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Technically is "cross-game voice chat". This includes 2 persons playing 2 different games... or 1 person playing a game and the other in the XMB... or both in XMB
The feature is managed by the firmware (the games doesnt need anything special).
This obviously looks like a problem, because there are games that uses his own voice chat (a lot), and they dont need any special firmware function, all the comunications are managed by the game. So are like a 2 different voice chats
The difference between them is "cross-game voice chat" needs to be managed from "out" of the game... and the only solution is to use the "XMB in-game" menu (by pressing "PS" button while playing)
This "XMB in-game" is supposed to be a light version of XMB (in fact, is a module... or a plugin that can be turned on/off by the user when using his functions)
But "XMB in-game" is not "light" at all... usually is laged by the "main game process" (when you turn on "XMB in-game" from inside a game there is a "fight" between the game and the plugin... the one with bigger "priority" wins)
The point here is everybody that has used "XMB in-game" knows that is not efficient, and is obviously a ram problem, but psp was limited in ram in the same way, and there was problem with custom plugins always
In PS3 we dont have custom plugins, the only firmware i know was publically experimenting with this was JFW3.56... at beggining they added some kind of plugin and the first consequence was "XMB in-game" was completly broken (huge delays, hang ups when using his functions, etc)
It was not usable at all... so they decided to reduce the ram compsumption of "XMB in-game" (by removing some of his functions) and they achieved some kind of success with this
*I never installed this firmware, so i ignore the details
Sony can do the same process with "XMB in-game" and much better of course... lighter, faster, maybe with less options but eficient in one word
This is the huge bottleneck for plugins, and this "cross-game voice chat" we are talking can be considered a plugin
The last thing i need to say is this 2 flags i tolk before (the table in the wiki.... to disable "XMB in-game" and "disable chat") has not been used yet (or nobody found them)... but both seems that was implemented in firmware 2.40, so are old and there is a relationship between them (both frees ram)
The fact that has not been used yet makes them available for use them to other function (or a small variation of his original purpose)
I bet they have been using this flags while betatesting "cross-game voice chat" in debug network/s lot of time ago
For me this announce is a bit like a comfirmation that they are working in it... is too much coincidence to announce a feature that was required by the users months ago (look at oficial forums and blogs, lot of people complaining about it)
I wonder if it will be included in some of the new firmwares
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