November 15. That's the day Sony births the PlayStation 4, the long-awaited prince of gaming consoles, and the company's first all-new home gaming system since the PS3 was unleashed back in 2006. The labor has been tedious and bloodied by an intense rivalry with Microsoft's Xbox One, due exactly one week later.
Both new consoles arrive with a unique claim to the gaming throne: at $400, the PS4 is the âaffordableâ next-gen machine, whereas the $500 Xbox One promises an ambitious, always-on integration with live TV that aims to subsume your cable box.
Without these distinctions, however, Sony and Microsoft consoles could be separated at birth. Both offer powerful HD graphics equivalent to high-end gaming PCs. Each delivers an impressive set of nongaming streaming-entertainment apps, and a relatively small slate of exclusive games right out of the gate. Meanwhile, both offer a strikingly similar lineup of third-party games, including the requisite roster of EA Sports titles, and the latest installments of the Call of Duty, Assassinâs Creed, and Battlefield franchises -- all of which have already been released on the PS3 and Xbox 360.
The PS4 and the Xbox One also share one ugly defect: neither console can play games purchased for their respective predecessors. Your library of PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360 discs is not welcome here.
Thatâs the playing field onto which these two next-gen consoles arrive this holiday season. So, which console is right for you? Is it worth spending $400 or more on a new console now? Does the PS4 make the case for PS3 owners to upgrade -- or for Xbox 360 owners to switch?
Itâs a lot to digest, so letâs get started. I'll walk you through the future of Sony gaming.
Editors' note: A sizable chunk of the PlayStation 4's functionality was not live at the time of this review. As more services go online with additional software updates in the coming days, we will continue to update the content herein accordingly. We'll assign a rating once we've had a chance to evaluate those eventual features, including media functionality and online gameplay.
What's in the box
Included inside every PlayStation 4 box is the console, power cord, a 6-foot HDMI cable (finally!), a DualShock 4 controller, a Micro-USB cable (to charge the DualShock 4), and a monoaural earbud for online chat. (The earbud plugs directly into the DualShock controller; you can alternately use any pair of headphones with a standard 3.5mm plug.)
The PS4 won't be sold in multiple models this time around. There's only one version, a 500GB model that retails for $400. This is $100 less than an Xbox One, though the latter ships with its camera and voice/motion-sensing peripheral, Kinect, in the box. It'll cost you $60 extra to pick up the PlayStation Camera that provides similar functionality -- which I'll get to a little later.
For early adopters, Sony is also throwing in a free month of PlayStation Network Plus and a free month of the Sony Music Unlimited music-streaming service, as well as a $10 credit for the PlayStation Store.
The hardware
Despite its smallish size -- at least compared with an Xbox One -- the PS4 packs a lot of power under the hood. The 2x11x12-inch (HxWxD) box weighs about 9 pounds and packs in 8GB of DDR5 RAM. The CPU is a low-power x86-64 "Jaguar" eight-core chip, and the graphics are powered by a 1.84 TFLOP AMD Radeon "next engine." The fine print may not impress the layperson, but suffice it to say, the PS4's innards are in line with a mid- to high-end gaming PC.
Like previous PlayStations before it, the PS4's 500GB hard-disk drive is user replaceable (a standard SATA laptop hard drive or SSD will work), something I'm thrilled Sony has decided to keep in tact. That 500GB may seem like more than enough storage, but with game sizes beginning to flirt with 50GB apiece, that might not cut it a few years down the road.
The PS4 boasts a striking angular design with a modestly low profile. The front end angles toward the user, sleekly hiding two USB 3.0 slots to the right and a slot-loading 6x Blu-ray drive to the left. Between these two ports are touch-sensitive power and eject buttons that give off familiar PS3 beeps when activated.
Around back of the PS4 are four simple interfaces in addition to a standard power connect -- the same size plug each PlayStation in the past has adorned. From left to right there's an optical audio, HDMI, Ethernet, and auxiliary port, which is used for the optional PlayStation Camera.
Note that the PS4 must be connected to an HDTV with an HDMI input; there are no analog (composite or component) outputs for this PlayStation.
The PS4 is equipped with wireless 802.11 b/g/n protocols and Bluetooth 2.1. That said, Sony has indicated that most current Bluetooth peripherals -- including headsets and older DualShock 3 PS3 controllers -- won't work with the PS4.
The PS4 has two power off modes when not in use. It can be turned completely off or it can be put into standby mode. It's worth noting that the PS4 must be on or in standby mode to receive automatic updates or be woken up remotely.
The top surface of the PS4 is one-third glossy and two-thirds matte black. Between these finishes is a slick multicolor LED that glows amber in standby, white while powered on, and blue when booting up.
Unlike the Xbox One, which must rest horizontally, the PS4 can be used vertically as well. Sony recommends using a dedicated stand for vertical operation, but the PS4 seems to sit on its side just fine by itself.
