Sony PlayStation 5 OT - Play Has No Limits, update: financial report indicates no major first-party/exclusive PS5 releases prior to end of March 2025, PS5 in "latter half" of console cycle

[Dre801]

It's apparently a massive system in terms of sheer size.

[DarkStar189]

No way I would pay $699 for the console. I could afford it but definitely wouldn't see the value in it. I think $549 is my limit, but even that is pushing it.  I'm guessing $499 for all digital and $549 for disc drive. Sony could afford to sell the console at a loss. They will make up for it with PS+ subscriptions. 

[Nokt]

16 minutes ago, DarkStar189 said:

No way I would pay $699 for the console. I could afford it but definitely wouldn't see the value in it. I think $549 is my limit, but even that is pushing it.  I'm guessing $499 for all digital and $549 for disc drive. Sony could afford to sell the console at a loss. They will make up for it with PS+ subscriptions. 

I don't think I'd bite for anything over $499, $549 is pushing it for me.

[Xbob42]

I asked this hypothetical on Discord, but I am curious as to what people think, and yes, it's just that, a hypothetical, obviously this won't happen: Assuming MS' gaming division got the blessing of the main company and just straight up sold the Series X at a price like $299, something Sony really couldn't afford to match, what do you think Sony's response would be? What would your response be?

[Brian]

Depends on the price point. Sony launches $399/$499 then nothing. Sony launches $499/$599 then Sony adds cheap value like PS Plus, PS Now, and/or a Sony game.  

[Xbob42]

What if Sony launches at $699?

[Brian]

Jim Ryan strikes me as an arrogant man so no price cut at launch. After it flounders, a price cut ($50-100) before its first big release which is probably Demon’s Soul. 

[DarkStar189]

@Xbob42 I can't say for sure what Sony would do.  So far they have been coasting along, releasing information a little bit at a time.  If MS announced an extremely low price I imagine Sony would have to get off their ass and really target the mainstream. Really convince people why their super fast hard drive is worth the higher price.

As for my response?  I probably still wouldn't get an Xbox.  When I go to my Library on PS4, I have 368 games tied to my account.  Some of those could be remnants of disc based games I don't have anymore but I've been all digital the last couple years.  Some of those are also PS+ games that were given out but my point is, I have a ton of games tied to my name and I'm not just going to dump it and start new on Xbox.  

[crispy4000]

1 hour ago, Xbob42 said:

Anyone who hasn't watched this yet, like I hadn't until a few days ago, needs to do so. It's not just about nice reflections or fancy lights, it's about how everything interacts with the world, which explains why it's such a huge hit to performance. But seeing the functional camera obscura they just casually built was amazing in a way nothing else in years has been for me. The only thing that felt "next-gen" like this in the PS5 presentation for me was the Ratchet and Clank transitions, which were a lot of fun, even if the multi-second buffers between dimensions were a far cry from "zero load times," it was still dramatically faster than anything we've seen lately.

 

I hope consoles are able to use some ray tracing in selective ways to incorporate it not just into visuals, but into actual gameplay. It doesn't take a genius to watch that Minecraft video and start seeing multiple ways the lighting and reflections could be used in puzzles or, for a game like Minecraft, how you design whatever you're building, which I think is an incredible testament to the tech. If consoles can keep using a select bit of the tech, then I'm confident PC versions could use it more expansively on more surfaces or whatever. Consoles REALLY need to use it though to keep its development (and development tricks/shortcuts) progressing until the next generation. Almost wish these things had been pushed out until AMD's second-gen stuff just so it'd have a lot more power and refinement under the hood.

As exciting as the tech is, we’re probably not accustomed enough to recognize RT at a glance most AAA games.  In Minecraft it’s easy to see, because the visual fidelity otherwise takes a backseat.  But hypothetically, if Horizon 2 employed RT lighting in the way Metro Exodus does, I don’t think many people could just eyeball it to know.  Especially not from a first trailer.
 

You also kind of need a game designed to show it off too: organic landscapes aren’t going to create as stark of an impression as cityscapes with tons of shiny surfaces.
 

It makes the whole ‘is it next gen enough’ question kind of unanswerable by RT.  I think we’ll recognize it more by the combination of elements rather than what Minecraft dials it up to.

