Story of Playstation, The (2023)

[bunniefuu]

(film rolling) (subdue music)

[Jason] Loss, terror, sorrow.

In the wake of World

w*r II, Japan was broken.

The atomic bombs were dropped

on Hiroshima and Nagasaki,

signifying a conclusion

to the conflict.

[Narrator] Wooden structures

were completely collapsed by the blast.

This was Hiroshima Castle.

Its framework was demolished

by the force of the blast,

but fires of secondary

origin did not occur.

That b*mb has more power

than 20,000 tons of TNT.

It is an atomic b*mb.

It is a harnessing of the

basic power of the universe.

(film rolling)

[Jason] There were two options.

The first was to give up,

to fall behind.

The second

was to rebuild.

(piano music)

(robust music)

(birds chirping)

(robust music)

(robust music continues)

(robust music continues)

(lively music)

The Sony Walkman was a huge hit,

selling over 400 million units worldwide

and solidifying Sony

as a new cultural icon.

Masaru Ibuka simply wanted to be able

to privately listen to

music on long flights.

However, nobody expected how successful

or timeless the product would become.

(transition music)

Many people started to use

this Walkman recording, - Mm-hmm.

which is even for the conference.

- Yes, that's right.

- Yeah.

[Acquaintance] Yes,

it's ideal. (Faintly speaks)

We started from very, very small company,

and we found unless we produce,

we make different product, unique product

without technology,

we thought we cannot

compete existing giant.

That's why we have been trying to be unique

and different from others.

Because in this country,

there are many, many unique creative idea,

but unfortunately,

it do not become a real

good industry or business.

PlayStation, a part of Sony,

and before they started making

video games and consoles,

they were actually much more famous

for other pieces of tech,

most notably the Walkman

and then the CD Walkman,

which were universally

taken up around the world

as a way to play a music on the move.

This was a phenomenally

successful product.

Everyone had one. I had one.

(energetic music)

[Jason] During this time,

arcades and video games were on the rise,

with companies such as Nintendo and Atari

leading the race in the gaming market.

Though it could be profitable,

the gaming market was

also highly oversaturated,

and Sony chose to

avoid the race altogether,

focusing on their hardware.

Amidst the 1980s recession,

Sony would proceed to develop the CDP-101,

the world's first compact CD player.

The release spurred their competitors

to realize their own

CD players a year later,

but Sony was already

focused on their next projects.

From the '60s,

Sony ensured the

standardization of their designs.

They formed the design office

where developers and chairman

would meet to plan new innovations.

This process continues to the present day

in this very location, now

named the Creative Center.

With competition rising, Sony

finally decided to branch out.

Ken Kutaragi worked for

Sony. He was a brilliant engineer.

He was also a maverick and a hothead.

He had a reputation for

ratting out his superiors.

The PlayStation was really his idea.

He had the idea back in 1984,

after seeing this computer

graphics workstation.

It cost tens, maybe hundreds

of thousands of dollars.

It had really advanced 3D graphics,

and he thought one day, that

technology will be cheap enough

to do a home games

console with 3D graphics.

And basically, he made it happen.

[Jason] Ken Kutaragi

would be a figurehead

of the gaming developmental branch.

From a young age, he was

considered a tinkerer of sorts,

destined from childhood

to have a deep interest

in the anatomy of technology and mechanics.

Delving into the world

of gaming technology,

Ken would propose Sony's

first collaborator be Nintendo,

but not everything went according to plan.

So, in the 1980s around about,

Sony was mainly an audiovisual company.

It hadn't really delved all

that much into video games.

The sound chip was

one of the things that made

the Super Nintendo Entertainment

System so successful.

The sound was incredible

for a video game console at that time.

And so, Nintendo were really keen

to carry on with that success.

They wanted Sony to

develop a CD-ROM peripheral

for the Super Nintendo

Entertainment System.

They wanted Ken Kutaragi to do it.

So, he befriends Nintendo.

He creates a chip

to do the sound for the

Super Nintendo console.

And then, he strikes a deal

with Nintendo to create the PlayStation.

And this is not the PlayStation we know.

This PlayStation was going to be a hybrid

of the Super Nintendo.

