Whether you're on board or not, virtual reality is turning the gaming industry on its ear. The PlayStation 4 has only been on the market for less than three years, but Sony is reportedly readying a massive overhaul to ready its game console for PlayStation VR and 4K, or four times the resolution of the current standard PS4's 1080p.
Dubbed the 'PS4.5,' or the 'PS4K,' the alleged console was first reported last month. The reports suggested new hardware, including a more powerful GPU, a 4K Blu-ray player, as well as an incremental price hike to reflect the component upgrades. Now, additional rumors have shed more light on the recent speculations.
According to reports from NeoGAF user OsirisBlack, the upcoming PS4K console will be priced at $499.99 and available in "Q1 2017." The PS4K reportedly features both a CPU and GPU upgrade, the latter being twice as powerful and much faster than the one found in the current PS4. OsirisBlack's NeoGAF forum post also mentioned that game developers already have their hands on PS4K development kits and will be creating games that will take advantage of the higher specs from the hardware upgrades.
The post also mentioned that while current games may not receive any sort of improved graphics from the PS4K, the vice versa creates an issue where future games designed for PS4K will not look as great on the current standard PS4 console. Unfortunately, no reports indicate a trade-in program is planned for current PS4 owners at this time. Hopefully, this will change as the rumored PS4K release date nears.
Check out the full NeoGAF post on the latest PS4K info from OsirisBlack below:
"PS4K information (~2x GPU power w/ clock+, new CPU, price, tent. Q1 2017)"
Related info from a meeting we had yesterday was waiting for it to be approved before posting.
Price is currently $399.99 they were discussing a better CPU which would raise the price to $499.99 we were guaranteed the price will be no higher than $499.99 (He mentioned the CPU upgrade quite a bit almost as if they haven't really decided on a final spec could be a pricing issue.) also there is currently no plan for any type of trade in program for current PS4 users but that could change.
They stated that the GPU is twice as powerful as standard PS4 and much faster. They did not say exactly how fast but that is was running at a higher clock speed while being much smaller than the original.
It will have a 4k blu ray player and will upscale games that are not natively 4k. Also there was talk of some sort of VR lounge for the media player app which is supposed to be getting a substantial upgrade. It was stated plainly and with no room for interpretation that there are developers that already have development kits for the PS4K and that they are making games that will directly target and take advantage of the higher specs of the PS4K. It was also stated that these games will in fact work for the PS4 but with considerable sacrifices made to performance.
It was also made very clear that current games would not be getting any type of performance upgrades by being played on the system and any benefits to older games would come via patch per game and per developer. When asked if this was going to happen the response was "Its a possibility but doubtful with the exception of a handful of games."
We were also given a list of games that will be available at launch that will directly take advantage of the PS4K where the differences are and I will quote him "Significant."
For the PSVR
Eve Valkyrie
Robinson
GT SportFor the PS4K
Deep Down (Thought this was dead)
GOW4 (This was the exact abbreviation on the sheet I can only assume its god of war 4)There were more games on the list but these are the ones that stood out to me. That's all I can remember off the top of my head I'll see if I can get any more information.
Edited to add:
I got a bit more information today but I am trying to find out who all knows about it before posting.
Also the word "Sacrifices" is being blown out of proportion. There are sacrifices made when making a console version of a game as compared to a PC game or when making an XB1 game as compared to a PS4 game. Don't expect PS4 games to all of a sudden become shit just expect them to run better on PS4K. I would expect a game that is really pushing the graphics envelope to run at 1080p 60fps on PS4K while the same game might run at 900p 60/30fps on PS4. Just the way I took it.
