Rumor: Associated Press dates Home for Nov. 19

by Ross Miller { Oct 12th 2008 at 1:30PM }

An article purported to be from the Associated Press has been floating around today that very casually dates PlayStation's Home for November 19 -- coincidentally, the same day as the New Xbox Experience launch. The origins of this version stem from The Inquirer ("Sony, Microsoft begin battle of virtual worlds"). It's also interesting to note that the article does not mention NXE's simultaneous launch date.

When you search the AP website, however, you will instead come across a "Sony, Microsoft virtual communities to start" from the same day (via Yahoo!). In this version, Home is "dated" for "later this year," while NXE is coming November 19. Both pieces also use the exact same quotes from Enterbrain's Hirokazu Hamamura, Sony's Ryoji Akagawa and Microsoft's John Schappert. It's likely that the former piece was an earlier, now-corrected draft from the AP or a gross misread by The Inquirer (and subsequently propagated from there).

It should also be noted that at Sony's Tokyo Game Show press conference this weekend, the company announced an open beta for Home would be launching in Japan this month and end in November. We've gone ahead and contacted Sony and AP to confirm.

Tags: home, new-xbox-experience, nxe, ps-home, rumor, rumorong

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

Ashkental @ Oct 12th 2008 1:36PM

Thanks for putting up my tip :D

Well, you guys didn't gave any credit though... well, whatever xD

Ross Miller @ Oct 12th 2008 3:17PM

Sorry, 'boss, we received 8 or 9 of the same tip, not to mention we saw it when popped it up on our RSS reader :)

Dirk Dorkelson @ Oct 13th 2008 5:30AM

For what it's worth, I logged on to AP Exchange today at my media job, and while the second article (with the NXE) was there, the one with the release date of Home was not. Given that all of AP's articles should be appearing on Exchange, methinks this is a hoax.

xandeR- @ Oct 12th 2008 1:38PM

Why am I not surprised?

halo 3 sucks. @ Oct 12th 2008 1:38PM

I saw the Fergie sextape, again.

Huzzah!!!

JoeTheBlow @ Oct 13th 2008 4:17AM

Huh?!?
Please tell me you mean Fergie from the black eyed peas and not the Duchess of York.

Psalm Bowser @ Oct 12th 2008 1:39PM

Two pointless facelifts launching on the same day.

Cher would be proud.

halo 3 sucks. @ Oct 12th 2008 1:42PM

As if I already don't get enough Cher references in a day.

007craft @ Oct 12th 2008 2:00PM

well avtars may be lame and a waste of time, but NXE is bringing other useful stuff to the table, like new features for private chat, the party system and more. Home is JUST a useless virtual environment, so thats 100% pointless.

I for one WONT be making an avatar (I read I did not have to). I really dont care about a "virtual me" on ANY system.

Psalm Bowser @ Oct 12th 2008 2:11PM

Don't worry, Bond. Nobody cares about a virtual you.

Extinction @ Oct 12th 2008 5:17PM

Home is bring the exact same party system to PS3.

Which would make NXE just as useless.

Vazquez @ Oct 12th 2008 1:42PM

Damn... thats going to be a long day for me.

Cj @ Oct 12th 2008 1:44PM

Whats so hard about MS just releasing it a few days earlier if this is true? It would an awesome dirty move.

TheOverlord#2 @ Oct 12th 2008 1:45PM

But you forgot that Nintendo will beat the competition!
Animal Crossing: City Folk on Nov. 16th!

(/sarcasm)

Monkey Thing?!!? @ Oct 12th 2008 2:28PM

Ahh, but that also means its the day that the WiiSpeak Channel launches, so it isn't as insignificant as that.

Clinton RRoD sept.3 @ Oct 12th 2008 1:48PM

i wonder if they will really do it. dont really matter though

SexyKittyKat2U @ Oct 12th 2008 1:48PM

Lol I LOVE IT!

Jakka @ Oct 12th 2008 1:51PM

First LBP/F2, then R2 and GOW2 and now this shit?

I especially find the R2 release day to be a rather stupid move since a majority of multiplat gamers would rather pick GOW2 if given the choice.

