For the latest news, analysis and banter, stick to our E3 2016 live blog.
This year’s Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) might not have as much starpower and new hardware as previous years, but it still promises to be a barnstormer of note.
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This is in no small part due to several leaks surrounding the big three, including Sony themselves.
What can we expect from this year’s edition of E3 then?
PS4 Neo?
Thanks to Giant Bomb’s massive initial story and a confirmation today by Andrew House, we already know that Sony is beavering away at an upgraded PS4 console. However, the Sony exec has revealed that Sony won’t be showing the console at E3.
What do we know about the console though?
Giant Bomb reported that PS4 games would need to ship with a Neo mode as of October, which doesn’t necessarily mean the console will arrive then. But our money is on Sony confirming the console’s existence at E3, if not revealing the console itself.
As for specs, the publication claims that we’ll be seeing the same AMD Jaguar octacore processor (albeit with a higher clock speed) and 8GB of RAM (with a higher clock speed too). But the biggest improvement is in the graphics chip, which will apparently double the amount of compute units from 18 to 36 and increase the clock speed. Enough fuel to power the next entry and then some?
PlayStation VR
A more powerful PlayStation 4 is good news for Sony’s PlayStation VR headset, which is scheduled to release in October 2016. That October date pops up again…
Anyway, PlayStation VR has a $399 price tag and will deliver a headset with a 5.7-inch OLED 1080p display. Not as sharp as the likes of rival efforts on paper, but definitely cheaper. What about VR-compatible games?
Prominent titles in this regard include EVE: Valkyrie, Gran Turismo Sport, RIGs and Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes.
Expect these exclusives again?
Aside from the aforementioned Gran Turismo Sport and RIGs, there are a number of other unreleased but already announced exclusives for Sony’s consoles.
Horizon: Zero Dawn by Guerrilla Games, Quantic Dream’s Detroit: Become Human, The Last Guardian, Capcom’s Deep Down, Rime, ABZÛ and Wild are the more notable titles to be revealed before.
Of course, PS4 and PC exclusive No Man’s Sky won’t be released this month, set for August instead. But expect some more footage to be shown off ahead of its launch.
New exclusives?
Information about all-new titles is being kept tightly under wraps right now, but it’s inevitable that we’ll see new properties launching here.
Aside from general PS4 games, expect to see newly announced titles taking advantage of the PlayStation 4 Neo and PlayStation VR.
One title that seems to pop up now and again is God of War 4, which has seen apparent art leaks depicting a Norse mythology setting.
Another title that has popped up is Dead Don’t Ride, apparently meant to be a horror game with an apocalyptic setting.
Otherwise, we’ll likely have to wait until E3 to be fully surprised.
Backwards compatibility?
Say what you will about backwards-compatibility, but Microsoft scored a major PR win when it announced Xbox 360 compatibility on Xbox One.
It would take some black magic to bring native PS3 backwards compatibility to the PS4 (then again, the same could’ve been said for Xbox One), but PS2 and PS1 compatibility is ostensibly a much more attainable goal.
It wouldn’t be the first time that PS2 games were running on the PS4 under an emulator either, as there are several PS2 Star Wars titles running via this method, Eurogamer confirmed.
Then there was a survey asking users whether they wanted PS1 and PS2 emulation on the current-gen console… Hm…
