PlayStation Home full of immature jokers, unlike other virtual communities
By Joseph L. Flatley 
posted Dec 30th 2008 1:59PM
posted Dec 30th 2008 1:59PM
It's not been a good month for Sony. Layoffs, poor holiday sales for the PS3 and a wee bit of hacking over at PlayStation Home surely have the electronics giant hungry for some good press, which has made the newest PR kerfuffle over at the nascent online service quite unfortunate. According to Ars Technica, Home has become something akin to the nightmare futurescape of The Warriors, a service "incredibly unwelcoming to women, with female players quickly mobbed as players dance around them or type sexual come-ons... a disturbing look at the worst part of human nature." This is heady stuff, but as the company is quick to point out, the thing is still in Beta, and it's still evolving -- hopefully, as it becomes more popular the free service will move itself out of the adolescent ghetto. In the mean time, they've been rocking a bit of good old fashioned censorship, banning words like "gay," "Jew," and "Hell" -- perfectly understandishable if you've ever spent a minute on any online gaming service, but highly uncool if you're trying to build any sort of inclusive social network. In the meantime, what's a homosexual Jewish Satanist to do? There's always Second Life...
*sigh* I'll never find a place that accepts me for who I am.
try neverland. im sure someone there will accept u ;)
@Chris:
Congratulations on overthinking an Engadget comment.
?? And Xbox Live is not full of imature kids??? Seriously,... I
Somewhere, there's a place for you
Somewhere,
A time for you...
Have you tried Gizmodo?
I talk so much shit on xbox Live its ridiculous.
In fact, what's funny is at this point, games are so fast paced, nobody bothers to downrank people anymore. When Quake 4 came out I talked so much crap to people while beating on em, I had less than 1/2 a star.
When Halo 3 came out and people basically stopped ranking others and avoiding them - my rank shot up to 5 stars.
Maybe the female players should toughen up a bit instead of whinging.
adrian, you are an asshole.
lol that was me i bet hahahahahahahhah high as shit i tell ya ;]
good weed good weed
*sings* Somewhere, over the rainbow, way up high.
There's a land that I heard of Once in a lullaby.....
Maybe they'll accept you there :)
so its the same as in here?
Why am I not surprised? I'm so not surprised, I think I'm going to die of not surprise.
A free online community that's easy to access with no real consequences for behavior... How do you expect people to act?!?
the worst part is that its not just 'people' being immature. its young males. we make up such an awful part of the worlds demographic. what is it about being a young male that makes us think we can get away with that shit and not only get away but think its funny?
even engadget had to tell people to reign it in with the comments. I feel ashamed to be part of such a pathetic demogrphic.
that's just it... it's called being young. as you grow old, you wise up when life gets real (responsibility, family, etc). well, most of us anyways. what else is a young male to do besides school? it's human nature to talk trash in competitive games, and it's a lot easier when there's no counter physical retribution to be had.
if you're ashamed of the demographic, do something about it and help educate young males.
this human nature is the pure essence of humanity, in that, it keeps us alive and prevents us from developing into a (worse) horde of boring robots. sure, it's not exactly positive behavior to really be celebrated, but i'd rather my kid talk shit on XBL and know to respect people and their limits IRL than be a polite, vanilla-flavored nancy: "oh dear, you shot me...jeez jimminyjillickers that was rude!"
people who are affected by the comments of XBL users should quit all forms of electronic communication as it is. no matter where you go, gaming communities (competitive) or even blogs (non-competitive), you'll find some form of bashing/flaming/shit-talking/rickrolling. it IS inevitable; everyone is an idiot.
I have the Home beta on my PS3. I hate it only because of it's lack of content at the moment. That is what leads to this behavior. You go on there and download all the areas, spend some time decorating your home with the limited furniture they give you, create a character with the limited clothing and accessories, and ... well that's about it. I don't play it but my girlfriend goes on when she's bored and guess what... She goes on there, creates some ugly ass avatar, and bothers people. We're in our late 20s so it's not like we're "young males". There's just nothing to do.
My point is that once Sony gets it's head out of it's ass and gets some content going on this nightmare which probably should have just become vaporware, we'll see this go away. It's just people doing it out of boredom. This is what would happen in WoW or FFXI if there were no quests or missions or whatever. Give people something to do, and if there's nothing to do, don't play. Simple. Sony sucks!