You could plug in the cartridges,

but it would also run CD-ROM

games created by Sony.

So, in 1991, Sony very proudly announced

that they were working with Nintendo

to develop this CD-ROM peripheral.

But Nintendo was worried that Sony

were gonna take over

their video game console.

And so, Nintendo very

publicly betrayed them.

(crowd chattering)

They announced that they

were partnering with Phillips,

one of Sony's main rivals,

to deliver this peripheral.

And this was just a

knife in the back to Sony.

Sony had no idea this was coming,

because Nintendo hadn't been

returning their calls all week.

Sony had already announced

that they were partnering with Nintendo,

so that made them look quite foolish.

Sony was really upset at this betrayal.

Nintendo's problem

with Sony was that Sony

was starting to expand into

movies and to TV and to music.

So, Nintendo was starting

to worry that Sony's ambitions

weren't just about supplying

hardware to Nintendo.

It was actually planning to

launch its own games console.

Now, at the time, Sony wasn't planning to,

but Ken Kutaragi wanted it to.

So, it was Ken Kutaragi's plan.

It wasn't Sony's plan at the time.

Sony saw a Nintendo as

this toy company, really.

So, the idea that this small toy company

would betray it so publicly

and team up with a foreign rival,

Phillips, really angered Sony.

It's not how business (heart beating)

is done in Japan.

And that helped Ken to persuade them

to develop their own video game console

as a kind of revenge on Nintendo.

(tense music)

[Jason] Nintendo's

betrayal was a shock to Ken

and the heads at PlayStation.

Nintendo opting for a different

manufacturer enraged Sony.

And in 1994, the Sony

PlayStation was released.

Woo

From the start, the PlayStation

would be seen as a powerhouse,

selling over 102 million units worldwide,

massively outselling the Super Nintendo,

and putting Sony into

running for the highest-grossing

manufacturer from a single release.

Sony PlayStation first came out in 1994.

(music drowns out Tristan)

(transition music)

You are approaching Saturn.

You're only seconds away.

I have arranged for you to meet my

companion.

In May, 1995,

at the first Electronic

Entertainment Expo, E3,

there was a huge amount of

buzz around the Sony PlayStation.

The Sony PlayStation was due

to be released in the North

American market that year.

Sega had its big kind

of press conference,

and it decides it's gonna trip up Sony

by announcing the Saturn is gonna cost $399

and is launching today

in selected retailers.

Now, this seemed like a great move.

That time, Sega thought,

right, we've really got Sony now.

Everyone was blown away by this,

but it was a gambit

that massively backfired.

Sony's head of development, Steve Race,

came on stage in response to

the announcement from Sega

and just said three words,

"299", mic drop.

$100 cheaper than the Sega's Saturn.

I'm going to ask Sony

Computer Entertainment

president of America,

Steve Race, (attendee coughs)

to join me for a brief presentation.

(attendees clapping)

(attendees cheering and clapping)

That, and along with the fact

that Sega had supply problems,

because they'd released

their console early,

helped to doom the Sega Saturn

to a mediocre commercial performance,

and basically ended Sega's ascendancy.

(upbeat music)

The first PlayStation console,

the PlayStation 1 came into a market

that was starting to really

boom in home gaming.

At the time,

the Nintendo consoles

were really leading the way.

There was the NES and the

SNES that had been brought out,

and also Sega's offerings,

the Master System, and so on.

PlayStation was a very different console

from everything that Nintendo had produced.

Nintendo was, very, very family-friendly,

very bright, very colorful,

very sprite-oriented graphics.

PlayStation, from the very beginning,

was prioritizing 3D polygon graphics.

So, it was more photorealistic at the time.

It was more 3D.

And it was deliberately going after,

very aggressively, a youth-focused market.

So, young adults, teenagers.

PlayStation really wanted

to corner the market for cool gaming.

Their idea was that as opposed

to Nintendo's more

family-focused games market,

they really wanted to get the teenagers,

and also the kids

who thought they were

a little bit cool as well.

PlayStation's advertising

was very different to your

typical video game ads.

So, it's very first ad in Japan

was this crying-looking office

with all these people at their desk,

banging the desk, demanding

they have a PlayStation.

