Okay, calm down, Anthony. You need to write this post… Ohhhhh, there it goes again. Breathe… breathe… Deep breaths.
The first decent rumors about the PlayStation 4 have been leaked out by yet another shifty anonymous source speaking to Kotaku. This source claims a lot of things, but most interesting may be the new name: Orbis.
You may be thinking: "What the fuck is an Orbis?!" I am, too. But you also may have heard the latin saying "Orbis Vitae" which means "Circle of Life". Now before you start singing that Lion King tune in your head, think about this – Orbis Vitae or Orbis Vita could mean that Orbis will play nice with the PlayStation Vita. Controller? I think so. An extension of the home console much like what's happening with some PS3 cross-platform play games? I can only dream. Sony definitely seems to be going with the Orbis name, as they already have a page on their DevNet platform for developers with an Orbis subdomain. Unfortunately, there's no info there… yet.
I hate the name, but I also hated the Vita name at first and it grew on me. Who cares about the name, though, when there is more… so much more to talk about.
Recent AMD chip rumors may be true after all, as this new rumor says that the PlayStation 4 Orbis will use an AMD x64 CPU and an AMD Southern Islands GPU capable of resolutions that go far beyond that of which current HDTVs are capable of displaying (4096×2160). And where the PS3 is stuck playing 3D games at 720p, Orbis can easily output full 1080p 3D games. Of course, this early on, these specification details can change dramatically.
Does anyone remember all the shit that Kutaragi wanted to pack into the PS3 originally? Dual HDMI ports, acts as a router? Yeah, shit changes.
Developers are said to have dev kits in hand for some time and got updated versions around the same time Daniel, Nick, and I were bitching about how boring GDC was and how badly we needed new consoles. Supposedly, more finalized versions of the kits are due by the end of 2012.
That's good, because this bad boy is said to be being prepped for a holiday 2013 release.
Now, on to the bad news. Remember all the trouble Sony had with backwards compatibility when the PS3 launched (it jacked up the console price and never worked quite right). Well, Sony is said to be skipping backwards compatibility altogether. Meaning, it won't play any of your PS3 library, although one would have to think that digital PSN titles would have to work. This all could change, though.
And remember that rumor about Xbox Durango having some sort of used game protection? The Orbis may have that too. Rather than forcing publishers to create online passes, games will be tied to one PSN account, and if and when they're traded or resold, part of the game will be limited to the next owner… until they buy a pass, presumably. This sucks for sure, but at least it's not too much of a far cry from what's already happening with online passes. But it could mean that anyone wanting to play games offline, cannot.
That's it for now. Please excuse me for a few moments, I need to change my pants… and my desk and office chair, and my sneakers. Wow.