I'm with bolezhinkov
"what else is a young male to do besides school?" Well, I'm a very young male, and I do Linux/electronics haxing, put microcontrollers in everything I can get them to fit. Don't like that? There's always audio "hackineering", video editing, graphics, lolcats, diy
That's not an excuse to be inmature, there's plenty of "clean" fun to have. I'm also ashamed of my demographic..
teej, this is not about XBL, it's about PS Home... And also, one think is to say "joo got pawned, n00b" to a hardcore gam0r, and another thing is to say "hey babe, want to see my stick" to a woman... You're comparing blueberries to bananas
Oh, let me correct that last part... "to a potential woman" - most likely actually a fat dude. But still, I've seen that happen in real life, with real woman.. I'd have loved to punch them in the face, but 1.7 vs. 10 = about to fail
GTA6?
I thought only XBL had these types of users?
There are asshats everywhere... Do they have stuff like GMs that could ban those idiots for a week and permaban the repeat offenders? That would solve the problem quickly.
Yes there are assholes everywhere online. It has already been proven in the "Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory"
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/3/19/
@Kal326 I'm gonna send that to all the flamers and trolls I know. Thanks buddy.
Blah blah Engadget, I had a blast with a British and Dutch, we throw a guy party and the Dutch one played music from his headset. We made fun of Swedes (I made them) Afterwards we looked for some girls.
Even though it may sound very "immature" and "primitive" it was very fun, and if just half of the experiences in Home are like that, it's great.
Sounds like Xbox Live
as amusing as that is, its also incredibly true... and why is it true?
It's because the people that spend their lives in these online worlds are generally social outcasts who feel empowered to do as they wish when they're hidden behind their avatar... whether its 12 year olds in halo, or just your run-of-the-mill loser in second life or PS home, these game manufacturers need to realize who their demographic is and realize that everything they produce will at some point be hacked or turned into a giant dick joke.
This has nothing to do with Sony, and has everything to do with humanity, or the lack thereof.
Jackasses are everywhere, MySpace, XBL, AIM and yes, even HOME.
Id love to hear/see what the worlds biggest dick joke is...... Personally I think thatd be funny.....
Xbox Live is full of 14 year olds. Who would have thought that 14 year olds could act immature?
These services need to provide an area for only adults.
an adults only area sounds good, but whats going to stop a 14 yr old from saying he's 26?
It shouldn't be by age, it should be by maturity. I've played some adults that were more immature than me, and I'm 14.
if your an older game ( mid 20's and up) goto www.geezergamers.com its a community full of mid 20+ people who play games online...its made my gaming life that much better...i always have a full squad of 6 people for COD4 and very rarely have to play with dumbass kids whose only words are racial slurs, f bombs, and your mom....
its not my site so dont flame me but its seriously the best site for older gamers who dont put up with shit and only want to have a good time
True, qwerty.
I always resented remarks like that when I was a teenager, because I felt that I was about as mature as a 40 year old.
Anyways, this won't really affect what I want to use Home for. Which would be the features they promised two years ago. Hanging in my virtual apartment with friends, viewing AVI's and pictures from my PS3 HDD on a virtual TV. And showing off my Trophies in some kind of trophy case. Alas... the only functionality I care about isn't there.
can you break into virtual apartments and steal their virtual PS3's?
I'd be happy with any 20+ forum. At least it'd keep Flashpoint out.
To some extent, but XBL has the benefit of allowing you to stay in a community of friends and not play with the general fuckwads that populate most online venues. Eventually Home promises to offer a similar, more inclusive, option but at this point that functionality isn't yet implemented. At this point all home really offers is exposure to a bunch of jack asses and a mechanism to shove even more advertising down your throat, which isn't horribly compelling to me. As they said though, it isn't complete yet.
It is sort of sad that to really enjoy the benefits of online systems like this you need to whitelist who you interact with.
If they've banned a word, can't you just be clever and put spaces in between the letters?
Anyway, I love Home, even though there isn't much to do on the EU servers (living in UK), but I'm sure it'll get better. Hopefully Sony won't fudge this up by making something, then leaving it alone, like they always seem to do.
That's so clever! Why didn't I think of that!
Y-e-s y-o-u c-a-n, d-u-h.
"female players quickly mobbed as players dance around them or type sexual come-ons..."
Good job guys setting the straight males back 100 years.
Think of Home as one big "online" bar. Just like in a real bar, there is always the guys hitting on girls. Here, it's just people hiding behind
PSN ID's knowing in real life they would get turned down.
@WixosTrix
"Good job guys setting the straight males back 100 years."
We got it easy compared to the homosexual Jewish Satanist who just got set back to Jesus times. Ironic? I think so.
@TK
That saddest part is, they are being turned down in real life, and in online communities...
=(
So sad. So sad.
Thank god I was not born a social outcast.
