The bomb's finally dropped: Sony has confirmed the existence of the PS4K - or the PS4 Neo, as many refer to it. The confirmation comes from president of Sony Interactive Entertainment Andrew House, who revealed that the "high-end PS4" is a part of the company's future plans to the Financial Times.
House even gives us a few juicy details about the device, claiming that it's going to be more expensive than the standard $350 PS4 that's currently on the market. However, new customers won't be forced into buying the more expensive console, as House explains: "It is intended to sit alongside and complement the standard PS4 [...] we will be selling both [versions] through the life cycle." Interesting.
Sony's looking to target "hardcore" gamers with the supercharged machine, which will offer better resolution for those who own 4K televisions, and, as far as we know, will boast better specifications. However, the shiny new PS4 won't be showing up at E3 2016 - which kicks off this weekend. We suspect that Sony will be giving it an official announcement when the time is right, then.
It's all kicking off now, eh? Let us know if you're in or out in the comments section below.
[source next.ft.com, via neogaf.com]
Comments 53
But everyone knows Sony come to E3 equipped with at least 20 presentations pre-planned so they can go with the one that best sabotages Microsoft
Woah! Expensive. Shame we have to continue waiting to find out more.
Suprised in some ways not in others think they will want to be pushing PSVR and games for the PS4 system. The Neo I think needs its own platform so it does not get lost amongst all the other announcements. I do laugh because another website which i am not going to name had a supposed leak about the E3 and said it would be 100% there.
And here we go!
@kyleforrester87
Wonder when they're gonna reveal this new iteration was created because PSVR needs more power
If launching this year I suspect gamescom
This is good! Very good! Less "new" console means more games!
Wow. Sony dropping the ball? Keeping this thing under wraps is not doing the PS4 brand any good.
It's a hard situation , maybe it's best to do a quiet soft launch with the PS4K.......the last thing you want to do is throw away everything you've done to get those 40+ million PS4's sold.
Microsoft 2013 is a testament to how fast the tables can turn if you don't have your ducks in a row.
Glad it's finally been acknowledged. The sooner we have an official rundown of precisely what PS4K is and what it can do, the better.
@kyleforrester87
Just like with revealing the launchprice of the PS4; if that wasn't a PowerPoint sheet that was adjusted that very day I don't know what is. You get a fairly slick presentation of the console, and then the price is revealed like this:
:')
I still can hear Jack Tretton bs'ing the press that "a company like Sony makes these decisions months ahead"... I guess that didn't go for the very last bit of their presentation then
At least they've confirmed it,but I'd rather get an NX as I don't have a 4K TV.
@Boerewors Or, maybe they were always going to price at $399.99, they just weren't going to announce it? Changing the delivery makes sense; changing pricing plans on the fly, less so.
You can't alter your sales projections like that on a whim.
@get2sammyb
Even if they did change the price that day, its a very smart move. You see your target audience respond poorly to the price point of your competition, why on earth would you repeat their mistake? Learn from it, pivot, and move on. If you can't do that, you are not likely to survive capitalism.
@dryrain
Not at all. The PSVR doesn't "need" a more powerful PS4, anymore than the Rift or Vive "need" dual GeForce GTX 1080's, but damn, get those and you will have a much better experience. Thats the idea here.
For what its worth, the GearVR can give a pretty decent VR experience with a mobile phone. Add in all the extra power that the PS4 has over your cell phone, and thats a pretty good experience for most people. A newer, more powerful PS4 is by no means required. Will it help? Absolutely.
@thedevilsjester I see the philosophy, but realistically, if they were planning for $499.99, it would have thrown their financials into catastrophe. You can't do that a few hours before a press conference.
@get2sammyb You are thinking too black and white.
Imagine this scenario. You are going to announce a new device price on the same day that your competition is going to announce it. Your last device had a very rough start because you didn't "get it". So you prepare more than one projection. What if we sold for $499? $449? $399? Find the price that you can still live with, hope that you can announce for a higher one, but be prepared to announce for a lower one that you have already determined is financially viable.
Woo-hoo, E3 2016, where the most 2 talked about things are the 2 things that aren't there, NX and Neo.
Should be a a ton of fun Q&As.
I like roller coasters in real life...but this emotional gaming roller coaster is making me woozy. I'd be so happy if this "Neo" was just an add on (like when he says it sits alongside) but not if it's more expensive then what I've already invested in my PS4... @_@
A quiet launch? A picture at the end of their briefing? or something said to get 1 over on MS - they hod back announcing Scorpio now and Sony brings out the Neo!!
Not suprised at all, this is the Sony of new. Their business sense has been great, even if they haven't always prioritized the PS faithful.
Call me a schmuck, but I'm going to stick with my regular PS4 & get PSVR (already preordered) for it. I believe PSVR on the PS4 core system will work fine as I can't imagine Sony will roll this thing out to 40mil+ broken. With this move Sony appease the hardcore & keep feeding the casuals (PS4 core price drop).
