Since its launch in Europe and the United States in November 2013, the Sony PS4 is about to reach its sixth year.
100 million units, this is the cumulative number of PS4 sales announced by Sony in July this year, and the third in Sony’s history. A game console with a sales volume of over 100 million.
Today, the new generation PS will open a new cycle for Sony gaming consoles.
On the evening of October 8, Sony officially announced, the next generation of consoles will be released at the end of 2020, the product name is confirmed as “PlayStation 5”.
The message itself is not surprising, after all, in the past few months, multiple sources have directed the release of Sony’s next-generation consoles to 2020, We have also summarized onePossible changes in PS5.
Now, we have put together some of the issues that everyone cares about, and some have already found the answer.
What does the PS5 look like?
The shape of the new mainframe is obviously a part of many people’s concerns. The design of the PS5 mainframe has also been broken.
In August of this year, The Dutch website LetsGoDigital has exposed a patented product with the Sony PS logo, and said that the device with a large V-shaped groove and surrounded by vents is the PS5 development machine.
Someone joked that Sony is paying tribute to the Roman numeral “V” of “5”.
The difference between “development machine” and “production machine” must be clarified here. Since many console games require 1-3 years of development time, some very large game cyclesIt will be longer, so host manufacturers will often provide developers with development equipment in advance to ensure that there is a sufficient game lineup after the new console is released.
Of course, since it is for development, just make sure that the hardware and production machine are the same, or use similar general-purpose hardware. As for the design, it will not be too much.
The PS4 development machine was much larger than the retail version, and it was closer to the original Xbox One.
▲ This is the PS4 development machine, the appearance and production version are significantly different.
Back to the picture just now, the more interesting news is still behind. An employee from Codemasters, a company in the dust series, said on Twitter that the machine is indeed a PS5 development machine because there is one in his office, and it is not long before the message is deleted.
In addition, Peter Rubin, the official editor of Wired, also got a close encounter with the PS5 development machine when he visited Sony Studio. He said that he saw the demo device “It’s very similar to the previously leaked pictures, which makes the picture more authentic.
However, even if we can clarify the appearance of the development machine, it is not the same as the final appearance of the production machine. What exactly does the PS5 look like? The answer may have to wait for Sony to reveal it.
How much better is the performance of the PS5 compared to the PS4?
In the PS4 period, Sony had a small hardware upgrade of the PS4 Pro. The biggest improvement is the support of 4K resolution and HDR effects, as well as better picture rendering of the original 1080p game.
However, PS4 Pro’s support for “4K games” is controversial. From the actual performance of the game, PS4 Pro does not have the full native 4K (ie 2160p) game running ability, Sony actually uses a kind of “checkerboard rendering interpolation technique that fills some pixels and then outputs them to a 4K TV To achieve close to “4K resolution” quality.
Comparing the loading speed of PS4 and PS5 mainframes, taking “Marvel” as an example, the former takes about 8 seconds, the latter takes only 0.8 seconds
Sony Chief System Engineer Mark Cerny also said in an interview with “Connect”, PS5 will The new SSD solid state drive will replace the original mechanical hard drive. This not only makes the game’s loading speed and rendering speed significantly improved, but also reduces the repeated reading of files, allowing developers to store more game content in the same storage space.
In addition, under the new graphics chip, the PS5 will also support hardware-level “ray tracing“. This feature, which is regarded as the future direction of visual technology, will have an impact on the game industry, and whether it can be more widely popularized with a new generation of game consoles, we will see the results in a few years.
▲ AMD has confirmed that Sony’s next-generation PlayStation mainframe will be equipped with Ryzen 3 processor designed by Zen 2 architecture and Radeon Navi custom graphics GPU based on 7nm process technology
Integrated with existing news, the specifications of the Sony PS5 mainframe are also roughly clarified. It will include a CPU/GPU chip customized by AMD, which supports up to 8K resolution picture output; and a unit that specializes in 3D sound effects, and Customized SSD solid state drives; optical drives support 4K Blu-ray movies, and single-disc capacity will also rise to 100GB.
It can be seen that the finer and more realistic images are still pursued by Sony’s game consoles. As long as we can distinguish the difference between virtual and realistic images, this kind of image-based technological progress will continue.
What changes will happen to the game experience?
In addition to the hardware level changes, Sony officially revealed a lot of new features of the PS5.
One of them is the handle controller. According to the official statement, the PS5 handle will be slightly heavier than the PS4’s DualShock 4, but still lighter than the battery-equipped Xbox One controller, where the L1/R1 two trigger keys will support different force presses and better built-in vibration. Motor and speaker.
In combination with these new features, the next generation of console games will also give players a stronger “immersion” – which is obviously not only for the picture and sound effects, but also for the improvement of touch and interaction, the key is still It depends on whether the game developers will apply these new functions to their games.
