PlayStation 4 will be released just in time for holidays, according to a Sony press conference held this week (video below). The console, which did not make an appearance, will have an 8-core X86-64 AMD Jaguar CPU and 8GB GDDR5 RAM Radeon GPU. The PlayStation Eye has two improved cameras that are capable of facial recognition. The DualShock 4 controller has been updated with a built-in speaker, headset jack, touchpad, a light bar that helps identify players and indicate health, an options button that replaces start and select buttons and a share button that allows players to easily upload screenshots and gameplay video to services like Facebook. Players will be able take the gaming experience out of the bedroom by streaming content to handheld devices such as the PlayStation Vita. Other features include the ability to sample games and play them as they download. Best of all, PS4 will eliminate save points and load times by putting the console in a low power state known as “suspend mode.”
Eurogamer is reporting that “PlayStation 4 will not block the use of second-hand games” as rumored but Sony Worldwide Studios boss Shuhei Yoshida seemed less sure. After conferring with his PR advisor, Yoshida said “used games can play on PS4” but that doesn’t preclude the possibility of activations fees.
Sony showed off trailers for Watch Dogs, DriveClub, The Witness, inFAMOUS: Second Son, Killzone: Shadow Fall and Knack but its was the game engine demonstrations that stole the show.
The audience got a look at some fantastical fantasy worlds complete with imposing dragons when Capcom and Square Enix demoed their Panta Rhei Engine and Luminous Engine, respectively.
David Cage from Quantric Dream displayed a disembodied human head that uses an unprecedented amount of polygons to create a video game character with a soul.
Cage narrated:
On PlayStation 4 this is what you can get. Quantric Dream has developed a completely new engine. What you see running in real-time 3D on a PlayStation 4. It is out first attempt at using advance skin shaders with translucency, realistic eye shaders, geometric light, 3D depth of field and many, many other features that were up until today were reserved for CG films. This is the quality that we will get in our future games and we know we can go even further but more important than these technical features, we start to reach a point where you can see very subtle emotions on the face of the characters. Where you can feel feel his emotion just looking at his face. Where you can see soul just looking into his eyes. When you look at this old man you can image who he is, what he thinks, what happened to him without him saying a word.
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