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PlayStation 5 - Next gen is expensive

Eighthours

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MattyP

MattyP

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5 minutes ago, HarryBizzle said:

Microsoft don't charge for cloud saves, right? And syncing is seamless on Xbox. Nintendo and Sony need to sort their acts out.

I don't think they do. They always work irrespective if I had a gold sub or not. Flick between the Xbox and PC all the time and its great everything just works well.

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Clipper

Clipper

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20 minutes ago, MattyP said:

I don't think they do. They always work irrespective if I had a gold sub or not. Flick between the Xbox and PC all the time and its great everything just works well.

they dont charge for it - it is so convenient that I feel bad for whinging (in my head) when I flip between xboxes and I get the syncing message for a few secs :D

 

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Quexex

Quexex

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10 hours ago, wretcherd said:

Oh you absolute bastards, now I can hear the coil whine. I was fine being completely oblivious.

It's like pointing out the ticking of a clock or your own breathing.

I think I can too, there's certainly some kind of 'fridge' like hum coming from my PS5 when it's downloading updates (in rest mode) could be coil whine as it's nearer the base of the system rather than the top near the fan.

 

Only noticeable in a silent room though. And no where near as bad as the fan noise and HDD noise from my PVR ;)

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Majora

Majora

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28 minutes ago, Lorfarius said:

When was it actually a thing? They've always jumped about.

 

It was definitely a thing for most UK releases in the past, but not for a long time now. It always used to be a bit annoying that the US would get new releases on the Tuesday and the UK would get them a few days later on the Friday.

 

Then it started changing so that the UK also started getting big releases on the Tuesday. Nowadays every game is more or less a worldwide release (Japan excluded) but the actual day of release seems very flexible.

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Quexex

Quexex

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3 minutes ago, HarryBizzle said:

COD was one of the first to move to the Tuesday. Rather than being to do with giving us the game at the same time, I think the extra days on sales helped it break sales records every time.

Typically games used to release on Friday as this worked well with bricks and mortar retailers. However as the game charts in Europe start counting from Tuesday some released moved to that day to maximise their potential chart position. Since shops have become less relevant, any day is good some choose to avoid the day of bigger releases.

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Dudley

Dudley

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2 hours ago, HarryBizzle said:

Microsoft don't charge for cloud saves, right? And syncing is seamless on Xbox. Nintendo and Sony need to sort their acts out.

 

Plus MS are the only ones with a service that actually works.  On PS4 it'll only automatically upload and download saves on the primary console as far as I can tell and Nintendo exclude some games because they think I have the slightest flying fuck that someone somewhere I'll never speak to might possibly use them to cheat.

 

Whereas with MS I can go to an Xbox I've never seen, sign in and continue playing Forza from right where I was without doing anything else.  And on a lot of games, do exactly the same on PC too.

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FiveFootNinja

FiveFootNinja

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Well this console continues to impress and entertain massively.

 

Demon Souls is genuinely astonishing in its polish and aesthetic, I’ve never played something so visually stunning while also being so smooth and fast. It does actually feel like a new generation game. I’ve still got a lot to learn with it but it’s so so good. I can see me hammering this over time just like I did with Bloodborne.
 

And today my lad started navigating areas in Bugsnax all on his own using the twin sticks for the first time, surprisingly even knowing where to go to get to the area he wanted and knowing how they all link together (just from watching me do it for him for a couple of session). Amazing.


Using a stick and trigger is not going to happen any time soon though due to the reach required. Comedy giant pad/tiny hands picture...

 

C87980A6-695D-4512-9658-F1F237482489.thumb.jpeg.67810f0e7cb998212ef126608f9ba5bf.jpeg
 

On a side note, I’m noticing some nice little touches here and there I hadn’t seen before. For example in Bugsnax the pad LED strip changes colour to indicate which sauce ammo is loaded into your catapult, or to mirror the colour theme of the page of the log/journal you are looking at. Really nice.

 

Despite my reservations pre-launch about how good this generation was going to feel, Sony have done well with this.

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Wiper

Wiper

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To my very pleasant surprise I received a shiny new PS5 this weekend - courtesy of Very under-promising and over-delivering for a change.

 

I know we've had plenty already, but I thought I'd give my impressions as someone who came in after the first wave, and thus with expectations a little tempered. And, you know, as a person of impeccable taste.

