INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
As we enter the fifth year of the PlayStation 4's lifecycle, our minds can't help but turn to the PS5
Now, at time of writing, Sony hasn't confirmed it's working on a PlayStation 5 which means that even though we'd love to be able to say we
know there's a PS5 release date announcement coming soon, we just can't
It's actually quite difficult to guess when exactly we might get our first look at the PlayStation 5, but we reckon it's safe to assume
While we can't be sure exactly when the PS5 will be revealed or even announced, we know that a PlayStation 5 will be coming at some point
Sony's President and CEO, Shawn Layden, confirmed as much in an interview with Golem.de
Sure, he said it wouldn't be any time soon
But that's better than not coming at all![Update: We can now be absolutely sure that the PlayStation 5 won't appear at E3 2018 during Sony's
During his recent appearance on PlayStation Blogcast, Sony's Shawn Layden firmly said that there will be no new hardware announcements from
Instead, PlayStation is trying to refresh its approach this year and will be offering deep dives into four of its biggest upcoming games:
Death Stranding, Spider-Man, The Last of Us 2 and Ghost of Tsushima.]Although we're hideously impatient for news of a PlayStation 5, we
can't fault Sony for looking before it takes the leap into the next generation of consoles
After all, the PS4 Pro is still relatively new to the market and its direct competitor, the Microsoft's Xbox One X, is an even more recent
greater power and 4K capabilities to the market, mid-generation upgrades such as the PS4 Pro and Xbox One X have extended the lifespan of
imagine it'll be another couple of years at least before a PlayStation 5 is necessary, or even wanted, and recent rumors have suggested
can persist on the high-street shelves, the more profitable it becomes over time, as economies of scale reduce manufacturing costs, while a
large install base means publishers can sell more copies of their latest games.And as you might expect, the PlayStation 4 is still selling
digging to get to the bottom of the mystery that's kept us up at night: what is the PS5 and when is it coming outPS5 Release dateWith no
official word from Sony, it's difficult to know exactly when we might get to see a PS5, so all we have for the moment is the guesswork of
In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, analyst Damian Thong (who previously predicted the PS4 Pro and Slim) suggested that the
console would arrive in the latter half of 2018
Though this release seems very early, it's supported by a report in SemiAcccurate which claims that the number of developer kits handed out
Speaking to GamingBolt, Michael Pachter said that though he thinks the PS5 will be a half step and will be backwards compatible with the PS4
would fall in line with predictions for when the 4K TV market in the US will reach 50%
"I think Sony has probably got the next console cycle lined up already", he says, "I think they already know what they've got to do."More
recently Pachter reiterated this claim, saying that Sony would most likely release the new console in 2020
from Kotaku's Jason Schreier backs up this thinking
He spoke to a number of developers about likely release dates with most of the conversations pointing to a 2020 release
pretty thin on the ground at the moment
But, as always, we do have rumors and we've collected and assessed them right here.Eurogamer tech analysisA recent report from Eurogamer has
attempted to narrow down a possible release date based on when technologies advanced enough to justify a generational leap will be available
The most important things that will need to advance will be the console's processor and its memory and in both cases, Eurogamer has
determined that we're unlikely to see a new console released before the very end of 2019.Even if Sony did manage to push its console out at
this date, the cost of production would make the PS5 far too expensive, making it more likely that we won't see the console released until
Andrew House, has been speaking about what the next generation of consoles could look like at the GamesBeat conference recently
Though House refused to comment specifically on the PlayStation 5 itself, he did say that he believes physical discs will stick around for a
while yet as a result of the need to continue tapping into developing markets where downloadable titles may not be quite as compatible with
limited internet infrastructure
thinks the PS4 and the PS4 Pro still have a long life in them yet
This doesn't necessarily cancel out the rumors that the PS5 will be with us in the next one to two years; if the reports that the console
will be backwards compatible are true then the PS4 generation will remain relevant long into the lifecycle of the PS5
Regardless, given that House was unwilling to comment on the PS5 despite being pushed, these details can only be considered speculation at
the moment.The SemiAcccurate reportSemiAccurate (via ResetEra) is claiming that it's received some leaked information on the
yet-to-be-announced console and says that the number of dev kits which have been distributed suggests the console could be released in
in at the Silicon level, and will sport a GPU based on AMD's Navi architecture with a CPU that's potentially a custom item from AMD's Zen
line.Though SemiAcccurate has a decent track record with its reports, having accurately reported Nintendo's Nvidia partnership for the
Regardless of how many developer kits that Sony has distributed, it feels to soon after the release of the PS4 Pro for the next PlayStation
Besides that, now that we're four months into the year it doesn't feel like there's sufficient build-up time to the introduction of a new
Twitter recently (Via GameRant), alleging that PS5 development kits are already in the hands of third-party developers
He also claimed that Nintendo is planning a Direct stream for March 8 (something which has since proven to be accurate)
In fact, Sellars has been accurate with his claims a few times: recently he revealed Metroid Prime 4 was being developed by Bandai
Namco.However, Sellars didn't provide any evidence to back up his claims so they really can't be taken as anything more than rumor at the
Cyberpunk 2077 was being developed for current and next generation consoles which came as a great surprise to many
