Playstation 3 User Interface Thoughts

I think you’re nitpicking the issues with bringing up the UI over an explosion.  And at the end of the video clip, they talked about more customization being available on the released version of the console.  It looked pretty much like the UI of the PSP clean and simple.  I like my 360 interface, but I could do with fewer blades and more direct access to things (like deleting crap).  And did you notice, no 1080i, only 720p or 1080p – at least in the dev version. I don’t think the PS3 will live or die on it’s UI, but on the crazy high introductory price.  

I agree about the nitpickiness, the issues are pretty sure to be fixed for the final version.  I also agree with Porktree, in that it would be great to be able to customize your 360 interface, I like the look, but I want it faster.  Why can’t we change the animation speeds (or disable entirely).  Why do we have to wait for the Live Arcade titles to load, can’t they be precached or something?  I want to be able to move some of the options around as well, it would be great to have a ‘Home’ blade that you could customize and add your own links (mine would be: resolution, marketplace, and arcade, hah).

Another annoying thing about the 360′s interface is the personal settings thing: some are in the guide, others under your profile, etc.

Anyways, enough complaining about the 360!  I like the cleaness of the PS3 UI, but it’s too clean, and doesn’t feel warm enough for the main interface.  To me anyways.

Well, using the PSP as an example, the custom things will come. Will it be through updates down the road or when it is released? That is what I want to know. The PSP UI gets some upgrade every time I update the firmware. The first version of the PSP UI had hardly any customization at all. So, I imagine eventually they will get it right. I am not a Sony hater, I just have been very disappointed in their last few releases such as the PSP and the PS2 HDD. I am hoping they do a better job with the PS3 else I do not think I will get one for a long time.

The PS3′s interface looks a bit too simplistic, while the 360′s is too unorganized for my tastes.  The 360 needs a windows-like system that allows you to customize each menu.  Instead, I have to look in the every menu labeled "demo" until I find the one I’m actually looking for.  

So… the 360 needs less and the PS3 needs more.  It seems like Sony didn’t think about their interface at all by just having an icon with thumbnails under it.  Like, my 9 yr. old nephew could have come up with that.  Imagine how long it might possibly take to scroll to the thumbnail you want of songs if you have over a thousand of them stored on the hard drive?

Re: "I don’t think the PS3 will live or die on it’s UI, but on the crazy high introductory price."

Yep – I’m with you here. Although I think it will be a combination of price and what games are available for people (just as is true for all console launches).

Re: "It seems like Sony didn’t think about their interface at all by just having an icon with thumbnails under it.  Like, my 9 yr. old nephew could have come up with that.  Imagine how long it might possibly take to scroll to the thumbnail you want of songs if you have over a thousand of them stored on the hard drive?"

Interesting point. This is one of those places where I have to give them slack and assume there will be some way to view groups of items… thousands of items in a scroll list just wouldn’t work (as you say).

I honestly think the UI is extremely simple. I don’t like it. It’s nice on PSP but not on a console. In my opinion, Sony should definately improve the UI. And is it just me or does it feel like theres too much stuff under each icon?

I don’t think there was any unnecessary knitpicking.  When you are trying to evaluate something that is realtively simple and straightforward you essentially have to knitpick.

I definitely prefer a blade or folded interface like in the 360.  An ultra simple interface for a very complex machine makes me thing its going to be annoying to navigate.

I must admit, I prefer the 360 interface (x100) over this PS3 one, which is too simplistic for a console IMHO.  The 360 blades are just perfect and although it required a bit of searching at the beginning, once you know where everything is, it becomes second nature.

I like your review, I think it was fair and balanced.  As a huge Sony (games) fan, I was a little bit disappointed; I think it looks extremely plain.  From my next-gen system I want pizzazz, something to really set it apart.  As of now I think the PS2 interface looks a little more refined.  I’m sure that will change over time though, this is just an early dev kit after all…and plus, the PS3 firmware is upgradeable.  

In response to Porktree…it’s time to get over this "price shock" issue.  Sure, Xbox 360 is $400 while the PS3 is $600…but you’re forgetting something.  The Xbox 360 is inferior to the PS3.  It has neither next-gen optical media support, nor wireless networking.  Add those features ($100 for the networking and maybe $150+ for the HD-DVD) and you’re talking about a system that is actually MORE expensive than the PS3.