[JPDunks4]

I intended to get both XSX and PS5 at launch, assuming both are $500.  If both are more expensive, I'll probably go XSX first, then a PS5 when a bundle hits or price drops a bit.

 

Their Backwards Compatibility right now still isn't clearly laid out which is actually a pretty big reason I want the console, to play all the PS Exclusives I haven't played yet, which is most of them, on the better hardware with hopefully  "Boost Mode" helping performance.

 

The launch lineup itself doesn't seem that strong, but I may need to revisit launch dates.  Main games that interested me in the showing was HZD2, Demon Souls, and both of them seem to be at least a year away still.

 

They also haven't mentioned if Last of Us 2 or Ghost of Tsushima will be updated on PS5 and given to owners for Free.  

 

Those are all pretty big things that would dictate how quickly I pick up the PS5.

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

56 minutes ago, Xbob42 said:

I asked this hypothetical on Discord, but I am curious as to what people think, and yes, it's just that, a hypothetical, obviously this won't happen: Assuming MS' gaming division got the blessing of the main company and just straight up sold the Series X at a price like $299, something Sony really couldn't afford to match, what do you think Sony's response would be? What would your response be?

Sony would just position the PS5 as a "premium product" in juxtaposition to the Xbox Series X which they'd frame as a "peasant product".  I'm trying to be flippant - that's very much a valid, proven marketing strategy in many industries (think Apple vs Everyone Else).

 

As for my response, there is no impact at all: I purchase both consoles because I can certainly afford it

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

[Xbob42]

25 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

As exciting as the tech is, we’re probably not accustomed enough to recognize RT at a glance most AAA games.  In Minecraft it’s easy to see, because the visual fidelity otherwise takes a backseat.  But hypothetically, if Horizon 2 employed RT lighting in the way Metro Exodus does, I don’t think many people could just eyeball it to know.  Especially not from a first trailer.

I think it wouldn't be too difficult. Reflections alone (mirrors and water are both very common in games) would be hugely noticeable. Reflections have sucked for years now. Like, sucked hardcore. Screen space reflections are rare to begin with and usually look like shit and cut off at the edges of the screen to boot. Turning off SSR in Resident Evil 2, for example, actually makes the game look better.

 

Shadows would definitely be far nicer and more organic looking, but yeah, on a casual glance at a trailer you'd likely not notice. But colored lighting mixing and matching and bouncing off of surfaces creates a far better looking scene that I think most people would notice. Maybe not directly like "That! That's the ray tracing!" but "Wow, this looks really nice." which is what most visual upgrades boil down to when it comes to casual consumers. Everyone noticed Clank's reflections, after all, although reflections are the easy bit to spot.

 

22 minutes ago, Emperor Diocletian II said:

Sony would just position the PS5 as a "premium product" in juxtaposition to the Xbox Series X which they'd frame as a "peasant product".  I'm trying to be flippant - that's very much a valid, proven marketing strategy in many industries (think Apple vs Everyone Else).

 

As for my response, there is no impact at all: I purchase both consoles because I can certainly afford it

This was my initial thought as well, figure MS could get in front of that by showing some absurd price like "Originally, we were considering charging $799 for this machine, eventually we got that number down to $599." and then they could frame it as them doing a favor for everyone: "But with recent events being what they are, we realized people might simply not be able to afford even that. We needed to do something more drastic. How could could we get a machine this powerful in the hands of the players for cheap? Well, in the end there was only one way: We'd sell at a loss. The Xbox Series is a machine worth nearly a thousand dollars, but starting this Holiday Season, you can have one for just $299. Hashtag BlackLivesMatter."

A bit of an absurd setup, but I like thinking about what competition could look like if these companies were really going for each others' throats instead of kind of tepidly waiting for the other to make a move and then making a light jab while doing basically the same thing.

[crispy4000]

50 minutes ago, Xbob42 said:

I asked this hypothetical on Discord, but I am curious as to what people think, and yes, it's just that, a hypothetical, obviously this won't happen: Assuming MS' gaming division got the blessing of the main company and just straight up sold the Series X at a price like $299, something Sony really couldn't afford to match, what do you think Sony's response would be? What would your response be?

Neither will price at Switch’s level without significant cutbacks.  If it was $299, I’d wonder what the catch was, and why they’re charging so much less than they did the current gen.

