PlayStation Home stands to become “an essential component for all PS3 games”, according to the service’s director.

Sony Computer Entertainment Europe’s Peter Edward predicted the online virtual world would become integral to future PS3 titles as the company continues to develop the service, Gamasutra reports.

“Home is the starting point for PlayStation 3 online, and that’s something that gamers are going to expect as more games support Game Launch from within Home,” he said. “This will become an essential component for all PS3 games.”

Edward’s comments came as download figures from the online service were released, showing Home now has 7 million users around the world, with 3 million in Europe.

While the SCEE exec mentioned the success of publishers that have made money from downloadable items, Edward was quick to point out this is not the primary function of Home.

“For Sony, revenue isn’t the main driver for Home,” he said. “We’re in this for the long term.”

Between them, Home users have downloaded over 6 million virtual items. Players have also demonstrated strong demand for content in the form of trailers and games, such as Red Bull’s free Air Race game, which has been played by over 873.000 unique users.

In-Home film campaigns have proved to be particularly successful with users clocking up 3.2 million visits to the special Watchmen are and free costumes based on the characters being downloaded 1.65 million times.

Similarly, the Star Trek campaign saw 450,000 costumes downloaded and 250,000 view of the trailer. In its first two weeks available, 125,000 people played the Transformers puzzle game.