"the things is still in Beta"
Come on guys, seriously? Don't you get paid to type right?
And by "right" you mean like this as well?
"It's not been good month for Sony."
"Don't you get paid to type right?"
Shouldn't that be "Don't you get paid to type correctly?"
:D
Thank you farris.
...that's "type correctly".
You're welcome.
Say hello to your mother for me.
"It's" is also a contraction of "it has" in addition to the common "it is".
Right is actually fine. It's both an adjective and adverb.
As much as I hate people correcting someone's grammar, I hate it even more when people try to correct grammar that is already correct.
o29: I was just being persnickety. I realize that right is technically correct in that sentence. And as we all learned from Futurama, that's the best kind of being correct!
i tried it, but never got it loaded. It stuck on a screen telling me to hit the X button to continue, but then wouldn't do anything.
Did you try hitting X?
(Sorry, couldn't resist)
Make sure the controller is set to the first position/ player. I had the same issue. The USB dongle for Guitar Hero was plugged it and would take up spot one even though it wasn't in use. I'd try to log in and nothing would happen. I tried the guitar and was able to maneuver without a problem. Reassign your controller to the first player and try again. It should work fine.
Yeah, happened to me too. Only controller "1" seems to work.
sounds like any other gaming community. what else is new??
unlike other virtual communities, especially here, I guess...
What do you expect from people that have problems keeping a real social life together outside of the virtual world.
This isn't an insult to all gamers, just the ones that feel the need to endless hours of online play versus real live interaction.
"incredibly unwelcoming to women, with female players quickly mobbed as players dance around them or type sexual come-ons... a disturbing look at the worst part of human nature."
Either there's some serious text missing where that ellipsis lies, or the staff at Ars Technica lives an incredibly sheltered life to think 14 year old boys trolling for cyber booty is the worst part of human nature.
I TOTALLY LOLLLED whaen i read this.
I downloaded Home the day it launched and I had high hopes for it. It's been hyped for a long time and if done correctly could have been a key element Sony needs to remain competitive against MS and Nintendo. The first hour I spent I felt like I was thrown into the middle of a gimmick to make some money because anything that you might want additionally you have to pay for (unless it's something else that leads to you buying something else). Then after spending some more time I had the same feeling as the title of this article, nothing but a bunch of punks. My wife was watching and said "and they want women to enjoy this?" It was no suprise when they disabled voice chat either. I honestly had hoped that the service was going to be more Peer-to-Peer with global social options versus being entirely global social.
*does the Running Man*
Has anyone else noticed a rise in the use of the word 'nascent' on blog posts as of late? Steve Jobs used that word at the end of his last keynote and now I'm seeing it all over the place.
well spotted, lol. What can you do, the man has influence, and seeing as you're here, I'm guessing you're into your tech/gadgets, which is where he has the most influence, what with iPhone and and cleverly made macbooks and other shiny whatnots
How do we know the 'female players' aren't just dudes with chick avatars? They probably like the attention.
I think we may safely assume they're dudes.
There are no girls on the internet!!!
LOL @ Sony.
Home=fail.
I have been waiting for it for so long, and now I don't even give a shit other than to laugh at how poorly timed/planned it all is.
Though I do like having a bluray player...
Wow, that place on the image looks totally cool. It has floating slides in the cieling.
"This is heady stuff..." Seriously, who's mind is in the gutter when they typed the article?
Home is kind of bad though. It is guys swarming over the gals and making sexual advances. I am a dude. I sat on the ground and another guy came up and stood in front of me. It's disgusting. I haven't been back since. Sad cause it has real potential.
Shakespeare. Hen. V: 'Never came reformation in a flood, With such a heady currance, scouring faults.'
Samual Johnson (1709-1784): 'Passions by which the heady and vehement are seduced and betrayed.'
heady /"hEdi/ a.LME. [f. HEAD n. + -Y1.]
1 Headlong, impetuous, violent; passionate; headstrong. LME.
2 Apt to intoxicate (lit. & fig.)
3 Headachy. colloq.
to be honest, I'm hardly surprised. The internet is so full of social retards that all the guys can do is go "WHOA!1! Like, Ur a... GURL!" Then poke them because they have shit all else to do and don't know how to actually speak to women (like fucking people, for instance), and eliminat any of their chances of getting laid. Ever. So keep up the good work guys, all the more laydees for the rest of us!
that would be *eliminatE*
I can't even frickin frackin rant properly
I happen to be one of those females that gets mobbed in Home and it pisses me off. My message box was immediately flooded within 20 minutes of being on Home with stupid messages like "I want you" and "Hey Cutie". Yeah I suppose female gamers are somewhat of a minority but still, all these stupid boys need to grow up. You actually can't really move your person when they circle you like that so it is very unpleasant. I am a devoted Playstation owner and this was just dissapointing.