@Kypdurron5, I don know what you mean by inferior? "Add those features ($100 for the networking and maybe $150+ for the HD-DVD) and you’re talking about a system that is actually MORE expensive than the PS3." What if I don’t want to add those features? Are you adding the wireless router in the price tag? Also, you get better performance when you plug the 360 directly to lan.

Also, not everyone sees value on the blu-ray; to me blu-ray is worth nothing. So, how is it an advantage if I don’t use wi-fi and blu-ray? I rather to use those $200 and buy myself a wii, DS, new video card for PC or 4 games.

That interface is way too simple and basic. It’s good for the PSP but not for a home console. Hopefully they will improve it a lot.

To Kypdurron5, the Xbox 360 isn’t really inferior because of those features. I prefer wired networking to wireless networking and I don’t really want a Blu-Ray player. All I want to do is play games without paying for things I don’t need and that is the problem with the PS3. People are forced to have things they don’t want.

That type of interface works great on the PSP, but after I finish paying $600 for a PS3 I expect to see more when I turn it on. Being easy to use is good (ie. the 360 or PS2 dashboard), but this is far too simplistic.

Re: "It seems like Sony didn’t think about their interface at all by just having an icon with thumbnails under it.  Like, my 9 yr. old nephew could have come up with that.  Imagine how long it might possibly take to scroll to the thumbnail you want of songs if you have over a thousand of them stored on the hard drive?"

Er…  I have an iRiver for music.  Why would I want a $600 gaming console to put my MP3s on?  I can understand having a few there if some of the games supported custom tracks, but really…

"The Xbox 360 is inferior to the PS3.  It has neither next-gen optical media support, nor wireless networking."

My teeth aren’t adorned with a diamond-crusted platinum grill, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re inferior to 50 Cent’s teeth.  It just means I choose not to have a platinum grill, but at least I have a choice.  See, I just want teeth… regular, white teeth.  Therefore, I don’t want to pay for the platinum-ing of those teeth.  The PS3 is a game console with a platinum grill, basically.  I don’t want nor can I afford that.  I want a game console.

And you’re also forgetting:  along with the wireless networking comes a wireless router (which is another expense) and along with "next-gen" optical media support comes "next-gen" optical media prices.  I’ll pass, thank you!

I only have two big concerns with the interface:

>Scrolling through over 20 items will be a chore

>The text is way too small – very little of the screen was utilized.

I think the interface will change quite a bit before launch (or afterwards).

This definately looks to be a fairly early concept.  I mean if you look at the Singstar marketplace at the E3 press conference that design is SUPERIOR to 360 in my opinion.  A big problem with the 360 is when you buy gamerpics you cant preview them, it doesnt list enough items on the screen and its not very graceful about how it lists them.  It should optimise itself when you are in HD.  Equally so though if that Singstar marketplace doesnt optimise itself when in SD mode it would be unusable, it clearly looks designed for 720p or even 1080p. The 360 is designed to be functional in regular PAL/NTSC, it just would be nice if it changed when in 720p or above.  Generally people with 720p have large TVs so a smaller font wouldnt be a problem to read and icons for stuff you are going to buy, or a decent preview (gamerpics) wouldnt go amiss.

Theres other things where the 360 still has some tweaking to go though.  It takes too long to get to the list of all the latest demos.  It takes WAAAY too long to get into Xbox Live Arcade, like someone else said it BADLY needs caching as to me the whole point of games on the HD is speed and its frustrating waiting for that list to load.

So the 360 design isnt perfect by any means, although I think overall its vastly superior to PS3 on software and hardware design.  The case for a start, the PS3 in my opinion is DAMN ugly and unpractical.  I can store my USB keyboard on top of the 360 without it blocking airflow, the PS3 you cant put ANYTHING on top of it because of its shape.  Its looks like a bloody bread bin with a CD player built-in.  Sony already messed up the PSP by going for style over practicality.  It looks sexy but its uncomfortable to use.  Its a shame they are trying to do the same with PS3.

