Having gorged itself to satiation on videos of your ears, PlayStation maker and digital anatomy house Sony has announced it now wants your entire body. Or, well, the entire body of the first winner of its just-announced Playerbase scheme, which will let some lucky son of a gun have their "likeness scanned and appear within a PlayStation game," starting with Gran Turismo 7.
It's actually quite an involved process. This isn't just "write your name on a raffle ticket and hope you get picked," Sony wants to subject you to something that sounds, I have to say, like a two-part job interview before putting you in the seat of a virtual racing car.
First, it wants you to apply and "answer a few questions about your experiences on PlayStation" on the Playerbase website. Also, "Players will also be required to sign in with their PlayStation account ID and share additional information to participate."
And then you get chosen and win? Not so fast, bucko. After reviewing the applicants, Sony will invite a shortlist of likely-looking gamers to "participate in video interviews to learn about them and their connection to PlayStation." They will probably ask you where you see yourself in five years, and the correct answer ought to be: "in Gran Turismo 7."
The single fan who impresses Sony's digital-essence hunters the most will be the ultimate winner. "One PlayStation fan will be selected to be featured in Gran Turismo 7 as part of The Playerbase, where they will have a special limited-time appearance as an in-game character portrait, similar to how characters are presented throughout the game." They'll also "help design a custom Fantasy Logo and a one-of-a-kind vehicle livery," which will be in the game forever and ever.
It'll all happen over the course of a day in a studio in Los Angeles, where the winner will also have their soul irreversibly ensnared in the PlayStation virtual chrysalis and placed into GT7.
This is not a one-off competition but the start of a whole thing. Going forward, Sony says it will spin up the Playerbase machine for future releases, with fans being digitally represented in other series in ways that "fit each game’s own style and world." Perhaps one day, you will be in Knack 3.
