I Don’t Know
by Kassadee Marie, HSM team writer
I love Playstation Home and I wish it would last for years in some version or other, on either the PS3 or the PS4 — or both. I’m grateful to Phil Harrison, the man who conceived of the idea. I’m grateful to Sony for moving forward with his vision and making it a reality and for continuing to support the idea. I’m grateful for every third party developer, even when I don’t like every product that they produce, for being a part of Home and for creating content that we can all enjoy. I’m not upset — at all — that they all did this to make money, as well as see their concepts and creations brought to life. Making money — earning a living — is a necessity for all of them, just like most of the rest of the people in the world.
Do I know if Home will be brought to the PS4? No, I don’t. If you asked me to guess I’d say “not at launch, but maybe later, in some version or another.” Do I know if Sony will continue to keep and support Home on the PS3? No, I don’t. If you asked me to guess I’d say, “they will continue to keep and support it as long as it makes money for them.” Do I know if both Home North America and Europe will continue on the PS3? No, I don’t. If you asked me to guess, I’d say “it’s likely these two regions will remain for at least a year, perhaps longer.”
And if you asked me if I know what it means that Home Japan and Home Asia are no longer getting new content after September 2013 and April 2014, respectively, I’d say “No, I don’t.” If you asked me to guess, I’d say that “I believe it’s straight-forward economics. These two regions (which are separate divisions of Sony) very likely did not support themselves monetarily.” If you asked me if I knew why this happened, I’d say “No, I don’t.” If you asked me to guess, I’d say that “I believe Sony Asia never had a large enough user base to support it and that Sony Japan offered more to (spent more money on) its users than it earned and that doesn’t seem like a viable business practice to me.”
Are my guesses more valuable than anyone else’s? Do I know more about the future of Home than any other Homer? No, of course not. But I believe that the people who are proposing one extreme or the other (Home will shut down at PS4 launch or Sony will surprise us and Home will be on the PS4 at launch) need to settle their emotions and think a little more logically.
It’s my opinion that Sony would have notified people by some means, if they intended to have Home on the PS4 at launch. Any small announcement would have spread through the Home community like the proverbial wild fire and it would have made some people less hesitant to buy or pre-order the PS4. As for shutting down Home on November 15, 2013, I believe the third party developers would already be aware of that and they would not make statements like those made by Lockwood, Codeglue, nDreams, Hellfire Game, Game Mechanics and even Sony, by way of Tempest_Fire, a Digital Platforms Community Manager.
Tim at Lockwood said: I’d like to reassure everyone (if possible!) by saying that our plans to continue supporting and creating content for Home have not changed in the slightest and we’re still full steam ahead!
Peter de Jong of Codeglue said: You probably all know that PlayStation Home in Japan will be closing down. We would like to assure you that we will continue to release new content on PlayStation Home in the North America and Europe regions! We are working actively with Home user Dani to bring more the best possible female clothing to the platform. We are also working on our first club house, and we are going to update some of our older Halloween items soon so that they use less memory slots.
So we will not abandon the platform. And more than ever we would like to hear from you boys & girls what you want to see in PlayStation Home!
Tempest_Fire said: As did SCEE, we at SCEA want to reinforce the message that SCEA Home publishes will continue as normal. SCEAJ have simply restructured their business and wish to focus on other priorities. I also want to confirm that you will still be able to visit friends in SCEJ and Asia regions through their personal spaces, as always.
SCEA/E both have a lot of content on the roadmap. SCEA Home is a thriving community, and SCEA will continue to support it. You’ve already heard that Lockwood and nDreams have content in the works, as do Hellfire, Madmunki, Atom Republic, Digital Leisure, Codeglue, VEEMEE and more. There are future core updates planned as well. There’s still nothing to announce at this point regarding PS4 and Home, but Home North America will continue to see support from SCEA.
Joey at nDreams said: It certainly will be a shame to see Japan stop releasing new content. But why I want to reassure you all, just as Tim (Lockwood) has, is that nDreams will be fully supporting Home until it either shuts its doors or is migrated. We have an amazing lineup of items ready for release over a long period of time and are working on even more. So, while its sad news for those Japan users the US and Europe will continue to see full support from nDreams for a long time to come.
