Five Ways The PS4 Is Still Better Than The PS5
04.12.2023 - 17:47
/ gamespot.com
By Justin Clark on
The PlayStation 4 has now been in our lives for 10 years, which is, quite impressively, par for the course for a PlayStation console. But there's something different about the PS4 continuing to thrive. Compared to where the PS1, 2, or 3 were at the decade-old mark, the PS4 doesn't feel like it's in its twilight, instead happily co-existing as a still-viable option right alongside its newer, flashier brother. That certainly made sense in those dark pandemic days when the PS4 was more readily available, but even some three years after the PS5's launch, there are still a few key ways in which the PS4 can lord over the PS5.
Yes, Sony, it's very nice that every game creates its own little hub on the PS5's XMB with its own music, updates, and whatnot. But this is no replacement for one of the coolest things about owning a PS4. Not only could you upload your own wallpaper and make the background whatever you want, but PSN was awash in custom dynamic themes, with their own icons, background music, moving backgrounds, and animations.
Granted, there are plenty of low-quality themes clogging up the works when you actually search for one, but there are loads of gems, too. Hell, a custom theme was one of the few bonuses that genuinely made a preorder worth the extra money. Persona 5's, in particular, were absolutely beautiful, and there was an entire collection of them. Untitled Goose Game's theme, with the goose stealing a random item every time you went up and down the XMB, was brilliant. It made your PS4 feel like your own. There's much less ability to do that with the PS5.
Just this past month, Sony launched the PlayStationPortal, which is basically a DualSense controller grafted to a custom screen that can connect to the PS5 for Remote Play over good Wi-Fi. If you travel a lot, that may be a sound investment, but it's still a step down from the PS4 and a poor, neglected little device called the PS Vita.
In the past, for the same price as the PlayStation Portal in 2023, you could've gotten a full-blown gaming powerhouse that not only could do Remote Play and play its own criminally underrated library of games--a few of which even had cross-play with the PS4, so you were even less tethered to the home console--but a system that could operate as a second screen in games like Tearaway, LittleBigPlanet 3. Dead Nation, and Wolfenstein: The New Order. The Tearaway second-screen functionality in particular was a crucial part of that experience, especially since the Vita's camera got in on the fun.
Even more than that, the Vita wasn't reliant on Wi-Fi if you had the model that included cell service, an idea that felt over-the-top back then, but would be an absolutely baller addition to a handheld now.