Back to the PS3 though, the most puzzling lack of anything on the main menu is that it doesnt seem tied to online.  You’d think with Sony pushing the online factor it would be like the 360 where every page is syncing with their online service in some way, trying to sell new content, demos, music and movies even.  You can understand why the PSP doesnt because you cant guarantee you are in a WiFi enabled area and the battery life, but with PS3 this is not an issue.  Still, they havent even manufactured any retail PS3 units yet so its rather early to tell.

What I’m shocked about is no one on either side of the rabbied fanboys (Joystiq comments being my example )) has actually point out that the theroy between UI of both next gen consoles is the same but with different make up on.

Stop and think about it on the 360 to get network settings you go => => =>, and then select the needed option.

On the PS3 and PSP you go <= <= <=,

The advantage that the blades has over the (I’ll call it the +, because thats what it reminds me of) + is the blades have sub menus, which is somthing I don’t recall seeing in any one sonys UI demos or on my PSP.

Personally I preffer the blades over the current + system in the PSP. Why?? the guide button!! One press of the button and I can change things that are important to my account (Such as gamerpic, message a friend etc) anything to do with my system I have to drop down to the OS (this all makes lots of sense to me).

Where as in the demo you seemed to have all the system options available.

Thats my take on the UI anyway

The only good things I saw about the PS3′s UI are that you can change the background (they didn’t say anything about further customization), and that you can quickly go from the bottom-most option of menu 3 to the top of menu 2 by going left once.

On the 360 both these things are far too difficult or not fully worked-out.

For starters the backgrounds can be changed, but only one picture can be used (by design to sell more themes I bet).

On the topic of quickly going from A to B: it’s a huge pain in the rear going from the Pal setup "page" (where you switch from Pal 50 to Pal 60 or back, which really shouldn’t be mandatory since the 360 should be able to auto-change the settings) to the first blade to play a game. One button click should do it, but no, we have to press B 4 or 5 times, or press the guide button and Y which takes equally long because the UI is often sluggish as heck.

I know you, Andre, said we can give our opinions and ideas for improvements by simply stating them, but I still firmly believe Microsoft has to become visibly pro-active about it rather than using their own employees who obviously do not represent the userbase as the (beta) testers for the UI.

Microsoft has the email addresses of everyone with an XBL account and a 360, they ought to set up some surveys to get information straight from as many of the users as possible, not just the vocal minority.

Back to the PS3′s UI: stacking options the way it’s done on the PS3 in that video just won’t work in the long run. But maybe that’s why Sony is so proud of them selling a Unix computer with gaming capabilities and they expect people to write their own UI shell?

I’m sorry but that interface is just that, an interface.   If you like your interfaces simple I’m sure you’ll love it.  I like interfaces to be a little more interesting and not so sterile.  I don’t think that it is going to look very good on a large widescreen TV.  The xbox interface seems much better designed for things like that.  I do agree that they could simplify the xbox dashboard but seriously it took me about 10 mins to get used to where everything was..it wasn’t rocket science.   And when I power up my xbox I get that "welcome home, lets play some games!" feeling instead of the "welcome to the hosptial we will be removing your organs and a wad of cash" feeling I get from that PS3 interface.  :)

I’m sure it will change eventually hopefully for the better but as of right I’ve gotta dissapprove pretty adamantly.  

You have to remember that Sony is a hradware manufacturer.  Microsoft is (mostly) a software manufacturer.  You would actually expect the X360 to have a better interface and the PS3 to have better hardware (though it means litte to me as I don’t have a HDTV).  Just look at the PS2 interface, or lack there of.

I agree with the points made by Alex Atkin UK: The 360 UI certainly is pretty good, but its weak point is still the whole organization and presentation of the Marketplace, despite the changes to it with the spring dashboard update:

- Displaying items in the Marketplace is much too slow

- Presentation in the Marketplace is completely text-only.

- It’s still very hard to find "new" items in the Marketplace, because in the "new" lists the new items are not listed, only the new games that they belong to. Items in the Marketplace do not contain a date since when they have been listed.

- Descriptions are cut-off in lists, making it impossible to directly pick 480p or 720p versions of the same item.

- No search options at all.

