PlayStation 5 - Next gen is expensive

[JPL]

3 minutes ago, gooner4life said:

 

In that it's virtualised 3D audio out of a stereo pair of speakers, but Dolby Atmos can produce sound from 32 objects in a 3D space simultaneously, PlayStations Tempest Engine can produce 300+ objects simultaneously.

Oh nice. So it’s a lot better then. I remember Cerny going on about having different profiles for different ears of something in that initial reveal they did.

 

I only ask because I’ve got a decent surround sound setup for my Xbox, but wondered if getting some headphones would elevate my gaming experience.

[BitterToad]

Just now, JPL said:

Oh nice. So it’s a lot better then. I remember Cerny going on about having different profiles for different ears of something in that initial reveal they did.

 

I only ask because I’ve got a decent surround sound setup for my Xbox, but wondered if getting some headphones would elevate my gaming experience.

I wasn't hugely sold on 3D audio pre Returnal. It seemed alright? There was a cool moment where I found a lad in the prison in Demon's Souls by following his voice but other than that I thought it was a bit of a gimmick. But Returnal's the real deal. It sounds amazing and you can properly use it to pinpoint where enemies are around you. Up there with haptics as the most interesting next gen thing I've seen as long as, all together now, people other than Sony actually use it. 

[Seamonster]

You can pinpoint things above and below you as well. 
 

There’s a part in Returnal where someone runs up a flight of stairs to your right. You can hear it from the right hand headphone (obviously) but can also hear the elevation increase as they run upstairs. 
 

When you’re just traversing a level there’s stuff going on all over the shop. 

[df0]

4 hours ago, BitterToad said:

But 3D audio works with all headphones? 

Does it? I did not know that lol.

Why did I buy this Pulse headset ffs 😔

[Alex W.]

You still can’t use Bluetooth headphones on the PS5 right?

[Uncle Mike]

1 hour ago, Alex W. said:

You still can’t use Bluetooth headphones on the PS5 right?

 

You can, you just need a dongle (and potentially be prepared for some lag, depending which audio codecs your Bluetooth headset can do.)

 

So, for example, (and I know I've linked to it a few times, so sorry to those that are fed up reading it) you can buy this dongle from your favourite retailer and it'll register as a standard USB headset with the PS5. But if your headset doesn't support aptX/aptX HD/aptX LL you may find the latency to be enough of an issue you'll wish you didn't bother.

 

The latency being the main reason none of the consoles do Bluetooth out of the box in the first place.

[sid]

20 hours ago, Alan Stock said:

So I just got Returnal today, and it kindly reminded me that PS5 3D Audio is a thing. So I dutifully plugged in my earphones into the controller and hey presto, it works - that's nice. Unfortunately I lose some of the bass I usually get through my earphones via the TV, but as they've specifically designed the audio with 3D in mind I will persevere.

 

Anyway in looking up the 3D Audio it turns out a bunch of PS5 games already support it, but I couldn't find an up to date definitive list which is annoying, even on PlayStation.com. The reason I want to know is that if its not using 3D audio I'd rather listen using my earphones plugged into the TV. I know it supposedly enhances PS4 games automatically with the 3d audio too, but I'm not that arsed unless its a big improvement for those.

 

Also wondering what your experiences are with the 3D audio compared to headphones plugged into the TV? And whether anyone has tried USB headphones plugged into the PS5 rather than in the controller?

 

I see Resident Evil 8 and Demons Souls are also 3D audio games, I'll have to try them again with the controller setup.

 

PS I still haven't gone into the 3D Audio profile setup on the PS5 which is apparently vital to match your ears, so don't forget to do that. Maybe that will improve the effect once I'm on the correct profile. The PS5 should really get you to do this on startup or at least remind you. And other games with 3D audio design should remind you at the start, just like Returnal, or people will just forget it exists!

Resi 8 audio is excellent, really immersive 

[Alan Stock]

Nice, I'll stick with the 3D audio for Returnal then. This morning I played a little bit and turns out some of the bass problem was simply because my ears were blocked up (I have a cold!). I'll have to find somewhere in game with a consistent wide range of good 3D sound and experiment between plugging my earphones into the TV vs the controller to see how much difference it makes. One thing that's really annoying is that because the 3D sound is via the console, to adjust volume you need to manually bring up the PS menu, go into the sound menu and do it in there. So there is that missing convienience factor - I adjust volume quite a bit, boosting for cutscenes and so on, or just switching games. I'm guessing if your headphones have a built-in volume control on the cable/housing then you can just do it there though.

 

I'll be trying out the 3D audio in Resi 8, Demons Souls and some of the PS4>PS5 upgrade games I have. Will report back if there's any that stand out.

[footle]

9 hours ago, gooner4life said:

 

In that it's virtualised 3D audio out of a stereo pair of speakers, but Dolby Atmos can produce sound from 32 objects in a 3D space simultaneously, PlayStations Tempest Engine can produce 300+ objects simultaneously.

I wonder how many a human can reliably distinguish at once, to the point that matters. Though more whether my aged ears can really tell, relative to just “loud seems better”. Most atmos stuff hasn’t impressed me, whereas VR audio always did.

[Alex W.]

Exciting Powerpoint slides over at Ars Technica:

 

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2021/05/sony-lists-pc-version-of-uncharted-4-in-investor-report/

 

This one really surprised me:

They also apparently haven't forgotten completely about PSnow.

[Super Craig]

The same thing happened with the PS4. Sony obviously aren't keen to sell hardware at a loss for long after the PS3 fiasco.

