Part 1: About Sony, Sony Computer Entertainment and the Move.me
Sony is one of the world’s largest and most comprehensive companies, with its humble beginnings in post war Tokyo. The company was begun by two men in 1946 as a radio repair shop with the original and perhaps not quite so catchy name of TTK (Tokyo Telecommunications Engineering Company in Japanese). It is now a company with annual sales of $87 Billion and employing 168,200 staff worldwide[i].
Sony is famous for its innovation and forward thinking. It has been behind the creation of a number of this century’s biggest technological inventions and battles relentlessly with its major competitors in order that these become the standard. From the 1968 Umatic, one of the first videocassette recorders, to the more recent battle of the Blue-ray Disc Vs HD DVD, which Sony won thanks to clever thinking (more further on). They have been an ‘Industry First’ for Home Video Recorders, personal music players and the floppy disk, Sony has brought countless technologies into the home. Although a major player in the war of the technical giants, there are some battles Sony have lost; Betamax video and the Minidisk being probably the most well known. It’s not that these technologies were not successful or beautifully crafted; more a technicality meant another brand became more popular. One thing though that Sony seems good at is the impressive publicity stunt; being able to keep an invention quite secret then launching it with huge multi-million dollar campaigns and always striving to be the first.
One of the most interesting facts about Sony is the sheer amount and diversity of its sub-companies:
Sony Electronics. The Electronics business comprises of audio, video, televisions, information and communications, semiconductors, components and other products.
Sony Pictures. The Pictures business centres on motion pictures and television programming, distributed by Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE).
Sony Music. Sony’s Music business encompasses music recording done by Sony Music Entertainment (SME).
Sony Financial Services. Sony’s financial Services business is composed of Sony Financial Holdings Inc. (SFH) and its consolidated subsidiaries, Sony Life Insurance Co. Ltd, Sony Assurance Inc and Sony Bank Inc. Sony Financial Services operations are based in Japan.
Sony Ericsson, recently changed to Sony Mobile Communications
Sony Computer Entertainment, Sony’s Game business which consists of game consoles and software. This side of Sony handle the development, production and sales of both hardware and software for the development of consoles (handheld and home) and the development and publishing of video games.
The computer entertainment division of the company was founded in 1993, with the launch of the PlayStation in Japan in December 1994. It was then introduced into America in September 1995 and Europe later in September 1995.
Before Sony, Nintendo and Sega dominated the market, with Sega boasting more than 52%. Sony's first real consumer success was the Sony cassette player, their first major consumer product. In the early days, their only involvement in the games market was manufacturing parts for Nintendo.
It wasn't until Nintendo’s proposed partnership with Sony; to create a CD drive that would be made by Sony and then Kinect to a console, that the PlayStation was born. Nintendo soon realised they would not get enough profitability out of the CD drive as Sony would retain all rights; so turned to Philips proposing the same idea. In 1991 Ken Kutaragi (father of PlayStation) announced the PlayStation Nintendo at CES, but shortly after this Nintendo broke its partnership with Sony and announced that Philips would be making the CD drive for the new Nintendo. It was this that prompted Ken Kutaragi to ask the Sony bosses for permission to develop their very own games console.
They cleverly utilised the cd rom and real-time 3d graphics, which gave games developers more scope to create more impressive games, Sony had signed up 250 games developers in Japan alone. This early edition had the support of many games developers, which produced a large amount of very good launch title games such as Ridge Racer and 1996’s Crash Bandicoot, even Square Enix brought Final fantasy 7 to the console.
Sony spent $48 million to buy Psygnosis- the developer who created Lemmings- and then changed its name to Sony Interactive Entertainment in 1993. The success of the PlayStation was also down to its clever marketing; they chose their target age range as 19, the thinking behind this was- no matter how old you are, you want to be 19, whether you're 12 years old or 30 years old. PlayStation wanted to get away from the Sony brand and promote the PlayStation as a lifestyle choice with the tagline of “you are not ready” this was so as to distance the PlayStation gamer from the Sony products their parents would use[ii].
The Move.me was released in the US 26th July 2011 and is due to be released in the UK 17th September 2012. It is a complicated piece of equipment any very little is known about it outside Sony. This is mainly due to Sony’s Privacy ethos, a philosophy which has caused them problems in the past and which they now seem to want to shift away from.