In US, they have things

like "Crash Bandicoot".

An actor dressed as "Crash Bandicoot",

going to Nintendo's offices

in Seattle with megaphone

and calling a Mario to come out

and let's have a fight in your parking lot.

And over in the UK, they

were associating PlayStation

with night clubbing and the

rave drug scene at the time.

So, it was very edgy marketing campaigns

that were very adult

and not this kitty toy vibe that

(transition music)

(music drowns out Tristan)

Let me tell you what bugs

me about human endeavor.

I've never been the human in question.

Have you?

Mankind went to the moon.

I don't even know where Grimsby is.

Forget progress by proxy.

Land on your own moon.

It's no longer about what they can achieve

out there on your behalf,

but what we can experience

up here in our own time.

It's called mental wealth.

And then, also, whereas Nintendo

is very first party-focused.

So, Nintendo makes Nintendo's games.

PlayStation came right out the gate.

They wanted to snuffle

up all third party developers

as many as possible,

and make their platform

as easy to develop for,

for all of those companies as possible.

So, that just meant that

there was just a huge,

broad gamut of games

that were being released on PlayStation.

And prior to PlayStation launching,

it was a one company industry.

And who doesn't love a bit of competition?

The more companies there

are, the better it is for gamers.

PlayStation really prided itself

on being technically forward.

The graphics were something

completely sets apart

from the Nintendo consoles at the time.

It looked new and it looked exciting.

When you look back on

it, it looked quite blocky.

But at the time,

we'd not seen anything like

that in the home console world.

They had a famous demo,

which was the T-Rex demo,

which involved a T-Rex

basically roaring at the camera.

And that was a technical display

of what you could do on that console.

And that was really exciting at the time.

The Sony PlayStation

was high performance,

low cost, simple to use,

and they used really clever advertising

to get people to buy into it.

(upbeat music)

So, it suddenly seemed

like games have arrived for adults,

and that was what Sony and

PlayStation thought to make.

Nintendo had these very tight, restrictive,

family-friendly policies about

what games could be linked.

Sony didn't care that much.

So, you've got things like "Resident Evil"

and other horror games.

The Nintendo would run a marathon.

So, it really changed the landscape

and what people thought

could count as a video game.

It became acceptable

to being your early 20s

playing video games.

Whereas before then,

it's something we should

grow out of by that point.

Fiction is quite difficult

sometimes in video games,

because, all right, say

you're playing a game

in which you fly internet

spaceships around a galaxy.

Spaceships aren't real.

The galaxy isn't real.

The people you're playing with though

and the friendships that you make there,

those are as real as anything.

And one of the most exciting things

about how the new consoles use the internet

is the possibility for

all of that to expand

and to have these huge

worlds in your living room.

When the PlayStation came out,

one of the things that really set it apart

is it had some amazing titles

from really early on in its launch.

I remember personally as a kid,

I loved to play "Crash Bandicoot".

That was a huge thing

for me. I loved that game.

And then, leading on from that,

we also had "Crash Team Racing",

which was a racing game

based with the "Crash

Bandicoot" characters.

But I also loved to play "Tomb Raider",

even though I wasn't very good at it.

And that has been one of the

most iconic PlayStation titles,

and I think was actually

a bit of a console

seller for a lot of people.

As well as that, there

were the racing games.

"Gran Turismo" was a huge deal,

and that was only

available on the PlayStation.

And people loved that,

because it took a more realistic,

modern approach to racing games.

To be perfectly honest,

I'm no good at racing games,

so I was never the best

person playing them,

but they were super popular,

and my friends really loved them.

I would say like Mario

was gaming's first mascot.

Lara Croft was gaming's first icon.

The fact that a video game character

was gracing the cover of magazines,

was selling energy drinks,

was being lusted after by a lot of people.

It was just breaking new ground,

and it just meant that games

were entering a new level of cool.

PlayStation was the '90s.

(bright music)

So, "Final Fantasy VII" was

a huge deal when it launched.

It popularized the role playing game

in the West, hands down.

It was the first "Final Fantasy"

to launch on a PlayStation console.

Prior to that, they were all on Nintendo.

