Fresh PS5 Pro Report Reiterates Sony Demands for Upgraded Games

It's a bit sad that Sony and others have to make mandates to get devs to take advantage of new hardware. But at least it means we should get a better experience.

If nothing else, Sony can tout itself as having ‘The most powerful console in the world’, but I am still waiting to see what the PS5 can actually do since it’s been held back by the PS4/5 crossover. I think I’ll wait until PS6 for a new console!

This generation has been all about load times for me and I love it so much. I'm not really all in on graphics, but I'll end up buying the Pro at launch.

We know how it will go.
Sony will demand something and then dev reality will hit.
Just remember that Sony/Microsoft were talking about 4K 60 this gen. And even cross-gen games can't hit that most of the times. Native next-gen games like Immortals of Aveum can barely run in decent resolution on those machines.

So, Sony claiming 4K/60 with ray tracing is just sad at this point.

Im hoping that if they do release a pro model the origional isnt kicked to the kirb because theres no way on earth the OG ps5 has been pushed to its limit but ive got a feeling it will be downplayed to make it look like everyone NEEDS the new pro version.

I’ll be buying one at launch. Not waiting another 4 years for the next upgrade / PS6. I’ll probably be too old to lift a controller by then!! 🤣🤣

@Godot25 listening and trusting all those marketing things like "4K @60FPS all around" is silly. Even high-end PC rigs struggle to maintain those numbers and require some kind of scaling technologies. And the games themselves become hungrier for system resources every year.

Not interested. Happy with my PS5 slim on LG C2. Runs like a dream

Having more power is all well and good, but if developers don't actually utilise it it's all for naught, and Sony themselves have a less than stellar record in this department.

Sure, when the PS5 launched Sony drip-fed us PS5 performance updates, but they left most of their games untouched and stuck at a disappointing 30 frames-per-second. Elsewhere, while Microsoft developed their own FPS Boost feature to allow games a performance update without the need for developer support (useful for titles they don't have dev access to like third party games), Sony didn't even attempt to match the effort.

They're also notoriously quick to give up the goose if they don't immediately see a strong profit forecast (even if there's strong potential). PSVR2, Dreams and PS Vita can attest to that.

The PS5 isn't a PC where we can immediately tap into the power increase. With consoles we're entirely at the mercy of developers and publishers to see if we can utilise the extra power for our favourite games. I'm sure Spider-man 2 and a couple of other heavy hitters will great some great performance, upgrade, but else-where I'm very hesitant to have optimism.

I’ll be waiting a year before purchasing to check developers are actually making use of the console.

If I see a game labeled "PS5 Pro Enhanced" drop from 60fps to 59fps during gameplay, I will return the game and console immediately.

For a good few years now I have had TVs with VRR support, top end TVs.
Started with the Xbox one x mainly.
And now with this generation I could recommend VRR tv even more. It so helps with frame rate variability and smooth gameplay, seems to remove any previous screen tearing.
VRR is great to have.

@Shepherd_Tallon As I understand it which features they implement or how many is up to the devs. It's just required that at least some are implemented to get the "Pro Enhanced" stamp.

Step 1: Toggle to set uncapped framerate.
Step 2: Apply "PS5 Pro Enhanced" label.
Step 3: ?
Step 4: Lose money!

Why these mid-gen upgrades/refreshes aren't the base launch system is beyond me

I'll be ready whenever it gets revealed. Hopefully we get news this summer!

@3Above
It’s inevitable when most devs have to go multiplatform to be profitable. This is why platforms making exclusive content is still important. Unfortunately we seem to be moving the other way.

@thefourfoldroot1 I've heard some (DF) complain that this gen the consoles were "too similar" or "basically the same box" to be interesting but fact is that without exclusives the actual differences are not obvious and it seems like they are the same. Not sure why people hate exclusives other than Console warriors.

Nope, last playstation for me. PC bound after a day 1 adopter I. The 90's

Seems fair enough to me. Devs that think that their game won't sell any more with or without the label won't bother patching their game - that's their prerogative - and those that do do the market analysis and conclude the costs of patching the game are worth it get a little kitemark to put on the store and their marketing materials.
I know I've ignored games because they didn't hit 60FPS this generation. Sorry, but I've been spoiled by the games that have managed to hit that performance and can't go back now.

