While development on the PlayStation 5 has likely been going on for years, Sony has officially confirmed that it's in the works and is on its way this year. It is expected to release holiday 2020 alongside the Xbox Series X, cost upwards of $450 or $500, and should be fully revealed sometime soon over the summer. Here's everything we know about the PS5 so far.
Sony has revealed the official design of the PS5, and it's looking futuristic and sleek. I'm not exactly sure what it resembles, but I can say I like it a lot more than the Xbox Series X. I can appreciate what Microsoft is offering, but a big, blocky console isn't all that eye-catching.
Yes. Like the Xbox One X all-digital edition, Sony is getting in on the fun with an all-digital edition of the PlayStation 5 that will not accept discs of any kind. If you want to play games, you'll need to download them directly to the console. It's unknown whether it will be less expansive than its sibling.
We don't know the cost for sure, but reports have indicated that Sony is struggling to keep the price down. Apparently, the PS5 cost $450 to make right now (it is unknown if this includes packaging and shipping) due to scarce supplies and a cooling system that is more expensive than usual. There is reportedly some debate within Sony whether or not the PS5 should be sold at a loss.
Others have speculated - and Sony itself even indicated as much - that the company is waiting to see what Microsoft will price the Xbox Series X at before committing to a price for the PlayStation 5.
The PlayStation 5 will release Holiday 2020. This coincides with the release of Microsoft's next Xbox console, Xbox Series X. There have been no publicly revealed delays due to COVID-19 as of yet.
Sony spoke exclusively with Wired about what fans can expect from the upcoming next-generation PS5.
According to PlayStation,, the CPU will be based on AMD's third-generation Ryzen line, with eight cores of the new 7nm Zen 2 microarchitecture. It will also apparently include a custom unit for 3D audio.
The GPU, which is a custom variant of Radeon's Navi family, will support ray tracing, which is a huge win for Sony. Ray tracing is a rendering technique that models how light travels and interacts with virtual objects. Wired notes that this is something Hollywood employs in big-budget movies, but it has not made its way to any video games consoles yet (although it's becoming more common with PC games).
To clarify whether or not ray tracing would be achieved on a software level or through built-in hardware integration, Sony confirmed the latter. "There is ray tracing acceleration in the GPU hardware," he said, "which I believe is the statement that people were looking for."
Ray tracing doesn't just deliver visual benefits, though, according to PlayStation. "If you wanted to run tests to see if the player can hear certain audio sources or if the enemies can hear the players' footsteps, ray tracing is useful for that," he said. "It's all the same thing as taking a ray through the environment."
The crème de la crème is that the PS5 will come packed with a solid-state drive (SSD) as opposed to an hard-disk drive (HDD). SSDs are historically more powerful, faster, and make for a much better gaming experience. Sony demonstrated what took 15 seconds to fast travel in Spider-Man on PS4 took only 0.8 seconds on a next-gen devkit. It will even support 8K graphics, though most people will likely have TVs that only deliver up to 4K resolution.
Because more simplified game data is possible through the use of an SSD, the way that game downloads work will differ from the PlayStation 4. On the PS5, downloads will be more configurable, and parts even removable. "Rather than treating games like a big block of data," PlayStation said, "we're allowing finer-grained access to the data."
This means that players could choose to download either the single-player or multiplayer portion of a game depending on what they wanted to play, or they could download the entire game and delete one part of it, like the single-player.
We still don't have exact number details on the PlayStation 5 specs, but we'll keep you updated on all new info. Here's how it stacks up against the Xbox Series X and PlayStation 4 Pro based on what we know so far.
What are the launch games on PS5?
Right now, only one PlayStation 5 launch title has been confirmed, a console exclusive game called Godfall. We know Bluepoint Games is working on a PlayStation 5 title but we don't know what it is or if it'll be a launch game.
Any other games that have been revealed for PS5 as of now are also releasing on PS4.
Outside of the launch titles, there's a decent list of games that have been confirmed for the PS5. Here's the full list that we know of:
PlayStation CEO Jim Ryan has stated that the PlayStation 5 will be backward compatible. Ryan even went so far as to see that the company plans to offer cross-generational play, where players can start a game on PS4, pick up where they left off on PS5, and hop back to PS4 if they wish.
"Whether it's backwards compatibility or the possibility of cross-generational play, we'll be able to transition that community to next-gen," Ryan said. "It won't be a binary choice about whether you have to be either on PlayStation 4 or next-gen to continue your friendship."
In a blog post, Sony clarified that it believes "that the overwhelming majority of the 4,000+ PS4 titles will be playable on PS5."
The next-generation PlayStation controller is officially called the DualSense. Sony revealed its design in a post on its blog. It features haptic feedback technology, adaptive triggers, a built-in microphone array, and a new Create button to replace the Share button.
To that end, there are two key innovations with the PlayStation 5's new controller. First, we're adopting haptic feedback to replace the "rumble" technology found in controllers since the 5th generation of consoles. With haptics, you truly feel a broader range of feedback, so crashing into a wall in a race car feels much different than making a tackle on the football field. You can even get a sense for a variety of textures when running through fields of grass or plodding through mud.
The second innovation is something we call adaptive triggers, which have been incorporated into the trigger buttons (L2/R2). Developers can program the resistance of the triggers so that you feel the tactile sensation of drawing a bow and arrow or accelerating an off-road vehicle through rocky terrain. In combination with the haptics, this can produce a powerful experience that better simulates various actions.
Though you shouldn't expect a new VR headset to launch alongside the PlayStation 5, Sony has big plans for virtual reality going forward. Sony Global Head of R&D for PlayStation Dominic Mallinson wants the next headset to be lighter, easier to put on, and have fewer cables. A fully wireless headset is difficult to put on the market right now because it would be more expensive for consumers, but he believes that is the way the market is trending.
Mallinson is excited about the possibilities of eye-tracking, and stated that he expects the resolution to almost double in future VR headsets, with FOV increased to over 120 degrees.
PlayStation System Architect Mark Cerny has also said, "VR is very important to us and that the current PSVR headset is compatible with the new console."
Sony has patented a new, wireless VR headset however you should still not expect this headset at launch alongside the PlayStation 5.
The user interface on the PlayStation 4 is fast and works well, but it's also static and can not provide a ton of information. The PS5 is set to change this.
"Even though it will be fairly fast to boot games, we don't want the player to have to boot the game, see what's up, boot the game, see what's up," PlayStation said. "Multiplayer game servers will provide the console with the set of joinable activities in real time. Single-player games will provide information like what missions you could do and what rewards you might receive for completing them-and all of those choices will be visible in the UI. As a player you just jump right into whatever you like."
Every week, the Jiggle Physics podcast brings you the latest news and hot takes from around the games industry with familiar co-hosts and special guests. We cover PlayStation, Nintendo, Xbox, and everything in between.
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