 

First, I want to get the unambiguous negatives out of the way, so as to avoid ending this post on a a sour note: that Sony rushed the machine out in order to hit Christmas/not be dramatically outpaced by Microsoft is clear, and to its detriment. Buggy, incomplete OS does not a great first impression make, and some of the oversights are extremely frustrating:

 

  • HDR implementation is inexplicable. Not an issue if you don't use HDR, of course, but if, like me, you do, having the so-called 'automatic' setting force HDR on everything is just insane. Ignoring it being a right faff to jump back and forth through the system menu when switching games, the fact that the system puts the onus on the player knowing which games are or aren't HDR titles is crazy. I'm hoping this is something that gets changed as a priority.
  • Similarly, but less of an issue for me in that the PS5 will never be my media machine, is the lack of ALLM on the console; that it doesn't tell my TV when to be in Game mode, and when it shouldn't, means it'd be a hassle as a media player. Again, hopefully something they'll iron out; it doesn't impact me, but if I did want to use it for UHD playback/Netflix etc. it would be a right pain; particularly combined with the HDR issue (which, at least, doesn't affect UHD playback - just everything else).
  • I'm relieved to say I've had no crashes/data loss issues yet, though having only used the machine for 2 days I'd rather hope that wouldn't be the case. However, I have had one case of truly bizarre behaviour from the system: today I turned on my PS4 for the first time since doing a limited network transfer to the PS5 on Saturday. Doing so, using my old Dual Shock 4 (which hasn't been paired with the PS5) caused the PS5 to turn itself on and eject its disc. Which was pretty annoying, as I'd left the associated game (Persona 5 Royal - totally putting that next-gen hardware to good use there) in a rest-state, mid-dungeon, so that's some progress lost. More, it was even more bizarre than it sounds, as never mind the DS4/PS4 shouldn't be waking up the PS5 (and/or making it eject a disc), I've set the PS5 to a heavy sleep state - i.e. it shouldn't be able to be woken up by the network/the PS app, never mind this aberrant behaviour. So, a little worried that the rest mode settings are a bit buggy, there.
  • Losing the ability to put games folders is probably the least serious issue, but it just feels like a daft oversight; ironically an issue that would be much easier to overlook were it not for backward compatibility meaning I have enough games on the system already that tracking them is a pain.
  • UX designs re: PS4/PS5 downloading are daft. I shouldn't have to worry about downloading the wrong version of e.g. Bugsnax thanks to vague interface design.
  • Let me backup my saves to USB, you arseholes.
  • The bit where I'd spent 4 hours sticking my PS4 titles onto external storage in preparation for the PS5, only for the PS5 to then redownload every single one as a gigantic 'update' file, made me feel like that was a complete and utter waste of time. I don't mind downloading them, but I begrudge the official guidance from Sony making me expect otherwise.
  • I miss my dynamic themes. I'm probably in a small minority there, mind.

 

In summary, the new operating system is... not great. I'm genuinely astonished by the initial reviews from articles which praised the PS5's 'new and exciting' interface as contrasted with the Series S/X's 'boring old' interface... despite the fact the latter was a brand new, vastly improved interface that happened to have been rolled out to both generations, whereas the PS5's is just a stunted version of the PS4's, albeit with Always On HDR. With the exception of the quick menu, which I think is an actual improvement.

 

Okay, that's the early adopter issues out of the way. I'm willing to cut Sony more slack than I usually would on them, as coronavirus will surely have had an impact, but they're frustrating enough that I can't completely ignore them. On to the 'everything else' section:

 

