PS3 Home Official Thread

Fun little game.

- very good controls, smooth gameplay
- left stick is steering, L1/L2 tilt the plane left or right, right stick is speed
- one "course", with about 25 or so "checkpoints" (with those balloon thingies like in the real Air Race)
- Extra 300 plane (3 teams/pilots to choose from (Hannes Arch, Peter Besenyei & Mike Mangold))

- no tutorial, no goals (I completed the course without any mistakes, didn't get any rewards, maybe it has to be faster as well, or maybe there aren't any rewards)

Oh, and before anyone asks, you start the game by going near the planes and pressing X when "Red Bull Air Race" shows up like the player names do.
If you can't get it, select (X) a random player near the planes and use the arrow buttons to cycle through other players as well as the Air Race.

My first time was a ~2:30 with a third of the checkpoints missed or wrong (ie plane tilted to the wrong side, or not tilted at all, or hit the balloons).
Second to fifth times in the ~1:30, final run managed to clear all the checkpoints. But as I said, no reward, no trophy.
 
I don't think you get anything for completing the red bull race in a good time or completing it without mistakes.

For something that took so long to come out you would think it would come with a shirt or something :/
 
Hmm..I saw the odd plane flying around while on the ground..but while playing, no other fliers seem to be in evidence. You can still see the people on the ground chatting, though..but not other planes in the air. Is it meant to be like that, or...? It's a pity if you can't see others flying. No explicit racing with others either, just time trial?

Also, seems to be confusing a LOT of people regarding how to actually start the game..

edit - the UI also harbours yet more inconsistencies...on my Japanese machine, it's circle to confirm everything, but plane selection requires x.

edit 2 - no reward items, and no leaderboards in the space are meh too.

The planes handle well enough, and I see good potential if they add new modes and multiplayer racing. It's disappointing that the flying itself is 'instanced' for each player, though, even if you can still see the other people on the ground and their chat. However, with only one mode, it kind of gets old pretty fast..as is, the utter confusion on the ground about how to start the game is eventually more entertaining than the game itself ;) I would like them to add more and kind of turn it into a mini pilotwings within home.
 
TTP said:
Yeah, if just 10% of the people currently visiting Home is stupid enough to spend that much money on a t-shirt Sony will definitely keep it.

Dont forget Home made more money in the first 3 days than the video store in a whole week.

So yes, there is a clear revenue stream there. Which leads me to think Home will continue to be supported more and more. But not necessarily for games or gamers as much as as a social network environment.
 
gofreak said:
Hmm..I saw the odd plane flying around while on the ground..but while playing, no other fliers seem to be in evidence. You can still see the people on the ground chatting, though..but not other planes in the air. Is it meant to be like that, or...? It's a pity if you can't see others flying. No explicit racing with others either, just time trial?

Also, seems to be confusing a LOT of people regarding how to actually start the game..

edit - the UI also harbours yet more inconsistencies...on my Japanese machine, it's circle to confirm everything, but plane selection requires x.

edit 2 - no reward items, and no leaderboards in the space are meh too.

The planes handle well enough, and I see good potential if they add new modes and multiplayer racing. It's disappointing that the flying itself is 'instanced' for each player, though, even if you can still see the other people on the ground and their chat. However, with only one mode, it kind of gets old pretty fast..as is, the utter confusion on the ground about how to start the game is eventually more entertaining than the game itself ;) I would like them to add more and kind of turn it into a mini pilotwings within home.

This is a cultural thing. I forget how it works, but O is seen as good, hence selection, and X as bad hence cancel. Majority of games use this reversed input method from Western controls. So if anything, it shows that Home can be responsive to its different markets, and why there are three different Homes.

As to the other stuff, I am sure they will add some basic leaderboarding. The point is to keep you in their space to advertise, so making it a little competitive by leaderboards is almost a no brainer.
 
AndyD said:
This is a cultural thing. I forget how it works, but O is seen as good, hence selection, and X as bad hence cancel. Majority of games use this reversed input method from Western controls. So if anything, it shows that Home can be responsive to its different markets, and why there are three different Homes.

But..Home on my US account detects that it's a japanese machine, and uses circle accordingly. It's just the space itself doesn't do that auto-detection, and just assumes 'x'. It'd be nice if the space auto-detected just like all other PS3 software does (including the Home menus). It was just a bit confusing at first, cos I was there hitting circle trying to select a plane for a good minute or so, and nothing was happening..
 
Oni Jazar said:
If "instanced" means that you don't have to wait in line to play then I'm all for it.

Well, yeah..that may be the case..I was never waiting, and there seemed to be lots of people there playing, so..maybe there's no queue.

It's nice if they could strike a balance..like maybe put you in an instanced aerial space with even just a few others..but with one main red bull space having multiple aerial spaces with different groups flying around, but all seeing the same people on the ground.
 