[Alex W.]

There’s got to be more than £450 worth of copper in that heat sink, I’m amazed the scalpers aren’t just selling them for scrap.

[jonamok]

Stupid question alert: If I want to play a game from scratch that doesn’t allow multiple game save profiles - in this case Returnal - can I just create a new player profile on my PS5 OS and play the game effectively as a completely new install, or will it treat it like I’ve played it already?

[rgraves]

2 hours ago, Alex W. said:

Exciting Powerpoint slides over at Ars Technica:

 

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2021/05/sony-lists-pc-version-of-uncharted-4-in-investor-report/

 

This one really surprised me:

They also apparently haven't forgotten completely about PSnow.

 

I call 'suspicion' on this - given the current shortage going on, I can't see any supplier worth their salt lowering costs on anything. Stuff is in short-supply, so why would you sell at lower cost to Sony right now when you'd almost certainly have others prepared to pay you more?

 

They may have something contractual I guess, but youi can bet the lawyers are going over those force majeure clauses for wiggle.

[Thor]

10 minutes ago, jonamok said:

Stupid question alert: If I want to play a game from scratch that doesn’t allow multiple game save profiles - in this case Returnal - can I just create a new player profile on my PS5 OS and play the game effectively as a completely new install, or will it treat it like I’ve played it already?

Just back up your original save to a USB stick and then delete the local and cloud saves. 

 

edit: To answer your question, yes that will actually work.

[Tempy]

28 minutes ago, jonamok said:

Stupid question alert: If I want to play a game from scratch that doesn’t allow multiple game save profiles - in this case Returnal - can I just create a new player profile on my PS5 OS and play the game effectively as a completely new install, or will it treat it like I’ve played it already?

Yes this should work. I created my son a local account to play Miles Morales. He can access the game although installed under my profile, but has no access to my saves and vice versa. It was like loading up the game for the first time. The saves are local instead of cloud as his account has no PS+

[p1nseeker]

39 minutes ago, jonamok said:

Stupid question alert: If I want to play a game from scratch that doesn’t allow multiple game save profiles - in this case Returnal - can I just create a new player profile on my PS5 OS and play the game effectively as a completely new install, or will it treat it like I’ve played it already?

 

Yeah that will definitely work. Me and the missus have separate profiles and have totally separate gamesaves etc.

[jonamok]

Thanks for the profile/save game answers all.

 

@Thor Didn’t think you could do a USB save back up on PS5.

[Thor]

9 minutes ago, jonamok said:

Thanks for the profile/save game answers all.

 

@Thor Didn’t think you could do a USB save back up on PS5.

Oh, I've been mucking about with Mass Effect saves, which of course are PS4. 🤦‍♂️

[Cyhwuhx]

2 hours ago, rgraves said:

 

I call 'suspicion' on this - given the current shortage going on, I can't see any supplier worth their salt lowering costs on anything. Stuff is in short-supply, so why would you sell at lower cost to Sony right now when you'd almost certainly have others prepared to pay you more?

 

They may have something contractual I guess, but youi can bet the lawyers are going over those force majeure clauses for wiggle.

There's a new revision being implied:

 

 

 

So I'm guessing they've made some (financial) improvements here and there like they always do with running changes in their consoles.

[Alex W.]

Just half an inch thinner. For my TV stand. PLEASE.

[p1nseeker]

Is it going to be physically different or just a new chipset?

[Cyhwuhx]

Just some of the guts being changed. This isn't going to be a Slim revision already.

[rgraves]

Seems early for a hardware revision - could it just be an additional color option  (to match the new pad options)?

[Alex W.]

But with less inside I can just squish it down right? Like a sandwich?

[Cyhwuhx]

No, no, no. It's nothing like a Slim/hardware revision. This is more akin to swapping out two separate chips on the board because you can now consolidate them into one new chip that's functionally identical to both.

 

In the old days, this would be done every half a year or so and we would get slightly different serial/type numbers to keep track of consoles. But Sony would not mention anything as functionally nothing changed. This is the first of such changes for PS5, so don't get your hopes up about anything really. This is purely a cost-cutting measure on their side. Only when things go weird do you actually notice this: like with the 'new' Switch getting a different chipset because the old one was becoming so old it actually went up in price to produce. So Nintendo had to change to a new chipset, which gave it better battery life at the same time. But such 'reverse' improvements are very rare.

 

They'll keep improving things, until the internal guts can be actually shrunken down a few sizes to generate a smaller/Slim edition a few years down the road, with some of the cost-cutting being handed down to consumers by way of a lower RRP.

[Alex W.]

Maybe I’ll just take the panels off and leave them off.

[SeanR]

Maybe they’ll remove a USB port on the back and replace it with a PS4 camera port, because it’s cheaper the building and posting adapters?

 

[Bushtopher]

I’ve seen Last of Us 2 is £23 on PSN. Reckon I’m at least a year away from getting a PS5 (stock here in Singapore is worse than in the U.K.)…. but still tempted to get this. Do Sony’s first party games tend to go much lower than this?

[Mr Do 71]

5 minutes ago, Bushtopher said:

I’ve seen Last of Us 2 is £23 on PSN. Reckon I’m at least a year away from getting a PS5 (stock here in Singapore is worse than in the U.K.)…. but still tempted to get this. Do Sony’s first party games tend to go much lower than this?

It was recently or still might be £9.99+£4.99 P&P @ GAME.