  • the controller's nice to hold. And I say this as someone who's never enjoyed Dual Shock controllers - the thumb sticks always feel like more of a strain to use, and the 360 has always been vastly superior for me (d-pad aside). Here the slightly different angle on the 'arms' of the controller, and the slightly bigger heft, actually feel a lot more comfortable for me - which was a relief, given other people's complaints about it. Then again, I unironically love the original Xbox Duke controller, so I'm clearly a bit of an outlier when it comes to pad size preference.
  • the controller continues to look like the ship from Radiant Silvergun. This in turn continues to be a significant positive aspect for me.
  • the force-feedback is... good? It's exactly what I expected - a combination of the Switch's HD rumble with 90s-era joystick force feedback, albeit applied to the triggers rather than sticks. Which is great, I loved Microsoft's force-feedback joysticks back in the day, and them dying off with the era of joypads on PC was a source of sadness for me, so to see that concept return in some format is a delight. I am a little bemused at the number of outlets treating it as revelatory rather than a pleasant return, mind you, but then I thought the same about the Souls games being hailed as revolutionary rather than just a happy return to sub-90s difficulty levels meshed with metroidvania design, so what do I know?
  • Astro Bot is a delight, just as Astro Bot VR was. Sony have crafted a fantastic mascot character there, one that leans into their tech-first background, and I hope they run with it. The presentation and creativity on display throughout were just wonderful, and as someone with no emotional investment in Playstation as a brand, it still managed to win me over with its love letter to the history of the console. Great stuff. I demand a full-length (non-VR) Astro Bot game - particularly as it (presumably) wouldn't need to lean so heavily into showing off all of the controller's new gimmicks, and could give itself a bit more room to breathe as an actual platformer.
  • Backward compatibility does, indeed, 'just work' - at least for the games I've tried. Very glad I've got a disc copy of The Last Guardian, as 60fps is genuinely a revelation for that game. Trying to remember which PS4 games do and don't use HDR, on the other hand, less fun. Again, I expect (hope) for that problem to go away sooner rather than later.
  • The console is quiet; with caveats. It's certainly not silent - at idle it's noisier than the One X, for sure - but I'm reasonably pleased with it. It's definitely worlds away from the PS4 Pro. However, had I gone in expecting true silence I'd have been disappointed - not too impressed with outlets for giving out that impression, as that set up unfair expectations. In all, I'm impressed with the noise it produces... except for the disc drive, which is just unpleasantly loud. At least as loud as the PS4 Pro's drive, only without a jet engine fan to drown it out. Not as bad as the Dreamcast at least, but I certainly won't be watching blu-rays on it; and the regular spin-up test when playing games from it is annoying, particularly in a quiet, measured game like The Last Guardian, where a sudden high-frequency whirr coming from the machine is quite distracting. So, not perfect, but still a vast improvement on what came before.
  • It is also, as expected, impractically big. The only thing on my TV stand that's as big as it (excepting the TV...) is my ancient AV receiver, and at least that has the decency to look like not-shit while lying flat. I've ended up having to wedge the PS5 in between speaker stand and TV stand, which at least puts it a little out of the way. And I do actually quite like its looks when in vertical orientation; though I'd appreciate a slightly less extreme level of LED lighting coming from it at all times.

 

I think, had I gone in completely fresh from the plaudits the PS5 got from the press pre-launch, I'd have been disappointed by its quirks. As it is, I've been having a nice time playing old games on it, plus an excellent time play Astro Bot. The new controller is lovely, the lack of jet turbine noise emanating from its part of the room is a blessed relief, and its insane looks as a console continue to amuse me, though I wish I had better space to put it in. A solid B+ of a launch device; not as exciting as the Dreamcast or DS, but not nearly so uninspiring as the PS4 or Xbox One - if only because of the one-two combo of Astro Bot and backwards compatibility.

 

1155681956_PS5insitu.thumb.jpg.a0ab5ee0ca000917fee3feae8300d61a.jpg

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FiveFootNinja

FiveFootNinja

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Nice write up (and console collection) @Wiper

 

The noise thing is a really interesting one as it all seems very variable for different people, and not a case of there are some noisy (with a particular sound) and some quiet.

 

I was playing Demon Souls at a really really low volume last night (as in might as well have been muted) and couldn't hear anything from the console aside from the occasional spin up of the disc for a few seconds, and at one point a slight almost exhale sound from the fan for about 5 seconds, and I was only sat maybe 2m from it on my gaming chair for couple of hours. Maybe I'm just lucky (or my hearing is worse than I thought) but I would be happy to apply the "silent" description to mine for 95% of the time it's on and running, idle mine is literally silent as I can't hear a thing from it unless crouched down next to it. Agree on the drive though, when it is spinning it does seem pretty loud but I haven't tried any films in it yet to see how disruptive it would be when the sound bar was on.

 

Re: Your HDR issues... I've not had this at all. I have HDR on my TV (and I've been setting up HDR on things like Demon Souls so I'm assuming it's working as planned) but when I've played maybe 5-6 non-HDR PS4 games without changing any settings and they look exactly as you would expect with no weirdness going on. Maybe a TV specific issue? Which titles have been giving you bother with it?

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Wiper

Wiper

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1 hour ago, FiveFootNinja said:

Re: Your HDR issues... I've not had this at all. I have HDR on my TV (and I've been setting up HDR on things like Demon Souls so I'm assuming it's working as planned) but when I've played maybe 5-6 non-HDR PS4 games without changing any settings and they look exactly as you would expect with no weirdness going on. Maybe a TV specific issue? Which titles have been giving you bother with it?