The “Connect” editor who played the real machine said that when you play the archery game, pressing and tapping the trigger button will bring about a completely different tension of the bow, and the subtle feeling on the touch will also be It is reflected in the different guns, such as the use of heavy machine guns and shotguns to fire, obviously there will be different trigger damping.
With a better vibration motor, the PS5 handle will be the same as the Joy-Con on the Switch, which will restore richer and more detailed feedback.
For example, in the GT Racing game, the concrete runway and the mud ground correspond to a kind of vibration feedback; while the game character walks on the ice,When the wooden bridge or sand is on the ground, the handle held by the player can also feel the corresponding tactile change.
Another change involving the gaming experience is the PS5 software system. According to Mark Cerny, the PS5’s physical games still need to be installed on the hard drive, but the new SSD solid state drive further simplifies the game’s installation data and makes the package more modular.
Based on this, players can choose which parts to install, such as only the content of single/multiplayer games, or more detailed chapter installation, and can delete the cleared levels at any time, saving More hard disk space.
▲ The game console system tends to emphasize simplicity and lightness, so as not to take up too much storage resources.
At the same time, the PS5’s system will also provide a more intuitive and convenient feature entry, which is very different from our original game habits.
In the past, players had to go through the process of “boot-select icon to enter the game-click to continue the game” before each game.However, on the PS5, you can directly select one of the levels in the single mode, or directly select the multiplayer mode.
Buy PS5, what about the original PS4 game?
For a long time in the past, there was an unwritten theorem in the game console, that is, games developed based on the new host cannot be played on the old host, but the game disk of the old host is rarely inserted directly into the new host. The CD-ROM is running normally, that is, it does not support “downward compatibility.”
The reason for this is hardware. Take Sony’s past four generations of PS hosts as an example. Almost every generation of processor architecture is different from the previous generation. There are only two options for achieving compatibility with older games.
One is an integrated chip that is plugged into an original host to achieve hardware-level support, but this will obviously increase the cost of the host; or it can be implemented by means of a simulator, but the stability and effect will be discounted. .
▲ “Fried rice” is also good or bad, a completely reset version like Resident Evil 2, or more sincerity than pure HD.
Of course, Sony or third-party developers also haveCommercial considerations. On every host of the generation, you can see all kinds of old games with the slogan “HD reset version” and “Reissue”. Compared with “downward compatibility”, game developers are more willing to use the new engine to renovate those old high-selling works. Who is not willing to make more money and not have to bear the risk of developing new works?
However, this frequent “fried rice” situation should change in the next generation. What we can see is that from this generation, both Sony and Microsoft have chosen the X86 architecture similar to the PC platform, and the new consoles released in 2020 will continue to use custom chips from AMD.
▲ Microsoft’s “Down Compatibility has been very mature, and there are currently more than 250 Xbox 360 games that can be run directly on Xbox One
In the case of a consistently consistent architecture, “downward compatibility” will also be a lot easier. In short, even if you have a large number of physical PS4 game discs, you may be able to plug into the PS5 drive directly next year.
At present, Microsoft has indicated that next-generation consoles listed in 2020 will continue to implement the existing Xbox One backward compatibility strategy; The Sony development team also confirmed in an interview with Famitsu that the backward compatibility of the PS5 is still under development. Although 100% compatibility coverage is not guaranteed, the team will work hard to achieve this.
There are still many unknown issues, such as starting games and prices
The distance from the official release of the PS5 is nearly a year. Sony has plenty of time to do pre-publicity and warm-up, and certainly the introduction of the PS5 starting game lineup.
▲ There are rumors that the PS5 game that Bluepoint is remaking is Miyazaki’s early work “Devil’s Soul”
At present, the only news related to the PS5 game comes from the “Rework Professional” Bluepoint Studio, which has developed “Wanda and Colossus Remastered”. They have already indicated that they are developing a PS5 game. The reset of classic old works is not known.
According to the strategy of Sony’s host computer in the past, within 1-2 years after the PS5 is listed, we will definitely play a lot of PS3, PS4 re-enactment works, and some PS4 final 3A games such as Final Fantasy 7 reset. Version, Death Stranded, and Last Survivor 2 should also be re-visited on the PS5 platform in a cross-platform format to fill the early window period.
However, given the existence of the “downward compatibility” feature, these PS4 old games can be upgraded directly, or if the player wants to buy a new game again, it depends on Sony’s decision.
▲ The picture of traditional games is almost reaching the limit, but it has only just begun for VR
There are still some questions that Sony has not expressed, such as the emergence of new cloud games or subscription services? What new changes will PS VR have? With the built-in SSD hard drive, the PS5 will sell at the same price as the PS4 for $399, or will it rise further? It’s not good to make a conclusion now.
But there is no doubt that Sony will continue to follow the “high-performance host + exclusive game works” route in the PS5 era, and use the strong narrative game content comparable to the size of Hollywood film production to drive the sales of the host hardware, continue to attract those who yearn for The core player of a great gaming experience.
Source of the title: PlayStation