Sony is finally ready to lift the curtain on the PlayStation 5 this morning.
The livestream begins at 9 a.m PT/12 p.m. ET on Wednesday, March 18, on the PlayStation Blog. It will mark the first real look at the system beyond a previous logo reveal during Sony’s Consumer Electronic Show 2020 presentation.
The company announced on social media on Tuesday that Mark Cerny, the PS5’s lead system architect, will “provide a deep dive into PS5’s system architecture and how it will shape the future of games.”
Tomorrow at 9am Pacific Time, PS5 lead system architect Mark Cerny will provide a deep dive into PS5’s system architecture, and how it will shape the future of games.
Watch tomorrow at PlayStation Blog: https://t.co/bgP1rXMeC8 pic.twitter.com/BSYX9tOYhE
— PlayStation (@PlayStation) March 17, 2020
The move comes after Microsoft unveiled the full Xbox Series X specs at the beginning of the week, on March 16. Both systems will use solid-state drives and are based on AMD’s Zen 2 and RDNA 2 architectures, graphics chips that focus on delivering ray tracing and variable rate shading.
Microsoft boasted that the Xbox Series X has 12 teraflops of power and called it “the most powerful” console ever made. Expect Sony to rebuff that statement before both consoles release this holiday season.
Cerny, who also served as the lead system architect on the PlayStation 4, previously spoke about the design philosophy of the PS5. Similar to Microsoft, Sony will focus on lowering load times by using a solid-state drive and making sure games perform at higher resolutions and frame rates than on previous consoles.
“We’re very used to flying logos at the start of the game and graphic-heavy selection screens,” Cerny said in an interview with Wired in 2019. “Even things like multiplayer lobbies and intentionally detailed loadout processes, because you don’t want players just to be waiting.”
While much about the console is currently unknown, the company did detail some changes to its DualShock controllers. Haptic feedback will replace the current version’s rumble technology, which Sony claims will deliver a more expansive range of feedback to players. In effect, doing things like driving a car on the grass or slamming into a wall will feel different in a game like Gran Turismo. The currently unnamed controller will feature adaptive triggers that will allow developers to program the resistance the L2 and R2 buttons offer up players. The controller will also feature an improved speaker from the current DualShock 4.
Acer’s Predator Atlas 8 finally has a US release date and price, several months after the company first showed off the handheld in May. The highlight is the Intel Arc G3 Extreme chip inside, which has been adopted by only a couple of other consoles besides the Atlas 8. This version will go on sale exclusively at Best Buy on November 1 for $1,299.99.
Acer originally said the Atlas 8 would arrive in North America in October, but left pricing open at the time. The launch came amid the ongoing DRAM crunch, which has made memory more expensive across the PC industry and complicated pricing for hardware makers.
Gaming laptops and I have a complicated relationship. One of my first gaming rigs was an Acer Predator that was already outdated when I bought it. I was a broke college kid, and that was the best I could afford. So trying out high-end gaming laptops is always fun. But ASUS' ROG Zephyrus G14 is a lot more than a laptop that can run AAA games. It is portable, so you're not lugging around a 2.5kg machine everywhere you go. It is built well, none of that plastic chassis, and can even function as a normal laptop outside of just gaming.
Google Play is borrowing one of the Nintendo Switch’s most useful little tricks. A new Sidekick tool called Playbacks captures a short clip after something interesting has already happened, sparing players from running a screen recorder throughout an entire game.
Playbacks is part of Google Play Store v53.8 and keeps saved clips on the phone. Google first announced it earlier this month, but the new Play Store update marks its arrival for players. Anyone who has watched a perfect win vanish because the record button came too late already understands the appeal.