 

Well, literally any which don't support HDR. So, of the ones I've tried, Persona 5 Royal and Shenmue III. And AFAIK it's not a tv-specific issue, the PS5's HDR is simply either Always On, or Always Off. Bear in mind it doesn't lead to a dramatic, obvious problem for SDR content - it simply ends up squashing the colour range slightly, which is quite subtle and easy to miss, unless you, say, had been solidly playing through a game on PS4 comprised primarily of strong, block colours (Persona 5 Royal) and went straight to the PS5 with it, and suddenly everything looked slightly... Off.

 

My TV's an LG OLED55BX, which did at least make it easy to identify the issue (it pops up with an HDR logo when switching from SDR to HDR, so the fact that wasn't happening when switching to the UI from the game was a clue, then confirmed by going into the (blindingly white) HDR settings menu within the TV which is only available when being fed an HDR signal). After that I read around, and lo, it's officially a thing.

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wretcherd

wretcherd

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I put on Spelunky 2 earlier and thought it looked darker than it used to, it now occurs to me that lack of hdr support could be the reason. I doubt I'll be bothered to switch it on and off on a game by game basis, and I also just leave the TV in game mode when using the media apps, so I must just be a philistine.

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FiveFootNinja

FiveFootNinja

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Ah okay. Was the HDR forced always on the PS4 as well? I ask as I'm fairly certain Rocket League, Journey and Abzu, are all SDR and when I played them this week on the new console there was no change in the range that I noticed compared to when I did them on PS4 not that long ago. I had just assumed if it could be used it would be used, not that it was always on (I don't get any handy badges on mine to tell the difference).

 

To be honest you have a substantially better TV than me so it could well be that mine just doesn't make as much of a difference in the wild. I don't for example have different profiles for each setting, it just runs the higher range under the current settings or doesn't. Anyway, I hope they patch it for you.

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Alex W.

Alex W.

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PS4 would automatically enable/disable HDR depending on whether the game was using it.

 

It sounds like it’s tone mapping the SDR games in to the equivalent part of the HDR colour space, which with a correctly calibrated ideal display in principle should give the same results as displaying in the SDR colour space.
 

But displays aren’t ideal - on an HDR LCD in HDR mode for example, the backlight goes up to the maximum, even if the image isn’t using the full brightness range. That means backlight bleed that is avoided when the TV is in SDR mode, where the backlight is dimmed to only the level an SDR image actually needs.

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Madness

Madness

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8 minutes ago, Parappa said:

Has anyone tested Spoity support? I am pretty sure on my ps4 it muted game soundtracks automatically and told you what song was playing etc but this doesn't seem to be the case on PS5 :unsure:


Spotify has never muted game soundtracks for me (I think the only console to ever do that was the Xbox 360 and it was freakin’ awesome and I don’t know why it isn’t the default)

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Parappa

Parappa

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Just now, Madness said:


Spotify has never muted game soundtracks for me (I think the only console to ever do that was the Xbox 360 and it was freakin’ awesome and I don’t know why it isn’t the default)

Ah ok i thought it did. That's a real shame. 

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cubik

cubik

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3 hours ago, Wiper said:

UX designs re: PS4/PS5 downloading are daft. I shouldn't have to worry about downloading the wrong version of e.g. Bugsnax thanks to vague interface design.

I'm sure this has been asked before and will again but how do I check that I've downloaded the PS5 version?

 

I was massively underwhelmed by Bugsnax the other day and thought the framerate looked a bit janky. I could be on the wrong version.

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Wiper

Wiper

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The indicator's an absence; specifically, PS4 games appear in your library with [PS4] overlaid on them, while the front page appends "| PS4" to their title as shown below their thumbnail when highlighted, per the below.

 

20201130_215825_copy_1947x1222.thumb.jpg.016fc1ebd2a56eb10c3a46cdd5e95f7d.jpg

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wretcherd

wretcherd

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2 hours ago, cubik said:

I'm sure this has been asked before and will again but how do I check that I've downloaded the PS5 version?

I was massively underwhelmed by Bugsnax the other day and thought the framerate looked a bit janky. I could be on the wrong version.

One giveaway would be the adaptive triggers. On the PS5 version, when you use the scanner R2 has a bite point halfway down.

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