Rumor Mill: New PS4 model releases this September?
Sony has announced that its newest gaming console has sold over 40 million units since its launch not even three years ago, easily making it the fastest of all their consoles to reach that high number. It's already halfway to the current number of Playstation 3 units sold overall, and Sony is predicting another 20 million or so units sold between now and this time period next year.
The reversal of fortunes for the big three console makers has been fascinating to observe in the past few years. It was only a decade or so ago when Nintendo was beating all others (by a healthy margin!) with the Wii, and Sony was hanging on disappointingly in last place in terms of overall sales. But the times, they are a-changin', as Bob Dylan would say. Now Nintendo's newest console is effectively dead, and Sony's next generation hardware is on track to become its biggest one ever.
Of course the internal competition is strong: the Playstation 2 remains the most popular console in the history of gaming, managing to sell over 150 million units in its incredible thirteen year lifespan. But if any console has a chance of topping the PS2's sales milestone, it would be the PS4 -- after all, it's already topping some very big milestones of its very own.
Yes, it seems like a gargantuan task to top the Playstation 2, but the PS4 is well on its way of doing it. And with a new, more enhanced version of the console on its way, Sony has a lot of reasons to be optimistic about just how high the console can fly, and if new rumors are to be believed, there is a very particular reason why Sony wants to gamble on new expensive hardware this fall.
According to the latest issue of Edge Magazine, the code name PS4 Neo model only exists so that Sony can make their virtual reality kit the PSVR a success in the market. Both are being courted for a September release, so that by October all the new games coming out can be supported by both the more powerful machine and the addition of virtual reality. The reason is simple: the soon-to-be older, base model of the PS4 cannot handle the limitations and strain VR puts on the box, and there is a need to run at 60 frames per second consistently. Developers will now have to make two versions of their games to make this happen.
Source say:
"PSVR was going to be terrible on a [launch] PS4. It was going to be truly awful. Something a bit more powerful starts to bring VR into range. If you want to deal with crazy requirements for performance in VR, you absolutely have to do this."
What do you think of all of this? Do you believe any of it? Hate it? Love it? Looking forward to the future ahead of us, or have an empty wallet and feel bad about all of this change? We will certainly hear more from Sony at E3 soon, since where there is smoke there is usually fire. And we will be sure to keep you updated on everything that happens, when it happens.
