What will playing a video game look like 10 years from now? Will video games be something we beam directly into our brains? Or will be still be gaming in front of a big television, monitor, or mobile much as we do today?
In a new video, Sony has imagined what a PlayStation controller might look like 10 years from now, and it’s something straight out of Star Trek.
“Sony’s Creative Entertainment Vision” YouTube video showed a number of designs for futuristic devices including a gaming controller. Now, while Sony makes a point of saying the content in this video is not directly related to any existing Sony product, it’s fun to imagine playing a video game with this:
The image shows a PlayStation controller connected to what looks like a floating and curved screen. Is the screen merely a projection from the controller, or an actual physical screen that floats in space, perhaps via the power of magnets? Sony doesn’t explain, and it doesn’t have to. This isn’t a prototype, just a fanciful imagination brought to life with special effects.
Here’s the official blurb on the video:
10 years from now, we will be living in a more multi-layered world where physical and virtual realities overlap without boundaries. If Sony, as a creative entertainment company, would be filling the world with new Kando in that future, what kind of experiential value would we be offering to make that happen?
To explore this question, we conducted a prototyping exercise under the concept of “Creative Entertainment Vision.” Envisioning through the lens of Sony’s creativity and technology, here we present the future as an extension of our lives today.
Reaction to the controller is a mix of disbelief and mockery, with some likening it to real-life PlayStation prototypes that never saw the light of day, such as the unreleased PS3 controller affectionately called the ‘Boomerang.’
It’s all a bit of fun, of course, but let’s entertain the idea for a moment. In a decade from now, so in 2034, we will perhaps be on the PlayStation 7 generation, assuming Sony is still pumping out consoles. But perhaps Sony will have gone down the hybrid console route, ala Nintendo Switch, by then. All you’d need to game on the go is a lightweight controller, looking something like the controller we see in the video, that projects a screen to look at wherever you are. Perhaps PS7 is the controller.
Which Call of Duty will we be on by then? That’s quick math I can’t quite wrap my head around. As long as the ping is low and the k/d high, I’ll be there.
Back in the world of the present, Sony is reportedly preparing to release a PS5 Pro, and last year it released the PlayStation Portal peripheral. Maybe we should take the PlayStation Portal and this video as a hint that PlayStation’s future is wherever we want to take it.
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at [email protected] or confidentially at [email protected].