It really made the PlayStation

saying it utilized all the technology

that the PlayStation had to offer.

There were those 3D polygon graphics,

making gorgeous cinematic cut scenes.

FMVs, I think they were called at the time,

full-motion videos.

I think the reason that "Final Fantasy VII"

was so successful

and why it really meant a

lot to people, myself included,

was that it showed how games

could do storytelling differently.

It showed how well games could tell stories

in a way that only games could.

"Final Fantasy" story is just,

it's an epic on a scale that

few games still have to match.

That's why we're remaking it nowadays.

And still, people are

playing and replaying it.

There's remix and

remasters and everything else.

It just captured people's imaginations.

It was a great story, it

had great characters,

and it looked absolutely

gorgeous, it still does.

[Jason] Excited to see the next release,

millions of people would

await the PlayStation 2.

Outside of shops,

customers filled the streets

in order to grab the new console.

From the 7th of September,

all could go into the shops

from the 7th of September

and place an order in advance

to book their place in

the queue, if you will.

Now, because we're only

getting a limited quantity,

we're going to have to

stop that whole process,

in fact, on the Friday,

the 17th of November.

[Jason] With the use of innovative

and edgy marketing,

alongside the promise for

even more powerful gameplay,

the PlayStation 2 would

release with a bang.

It might resemble an executive briefcase

or at a push, the latest

Breville sandwich toaster.

But made no mistake,

this Sony PlayStation 2

is the most sought-after

electronic consumer item of the year,

and guaranteed to cause more tears

on Christmas Day than Bambi.

(robust music)

[Jason] To this day,

the PlayStation 2 remains the

world's highest sold console,

clocking in at over 155 million units sold.

(robust music)

The PlayStation 1

had been wildly popular,

but at that point,

it was Sony's only foray

really into the gaming world,

and they really wanted to

prove they could do it again

and capture that audience again.

So, when the PlayStation 2 came out,

that was really important for them

to really catalyze on

what they'd done already.

And the good thing was the PlayStation 2

was readvanced graphically,

but also had a k*ller lineup of games.

The anticipation for

PlayStation 2 was enormous.

And so, it just sold like lightning.

No other game console

managed to catch up at all.

Nintendo and Microsoft,

by the time they got their machines out,

PlayStation's lead was sky high.

It is still the biggest selling

home games console to date.

[Reporter 1] And had their initial quota

halved to 500,000 machines,

while British shoppers

will get just 165,000 before Christmas.

So, all hail, PlayStation 2.

It plays the latest video games,

as well as DVD films and compact discs.

The big reason for the

PlayStation 2's success

was that it was also a DVD player.

DVDs were just taking off,

and suddenly, you could have games console

and a DVD player for the same price,

or sometimes less than

a DVD player on its own.

So, for many people,

it was the way DVDs became a big thing,

and that really helped drive sales.

At the same time, Microsoft and Nintendo

didn't release their

competing consoles for a year.

So, PlayStation had a very long headstart,

and it had all the great games.

It had "Tomb Raider"

and Microsoft Nintendo didn't have them,

so they got left behind.

Shoppers at this London store

are in such a virtual world

of their own that they

just don't seem to care.

Just before midnight,

they'll be picking up the

first new models available.

If you didn't pre-order

one of these machines

back in September,

then don't bother turning up tonight,

because they've all sold out,

and there won't be any PlayStation 2s

freely available on the

shelves until next year.

This is clearly a very big

money-spinner for Sony,

and it couldn't have

happened at a better time.

PlayStation games were often allowed

to be a little bit edgier

and have a little bit more adult content,

and also have a little bit more violence,

which could go either way.

But meant that they were

able to really expand on things

like the sh**ter genres and

more adult-themed games

that were super popular

and really help to sell their consoles.

(car passing)

So, "Silent Hill" was

psychological horror game.

You were sent into this deserted,

mysterious town that was quite foggy

with all these weird,

twisted monsters in it.

And it was basically supposed

to be a reflection of your

main characters' own psyche.

So, its this really creepy horror,

instead of this B-movie, zombie horror,

the "Resident Evil" offered.

[Jason] Now in the 20th century,

gaming consoles were improving by the year.