@guardianoftime same-ish here. Day 1 PS5 and LG C3(2023). Perfect combo. Will wait until PS6. 👍🏻

@3Above @thefourfoldroot1 With the cost of modern game development, it's just not possible to spend the kind of money required and actually make a good return without hitting every possible corner of the market you can hit. That's really always been true. We've kind of got used to a quirk of history as a business practice from an era where the hardware and the storage media were so custom and different in terms of capabilities that games made for one rarely ported well to another. It helped set the stage when Nintendo (illegally) mandated that every game published on the NES MUST be exclusive.

But the hardware matured. They're all just various forms of x86 PCs or ARM tablets these days. Publishers wanted a generic hardware platform to publish their games to as many markets as possible finally. It's not a "bad" thing but the era of exclusives doesn't make sense anymore. Most of the "exclusives" back in the day weren't really business strategy exclusives other than the mascot exclusives that, arguably, Sony never even participated in other than Crash/Spyro association now owned by MS, they were "exclusive" to a platform because the game used unique capabilities of one platform that didn't exist on others. Square for example, jumped to PS-only because only PS had the storage medium for the music tracks and FMV they wanted to include (and because Yamuchi kicked them out of Nintendo because they dared put a game on Playstation...that too.)

That's why the PS Mini's kind of sucked. A lot of the classic "PS exclusives" weren't actually Sony's games. And they weren't actually paid for to be exclusive. They just happened to be exclusive by coincidence because the games needed physical attributes of the console they couldn't get on other platforms, but now they can put it anywhere.

They've tried for a while to keep that environment going, at first with exclusives being tech demo showcases that sold at a loss to move hardware to sell more mulitplat games on. But then they ballooned their budgets and need to make money on a game same as any 3rd party publisher, and thus was the end of (most) exclusives.

We're just seeing the boringness of a tech reaching maturity. Consoles existed because graphics capable generic computing devices were extremely expensive. Now it's all commodity and is flavors of the same thing. Even VR, the last real frontier, the headsets have a gimmick or two that's unique, eye tracking vs not, but ultimately, they all do the same thing similarly, they're all compatible mostly.

It's not a bad thing, but it's more boring than the early frontier. We just have to accept we are Arthur Morgan. The old days are never coming back.

@NEStalgia
Whilst not disagreeing with most of that, I stand by the fact that it is a sad state of affairs. Even small things, like MS not having proper haptics and motion controls in their controllers, has held devs back from fully utilising those options. On the console level it hasn’t been evident due to devs having to support last gen/Series S, but I guarantee things like the immense PS5 I/O throughput wouldn’t have been utilised anyway in most third party games as it would have required an entirely different development model for the Series X and S (I’m sure PS5 would have held back Series X in its way too before anyone piles on, I’m just not as familiar with that architecture).

Fact is, only exclusives allow us to fully utilise our consoles so I wish the business case was there for more of them. Alas, that’s no longer the case (and yes, I realise I say this from a privileged position of being able to get all the consoles if I wanted all the exclusives, but that doesn’t change the main point just because there are also disadvantages).

Yeah. My next console will be ps6 or ps6 pro.

It seems that Sony despite the sales it has, despite likely launch a new console in about 3 years they want to sell even more ps5 and expect developers to enchant there games so they might sell a few more copies. Doesn't make sense to me but Sony must have a reasonw

@BIG3 PS6 is around 4 and a half years away

The “upgrade” means something akin to PS5 exclusive. Meaning not cross-gen!

I feel like devs still making games cross-gen with the PS4 has held back the PS5 more than anything else.

@thefourfoldroot1 Definitely agree on motion controls. "Haptics" are fine. I go back and forth between all 3 console controllers, they all rumble, and while playing the all rumble the same. Yeah if I'm paying attention I can feel differences but while playing, no. It's like you and 30fps lol.

But motion controls is my pet peeve with Xbox. I simply assumed the xsxs would have that and I'm so mad it doesn't. Totally agree there. I can't play fps without motion after splatoon. Though I can't really play fps without VR control at this point so maybe it doesn't matter. If Xbox would just supports Quest I'll never complain about motion again

I'm some ways ps5s success is already holding back xsx. They do have differences. Xsx strength is in having a lot of features that require use of more efficient development tool use. PS5 is just built for brute force. Microsoft bet on improved Dev techniques. A dumb bet. Devs just targeted the bigger market of PS5, let the PS4 dev methods stick and let the raw grunt handle it. So PS5 generally wins because it's better at being a more powerful Gen 9 console, ironically.

