Epic Games’ Unreal Engine 4 demo “Elemental”, shown running on PlayStation 4. Image: Epic Games
Sony officially announced PlayStation 4 on Wednesday evening at an event in New York City, showing off demos of early games but saying little else. Although it said PlayStation 4 would arrive in time for the holidays this year, it did not show the hardware itself, did not reveal a price, and shared only minimal details about PlayStation 4′s features and specifications.
“PlayStation Wants To Win the War Against Reality,” read a caption on a teaser video played as the conference began. Who knew it would prove to be so literal?
The major features that differentiate PlayStation 4 from other game consoles, Sony said, would be social: You’ll be able to press a “Share” button on the Dual Shock 4 controller and immediately begin streaming your gameplay over Ustream. Your friends can watch, and comment on your play in a chat window. As game streaming on services like Ustream and Twitch has become more popular, this was a timely announcement that may well prove to be an enduring and compelling feature for PS4. Sony is also building in a feature that will let you power PS4 down and power it back up, with your game automatically resuming immediately where you left off.
Other than that, what Sony showed on PS4 wasn’t that dissimilar to what it already has on PS3, which makes one wonder why the average consumer would be enticed into upgrading. While Sony talked up the advanced new technology that forms the backbone of the machine, the games just looked like your average triple-A PlayStation 3 effort. And most of them were in the same franchises: Killzone. Infamous. Many new games, like Bungie’s Destiny and Blizzard’s Diablo III, will be launched on both PS3 and PS4, the developers said on stage.
About the only thing that PS4 won’t do that PS3 does is play PS3 games. In a first for Sony, it is launching its new console with zero backward compatibility. No previous PlayStation games will work on the new device. This is because it uses a totally different architecture: While the PS3 used a custom Cell processor that proved difficult to work with, PS4 will use a PC-like X86 CPU. But this could be a real bummer for would-be early adopters who don’t like the idea of giving up their old reliable console so soon.
Sony has certainly learned from some past mistakes, but not others. The low point of the show was the appearance of a Square Enix executive, who said that a Final Fantasy game would be released on PlayStation 4. This, from a developer that had such incredible problems producing games on PlayStation 3 that one of the games announced prior to the launch of that console in 2006, Final Fantasy Versus XIII, is still to this day mired in development hell.
The PS3′s controller, besides the Share button, will also feature a touch pad in its center. It will also interface with a new “stereoscopic camera” device, which basically looks like a copy of Microsoft’s Kinect. Sony did not show any games using either of these new control schemes.
As we’ve learned from previous PlayStation announcements, talk is the cheapest thing there is. And that’s basically what Sony did today: It espoused a philosophy, said the names of a lot of popular games, but didn’t give us any real concrete information in an age where it’s more important than ever.
Sony may be saving all of this for E3, but it doesn’t look good when the debut of PlayStation 4 seems to be all smoke and mirrors.
Our live blog coverage follows.
5:04 PM PST #
Andrew House thanking us for being here. “We look forward to continuing the conversation.” Coming Holiday 2013. No form factor. no specs. No feature set. No price. Wow.
5:02 PM PST #
At the launch of Destiny, PS3 and PS4 versions will be available. No idea when that launch is, of course.
4:59 PM PST #
Hirshberg bringing Bungie to PlayStation 4 players. Last week, they showed Destiny. Today they’re talking up that it’s coming to PS4. Showing in-engine footage.
4:57 PM PST #
One more partner, says House: Eric Hirshberg of Activision.
4:56 PM PST #
No gameplay footage of either. “In the coming months.”
4:55 PM PST #
Oh, PS4 and PS3.
4:54 PM PST #
Blizzard’s PS4 game is… Diablo III. Of course.
4:53 PM PST #
Okay, this is surprising: Blizzard is here. “Many of you are probably wondering why an old-School PC developer is crashing the Sony party.” Well, we kind of guessed the reason is that you’re going to make a PS4 game.
4:51 PM PST #
It’s still a demo of Watch Dogs, an open world (?) third person action-adventure. Guy’s doing parkour across a city to escape cops. Looks like Assassin’s Creed: Guns Edition. Which, you know, could be pretty good.
4:46 PM PST #
Watch Dogs developer takes the stage to talk about the plot of their new game.
4:44 PM PST #
Yves Guillemot from Ubisoft is here to talk about next-gen titles like Watch Dogs.
4:43 PM PST #
That was the lowlight of the show so far.
4:42 PM PST #
Here comes Shinji Hashimoto, brand director for Final Fantasy. I just have one thing to say, he says: “I would also like to announce that we are preparing for development of a Final Fantasy title. Please be excited for E3 this year.” Leaves, shows nothing.
