Old shots of the ps3's XMB from GDC06

[makingmusic476]

I just stumbled across these through another website, and it's interesting to see what SCE envisioned for the ps3's OS way back in 2005, and how damn far away we still are from such features ever being realized.

In-game XMB!  We got it eventually.


And not just cross game voice chat, but cross game video chat!

 
I also tracked down an article on GameSpot covering this GDC presentation:

Using the PS3 game Formula 1 as a backdrop, he showed how up to three simultaneous video chat windows could pop up during gameplay via a minimalist, translucent heads-up display (HUD). Later slides showed how a player could send messages, check e-mail, scour friends lists, and send game requests all while in-game--and all using the same translucent HUD architecture.

Moving on to commerce, Harrison displayed the first shots of the PSNP store, which can also be accessed in-game. He showed a mockup of a menu offering an additional racetrack that players could buy, again using the same translucent design as the communication HUD. He then showed how the PSNP store menu could be customized to match the look of a game with a slide of a car being bought in Motorstorm. The menu featured the same bold yellow design as the off-road racing game's logo, but retained the same elements as the other store menu.

There's also a video floating around somewhere (on GameSpot, I believe), that showed an actual demonstration of the ps3's OS a few months prior to launch.  It only had 4-5 icons, and was nothing like what was shown in these shots or what we have today, but it did have functioning in-game XMB, unlike the ps3's launch firmware.  I can't seem to find it now, though.

It seems Sony has always had a proper vision of where the ps3's OS should be, yet they've taken forever in getting anywhere close to this vision, which I guess says a lot about the guys they have working on firmware.