After the PlayStation 2,

came Sony's biggest

competitor entry into the market.

Microsoft had released the Xbox.

Understanding their demographic,

Sony chose to become

experimental with their marketing,

opting for strange adverts

that subverted expectations

for a gaming manufacturer.

Whilst people were used

to the somewhat childlike

aesthetic of Nintendo,

Sony chose to adopt a mature theme,

incorporating directors

such as David Lynch into their adverts,

and purposefully making themselves

out to be the rebel the

kids secretly wanted to be.

Welcome to "The Third Place".

[Presenter] "PlayStation

2: The Third Place".

[Jason] 2004 saw the release

of the massively successful Nintendo DS,

a repercussion of

Nintendo's continuous efforts

to branch into the handheld market,

to great degrees of success.

From the Game Boy to the DS,

Sony wanted to try their

own hand at the market.

Once again, taking on Nintendo

with the development

of the PlayStation Portable in March, 2005.

The PSP did remarkably

well (crowd cheering)

for a company who had not delved

into handheld gameplay before.

Games such as "God of

w*r", "Tekken", and "FIFA"

were on the rise in many households.

(crowd clapping)

Around the time that Nintendo

were developing the DS,

Sony developed the PSP,

the PlayStation Portable.

The PSP blew my mind when I first saw it.

The screen was so big, it took

up almost the whole device.

It was almost like a smartphone

10 years before smartphones existed.

Well, we have great

competitors in almost every area.

People like

(indistinct)

do a good job.

Sony in video games does a good job.

It'll give an opportunity

for development staff

to display their creative talents.

They both use these new devices

to create more immersive worlds.

And the games they create

will have better graphics,

better sound quality,

and be an all round,

more enjoyable experience.

[Crowd] Seven, six, five,

four, three, two, one. (Cheers)

(crowd chattering)

(upbeat music)

(crowd yelling)

(upbeat music)

[Jason] The PlayStation 3

was considered a strange decision by many.

The machine was designed for power,

yet lacked quality games

one would come to expect

of Sony's new releases.

So, in 2006, Sony wanted

to release the follow-up,

the PlayStation 3,

but the release of the PS3 did not go well.

So, PlayStation were really riding high

after the PlayStation 1

and the PlayStation 2.

Everyone was excited to see

what they would have in

store for the PlayStation 3.

But actually, that's

one of the few consoles

where the release at least

fumbled the ball a little bit.

And one of the reasons for that

was it was releasing

into a quite a crowded

marketplace for gaming,

and it had a very high price point.

[Reporter 2] This is one of them.

Dylan Scott is furious that Sony customers

were only told of the problem

days after criminals targeted the network.

For the first three days, I

didn't know what was going on.

I wasn't sure if they'd been hacked into,

or if they'd shut down, or...

They still haven't told me today.

I've actually rely on going

on their personal blog

and hoping that they tell me something.

With the PlayStation 3

suddenly decided it was going to create

this really vast new kind of

microprocessor called the Cell.

And it took years. It was

incredibly expensive to do.

And when they finished,

the game developers

who had to use this chip

to actually make games

found it a nightmare to use.

So, basically, it got obsessed

by its own interest in technology

and lost sight of the bigger picture.

They had to sell it at a

really high price as well,

because this was really advanced technology

that was very expensive.

They'd also stuck a Blu-ray

player into this machine

and basically hidden a

PlayStation 2 inside it as well.

So, it is incredibly expensive

compared to everything else.

And that really set Sony back.

It had a shortage of games,

'cause people couldn't really figure out

how to make games on it for a while.

And it had all this stuff in it

that made it really expensive

compared to the Xbox 360.

[Jason] It faltered from the start

due to its incredibly

high selling point of $499,

a whole $100 more than the Xbox,

as though the history of the Sega's Saturn

was repeated with Sony

on the receiving end.

People weren't super willing

to part with all that money for a console,

which they couldn't

play that many games on.

Eventually, it did end

up selling more consoles,

but generally at the start,

it wasn't very successful.

[Jason] Despite critical setbacks,

Sony would use this console

to be the foundation for their

upcoming exclusive games.

"The Last of Us" was a

groundbreaking decision

for the company,

bringing focus into storytelling

with narrative-driven games.

