I caught up recently with Peter de Jong, CEO & Founder of Codeglue B.V., a developer for Playstation Home. YPSH : Thanks for visiting with us today Peter! Can you tell our members who you are and what you do at Codeglue? CG : Hi Karen, I am one of the founders of Codeglue, a small game developer based in Rotterdam, The Netherlands. We develop games and virtual goods for various platforms, like Playstation Home. Personally, I am responsible for bringing in new projects and occasionally have my say about game designs and ideas. Oh and I do interviews. YPSH : How long have you been doing digital graphic and game design? CG : We founded Codeglue back in 2000, when the first mobile phones became capable of running games. So we started creating those. But my professional gaming career started earlier than that, in 1995, when I graduated on creating a platform game for the Philips CD-i player. For those who don't know the CD-i player, Google it, it's good old stuff! (ref: http://tinyurl.com/prnfk ) YPSH : So Codeglue got started in 2000. Are you the founder of Codeglue? When did it become associated with Playstation Home? CG : Yes. I am one of the founders of Codeglue, together with Maurice Sibrandi. In 2000 we started developing games for mobile phones. It took us 7 or 8 years or so before we started creating games for consoles as well. Since 2008 we have been developing games and virtual goods for Playstation Home. A lot of it behind the scene, but we recently got more visible with our own store called the Cardboard Cartel. View attachment 2646 YPSH : Codeglue is a Dutch company correct? CG : Correct! Does anyone fancy some wooden shoes in Playstation Home? YPSH: Sure! Why not! I know Rocket Riot is one of your premier games. Tell us some of the other games Codeglue has developed. CG : Rocket Riot is indeed one of our dearest games, but we have developed many other games. Some recent games include HydroTilt for the iPhone, which can be picked up from the AppStore for free, and SlapHappy, also for the iPhone. The last one is based on the cartoon series Happy Tree Friends, not really a game, but a great way to relieve some stress. The one project we are really excited about at the moment is called ibb & obb, which will be released for Playstation 3. This is a really smart and cute looking game. You can follow its development on Facebook. YPSH : Codeglue develops games for other platforms besides the PS3? CG : Yes, we develop a lot of games for smartphones and tablets, like the iPhone, iPad, Android and Windows Phone 7 devices. E.g. Rocket Riot was released for the Xbox 360 and for Windows Phone 7 devices. Not sure if it is a good idea to mention this here. YPSH : What area of your business do you envision to have the largest growth in he future? CG : The largest growth we envision by connecting various game platforms. E.g. Connect a Playstation Home game with a smartphone game and a online PC game. Games on these platforms don't need to be exactly the same, but they rather complement each other and use the strength of each platform to the fullest. We have experience on these platforms. It's time to tie them together I think. YPSH : Codeglue has developed a number of virtual items for Playstation Home. Some under its name, some not. Tell us about some of those items Codeglue developed that we might not realize came from Codeglue. CG : That's really quite a lot. E.g. We created a lot of full body costumes and furniture for The PPC. These include outfits for movies like WATCHMEN, Star Trek, GI Joe, Kick Ass and the Last Airbender. We also did the latest outfits for SingStar and we created the Karate Kid costumes and the Wiseman that was sitting on Home Square. But our biggest project up till now was three mini-games for Home Square, Tug Of War, Shooting Hoops and the Voting Fountain. Just to name a few. Our website will be updated soon showing a full list of the projects we have done. So keep an eye on our website! (note: some of these items were only available in EU Home) YPSH : Recently, Codeglue opend its first virtual store on PS Home in the EU with the introduction of the "Cardboard Cartel". Is Codeglue going to expand that concept into other regions of PS Home? View attachment 2647 CG : We would like to of course! But I also think it is a matter of available space. But we are going to try! YPSH : Has Codeglue designed any personal or public spaces for PS Home? CG : This is the one thing we haven't done yet. But it is one of the things we would like to do very much. We have some very good ideas (hopefully) which we would like to start developing very soon. YPSH : Can we expect to see some personal spaces for PS Home from Codeglue in the future? CG : Yes. For sure. Like said, we might start developing a space very soon. YPSH : The womens fashions you recently introduced in the EU and US were well received. Can we expect to see more? What about for the men? View attachment 2648 CG : Yes you can expect more. We have some more female clothing items in the pipeline already. For men we plan to release some T-shirts soon. YPSH : What hardware limitations have you run into when developing ideas for the PS3 platform? CG : We haven't really run into hardware issues with the PS3. It is perfectly capable for the stuff we would like to create for it. We do run into software limitations form time to time, e.g. With Playstation Home. But Sony is working hard to have these limitations taken away, so possibilities will only grow in the near future. Playstation Home will get better and better imo. YPSH : If Sony asked you what you would like to see in the PS4, what would you ask for? CG : I would ask for lots of storage. Personally I think the Blu-ray player can be dropped, I'd rather download everything and store it on a HD. And the PS4 should make it easy for me to watch the latest movies and TV series (streaming) and listen to music via services like Spotify. And make these services available in the Netherlands (or rather : all countries)! YPSH : How many hours a week to you spend in Home? CG : I consider myself a light Playstation Home user. I spend about two hours a week in Home. I often just wander around looking at what is out there, seeking inspiration for new ideas and possibilities... YPSH : What are you favorite features in PS Home? What would you like to see added or changed? CG : My favourite features of Playstation Home are the ability to meet people and together play mini-games or arcade games. That's a very powerful concept I think. But what I do miss is better integration with other social networks like Facebook and Twitter. I think it should be a bit more open to other platforms, so that these can get connected, creating a more entertaining experience. YPSH : Lastly, can you gives us a hint of what to expect from Codeglue in the coming year? Any exciting projects? CG : We want to focus on three things: First of all is to fill our Cardboard Cartel store with fun and good looking items, second, create a Personal or Public game space and third is to create some arcade cabinets (we have a very good idea for a fun casual game at the moment). So we will be very busy this year! YPSH : We appreciate your taking time out to talk with us today Peter! We look forward to seeing new fun things from Codeglue! (Quotes from this interview maybe used on other media provided it clearly states it’s origin, www.yourplaystationhome.com)
Nice read Karen, looking forward to what codeglue come up with next, it also be nice to see some more arcade games in Home (None active)
Great! Very interesting to read that not only are they planning on really expanding their arsenal for Home goods, but it was neat to gain some insight into the 'developer' side of things.
WOW KAREN!!! That was a really interesting read!! I learned a few things! How did you get to talk to him? Did someone here know him already? Pretty cool that his team made some stuff I love.
