PlayStation 5 First Year Anniversary

[TrophyChief]

Playstation 5's First Year Anniversary is coming up on November 12th for most markets while UK and rest of the world will quickly follow. What are your thoughts reflecting back over the first year? What were the highlights? What were the misses? What are you looking forward to in the years ahead?

 

Some reviews from recognizable gaming news organizations and popular content creators for your viewing pleasure. More to come...

 

IGN - 

 

 

Mystic - 

 

Gameranx - 

 

Gamespot -

 

PlayStation Blog -

https://blog.playstation.com/2021/11/12/playstation-5-turns-one-today/

 

Edited November 15, 2021 by MrTrofyHunter
Added video links

[da-Noob123]

Looking forward to actually getting one. ?

 

I have not tried to order one having a  big enough backlog as it is and there is only one PS5 exclusive out that I want right now. (Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart) For the time being I'm content with my PS4. 

[NxtDoc]

Grade wise.  I'd give it a solid B. 

 

The launch has been very good.  I can see the view that this is PlayStation's best launch for a Next Gen console.  

 

The game lineup was very good with Demons Souls, Spider-Man MM, Returnal, Ratchet, Godfall, GoT: DC, and DS: DC. And I look forward to year 2 with the big bangers like HFW, and GT7.  Then the excitement of the unknown of year 3, and so on.  

 

My highlight has to be how eerie launch day was, due to COVID.  I loved going to midnight releases for PlayStation launches.  And going in and there only being 1 other person there was bizarre

 

I can only think of a few critiques for PlayStation.

 

* I am disappointed we still don't have Themes.

* Yes we have expandable storage now, but it should have been a launch feature.

* And I miss the old trophy sound.  It would be really cool if we could use any of the PlayStation's Hardware trophy blings.  PS3, Vita, PS4, or keep the PS5 lighter, more elegant bling

* Proper Backwards Compatibility with all previous PlayStation Generations.  And personally I don't want to hear any excuses about the PlayStation 3's architecture.  If technologically sound PC gamers can make an emulator on PC, in their free time, Sony PlayStation can do it too, and better.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited November 11, 2021 by NxtDoc
Add info

[TrophyChief]

18 minutes ago, NxtDoc said:

Grade wise.  I'd give it a solid B. 

 

The launch has been very good.  I can see the view that this is PlayStation's best launch for a Next Gen console.  

 

The game lineup was very good with Demons Souls, Spider-Man MM, Ratchet, Godfall, GoT: DC, and DS: DC. And I look forward to year 2 with the big bangers like HFW, and GT7.  Then the excitement of the unknown of year 3, and so on.  

 

I can only think of a few ritiques for PlayStation.

 

* I am disappointed we still don't have Themes.

* Yes we have expandable storage now, but it should have been a launch feature.

* And I miss the old trophy sound.  It would be really cool if we could use any of the PlayStation's Hardware trophy blings.  PS3, Vita, PS4, or keep the PS5 lighter, more elegant bling

 

 

 

So the software (games) has been good but the UI is the biggest room for improvement. I would agree with that assessment. I do think the hardware was also a win in my view (DuelSense, 3D Pulse Headset & power/speed of console) helps make the playing of the games a fantastic experience all around.

 

Services, UI and community building is something I look forward to PlayStation improving.

[EverythingOnFire]

Taking the pandemic into account, I'd say that Sony and all these developers have done a good job. I really do think that we should all keep that in mind, especially when looking at the launch lineup of games. That's the biggest win/highlight for me.

 

Biggest miss for me are all the cross-gen "exclusives". Cross-gen games are nothing new; you see it a lot with the Call of Duty's, sports titles, shovelware, etc. But exclusives? I didn't have a big problem with that news at first, but over time it's started to annoy me more and more. It's pretty lame to show off the NVMe SSD tech and talk about how it's going to change the way games are designed and played, only to then impair the next few big Playstation exclusives by developing them with last-gen tech in mind. I get why they're doing it, and believe it or not I'm happy that PS4 owners will get to experience those games, but overall it's still a shame.

[maisie666]

Pleased with mine.  Got a Used digital very cheap as it had been dropped by previous owner or UPS.  Replaced the plates with black which fixed or hid most of the broken plastic.  

 

Positive.

 

Fast load times. 

Demon's Souls.

Returnal.

Pulse headset, its my first headset also.  Good battery life.

Charging station.

Ps4 games work well

4k is nice.

Digital option.

Black controller option

Controller feels great, better than DS4.

 

Negative.

 

Ugly.  Black plates and hid it behind my screen.  Didn t see it for months until i had to change a disc in my ps3.  

Both controllers i have, the original and black new one, both had stick drift and R2 springs break, one had the ps button spring die. 

Controller battery doesn t have enough capacity.

