I liked Sony's message, I liked the support and the kind words a lot of independent developers showed towards Sony and I liked the fact that they showed a continued support of a wide-range of diverse titles that go from the typical first-person-shooter to beautiful and inspiring games like the Witness. I also liked the fact that this is the first Sony console ever, I think, that was developed with a focus turned towards developers. Where a lot more effort was put behind the development tools from the get-go.
Even so, after the unveil, Sony hadn't shown a number of titles that was enough to convince me of where I should put my money, if at all, that was until I saw Microsoft's conference. When I saw the direction in which Microsoft was taking their console I pre-ordered the Playstation 4.
I'm trying hard to not point out criticism against Microsoft but I'd be lying if I said that the way they unveiled their console and their announcements since then weren't influential in my purchase decision.
With that aside, Sony has historically shown excellent software support for all of their consoles, and even this year, when they are having one of their most important launches, they are still pledging great software support to the Playstation 3. When I look at the library of games I own for both the PS3 and 360, the PS3 had the majority of the games I enjoyed the most or found most memorable.
I consider my pre-order of the Playstation 4 more of an investment for future games I want to play than a product I want to buy. I'm not exactly dying to play any of the upcoming next-gen games at launch but I am very confident that Sony will deliver games that satisfy my expectations.
After seeing some of the games they unveiled yesterday like Rime, I felt once again like I had made a good decision.
Since this is meant to be an informative post for the OP, I'll see if I can summarise my reasons, big and small, in bulletpoints.
- Sony has the highest-quality and most diverse group of first-party developers right now, IMO
- PS3 had some of my favorite and most memorable games of this generation (Journey, Sound Shapes, Ratchet and Clank, Unfinished Swan, Demon's Souls) and I honestly don't believe most of them would have existed if Sony hadn't funded or supported them in some way
- Sony's development software is, reportedly, immensely better than it was in previous console generations and a lot of developers have publicly expressed how satisfied they are with it and the direction Sony has taken the console
- They support their consoles betters in terms of first-party software, from launch day until their new console arrives
- Strong independent developer support and respectful showcase of their work in conferences right beside multi-million dollar games
- NO POWERBRICK
- Historically Sony has had more reliable hardware
- No proprietary hard drives
- Backwards compatibility with some peripherals (wheels, PS Move, Bluetooth headset)
- Historically Sony has received much better software support from Japanese developers, specially niche or smaller ones (jRPGs, rhythm games, Graphic Novels)
- No paywall behind most of the online services, only online play for games that aren't F2P and some small improvement of life services like Cloud Saving, as an example
- Playstation Plus offers great value for one console alone, immensely more if you own a few Sony ones.
- The Playstation 4 interface is not filled with more advertisements than actual menu options (ahem)
- The Dualshock controllers are significantly cheaper than their competitors' and will be available in 3 colors at launch (in Europe)
- It has remoteplay for most games to the Playstation Vita, which I already own
Phew, I think that's all I can think of.
