Submitter: Starlight - (http://www.play-mag.co.uk)
Site Tags: speculation what known sony playstation 4 console
Category: PlayStation 3
It’s no secret that Sony has been working on the PlayStation 4 for a good two years now, and rumors abound that Sony will bring forward its launch to 2011/2012 to directly take on Microsoft’s proposed launch of its next Xbox.

All this talk of will it, won’t it? or ‘will PlayStation 3 be Sony’s last PlayStation?’ are largely irrelevant. It’s happening, the real question is: what form will the console take?

What follows is a list of possible functions based on what experts inside and outside of Sony have been saying, both current and future trends in the videogame, multimedia and Internet markets, to quote:

Sony successfully pioneered the first truly mainstream games console with the PlayStation 2 by first appealing to an early adopting customer and then, later, opening up the console to a wider market with aggressive pricing, marketing and a range of products (EyeToy, Singstar) that appealed to your non-traditional gamers.

In this regard, PlayStation 3 has failed to learn the lessons that Sony itself once taught. It appeared that only Nintendo was listening.

Nintendo’s Wii has proved that the games/software market is much bigger than anyone had previously imagined – PlayStation 4, therefore, needs to appeal to geeks and grannies alike or it will simply be relegated to a specialist gaming machine.

Sony’s past business success has been founded on mass market products like Walkman so Sony will want desperately to take (reclaim?) a large chunk of Nintendo’s business.

Price then is a key point but how will Sony keep the price down to the impulse buy level that served it so well with the PS2? The technology that was once cutting edge in PS3 has now become standard. The 1080p output, the Blu-ray drive, the built-in wireless intenet connection – all of these features and more have quickly become, or will quickly become, industry standard.

TVs, for example, now come with wireless internet connections and web functionality. This means that the cost of the technology has and will continue to come down. Likewise, the production cost of the Cell processor (reportedly the most expensive component in the PS3) has been slashed recently, with cost to fall further in the coming years.

It’s likely that PS4 will be powered by Cell, or a variant of. Not a single chip but several working together – this is, after all, what the Cell chip was designed to do in the first place. And with a price tag of over $3 billion, it had better have more than a five-year lifespan.

Graphics processing, the other expensive chip in the PS3, is likely to come from another joint venture with nVidia or another chip manufacturer, keeping costs down. The visuals won’t need to be that much better than what we’ve got currently.

Naturally, graphical fidelity will increase with photorealistic textures (this is possible on current PC cards) and polygon processing will increase – although not dramatically. 1080p, 60fps native output on all games is a must.

The PS4 is also likely to be able to process real 3D imagery (both for movie playback and real time graphics) but, as demonstrated at the recent CES the PS3 can already run several games in 3D, albeit at a reduced resolution. So again, this wouldn’t need a huge leap in processing power to achieve.

In terms of television resolutions (the jump to TrueHD prompted Sony’s inclusion of 1080p in PS3 in the first place) the next big thing will be Super High Definition, which is reportedly 10 times the resolution of current HDTVs. This probably won’t be available commercially for another 10 years so it’s unlikely that the PS4 will need to support this resolution, again saving on costs.

First there was analogue, then there was EyeToy, then there was the Wiimote. With each development of control systems comes a revolution in the type of games that we play. Sixaxis failed to be a substitute for Nintendo’s game control revolution so it was back to the drawing board for both Sony and Microsoft.

Both companies came up with viable solutions to the problem and I suspect that the future of game control lies in motion tracking, motion control and voice control. Whatever the PS4’s primary control system is, it won’t be a DualShock controller.

The real battleground, if you like, will be with the software. True voice recognition for games and software that facilitates better community, social and sharing and creation aspects of gaming will be of utmost importance.

I’m not going to predict what that might be here but all the major console manufacturers are currently experimenting with different ideas in these areas. Time will tell which will be successful. The point is that these ideas will have reached fruition when the next generation of consoles launch.

So that’s it. The PlayStation 4 will be a leaner, meaner version of the PS3. It will have state of the art community and internet-enabled functionality right out of the box; you’ll use it to stream both games and movies down your fibre optic broadband.

It will support 3D TV but may not be a similar graphical leap as we had from PS2 to PS3. It will appeal to the whole family with its wide selection of software and interactive entertainment and be affordable from day one. In short, it needs to be an Xbox 360, a Nintendo Wii and a PlayStation 3 all in one box.