All in all, I think the Xbox Live Marketplace UI is in need of a complete overhaul, because as it gets more and more content, it will become even harder to use than it is already.

I’ll see you on the "deleting things is way too involved;" "it takes too many button presses to get out of a deep menu;" and "the Marketplace UI is still bad, even with the update."

I’ll also raise you with: "I think that it’s mean to gimp the media features for users who don’t own Windows Media Center Edition;" "it would be nice to have an in-console list of upcoming release dates;" and "I really like the fact that I can play music off of a handheld device by connecting it with USB, but I wish there was a way to move audio to the console’s hard drive from the device and vice-versa."

J Goodwin,

Concerning the audio issue you were talking about.  If you put all the music files onto your PC then the 360 can stream them from there, they never need to be on the console.  Course this requires a home network which I know everyone doesnt have.  Personally the hard disk on the 360 isnt all that big and I wouldnt necessarily want to load up audio files on it for that reason.  It would be nice to be able to move save game files from your PC to the xbox over the home network for backup or that sort of thing.  (I know there are some products that allow this but as far as I know they require a sata connection to the PC so the PC would have to be close to your console).

As far as the other comments about navigating around and deep menu’s I would tend to agree with you guys on that but your input device is generally a controller which takes away alot of the options for shortcuts.  Obviously some of this could be alleviated by better layout but I think it would be hard to totally alleviate the issue.  I do think a search function in the Marketplace would be ideal though.

All in all for a console I think they have done a pretty good job, they currently are far and above their competitors on the online scene, so I am interested to see what sony and nintendo comes up with to counter.  Could there be improvements?  Obviously, and I think there will be as time goes on.  The marketplace is something new, less than a year old, so I would say give them some time to work out the kinks and features.  (Same with the PS3 UI)

Some great comments here – keep them coming. I can say that we mentioned at Gamefest that we’ve done some work around making Marketplace easier to use. You’ll be seeing more on that in the coming months. Definitely a known area for improvement.

I know some of the UI team reads this blog, and I’m sure they’d love to hear constructive comments on issues, with suggestions on how to fix. I will say that our UI guys are wicked smart, and have done a *lot* of thinking on how to build a UI that works worldwide, is scalable, and easy to use. There have been a couple of times when I’ve had a suggestion that seemed super-obvious to me only to get shot down because they’ve already thought about it, rejected it for very good reasons, and then described where they’re going in the future. Was impressed… all that’s to say bring on the feedback, but don’t assume everything is super-easy.

I understand that I can keep all my audio on my computer etc.  I in fact do that.  However, that doesn’t mean that I expect that everyone in the target market for 360 is going to have a computer capable of supporting Windows Media Connect or the awareness that they can do that, or the technical savvy to actually accomplish what to me and you is a very simple task.

On the other hand, the "neat" factor of ripping a CD from the console or connecting your portable to it would, I think, naturally lead a user to ask themselves why they can’t move music from one to the other.

I guess it is a reasonable question as to whether the average user would even know that they can plug a Gmini or Zen into the 360.

Another niggle about the music on the hard drive thing is that you can only delete everything, all that once.  You can’t just delete an artist, album, or certain song.  The other one is that it seems like if you have a large portable music device, the system can only play about 100 songs on shuffle, instead of being able to access everything.

Great to hear, Ozymandias, about the continuing work to improve the Marketplace UI! As you asked for it, some super-easy suggestions

- Getting out of a deep menu back to the top of the first blade with a single button (the "start" button, maybe?). Because I play a lot of BC games (Halo1, Jade Empire, KOTOR), I continously have to switch between 720p and 480p (to get rid of the black borders on the sides of the screen for many BC games). That process now requires 13 button presses.

- Make the "Play now" option after downloading an Arcade game actually play the game. I thought this was already solved in the last update, but still when I select the "Play now" option after downloading an Arcade game, it goes into the Arcade menu, and I have to find the game myself.

- Make the "Newly released downloads" section in the Marketplace list the actual new items. Now it just lists the games, and if you select a game you get a list of all Marketplace items for that game, with no clue what the new items are. The items you see don’t even seem to be listed in order of "newness". Attaching a released date to all Marketplace items would also help a lot.

