E3'07: More Home & PSP Slims Up At Sony Presentation News
Jon Wilcox
11/07/2007
Jack Tretton and Phil Harrison make some noise at the last of the three hardware keynote presentations...
The last hardware manufacturer to take to the E3 keynote plate, Sony has today unveiled additional information about their virtual world Home, together with a round up of titles heading to PlayStation3 and PSP in the run up to the end of 2007.
Taking to the stage in Santa Monica, SCEA boss Jack Tretton and SCE Worldwide Studios' Phil Harrison announced that the Home client has now been scaled down to also fit on a mobile phone - along with the unveiling of the Home square, the virtual world's open space. PS3 games are also being created to have their own Home lounges to launch from, and if that isn't enough, Home will also have a social networking website online, enabling further blogging and communication options.
Besides showing a montage of PlayStation3 games, which reeled off a selection all seen in Microsoft's presentation the night before including Assassin's Creed, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, and Resident Evil 5, Sony also announced that Unreal Tournament III would only be available this side of Christmas on PlayStation3. The debut PS3 title from Epic Games, UT3 will also feature functionality allowing mods to be passed over between the PC and PS3 editions. Ubisoft's Haze is also set to be an exclusive PS3 title, this side of the holiday season, at least. In addition, NCsoft revealed that it had signed an exclusive agreement to produce online games for both PlayStation3 and PSP; no word on exact titles, but could Richard Garriott's Tabula Rasa be on the cards???
No Sony presentation would be complete without at a few first-party titles, and joining KillZone 2 (already unveiled at a previous event the night before) was a new look at Gran Turismo 5 - including news that a Prologue version would be released ahead of the main title - together with news of inFamous, a new title in development by Suckerpunch (Sly Cooper), and Naughty Dog's Uncharted: Drake's Fortune. A small selection of PlayStation Network games were also presented, including a minimalist puzzler called Echochrome set for release by March 2008 (along with a UMD edition for PSP), Pain, WipEout HD, and new footage of SOCOM Confrontation and WarHawk.
Rumours of a re-designed PSP were also realised at the presentation, though the number one point of a second analogue nipple didn't feature. Instead, the new version has slimmed down somewhat; a third lighter and just under a fifth thinner, the addition of a video-out port at least pads out some new functionality to the handheld system. A number of limited edition PSPs will also be released (across North America, at least), including a Star Wars version bundled with Battlefront: Renegade Squadron...cue the walking carpet himself, Chewbacca to arrive on stage. The PSP will also be available in Piano Black and Ice Silver, feature a 1GB Memory Stick and Daxter - a Family Guy edition will also be released.
So that's about it: New PSP. New spaces for Home. New exclusivity with NCsoft, Ubisoft, and Midway. Let the show begin...
