By using this site, you agree to our Privacy Policy and our Terms of Use. Close
Rainbird on 10 January 2010
Edit Thread

I thought I'd do a little research to prepare us for the PS Wand, and since the Wand utilizes the PS Eye, I thought I'd try to get some statistics on that.

From Wikipedia, is a list of games that support the PS Eye (both PSN and retail)(the letters after each game represent their category of PS Eye use):

Categories:

  • (A) - When certain conditions are met, the camera will take an image of you or record a bit of video, so your reaction can be seen. (Getting crushed in Burnout during an online race for example)
  • (B) - The camera can be used to personalize characters in the game or take pictures of yourself to be used for other 'avatar' purposes. (Creating a custom character with a face modelled from your own in PES for example)
  • (C) - These are games or applications almost entirely created to showcase the PS Eye and its capabilities. These games are thus very simple and use gesture interaction.
  • (D) - These are games where the PS Eye is integral to gameplay, as they cannot be played without a camera.
  • (E) - Other
    • High Stakes on the Vegas Strip: Poker Edition - Streams video and audio from up to six players, allowing you to read eachothers facial expressions and other reactions when playing.
    • LittleBigPlanet - The PS Eye can be used to take pictures and thus create custom textures in the game's Create-mode.
    • SingStar - The PS Eye allows for people to record their singing performances and have snapshots taken during said performance. These can then be shared online with the Singstar community.

I added FIFA 10 to the list, as I know it supports the PS Eye, but I don't know about older FIFA titles though. Tiger Woods 09 isn't on the list, depsite both 08 and 10 being on there, again I don't know if it uses the PS Eye, but one would think it did. I also edited out a few unreleased games.

On top of that, you have the Eyecreate application for those who just like to fool around with the camera, and you can do video chat with it, or just use the microphone for regular chatting.

Finally, it should be noted that a few of the above games support the Eyetoy for the PS2 as well.

The two big games on that list are The Eye of Judgement and Eyepet, as neither of these games are playable without the PS Eye. Currently, Eyepet has sold 370k units (but have only been released in Others), and The Eye of Judgement has sold 300k units, but without Others-numbers.

It's therefor easy to conclude that there are at least 670k PS Eyes out in the wild, though I feel confident in saying that there are 30k people out there who own a PS Eye, but not one of those two games, bringing the total up to 700k. On top of that, we have an unknown amount of Others-residents owning The Eye of Judgement, and I don't think the target audience for TEoJ and Eyepet overlap very much, so that is probably just more PS Eyes in the homes of PS3 owners.

Things to take note of:

  • Through the holiday season, Eyepet has sold steadily at around 30k units every week since its release. How Eyepet will sell now that the holidays are over remains to be seen.
  • Gran Turismo 5 will release with headtracking functionality for those who own a PS Eye. I don't think it will give PS Eye sales a huge bump though (unless it turns out to be really cool, and gains good word of mouth), both because it is in no way central to the game experience but also because many potential GT5/PS Eye buyers may already own Eyepet (the same people may not be playing it, but they'll be playing on the same PS3s).
  • We do not yet know when Eyepet will release in NA, but I think it's reasonable to assume that it will be a PS Wand launch title.

In conclusion, I'd say there are at least 700k PS Eyes on the market today, though the number might even be nearing a million, I don't know. Going by the Wii audience, it doesn't seem unlikely that the people who picked up Eyepet will also be interested in getting the Wand.

As the PS Eye standalone costs $39.99/£24.99/€39.99 at the most, you have at least 700k PS3 owners who will be able to use motion controls on their PS3 at a considerably lowered cost of entry (though it depends on Wand pricing and bundles), compared to those who do not own a PS Eye.

Will this have any effect on the success of the Wand do you think?

EDIT: Categories have been added to the list of games supporting the PS Eye.