PlayStation 5 forces games to improve and it all starts with the controller



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PlayStation 5 has been pre-ordered in Romania and is expected to reach early users soon. If you haven’t taken it at that point, it will be available again. Until then, or when your console arrives, it’s good to know that it will come with a different new controller. Alright then.

As you’d expect from a console you’ve probably been waiting for a few years, the PlayStation 5 has some necessary improvements. Not necessarily from the point of view of design, which has already generated two fields: those who hate it and those who appreciate it. The middle way doesn’t seem to be.

Personally, after using the console for a while, the design didn’t really matter. Although initially I was in the first camp, because white never seems like an inspired decision, but also because the disc version seems, somehow, disproportionate. But don’t buy a console for the design, but for the performance. And in this note I want to mention that it is very quiet, compared to a PS4 Slim.

When I say that the PS5 itself improves games, that’s not true. PlayStation 5 offers both high-performance hardware and an excellent controller. Now it’s up to the game developers to really take advantage of the console.

Apparently, a classic Sony controller. In essence, DualSense is completely different

Sony PS5 DualSense USB-C
USB-C port, which we need on all gadgets
Sony PS5 DualSense Controller
The touch area can be integrated into games more than it did with the DualShock 4. Provides two points of contact (thus multi touch) and haptic feedback

What I have to blame for the overall design of the PlayStation 5 is the choice of color shades. The more elegant the combination of black and white, the stranger it is about the gadgets you constantly use. But we also need a mention. Both the PS5 and the controller aren’t really white. It is a shade of gray. In some images it can be seen, in others not even.

Sony PlayStation 5 DualSense PS5 (1)
The controller and console are grayer than immaculate white

Any PlayStation 5 model comes with two things: a DualSense controller and Astro’s Playroom. The latter is there to show you and the developers what the former can do.

DualSense makes sense to get more involved. The way vibrations are reproduced has been improved and they are now somewhat spatial, that you may hear something to the right or left or in front of the controller, depending on how it is integrated into the game.

In Astro’s playroom, for example, tilt the controller and climb a wall (sense movement through an accelerometer and gyroscope). Or feel the vibration to the right of the controller, that there is a problem or there is something you need to interact with. With a simple logic you can think of racing games that use both vibrations (to feel where the impact with another car was) and the accelerometer to drive the car.

DualSense trigger for Sony PS5
Is it possible to simulate the tension in games? DualSense is trying this

The L2 and R2 triggers have also been improved. They are stretched, with a longer stroke and you press on them, then you feel some tension. The controller can simulate, through these, that your game character goes faster, that you have “pressed” the accelerator pedal or that you have set your goal. There are many opportunities to use this kind of tension translated into how the player feels.

I would find it useful, for example, in FIFA. You can, at least for free kicks, shoot with such a trigger and choose how much force to put into the shot. It is equally useful in racing games. Or when you pull something, you push something and you have to understand how difficult the task is.

DualSense has both a speaker and microphone, charges via USB-C, and in some respects feels like a DualShock 4 arranged to look more modern. And this helps the ergonomics, because it fits a little better in the hand and the sticks are a little tighter.

What I regret is that the buttons on the right, so familiar to any PlayStation user, are now only transparent and with the classic shapes: triangle, square, circle and x. They add a pop of color to the previous controller. There are only modules here. This, although, of course, the colors have not disappeared in the games. It doesn’t necessarily confuse anyone with the presence or lack of colors, but that’s why I don’t see why they were removed.

The Share button is now Create, here’s what you do: create a screenshot, a video. Nothing complicated here, just something good: a slightly more efficient and faster menu to take a screenshot or start recording the game.

The PlayStation 5 now depends on the game makers

Sony PlayStation 5 DualSense PS5 (2)

Sony PlayStation 5 DualSense PS5 (3)

In 2020, people have resorted to video games more than ever. Every developer who has taken themselves seriously has relied more on the multiplayer component, and PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X and S are coming at best.

Both come, at the same time, at a time when technology has evolved enormously. The big TVs of seven years ago are, at best, average now. The panels are better, with nanocells or QLED or OLED or whatever the name used by the manufacturers. Sound is also being taken more seriously than ever, as Dolby has begun to accustom the world to Atmos and other manufacturers to follow suit.

The need for a new console was clear. PlayStation 5 also has a new controller that makes you “feel” a little more when you play something. As much as I like what DualSense has to offer now, and what I’ve experienced in the pre-installed game and Spider-Man: Miles Morales, one thing confuses me a lot: Will the developers use what Sony has put into this gadget?

If Electronic Arts, Ubisoft, Epic, and others take the step, which complicates their workflow too much, DualSense would only have been half useful. The verdict can be issued in about two years. 2021 will be the year when new games are released on PlayStation 5 for the first time, and old ones have finally been updated accordingly.

The exciting thing about DualSense for now is that it carries the idea of ​​diving. Between PS4 and PlayStation 5 there were augmented and virtual reality which proposed completely new approaches in terms of the mix between real and digital. I like AR best, but it’s not for all games. DualSense takes some tricks from mobile games (accelerometer and gyroscope interaction and develops slightly better vibration feedback).

It can also be the first in a larger collection of console accessories. For now, games compatible with it are planned. Until then, it remains the most ergonomic controller to date.



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