Are they updating the network now ? I can't access PS Home or PS Store.

R2 competitive mode seems to be working at this moment.
 
HOME announcement coming soon:

How big is Sony’s booth at the Consumer Electronics Show this year? So big they’re filming episodes of Jeopardy! on-site (no Trebek sightings for me yet, but that will hopefully change today).

While the vast majority of the acreage is packed with Bravias, VAIOs, Handycams, and awesome audio setups (find out more at Sony.com/news), a number of current and upcoming PlayStation titles made the trip to Vegas. Here’s a quick tour we shot last night during a preview event for those of you not among the 140,000 projected CES attendees:

In addition, colleague Brian Dunn snapped lots of pics of the Sony booth at large last night as things were being set up - you can see the full gallery here.

Better yet, developers Guerrilla Games (Killzone 2), Sucker Punch Productions (inFamous), and SCEA Bend Studios (Resistance Retribution) are also in Vegas for CES. I’ll be grilling them on their presentations for you in some future posts, so keep an eye out for those.

As far as that PlayStation Home announcement Jack Buser mentions in the video - you’ll find out about that soon.

Source & Video @: http://blog.us.playstation.com/2009/01/08/ces-2009-see-sonys-booth/

wonder what it could be? File sharing? or more HOME spaces?
 
patsu said:
Wait, so you guys could get into Home ?

I'm in Home right now, they replaced the Theater movie with the Uncharted 2 trailer now. They should have the movie theater like Japan or Europe where you walk in and there's a bunch of different ones, like a real movie theater. The US theater sucks.
 
PlayStation Home has added Electonic Arts to Home today. Based on the demo, it looks like it includes an EA casino and other places where you can give more of your money to Sony.
 
For those of you at work (I'm in college and still Home for Xmas--get it? Home) I threw a quick video or two up on GameTrailers of the space itself, plus a little bit of racing.

To just look at the space: (no audio, sorry didn't realize it wasn't set up when I started the webcam)
http://www.gametrailers.com/player/usermovies/301051.html

Air Race footage:
http://www.gametrailers.com/player/usermovies/301059.html

p.s. Sorry if the vids are a little dark. Didn't realize the calibration was so far off. My Quickcam software keeps resetting the settings, but oddly enough, not to the original defaults. That's why the sound was off, and that's why the exposure is too low.
 
patsu said:
How the hell do you get up the plane ? I tried facing the plane and press X but nothing happened.

If you go up to a plane and you wind up interacting with a person you're supposed to press left or right (dpad or left stick) and eventually wind up facing the plane. Unfortunately, it doesn't always work very well. In fact, it works quite poorly. So, I just hold forward on the left stick while I try to press X by the plane, and SOMETIMES it works. Not always though...
 
OldJadedGamer said:
It will be cool if more companies do this and support it but I'm kind of leary of him saying you can "buy boosts" for your car to get better times.
did you skip the part where you earn that currency within home? all the EA Home games use in-game currency for upgrades and progression.
 
OldJadedGamer said:
No I'm leary of EA and their microtransactions.
which have little to do with their Home space, which uses in-game currency for upgrades/progress that you earn by playing the games.
 
dfyb said:
did you skip the part where you earn that currency within home? all the EA Home games use in-game currency for upgrades and progression.

I take this in game currency will only be for EA Sports complex or EA Home Spaces, that is I won't be able to spend that currency on other Home items.
 
Regular Home items use real currencies. If you like certain EA services or items, you probably need to use EA currency to get them... unless they allow you to buy them right off the bat (which is possible too I guess).
 
Hey I had NO idea how to get to the Uncharted and Farcry shit until I was just fucking around...is there anywehre on the hubworld to get to them?
 
Christopher said:
Hey I had NO idea how to get to the Uncharted and Farcry shit until I was just fucking around...is there anywehre on the hubworld to get to them?

Nope, strangely the only way to access these extra areas is to use the clumsy and slow world map.
 
I'm pretty sure you have to wait in line to play the Red Bull Airrace. The "play game" button seems to disappear when somebody else selects it.
Plus I could see other people fly above me, finishing the course.

But no matter if my assumptions are correct or not, has anybody tried steering the plane into the waiting crowd? Is it impossible to do so or does it simply not happen to other Home users due to local game instancing?
 
Huggy said:
I'm pretty sure you have to wait in line to play the Red Bull Airrace. The "play game" button seems to disappear when somebody else selects it.
Plus I could see other people fly above me, finishing the course.

But no matter if my assumptions are correct or not, has anybody tried steering the plane into the waiting crowd? Is it impossible to do so or does it simply not happen to other Home users due to local game instancing?

I don't think you need to wait. You can press X then left/right to try to select the air race game.

Additionally, I've noticed if I fly low enough, you can get the text bubbles of text chat while you're still flying. So, it does seem pretty well done in that sense...
 
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