10:15 PST: I’m just talking to my friend and he’s still in line. He says that the line is really really long. Really long. I hope he can make it in….

10:27 PST: Just in case you’re wondering, my friend Joshua is a co-founder of Magmic. Magmic makes some cool games for cellphones, and he’s at the conference in that capacity.

10:35 PST: To tide you over until I get word from Joshua, here’s an interesting article about PlayStation Home from Kotaku. And here is a Home trailer from GameTrailers.com! Now to go look at that video… (Thanks Gary.)

10:41 PST: Joshua has a seat and is waiting for the conference to begin.

10:46 PST: “He’s on!” (Note that whatever I put in quotes is exactly what Joshua is saying.)

10:48 PST: “Audience participation and emergent gameplay are the topics. Gameplay 3.0”

Bah! I’m going to skip the timestamps.

Why does he call it Gameplay 3.0?

“1.0 the disconnected console.
2.0 connected console. Networks plus static content on disc
3.0 open standards dynamic content”

Something else I found at Kotaku. LittleBigPlanet

Joshua doesn’t have the advantage of seeing the trailer like we just did, or maybe he’s getting it now, but he’s amazed at what he’s seeing:

“Wow! Full rich 3d interactive social community world. Like 2nd life?
Games unlock content in home world

Home launching later this year.. Demo starting
Rich dynamic advertising all over the world.. You probably see all of this in the video

Casual game lounge.. Bowling, pool, etc. Arcade cabinets for video games, downloads, demos..
Virtual psp is the control panel.

Set up your own virtual apartment, club house..”

I asked about the PSP, and Joshua said:

“Yeah you pop up a virtual psp for all settings and stuff.
Everything is crazy customizable.

[He] just took a pic of the crowd, put the memory stick in the ps3 and added a framed pic of us to his virtual apartment.

Home cinema…
Virtual theater to watch movies and trailers.
More customizable features and loads of dynamic content…

Hall of fame. Cool personal trophy room.. Achievements. Share with other people by bringing them in.

Done the home demo. Very cool.
Absolutely free to download and use.

Beta in April. Launch in the fall”

Hmmm. Anybody out there know how I can get on the beta? I asked Joshua jokingly, but he replied:

“Don’t know, but it will be a large scale public beta. There is a private one running right now.”

Cool stuff.

Now the keynote moves away from PlayStation Home to talk about other stuff. Like SingStar! Hm, Joshua doesn’t say much about that.

“Playstation edge announcement
Tools and tech being shared free with all ps3 developers
Rsx profiling tool

Optimized libraries.
Session later today. Available after GDC
Little big planet game announcement”

(See my Kotaku link about LittleBigPlanet above.)

“By ragdoll kung fu guys
Media molecule is the company
Looks very creative and cool!

Another build a virtual world type thing. Everything can be manipulated…
Can use it to build games and levels.

They are building, playing and manipulating live on stage.. Wacky. This is emergent gameplay.”

I asked Joshua if it looks like fun.

“I guess it’s a virtual attempt at recreating what we used to do as kids when sent outside to play. Fun is what you make of it and with the people you are with. It can be fun. But for gamers used to everything being given to them, they’ll probably bore quickly. I suppose if enough pre canned games are provided and the community generated content rolls in, it has a lot of potential.”

Here’s that user-generated content Sony’s been talking about recently. Gary, are you listening? (He was just asking about this yesterday.)

Next Joshua mentions the fact that we get together for games nights, and how this game might be fun for us:

“Actually it would be an easy candidate to use up entire game nights for us. You need a group to really enjoy it. Yeah… Just ended. It rocks.”

About the PS3: “The community and collaboration aspect looks really sharp. I almost want a ps3…” (Unfortunately, Joshua doesn’t buy home consoles… Any…)

All done!

Here is Joystiq’s coverage.
Here is Eurogamer’s coverage.

LittleBigPlanet Video (thanks again Gary)

Crap! I just realized that this post has been private. I don’t know how that happened. Crap. Ah well, at least you can see it now.