This would only be the

start for Sony exclusives.

(upbeat music)

[Reporter 2] For UK

game developers like this,

insiders predict a huge

market for small firms.

The Sony have been very proactive

in terms of trying to get these smaller,

homegrown developers onto their platform.

And so, I think there's a huge opportunity

in terms of the number of jobs

that could be created in the UK,

the amount of UK content

that could go forward.

(upbeat music)

- Uh-oh. Come on.

- Yeah. Sweet Tooth.

Sweet Tooth. Fat Princess.

I love when she gets more powerful.

This is awesome. (Player laughing)

[Jason] By taking their previous mistakes

into consideration,

Sony released the PlayStation

4 with huge success,

turning the tables.

It was Xbox this time

whose price exceeded their competitors.

(upbeat music)

Andrew, there'll be

millions of misspent youths,

because of this,

and you are the man who's brought it to us.

What do you have to say to parents?

I think that we try and

be a responsible industry,

but we're about delivering fun connectivity

and an opportunity for people to play.

(upbeat music)

So, Sony really did learn

its lesson with the PS4.

It put developers first.

It made dev kits very,

very easy to port games to.

But most of all, it made it

a more exciting place to be.

The home screen was super vibrant again.

It had live streaming capability.

You had share buttons,

you could share play,

which meant you could literally be playing

with someone who was on

the other side of the world.

You could pass the controller to them

as if they were there on the sofa with you.

Sony PlayStation were really keen

to recapture the magic

of their earlier consoles

with the PlayStation 4.

So, they brought in Mark Cerny

and a bunch of other people

to really make sure that it stood out

and was just revolutionary at the time.

Mark Cerny was the guy

they put in charge of

creating the PlayStation 4.

He goes back years.

His career started in

Atari, worked with Sega.

He has a long history in video games.

Essentially to put him in charge,

Sony moved control of

the PlayStation architecture

from Japan to America.

So, really it was Mark Cernys'

kind of leadership and vision

that created the PlayStation 4.

How we use it.

(crowd clapping)

Thank you.

So, during the development

of the DualShock 4,

we worked with key partners,

and the games' continuing to evolve.

(soft upbeat music)

They also really understood

that they were marketing to gamers.

They knew that people

wanted to be able to play games.

They knew that that was a really good way

to market themselves.

Whereas the Xbox One,

which was that generation's

rival from Microsoft,

tried to market itself as more

of an entertainment system.

And they also had limits on

how you could share games

with your friends and with other people,

which PlayStation didn't have.

So, PlayStation were able

to basically bounce off

of some of the mistakes

that Microsoft made and position themselves

as kind of the console

that anyone who likes

games would want to play.

So, I think the jewel in the crown

of PlayStation's exclusive titles

in terms of development

studios, it's gotta be Naughty Dog.

You've got "The Last of Us",

"The Last of Us Part II",

the "Uncharted" series.

All of those games,

they were just pinned to the consoles

as a brilliant demonstration

of what these consoles could do.

And they're just by far and

away some of the best games

you'll ever play in terms of storytelling,

in terms of graphical capability,

in terms of soundtrack,

in terms of just everything.

They're just fantastic, fantastic games.

They're so good

that they're making TV

series inside of them now.

Both PlayStation and Microsoft Xbox

are trying to create a

whole entertainment system

in the home.

It's not just about video games anymore.

It's also about watching movies

and accessing the internet.

Initially, Xbox focused more

on that connectivity and playing

massively multiplayer game,

whereas PlayStation

was focused on high

performance and amazing graphics.

But PlayStation 4 for a start,

didn't have to be

connected online all the time.

And they didn't come with connect.

So, it had a lot less hassle around it.

It was much more orientated

towards video game players.

But there wasn't,

once you get below the surface,

there's not a huge gulf

between them technically.

They are basically two

PCs in a box under a TV.

It's more the way they were being promoted,

there was the real difference.

I actually worked as

part of a PlayStation Studio

for quite a few years, which

was incredibly exciting to me.

Not only because PlayStation

had been a part of my life for so long,

but also because the company

I worked for, Media Molecule,

had originally made "LittleBigPlanet".