But even there were mostly taking about performance differences, more resolution, some more shiny shiny. Nothing really magically exclusive. As people point out, Spider-Man and other games have less physics than PS3 games did. Heck breath of the wild has more physics on a 2011 tablet than any 9th Gen game. It's not about exclusives. All these games are just pc games now. But creativity is gone, it's just about graphics now. People lining up for a better GPU with no CPU upgrade for likely much more money than psvr2, actual innovation in gaming that just sits there. I know vr can never be for everyone. But the thirst for nothing but even shinier metal, more reflective water, and denser grass gets so tiring. But that's all the market cares about.

@ArcticSin because of the millions of people worldwide who will buy a base ps5 on release - followed by a ps5 pro on release

@NEStalgia
But the bit about haptics just supports the point - there is indeed no difference, but not because it isn’t actually a discernible difference as you think, but because it simply isn’t utilised, even in PS5 games, because it would put off people from buying an Xbox version even if that’s all they have access to (in the same way I don’t buy censored PS games even though I wouldn’t buy them on switch anyway). Nobody wants to get a game if they are hit with a second best version.

I’m the same about VR though. Not completely on topic, but I got Ancient Dungeon at the weekend. Really fun game, although I do wish there was more progression possible in your stats and abilities. Not really feeling like I’m getting stronger, but I haven’t unlocked the anvil yet i guess.

@Zenos Sounds good to me.

@thefourfoldroot1 Nah, I mean Nintendo first party with "HD Rumble", Sony first party with "Dual Sense" or whatever their rumble tech is called, and XB with a good quality normal rumble pretty much feels the same in play. I think it's an overblown tech started by Nintendo. Actually one thing XB does cool is separate rumble motors for triggers and main. I think the motorized triggers on PS5 kind of emulate that but not actually as well. Of course PS5 has the motorized triggers but I generally don't actually like them. Spiderman wants to give you arthritis. Games like XVI that use it for "opening the doors" just seem stupid. It's used well in some VR games, and it makes more sense in VR when you're actually simulating grabbing objects.

I mean, yes, the rumbles technically can feel different, but not meaningfully so unless used as a gimmick like Astrobot/1-2-Switch.

IMO I think "rumble tech" is a thing that the added sensory input of "motion" in your hand helps your brain track the action that's occurring, but the fidelity of the exact feel of that motion isn't something your brain actively processes, really even in real life. It's not the detail of the motion your brain processes secondary to visual/auditory inputs, it's that the motion exists at all. I think the "HD" rumbles are one of the silliest gaming "advancements" of the past 10 years. Motion triggers aren't far behind. What I still want is motion STICKS though. We had that on 90's PC flight sticks. How do we still not have that on consoles?

But no instead we get ever worse potentiometers that drift more easily.

OT: I'm still stuck on Cyube because I wandered away looking for iron deposits, got lost, and can't find my base anymore. And the patch that adds teleport to base never seems to happen. My new plan is throw myself off a mountain and sacrifice my on-person inventory to respawn at the base. It's my only way back to base, lol.

@NEStalgia I do tend to agree with you with regards to gaming/game design. I don't really feel gaming has actually changed in the past couple of Generations - the type of games we were getting over a decade ago are still the games we get today.

Open world for example maybe has become 'more' open as streaming/loading has significantly improved meaning you have less 'dead' areas designed for longer loading/streaming times. But that's also benefited other games - less/no Door opening/lift based loading screens for example.

However, the basic game-play loops haven't really changed - the Physics and AI is still quite limited - maybe even less Physics in some games (Battlefield for example) which has virtually no physics destruction today. AI still doesn't seem significantly different and worlds seem equally as Static despite looking increasingly more dense and/or realistic.

It doesn't surprise me that games from a decade (or more) ago still hold up well today - whether they are playable via BC or have been ported to modern hardware with more 'modern' visuals. I'd still rather play games like Mass Effect, Dead Space, Uncharted, Tomb Raider etc than many 'new' releases that may 'look' more modern/impressive, but have 'generic/bland' characters, stories, game-play loops etc.

Arguably circumstances back in 2012-3 (another Financial crisis with people predicting the 'death' of Consoles) and the decision to go with 'weak' CPU's to keep costs down and GPU's to make 360/PS3 era games 'Look' next gen and 'full' HD affected game design we are still feeling today. Games like AC: Unity with all that unique AI or Just Cause with its Physics Destruction really Struggled and why I feel AI/Physics maybe worse than the PS3/360 era.