A/S/L?
/kidding
I still have no idea what "Home" is.
"You're...... a.... Gurl?!?!?!?!? Like, in RL?????"
/sarcasm
My name is Dopamine. I believe we'd go good together.
@decypher44
"I still have no idea what "Home" is."
Sad part is...neither does Sony :/
You're pointing out something I really have a problem with, from just a design perspective: they've done an exceptional job at putting real world constraints into a virtual environment. That means people can get blocked by other people, pool tables and bowling lanes can all be taken, "bars" that should be instanced can become over-crowded, etc. etc. It's like they really didn't think about developing virtual spaces at all with the *advantages* in mind -- so they've baked in all the disadvantages really really deeply.
On xbox live the closest equivalent is I think phantasy star universe.. it has a chat lobby like home.. and its got the worst community I've ever seen bar none.
If home is implemented correctly it will kill xbox live. Personally i think when a PS3 starts up you should be in your Home.
The XMB should be FULLY functional (as in with media streaming and chat working) and accessible by pressing the PS button.
You should also be able to launch all games and all stuff like the internet browser from your personal space in Home.
The theater should be expanded into having more than trailers. You should be able to rent/buy(GIVE INTO NETFLIX SONY YOUR VIDEO STORE SUCKS!!) a movie and have private screenings with friends.
The Central Plaza should have some giant screen with either news or some video on it.
The Mall should fully replace the Playstation Store. (i.e. the PS Store is a store in the mall)
Those "themed areas to games" should have some special stuff that goes with the game...like each game has one and your person appears in them when online in that game.
this is all bandwidth and cost intensive but it Home becomes this id pay for it (and id find more than a 6meg connection)
Good Ideas. But I think that's what Home will eventually become. But for now it's as it is. I doubt we will see those implenmentations untill the PS4's Launch.
This reminds me back in windows 95, they had something like 'netscape home' or something like that. You would have several rooms. Your games would go on your bookshelf. I thought it was pretty damn awesome, but it was bugged as hell and difficult to add or modify software content to it. I still enjoyed it a lot though. Obviously though this isn't the most efficient way to view media, but it's not always about efficiency.
Take it offline, and replace the mall with a living room and you've got MS Bob.
Didn't work out so well...
lmao welcome to the fucking internet, good lord.
Greater Internet (frak)wad Theroy
Normal Person + Anonymity + Audience = (frak)wad
It's not been good month for Sony. This is heady stuff... the things is still in Beta...perfectly understandishable.
Come the hell on. I know some have been pointed out, but WOW. How does that even happen?
Well, it's obviously a reference to an episode of Mr. Show. I love how Engadget puts lots of little references in their posts! There is no need to dumb it down here.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0652155/
I went on for about 90 minutes to check home out one day, and I didn't see a single thing just mentioned here. Where's the source on this "mobbing women" thing? Is this just something you observed? When I went in, i was surprised at just how many female avatars there were. However, most of the 'groups' consisted of multiple avatars compromised of both sexes. I also didnt see any stupid pick up lines or sexual come ons. I did see someone ask where someone else lived, but i hardly think that would be considered a come on.
It has been getting better since it launched.
Is there an editor who proof-reads these stories? Reading this article made me feel like I was on the phone with tech support from India. Great job on the grammar Joseph L. Flatley. Your first sentence sounds like it was written by a first-grader. "It's not been good month for Sony." And what does "perfectly understandishable" mean? Can we get some Americans to write these articles or have all the writing jobs been outsourced to India?!
Way to be racist, dude. At least the service people in India are polite.
WC, they're polite because if they're not they'll lose their jobs will be outsourced to Tibet.
"It's" is also a contraction for "It has", douchebag: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/it%27s - the only thing worse than a grammar nazi is one that isn't even right.
John....
""It's" is also a contraction for "It has", douchebag: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/it%27s"
"It has not been good month for Sony." is still wrong.
"It has not been A good month for Sony." is correct.
"the only thing worse than a grammar nazi is one that isn't even right." Take your own advice.
He was only taking orders from the higher authorities..
I think the solution to this is clear:
http://www.joystiq.com/2008/12/12/how-to-perform-quincying-in-playstation-home/
How is that being racist? Did I say anything derogatory about Indians? If I was talking to a girl and told her she sounded like a girl would that be sexist? And yeah, I agree the Indians are usually polite, but that doesn't make up for how annoying it is to try to understand them.