Pulse has a stupid usb stick.  Be nice if it was internal.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited November 11, 2021 by maisie666

[JAK-KRIEG]

Overall very underwhelming. People that still don't have one have not missed out on a whole lot unless you count loading time is faster. Battery life on controller is atrocious might as well just leave it plugged in. They need to step up big time for year 2, yes I know Corona and all but still. Conclusion disappointing.

Edited November 11, 2021 by JAK-KRIEG

[OmegaRejectz]

39 minutes ago, EverythingOnFire said:

Taking the pandemic into account, I'd say that Sony and all these developers have done a good job. I really do think that we should all keep that in mind, especially when looking at the launch lineup of games. That's the biggest win/highlight for me.

 

Biggest miss for me are all the cross-gen "exclusives". Cross-gen games are nothing new; you see it a lot with the Call of Duty's, sports titles, shovelware, etc. But exclusives? I didn't have a big problem with that news at first, but over time it's started to annoy me more and more. It's pretty lame to show off the NVMe SSD tech and talk about how it's going to change the way games are designed and played, only to then impair the next few big Playstation exclusives by developing them with last-gen tech in mind. I get why they're doing it, and believe it or not I'm happy that PS4 owners will get to experience those games, but overall it's still a shame.

For sure. 'Blank and blank was impossible on PS4, but with the *POWER!!!* of the PlayStation 5™ these things are possible!'

Oh, but actually all these next-gen "exclusives" are coming to 7-year-old hardware.

19 minutes ago, JAK-KRIEG said:

Overall very underwhelming. People that still don't have one have not missed out on a whole lot unless you count loading time is faster. Battery life on controller is atrocious might as well just leave it plugged in. They need to step up big time for year 2, yes I know Corona and all but still. Conclusion disappointing.

I sold my PS4 last month so I could still get a good trade-in value and was gonna get a PS5. But instead just upgraded my keyboard for my PC which has outdated specs and I'm loving it. $80 half a TB SSD and an $80 keyboard and it feels better than PS4 ever did.

[AJ_-_808]

"What were the misses?"

 

For plenty of us, the console itself

 

 

Aka lack of reasonable availability 

Edited November 11, 2021 by AJ_-_808
Reworded

[Helyx]

4 minutes ago, AJ_-_808 said:

What were the misses?

 

The negatives of the console for me (thus far) are the UI (it needs QoL improvements to at least get in line with the PS4) and the controller isn't built to last (unlike my PS3 and PS4 controllers).

 

As for positives, Demon's Souls (been said, but I wanna say it too damnit), cross-gen upgrades (double the plats), and the DualSense controller is comfy af.

[Jake-TheGreat97]

I think it's definitely better than the first year of the PS4 that's for sure. There so many games to play, even though most are because of backwards compatibility. When it comes to highlights, I Astros Playroom is still one of the best games on the system. I also really enjoyed RE Village and Rift Apart. In terms of misses, it would probably be save transfers. I think they might have fixed it for some games, but I thought it was really annoying having to download the PS4 version of a game just to transfer my save to the PS5 version. 

[Z1MZUM]

November 11 here in Aus though mine came from japan and arrived on November the 16th.

 

Positive

 

Astros playroom is fun

Demons Souls

Backwards compatibility is fantastic

 

Negative

 

It's very ugly imo

The Dual sense, it really isn't for me and the main reason I haven't been buying PS5 Versions

Guilt, As I got it early and I know someone out there would appreciate it more then me

Edit: No web browser, Like seriously Sony are you trying to protect the console? Because

Edit: It's been hacked twice

Edited November 11, 2021 by Z1MZUM

[BrandedBerserk]

Great first year for me. Great exclusives, get to play my entire ps4 Backlog with better performance and loading times are pretty much a thing of the past now. 

[BlackTorito]

I think overall it’s been a solid year, much better than PS4’s first year, and, specially taking into account the pandemic have undoubtely harm the games line-up.

 

Positive

- No air plane sounds 

- Much better controller

- PS4 retro works really well

- 4K/3D Audio (some games look sick, like Tsushima , even though I played the PS4 version)

- Much faster system and store UI

- Ridiculous easy to clean

- Much, much faster loading times.

 

Negative

- No themes, and very weird social UI at first (they patched it a little bit, specially messages)

- Cheap plates design that makes an extra very annoying noise (easily fixed thankfully)

- Dualsense it’s still not exploited as much as I’d like (except Astro Bot… and I haven’t played Kena yet).

- Dualsense battery is very low.

- Hard to dismount and place back the plates (maybe it’s getting the hang of it…)

Edited November 11, 2021 by BlackTorito

[AJ_-_808]

2 hours ago, Helyx said:

 

Snip

 

I meant that as, basically everything is a miss for those of us that havent been able to get one. Kindof a sarcastic joke. I reworded it

[Conker]

Positives

I got one  

fast load times

Astros Playroom

 

Negatives

My biggest one is no themes still

[AJ_Radio]

Meh. This anniversary will basically come and go for a lot of us. Since I mostly play older games and indie titles, I don't exactly need a PS5 right now. Not that I can get one anyway due to having such limited availability. People fucking pick them up the moment the stores announce a few shipments have arrived.

