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PlayStation 4 Gets Away With Terrible 2019

Last Updated September 23, 2020 1:21 PM
William Worrall
Last Updated September 23, 2020 1:21 PM
  • PlayStation is a successful brand, but they’ve not had a great year game-wise.
  • Most of their exclusives have been either VR focused, poorly received or straight re-releases.
  • PlayStation needs to improve game concepts if it wants to continue having success in 2020.

PlayStation is a big brand with plenty of success. It has to be to get away with the shocking year it had. Despite breaking sales records, game-wise they’ve barely released anything at all that was exclusive to the PS4.

Current generation consoles are getting ready to bow out, leaving many games out in the cold. Of course, this would be the perfect time to go out with a bang. The question is, will PlayStation 5 poach all of the good games for itself, leaving the final days of the PS4 to wallow in mediocrity?

PlayStation’s Lackluster Exclusives

There really haven’t been very many high-profile exclusives for PlayStation this past year. Most of the exclusives that came out were either re-releases or received a mixed reaction . The only remaining exclusives are for PSVR, which is only available to 5% of the PS4 user base anyway.

Somehow Sony’s little box of dreams has still managed to become the top-selling console this year. Perhaps it’s all based on the promise of games yet to come, but the generation isn’t over yet. It all feels like a remarkably lackluster lead-in to the PS4’s final year as Sony’s main console.

With the PS5 coming out at the end of 2020, both of Sony’s biggest exclusives for next year will have less than a year before becoming obsolete. You have to wonder whether that many people will feel like investing when there will almost certainly be a PS5 version of both The Last of Us Part II and Ghost of Tsushima before too long.

The Last of Us Part II - PlayStation
No matter how much people are looking forward to The Last of Us Part II, the pending release of the PS5 will certainly have an impact on sales. | Source: PlayStation 

What Will Become of 2020?

Typically, the year new consoles come out are a bit lacking in releases. Many developers and consumers are waiting for the release of up-to-date hardware. Many a time in the wild years of the 1990s console peripherals were killed off by the promise of new consoles. Just look at the Sega 32X .

You have to wonder if the release of Ghost of Tsushima and The Last of Us Part II is a case of bad luck or poor planning. They’re both highly anticipated games of course, but that doesn’t guarantee success. When they come out a decent chunk of their audiences will probably consider holding off for the inevitable next-gen version.

No matter what happens, Sony will need to buck their ideas up if they want PlayStation to be on top next year. It’s all well and good relying on brand loyalty to keep you afloat, but loyalty is a finite resource. If they’re not careful, people will have stopped caring by the time the PS5 comes out.