[Xbob42]

1 minute ago, crispy4000 said:

Neither will price at Switch’s level without significant cutbacks.  If it was $299, I’d wonder what the catch was, and why they’re charging so much less than they did the current gen.

What if their answer was "Because we have the money to kill Sony?"

[Bacon]

1 minute ago, Xbob42 said:

What if their answer was "Because we have the money to kill Sony?"

They would fail. People want HZD, TLOU, Spider-Man, GOW, and Demon's Souls. Even if PS5 has shit numbers at launch, it would probably pull another ps3 and just sell well later. 

[crispy4000]

9 minutes ago, Xbob42 said:

I think it wouldn't be too difficult. Reflections alone (mirrors and water are both very common in games) would be hugely noticeable. Reflections have sucked for years now. Like, sucked hardcore. Screen space reflections are rare to begin with and usually look like shit and cut off at the edges of the screen to boot. Turning off SSR in Resident Evil 2, for example, actually makes the game look better.

 

Shadows would definitely be far nicer and more organic looking, but yeah, on a casual glance at a trailer you'd likely not notice. But colored lighting mixing and matching and bouncing off of surfaces creates a far better looking scene that I think most people would notice. Maybe not directly like "That! That's the ray tracing!" but "Wow, this looks really nice." which is what most visual upgrades boil down to when it comes to casual consumers. Everyone noticed Clank's reflections, after all, although reflections are the easy bit to spot.

In highly edited cinematic trailers it’s almost always going to be harder to tell.  Some effects could be ramped up there and not in gameplay too.
 

I was actually pretty happy to see extended Ratchet and GT7 gameplay snippets for that reason.

 

Actually that’s a good test, since you claim this isn’t so hard  ... what extent of RT does GT7 incorporate?

[Xbob42]

Just now, crispy4000 said:

In highly edited cinematic trailers it’s almost always going to be harder to tell.
 

I was actually pretty happy to see Ratchet and extended GT7 gameplay snippets for that reason.

 

Actually that’s a good test, since you claim this isn’t so hard  ... what extent if RT does GT7 use?

I was barely conscious for that boring ass trailer, but I remember a car being revealed from some mirror-like box or something that had a lot of reflections on it, so I assume that was ray traced. I literally don't remember much else from the trailer besides that horrendous main menu though, and too much pure driving with nothing else going on.

[crispy4000]

5 minutes ago, Xbob42 said:

I was barely conscious for that boring ass trailer, but I remember a car being revealed from some mirror-like box or something that had a lot of reflections on it, so I assume that was ray traced. I literally don't remember much else from the trailer besides that horrendous main menu though, and too much pure driving with nothing else going on.

Shadows?  Lighting?  You can rewatch it on YouTube.

[crispy4000]

15 minutes ago, Xbob42 said:

What if their answer was "Because we have the money to kill Sony?"

They can’t even kill Apple desktops.

[Xbob42]

10 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

Shadows?  Lighting?  You can rewatch it on YouTube.

I'm definitely not going to watch it again because I don't care about GT to begin with, but I also remember a lot of shadows hitting the dash nicely, so that could've been ray traced, could've also been baked. When it comes to just regular ass lighting and shadows we've got the fakery down fairly decently, so it makes for a poor example, and the less control a player has over the lighting, the easier it is to fake it looking really nice with baked stuff.

When it comes to things like colors blending off of bounced lighting from colored surfaces and shadows having multiple levels of brightness depending on said bounces, that's where the fakery stops working so well, quadruply so when the player can interact with any of that.

So yes, there will be games where it's very obvious, and games where it's very subtle. As I said, the same as any other graphical effect.

 

But it's also not about "recognizing it at a glance," although when it's very dramatic and stark, you can without a doubt do just that. That's why Minecraft makes a way better presentation than Metro Exodus. Control as well, which looks like a next-gen game compared to RTX being off. Even in its subtle form it's about just making the lighting and shadows in a game look tremendously better, as in more natural and accurate. Maybe you won't notice like maybe you won't notice a wide color gamut or full 4k resolution or better LoDs, but in the end I think that's totally fine. They're all working together to immerse you in a world better and if you're not actively thinking about the visuals (good or bad) then for many games that's a huge plus.

