When Sony announced a premium PlayStation Network subscription called PlayStation Plus at its E3 press conference yesterday, I balked at the $49.99-a-year fee, since the features that Sony Computer Entertainment of America president & CEO Jack Tretton announced — which didn’t seem all that great anyway — didn’t even include cross-game chat. Now, it seems that party chat may indeed be coming to the PlayStation Network, and the apparent implementation has its pros and cons.
European PlayStation websites, including the Dutch site (as seen above via Examiner), originally listed party chat as a feature included in PlayStation Plus. I can attest to that, since I loaded up the Dutch site last night and saw it myself. (Strangely, the cross-game chat bullet point appeared on the site just as you see it above — the entire page was in Dutch, except for that one line in English.) And Joystiq is reporting that party chat is definitely coming; the details cited indicate that the feature will be limited to four people in one session, and that while any PS3 user can partake in party chat, only PlayStation Plus subscribers can to start a session and invite other users. If all Plus members leave a chat session, it will end.
But the plot thickens: any mention of the feature has since been removed from all of the European PlayStation sites, and a Sony representative told PlayStation Universe that cross-game chat “was not announced as part of PlayStation Plus.” Still, on these here Internets, this is exactly the kind of behavior that smacks of a confirmation, and I’m sure we’ll see one down the line.
Now that I look at the feature set for PlayStation Plus again, it actually seems like it could be worth it, especially since you get four free games (one full PSN game, one PSOne Classic, and two PSP minis) per month. So is cross-game chat a feature that makes PlayStation Plus attractive enough for you to subscribe, or will you let your wealthier friends sign up and have them invite you into chat sessions?
E3 2010: Cross-game chat confirmed for PS3, Coming this month [Examiner]
Cross-game party chat coming to PS3 (with strings attached) [Joystiq — thanks, Joe!]
PlayStation Plus: cross-game voice chat and other details [PlayStation Universe]
