Yesterday evening it happened.
If you couldn’t get to a computer or couldn’t stream it on your phone Sony held a much anticipated press conference announcing the Playstation 4 gaming system coming into homes HOLIDAY 2013 .
The 2 hour press conference touched on a lot of subjects regarding the PS4. One of them being the social interaction and sharing between players and the rest of the world. With us living in a time that we are sharing everything on social networks, Sony has made it that much easier. With the new system you will be able to share the last few minutes of your gameplay if you choose with just a press of a button. The button in question can be found on the new Dualshock 4 controller.
Each controller will have a touchpad in the center and also a colored sensory bar. What’s that for you ask? The sensory bar will tell the system where you are positioned in the room and how far away you are. It also works with this…..
This thing has been dubbed the PS4 Eye. The specs on this thing look pretty impressive for a gaming console camera:
External Dimension Approx. 186mm x 27mm x 27mm (width x height x depth)
(tentative)
Weight Approx. 183g (tentative)
Video Pixel (Maximum) 1280 x 800 pixel x 2
Video Frame Rate 1280×800 pixel @ 60fps
640×400 pixel @ 120fps
320×192 pixel @ 240fps
Video Format RAW, YUV (uncompressed)
Lens Dual Lenses, F value/F2.0 fixed focus
Capture Range 30cm~∞
Field-of-View 85°
Microphone 4 Channel Microphone Array
Connection Type PS4 dedicated connector (AUX connector)
Cable Length Approx. 2m (tentative)
Another thing they did touch on was Remote Play. Sony is wanting to concentrate on cross gameplay with the already existing PS Vita. Basically you would be able to play all your PS4 games (eventually) on the Vita with the PS4 acting like a server and the Vita becoming the client. Another interesting thing is the capability to use a tablet or smart phone to enhance the gameplay experience too. That sounds like a fantastic idea to me….especially if my kids end up wanting to take over my TV. Now the only question that stands with that is button configuration of some titles.
Buying and playing games from the Playstation Network will overhauled as well. As soon as you hit the purchase button you will be able to start playing your game while it downloads in the background. This is fantastic for gamers! Even though waiting wasn’t THE END OF THE WORLD, it sure as hell will be a pretty awesome to get to your gaming experience right away.
The hardware specs of the PS4 read like a super PC of sorts. This thing is a monster and will be significantly more powerful than the PS3. This bad boy boasts a X86 CPU, enhanced PC GPU, 8GB unified memory, local HD and GDDR 5 system memory. May not be too impressive for the hardcore PC gamer but it’s impressive for a home console.
Sony and various developers came up and talked about what we all wanted to hear: The Games! Gameplay footage of Killzone Shadow Fall was shown and also a trailer for Infamous: Second Son. The footage looked excellent and really showed what the system will be capable of. I for one am very excited! Blizzard stated that Diablo III will be released on the PS4, Square Enix said they are currently working on a new Final Fantasy game and Bungie will be releasing an Open World FPS called Destiny. Launch titles count immensely during the first year of sales from a business stand point and I think Sony pulled out some of the big guns. Now let’s see what game announcements they have up their sleeve for E3.
Now on to the “iffy” things:
A MAJOR strike for me is the fact that there will be NO backwards compatibility including existing PSN game purchases . As a business I can understand that you want the consumer to buy another system but gamers probably purchase 100’s of dollars on games themselves the least they could do would be to enable us to still play all game discs on one system. They did say that “emulation of the entire PlayStation line’s library of games will be possible at some point”. The words “at some point” makes it sound like they’re telling us “not any time soon”.
We haven’t seen the actual console at all and to be honest that’s understandable. I’m sure they’re looking at E3 to unveil the system but they should at least have given a price of the system. I’ve heard rumblings here and there of a $599 price tag which I’m hoping that’s just for the top tier console. It’s quite possible that Sony is still working out a pricing plan but here’s hoping that they make it a bit more affordable.
So, there you have it. The PS4 is now officially a reality. Will you be in line for the console this holiday season? I’m thinking I just might despite a few negatives.
If you want to see the announcement event yourself then I’ll add it down below:
Comments
Cant wait for the PS4 and some of the good games coming out.