And when I worked in a game shop,

we actually were there for

the launch of "LittleBigPlanet"

and "LittleBigPlanet 2", I think.

And those were games

that I was so excited to play at the time.

And also, really built on my desire

to get into game development.

So, then, when I went to

work for Media Molecule

and be a part of the PlayStation Studios,

it just felt like a real full circle moment

from the PlayStation and "LittleBigPlanet",

through to me working on "Dreams".

(subdue music)

[Jason] With the

implementation of the Sony VR

and a library of incredible

exclusive games,

the PlayStation 4 would be a statement

on machines specifically built for gaming.

Whilst the Xbox One

had a fantastic interface,

Microsoft seemed to be more

focused on software integration

and transforming the Xbox

into an all around entertainment hub.

(crowd chattering)

[Reporter 3] Okay.

So, you've decided to

queue for the PlayStation.

- Yeah.

- Why? Why decided?

- Sorry?

- Why did you decide

to do that?

Just 'cause I'm a gamer.

I already have an Xbox

One. I wanna get a PS4.

- Okay.

- Just compare.

I'm a gamer. I want a access

to all the best games, so.

[Reporter 3] What upcoming game

are you most looking forward to

for PlayStation?

- Well, right now, "Killzone".

There's several of the

games that are out here

I've already got on Xbox One,

so it's mostly just "Killzone" for now.

I'm gonna give "Knack" a go as well.

[Reporter 3] Today.

I wanna be one of the first to go home

and play my PlayStation.

I'm a real Sony fan. I

like the company structure.

I think it's a good

company to be part of. Yeah.

[Reporter 3] Cool.

And what upcoming game

are you most looking forward to?

"Killzone" and "b*ttlefield 4", "FIFA".

All of them really.

The graphics look extremely better

than the PlayStation 3.

And I'm glad I'm here.

(crowd speaking in foreign language)

[Group] PlayStation 4. (Cheers)

[Group Member] Yes.

(speaks in foreign language)

(robust music)

(robust music continues)

[Jason] COVID-19 forced

many to remain at home

with their devices, now was more important

than ever for communication

and entertainment,

and video games would be a vessel for it.

The Nintendo Switch

found incredible success

in otherwise, dark times.

Purchases would be made

to fill the void people

found in their homes

and "Animal Crossing: New

Horizons" would be their refuge.

(robust music)

And then, of course, after

PS4, came the PlayStation VR,

came PlayStation Move, came eventually PS5.

PS VR, it's being well-received.

PS VR 2 of course has

just come out recently.

Sony has a track record of doing this.

It tried 3D TV games for a while.

Then, PlayStation also

came out at the PlayStation 5,

its latest console, which

also has a VR headset.

VR, in general, is super interesting,

because the technology is incredible.

It's amazing.

I've tried PS VR 2 for the

first time, like a week ago.

And it's mind-blowing,

but it's still

got slightly too many barriers for entry

for most people to adopt it.

And therefore, a lot of developers

are slow to adopt it as well,

because there just aren't

that many people buying it.

So, it's that strange thing of,

until we really get a

k*ller app for a PS VR,

it may still just be a novelty.

(energetic music)

The PlayStation 5 is

Sony's most recent console,

and it has been wildly successful.

Even though there were supply chain issues

at launch due to the pandemic,

they still have been selling

out over and over again.

And people just cannot wait

to get their hands on a PlayStation 5.

At the moment, it's the

most popular console

and that's because it's just,

yet again, another addition

in PlayStation's line

of technical innovation

and fantastic games.

So, with PS5, there's just,

we've come so far from

the early days of PlayStation,

'cause some of the games

that are coming out now,

they're just lightyears ahead of anything

you could possibly

imagine I'm sure in the '90s.

"God of w*r Ragnarok",

it's a cinematic masterpiece, it just is,

that you also happen to play.

And you've got all the

"Resident Evil" remix

that are coming out now as well,

which are taking those early,

early, early day horror games

and giving them not

just a new coat of paint,

but they just feel different as well.

They're just modernized

in a really satisfying way.

Sony and Microsoft have

very different-looking consoles.

Sony tends to do quite

designery kind of looks.