[Kcrack_Km]

1 hour ago, BrandedBerserk said:

Great first year for me. Great exclusives, get to play my entire ps4 Backlog with better performance and loading times are pretty much a thing of the past now. 

 

Same here. On top of that, due to a decent sized backlog, I've also got a good chunk of ps4 games I haven't played yet that have free ps5 upgrades. Installed a 2tb SSD as well, feels good man.

[DrBloodmoney]

How time flies when you are having fun...  and when it took you a full six months to find one of the damned things! ?

 

More than happy with the system so far - no shortage of games, great UI, love the Duel-sense (and love it more when games like Returnal and AstroBot use it effectively!) 

 

Between Returnal, AstroBot, Demon's Souls, Deathloop, Life is Strange : True Colours - even Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart, which was a disappointing game from a gameplay point of view, but certainly a showpiece graphically -  I've easily justified the purchase with exclusives alone ?

 

That's without even considering the huge benefit in load-times and reduced fan-noise when playing cross-get or older PS4 stuff...

...I don't actually think my PS4 has been switched on once since the day I got my PS5! ?

[theSpirae]

5 hours ago, JAK-KRIEG said:

Overall very underwhelming. People that still don't have one have not missed out on a whole lot unless you count loading time is faster. Battery life on controller is atrocious might as well just leave it plugged in. They need to step up big time for year 2, yes I know Corona and all but still. Conclusion disappointing.

 

Atrocious battery life? I'm not sure about your controller, but I can do 6+ hours sessions easily and the low battery notification doesn't even pop up. That's plenty of gaming time in one go.

[KenjiCBZ]

One year has passed, and my situation hasn't changed: an endless backlog of Ps3, PsVita and Ps4 games to play. ?

 

And I didn't even bother trying to get the Ps5, and I likely will not for at least a couple of years.

[happyman778]

I have enjoyed my time with the PS5, although I have mostly used it as a suped-up PS4. 

I think its come a long way already in a relatively short amount of time, but there are things I would like to see changed. For example, the PS+ Collection - I was hoping that every once in a while the line-up of 20 games would change.

[hittheroadbucky]

6 hours ago, AJ_-_808 said:

"What were the misses?"

 

For plenty of us, the console itself

 

 

Aka lack of reasonable availability 

I feel this, I work in an electronics store and still haven’t been able to source a console ?

 

tbh I’m not too upset about it for the time being because there’s not any of the launch games that really excite me. Ratchet & Clank looks good, but I’m happy to wait and get that on sale due to the incredibly short platinum time. Miles Morales is another one I’m happy to wait and get on sale. At the moment the only PS5 exclusive that has me intrigued is Death Loop so that’ll probably be one I try to grab as soon as I eventually get the hardware.

 

I feel like next year is going to look better for the PS5 (in my opinion) as a lot of the games that have been pushed back because of the pandemic are getting their releases ??

[Tsundokuist]

3 hours ago, AJ_Radio said:

Meh. This anniversary will basically come and go for a lot of us. Since I mostly play older games and indie titles, I don't exactly need a PS5 right now. Not that I can get one anyway due to having such limited availability. People fucking pick them up the moment the stores announce a few shipments have arrived.

100% the same here, I have the grey 20th Anniversary PS4 which is a gorgeous thing and it’ll be a sad day when I have to unplug that.

 

Right now however I don’t really even have a reason to. To date, Demon’s Souls is the only PS5 exclusive I have any interest in but even then I’ve never played a “Soulsborne” game before so that’s more a mild curiosity than the actual burning desire of a fan.

I thought Gran Turismo 7 would be the killer title for me and I’d be following PS5 restock threads or paying a scalper a 50% markup but now GT7 is multi-platform and my pre-order gives me both versions I’ll probably stick with the PS4 for another year unless PS5s are just there to buy on Amazon in Feb/Mar.

Edited November 11, 2021 by Tsundokuist

[trampgav]

My wife got me one on launch day without any preorder. Pretty lucky! She did keep it secret until Xmas day though…
 

Pros

Graphics- beautiful looking games

Excellent controller, huge step up from ps4

Fantastic load times

I personally love the look of the console

Silent fans

I think it won the battle of the consoles, as a PS fan it’s nice to know I’m not missing out by not being on Xbox.

Cons

Themes! Not a big issue but seems like an easy thing for them to add on….

Some new games trying to be BIG to really use all the power of next gen consoles but missing the basics- story, map design. So many new games are 90% made up of huge fields of grass blowing about….