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PS5: 10 Incredible Game Previews and Other Things We Learned From the PlayStation 5 Reveal

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As we covered last week, there’s a lot of excitement building around the forthcoming release of Sony’s next generation gaming console, the PlayStation 5 (PS5). After an initial delay to give the Black Lives Matter protests some breathing room, Sony held their much anticipated Future of Gaming launch event online yesterday. The full reveal of the PS5 hardware was met with mixed reactions from the internet, with many saying that the machine resembles a wi-fi router, but the response to the game trailers that were dropped in the announcement was effusive.

If you want to watch the entire launch event you can find it here.

10 Incredible Game Previews and Other Things We Learned from the PS5 Reveal

Who is the Target Audience for This Design?

The box reveal for the PS5 got the internet’s sarcasm engine running. The public was quick to jump on Sony for a design that resembles basic networking hardware or the nearly 20-year-old Nintendo Wii. The plastic wings extending from the top of the machine are apparently a design feature, intended to evoke a feeling of classiness. As Sony’s PlayStation CEO Jim Ryan put it to the BBC, “The PlayStation sits in the living area of most homes, and we kind of felt it would be nice to provide a design that would really grace most living areas.” The black and white look of a squashed Star Wars stormtrooper helmet will be the machine’s only color scheme at launch.

https://twitter.com/xenokizu/status/1271191521245696000?s=20

Disc-less PS5 Console Option

The PS5 will be released in two models, the standard box and a more streamlined option without a disc drive. In a first for Sony, the alternate box will rely entirely on digital downloads and online game-play. While no price points have been released for the consoles or any of the PS5 hardware, it seems safe to assume that the disc-less version will be less expensive. Sony promised more details on pricing and exact release dates in the near future.

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So Many PS5 Games

Sony debuted trailers for more than 20 games during the hour-plus announcement event, and they look absolutely amazing. The upgraded capabilities of the new box are fully on display throughout, with unrivaled graphics and sound. The announcement of the continuation of some favorite titles was also huge for fans of classic PlayStation 4 franchises.

Inclusion is also in the spotlight here, with many of the games that were revealed being led by minority or female characters, in a massive culture-shift for the gaming industry.

Spider-Man: Miles Morales

The PS5 game trailers came out of the gate strong. Super-powered, in fact, with the teaser debut of Spider-Man: Miles Morales, a follow up to the massive 2018 PS4 hit, Spider-Man. In a later announcements it was clarified that this game is an add-on and extension to the original, with upgrades across the board in graphics, sound, and game engine.

The game will feature an all-new adventure focused not on Peter Parker, but on Miles Morales, the Afro-Latino teenage Spider-Man who was most recently the lead character in Sony’s Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. This would have been a grand-slam of a reveal under normal circumstances; Miles is a great character and a fantastic Spider-Man. With things the way they are in our country right now, Sony just absolutely nailed this one. Plus the game looks awesome!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHzuHo80U2M

GhostWire: Tokyo

I’ll admit, between the headless girl in the old-timey sailor costume, the bizarre visuals and the Agent Smith looking guys, I have very little idea what’s actually going on in this trailer. There are a lot of cool looking moments in here that really display the capabilities of the PS5, though, and the game looks like a wild ride of a supernatural thrill-combat game from the typically reliable Bethesda Softworks.

Project Athia

Not to be outdone, Square Enix subsidiary Luminous Producions released their trailer for their PS5 exclusive game. The team behind Final Fantasy XV was incorporated specifically to focus on this game and be “a fusion of cutting-edge technology and art,” as Yosuke Matsuda, president of Square Enix, puts it. I’m not sure about all that, but the game looks like pretty killer.

Stray

If you told me that one of the best looking games displayed during the PS5’s reveal event would be a noir adventure in which the gamer plays a stray cat wandering through a dystopian metropolis populated entirely by androids I would have asked if you had any more of what you were smoking, and where could we watch that trailer? Beyond this footage I have very few details on this game. The studio only describes it as a “third-person cat adventure game” which is less than helpful. Is there a story? No idea. Is there combat? Probably. Are you a detective cat? Possibly. That scene where he looked in on the robot barber seemed to have some investigative feel to it.

Resident Evil 8: Village

The grand-daddy of horror gaming returns on the PS5 with the all-new eighth installment in the main franchise. This trailer makes great use of the PS5, rendering cinema-quality graphics and sound. The upgraded features will only help with the immersion that is so critical in a good horror game. Without buying-in to the environment and the creeping sense of dread the jump-scares and genuinely intense moments lose their feel, a problem which dogged earlier entries of this and other horror franchises. This one looks like it will grab hold and not let go until it finishes devouring your attention span and your weekend.

Horizon: Forbidden West

This might be the best looking trailer I watched. Just flashy all the way through, showing off what the PS5 can do with weather and water effects, and giving us a look at the highly anticipated sequel to Horizon: Zero Dawn. This game adventures into a new open world setting in the unexplored western regions of the original game and promises more of the same open giant monster-hunting madness.

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Deathloop

The second game revealed by Bethesda Softworks looks like an absolute blast. To summarize the trailer, which you should absolutely watch, this game is basically Groundhog Day meets John Wick 3. You’re an assassin on the run from a city full of assassins trying to cash in on the bounty on your head, but the catch is that every time you die, your time-loop resets and you start over.

As the trailer reveals, or as you may have learned in either of the Happy Death Day movies or Edge of Tomorrow, every time you die you get a little further, gain a little more information. A hard-R of a first-person shooter, this game looks like it has a bit of everything from stealth, to gore, to detective work, and the hyper-stylized trailer and cut-scenes just add to the amazing looking game-play.

Returnal

To summarize the trailer, this game is basically Groundhog Day meets … I swear we just did this. Yes, it’s another game that uses the concept. This time around you’re an astronaut trapped on an alien planet. The atmosphere of the third-person shooter is reminiscent of the movie Annihilation, with it’s creepy sci-fi alien world setting and monster mayhem.

Kena: Bridge of Spirits

An adventure game that looks like it has a lot of the DNA of a Zelda: Breath of the Wild to its game-play, this one has some absolutely gorgeous animation going for it. The studio behind the game began life as an animation and CGI company, which is apparent in their stylistic choices throughout.

Grand Theft Auto V (again)

This one has a bit more of the feel of a cash-grab to it. Capitalizing on the continued popularity of Grand Theft Auto 5, Rockstar has touched up and expanded the now seven-year-old game for release on the PS5. How much difference there will be between this version of GTA V and just playing your PS4 version on the backward-compatible PS5 is an important and unanswered question. The cut scenes on display in this one don’t look all that much different from what I remember in GTA V and GTA V Online. That Rockstar has continued to develop content for GTA V Online seems to render this remake even less essential.

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