The chips are now on the table- we know that the PS4 Neo and the Xbox One Scorpio both exist, and even though specs for both have not fully been officially confirmed yet, we also know that the Xbox One Scorpio is truly a beast of a machine, and far outstrips the PS4 in terms of power.
In a way, it is an amusing reversal of roles- where the PS4 was the more powerful machine over the Xbox One for so long, a difference that Sony made sure to play up when they got the chance, something that definitely contributed to their dominance in the console market currently, now we are seeing the PS4 being left behind by Microsoft’s upgrade to the Xbox. What does Sony have to say about this? In an interview with Time magazine, Sony’s Shawn Layden discussed Sony’s PS4 Neo, with respect to Microsoft’s Scorpio.
“We’re seeing apparently Microsoft taking a similar course to ours, which is to innovate within the life cycle of the console,” Layden said. “It’s nothing that’s ever been done before, so there is no road map to how to do that. Both companies are trying to find the right way to bring that to developers, to bring it to market, to talk about it. But seemingly they’re doing similar things to what we want to do, which is to bring more power to developers, to bring more weapons for them to create games with, to create an enhanced experience. Again I think it’s good for gaming, so it’s good for us.”
Specifically when asked about the power gap, he tried to downplay it as much as possible.
“Is that going to be the end-all, be-all of the gaming experience? No,” he said. “I think more than anything else today, we’re seeing the power of narrative move the gaming business forward more than ever before.”
Well, that’s… that’s an interesting deflection, Mr. Layden. Do you think that ‘power of narrative based games’ also nullifies the lead in hardware power the PS4 has over the Xbox One, then?