 

But then you also have super accurate reflections that you know in an instant are ray traced because our reflection tech has been absolutely fucking trash for decades.

[Xbob42]

6 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

They can’t even kill Apple desktops.

Yeah but Sony's so much smaller than Microsoft. I always find it a little weird that they don't try to compete at a higher level while leveraging their tremendous wealth. Guess they gotta keep their losses in check and obviously you're not gonna find many companies wanting to throw away tons of money just to beat down the competition, but they always seem to just compete at the same level or lower, like the fucking Zune.

[crispy4000]

11 minutes ago, Xbob42 said:

I'm definitely not going to watch it again because I don't care about GT to begin with, but I also remember a lot of shadows hitting the dash nicely, so that could've been ray traced, could've also been baked. When it comes to just regular ass lighting and shadows we've got the fakery down fairly decently, so it makes for a poor example, and the less control a player has over the lighting, the easier it is to fake it looking really nice with baked stuff.

When it comes to things like colors blending off of bounced lighting from colored surfaces and shadows having multiple levels of brightness depending on said bounces, that's where the fakery stops working so well, quadruply so when the player can interact with any of that.

So yes, there will be games where it's very obvious, and games where it's very subtle. As I said, the same as any other graphical effect.

 

But it's also not about "recognizing it at a glance," although when it's very dramatic and stark, you can without a doubt do just that. That's why Minecraft makes a way better presentation than Metro Exodus. Control as well, which looks like a next-gen game compared to RTX being off. Even in its subtle form it's about just making the lighting and shadows in a game look tremendously better, as in more natural and accurate. Maybe you won't notice like maybe you won't notice a wide color gamut or full 4k resolution or better LoDs, but in the end I think that's totally fine. They're all working together to immerse you in a world better and if you're not actively thinking about the visuals (good or bad) then for many games that's a huge plus.

 

Right now, it is all about first impressions though. We’re being marketed to, and expect to see something that looks next level.

 

I actually think we got there with Sony’s presentation at a few points.  Just not in a way that tries to impress as Control or Minecraft does.  Shoving RT in our faces to where it’s obvious isn’t the only way to leave an impression on what these consoles can do.

[Keyser_Soze]

45 minutes ago, DarkStar189 said:

@Xbob42 I can't say for sure what Sony would do.  So far they have been coasting along, releasing information a little bit at a time.  If MS announced an extremely low price I imagine Sony would have to get off their ass and really target the mainstream. Really convince people why their super fast hard drive is worth the higher price.

As for my response?  I probably still wouldn't get an Xbox.  When I go to my Library on PS4, I have 368 games tied to my account.  Some of those could be remnants of disc based games I don't have anymore but I've been all digital the last couple years.  Some of those are also PS+ games that were given out but my point is, I have a ton of games tied to my name and I'm not just going to dump it and start new on Xbox.  

 

I'm the opposite. I have plenty of disc and digital games going back to the 360 which I could play all on the XboxSex.

I mean I have a good handful mostly of digital games going back to PS3 but I don't play the playstation nearly as much. I don't play either nearly as much to be honest.

[crispy4000]

23 minutes ago, Xbob42 said:

Yeah but Sony's so much smaller than Microsoft. I always find it a little weird that they don't try to compete at a higher level while leveraging their tremendous wealth. Guess they gotta keep their losses in check and obviously you're not gonna find many companies wanting to throw away tons of money just to beat down the competition, but they always seem to just compete at the same level or lower, like the fucking Zune.

Microsoft couldn’t even self-sabotage themselves behind the Wii U this gen with their massive early blunders.  Sony’s console brand is in a similar too big to fail position, IMO.
 

I think Microsoft would sooner kill Nintendo than Sony with a price move like that.  And that’s not an easy feat either, with how Nintendo rallies back from failure.
 

I think they’d also need games that can only be played on their box to do it.  Not PC too.

[Firewithin]

Gta V is the new skyrim.  Will be in ever new generation forever now

[JPDunks4]

49 minutes ago, Xbob42 said:

Yeah but Sony's so much smaller than Microsoft. I always find it a little weird that they don't try to compete at a higher level while leveraging their tremendous wealth. Guess they gotta keep their losses in check and obviously you're not gonna find many companies wanting to throw away tons of money just to beat down the competition, but they always seem to just compete at the same level or lower, like the fucking Zune.

