Interviews// VP of Sony's Worldwide Studios, Jamie MacDonald

SPOnG: Are you using only Sony music, for SingStar downloads?

Jamie MacDonald: No, no, no. Just like the disc-based product, it goes across the whole spectrum of publishers and labels.


SPOnG: Going back to online, one of the impressive things on Xbox Live has been achievement points. It is still, currently, one of the reasons why certain gamers will buy a 360 title over a PS3 title. What plans do you have with Home to offer a similar experience?

Jamie MacDonald: Well, as far as we are concerned we don’t copy or emulate any of our competitor’s things, but within PlayStation Home there will be the feature called the Hall of Fame, which Phil Harrison demo’d at GDC and E3. Where you can show your trophies off, essentially, with 3D-animated objects which will be your trophies. So, for example, if you’ve done a particularly great lap in GT5, there will be a 3D model of your car as some kind of personalised trophy, things like that.


SPOnG: Moving on to say a few words about PSP. I just read earlier that 95% of PSP owners are male, which I thought was an interesting statistic – bearing in mind we’ve been talking a lot at Edinburgh in the last couple of days about attracting female gamers and different markets.

Jamie MacDonald: It’s one of those things. With games like SingStar on PS2, we really have – I think I’d be right in saying – with that title we were probably the first to attract female consumers in quite a major way. Different platforms and different games attract a different demographic.

With PSP, certainly from the point of view of London Studio and Cambridge Studio, we haven’t targeted female gamers, but I hope our pedigree speaks for itself. We’ve demonstrated [with SingStar] our ability and desire to attract female gamers. But we can’t do it all by ourselves! [laughs]


SPOnG: How is PSP going to work with Home?

Jamie MacDonald: Can’t comment on that one.


SPOnG: Are there any plans for GPS style, location-based games on PSP?

Jamie MacDonald: Again, there are plans for that, but I’ll be honest with you, I don’t know the specific plans of the GPS-enabled titles for PSP. I know that there are some in the pipeline, but I don’t know when they are going to be announced.


SPOnG: What’s the latest on The Getaway on PS3? When might we see it?

Jamie MacDonald: Well, we’re working on it, it’s looking really exciting. It’s moving the whole Getaway world and experience on, as you would expect. Again, watch this space. [enigmatic smile]


SPOnG: Moving on to say more about downloadable games and add-ons for games – the fact that Microsoft has exclusive downloadable episodes for Grand Theft Auto IV has been made a lot of in the news over the last six months. What kind of things will Sony provide, both for GTA specifically and for PS3 games more generally?

Jamie MacDonald: For GTA, that’s not for me to comment. You need to direct your questions to Rockstar.

And it terms of downloadable games [such as Echochrome and flOw]… those download-only games are more and more a feature of our first-party development. We have dedicated teams both in the US and in Europe working on those kind of titles. I think it’s really exciting as it [encourages] teams who don’t have the time or money or resources to develop big AAA titles... if they have good ideas and are smart, creative people they can now create really compelling titles which can be made available at a lower price point on the PlayStation Store. I think it’s great.


SPOnG: There does seem to be a focus on bringing original downloadable titles out on PS3 and not as much focus on retro arcade gaming.

Jamie MacDonald: Yes, and let’s not forget we have our PSOne back-catalogue that we are making available on the PlayStation Store. There’s a few games there too!


SPOnG: Thanks for your time, Jamie.

Jamie MacDonald: No problem.