Not included with the PS4, the aforementioned PlayStation Camera is a $60 accessory that allows you to control your PS4 with your voice. It'll also recognize your face and log you in should you set it up that way. Its functionality is quite similar to the Xbox One's Kinect, though it doesn't feature any IR blasting support. In fact, there's no IR port on the PS4 hardware, either, so you're stuck using the DualShock 4 controller when watching movies or streaming video. (Sony says a special Bluetooth remote is in the works, but didn't supply an ETA.)
Gameplay
So what does playing a PlayStation 4 feel like? Quite honestly, it's a lot like the PlayStation 3. There's a noticeable bump in graphics, of course, but it's logical to assume the real heavy hitters won't have their day until we're deeper into the system's life cycle. Like I mentioned earlier, the jump in visuals is not as dramatic as it was going from SD to HD. Also, PC gamers with the luxury of a souped-up machine probably won't be much impressed at all. It's also worth mentioning that some cross-platform games like Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag don't look nearly as good as PS4-exclusive games like Killzone: Shadow Fall.
Not all of the PS4's launch software received the next-gen "port" treatment. A lot of the sports games (FIFA 14, Madden 25, and NBA 2K14) are reworked from the ground up and run on next-gen engines to take better advantage of the new hardware. Of course, these next-gen games will be available for the Xbox One as well.
In terms of gameplay, the PS4 experience is greatly improved thanks to the fantastic DualShock4 controller. Nearly every genre I tested seems to benefit from the redesign.
During any gameplay session you can suspend the action and back out into the Dynamic Menu. Double-tapping the Home button will bring you back to the game or you can manually select it from the menu. However, if you put the system in standby mode or turn it off, you'll lose your gameplay session.
Sony has been very vocal about the PS4's support for independent game development and plans on offering a healthy selection of titles at launch and soon after. These titles can only be accessed through the PlayStation Store exclusively.
Game saves are synced in the cloud (and backed up locally as well) and can be accessed on any PS4 you log in to as long as there's an Internet connection. I'll dive deeper into account management in the next section.
Of course we can't overlook backward compatibility. For all intents and purposes, there is no disc-based backward compatibility at all on the PS4 -- none of your PS3 games will work on this machine. (Xbox 360 games are similarly incompatible on the Xbox One.) However, Sony has teased streaming capabilities that the company plans on implementing thanks to its acquisition of Gaikai last year. The service won't go live until 2014, but the plan right now is to have a portion of the PS3 library available for streaming play. Of course, that will require a wicked-fast high-speed Internet connection and -- probably -- the repurchasing of the titles you want to play (or at least a subscription to Sony's PSN Plus service).
The PS3's answer to Xbox 360 Achievements, known as Trophies, continues on the PS4 and will merge both PS3 and PS4 trophies together. The PS4 introduces a dynamic trophy system where developers can program new trophies as well as classifying the rarity of items based on the performance of other players.
The controller
While the Xbox 360's controller was the seemingly perfect evolution of the original Xbox's pad, the DualShock4 is just as, if not more of an impressive realization. It felt absolutely wonderful and addresses nearly all of the shortcomings of the DualShock3 (the predecessor controller that shipped with the PlayStation 3). Unlike the slippery dome coverings of the DualShock3's sticks, the two analog sticks on the new controller have smaller embossed faces that make for much easier control. The DualShock4's sticks flank the familiar PlayStation Home button and audio speaker that is built into the controller. (Don't worry -- audio from the controller can be turned off.) Below the PS Home button is the headset jack (for online chat) and an "EXT" port for use with something else down the line.
The DualShock4 is wider than the DualShock3, perhaps to fit the controller's clickable touch pad that sits between the Share and Options buttons. The touch pad works just like a laptop touch pad and feels equally as responsive. The Share and Options buttons replace Start and Select. Though they occasionally function like their predecessors, they are also used to activate game DVR footage and sharing.
The L1, L2, R1, and R2 buttons have all received redesigns as well, but no button on the pad seems to have benefited more than the L2 and R2 triggers. These now extend out and feel much more comfortable to pull. The DualShock4 also has two rumble motors so developers can localize the vibration feedback contextually within a game.
Like the DS3, the DS4 has a six-axis motion-sensing system, which encompasses a three-axis gyroscope and a three-axis accelerometer. A fun little note here: you can click the right stick during text entry to get a tiltable keyboard that's slightly quicker than entering letters manually.
You'll likely notice the glowing light emanating from the DS4's back. It's designed to work with the PlayStation Camera accessory and will change colors if there's more than one controller connected to the system. Below it sits a Micro-USB port for charging the controller's built-in rechargeable battery.
The interface
Both the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One have made substantial efforts in streamlining the user interface. The PlayStation 3's cross-media-bar has evolved into the PlayStation 4's "Dynamic Menu" that casts a blanket of simplicity throughout the operating system, logically grouping like-minded items together.
It basically consists of two horizontal rows, the top filled with icons for various functionalities like Friends, Trophies, and Settings, and a thumbnail lower row that is populated by recent activities like the last game you've played, shared game DVR clips, downloaded titles, Web access, other media, and more.
When you highlight an item in the Dynamic Menu, "live" items from the PlayStation Network (PSN) will populate with relevant content for you to browse.
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