This is probably the best way Sony could have played it so kudos to them. Also with no Neo at E3, this means more time for games. Bring on E3!!
@get2sammyb
True, but I believe they were able to "artificially" lower the price by making the camera optional. If you see early press events and presentations on talk shows and what not, it's clear Sony initially had way bigger plans with the camera; I'm not just talking the little robots game, which name I don't remember atm, but the camera was gonna be an integral part of the "social experience" the PS4 was gonna deliver.
Even when you make sales and cost projections for a new product you always make sure have some room to spare in the budgets, especially when you have a direct competitor which hand is forced to announce a price first. I truly think that there were multiple launch options, also one where a camera bundle was optional, but they chose to go for the minimalist approach after MS revealed their price. They saw the backlash, they noticed how people felt about the price and they had a couple of hours for a meeting where eventually was decided the PS4 would launch lean and mean, for just $399; and the rest is history.
I really hope there will one day be revealed how everything around the launch of this gen came to be. I've heard the wildest rumours, some from a insider I know and trust, and especially on the MS side there were some pretty interesting deals made behind closed doors we probably never hear about. The story about this gen's "reveal period" would make an excellent movie if even half of what I heard is true... It's a shame we already know how it ends though; the good guys win
@thedevilsjester I've had this discussion so many times. I just don't see it. $100 difference on a device projected to sell 10 million units within its first few months on the market is a difference of $1,000,000,000. It's unfathomable to think that they made up their mind regarding such an enormous sum of money in the hours between two pressers.
@Boerewors
@Boerewors Best comment of the day.
About PS4 vs. PS4Neo, it's good to hear that Sony will support PS4 during the whole generation, I just hope that is true, otherwise many people are going to feel disappointed.
@get2sammyb You are putting words in my mouth that I did not say. I didn't say that they didn't make up their mind until the last minute, I said that they likely had already planned before hand to take the hit if they had to. So you say "We CAN do $399, but lets hope for $499" If Microsoft had said $499, they might have come in at $449, having ALREADY decided that $399 was an acceptable price point, since $399 at 10 million units is much better than $499 at 5 million.
Cant wait to not be shown this! Roll on E3!
I wonder if they've decided to keep it from E3 so they can see what MS are up to with Xbone 1.5 first?
Really hoping there are still things to talk about that we don't know about at E3. Seems like we know about all the upcoming games that matter...
might as well put the new AMD Zen CPU+RX480 GPU in an APU, yeah i know its technically entry level. and will keeps the cost down, but should give the PS4K a 3-4 year life,
@JoeBlogs They mean from a retail sense. They're going to sell both models simultaneously.
@joeblogs similar to to how apple does it with the 6, 6s, 6s plus etc
I normally buy a second PS console each Gen so this sounds perfect timing if it's out at the end of next year when I get a 4K HDR TV to + I can't believe I am going to say this because it will never happen(SHAME) but it would be cool if the newer PS4K could play all my PS1/2&3 discs to(that is what REAL HARDCORE PS owners want SONY & Mr.House)
@thedevilsjester
I'm with you on this. Of course things weren't decided right then and there, but you bet your bottoms they had several back-up plans, of which they eventually ended up using one. It's way to easy to say: "it would be a billion dollar difference in year one, so it's impossible", there are so many more variables to take into account.
First there is the camera which I believe was an integral part of Sony's strategy at first. They saw the sales succes of the Kinect and realized Nintendo was wasn't gonna do Wii numbers, so there's no better way to attract that audience than with a pretty advanced camera that eventually would also be used for VR. But it was mostly meant to play a huge part in their "social experience" strategy after the explosive growth of social media and Twitch in particular.
Second of all, and this is even more important: Sony isn't just a console manufacturer, they make their money from software sales and subscriptions. So if they hoped for a $499 release, perhaps with a camera, but MS announced that price without any option to ditch the Kinect, Sony could easily make a leaner package with just a controller and put it in the market for $100 less; the extra money they make of of software and subscriptions easily covers the difference in initial projections.
In our family business we deal with comparable issues all the time. If we prepare a tender for a big contract and we get info from the inside about what the competition is offering, something that happens way more than people think (we actually employ 2 people FT lobbyists that also "investigate" these things because they have chatty contacts), we sometimes change a tender on the fly to make sure we'll get the contract. We can do this because we have evaluated the tender and made projections for back up plans as well; we have a plan B and C where we are able to cut cost by removing non- essential features, or making it an extra, or use cheaper parts. Because the last thing you want to do is low balling the offer just to find out you could've made millions more and still have the best proposal.
That's better. Show more games. "Sony's looking to target "hardcore" gamers", could it be revealed at PSX?
