Sony has said that it is investigating the possibility of adding MP3 and CD playback support to the PS4 after launch, but has yet to provide a firm date for its availability.
The PS4 is designed to greatly improve on its predecessor - the custom Cell processor of the PS3 has been replaced by a semi-custom AMD accelerated processing unit (APU) which shares the same architecture as modern PCs, making cross-platform development easier. 8GB of high-speed GDDR5 memory allows for far more detailed scenes and more complex worlds to be created.
For those who use their console as a media centre, however, the upgrade is a step backwards. Sony surprised customers late last month with the news that the PS4 won't support MP3, CD or DLNA streaming. Instead, those who want to listen to their own music when playing a game are asked to subscribe to Music Unlimited, Sony's own cloud-based streaming service, at a cost of £4.99 a month.
The backlash was immediate and outspoken, with many customers threatening to cancel their pre-orders while others expressed pleasure that Sony was seemingly concentrating on the gaming experience first. Now, Sony's Shuhei Yoshida has spoken on the matter, saying the company is investigating how it can add these missing features back in.
Describing the response as a surprise, Yoshida told gaming site GiantBomb "we didn’t really think about MP3 or CD - we thought ‘we’re going to do that eventually.’ It caught us off-guard. As we speak, people in Japan, the system guys, are discussing when we can put these features in".
Denying that the move was an attempt to force users into paying for subscriptions to Music Unlimited and Video Unlimited, Yoshida did not offer a release date for the update. He also didn't mention DLNA, a media streaming standard created by Sony specifically to allow the last-generation PS3 to load photos, videos and music from remote devices.
The PS4 launches on the 29th of November, without CD, MP3 and DLNA support.
Andoid Games
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