- Hey y'all. Scott here. Big day for me. I finally bought a shoelace. It's really firm and on one
end we have a USB connector. That's pretty unique. And on the other end, oh, damn it. This always happens to me. The PlayStation 2 was
my mortal enemy in 2003. It was all about my GameCube back then when all my other friends
had these monstrosities with the things on the
bottom of the controller, and the DVD player and more games. And it didn't matter, okay? The GameCube was better. I was a kid. You really just wanted to
defend the stuff you had in comparison to your friends. It's all about feeling superior and that's what console
wars were all about. I don't need to do that anymore. I know I'm more than the
products I happen to own. I've grown up. I'm more mature and I don't need to resort to childish arguments when talking about why the Nintendo switch is better than the stupid (beep) X-Box One. However, even considering
my loyalty to the GameCube, there was one thing the PlayStation 2 had that made me consider adultery. The Eye Toy. Bet you weren't expecting
to hear that today. Three reasons to buy the PlayStation 2. One, two, three. Back when I was younger, the idea of being on a
television was insane. That was where "Nick
at Nite" goes, not me. Even just watching home
movies played back on the TV, felt like a special occasion. To see yourself on the screen
was such a cool experience. Stack that up with putting your
own content in a video game. I love the whole idea of
making my own video game outside of the act of
making my own video game. I squealed over in
depth character creators or stage builders, or
just having the ability to put more personal touches in a game to truly make it feel like your own. Couple these two desires together, and we have ourselves a product seven-year-old Scott
pointed out in the store. Eventually, I found a PlayStation 2 at a garage sale for $10. An Eye Toy at a game stuff for $2, and an Eye Toy game for one. I have never made back that investment. So the Eye Toy. It's a webcam. I'm not one to lie. It plugs into the PlayStation 2 via USB. You can adjust the angle. Adjust the focus. It's just a webcam for the console but with a little bit of love, you can use it as a
camera for your computer. You can use the Eye Toy
as a (beep) flashlight with two LEDs on the front. One blue to denote it's on, one red to tell you to
turn on some lights. Oh my God. And it also has a built in microphone. I've eaten things more
complicated than this. It's a no nonsense camera
for the PlayStation 2. And that's all it really is. There's a silver revision of it out there. And that's all there is to say about that. But you didn't buy an Eye
Toy for the bumper sticker, you bought it for the games. Well the Eye Toy itself wasn't
technologically advanced. It was all about how games utilized it. I mean, standard webcams
can do some crazy stuff. You ever use photo booth on max? Like humans made this? So let's see just how the
games utilize the camera. Let's put the GameCube in the closet. So it never has to witness
what I'm about to do. There were a total of 25 games
that required the Eye Toy, with only eight of them
releasing here in north America. Yes, officer, I have all the
north American Eye Toy games. Now there were a bunch of PS2
games that supported Eye Toy, but it was totally optional. And was just for putting your face in the game or extra
mini games, or whatever. The Eye Toy launched
on November 4th of 2003 over here in a box that
is (beep) terrifying. It's watching me. Alongside the camera, the game
Eye Toy play was included. So let's give this a try first. Eye Toy play will never die. It's one of those worthless PS2 games you always see at used game
stores and thrift shops going for the low, low
price of please take it. This is supposed to be a textbook
example of Eye Toy usage. A game that shows us what
Eye Toy is capable of. So what exactly can Eye Toy do? Nothing. Like I said, this is just a stupid webcam. The games do all the magic here. We get this introduction video to Eye Toy giving us the rundown
as to just what exactly we're supposed to do with this. Clear the space, step back a bit, put yourself in the center of the screen. If we want to close out of a game, cover up the camera to avoid the NSA. And it does state we can
technically cheat in Eye Toy games by standing relatively
close to the camera. But where's the fun in that? It's me. This is Eye Toy play. To select any options on a menu, you have to hold your
hand over and say goodbye. This is a collection of 12 mini games and they are as follows. "Beat Free." Bang to the beat. Makes me feel like a Neanderthal. "Kung Fu," a game that makes
you look like a (beep) nutcase to anybody entering the room. "Wishi Washi" clean the windows. (beep) yeah. "Soccer Craze," keep the
ball bouncing with your head. But the Eye Toy doesn't know what that is. So use any appendage. "Boxing Chump," just punch the air. Again, great for my reputation. "UFO Juggler," you juggle UFO's. Is there anything else to explain? Is there? "Slapstream." You see, I can go on for hours
talking some "Slapstream". But the PlayStation 2 froze while playing. "Plate Spinner," keep the plates spinning and from falling over. They are really stretching the definition of the word play here. "Disco Stars," it's Simon says. (beep) yeah. "Ghost Eliminator," rub ghosts. "Mirror Time," so with this one, you have to select all the good icons. But the game messes with the perspective to make it more difficult. Game design students take note. This is how you make an Eye Toy game. Finally, we have "Rocket Rumble." I gave up at this point. Eye Toy play. They really like this one. Most of the games, I got the
gist of under 30 seconds. And they went on for over two minutes. I know I'm gonna be seeing