Speculation: What is Known on Sony's PlayStation 4 Console

Posted 137 days ago      12 Comments      PermaLink


Comments

#1
By xxLindenxx on 20 weeks ago:
I'll hope with all of my heart, that psn will still be free. I can't believe people are actually paying for xbox live..

#2
By red8316 on 20 weeks ago:
I second that, keep psn free, that was a big seller for me. Otherwise I would have gone xbox 360 + mod, sans the online gameplay. For the PS4 I'm hoping mainly for more horsepower for graphics. More memory, larger textures, more filters like Anti-aliasing, I'm all about the eye candy. Peripherals and controller inputs not so much, but its cool to have the option. Looking forward to some hard facts on the PS4 whenever they arrive.

#3
By OneDayFly on 20 weeks ago:
I think if Sony brings out a PS3 slim version, new motion controls and at some point lowers the price to what the PS2 is now. The lifespan of the PS3 can be greatly extended.

I for one would much more prefer to see a real HD handheld console from the sony camp.

#4
By mrmiller24 on 20 weeks ago:
Quote:
Originally Posted by OneDayFly View Post
I think if Sony brings out a PS3 slim version, new motion controls and at some point lowers the price to what the PS2 is now. The lifespan of the PS3 can be greatly extended.
So you expect sony to be able to lower the cost of what is still fresh technology to the same price as something that happened nearly 10 years ago.

You've got to remember that the ps3 is still in its 3 year, so its got another 6 years before the price has a chance to get as low as the ps2 is today.

However a price drop would be welcomed, a manageable price drop that allows sony enough money to develop for the future.

#5
By DRodPoundcake on 20 weeks ago:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Starlight View Post
It's no secret that Sony has been working on the PlayStation 4 for a good two years now, and rumors abound that Sony will bring forward its launch to 2011/2012 to directly take on Microsoft's proposed launch of its next Xbox.
At E3 one of their biggest things was making the PS3 the next 10 year console, which I understand its predecessor is finally dwindling at the age it is but it did take quite some time for it to finally happen.

Do you really think that the console would be released that early in comparison to the statement of a 10 year console?

#6
By seed101 on 19 weeks ago:
If the ps4 release in 2011/2012 i'll trade my ps3 on it!!

#7
By Debro on 19 weeks ago:
Somehow, I doubt that sony will be throwing away the cell architecture. I'd expect sony to increase the cell count inside the cell processor, or perhaps even a dual-core cell processor, and then reduce the core size & clock it higher.

And why is anyone even mentioning the video chip?

The Cell processor IS the video chip. The video chip built into the PS3 was only included to fast-track initial games & apps, because the programming for the cell processor was unfamiliar, and hence lengthy. A game console without games isn't going to appeal to many.

The graphics chip was weak when the PS3 was released, and has fuelled many a microsoft fanboys PS3 vs Xbox360 flaming. To consider it now as anything other than just a legacy appendage is just futile.

#8
By maxpwer222 on 19 weeks ago:
I actually enjoy the Dualshock controller quite a bit. I will be sad to see it go. I personally think the price of the PS3 is fine the way it is. All the extras that it comes with HDD, Blu-ray, wireless, etc really make up for the higher price tag when compared to other consoles.

Every time I see someone complain about the price of the PS3 or the PS3 backwards-compatibility, I honestly want to punch myself in the face.

#9
By doughboy2008 on 19 weeks ago:
Like everyone else is saying keep the psn free.. Make it awesome I hope they do something really unique!

#10
By pan0k on 19 weeks ago:
I think changes should be from PS3 to PS4:

- More cell processors - Cell is very powerful.
- New GPU with more RAM - 1GB????
- More RAM - 8GB???? Abandon RDRAM and go with DDRx RAM.
These should not changed.
- PSN free
- Hard drive upgradable - I hate 360 for that. Have 20GB, can only install 1 game at a time.
- Compatibility with current hardware - controllers, eye toys, etc.
- Wifi and ethernet port

#11
By gyorkland on 19 weeks ago:
I don´t care if it is ps3 4 or 5, or if it is xbox 720 or whatever it wont do any change if the games don´t evolve first, day after day I feel that the games become shorter and shorter while increasing the graphics (not that I am complaining about hd graphics) I am just saying that the game companies are not even prepare yet for a ps3 to use it´s full capacity. BlueRay is supouse to store like 25gb, almost every game comes out on the three consoles and xbox and wii still use dvds.

#12
By razz56rob56 on 18 weeks ago:
i thought the ps3 cell was an 8 core already? As for price some people just need to understand it cost more because it's worth more and costs more to build.



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