4:40 PM PST #
“This is the level of quality that Square Enix is targeting for its next-generation titles.” “It’s a game developer’s dream.”
4:37 PM PST #
“Today’s demo isn’t a game.” No duh. Square Enix, make a game? Pull the other one. Maybe after they finish Final Fantasy Versus XIII on PS3. Oh, it’s Agni’s Philosophy, the not-a-game demo they showed at E3 last year.
4:35 PM PST #
Andrew House reminds us that he speaks awesome Japanese. Now says that Square Enix will be developing on PS4. Well, it’s got to go a lot better than their development on PS3.
4:32 PM PST #
The game’s called “Deep Down” (working title). A couple of mean-looking elves are in a cave grumbling with coarse British accents about something.
4:32 PM PST #
Now a new IP running on PS4 using Panta Rhei engine.
4:31 PM PST #
Ono spending a lot of buildup time talking about how PS2 and PSP etc. changed Capcom’s games. New PS4 engine, he says, codenamed Panta Rhei.
4:29 PM PST #
Alex Navarro notes on Twitter that it took 98 minutes to get a Japanese developer onstage. Sony has changed dramatically.
4:28 PM PST #
Shows a slide with the logo of what looks to be every third party ever, saying they’re supporting PS4. Yoshinori Ono from Capcom now takes the stage. “I’m not talking about Street Fighter today.”
4:27 PM PST #
Andrew House back on stage: “I think you’ll agree that our WWS team and indie creators are pushing the boundaries of how games look, feel, interact.”
4:25 PM PST #
Showing a virtual puppet show, with two guys with Move controllers causing two 3-D sculptured puppets to act out a play.
4:23 PM PST #
Alex from Media Molecule is here to tell us about how much the company loves the Move controller. They’ll use the Move controller with PlayStation 4. They made a 3-D sculpting tool with it. Lets you use Move to create 3-D sculptures.
4:20 PM PST #
David Cage shows a look at what an old man’s head would look like, rendered on the PlayStation 4. Cage says that you will just be able to look into this old man’s eyes and know what he’s been through on the PS4. Okay.
4:15 PM PST #
The Witness looks like my kinda game, you know? “What follows now,” says Sony guy, “are not game presentations.” That is refreshing honesty, but why the heck not? Hey, here comes David Cage of Quantic Dream.
4:10 PM PST #
It’s “The Witness.” “At its heart, it’s a game about epiphany,” says Blow.
4:09 PM PST #
Hey, Jonathan Blow is here to lend indie cred and announce that his new game will be on PS4.
4:09 PM PST #
WWS guy back out, saying Sony will support “smaller indies” and take “risks other publishers simply won’t.” Time to hear from indie devs. Says they’ll show 3 new products.
4:08 PM PST #
Yep, it’s “Infamous: Second Son.”
4:06 PM PST #
“Now imagine what would happen if a group of people developed superhuman abilities.” Oh, it’s… Infamous? It’s by Sucker Punch, at least…
4:05 PM PST #
Ok, this could be interesting: Game designer on stage talking about how he was once tear-gassed by the cops. And how there are tons of security cameras in Britain, US government has taken telephone records of citizens. “Our security comes at a high price — our freedom.”
4:02 PM PST #
We’re through the first hour of presentations. How much longer?
4:01 PM PST #
They’re talking up the detail of the cars. The “suede and carpet have a fiber direction map, causing them to reflect light differently when they’ve been brushed or touched.”
3:59 PM PST #
“Next generation no longer just means more powerful hardware.” That’s clear. Driveclub is about teaming up with friends and battling other clubs “all around the world.” It’s about challenges, not just races.
3:57 PM PST #
A racing game from “Evolution Studios.” It’s called Driveclub.
3:55 PM PST #
I… this… really? We’re watching a long demo of a first-person shooter that looks like a PS3 game and seems like it plays like every other videogame of the last 5 years?
3:51 PM PST #
This looks like every videogame ever.
3:48 PM PST #
Co-founder of Guerrilla Games (Killzone devs) here to show us an early look at a new game… oh, he’s talking about the Helghast. So, Killzone.
3:46 PM PST #
Michael Denny, from Sony WW Studios, takes the stage. One would hope this means games.
3:43 PM PST #
Lots of developers talking about how they, too, are on board with the things Sony is doing with PS4. Would really like to hear some game announcements soon! I think we all get the philosophical framework by now…
3:41 PM PST #
First bad news. No backward compatibility on PS4. David Perry says Sony’s “goal” is to enable you to play old games via Gaikai, but that this stuff will be rolled out in phases and will only happen some day in the future, maybe.
