Rumours have long surrounded the PS4 controller – and it appears many are true.
The Playstation 4 controller has been a subject of much speculation – especially in the last few months as more information on the new console has been leaked, questions were raging on the controller.
Now it appears that we finally have some of the answers – although that isn’t to say that a whole range of new questions on the new joypad for the playstation 4 haven’t been raised. There are a number of new functionalities that this controller promises, and we’ll go through each one in turn in this article and try to make some sense of them.
Ps4 Share Button
This feature was a long standing rumour and it appears that it it is true. There is a button on the joypad that is situation to the upper right of the direction pad and to the left of the assumed touch pad, and from what the rumours and whispers say it it indeed the touted share button. The share button could have many different functions, from sharing your scores with friends, to asking people on social networks to come into a game with you to something more. Gaikai were bought out by Sony last year and Gaikai are a cloud based gaming service. It’s possible that this will be similar to OnLive’s brag functionality, and will allow you to upload a short clip (say 15 seconds of gameplay) to show off to your friends. This will be fantastic if your friend wants to know how you beat a boss, or perfected lap times, or just create short “lol” videos for say youtube. It’s all very all days, but I’m very interested in what Sony are intended PS4 owners to do with this.
Multi Touch Surface Similar to the PS Vita
A multi touch pad was another long hyped addition to the controller, and it appears not at the rear of the pad like Sony’s Playstation Vita, but on the front – replacing the iconic start and select buttons. It’s unknown right now what the functionality could be used for – but there are a plethora of potentials. UI navigation is an obvious (although somewhat boring) example, as well as say web browsing. Imagine being able to easily navigate a web page with such things on a large screen. There are other games too – such as RTS games – imagine StarCraft 2 ported to the Playstation 4 Orbis using this technology – I certainly can. They’d still have to be creative due to all the hot keys, but at least scrolling around would be a hell of a lot easier. It is rumoured that you can also ‘click’ this in – but that’s not confirmed yet.
Playstation Moved
Perhaps the most striking of the changes on the controller is the blue glow at the top -this top mounted LED is similar enough to the one featured in the Playstation move. It’s been said that the PS4 will feature dual camera systems, and if this is true will help the PS4 determine not only position in terms of side to side, but also the ‘depth’ the controller is. It’s likely this will function as a replacement of how the movement controls in the Dual Shock 3 worked. Obviously you’ll not have separate control of both of your character limbs for example – but there are still a lot of possibilities for this especially when tied up with the multi touch surface.
Integrated Speaker ?
You’ll notice what looks to be a speaker on the controller too – which is an interesting decision by Sony. It is possible that this will be used for game sounds similar to how Nintendo’s Wii U and Wii uses them as extra sound effects to ‘spice things up’ – but then it’s also possible it’ll feature a myriad of other functionality, including voice chat while in game, or even say a Skype based system. It could even function as a microphone too and respond to voice commands, in a similar way to modern phones (such as Siri for the Iphone).
New D-Pad design, wider grips, and the thumbsticks have a dimple
The thumbsticks have gained a dimple it seems, a convex (dent) in the middle, with a raised ridge – obviously to help your thumbs find a better grip. How comfortable this will actually be isn’t known, but I imagine Sony have done some testing on this. The Iconic X, Triangle Square and Circle are still the same as they ever was, but with the slight increase in size the sticks have moved a little out. It seems that the D-Pad of old has been scrapped, and now made from one piece of plastic. This is then segmented into four ‘sections’ which represent the four directions. It also appears that the chassis of the pad is a bit bigger, meaning that the shoulders could be a little wider in turn.
Port in the audio storm
From the photos, it appears there is an audio jack too at the bottom of the pad – it’s possible that this is for the prototype versions only and that the full controller doesn’t feature this and will be more reliant on the Blue Tooth head sets, but on the other hand, it would tie everything nicely into the controller.
