Long Live Play PSN Community Spotlight

It’s a special Mother’s Day edition of the PSN Community Spotlight! The Spotlight, as usual, is powered by your stories on the PlayStation Community Forums, and is your chance to get your PlayStation story featured on the PlayStation.Blog. Remember, if your post is selected, you’ll be getting a $50 PlayStation Store voucher code.

Remember to read the posting best practices for more info.

My Mother, PlayStation, and Her First Journey
Last weekend, my mother had her first video game experience. My mother, aged 57, never really understood gaming. She saw gaming just as the mainstream media wanted her to. To her, and my father for that matter, games were only about brutally killing and stealing cars. With her slamming gaming for the majority of my life, I decided to finally counter back, and I began my research.

I tried to think of what game could show her that my passion wasn’t all about brutality and space marines. I wanted to let her play Portal 2, but the concepts were probably too complex for a first time gamer. After many thoughts and failed ideas, I finally realized the perfect game: thatgamecompany’s Journey.

Starting at 9:00AM on a beautiful Sunday morning, I pulled my mother aside and handed her a controller. I told her that I would not be helping her, and that she was free to do whatever she wanted in the game. The results were astounding. Even for a first time player, Journey’s narrative pulled her along, and she knew exactly what her goal was from the get-go. Though let it be known that the process of jumping was hard for her.

After the game finished and the credits rolled, she saw the list of players she met along the way. She didn’t realize that the other characters in the world of Journey were real people online, and she was stunned. She couldn’t believe that another player would help her through a world, come back for her when she fell, and hold her hand through some of the toughest areas. I snapped a picture of their names on my phone, so that I could send them a thank you message later.

Hours later, after my Mom had left, I typed a message to them on my Vita, which I then posted to the website Reddit. You can see the post here.

At the end of the day, it had 250,000 views, 3000 upvotes, and even a retweet from Jenova Chen and the official Twitter account of thatgamecompany!

My Mom’s first game experience not only was awesome for her, but also inspired many to buy Journey and play it for themselves. What an awesome Sunday.

So what are your thoughts on HarrisFoster’s story? Is your Mom cool with gaming, or is it something that she may never get into? Congrats to HarrisFoster, who is now the recipient of a $50 voucher redeemable in the PlayStation Store! Send in your stories here, and feel free to read HarrisFoster’s original post here, and lest we forget, Happy Mother’s Day!