Unfortunately, I don’t think Sony cares one bit about any of this. I can confidently say that I no longer care either. They can keep their X7, their beta-tests and most likely their FUBAR.

Home is already FUBAR to me these days. And I mean that in the most respectfully traditional usage of the acronym. Aside from a few select activities, Home is dead to me.

2012 was supposed to be the year of the game for Home. Unfortunately, all of these over-hyped games are billed as blockbuster releases but only live up to the “bust” part. Nothing more than mind-numbingly repetitive mini-games released full of bugs with no long-term replay value. These games go from server-clogging traffic to forgotten spaces within a few weeks. Cutthroats, No Man’s Land, Mercia, Home Tycoon…can we expect any different from FUBAR or Uproar? zzz zzz zzz

I haven’t even mentioned the expenses that these games can pile on the user. 10, 20, 50, 100+ dollars that people have spent to be successful in some of these games?!? Would anybody even give these games a second glance if they were being sold outside of Home, much less spend money on them? Home Tycoon might have been revolutionary before I was even born. But now…not so much. I cannot understand the buying habits of Home consumers anymore. I might still consider buying something that I like in Home but I won’t buy anything simply because it’s in Home.

My Home usage has come full circle to some extent. When I first started using Home, I probably spent the most time playing poker at the EA space. My main activity lately…playing poker at Digital Leisure’s Casino. Not to say that I didn’t have a lot of good times with Home in between.

Great article, for sure.

I never thought I’d say this but, The Midway was (is?) headed in the right direction for Home-only games. Hell, even that god awful grind-fest they call Edo is better than this approach. I’m sorry for my negativity here but I just think even the casual gamers of Home should be given something better than a Tower Defence game. What’s next, a Zuma clone? I’d rather a Peggle clone myself, if that’s how it’s gotta be.

Regarding the “exclusivity” of late beta access; I was grumpy about not getting into Mercia, but what can you do there? This is different, there’ll be people who want to know about this game, and I’m sure the access method will put yuck-faces on heads but still, it all comes down to the misplaced sense of entitlement that most Home users still have today. And, at least, if you really, REALLY want into this games final beta phase you can take action to ensure your place, unlike just being lucky enough to get an email.

Once x7 members get a beta invite for a future game on Home, then say a week later several beta invites get sent out such as with No Man’s Land and Mercia. x7 members could/would recieve early beta access (which might entice people to either get plus or one of the Home items required to enter)and then other users would get chosen at random, or however they do it, a week later.

Great article and I think this would be a great discussion in the near future.