PlayStation®Home General Discussion

[EdwCarnby]

Hi... I'm Ed!

Most people would tell you I should stay out of politics and stick to the funnies and they are probably right. But after 3 years of using Home I've seen a worrying trend of more features/ content being added and less things actually working with each coming core update and it irritates me to sit on the fence.

Home is both a pleasure and a pain  to use. The content and community are the pleasure, but the stability of the service is a pain. We know it's the content and partnership deals that make you guys money, it's not rocket science. But if the core becomes rotten people will stop biting into that rosey red apple of a virtual world. The core needs some serious addressing before issues surrounding it snowball.

I know you have made several changes to your staff roster, no doubt your organizational structure as well as the overall business objectives for PlayStation®Home. Improving operability for the user has clearly become the lowest priority  as a result, and I'm not sure how others feel about it but I for one think it's a bummer! How can new builds of the client be worse than older ones from 2 to 3 years ago?!

Now I'm sure you want examples but not an essay. So in no particular order:

People that spend the most money in Home are the most punished. Our stuff breaks, goes missing, or can't be accessed at all. And it gets worse the more we buy (in other words, support your product).

There are more pointless animated graphics than you can shake a stick at. It makes Home slow, often crash, and looks like it's for kids (that's right, the people not allowed to be on here!)

Buggy content is usually removed, not fixed. Employees are more interested in removing the griefer than they are fixing the bug they are exploiting which ultimately creates more stress for us and you.

Wireless connectivity to Home "doesn't work". How data is sent/received is unconventional, and your early adopters (phat PS3 owners) suffer noticeably more, regardless of ISP or equipment. 4 1/2 years on, it still "doesn't work".

The usual 2 answers to fixing ANY problem here are "Delete and reinstall Home" or "clear your cache/ change your cache size" - REMOVING Home is a common solution to problems on Home! Know how crazy that sounds?!

So there you have it. Still not sure why this matters? I'll now tell you why. When I use Home these days: 

I find myself waiting 30 mins or more just to get into the same space as a friend  to say "hi".

I find myself being greeted by problems staff refuse or have no authority  to fix.

I find myself not enjoying content I bought because it takes too long to access or it doesn't work half the time.

I FIND MYSELF USING HOME LESS, AND LESS, AND LESS. What happens when I am not using Home? I'm not spending money in it!

Please, Business Manager of Home, make Home a shopping mall if you have to, but at least make it practical and make it work! We are comfortable with what you are selling us, just give us a better world for us to use it in, and you will build a better future for Home and your bank account Carnby out.

P.S. This is also an open discussion to the community - do you feel the quality of the Home client has an impact on your ability to enjoy both the FREE and PREMIUM experiences of Home? 

[Wait-Jester-Sec]

Some very good points there Ed, and there all true. These problems are getting out of hand. and it seems on the Tech forums there is only 1 or 2 mods. The customer service and responce to their customers has dropped significantly.

Case in point. i brought a Brown jack pack bundle over a month ago. i didnt receive it but the money was taken out. posted on there got told it was being looked into and refunds were issued. Other people received their refunds but i havent. i asked why and have received no reply of any kind. Not the kind of customer service you expect from a corporation the size of sony. One of the reasons i no longer spend money on home

And the reinstall home / clear cache is good for some problems but not ones that occur when you download spaces. Sounds to me like they rushed it to move ahead with the new Hub thats coming.

Anyway sorry for the rant. But you have brought up some very good points indeed. and have hopefully given people something to think about

[griffsta87]

To be honest, I'd forgotten Home still exists...

[Shenmue182]

Good points but the wireless one?  Saying home doesn't work over a wireless connection? I've never had any problem with that, might be your ISP. I don't get disconnected. And it always connects fine. I also have a 60GB launch PS3

[Troothpaste]

Great points there ed although i think it may fall on death ears as there are rumours that Drexl/Dan Hill/Homes business Manager left before christmas and with the HCL Crouac being less than communicative with the community i feel once again the communities pleas are getting left out heck i would say you have more chance of getting home sorted by posting this on the US forums tbh

But great points that really need addressed

[fly123]

I agree with you EdwCarnby. Home have to work preferably without any problems, it's becoming really annoying

[claremac90]

Hey ED , you know I agree with you 100% After the mess that was last nights attempt to have a chat it does seem that Home is getting worse . I've never had any trouble with buying and using things but it sounds like I'm lucky in that respect . I'm sure some people will say "stop moaning so much its a free service what do you expect " but that's not the point . I'm sure Sony make a decent return on Home because if they made a loss it would be gone by now , right ??? On a positive note I do love going on Home (when it works) so I'm not moaning just for the sake of it , I just want it to be really great .  Hopefully a certain someone on this forum will not ***** me off for expressing my thoughts on this subject , its a free world ,right ????

[Pacman_Ownage]

Wut's with the colours?

[sbi-7]

When it becomes too much effort to use then I wont bother with it, and that seems to be happening a lot lately. I no longer bother with home after updates, I'll wait till after work the following day when most of the problems have been sorted.

The updates have been fairly good this year with content and spaces(although not much for me) but if the main service keeps stuffing up then it gets to the point of why bother.

[EdwCarnby]

@Pacman the colours are so people don't cry "WAALLLLOFTEXT!"

@sbi-7 The main reason behind the thread. The service is to me getting to a point where it is so much hassle to use I am doing more to try and get it to work than any actual communicating. I used to buy lots of stuff, I've spent a larger sum of money that I would have liked, but that spending is stopping.

@Shenners can I have your PS3 the wireless problems have persisted with Sky, TalkTalk, O2 and at 4 addresses with 6 different routers and 5 PS3's (only 1 of them a slim). I'd like to think it is more a Home issue than an ISP or equipment issue. Wired bridge works a charm but TBH that's a waste of a feature on your PS3 and it is what you had to do back in the PS2 days!

@Trooth Crouac can go eat a Nougat bar and I'd rather this fall on death ears than no ears! Also i amliking this discussion

@griff maybe if the core updates carry on like this, I might forget it exists as well!

@claremac90 Thanks yes, multiply the amount of time wasted trying to stay connected by the amount of days in the year and you'll find that's a lot of time that could have been used somewhere else.