Would Sony benefit from MMO-like Game Shows?

[4thHorseman]

This thought crossed my mind yesterday while listening to the GameEnthus podcast from last week. They brought up 1vs100 and how much they loved it and I remembered...quite a bit of people liked it, myself included. I know it ended up failing for Microsoft because of financial reasons (or so we were led to believe), but I started thinking about Sony.

Would Sony have success for a game like this? Maybe not 1vs100, but a type of gameshow where a large number of their playerbase could gather and face off with each other?

They could have certain nights where a portion of the audience would have a chance at prizes, and since it's Sony, they aren't against giving away prizes. Just look at the Playstation Rewards Program on HouseParty or the various promotions they do with Subway to give out free things. They could give out free Playstation points, free PS+ subscriptions, games like Uncharted/Resistance/Killzone/etc, or money.

Have a game like this for $5-10, get a Sony developer behind it, and get ads and it may bring some money in for Sony. While I dread the thought, they could even put it in Home to try and get more people in there to purchase Home content. And what would make it even better? Kevin Butler as the host!


It was a random thought and wanted to get the thought out there instead of keeping it inside with nobody to bounce the idea around with. I loved 1vs100 and was one of my favorite things about Live when I had it. I didn't care for the Poker they replaced it with and I still miss 1vs100. I just think Sony could have a successful thing going for them if they could capitalize on something Microsoft couldn't...plus I would get a game like 1vs100 back.

 

[TheHelix]

It still bothers me that Sony doesn't have a full-fledged Jeopardy game like 1v100 for PSN. They should have someone qualify from the show this way.

 

[Thomas96]

Maybe yes, but Sony would it up trying to put it inside home.

 

[IAmTheCheapestGamer]

When you mention MMO OP, all I think of is WOW and games of that ilk and I don't think I'd ever get into anything like that, especially if I had to pay to play.

But a free game show type game on PSN that I could win real prizes on, sign me up.

 

[Thongsy]

[quote name='Thomas96']Maybe yes, but Sony would it up trying to put it inside home.[/QUOTE]

Maybe they already do have such a show and it's inside Home and thus why nobody knows about it.

 

[FriskyTanuki]

[quote name='Thongsy']Maybe they already do have such a show and it's inside Home and thus why nobody knows about it.[/QUOTE]

The problem with 1 vs 100 was the lack of advertising to keep it going. They had the same couple of sponsors from the beta to the end of the second season and they were the same companies that buy advertising on most internet stuff (Sprint, Ford, etc.). It should've been propped up with the avatar marketplace since that thing was secretly great advertising for the stuff that you can buy on Xbox Live or earn from games, so MS should've played up that aspect of it and let you go directly to the avatar marketplace to buy the same items that you see others wearing.

The other issue is whether you go paid or free-to-play since both have their limitations for how to sustain a way to always build an audience that will keep playing it every night. It would be great if Sony or somebody could build a similarly great game that's easy to get into and understand with the great aspect where people are randomly chosen for the spotlight to play for better prizes. A free-to-play, massively multiplayer version of Buzz! would be great to do this with since it has the trivia aspect that work best and it already does a great job with multiplayer, so it would just be a matter of whether Sony recognizes that and/or thinks it would be worth the risk.