in the hands of developers, this doesn't mean the PS5 is coming any time soon
It could still be another couple of years before any kind of reveal.The patentSomething that does help Sellars case is a recently updated
patent for backwards compatibility that's been filed by Sony
PlayStation Plus newsThough there's been no official word from Sony on the development of a PlayStation 5 just yet, a recent announcement in
relation to the PlayStation Plus service has ignited some speculation
It's been announced that from March 2019, PS Plus will no longer offer free PS3 or PSVita games and will instead focus on PS4 titles
This has led to some wondering over whether or not Sony is attempting to phase out these older generation titles in preparation for a new
This is, of course, pure speculation but it's interesting that Sony would be willing to reduce its game offering to only two games (as it
informed Polygon) without any other excuse than wishing to focus on titles for an already highly successful console
Whether Sony is truly making way for the PS5 or whether it's going to offer a higher quality of PS4 game is unclear and it seems we'll have
tantalising hint of what 4K gaming could be like
pixels and using each to render four pixels in 4K resolution is clever and it can do native 4K output but it often has to sacrifice
And if Sony cracks that particular problem with alacrity, it could even mean that a PlayStation 5 will arrive sooner than anticipated.Aside
from 4K visuals, if recent showings at GDC 2018 are anything to go by we certainly can expect the next generation to offer incredible visual
us extremely excited for the PS5.Real-time ray tracing was revealed to be the next big thing in rendering while Epic Games gave us a taste
of how it might be used to create the most lifelike characters ever
Using its capture technology, the Unreal Engine creator displayed a future with character models so realistic they bring us close to
crossing the uncanny valley
hardware that can support this technology "pretty shortly" we can't be sure, but we like to think she's talking about the
yet-to-be-announced PS5.The VR effectSony recently became the first console manufacturer to embrace virtual reality, thanks to the
stands, even its current incarnation almost pushes the base PlayStation 4 beyond its limits
Running a PlayStation VR on a PS4 Pro brings improved frame-rates, which are very handy indeed in terms of the overall VR experience, but
appears to be catching on) Sony will want to return to the market with a second, markedly higher-tech iteration: which would provide an
A recent report from SemiAcccurate which claims that the PS5 will have virtual reality capabilities built-in at silicon level suggests this
implementation for the HTC Vive that renders it wireless
is likely to be a possibility even for the PS5
As Kingsley points out, that would require 4K rendering per eye, which equates to 8K rendering overall, which we expect to be beyond the
PlayStation console.What form will the PS5 takeIt has been suggested that future consoles could take radically different forms to current
ones, thanks to advances in cloud computing bringing about the ability to stream games, thereby doing away with the components that make
components which, in the PS3, were so esoteric that the console flopped
the best games using the minimum amount of effort
The fact that Sony has now made external hard drive support possible for the PS4 and Pro is a step in the right direction and this is
PlayStation is very keen to hear what its community thinks
Very recently a group called PlayStation Voice sent out surveys to members of its closed community asking them what their expectations of
One community member posted the email they received and found themselves removed from the group for breaking its non-disclosure
doesn't tell us much about PS5 itself, other than that things are likely to be still in the very early stages
While it's unlikely that Sony would use the information gathered from its communities to decide exactly which features will be included in
the console, the ideas of fans can certainly spark a good deal of inspiration.Streaming gamesOf course, if games were just streamed to the
more of a definite feature rather than something on our wishlist Well, Sony is remaining tight-lipped about PlayStation Now uptake figures,
but we suspect they are pretty unimpressive
It has certainly had issues with setting the right subscription charges, given that PlayStation Now effectively gives backwards
small form-factor cloud-based version of the console for those with mega-fast broadbandBut the biggest issue is broadband speeds
There would be nothing to stop Sony launching a small form-factor cloud-based version of the console for those with mega-fast broadband,
Philip Hammond announced an infrastructure investment aimed at bringing fast broadband and 5G mobile data to the UK
But the earliest that would have an impact would be 2021, and the PS5 will almost certainly arrive before then
Perhaps its first mid-cycle update, though, will be a streaming version which takes advantage of burgeoning 5G networksOptical discs or
notThe rise of download games, which continue to eat into the physical disc market, means that pundits have been predicting that consoles
will go discless for about a decade now
launch the PlayStation 5 in 2019
The sort of technology available then should easily allow full native 4K games without saddling the PS5 with a massive price-tag and, by
2019, 4K TVs will be the norm, rather than the exception, in the average household.2020 might be the year in which Sony unleashes the PS5 on
perhaps 2020 might be the year in which Sony unleashes the PS5 on the world, as the first native 4K console with wireless VR as long as
can expect to see our whole PS4 library available to play on the PS5
Or perhaps we'll see another round of remasters as we did when moving from the PS3 to the PS4
However, we imagine there will be some games being developed specifically for this new console generation and the power it's likely to
offer.Already we've seen CD Projekt Red mention that it's developing for this generation as well as the next and alongside the rumors that
there are already developers kits out in the open, we think there's a good chance that Cyberpunk 2077 will be one of the early PS5