It has been called a ‘hobbyist kit’ and a tool for education. The description on the Sony website is that the Move.me isn’t a game: “It’s a software server application for the PS3 system[iii]” the Move.me uses the Move, the Eye camera and the Move controller as an input device, similar to that of a mouse or a keyboard.
The potential of the Move.me seems to be all to do with Sony wanting to become more public. They have not locked the Move.me to Windows and not limited the drivers so both Mac and PC, Linux and Windows users can use this. It is expanding the usability of the PlayStation beyond the PlayStation[iv] and trying to develop an open source community around it, similar to ‘Steam’ e.g. Source SDK and Gary’s Mod, basically they want hobbyist and educators to learn and develop for and with Sony.
What is the Move.me?
Move.me hooks up your PC to the PlayStation Move platform: with the Move.me server you can use the PlayStation Move motion controller as an input device to supply sensor data to your PC application. The Move.me server resides on a PlayStation®3, but Move.me allows you to use the rich controls and processing power of the platform without the need for access to the PlayStation®3 SDK, an NDA, or Game developer license.[v]
What is the potential?
The Move.me has the potential to provide students and academics with a development system; it can be used for research for so many aspects of learning, from students of games design to multimedia to the more medical, science related subjects like human/computer interaction and motor skills rehabilitation.
It lends itself particularly well to in-house and prototype applications such as these.
Part 2: The Potential of the Move.me and my User Experience
PlayStation Move has been quoted to be the result “if Nintendo Wii and Microsoft Kinect had a bastard child, then it would be Sony Move”[vi], as it utilises a very similar hand control to the Nintendo Wii and the motion control of the Kinect, This, it could be argued, makes it either the best of both or in the middle of two sets of controls. Depending on which way the market goes; there is always the possibility that the Move could be left behind in the battle of the consoles.
During the practical research and testing of the Move.me I was impressed by the accuracy of the controller. I felt that this would be the selling point for anyone who wants to create a motion controlled interface or an augmented reality-based application. You would not be able to get the same level of detail and accuracy with any other motion controller, e.g. the Wii or Xbox Kinect. I also like the aspect that I could create something completely unique from scratch, and I could do this from any platform as Sony have not limited it by using drivers so that is open to everyone and any operating system. I liked the augmented reality aspect of this sort of game, it reminded me of another application that I've seen for the Kinect and iPad which tracks the player’s heads to update what is seen on the monitor, thus giving the illusion of depth. This sort of application would not work on the Nintendo Wii as it does not have the motion tracking capabilities, but it is something I think could be possible.
As mentioned before, the potential users for this application is vast. Obviously from my perspective as a student, I see the potential in learning about games design, designing for augmented reality and future technologies. Move.me as an application I feel would serve very well within the education sector for example; the move controller would be a brilliant way for teachers and lecturers to present work, draw notes and demonstrate 3D packages such as the 3DS Max and Maya, with the wave of hands you could move around a 3D objects. There is also the potential to apply this to 3-D modelling programs such as Z-brush and Mud Box and be able to use the Move controllers to sculpt and paint detail. Also the accuracy of the move me could be plotted when trying to create animation a bit like mo-cap, either through plotting a path through a room or the way a sword, sports racket or object would be held in the hand.
From another perspective, there is a huge market for physical therapy and rehabilitation, for areas like physiotherapy the accuracy of the Move controller would be able to plot the progress of a long rehabilitation period and in doing that, the patient would see their own progress and therapist can focus on the finer movements of the patient. Video games consoles now have really sophisticated motion control interfaces that normal computers don't and by releasing Move.me developers and researchers can create non-game applications that can be used to help people in this situation where they need physical therapy[vii].
Through looking at my research of Sony it's become apparent that this could be potentially another Betamax versus VHS and in this case VHS being Kinect Lab. A strong open source community is paramount to the success of Move.me, for example Steams online community has kept the source SDK in strong use despite being outdated by other SDKs
To establish the move controller as the best option for motion and augmented reality control it needs to utilise its technical proficiency over the competition. As for the potential of the Move.me and the Move controller, it depends on making innovative applications that can't be replicated on anything else and creating a community based around this.
