La Playstation formidable?

And here, in the wilderness of the internet, we can see grainy footage of the species, that many of us expect will beckon in a new age of couch-based gaming.

This beast has been in hibernation for a long time. Few have stumbled upon this elusive animal, and we had sketchy reports of its capabilities, but nothing was confirmed until this new footage was found. Now, hunters, there is something new to mount on your next-gen desk, beside your Wii-U – the Playstation 4.

The really bad David Attenborough impersonation aside, the biggest gaming announcement of last week is that of Sony’s latest console – their entrant to the world’s 8th generation console championship. Despite the announcement, there’s still quite a lot we don’t know about the PS4 – but what we do know is interesting. There seems to be a move away from unique console-oriented architecture (such as the Cell processors of the PS3) and a move towards more PC-ish hardware, such as x86_64 cores. The widely-touted reason for this change is because the games are developed on the PC anyway, and swapping between architectures is a waste of time and money. Why not just build on a PC, for a slightly altered PC? Both CPU and GPU are AMD-supplied, and are backed up with 8GB of RAM – 16 times as much as the PS3, and 8 times as much as Microsoft’s Xbox360. As with the departing generation, we’ve been told that there’s sizeable internal storage in the PS4, which is good, as one of the latest news snippets is that all games available on the PS4 will be available as a direct download. Kinda Steamy-ish, I guess.

Images and prototypes for the new DualShock controllers are out, and they’ve kept the style of the older DualShock controllers, added some rounded bits from the Xbox controllers, and thrown on a capacitative touch screen on the front, a la Wii-U and PS Vita (sort of). I really like where this new controller is heading, with a 3.5mm audio jack (something I severely hate companies for not already doing), but also a mono-speaker on the back.

With regards to the button layout, it’s the normal configuration when it comes to playing games, but the Start and Select buttons (of the 90s) have gone the way of the Dreamcast, and been replaced by a single 360-esque ‘Options’ button. Added to the controller, however is a new ‘Share’ button, which ties in the some of the new online features promised by Sony.

You’ll now be able to watch your friends playing on their console, online through a stream (kinda like a built-in Twitch service) and you’ll be able to stream games directly – it looks like neither Sony nor nVidia got the OnLive memo. At least it saves on internal memory.

There are a few things which are unclear (especially due to Sony’s liberal breaking of promises (see: ‘Other OS’ of PS3)) such as the use of pre-owned games. There’s still quite a market out there (especially if the games are still ~£40), as a lot of people like to sell on their completed games, when they’ve milked it for all the trophies you can get. Sony has continued to be a little vague, with cryptic messages along the lines of ‘We’ll do what’s best’ (I’m imagining a Fagin-like Sony representative, and a sly wink). Well, best for whom? It’ll all come down to the vast amounts of scaremongering, and latest draconian DRM, so I can’t see it working out well for the second-hand market, I’m afraid. I actually want to be wrong though.

Unusually for a game-based device, the PS4 is said to ship with the new Playstation Eye (now with two cameras) and a variable-colour light-bar on the top of the controller, for use as a PS Move – style device. They’re not making you pay extra for these bits – they’re included (well, they are making you pay extra, but hidden away in the original price, rather than an extra purchase, a few months after release.)

Release games are a little hand-wavey at the moment. As with Nintendo always bringing a Super Mario title upon release, Sony’s bringing out a new Killzone for the PS4, but most importantly – Watch Dogs! As you might have noticed, I’m quite a PC-oriented guy (and also an equal-opportunities employer), but I feel pumped by what’s been happening with the development of the PS4, and I like the shape of things to come.