They're very elegant machines.

There's style and PlayStation

5's got that curvy wings look.

The PlayStation 2

could stand up like the monolith from 2001.

Microsoft's Xboxes are more functional.

The OG Xbox is like big black box, green,

is big and it's noisy. (Chuckles)

It is not subtle design

from the Xbox point of view,

which is not necessarily a bad thing.

It works for them,

but they very much take

the box part very literally.

- Thank you very much.

- No worries.

- Have a good one.

- Thank you. You too.

[Jason] The impact of the PlayStation

has contributed to childhood

memories and the present alike.

With focus on great stories,

their games have gone as far

to become gigantic

franchises in their own right.

When I first got the PlayStation 5,

I was really excited to

play "Astro's Playroom",

which was an exclusive title

that you could play on

the PlayStation 5 at launch,

which follows a bunch of little robots.

But the thing I was most excited for

was it used the new controller,

the DualSense technology,

which was again, something that Sony

had really innovated with

and I hadn't seen before.

And what that meant

was that as well as all the usual controls

you could use on that controller,

it also used things like

advanced haptic feedback

where it will give you different vibrations

according to what you're doing.

You can use the touch pad.

And it was just really exciting to be able

to see that next step in

PlayStation technology

being used so well in a really fun game.

PlayStation now are the dominant figures

in the video game market.

PlayStation has as much market share

as the other two combined.

So, they're gonna be

around for a really long time.

The PS5 has just been

released, a monster of a box.

And the technology in the PS5

is allowing games to be

more realistic than ever before.

I think PlayStation's legacy

is that they wanna make games for everyone.

They wanna make games

for everyone from kids to adults

across all different genres

that allow people to play in

any kind of way they want,

whether that's a sh**ter,

whether that's an adventure

game or a platformer.

And just be the industry leaders

in having that breadth of

gameplay across their consoles.

(Aoife chuckles)

I think the key to Sony's success,

pettiness and just having

a lot of deep pockets

and a lot of technical

expertise behind you.

I love that their whole thing kicked off,

because of a stab in the back.

They really took that and ran with it.

PlayStation's legacies

to make video games

acceptable for adults and to

get them a sort of air of cool.

I wouldn't say video games

are the coolest thing on earth,

but it got them past this,

oh, it's the geeky thing for kids.

Sony wiped that away

and changed how the

world views video games.

Without Sony doing what it did

with the original PlayStation,

that wouldn't be the case.

We'd still be looking

at video games in a like,

oh, isn't that for eight-year-olds?

Or isn't that something

that geeky 16-year-olds do?

They really moved the

perception of video games.

That's their biggest legacy.

That and their video game controller,

'cause before the PlayStation,

they were like flat rectangles

and Sony made them comfortable to use

as you made them things

you could hold for long amounts of time.

The legacy of PlayStation

is just really good games,

like just focusing on what players enjoy.

Like taking a really solid

core idea and running with it,

even if that means running

with it for 30 something years.

And I like that. If it

ain't broke, don't fix it.

But in terms of consoles,

they've innovated massively.

From the original PlayStation to the PS5,

you've got huge innovations there.

You've got DualSense

controllers, haptic feedback,

you've got just gorgeous,

gorgeous graphics,

a real focus honing in on

what feels good to play.

(dreary music)

(b*mb exploding)

[Narrator] In the Pacific,

in mortal combat against a fanatic fall,

the Army, the Marines, and the Navy

were driving to a finished fight.

The Philippines...

[Jason] Though Japan suffered hardship

as many countries did during World w*r II,

they were able to recover

and focus on innovation.

The post-w*r years provided the world

with gaming on a mass scale.

From old arcades to our finest consoles,

Sony has always been

at the forefront of

technological innovation.

(solemn music)

They don't just provide

good games or good consoles,

PlayStation also provides us with hope.

From nothing but w*r,

Japan built itself from the ground up.

No matter the dark times,

the conflict we experience,

we are always able

to lift our heads to focus on the present,

to work for the future, and

have a little fun along the way.

(solemn music)

(transition music)

We're driving cars onto Mars tonight

We're blastin' off to the stars tonight

We wanna go, go

("Driving Cars onto Mars")