Jonathan Hemingway, game designer of Gearbox Software commented on the PS3 online experience and how the lack of microphones bundled with every PS3 hurts the online atmosphere.
His response was in a question by Gameinformer, where he said, “Absolutely. Absolutely. The thing that kills co-op gaming faster than anything else is not being able to communicate with my buddies. By definition, it’s supposed to be a shared experience. That means communication.”
We do agree with him but considering Sony isn’t making that much with every PS3 sold, it may be a financial situation rather than remaining oblivious to this fact. Jonathan’s friend Paul chimed in as well, “One of the most heard things when we watched people play Borderlands is “Where are you?”. How are you supposed to do that when you don’t have a headset? You can’t even find each other; you have to pull out the maps and all that kind of stuff. The microphone is a big part of it for sure.”
However, Jonathan pointed out the amazing co-op design of Portal 2 to help people that don’t have a microphone. In Portal 2 you can send signals to your partner as to what to do in, which gives them an idea and it saves a lot of frustration.
“ll call out one more game that I think is doing a great thing in the area of co-op, and that’s Portal 2.”
After seeing the PS3’s price drop to $249, we are pretty hopeful that Sony will include a headset and an HDMI cable in every PS3, but looking at the situation now, it seems pretty unlikely.
Also do check out the full interview at GameInformer because it is simply awesome.