 

Keep in mind, launch of Xbox One, the Xbox Division wasn't nearly in the position at Microsoft as it is today.

 

Phil Spencer was promoted to Microsofts Executive Leadership Team in 2017.  After that, I think he finally got Microsoft to be willing to open their pocketbooks a bit more for the Xbox Division.  They stared buying up studios to bolster their 1st party after that.  

 

This will be the first new generation with that shift within Microsoft, and that is probably why Phil has said that Microsoft is giving him the wiggle room on price.  

 

I think Microsoft is clearly coming into this gen way more confident and ready to compete. 

[Keyser_Soze]

I find it humorous that Sony was the company that poo poo'd Xbox One for (wanting) to be nearly all digital and then they release a PS5 that is digital only.

[crispy4000]

13 minutes ago, Keyser_Soze said:

I find it humorous that Sony was the company that poo poo'd Xbox One for (wanting) to be nearly all digital and then they release a PS5 that is digital only.

Does it even matter when a physical media option still exists?  And discs aren’t tethered to a specific console? 

 

They’ve also been toying with the idea of digital only since the PSP Go technically.

[Keyser_Soze]

29 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

Does it even matter when a physical media option still exists?  And discs aren’t tethered to a specific console?

 

Yes.

[Dre801]

1 hour ago, Firewithin said:

Gta V is the new skyrim.  Will be in ever new generation forever now

I'd be more OK with it if the expansions they mentioned were for the single player(since we never got single player DLC for GTA V), but it seems that the expansions are for the online stuff. Oh well.

[gamer.tv]

5 hours ago, Brick said:

I honestly do not understand how it's in the Top 10 selling games each month still. 

 

It's something to do with new copies coming with significant in-game currency. It works out cheaper to buy a new copy of the game, rather than buy them from a console online store. At least I think that's the case, since I assume by this point, everyone that wants to, must have played GTAV by now. 

[SimpleG]

9 minutes ago, gamer.tv said:

 

It's something to do with new copies coming with significant in-game currency. It works out cheaper to buy a new copy of the game, rather than buy them from a console online store. At least I think that's the case, since I assume by this point, everyone that wants to, must have played GTAV by now. 

I have heard that too but I cant find any real info on it.

[crispy4000]

5 hours ago, Keyser_Soze said:

 

Yes.

Why?

[legend]

11 hours ago, Xbob42 said:

Right?

Anyone who hasn't watched this yet, like I hadn't until a few days ago, needs to do so. It's not just about nice reflections or fancy lights, it's about how everything interacts with the world, which explains why it's such a huge hit to performance. But seeing the functional camera obscura they just casually built was amazing in a way nothing else in years has been for me. The only thing that felt "next-gen" like this in the PS5 presentation for me was the Ratchet and Clank transitions, which were a lot of fun, even if the multi-second buffers between dimensions were a far cry from "zero load times," it was still dramatically faster than anything we've seen lately.

 

I hope consoles are able to use some ray tracing in selective ways to incorporate it not just into visuals, but into actual gameplay. It doesn't take a genius to watch that Minecraft video and start seeing multiple ways the lighting and reflections could be used in puzzles or, for a game like Minecraft, how you design whatever you're building, which I think is an incredible testament to the tech. If consoles can keep using a select bit of the tech, then I'm confident PC versions could use it more expansively on more surfaces or whatever. Consoles REALLY need to use it though to keep its development (and development tricks/shortcuts) progressing until the next generation. Almost wish these things had been pushed out until AMD's second-gen stuff just so it'd have a lot more power and refinement under the hood.

 

Potentially if we get another mid cycle refresh that could help keep console devs pushing on ray tracing tech. 

 

11 hours ago, Xbob42 said:

I asked this hypothetical on Discord, but I am curious as to what people think, and yes, it's just that, a hypothetical, obviously this won't happen: Assuming MS' gaming division got the blessing of the main company and just straight up sold the Series X at a price like $299, something Sony really couldn't afford to match, what do you think Sony's response would be? What would your response be?

 

Wouldn't change my decision. I'm extremely happy that MS is putting such an effort into making all their games available on PC going forward, but for me that just means I have no reason to get an Xbox. Whereas PS5 will have exclusives I cannot play on PC.