We certainly have items on production that go past March 2014 for US and EU…
Novus Cooldown from Hellfire Games said: Never fear! I can confirm that Hellfire Games is very much committed to Home in the NA and EU regions. We’re actually much busier than we’ve ever been as a studio, with no less than seven projects in the works for Home. Stay tuned for more info on some of those soon.
Although it’s definitely a shame to see new content publishing cease in Japan, it’s also likely that the NA and EU regions will see a surge in their player base as a result, especially with that new $199 PS3 out in time for the holiday season. Be prepared to see a lot of new faces!
And in a second post:
I’d like to calm some fears (if I can) with a few facts from a Home developer’s perspective. This has been the biggest year for Home to date in North America, and keep in mind the core Home Platform Group is in London, so support in NA and EU show no signs of stopping — especially with all of the projects that haven’t even been announced yet by the Home devs, and massive projects like Pottermore just getting started.
As I mentioned earlier in the thread, Hellfire Games alone has SEVEN Home projects underway, and we’ve never been busier. There’s no indication that Home will be anything but “full steam ahead” in NA and EU for a long time. Relaaaax.”
A representative from Game Mechanics said: I just want to reaffirm our commitment to Home. We do not do our work on Home for any other reasons than we have fun doing it and we use Home ourselves. We are not one of the top tier developers, but we love to make things that are as good as they can possibly be. We will be here until they throw us out.
That said, we have some of the best stuff yet about to come out. While we are sad for the people who will not get to enjoy our items in Japan and Asia, we are extremely excited about the things we are about to ship. For us, the best is about to come.
Today we are sad for all the opportunities for experiences that will be lost long term. But tomorrow we will celebrate all the experiences to come.
Rule 208 from the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition – “Sometimes the only thing more dangerous than a question is an answer.”
So, even if I don’t know, some people do — and they have spoken. Let’s all relax, stop panicking, and have fun!
September 10th, 2013 by Kassadee Marie | 5 comments
Home is endlessly entertaining to this California girl. Kassadee has been in Home for about four years, and loves almost everything about it (with a few notable exceptions). She spends way too much money there, and perhaps too much time... Someday she will travel the world and write about the people she meets and the places she sees.
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Sorry put a fork in home its done. The reason they didn’t announce the time table for the EU, NA content shutdown. Is because they don’t want to hurt their PS4 sales. If you really want to send a message to sony? Cancel your ps4 pre-order…
Home will be around for quite awhile yet it is long from finished. I don’t know where you get your information from, but when all the developers are stating as well as Sony is stating that they have a lot left to add to Home, I think jumping the gun and saying we should stop buying anything is self destructive to say the least. I hate to say it but the very few who boycott this will be the only ones who suffer because most people won’t. Sony has a great product and Home is free to everyone unless they choose to buy, which I intend to continue doing.
That was such a well written article Kass. I couldn’t of put it any better!
There are good reasons for and against home continuing but without any real facts it’s very much speculation. I tend to think that home will not make PS4. But hope it does. The only facts we get are supposed to be celebrating the amount of people that visited that space. When a lot of these figures actually show how many people dont use home. Aurora took nearly a year to get a million unique visitors it was released at different times in all four regions in that year and it didn’t take into account multiple account users. A mediocre game released in one region would sell a million copies in 3 months. You would think that a social MMO would be used by users that use other social medias but look at the the likes and followers etc on social media when it’s related to home, the numbers aren’t that great. I can make videos on killing players on COD with my knife and get more likes. So ultimately is it because there isn’t enough users that it doesn’t really matter to Sony if all the home users said we won’t buy a PS4 so really are they bothered about home. All the comments from developers are too ambiguous to be worth anything and show they either know nothing as well or know enough not to want to give any clues. I think it will be allowed to grow old and die which wont be for a while yet.
I have to disagree that the statements by the developers are ambiguous. They have all stated that they have projects “in the works” and one of them said these projects extend beyond March 2014. No, that’s not an exact date and I don’t believe they can state one.
They will never say “forever” of course; nothing lasts forever, obviously. Sony will “close shop” on Home (NA & EU) when it is no longer financially viable. Will the developers know before the general public? I believe so. Will Sony announce the closure months in advance? I sincerely doubt it.
But the way to be SURE that Home closes it doors sooner, imo, is for everyone to stop buying now. I do not intend to do that. I’m having too much fun and I want to support Home until it’s gone, whenever that may be.