Dunno if anyone else posted, but I thought it was funny that the demoer of the OS mentioned the "little Playstation button in the middle of the controller"… hrmm, interesting.  Wonder where they got that idea

Goodwin,

Very interesting comments, I myself have never played music on the system.  I have used the picture viewer linked over the network to the PC and it has worked really well but that is about the extent of what I have done with my PC connection.  I still say that the hard-drive is currently too small to really make moving music files to the 360 a beneficial thing even if people think they should be able to do that. Most people I know that have an Ipod or similar device have well over 20GB of music files on it already. If they were to offer an upgraded hard drive with more space maybe, but it appears that they have positioned the 360 as a media center extender therefore they expect users to keep their files on the PC instead of on the Xbox.  So I don’t really see that happening.  I agree that most people probably wont ever use that functionality because of the fact you stated that they are unaware of even the posibility but to be fair there are articles on how to set that up on xbox.com. (People still have a hard time following directions I know)

"I know some of the UI team reads this blog, and I’m sure they’d love to hear constructive comments on issues, with suggestions on how to fix."

Well, as for the deep-menu thing; not all buttons are used when I’m done changing the PAL settings. I know A and B are in use for "select" and "back", I think X is also used for "sign out", which leaves Y for a quick return to the dashboard. Or what about simply using the Back button (or Start, as suggested by BrokenSymmetry).

I also agree with the others that on the marketplace more items should be shown at once, perhaps through a user-defined setting? I would like more than 9 items on one screen, but people with smaller TVs might be perfectly happy with only 6 items.

Seeing dates at which items have been put online, and the ability to easily sort by date or name (using the shoulder buttons?) would really help in finding new content or content you only know by name.

I’d also like to have the option to subscribe to new releases, for example the Red vs. Blue episodes. They’re often so hidden that only when I read about them I know to look for them. Automatic reminders "Dood, you subscribed to XXXXX and something new’s out! Want me to download it for ya?" would be great.

I imagine this working on a per-console system; new releases are put in a downloadable file (XML?) which the console downloads once every two (?) hours and then checks against some settings in the profile.

Oh and one more thing; why do we get asked for a confirmation when we delete a demo/trailer/trial/savegame/picture/theme/whatever but not when we delete a received message?

J.Goodwin + Porktree brought up deleting things and as a developer (Not on the Live team or in fact not even in MS) I’d like to give a view on why the deleting is such a high click operation.

In short the delete button is a developers worst nightmare. The user want to able to delete things, but if you don’t force the user (and I do mean really do force the user) to think about the action they are taking then you get the "I’ve deleted this by mistake how do I get it back?".

So making the process longer the developers are trying to get at 2 things 1) The exact item you want to delete and 2)Are you really sure you want to get rid of that item because once its gone its gone for good.

But there some really good stuff in these comments nice to see that the rabid fanboys haven’t attacked yet!

What I’d like to see the market place is like a games preview like this http://www.xbox.com/en-GB/games/p/prey/ (but not a Browser! a browser has no place on a console, and defently not if the console works within enclosed network like LIVE). But surely the team could create a blade that is populated with details of a selected game.

So for example, you load the marketplace blade. On the blade there is an option to view games details.

You can then enter a game that your looking for (Or list by genre, or whatever). you then click on the game you want to view.

You then get (Local) details about the game ie:

-In game photos

-A write up

-Possible release date

-If the developer is working on a demo for the markeplace/ Or if there is a demo already up.

I think you guys get the idea

I like the 360 dashboard tho it’s not quite as intuative as the Halo 2 interface it is basically mimicking. Pressing the guide take you to you own profile which is pretty much never your destination (more likely friends/messages) so your always an extra couple of presses from where you want to go, and game invites feel clunky especially if you wanna hit up several people. But basically it’s good and nicely featured.

The PS3 interface looks distinctly spartan and unfriendly; especially given the – it’s not a console party line. But Sony has always been more about hardware than software (as my woes with the excellent new walkman and it’s horrendus accompanying software can attest), so I’m not surprised they’ve skipped over a through job there.

