Opinion: The Growing Importance Of Sony’s PlayStation Experience Event

After the successes of last year’s PlayStation Experience, ostensibly to celebrate the console family’s 20th anniversary in as big and bombastic a fashion as possible, it was quite clear that Sony would want to try and repeat the same trick, and repeat it they did last weekend. From moments of nostalgia and numerous surprise reveals, it was the perfect way for Sony to end the year on a high, with a fresh sense of optimism and excitement for what lies ahead.

The gaming calendar had for a long time been defined by the E3 press conferences in the heat of Los Angeles in June, setting the agenda for that autumn’s release schedule and working hard to get gamers excited for what they’ll be able to get their hands on in time for Christmas. However, this process broadened with the rise of Gamescom in Germany, and it’s trade show presence in Europe. Now there was a second press conference to fill with more trailers and more announcements.

However, the games industry has changed over the course of the last generation. Certainly, the biggest ticket games and franchises are still going to land in the autumn, as the nights start to close in, but 2015 in particular seemed to see developer after developer flee a previously announced release date in favour of spending more time polishing and the greener pastures of Q1 2016. It was something that quite notably struck Sony as well, and with Uncharted 4 pushed back to 2016 and unable to prop up a Gamescom conference with little else to discuss for the end of this year, they held back.

Yet, even without a major exclusive to lead the charge, Sony and the PlayStation 4 are seemingly in complete control of this generation, and are only getting stronger and more confident as they go. PlayStation Experience is a sign of that, as they take a leaf out of Apple’s book and host a conference outside the confines of another group’s event, after 2015’s release schedule is effectively at an and, and most importantly, without any competitors there to distract from their announcements.

Last weekend was all about PlayStation, all of the time, and with almost all of the announcements focused on next year. Whether an existing owner or a prospective buyer, it’s always the next big thing that will have your attention. When I first bought my PlayStation 3 – choosing it over an Xbox 360 at the time – it was because LittleBigPlanet and Resistance 2 were just about to come out, Killzone 2 was out in early in 2009, and there were already a healthy catalogue of games for me to catch up on. I bought it because the future looked exciting, and that’s just what Sony have been selling at this year’s PSX.

PSXBlog-UC4

There were the obligatory looks at Uncharted 4 – oh, and by the way, did you know there’s a beta going on for those who own the Nathan Drake Collection? – and Street Fighter V, but they also spent a good deal of time focussed on VR games, trying to lay some more foundations for the launch of PlayStation VR some time next year though, unfortunately, this was arguably one of the weaker segments. They even pulled an increasingly familiar trick of releasing games live at the show, with Guns Up! and Fat Princess Adventures.

And yet, for all the looking to the future, this was also a showing steeped in nostalgia and wish fulfilment, just as their E3 conference was. Final Fantasy VII dropped jaws with its visuals, a second Ni No Kuni will have also delighted fans of the original, the eternally demanded Yakuza series is seeing more western releases, Double Fine announced another new Psychonauts game, and the run up to PSX saw PlayStation 2 emulation more fully unveiled.

It’s quite the cocktail for people to get excited over, coming at almost exactly the right time of year to capture imaginations right in the run up to Christmas, and again, with little chance of a rebuttal or counterpoint from their competitors.

17 Comments

  1. It was alright not a complete bore, the highlight was gonna be the ps2 games with trophies support Xbone just give you backwards compatible with-out achievements support.

    Also Ps2 games that 1089 HD & runs 60 frame rate. :)

    & & the all time classic RPG returns FF7 :)

    • Except there are now rumours that the PS2 emulator on the PS4 is running at 50fps here and then “doing technical things” to turn it into 60fps with terrible results. Although reality might be that nobody would notice. Just need to hear what’s going on from a reputable source.

      So that highlight might turn out to be not so good. The same way they showed off FF7 and all sorts of ways it might just go horribly wrong were revealed later.

      Still, Ni No Kuni. Has to be good. Even realising Studio Ghibli isn’t involved this time hasn’t stopped me looking forward to that one.

      • Dam that really sucks if it true I haven’t played dark cloud or rouge Galaxy even FF7 yet so I wouldn’t know.

        Yes I’m impress with Ni no kuni 1 so I properly get the 2nd one too as I’m a JRPG geek.

      • It’s because we have the PAL versions in the EU, and in the PS2 days, that meant the game ran at 25/50FPS, instead of 30/60. The PS4, though, doesn’t output at 50Hz, only 60Hz, so just as we’ve seen with Wii U virtual console, they’re having to double frames in order to make up the numbers. Presumably licensing and regulations mean that they can’t offer the NTSC version to those who would rather have that.

      • US mains frequency is 60hz, which means old games from the NTSC era has to run at 30fps, which means lower resolutions. Europe has PAL, higher resolution, 50hz mains, 25fps.

        Not even Sony can change how things worked when TV standards were devised decades ago.

        Thankfully in the all digital EEA where things don’t have to be encoded as PAL or NTSC things don’t matter now

    • Achievements are supported with the xboxone BC, not sure where you’ve gotten that it doesn’t.

      • My bad I’m pesume it wasn’t have achievements with Backwards compatibility I’m been corrected.

        But look at the old bulky PS3 that was backward compatible & that never had any trophies.

        The new PS2 Classics with trophies support & share-play support is not really backwards compatible. :|

      • I thought you had left?

  2. It wasn’t nearly as enjoyable (for me) as last year but I still wanted to absorb the good stuff. Hopefully they’ll be able to refine it as the event matures with each passing year. One of the big things I’d like them to get rid off is anyone who comes on with the equivalent of a sports shirt, hat, etc., like he’s just stepped away from supporting his favourite American football/baseball/basketball team.

    I want them to appeal to the world, not just the American guy who watches the Superbowl in his team’s colours. Having that sort of presenter makes me cringe continually until I feel the relief of them leaving the stage.

  3. That would be easy wouldn’t it & a coward way out for me. :)

    Now you know my feelings let’s leave it at that.

    Now Sony Ps blog says more Ps2 Classis will come on regular basis. What are the next batch of games?

  4. I thought it was a waste of time! Just me I guess!

  5. It might be important to Sony in terms of marketing and exposure, but there’s zero importance to the customers. There’s nothing they couldn’t already have done at Gamescom, E3, TGS or in upcoming events such as CES and the like.

    I can’t see how it benefited their Q1 2016 releases when they wasn’t actually showing a lot in the first place, partly because it seems like they’ve got nothing much to show on the one hand, and partly because they games like GT Sport seemingly fly by without so much as a trailer or new information. The more general releases and announcements outside Q1 like FFVII and Ni No Kuni 2 are welcome, but it hardly makes the event groundbreakingly important.

    I don’t know, there was a lot there I suppose, but it all seemed to pass by rather whimsically.

    • Any event that offers me the chance to play GTA Vice City again on my current hardware (& earn trophies to boot!) is awesome as far as I am concerned! ;)

      • Certainly wouldn’t disagree there! ;)

      • I can see my rants are lost on you both :)

      • @Avenger Not at all mate, I was agreeing with Forrest about the joy of being able to play GTA Vice City on current gen with bells on, I don’t particularly have an opinion about the event.
        I did use the lower heirarchy post level to reply to Forrest rather than to your post, but can see how it could be represented otherwise. ;)

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