A good route for this would be to tap in to the already existing Sony Home, for example, you could make a new area within the plaza for Move.me where people can go and test out each other's creations in open source environment. Also have a section for move applications that have been developed by professionals to buy, this could also be tied in with the PlayStation network marketplace, so that way you don't have to be a member of Home to be able to utilise the community and the open source data.
Bibliography
Websites/corporate sites/YouTube videos:
Sony USA site, www.sony.com corporate fact sheet page
Move.me users guide 2011 Sony Computer Entertainment Inc.
All Rights Reserved.
SCE Confidential
PlayStation Network Website http://us.PlayStation.com/ps3/PlayStation-move/move-me/ 2012 Sony entertainment
http://www.itproportal.com/2012/02/17/sony-releases-moveme-sdk-eu-and-uk/ John Martindale 17th Feb 2012
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/108219-Sonys-Move-Me-Fails-to-Move-Me Greg Tito 4th March 2011
http://www.engadget.com/2011/04/10/sonys-move-me-database-used-to-create-gesture-enabled-mouse-dri/ Sean Buckley April 10th 2011
The Complete History of the Sony PlayStation from PlayStation Museum http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryi1QBA6XyI
Books/articles:
Sony: A Private Life [Paperback]
John Nathan (Author)
Sony vs Samsung: The Inside Story of the Electronics Giants' Battle For Global Supremacy [Paperback]
Sea-Jin Chang (Author)
Made in Japan: Akio Morita and Sony [Hardcover]
Akio Morita (Author), Edwin M. Reingold (Contributor), Mitsuko Shimomura (Contributor)
4.5 out of 5 stars
Doing Cultural Studies: The Story of the Sony Walkman (Culture, Media & Identities) by Paul Du Gay, Stuart Hall, Linda Janes and Hugh Mackay (28 Nov 1996)
The Video Game Explosion: A History from Pong to PlayStation and Beyond [Hardcover]
Mark J. P. Wolf (Author)
John Nathan (Author)
Sony vs Samsung: The Inside Story of the Electronics Giants' Battle For Global Supremacy [Paperback]
Sea-Jin Chang (Author)
Made in Japan: Akio Morita and Sony [Hardcover]
Akio Morita (Author), Edwin M. Reingold (Contributor), Mitsuko Shimomura (Contributor)
4.5 out of 5 stars
Doing Cultural Studies: The Story of the Sony Walkman (Culture, Media & Identities) by Paul Du Gay, Stuart Hall, Linda Janes and Hugh Mackay (28 Nov 1996)
The Video Game Explosion: A History from Pong to PlayStation and Beyond [Hardcover]
Mark J. P. Wolf (Author)
[ii] YouTube “the complete history of Sony PlayStation” Author PlayStation Museum, 20th February 2011
[vii] Posted by John McCutchan // Senior Engineer, Developer Support
http://blog.us.PlayStation.com/2011/07/26/move-me-available-today-on-PlayStation-store-free-for-students-and-educators/
http://blog.us.PlayStation.com/2011/07/26/move-me-available-today-on-PlayStation-store-free-for-students-and-educators/
[vii] http://www.videogameconsolelibrary.com/art-controller.htm History of the Games Console Author Dark Watcher 1st April 2008
All Accessed between January 2012-February 2012
[1] www.sony.com/SCA/corporate.shtml Sony USA corporate facts 2012 sony corporation of America.
[1] YouTube “the complete history of Sony PlayStation” Author PlayStation Museum, 20th February 2011
[1] http://us.PlayStation.com/ps3/PlayStation-move/move-me/
[1] YouTube gamerlive.tv “sony shows off Move.me” 9th March 2011
[1] Posted by John McCutchan // Senior Engineer, Developer Support
http://blog.us.PlayStation.com/2011/07/26/move-me-available-today-on-PlayStation-store-free-for-students-and-educators/
http://blog.us.PlayStation.com/2011/07/26/move-me-available-today-on-PlayStation-store-free-for-students-and-educators/
[1] http://www.videogameconsolelibrary.com/art-controller.htm History of the Games Console Author Dark Watcher 1st April 2008
All Accessed between January 2012-February 2012
