In defence of Sony and the PS5 – Reader’s Feature

A reader offers a rebuttal to recent criticisms of Sony and the PS5 and explains why he bought the new PlayStation over an Xbox Series X.

Recently on GameCentral there seems to be a large volume of letters praising Xbox and slating PlayStation. This Reader’s Feature details my reasons for why I take the opposing view, that the PlayStation 5 is at present the superior piece of hardware, and the reasons why I chose the PlayStation 5 over the Xbox One Series X.

I acknowledge that Xbox are more consumer friendly but this is born out of necessity rather than some misguided notion that Xbox are our best buds.

I also accept that Sony have made recent missteps.

Game Pass

Let’s get the big one out of the way. Microsoft’s big hitter, Game Pass is consistently brought up as a reason to choose the Xbox over the PlayStation 5 and to some extent I can see the reasoning behind this, but on the other hand I do feel that Game Pass is over hyped. A tenner a month for access to hundreds of games and day one access to first party exclusives is great value for money… except as far as I am aware the last AAA big budget Xbox exclusive was Gears 5 and that wasn’t particularly well received.

Frankly, I think PS Plus has proved better value for money since the PlayStation 5 was released. I subscribed for a year in November and in that time myself and other users have been able to download and play massive games such as Final Fantasy 7 Remake, Shadow Of The Tomb Raider, and the upgraded PS5 Ultimate Edition of Control on the day of release, as well as smaller PlayStation 5 exclusives such as Bugsnax and Destruction AllStars.

Game Pass may have the bigger selection of games, but I believe the games offered through PS Plus over the past few months, as well as the PS Plus Collection, means PlayStation 5 owners have access to better games. Not to mention some of the great titles such as Horizon Zero Dawn and Astro Bot that are being made available to all PlayStation players regardless of whether they subscribe to PS Plus or not, as part of the Play at Home initiative.

Backwards compatibility

All Xbox titles from the original Xbox work on the Xbox Series X, is what I understand. It’s an interesting premise and is great for those who want to catch up on games they may have missed out on. The PlayStation 5 on the other hand only plays PlayStation 4 and 5 games. Add to that, the fact that Sony have decided to discontinue PlayStation 3 and PS Vita titles from online stones in the coming months.

It’s disappointing sure but, honestly, I don’t know if I’d play a PlayStation 3 or earlier game. Most of the better PlayStation 3 titles have either been remastered for PlayStation 4 or are available via PS Now, should the feeling take me. And if I cared that much, I could bring my PlayStation 3 downstairs but it is used exclusively now as a media player so the kids can watch DVDs or Netflix in me and my wife’s bedroom before they go to bed.

Backwards compatibility is great, sure, but honesty I just don’t see myself taking advantage of it. I’m not sure, either, how well some of the older games would stack up these days. I played GoldenEye 007 a while back in an arcade club and honestly it was dreadful. Practically unplayable and I used to love the game.

I also don’t understand the obsession with 60fps. I’ve played both Control and Spider-Man: Miles Morales with the 60fps option turned on and quickly changed back to resolution mode to enjoy ray-tracing. Honestly, I can’t tell any difference between 30 fps and 60fps but I can see huge differences when I have ray-tracing turned on to when it isn’t.

Enhancing old games is all well and good but if a game is bad it’s bad and if it’s good it’s good, 4K or 60fps isn’t going to change that fact.

New features

The one thing I like about my PlayStation 5 is that it feels different straight away. It’s a new interface and the hint cards are great if you get stuck or want to know how long a mission/objective is likely to take. The new controller is also really good and a definite improvement over previous designs.

The Xbox Series X on the other hand has the same interface as the other consoles and has an almost identical controller to the previous generation. Granted the controller didn’t need much tweaking, as it was near on perfect already, but still, it’s nice to have a new experience.