I Xi [See] The Future of PlayStation Home

(Actually, it’s pronounced “sai,” but you get the idea.)

As other blogs, both here in GAP and elsewhere, have mentioned, Xi has begun within PlayStation Home. I’ve played it. It’s moderately fun, but the real excitement for me comes from the potential for Home that the Xi game reveals.

Xi is basically an Alternate Reality Game, except that this one already takes place in the alternate reality that is Home. So far, it’s a scavenger hunt / puzzle, but frequent updates promise fresh content each time one logs into Home.

If that in itself isn’t enough to get excited over, then the possibilities within Home that Xi has shown us are. Having completed today’s “expeditions,” as the Xi ARG calls them, I believe that I have seen the future of Home.

Experience Xi for yourself (go now).

…

Or read on.

Picture your avatar entering the Xi space, named The Hub. Big screen across the way, white, concrete walls, and “AFK” branded on the central space below. Accompanying the usual blur to focused transition, a voice speaks to you over the intercom, briefly showing you sections of The Hub, and then guiding you through an initiation process, (No hazing, but puzzle and scavenger hunt included) not just telling you what to do and sending you on your way, but actually guiding you and following your progress.

Generally, Home feels a bit lifeless, with only the other avatars to remind you that this is a place for people. Xi, however, feels alive, and the voice, a human voice talking to you over the intercom adds greatly to that feeling.

In-Home opening cinematic aside, more surprises await as you dig a bit deeper. Home features such as accessing the system web browser through an in-Home terminal, on demand videos, game progress recording, and triggering events with emotes make their first appearances; Home features that have, till now, only been discussed.

These features show that beyond the relatively static spaces that have been released to date, PlayStation Home actually has great potential for immersive, highly interactive spaces as well. Imagine a Warhawk space that allowed access the MyWarhawk.org, or an Uncharted space that has you solving puzzles through artifact finding and examination. Poor examples, but still much more content than those spaces currently provide. There is great potential here.

Suffice it to say the future of Home looks good. What Xi has pioneered gives us a glimpse of the future of what Sony’s virtual community can become, and today, that future seems a little bit brighter.

Originally published on PlayStation Gamer Advisory Panel (GAP) 2009-03-23 14:41.