So I was one of the crazy people who went out to Best Buy at midnight on Friday to buy a PS4. Andrew asked me for my initial impressions…read on for details!
So I was one of the crazy people who went out to Best Buy at midnight on Friday to buy a PS4. Andrew asked me for my initial impressions so here goes!
Midnight Shopping Experience
I procrastinated on pre-buying the PS4 until it was too late; all outlets were sold out on pre-order when I went to buy one. Therefore, I decided to head down to the local Best Buy for their midnight release to see if I could snag one. I headed out shortly after 9pm, showed up at the store and saw 29 people in line ahead of me. I took my slot on line and struck up conversations with the other customers, talking release games and swapping plans of what to buy with the PS4. Best Buy handed out tickets to each of us, as their stock was limited, and then allowed us to come into the store one at a time to buy one. 44 people lined up and only three went away empty-handed…and the Best Buy employees were a pleasure to deal with. After ringing up our sales, they let us hang out in the store until the midnight release time, so a few of us watched TV and killed some time. Once midnight hit, we were each given our PS4 and we left. Thanks to Best Buy #207 for a great shopping experience!
PS4 Setup
I was home by 12:45am, and went ahead and set up the PS4. The day-one patch came down just fine, but PSN was down. After fooling around with PSN for about 30 minutes, I went to bed and tried again at 6am. I was able to set up the unit very quickly, then went to work. If PSN had been up and working, setup with a pre-existing PSN account should have taken 15 minutes.
I loaded the Call of Duty Ghosts PS3-PS4 upgrade via PSN, and the download took a few hours. PSN was clearly being stressed; hopefully that works more smoothly in future downloads.
Initial Impressions
The graphics are really fantastic. Light and shadows are a step up from the PS3, and the overall games just look great. Here are some Killzone Shadow Fall screenshots for you to look at:
The visuals are stunning, especially in comparison to the PS3.
The new Dual Shock 4 controller is a real step up, and the integrated touch pad is useful. The camera is optional, and does not seem to add much yet, but I have liked how it helps to log you in using facial recognition.
Social sharing is interesting; the above screenshots were shared on Twitter from inside the game, and videos can also be shared on Facebook. You can also live-stream your gameplay on Twitch.TV and UStream, along with your audio commentary and viewer comments, but that is streaming in a fairly low resolution. Of course, none of this was possible on the PS3.
Remote Play to the PS Vita is really nicely done, with no lag. I was able to connect with the PS4 and stream Killzone Shadow Fall on the Vita one floor removed from the PS4 in my house…this looks like a feature that I might use in the future!
We’ll have a full-blown review soon, but in the meantime (especially for UK fans who have to wait for two more weeks) hopefully this gives you a taste, and enjoy these product pictures an screenshots!