Graphics are our 'first' impression - we either see Screenshots or Trailers long before we get any 'hands-on'. Even little changes between trailer and release (Puddles) set people off and a game that 'looks' dated, especially AAA+, is almost dead before it releases. So I can understand why it maybe a priority over Game-play, writing etc (Immortals of Aveum) Style over Substance.

As for Haptics, that's a personal thing. I'm OK with some rumble but I hate the Adaptive Triggers on the DS5, loathe gyro-aiming or Gyro controls etc. I also don't want to be blowing on, being heard by mics built in to controllers so I'm OK with it only being on Playstation. I never finished Astro's Playroom because I hated these features. Each to their own - but if they were 'standard' then chances are, some games wouldn't give you the Choice to turn them off.

@Godot25 It’s not sad. Developers just need to scale back their graphics for whatever genre of game they are making. As the PS5 and XSX aren’t capable for some of these ambitious graphical titles at 4K60. Perhaps 1440k60 with up scaling should be the way. As 4K requires a lot of raw power. Perhaps next generation Sony or Microsoft will build consoles that are worth at least 1300$ with more bespoke hardware that is strong and charge more from the get go so the consoles have enough grunt for many years. Just like the PS3/X360 era.

@3Above I can give you the perfect test. Play the same game on a ps4 then load it up on the ps5 and the improvements will be stark bro

I’ll be getting this model to replace my OG PS5. For those that don’t have a PS5 I’d urge them to get this one as I don’t see next generation changing with cross platform games for the first few years of next gen. So the pro will carry one at least a quarter into next generation if not longer. Unless the PS6 is truly bespoke and designed with an impressive SOC like the PS3 era, one won’t have an incentive to get a PS6 initially.

I never buy the Pro models, and truthfully, I don't play enough PlayStation games to warrant upgrading midway through a generation anyway.

I will watch with interest what Sony bring out, and most importantly what value they put on such a device. I suspect it will be pretty pricey, and also that Sony will not think that they need to swallow the price increase themselves, as they did with the PS5 at launch because at that time they needed to match the Series X in price (particularly so because the Series X was actually slightly more powerful).

The situation that Sony will find themselves in is one of market dominance (currently holding a roughly 75% market share), and with a large userbase meaning that likely as not Sony will be relatively comfortable selling the Pro at either cost, or possibly at a slight profit. I think the console will retail at at least £600, and possibly even £700, and that Sony will feel that they will garner enough interest in the console, even at this price, to warrant not selling it at a loss.

Personally, I shall await the PS6, which I think will arrive around 2027/2028, and which will likely supersede the Pro in both specs, and potentially even cost! I just don't have the funds to afford a Pro and then the PS6 just a few years later. The PS5 works perfectly well for me, and I can wait for the PS6. I'm interested to see how the PS5 Pro performs, but that is about as far as it goes...

@NEStalgia
Maybe it’s just one of those things different people are more or less able to detect as you suggested before. The only time I can’t feel a difference between monotone rumble and true haptics is when the devs haven’t implemented a difference (which is most of the time these days for reasons stated above).

Regarding cyube, it sounds like you should just kill yourself to teleport back lol. I take it the draw distance isn’t good enough to climb to the highest mountain peak and spy it from a distance?

Not using the existing Tub o' Lard so damned if I'm going to pay another £500 for another glorified paper weight.

Going to keep the PS4 Pro going and hopefully the PS6 will be out when it expires and proper Sony will be back in the room.

@Mikey856 Preaching to the choir on that one, I'm still impressed by the loading in Rebirth and it's not even cross gen. I was just saying that some people complained about the similarities. But for me personally playing Forbidden West on PS4 then playing Burning Shores on PS5 at 60fps was all it took.

I just want to say that the picture accompanying the article rocks!

@BAMozzy The problem, I think, runs deeper than the 2013 consoles and the choice to limit the CPUs. That definitely created a problem last gen, but we could have easily blown past that by now, and I don't think that's the main problem.

