To Shawn, I don’t think Nintendo saw what was “now.” I think they were pushing boundaries, along with Sony. However, their boundary pushing machine was just cheaper and resulted in more people joining the band wagon.

The potential for Home is there, lets just hope they could pull it off.

I think the overall goal of Home is to provide a environment in which people can interact without boundaries or limits. I own a 360 myself and love the online gameplay element but still it is a very closed concept where you never get a chance to meet people outside of the community of the game you are playing. Sony is trying to change the whole design of an online community where everything is streamlined and real-time so you meet people, chat a bit, find common ground and gaming interest and then get to experience it together by launching a game from Home. Another aspect of this type of community is that you can have dynamic experiences as content and community evolves continuously. Perhaps you just want to hang out and talk to people and make friends rather than play a game.

My general thoughts are this:

I wish I had never bought the wii outside of wii sports(SAD that bowling and boxing keep me using the wii once in a while)

I have had an xbox since day one of the first xbox coming out and I have beta tested live and have also stayed with live throughout its existence and to be honest, I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

My thoughts on Home? Why? I can voice chat on xbox live, always could, I can voice chat on Home, great.

But why do I care if I have an apartment that I can decorate with pictures and televisions etc. (For a price I am guessing) – that to me is absolutely pointless.

What are we doing, trying to be animal crossing here??!! I have a game console to game – if someone can tell me why a virtual apartment is going to be so great opposed to not having one then I’m all ears.

I have to walk around and see what other people have done to their place, I guess if the movie thing truly works where you can display home videos on the walls of your apartment then that would be cool, for about 2 minutes – I can share those easily without having a virtual apartment on Home.

Maybe I am just missing the big picture here but to me this sounds like something the Japanese would love, because thats what they like and the rest of the world would use a couple of times and thats it unless you have to look at it in order to get your ‘Microsoft’ achievement list

I will go back and research all of the promises that Home offers and see if I am just missing the big picture here.

Don’t get me wrong, I think the PS3 has great potential and when it drops another 200 I will buy one primarily as a Linux / games console. But for now, I don’t need blue ray and I don’t need Home – it just does not do anything thats beneficial.

People will call me a fan boy or, a fan man (i’m 38) but I honestly see Home being a very very cumbersome xbox live.

After the hype settles, people just care about 1 or 2 clicks to see their scores, their friends scores, their achievements and to get into a game or play a move etc. Xbox live does this very simply, easily and reliably.

Web 2.0 is not as sought after as you think. Glitz and glitter and virtual worlds does not necessarily translate into must-have and sought-after features.

I agree with on thing though, web access via the 360 would be nice as an overlay when doing other things on the 360 – sometimes get annoyed having to wait for my laptop to power on.