Tuesday 11 June 2013

E3 - PlayStation Round-Up


Round-Up

Anticipations for Sony's E3 conference have been high, to say the least, since the reveal of the latest addition to the PlayStation family last August. Yesterday, Sony had a great deal more to offer to the existing image of the PlayStation 4, with promises of exclusives and timed releases, however it was without doubt the last segment of the briefing which left gamers with the highest level of satisfaction towards the new console...

DRM

During the final segment of the show, Jack Tretton returned to the stage with the intent of stressing, (to the great delight of the audience) that the PS4 would not "impose any new restrictions on any used PS4 game discs. Judging by a whole 25 second round of applause from the audience at the briefing, the PS4 has without doubt the competitive edge over Microsoft in this field. Following this, Tretton also ensured the various media outlets present at the event that there would be no restrictions placed upon 2nd hand games, and no periodical authentication would be required by the system. This was perhaps, the most critical part for Sony's success in the next generation, as it appears to have taken a more consumer friendly approach than Microsoft, when designing its new console. 

Games

Furthermore, Sony unveiled and expanded upon a range of new and existing exclusive IPs which it will be carrying through to the next stage of the PlayStation life-cycle , including;

The Order - A brand new IP from Sony's Santa Monica Studio, featuring a steam-punk esque London, combining Victorian England with the steam-punk style of such games as Dishonored and Renaissance Heroes. The trailer for the game featured Whitechapel (a segment of London) infested with a horde of undead monsters. The style of game-play is not yet confirmed however it is most likely to be a standard shooter or squad based shooter of some form. 

Infamous: Second Son - A new chapter in the infamous series featuring a new protagonist and setting. As a successful existing IP, this game, like its predecessors, is being developed by Sucker Punch studios, one of Sony's many first party studios. 

Drive Club -  Like Infamous: Second Son, we were first given a glimpse of this game back in February, at the reveal of the PlayStation 4. This new franchise will be available for PlaystationPlus members at launch, as part of their PlayStation Plus subscription. This is likely to be the majority of users, due to the requirement of PlayStation Plus for online gaming, through the console. Drive Club has been designed to showcase all of the features of the PS4 including the heavy focus on social integration and updated hardware. 

Hardware

The PS4 will benefit from greatly improved hardware, in comparison to its predecessor. Not only has the PS4 benefited from an increase from 512 MB of GDDR3 RAM to 8 GB of RAM, but it also features an upgraded hard drive size, to five hundred gigabytes, much unlike the PS3 which originally launched with a 20 gigabyte hard drive. Furthermore, this size will be expandable much alike the PS3 to a larger size of hard drive, meaning that you will not have to invest in a later version of the console, as your game library grows. Finally, the PS4 will benefit from GAIKAI streaming technologies, following Sony's acquisition of the company last year. Dave Perry took to the stage to announce that the ability to stream PS3 games using GAIKAI technology would be available, beginning in 2014.

A Good Day For Sony?

Overall it is hard to tell at this stage whether the PS4 will upstage its main competitor, the XboxOne, however based upon the reaction of social media and the masses towards each of these consoles, it is more than likely that Sony will be the ruler of the next generation of consoles. Perhaps Microsoft will gain a higher reputation in future, however in the meantime, Sony looks posed for a long and successful life-cycle, for the next generation of the PlayStation franchise. 

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