3:36 PM PST #
Remote Play has been built into the architecture of PS4, Perry says. PS Vita is the “ultimate companion device” for PS4 — you can play your PS4 games on Vita’s screen.
3:34 PM PST #
Spectating has become very popular, Perry says. Yes. Sony asked itself how it could improve the experience. You can push the Share button to broadcast your game in real time to your friends. Your friends can “look over your shoulder virtually.”
3:33 PM PST #
“With Gaikai in PlayStation Store, you’ll be able to instantly experience anything you want.” – David Perry. Seems like they’re using streaming for demos rather than full games? At least for now?
3:31 PM PST #
David Perry is here to talk about Gaikai, the Sony-owned streaming service, on PS4. So basically the first two people telling us about PS4 are the guys who made awesome Sega Genesis games.
3:30 PM PST #
Social features: Most importantly, you can stream your own gameplay automagically with PS4. That looks really great.
3:24 PM PST #
Cerny says the hardware supports “suspending and resuming” of play sessions: game will save your progress at the exact spot you left off when you power it off. That’s cool. Can download updates in the background with the main power off. You can start playing a digital game while it’s still downloading.
3:22 PM PST #
Showing a trailer of a new game from Japan Studio, featuring a little robot called Knack. Looks like fun, looks like a PS3 game.
3:20 PM PST #
Shows a couple of tech demos from Unreal Engine and Havok. Cerny says he’s also working on a game, and shows a trailer.
3:19 PM PST #
The Dual Shock 4 will work in tandem with a “stereo camera” that scans the room in 3-D. So the Kinect. Not sure if it’s bundled with the hardware or not.
3:18 PM PST #
AHAHAHAHAHAHA. SONY KINECT.
3:17 PM PST #
The controller is called the Dual Shock 4. Wow. Everything is named the same with one more number.
3:16 PM PST #
The architecture is “like a PC in many ways.” X86 CPU, allowing Sony to “tap into three decades of programming expertise.” An “enhanced PC GPU.” 8 GB of high speed unified RAM. This was the #1 developer request, Cerny says. Hard drive in every box, no size given.
3:15 PM PST #
Sony is spending a LOT of time laying the rhetorical groundwork here, lots of talking about the philosophy behind PlayStation 4. Note: Very interesting that the lead architect of the hardware is not Japanese, no?
3:11 PM PST #
House intro’s Mark Cerny, a game industry veteran who is the Lead System Architect of the PlayStation 4.
3:10 PM PST #
“Over the next couple of hours…” Uh, how long is this going to be, Andrew?
3:09 PM PST #
Oh man, it’s called PlayStation 4.
3:07 PM PST #
House just talking about things Sony has done so far on every facet of PlayStation, from Plus to Mobile etc.
3:04 PM PST #
Andrew House of Sony is the first to take the stage. “Today marks a moment of truth and a bold step forward for Sony as a company.”
3:02 PM PST #
It’s beginning with an inspiration video. “PlayStation Wants to Win the War Against Reality.” Sony and reality have definitely been at odds for a while now.
3:00 PM PST #
Holy crap, did a Sony event just start on time?! Maybe they are really changing things.
2:02 PM PST #
I want to believe that The Last Guardian’s MIA status is related to the fact that it shifted platforms to PS4.
10:21 AM PST #
Watch this space for Wired’s live blog of Sony’s big announcement, starting at 6 p.m. Eastern. If it’s not PlayStation 4, New York City had better get the riot cops ready.
At 6 p.m. Eastern time in New York City, Sony will unveil the future of the PlayStation brand, widely expected to be its latest home console.
“Can the PS3 Save Sony?” asked a Wired story in 2006, as Sony launched its last home console. As it turned out, the answer was “not really” — PlayStation 3 came in third in the hardware race, bled money for years and led to the ignominious departure of “father of the PlayStation” Ken Kutaragi. Now Sony as a whole is in crisis mode, having lost money for the past three years. CEO Howard Stringer stepped down a year ago to be replaced by Kazuo Hirai, the executive who led Sony and PlayStation during its decade of industry dominance. Hirai, as one might imagine, believes that gaming is one of the key products that Sony can leverage to turn the ship around.
New machine, same question: Can the PS4 save Sony?
Follow our live blog feed of the announcements, which will be livestreamed in the embedded video above when the show starts. Later, Wired contributor Stu Horvath will weigh in with any hands-on gameplay impressions and interviews with Sony executives that are offered at the event.
