IT'S COMING! But did Sony's unveiling of the PlayStation 4 make its targeted impact?The cat's out of the bag, then- Sony are bringing their PlayStation 4 console to retailers everywhere (other than the UK) in Winter 2013. The question is, though, did their unveiling of their latest hardware do the trick? Put simply, it's a fairly firm Yes, although there were a few shortcomings to the show that will perhaps hold back Xbox gamers such as myself from being converted.
First up, let's deal with the most important element of any video games console reveal: the software. Sony made a strange call bringing Knack as their opening trailer, especially as it looked like something of an indie title which mimicked DreamWorks animated films. Nevertheless, after that the video game announcements came thick and fast in an impressive way- Killzone: Shadow Fall, inFamous: Second Son, DriveClub, The Witness, Diablo III, Deep Down and Watch Dogs were all looking very hot on the new hardware. Sure, some of these titles will end up being multi-platform, but you can't fault Sony for their pure ambition.
Or can you? I'm not trying to put a dampener on what Sony promoted here, yet beyond the impressive third-party contributions, the company itself appeared to be going through the motions. With a photo-realistic racing game, a new open-worlder, a new futuristic shooter and a few Move-based entries, there was little in the way of the shocks that Watch Dogs offered at the conference's end from the first-party publisher and developer. Perhaps if, as hoped, Sony had either placed a bigger empahasis on new IPs OR actually brought out more of the first-party franchises which players care about such as Little Big Planet 3 or definitive news on The Last Of Us, The Last Guardian or even a fourth Uncharted, the conference as a whole could have fared even better than it did.
Kudos must go to Sony, though, for offering plentiful details on the hardware and its social integration. The 8GB unified RAM that the PS4's packing is mighty impressive, ensuring it'll match up to modern high-end PCs. All the same, beyond that, we were just shown a host of features that tried to convince us that live gameplay videos and use of Facebook and Twitter would revolutionise the world of video gaming. I'm sure some of the 'Share', PSVita and Gaikai features will have a meaningful impact on the new hardware, yet this wasn't perhaps the best space for Sony to demonstrate the new additions to its ecosystem. Twitter was filled with comments at certain points in the conference along the lines of "GET BACK TO THE GAMES!", and while the Future Of PlayStation's highlights mostly compensated for this, such complaints shouldn't be forgotten.
My overall stance on the Future Of PlayStation event is mostly positive, in all honesty. The PlayStation 4 console's visuals are looking incredible to say the least, and the DualShock 4 controller should with any luck work as a brilliant combination of the PSVita and Move's best new features. However, particularly in comparing the Killzone trailer to that of Watch Dogs, there's still a sore need for innovation in some areas of the PlayStation ecosystem. Nevertheless, although we've got to wait perhaps another month longer than anyone else, and perhaps the lack of strong exclusive content won't necessarily tide over Xbox fans such as myself, it still seems that the PlayStation 4 will have a strong launch ahead!
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