The pattern we see now in consoles is exactly the pattern that existed all the way back in the 90's and early 00's on PC. I think it's mostly tied to the Western, originally American, but now also clearly European, game design philosophy of that era. "Console" developers were almost entirely Japanese still, with their penchant for quirky designs. While PC development was all American and some European. And it was the same pattern on PC back then. Same game, iterated with a new engine and better graphics, year after year. The obsession with technophilia and showing off compute power was the whole point of the game. id Software back in the Carmack days typifies this. Up to Crytek with Crysis and beyond. You didn't buy shooters because shooters were popular. You bought shooters to show off the latest and greatest graphics power.

If we go back far enough, on PC, which is where all the modern western console devs originate, what did we have in the 90's. Shooter after shooter after shooter, each demonstrating more graphics grunt. We had early big open world games before "open world game" was a thing. Bethesda was doing open world with Daggerfall, Morrowind, Baldur's Gate, Fallout, etc, though isometric were doing open world. The console tropes of "late PS3 and later" really stared on PC in the late 90's and later. Max Payne was, what, 2000? It's basically every single narrative action adventure game that has existed since it. And it wasn't really all that unique in its own time, it was just really good.

Half-Life 2 became legendary in that world because it did one amazing thing: Physics. You could interact with nearly everything, and it responded. And we've basically never seen a game like that again, Portal, it's sibling, aside, until the new Zeldas (which maybe takes the idea to a fault.) And that's running on an ancient tablet not a power console.

Meanwhile, unfortunately the market demonstrated that doing exactly that is where the big, big money is. So the Japanese devs that classically innovated have largely been caught in the same cycle of just impressing and iterating graphically, because Japan itself doesn't really buy games anymore, so appealing to western tastes conditioned to keep playing the same game with better graphics is how to make money.

Every game that comes out and struggles on consoles what does everyone scream? About how much better PC is, better res and fps and sliders. As though that changes the fact that the game is fundamentally a game from the mid '00s made prettier and running hotter. The market was trained.

A lot of that comes from cash injections from nVidia and ATI (before it was AMD) and 3dfx to push their hardware technologies into development. I think that's really the biggest issue. The western devs also did different things until around that time. Then 3dfx, later nVidia and ATI just started funding developers almost the way console mfrs treat 2nd parties for exclusives, to push their graphics tech to the limits and condition consumers to expect the most technological power. I don't think game development ever recovered from the whole development motif of design the game designed around pushing the engine to maximize the hardware of the game's sugar daddy hardware mfr benefactor. It became a codified mindset and corporate culture.

The irony is 3dfx bankrupted themselves and ATI had to be acquired by AMD. nVidia flies solo and rules the world, but the reasons have nothing to do with their GPUs.

In all honesty, I was originally all in for the pro, but until I actually see some regular full on ps5 games I honestly don't see the point. Plus I've just spent cash on a steam deck (which is superb)

Other than frame rate who cares. Eh ray tracing that barely gets understood still but trying let alone couldn't care less about shadows/lighting/reflections on the scale it can offer anyway for any glass buildings, water, cupboards with glass panels wow I need that. Pass no thank you Sony, Microsoft any 1st/3rd party developers. I'm not interested.

And boring GPU enhancements. Pass. Tell me when interesting gameplay mechanics in games happen not a Pro console with games still with not as well tweaked engines to handle this let alone borefest graphics focused games with boring grounded characters with bad movesets lacking depth, boring worlds and recreations of boring real world locations then fictional worlds with more exciting level design and movesets to offer come out. Pass.

I upgraded from PS4 to PS4 Pro back in the day. I bought PS5 a couple months after it launched. I love it but I don't feel the the need to have PS5 Pro like I did with PS4 pro.

Haven't really seen anything that demands an upgrade....or much of anything at all really. devs have barely tapped what we have now halfway into the gen and they won't let go of last gen. will just hold onto the current ones they work more than well enough. whats more interesting now is nintendo about to release their next system.

My PS5 crashes after about 1.5-2 hours, no matter how it is standing and with an external fan. So yeah, I got about three years with it. Think I'll skip the mid-gen refresh.

Can't wait for GTA 5 PS5 pro edition £60

According to almost every developer interviewed when asked about how easy is it developing Games for the PS5, the comments are typically that its already the easiest Console to develop for this GEN, so it should be even easier than Last GEN's PS4 PRO mainly with the Added help coming from the PS5 PRO's New (Hardware Dedicated) Ray Tracing and Machine Learning...aka PSSR baked right into it, so it should make it easier to implement most of the Added Feature Set of the PS5 PRO.

Day 1 Purchase for Me!

Happy Gaming ✌!