... damn, thats too easy to do.

Who the hell wants to wait for a 3d world to load up and then have to walk around a virtual living room just to compare my game stats against Tims? Some things just don't need the 3d treatment. From a social (chuckle) standpoint its fairly interesting, but so is Second Life, or the Mii's on my Wii. Nothing revolutionary.

Posted by Trent on Tuesday March 13, 2007 at 9:48 AM

I too listened to this podcast and was surprised at the 'anti-Wii' sentiment from Gamer Andy. The Wii isn't for him, but that doesn't mean it isn't going to be a commercial success for lots and lots of people. Steve was more realistic, pointing out that the system allowed developers to produce games less expensively, but also pointed out that developers were unhappy about its limited horsepower and preferred all the cool things they can do with the PS3.

All told, this was one of Steve's poorer podcasts because while he maintained his usual 'industry insider' approach, Gamer Andy is just a fanboy. Steve needs to avoid guys like these - it brings his podcast down.

Posted by Scott on Tuesday March 13, 2007 at 9:57 AM

Wow, 4 days of nothing, then 5 times in one day! Thanks Dean!

I'll modify my stance slightly. While I think Home is a nice idea from the 'socializing the gaming scene' standpoint, the PS/3 isn't the right machine to do that on. It's target audience wants to play games, not 3D chat. And, as I said, the people who might like to use Home, the 'casual' gamers, aren't shelling out $600 for a PS/3. If Sony were to drop the price to around $300, they might have something. As it is, Home looks to be a marketing mistake, albeit one that won't sink the ship, it just isn't going to help right it.

LittleBigPlanet on the other hand might help sell more PS/3s...

Posted by jp on Wednesday March 14, 2007 at 9:21 AM