Like finding a bright yellow crate in a barely there grain bush, Sony has finally announced the worst-kept secret in gaming: the PlayStation 5 Pro! Dropping this November, the much-anticipated console will set gamers back roughly R12,550, going by direct exchange from the $700 American price tag—but more on that later.
If you missed the announcement, PlayStation 5’s lead architect, Mark Cerny, confirmed the mid-gen refresh during a PlayStation 5 Technical Presentation, casually flexing that this new beast will finally give us the high frame rates our eyeballs crave. The GPU is now the size of a Dark Souls boss, ray tracing is beefed up like it’s been hitting the XP grind, and there’s custom hardware for machine learning – because why not throw in some next-gen AI wizardry (they call it PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution).
As for the design, it lines up with all those leaks you saw on the gaming subreddits. Imagine the PlayStation 5 Slim, but now it’s got racing stripes, so clearly, it’s faster. In a post on the PlayStation Blog, Hideaki Nishino, the ultimate boss of Sony Interactive Entertainment’s Platform Business Group, outlined the PlayStation 5 Pro’s key stats:
- Upgraded GPU: We’re talking 67% more Compute Units than the current PlayStation 5 and 28% faster memory.
- Advanced Ray Tracing: Rays fly around at double or even triple the speed. It’s like Mario Kart’s Rainbow Road, but with light reflections bouncing off everything.
- AI-Driven Upscaling: Enter PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution, where AI gives your games more pixels than a Minecraft speedrun. It’s like squinting at a 4K screen, and then the AI just… un-squints for you.
Sony also confirmed that the PlayStation 5 Pro will drop on November 7, 2024. The package includes a whopping 2TB SSD (plenty of space for those 200GB day-one updates), a DualSense controller, and Astro’s Playroom pre-installed so you can pretend you’re testing your new console while actually reliving Astro’s adorable platforming glory.
Now, when it comes to the price, the standard PlayStation 5 retails for R13,999 in South Africa, which is roughly 56% higher than its $499 price in the US. The PlayStation 5 Pro is launching in the US with a $200 difference over the OG console, which would make it at least R17,580 locally.
However, if we get hit with the same 56% premium as we’ve been drowning under with the OG, that sets the Pro up for a sweet R19,570 price tag. Do with that information what you will.
The PlayStation 5 Pro will launch disc-free, which feels like a plot twist no one saw coming (except we all did). However, you can snag the current PlayStation 5 disc drive separately if you’re still holding onto your physical game collection like it’s an ultra-rare Pokémon card.
Oh, and you’ll be flying through the internet with Wi-Fi 7. Games that level up with PlayStation 5 Pro’s powers will have a shiny new PlayStation 5 Pro Enhanced badge, so you’ll know which ones to show off. Launch titles with this badge include Alan Wake 2, Assassin’s Creed: Shadows, Demon’s Souls, Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth, Gran Turismo 7, Hogwarts Legacy, Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, and more.
Talking about games, all your trusty PS4/5 games will still work on the Pro, but they might look a little better thanks to PlayStation 5 Pro Game Boost. This new boost will give a performance buff to more than 8,500 PS4 games, which means all those games gathering dust in your library might get a second chance at glory.
Lastly, all your current PlayStation 5 accessories, including the VR2, PlayStation Portal, and your trusty DualSense Edge, will be fully compatible with the PlayStation 5 Pro.
But now I want to hear from you. Do you think this is a worthy upgrade, or will you be sticking to the OG 5 for a little while longer? Let me know.