The PS4 is widely regarded as one of the best consoles of any generation in video game history. It is jam-packed with incredible exclusive titles, many of them going on to win multiple awards, including Game of the Year. Its base version upon release was also recognizably more powerful than its primary competitor.
After the lukewarm reception the PS3 received throughout its run, the team at Sony knew they had to take drastic measures to ensure the PlayStation 4 was going to win the gaming community again. As we all know now, they did. And with the PS4’s successor arriving for the next generation of consoles in just a couple of weeks, it will be fun to take a look at how Sony’s current console came to be.
10 Development Began In 2008
The development for the PS4 began as early as 2008, just two years after the release of the original PS3. Sony wanted to assess every single mistake they made with the PS3 and make sure that doesn’t happen again with the PS4
No one in the public and only a handful in the media was made aware of this, though. Rumors of a console that would succeed the PS3 did not circulate until around 2012, 4 years after development began, and just about a year prior to its eventual release.
9 Mark Cerny
At the forefront of the PlayStation 4’s development is Mark Cerny. Prior to being the lead architect for the PS4, Cerny worked for Atari when was just 17 years old. While there, he worked on games for the company such as Millipede and Major Havoc. Mark Cerny’s first widely recognized and successful title was Marble Madness, which he designed when he was 18.
Mark Cerny began working with Sony during the development of the PS2, making him the first American to ever work on the console. He has then since assisted first-party developers, created graphics engine and software tools for the upcoming consoles until he eventually became the PS4’s lead architect.
8 Sony Worked With Bungie For The PS4’s Controller
In an interesting turn of events, Bungie, a video game developer exclusive to Xbox and Microsoft, actually provided input on how Sony can make the Dualshock controller of the PS4 better. Specifically, better for first-person shooter games.
Bungie is a studio well-known for creating the widely famous Halo franchise. When Microsoft acquired Bungie in 2000, Halo ended up being a launch title for the first Xbox console. Since then, Bungie has been developing games solely for Microsoft until 2014’s Destiny. When it was revealed Sony and Bungie worked together in creating the PS4 controller, it came as a surprise to everyone given Bungie’s affiliations to Microsoft.
7 Orbis
When rumors of the PlayStation that would succeed the PS3 started circulating around the internet, one rumor in particular apparently “revealed” the name of the console. It was rumored that the next PlayStation would be called “Orbis” or PSO.
As we now know, that’s not the case at all. In truth, Orbis was the name of the development kit Sony handed out to developers, a modified PC running the AMD Accelerated Processing Unit chipset. Orbit ended up becoming the name of the PS4’s operating system.
6 Very Programmer-Friendly
The PS4 was specifically created to be considerate to developers and programmers. When the development for the PS4 began in 2008, software tools were already being written alongside hardware design. Mark Cerny, the lead architect for the PS4, made sure the developers would find the console easy to use.
Sony also distributed questionnaires to over 30 third-party developers on the future of gaming, specifically how they want the PS4 to perform in terms of graphics and gameplay. Among the most popular suggestion was the use of a single, unified high-speed pool of memory instead of the two found on PCs and the PS3.
5 Knack & Other First-Party Titles
During the development of the PS4, Mark Cerny and the team at Sony behind the console worked very closely with video game studios on how they can make the console better and friendly towards programmers. Many of Sony’s first-party studios were very hands-on during this process, specifically Guerrilla Games, Naughty Dog, and Sucker Punch.
Mark Cerny himself provided and directed a video game that’s meant to be a launch title for the PS4 called Knack. Guerrilla Games worked really closely with Sony as well, even developing a launch title for the console called Killzone Shadow Fall.
4 Future Of PlayStation
On February 20, 2013, Sony held an event known as PlayStation Meeting 2013 which they held in New York City. It was here Sony discussed the “Future of PlayStation” and officially announced the PlayStation 4. On top of that, Sony also revealed some of the first-party titles that would become available on the console, a few of them being launch titles.
A few days prior to this event, a leak actually surfaced online detailing the new Dualshock controller that featured an integrated touchpad and an earphone jack. The design was not exactly accurate, but the functions were.
3 Win At E3
Sony really made a lot of noise during E3 2013. It was here they first unveiled the design of the console along with its official price tag.
E3 2013 was a major win for Sony and the PlayStation 4 for multiple reasons. One, the PS4’s price tag is a hundred dollars less than that of the Xbox One. Its overall design was also considered to be more appealing. While the PS4 fully marketed and highlighted its capabilities as a gaming console, Microsoft went in a different direction and made the Xbox One sound like a living room entertainment system. Needless to say, many gamers made their decision to opt for the PS4 instead of the Xbox One when E3 was over.
2 PS4’s Release
The PlayStation 4 was initially released on November 15, 2013, in North America. Hundreds and hundreds of people started lining up in front of retail stores hours prior to opening. Prior to release, pre-orders for the console reached up to over a million orders.
As expected by many, the console sold over a million copies on launch in North America. In the UK, the PS4 ended up being the best-selling console at launch, selling over 250,000 copies in just 48 hours. Today, the PS4 ended up selling over 112 million copies worldwide.
1 Codename “Neo”
In September of 2016, approximately two years after the release of the PS4, Sony announced an iteration of the console, codenamed Neo, one that would have a more powerful GPU, hardware, and a higher CPU clock. The design was also slightly altered, providing a three-decker type design instead of the base console’s dual decker design. This is the console we now know as the PS4 Pro.
The PS4 Pro is more powerful than the base PS4 on every level. It was also capable of running games on 4k resolution, something the base console was unable to do. It would also improve the performance of the PSVR.
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