New EOD Updates From LOOT, and Hints of New Furniture
Information courtesy of Sara Stephens, LOOT Production Coordinator, with commentary provided by NorseGamer
Every so often, something comes along that you genuinely wonder how you lived without.
Example. DVR technology. Remember the first time you paused live television? The sheer shock of it, and the giddy giggling that followed, was akin to the first time you beat a pedestrian to death in Grand Theft Auto III. You just knew that nothing could ever quite be the same again.
No, seriously, what did we do before DVR entered into our lives? Remember when you had to program a VCR to tape things? Remember rewinding something? Or, heck, for that matter, remember the cell-phone-in-a-blender sounds your first dial-up modem made? Or when you eagerly anticipated hearing AOL’s baritone tell you you actually had a piece of e-mail?
It’s amazing how fast things change, particularly in this digital age, and how we’ve grown so accustomed to it all.
Home is no different. It’s been around, in open beta, for a few years now. Yet it has been only recently that Home, courtesy of LOOT, introduced a game-changer product: Entertainment On Demand (EOD) technology. And, in particular, the inclusion of RadioIO and Crackle with it.
No, seriously, what the hell did we do in Home before EOD? It’s a game-changer, pure and simple. If you invest in a PS3, you can now sign into Home (which is free), ignore everyone and everything else, and enjoy tons of multimedia entertainment for free.
Christ, imagine if EOD had been available when Home was first launched (granted, that’s assuming the infrastructure at the time could’ve handled it). How different would the public reception have been? How about user retention? It would have been the halo product that people could point to and proudly proclaim as the cool justification for their usage of Home.
Still, better late than never.
What amazes me, though, is just how fast it’s being updated with new content. Here’s the latest announcement from Sara Stephens:
Next Wednesday, February 8th, Crackle, Animax and LOOT will bring two new Anime series to US PlayStation®Home users: Nisemonogatar and Ikki Tousen, as well as new episodes of Kurozuka and Fate/Zero. Also there will be a new channel dedicated to Music Documentaries, including but not limited to: 
Beastie Boys: Horseplay: Unauthorized
The Buddy Holly Story
Composing The Beatles Songbook: 1966-1970
Miles Davis: Cool Jazz Sound
Pearl Jam: Under Review
Prince: The Glory Years Unauthorized
Queen Under Review: 1973-1980
Radiohead: Homework
Rolling Stones: In The 1960s
Tom Waits: Under Review
U2 – Achtung Baby: Classic Album Under Review
U2 – Rebirth Of Cool: U2 In The Third Millennium
Van Morrison: Under Review: 1964-1974
Velvet Underground: Under Review
The Who, The Mods And The Quadrophenia
What will you watch first? This content is available FREE on the LOOT EOD Theater #3, LOOT Space Apartment, LOOT Sunset Yacht and Hollywood Hills House. Enjoy!
That’s…quite a lot of awesomeness, actually. I mean, seriously, remember thirty years ago when it was a big, big deal if you had cable? Remember the old HBO intro animation?
(Hell, that animation was sometimes better than the movie that came after it.)
I honestly never thought we’d live in a digital age where you could have monster flat-panel televisions, virtual reality, and free movies on demand. I’m part of the last generation that was born into an analogue world, so I still have something of a sense of awe for all that’s happened in the last thirty years.
Let’s shift gears for a moment, though, and discuss something else LOOT’s got cooking: new virtual furniture!
LOOT’s being quite clever with their preview PR about this, sending different furniture bundles to different Home media projects. I like this idea. We all more or less cover the same cut-and-paste information, although HomeStation does go to some lengths to actually discuss, analyze, opine and reflect upon it. But if you want to see all the pieces ahead of time, you actually have to check out more than one media site.
So the one we’ve been given preview access to showcase: the Sleek bundle. No release date yet given.
This bundle will include bars designed for the Space Apartment aquarium, curved to either sit around the outside or stand on top of the aquarium. It also comes with massive, sleek tables (in two sizes) and the room dividers. One potential usage we can see is to place one of the bars on top of the aquarium on the first floor, and then jump down onto it from the loft. Because futuristic dancing is still more entertaining when on top of a bar.
I have to admit, I particularly like the room dividers that Sleek offers. Ever find yourself in desperate need of a good room divider, and there just isn’t anything out there which will work? I suspect this one will fit the bill quite nicely. And the clean, modern lines of the rest of the furniture should ideally suit quite a number of estates — which, frankly, I think is quite important. Sure, it’s fun to have highly specialized furniture that’s made for a specific estate, but more often than not, I find myself gravitating to virtual furniture that I know can be used in a multitude of apartments, which helps justify the investment.
Amazing, isn’t it? Here we are, a dozen years into the new millennium, and we’re talking about furnishing digital apartments in virtual reality. And what’s more amazing is that by the time I’m an old man, this will all be looked back upon as a quaint beginning.
February 3rd, 2012 by NorseGamer | 4 comments
NorseGamer is the product manager for LOOT Entertainment at Sony Pictures, as well as the founder and publisher of HomeStation Magazine. Born and raised in Silicon Valley, he holds a B.A. in English/Creative Writing from San Francisco State University and presently lives in Los Angeles. All opinions expressed in HSM are solely his and do not necessarily reflect the views of Sony DADC.
LinkedIn
Twitter
I will absoLOOTly have to add this to the LOOTerprise!
Very nice!
Thanks LOOT!
…but you ARE an old man, my dear. LOOL. omg, im sooo teasing. hey, im WAY older. and i loved the article. even though crackle movies dont play in canada, i still love my eod homes not only for the home itself, but the capability to listen to what i want in my own apartment. sweeeeet
They’re coming to Canada: http://community.us.playstation.com/thread/4660984?tstart=0
i’ll be one happy little mouse when that shows up! WOO HOO!!