One thing that PS3 won’t suffer from with such a basic interface is that slight delay for every menu to swing in over a game; I like animations, but if it’s gonna make the experience sluggish in practise I wish I could turn them off.

I can understand the "developer’s nightmare" about deleting things.

How about a simple mode and an advanced mode toggle.  Advanced users might have direct delete abilities, simpler text blades that have the actual content right on them (an Arcade blade that immediately shows a text only list of your games and lets you launch them with one button press, instead of S…L…O…W…L…Y… finding each game on the hard drive (It’s no biggie when you’ve only got five, but when you’re up to 27 titles…it takes forever).  I don’t need the graphical representation of achievements and the friends leaderboard, I just want to play a game before I hit the sack.

I personally think that more blades, and having what you’re looking for available right at the top is a better design than having fewer blades but mucho depth in the menus.

It’s confusing to have some videos show up in one place, and others show up in another place (the games blade vs the media blade).  There ought to be a videos blade, with four buttons on it (the profile, which is consistent, the play game button, which should always exist, and then one for "play content on this system’s hard drive" and another for "play content from a media center pc" and maybe one for "play content from a memory card").

Of course then all those old themes would break, I guess.  That’s another peeve of a lot of people that I know.  You can’t preview themes or gamerpics on the system (you have to go to Xbox.com, and it’s not always updated in a timely manner), and they cost money.  Word on the street (from Gamefest) is that developers want to put free themes and pics on the marketplace, but that Microsoft is not keen on the idea…um…I don’t think that’s a good position for the company to take.

I kind of want to point out here that although I’m whining, I’m trying to offer constructive criticism where possible.

I really love the 360, and I like where it’s headed, that doesn’t mean that I don’t think it could be better than it is though.

secondo me tu non capisci un *** e fai solo propaganda per la tua aziende di merda sei solo un coglioncello pieno di soldi che hai paura che il progetto xbox venga cancellato e quindi venga cancellato anche te, hai sentito la novità? l’online della ps3 è gratuito e non come quella puttanata mangia-soldi (yes, money-eat)di x-box live

Re: "Dunno if anyone else posted, but I thought it was funny that the demoer of the OS mentioned the "little Playstation button in the middle of the controller"… hrmm, interesting.  Wonder where they got that idea "

Yeah, noticed that. But can’t blame them, it’s the obvious way to go once you come to terms with having a continually running process in memory that you want quick access to. Although I guess there’s always good ‘ol Ctrl-Alt-Del.

Great discussion. Andre pinged me on this so I thought that I would drop a line.

First, we completely appreciate straightforward and thoughtful feedback. Sometimes it’s painful, sometimes it’s not what you want to hear, but it’s good to hear it and it’s a way to get much better at what we do. So, please keep it coming.

The Arcade game enumeration problem is known and you should see this fixed in the next drop. No more waiting!

Many of the issues surrounding the Marketplace are known and we are going to try and address them. I can’t speak to anything specific, but know that we are hard at work on a whole bunch of stuff.

One of our biggest challenges as an organization is that we’ve got a tug-of-war between adding new functionality and fixing existing features – we have finite resources and time, and it’s a difficult tradeoff every time. You will always see both, and I promise that there will be some awesome things you will see in the next few months, and still some things that will make you think that we’re a bunch of monkeys with computers. However this shouldn’t prevent you from giving us feedback. Sometimes it’s your voices that helps someone push a change through.

I’ve just recently (past week) put up a blog on spaces.live.com, so this would be a great way for all of you to have a direct line to the UX team responsible for all of this. Thanks again.

Luca, dovreste considerare Prozac.  Avete ottenuto un problema molto piccolo di rabbia.  Grazie per contribuire alla discussione.

Nice blog, Wildchicken! Learned a few new things from your Xbox 360 tips, like being able to use the bumpers to switch blades, and the triggers for page up and down in the lists. Nice!

goodwin, era solo per vedere se capivi l’italiano cmq visto che lavori al progetto xbox fai i complimenti a chi ha progettato il controller del 360 lo uso sul pc ed è veramente comodo

I was hoping for much more visually apealing interface than this psp clone. The 360 UI in much more appealing. I think sony blew it with the UI cuz it is just so bland. The 360 has its own style.