a lot of people saying "Oh, (beep) did you hear what
Scott said about Eye Toy play? Doesn't matter, okay? I don't care about the backlash. It's my opinion. Well, let's try out Eye Toy groove. Maybe this will make
better use of the Eye Toy. It's "Beat Freak," it's Beat Freak! I mean, if you really wanted
a rhythm game for this thing, which equates to you just
moving your hands around, I mean, this does the trick. But you already sort of
got this thing in the game packed in with the Eye Toy. How about "Sega Superstars?" Hey, you know, it's
"Sega Superstars Tennis" and "Sonic and Sega All-stars Racing." That series actually
started as an Eye Toy game. And what better way to
get somebody comfortable with the peripheral? We'll they've got ChuChu Rockets here. Then I've got to trust it. "Sega Superstars" is, let's
see, I got a tattoo of this because I'm gonna be saying this a lot and I have to remember it. An Eye Toy mini game collection. 12 mini games based on Sega games. And we have a lot of variety here. "Sonic," House Of The
Dead," all bases covered. In the "Sonic" mini game, we move our hand around
to control Sonic running through the tunnel like the
rings in the chaos emeralds. Super Monkey Ball's a
bit more interesting. You have to tilt your body back and forth to go through simplistic
monkey ball courses. Honestly, this wasn't the worst. Now do I prefer this to a
regular monkey ball experience? "Samba de Amigo." Hope you didn't buy Eye Toy groove because I have bad news for you. "Virtua Fighter." Hope you didn't play "Boxing
Chump" on Eye Toy play. "Crazy Taxi." Oh man, we get to control the taxi. No, you have to grab the
attention of the taxi driver by going effing nuts. "House Of The Dead." Remember "Kung Fu" on Eye Toy play? Yeah, "Space Channel Five." Remember Disco Stars? ChuChu Rocket. Leave the bridge up for the Chuchus, lower the bridge for the Kapukapu. "Billy Hadger," his game
didn't make it to the PS2. So I hope this is good enough. "Virtua Striker." You can't have "Sega Superstars"
without "Virtua Striker." "Puyo Pop Fever." This one's actually pretty neat. You have to use your body
to guide puyo puyo pieces into the right colored area. This actually required
a bit more calibration than usual for the Eye Toy games and did a solid job detecting my body. "Knights." This is another fairly
impressive Eye Toy game. You have to position your
hands like you're flying to get through the level. I didn't really want to play much more than 30 seconds of this. But Sega, you made the Eye
Toy fans proud with this one. That was okay. It was fairly well-made. And I found it to be a lot
more fun than Eye Toy play. But I'm starting to see this trend where it feels like developers
only had like five ideas for Eye Toy games and they
all just made the same thing. Well, whatever Sega can do, Nickelodeon can sort of kind of do. "Nick Toons Moving." Yes, finally. I can be on screen with my
favorite Nickelodeon stars bowling and playing whack-a-mole. This is another Eye Toy
mini game collection. But this is obviously made
for a much younger audience. Not because it's based on
Nick Toons or anything, but because these games are
so simplistic and short. Like I'm done with these things
in under a minute sometimes. And the concepts are
basically whack-a-mole, fix the picture, move the ship. Most of the games worked fine, but there just wasn't anything to them. And they didn't feel that inspired by the shows they were based on. Like, oh yeah, we gotta
make a SpongeBob mini game for the Eye Toy, (beep) bowling. Well, Eye Toy play came
back with a vengeance. Here's Eye Toy Play 2. I can already tell this is a much more ambitious title than the original. The games here are far more complicated and don't just feel like,
wave your hands around and move your head. "Air Guitar." You actually have to hold your hands. like you're holding a guitar and strum and move your
hands when it tells you to. Could you imagine Eye
Toy Play 1 doing this? Could you imagine Eye
Toy Play 1 doing this? Like my God, they whipped
out the big guns for this. "Home Run." You act like you're hitting a baseball and run by realizing the
game's not working right. "Knockout," it's boxing
champ but with a twist. It's in Eye Toy Play 2. "Bubble Pop," pop the blue
bubbles, avoid the red ones. I bought this. "DIY," various mini games about doing down and dirty house work. Again, this shows how Play 2 is a lot more ambitious
than the first game, but "DIY" is not a game you're gonna say, "Finally, they made a game about this." "Drummin'," they made the
same games this many times. "Goal Attack," so the way this
game works is really bizarre. You have to stop soccer
balls from entering the goal. And it's not like the soccer game in Eye Toy play or something, no. You have to shift your
body left and right. And maybe sometimes you'll
do so in the actual game. This one didn't work well for me. "Secret Agent," so you
have to complete tasks without getting spotted or by
staying still in a spotlight. Honestly, this was a cute and
clever use of the Eye Toy. "Table Tennis," it's as raw as it gets. Playing table tennis with your bare hands. It's from the perspective
of your opponent, but it actually works pretty okay. "Kung 2," the long awaited
sequel to "Kung Fu." Which is to say it's "Kung-Fu" again. I mean, why change what
worked so well the first time? They saw the responses to Eye Toy play. "Mr. Chef," we have to
put burgers together and grate cheese. Next game. "Monkey Bars," we have
to choose which direction this thing should go in
to get to the bottom. This is fun. So probably my favorite part of this game was the secret agent portion. So let's give Eye Toy
"Operation Spy" a go. I had so many damn problems
