In one of the worst-kept secrets of the year, Sony finally announced their "first-of-its-kind" 3D online user community service for the PS3 at GDC overnight. The new service - Home - is scheduled for a world-wide release "later this year". Users will be able to create their own avatar, and then explore a real-time virtual community (similar to a sort of detailed 3D PS3 game). On the surface, it's a sort of... non-cartoon Mii meets Second Life meets Xbox Live.

Home was a key element of SCEI Worldwide Studios' President Phil Harrison's keynote presentation - "Game 3.0: Developing and Creating for the 3rd Age of Videogames" - and we've got a shiny video, just for you.

It seems that finally, PS3 users can interact, communicate, share private content, join online games, shop and even build and show off their own "personal spaces" to others in real time, with this online 3D networked community, using the PlaystationNetwork. Home will be a free download from the PlaystationStore, and can be launched directly from XMB (XrossMediaBar) on PS3.

"This is about the connected device," said Phil Harrison, SCE Worldwide, as he introduces his concept of Game 3.0 in his keynote speech at GDC. "We want the entire game community to add to this and build on this. It's not something that we want to claim as a copyright or a trademark. It's about community; it's about collaboration; it's about customization. It's about emergent entertainment powered by the audience—with the audience at the center of this universe."

Avatar creation, social interaction, Hall of Fame

Each avatar is uniquely customised to each user's specifications (similar to the chargen process of many MMORPGs - choose from variations of skin and hair colour, body type, and various clothing options), and can then be used to expore the 3D community that is Home - a modern, sleek environment featuring expansive common areas featuring various casual games, as well as personal apartments and custom spaces dedicated to specific PS3 titles. By becoming a Home user, you'll be given an apartment - and you can invite others to join you there as you display your own style, with furniture and art - and even by changing the view from outside your window. Use the media stored on your PS3 hard drive to display video and pictures in your apartment, and communicate with others through built-in text, audio and video chat (a USB keyboard and microphone headset would be a good investment), as well as "sophisticated emotional animations" for each character.

Home is big on sharing, in case you hadn't picked that up. Another way you can share is through the Hall of Fame - display 3D trophies you've unlocked through in-game milestones you own - and view trophies of other users across the network.

"This is a significant step forward in the area of user community services and emergent entertainment experiences," said Izumi Kawanishi, Corporate Executive and CTO Software, SCEI. "While the 3D graphics demonstrate the power of PS3 and the PLAYSTATION Network, the most impressive feature in Home is the variety of ways in which multiple consumers, as well as our third-party partners, can experience the next generation of communication by interacting and sharing among each other. I feel strongly that this unique blend of community, user-generated content, collaboration and commerce will expand the future of computer entertainment."

Sports casual games, PSP interaction, Personal Space

Sony is working with a broad range of business partners for Home - third-party publishers and developers as well as brands not commonly associated with traditional gaming categories - which combined with the powerful selection of upcoming PS3 game software titles, suggest that the company will expand the horizons of networked entertainment, and vigorously promote PS3 as the next-gen computer entertainment platform.

This "spring" (read: Australian autumn) will see a Home closed beta test, and the full launch of the product is targeted for later this year (and yes, we'll believe it when we see it).