Vidikron @ Oct 12th 2008 2:00PM

I'm just trying to figure out why there are so many potentially good games launching from the last half of October through the first half of November. Why aren't these things being spread out more evenly?

sk8monroe81 @ Oct 12th 2008 2:01PM

whats next haze 2 releasing on the date of halo 4.

is home ready or is this just to show that sony can catch up to MS?

SoCoolCurt (PSN: KillaKornbread) @ Oct 12th 2008 2:04PM

they are trying to get these things out close to holidays when people are in a more spending mood. i dont really agree with it though since i buy the same amount of games in December as i do in March. if a good one comes out i want, ill find a way to buy it.

Sheppy (of the Fidlious Clan of Wong) @ Oct 12th 2008 2:20PM

Saying Gears of War is competeing directly with Resistance 2 is like saying Madden's release date is meant to directly fuck up Mario Tennis's world.

Some common themes exist but entirely different shooters, gameplay, designs, campaigns, and multiplayer systems.

Superstar90 @ Oct 12th 2008 3:19PM

well every game that comes out on the same day is in direct competition because there is one more option to choose. I disagree with r2 and gow2 not being in direct competition since they are both very anticipated shooters on the 2 consoles and multiplat owners will have a hard time choosing between the 2. I think that gears has more of a fanvase so ps360 owners will sway towards gears when buying something that day or week.

BIGFAT @ Oct 12th 2008 3:46PM

@ sheppy

what you just described is the difference between games not genres, every game is going to make that stuff different to stand out but they are competing with each other. in each game you fight a alien,shoot a gun, are the good guy/humans,have to save the world(by shooting no less!), have to fight larger then life bosses, use cover, and have vehicles.

so they are competing its no coincidence that the publisher (is it Sony?) choose that date.

KarlW @ Oct 12th 2008 4:23PM

"is home ready or is this just to show that sony can catch up to MS?"

If I read correctly, the NXE's social gaming features don't match Home by any standard.

I've also read a lot of hands-on reviewers saying the NXE is closer to the XMB in terms of speed and features (launching new games from in-game menu), indicating that MS is catching up to Sony.

Ultimately, none of that matters. MS catching Sony, or Sony catching MS (that sounds wrong). Both are trying to catch up to Nintendo.

Jakka @ Oct 12th 2008 4:30PM

Sheppy, that's a bit of a skewed analogy as Mario Tennis is marketed at a completely different crowd than Madden.

Gears 2 and R2 ,otoh, are direct rivals and releasing them on the same day is a loss for Sony.Let's face it, 360 crowd will get Gears 2,Playstation 3 crowd will get R2 but 90% of Multi-plat Crew that aren't dedicated enough to buy and play two different AAA games will choose Gears over Resistance, the former having a much better reputation and history.

They could avoid all this and get a lot more sales of Multi-plays by doing as little as releasing the game a week early or two weeks after GoW2 release.

Extinction @ Oct 12th 2008 5:19PM

"a majority of multiplat gamers would rather pick GOW2 if given the choice."

1) No, we'd get both
2) If we only could get one, it wouldn't be GOW2 after how the first one could be played on a black and white TV without missing much color at all.

WRE @ Oct 12th 2008 7:45PM

I agree with Jakka. If I have to choose, I will be picking up Gears first and with Baby on the way I definitely have to choose. See you at a future date, Resistance 2.

Vidikron @ Oct 12th 2008 11:43PM

I'm buying both day 1.

SoCoolCurt (PSN: KillaKornbread) @ Oct 12th 2008 2:04PM

who cares?

most likely neither feature will be a system seller anyway (well MS's NetFlix streaming could be). ive been hearing about Home for a long time now and im not really all that excited about it. and my 360 is due to be delivered tomorrow, so i havent used the old dash enough to be tired of it yet.

so yea, if they do launch the same day, ill welcome them both, but im not going to be jumping up and down either way.

Ayrkain @ Oct 12th 2008 3:39PM

The Netflix feature is really cool, but you can have some of that now with the PlayOn Media Server (for PS3 & 360) or you could use the Netflix Media Center app if you have Media Center. The only thing those won't have is sharing, which apparently isn't making it into the NXE launch in any case.