setting this game up. It has to scan your face
to sign you in like a spy, but it barely worked. It kept flickering in and out. I'd get on the ground
up close to the camera. And when it wouldn't work, I'd get up and my head would
trigger the back button. And I had to go through
everything all over again. I mean, this is just a
little spy game, you know? Like those spy things out there for kids. Yeah, they made a game out of them. Actually, it seemed like
Sony was really pushing the Eye Toy as a security device. Kinda. Eye Toy Play 2 had this feature where you could leave the Eye Toy running as a security camera, and it would capture what
goes on in your living room. That'll scare off the burglars. Oh, (beep). He's got an Eye Toy. Well if anything, we can
repurpose the Eye Toy as a security camera. Two more games. Eye Toy Kinetic. It's a workout tool. Holy (beep). Really think I'm capable
of remembering this motion? I mean, this works, but the
fact that you can cheese the Eye Toy so much makes
using it as a workout tool, require a lot of self-restraint. Finally we have Eye Toy
Antigrav developed by Harmonix. All right, okay. It's a hover board racing game. really fitting in with the
rest of the Harmonix crowd. You don't even see yourself on the screen. You just control a racing
game with the eye Toy. So that is the entire north
American Eye Toy library. Now there's a lot more in Europe. Europe loves the Eye Toy. There are over 10 million
of these things sold which means it definitely didn't flop. But nobody talks about this thing. I think I know why. The concept was awesome but the execution, while it mostly worked, I think it left a lot to be desired. Like I said, it feels like they
only had a handful of ideas on how to use the Eye Toy. And developers just kept on repeating them in their own mini game collections. Many of these games just feel like variations of whack-a-mole. Move your hand in the right
place at the right time. And it's really easy
to fake out the Eye Toy and not actually do
what it wants you to do. It still has some charm to it all, but there is almost no reason
to play these games now. They are all so simplistic
and short and not that fun, that it just makes the Eye
Toy a relic from the past and not much else. But hey, I finally got the
Eye Toy out of my system. Which means I can finally focus
on just buying a shoelace. I went to the store To Be
Continued and I picked up, my shoes aren't ready for
this kind of commitment. (quirky electric modern music playing)
i fricking loved this thing as a kid I used to play that game where you would slap little dudes coming at you from the corners of the screen
The best EyeToy Play game will always be the window washing one. Nobody will ever tell me otherwise, that song will forever be in my head.
I used that bloody thing as my primary webcam right up until the PSEye was released.
I remember playing one of the EyeToy Play games and the best strat was just getting right up to the camera and waving your hand
Ah the EyeToy. A part of the ever growing list of PlayStation peripherals that a fair amount of people bought but no one ever talks about. And it's not even like a lot of those peripherals on that list are all that bad (I fucks with that PS Move. Wish it had more games.), it's just for one reason or another their peripherals are often forgotten about.
Something that will always stick with me is when it was coming out and EB Games had one to play. Some guy was playing the karate game and I walked by and got smacked in the face.
Good times.
Every so often I'm reminded of the eyetoy's existence when I rummage through my stuff. I Have two of them and I have no idea why I keep them. I dont even have the games anymore.
I still have memory cards with videos of me when I was 15 in 2003 making stupidly cheesy 10 second videos.
I got into Eye of Judgment, bought a couple boxes of cards. Made custom decks with extra cards I had, including whatever the term for the legendary cards was, and sold them on eBay. Game is still my ideal TCG, I just loved the positioning part, the grid, how cards kept their updated damage numbers (novel back then!), ranked online play. Shit was dope, the card game was just so well made.
My friends and I bought extra lamps to light up the board since the Eye Toy wasn’t great, and any shift in lighting in your room fucked it up, including your own shadows over the board.
Hilariously, the EoJ cards were recognized by the Eye through a pattern on each card, so yeah, people just started printing cards to make ideal decks instead of actually buying packs. The cards were nice, though. They just had a pleasing design or something. Still have my main decks in a drawer.
This is just one of a huge number of reasons why I think the PS2 is the best games console of all time. Just the best game library ever, the best half-way point between old-school easy-to-produce graphics and strict intense modern graphics standards, a really great and cheap controller, and an excellent DVD player.
The Xbox is close but the size of the console, the ridiculous original Duke controller, and the subjectively worse game library (no Final Fantasy, Ratchet & Clank, Metal Gear Solid, etc....) pull it back a bit. Here in the UK, the Xbox was like the "adults" PS2. If you were older and cooler you probably got that one whereas a lot of kids got the PS2. Obviously for the next generation this switched... The EyeToy being cheap and/or bundled is very indicative of this appeal to the younger audience
Another big boon for the PS2 (and also Xbox): it's hard as fuck to emulate, which lends an air of mystery to many games from this generation. I think that has led to the PS2 being relatively underrated, and games that haven't seen ports to modern systems have been mostly forgotten.