Taiwanese daily Digitimes is reporting that Sony is planning a PS4 launch for 2012, based on manufacturers’ claims. Foxconn and Pegatron are supposedly to assemble the systems in late 2011. Digitimes usually has its finger on the pulse when it comes to this sort of thing, but I can’t help feeling there may be some misinterpretation here.
Sony has always considered its PS3 to be a long-lived device. They said in 2006 (when it was ludicrously expensive and had few must-have games) that they were playing a ten-year game. Sony doesn’t tend to joke about that kind of thing. I suspect that 2013 represents the earliest time we’ll see a truly new console, either from Microsoft or Sony (some say 2014); as it is, they’re barely keeping a margin on their hardware, and have been working mainly on driving down the cost of the components. A new system now would likely be very expensive and require a price drop on the old consoles — something neither company can really afford.
We heard rumors of a new Xbox a while back, but Microsoft quickly denied them (though they would) and it seems that Sony is still in active development around the PS3, since they have a new version coming out this summer in Japan. Supposedly the new Playstation would feature “body movement-based control like Kinect,” but I wonder whether Sony is dumb enough to copy-paste its competitors twice in a row like that. Don’t get me wrong, the Move is fantastic, but it didn’t sell for… well, a number of reasons, but among them that it simply wasn’t original.
I’m sure we’ll hear more soon if there’s anything to these whispers. In the meantime, I’d take the “PS4 in 2012” thing with a grain of salt.