@Carl-G Don't think your last point will happen. PS Now is their solution for that.
Works for me. I'd prefer they spent more time showing off upcoming games anyway.
Not sure this is a good idea. Is it a double standard for all those praising Sony for this yet bashed Nintendo for the same thing?
About time Sony... So the "goal" of ps4k is to deliver higher res games to those of us with 4k TV's. Now as a cosumer I understand what you've been upto.
I'm still concerned about additional development and testing requirements but at least I understand what your upto.
It will output movies in native 4k, games will be 1080p. The 4k TV will upscale the games on the fly. Watching my mates Sony 4k tv do this with the current Ps4 was very impressive....the bravia tech in Sony TV's is mighty.
In, most definitely. I've already been putting some pennies to one side ready for the PSVR launch. Time to double up those pennies me thinks lol. I do own a 4K tv so it makes sense to upgrade. I just hope they have some good trade in offers for my present console, here in the UK.
@Boerewors Fair points in your last post - I can accept that they may have pre-planned various packages and gone with the one most suitable. But at the same time I have to wonder that if this really goes on as a) I'm sure Sony and MS have the resources to find out what one another are planning ahead of time and b) Would MS really be happy following on from Sonys conference each year? Surely MS know Sony's plans are set, else they would either refuse to take the first slot, as it's blatantly damaging their business letting Sony change their position on the fly, or they'd withhold crucial information to then release later on in the week after Sony have gone to retain the upper hand.
And finally, this is E3, but it's not really as big as we like to think it is, and a lot of the people watching it have their allegiances and are not terribly swayed by what's said in the conferences, and those out of the loop can easily be influenced through other means. I think we tend to overthink the power of these presentations.
http://www.polygon.com/2016/6/10/11902554/sony-playstation-neo-e3-2016
Well played Sony
**Nintendo announces NX won't be at E3**
"L0LNINTEND00MED!!1!11"
**Sony announces PS4K won't be at E3**
"Let me lick Kaz's boots! Just one more time!!!"
Jesus, when did this place become NeoGAF?
I anticipated three new pieces of hardware to be at E3, now we may not see one. Disappointing, imo.
@Kage_88 I think Nintendo need to start building interest in the NX after disappointing sales of Wii U, whereas Sony don't need to dilute the PS4 brand or confuse potential buyers until they have to.
Sony hold most of the cards this generation, Nintendo just have their character cards left!
tell you im confused never mind a normal punter walking into game
4k i doubt will ever take off in uk. Same as 3d etc etc. Best bit tech i have is google chromcast soI can stream stuff for kids from my pc & phone
My Tv is ready lol
@kyleforrester87
Normally I'd say e3 isn't as big as we like to think, yet it is the biggest (and only) media event which gets coverage by all big newspapers and lots of TV outlets. Actual prices in the store when compared are really important too, but the good word-of-mouth the PS4 got back then started way before the launch. As the "gamer" in the family I still get tons of questions about Xbox' DRM, 'spy camera' and always online (which you can imagine is a huge thing in a 3rd world country).
And for Sony and MS knowing from each other what they're doing... I think MS didn't know what Sony was doing because they kept the PS4 specs really safe, there wasn't anyone who leaked, cause I'm positive MS would've had a stronger GPU as it has since the extra costs are negligible for them. Heck, they could've even had overclocked the current one with the One being this huge.
It's a public secret that all big(her) companies hire "spies" or hire private investigators to find out what the competition is doing. The easiest way is by gaining info from Foxconn's lower ranked factory workers, although it's hard to find some who actually realize what they're working on. But there are tons of stories about how key people in companies leaked to the competition, and not always for money; my brother got really pissed one time after our industry's biggest convention and started talking bout our latest software, which was revolutionary back then. It turned out one of the people he was with was an account manager of our biggest competitor, a newbie we didn't know yet, who got a big raise really soon after he got hired I can imagine.... cause when his companies' new and improved firmware dropped, it had a key feature we had been working on for quite some time (fuel efficiency for certain types of UAVs, boring stuff).
I'm so hyped Sony finally officially confirmed the PS4K's existence.
Now we just need a MSRP and confirmed release date already...
I think this is a smart move. They're acknowledging its existence and not acting like its the best news in the world. Good stuff!
So what about amd modernize factory so Sony forced to upgrade speculation? It seems it wasnt true or Sony has lot of spare parts and believes that nowadays users upgrade and new users buy used ps4s.
Anyway Im glad Sony is moving on with something new but still worrying about new games optimalization for lowspec ps4 - I mean maybe more games will be little choppy like JC3 and Witcher without pressure on devs.
Maybe it would be good if Sony makes some lowest quality requirements for both. If higher model is minimum fhd/60 then lower model should run fhd/30 or hd/60 minimum.
makes sense to me, tell us now so we aint waiting for it during their E3 show
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