Once it’s released, the PlayStation 5 should stick around for six to seven years, including an upgraded model like the PS4 Pro, according to a Sony executive. That would roughly match the lifespan of the PS4 itself, which has been out for six years as of this November.
The PlayStation 5 is set for a 2020 holiday season release, which means it should stay viable until around 2027. One of Sony’s main goals with the PS5 is reportedly decreasing load times in games, thanks to the inclusion of a fast SSD instead of a standard hard drive. On the other hand, if a recently filed patent for a controller is in fact the design that Sony goes with, it seems that there won’t be any major changes to the controller.
Masayasu Ito, executive vice president of hardware engineering and operation at Sony Interactive Entertainment, recently spoke about the PS5’s lifecycle during an interview with Game Informer for the PlayStation’s 25th anniversary. According to Ito, the fast pace of technological development has shortened the length of time that a piece of hardware can stay viable. He also spoke about the possibility of a PS5 Pro, saying “we should be able to change the hardware itself and try to incorporate advancements in technology” during the console’s lifetime, calling the PS4 Pro a “test case” for the idea of mid-cycle console revisions.
Sony could be keeping games for older consoles remain playable after its original platforms are phased out, as it’s reportedly working on backward compatibility for the PS5. The company also seems to be hard at work securing a library of original games that will keep fans happy. Sony recently put Guerrilla Games head Hermen Hulst in charge of PlayStation Worldwide Studios to help grow its global teams. At the same time, it moved Shuhei Yoshida in a new position to support independent developers. After resisting the feature for a long time, Sony also recently embraced cross-play, which could make it a more attractive platform for online games.
The length of console generations hasn’t changed too drastically, but Sony is clearly planning for the future to make sure it doesn’t get left behind in the hardware race. With the PS4 finally starting to show its age, it’s clear that the time for an upgrade is coming up. Knowing that the company is already looking ahead to a more powerful version of the PlayStation 5 shows that it intends to support developers pushing the technological envelope well into the lifecycle of its next console.
Source: Game Informer