Social Animals

Sega's abortive experiment with Dreamcast VMU mini-games aside, there's a shocking dearth of game experiences which span multiple different platforms and environments with different, inter-linked experiences. I can't play something on my iPhone or Android device while waiting for a bus to work that influences something in the game world I'll be playing in on my console that evening, or access something through Facebook on my office computer which lets me carry out various tasks related to a game on my Xbox or PS3 at home.

Even on a simpler scale, these devices aren't being used to improve players' experiences. Why can't I arrange to play Call of Duty 4 or Killzone 2 with my friends at 8pm this evening over Facebook, email or text message, and then get a reminder and an invitation to join the automatically created party when I turn on my console in the evening? Why can't I set up a Street Fighter or FIFA tournament for my colleagues on a social networking site, and have the game service automatically set up the matches and fill in the results?

The second key thing which the games industry should take away from the rise of social networking is that differentiation between friend groups is important. At the moment, both Xbox Live and PSN are shockingly simple in their implementation of "friends". The services which these networks can offer are restricted on a simple, social level, because they don't actually distinguish effectively between different friend groups. When your system doesn't understand the difference between a lifelong pal and someone you've played a couple of times in Forza Motorsport who "seems like a decent sort", the extent to which you're willing to share information - or be contacted directly - is extremely limited.

Appreciating the difference between a close friend and an acquaintance is the difference between your game's social features being a channel for spam from near-strangers, and being a fantastic channel for friends to challenge, taunt, invite and cajole one another. This is the fine line which any kind of social networking integration needs to walk - many early attempts at Facebook games had an unacceptable signal to noise ratio, were quickly labelled as spam and blocked by millions of users, a cautionary tale for any developer who takes steps into this space.

With the ability to work out more detail about the relationships between players and to permeate further into their social lives - and even their working lives, given the level of Facebook use among office workers - there's no question that the potential here for games is immense. From inspiring competition among groups of friends to organising them together and giving them shared goals and responsibility for one another's success; from extending the game world onto mobile devices and office PCs through to whole new takes on the meta, "alternate reality" game concept; social networks promise to add a host of exciting new tools to the arsenal of the modern game designer.

The integration promised by Microsoft and Sony is nothing but a first faltering step towards a much more exciting future. Facebook on Xbox 360 and YouTube on PS3 aren't the marriage of social networking and gaming - at best, they're just the two sides finally noticing one another across the room. The best is most certainly yet to come.