SoCoolCurt (PSN: KillaKornbread) @ Oct 12th 2008 9:35PM

you know, i have that PlayOn Media player and i forgot it could do NetFlix. probably because i dont use NetFlix as i dont have a very reliable internet connection (im going on 3 weeks now with no service).

but that does add to my point even more, i dont think either does anything that will sell systems. im sure Home will be a interesting bullet point for Sony and the NXE will make their console easier to use, which is also a bullet point for MS. but neither is something the average consumer (who they are trying to rope in) would care about.

davidw001 @ Oct 13th 2008 11:52AM

I've been a netflix subscriber for 2+ years now and have barely used the watch now thing. Everything on it is either old as the hills or a tv series I could have dvr'd for free. For a person already subscribed to netflix I can't see this being a big plus, and for a netflix new subscriber I would say it will be disappointing to them really quickly. Don't get me wrong I love netflix, get 5 movies at a time, keep my queue at about 100 titles constantly, just not enough good stuff on watch now for me to get excited about.

t3kni9e @ Oct 12th 2008 2:07PM

Is HOME free or something you buy?

Jon D @ Oct 12th 2008 2:16PM

it's free, but you can buy up a bunch of stuff with real money to add to your virtual pad or dress your character with.

Sheppy (of the Fidlious Clan of Wong) @ Oct 12th 2008 2:22PM

Yeah, but who would buy those? Not many. But get some advertisers to finance add-ons for either service and you'll see people use it.

t3kni9e @ Oct 12th 2008 3:12PM

Well, while I will never buy any add-on, there are millions of idiots who do. Because whats ironic is while people may protest Sony/MS for charging money to download add-ons, those same people are buying things by the millions.

Peanut butter Woman @ Oct 12th 2008 2:20PM

Who cares. I hate all this social networking bullshit. It's such a waste of time.

j.howlett @ Oct 12th 2008 2:22PM

i'm leaning heavily on the rumor side caused by a lack of knowledge from the original report.

Syn @ Oct 12th 2008 2:25PM

When the open beta hits, it better include a lot more than it is offering now. There isn't anything going for it as of now that makes me want to use it on a constant basis.

Monkey Thing?!!? @ Oct 12th 2008 2:30PM

I'll admit it's fun to watch them struggle tooth and nail from an outsider perspective.

TwistedBishop @ Oct 12th 2008 2:35PM

The battle for gamer apathy begins.

Monkey Thing?!!? @ Oct 12th 2008 3:13PM

Off topic, but has anyone noticed that the disappearing comment phenomenon has vanished (gratefully), but has been replaced (at least here and on NWF) by broken comment counters? Comments for this thread reads as 0 on the actual article page, while on the front page it reads as 28.

Superstar90 @ Oct 12th 2008 3:14PM

home seems stupid to me,why would I go around in a virtual world to launch my games or chat with friends when I can just launch that stuff from xmb? avatars are pretty lame as well, I like the nxe but I'm not gonna waste time with an avatar.

Noshino @ Oct 12th 2008 4:01PM

same reason why me and some friends used to log on teamspeak or vent 30 minutes before guild wars to talk about the strategy, or why some UT clans get together to talk about their strategies.

Seriously, unless you have never been on a guild/clan, I don't understand how is it that this is seen as something bad...this is just like in pc, with the only difference is that you can boot right off your appartment...

Alex @ Oct 12th 2008 3:21PM

I don't know which I hate the most: Avatars or Playstations...

...
...

After much deliberation, it's Avatars.

JoeTheBlow @ Oct 13th 2008 4:19AM

I dunno which i hate more, fanboys, or you.

........
..
.
Its you.

Snowblind @ Oct 12th 2008 3:22PM

I'm not particularly interested in Home. Some of the features may be pretty cool, being able to see a virtual presentation of e3 will be pretty cool, but of course that will only be for Sony, and they tend to have pretty boring shows anyway. And that's assuming e3 is still around next year.

My main issue with Home, is that it doesn't really seem to be adding anything useful, it seems like more of a diversion, rather than something that will aid online gaming.

The MS avatars are pretty pointless as well, but at least they offer a more personal representation of your friends, rather than just having gamer pictures.