Overall, though, the core user interface is excellent, and it is augmented by an already robust set of social and practical features that, like the interface itself, simply work. The PS4’s focus on social functionality has been well advertised, and I like how the Friends and Profile menus have been redesigned to more closely mere (and interact with) social media. Sending friend requests, seeing what your friends are doing, and engaging with those friends is easier than ever, and the PlayStation Network is much more robust in terms of what you can do with social interaction and online gaming. Party Chat is the most obvious example – I have only used it briefly, but it is, like most of the PlayStation 4, easy and intuitive to use – but little things, like seeing what your friends are playing and immediately being able to jump into their game, whether you were playing that game or not, also impress.
The integration with social media is limited at this point, restricted only to Facebook and Twitter (and Twitch and UStream on the streaming side), and I hope it opens up a little more in the future, particularly in regards to which social media a user wants to focus on. I, for instance, barely use Facebook any more these days, but you have to link your accounts to access some PS4 features, like using a picture of yourself on your profile. As an avid Twitter user, prioritizing one social media over the other would be nice. Nevertheless, I find the social functionality pleasing; it is extremely easy to link accounts and share what you are doing, and the level of integration in the “Share” system is impressive.
Sharing is, of course, one the PS4’s flagship features, so much so that “Share” is now a button on the controller. The ability to take screenshots, record and edit gameplay footage, and even stream your own gameplay all seems far too ambitious to work perfectly, but for the most part, the “Share” functionality is amazingly stable and easy to use. Just as advertised, a click of the Share button during gameplay will both take a screenshot and give you access to the last 15 minutes of gameplay footage, which you can then take clips from to your liking. Videos can be uploaded to Facebook, and screenshots to Facebook or Twitter, while a third option allows you to start broadcasting gameplay to your own private Twitch or UStream channel.
In my experience, all three functions work flawlessly, and I was particularly surprised by the sheer simplicity with which gameplay streaming works; on multiple occasions, all it took for me to start broadcasting my gameplay was a hit of the button (after making a Twitch account, of course) and the selection of an option or two; before I knew it, I could see my own gameplay live (mostly – there is a short delay, of course), with voiceover, on my computer or iPad. The video is obviously much lower quality than what you see on the PS4 itself – though not ‘bad’ by any means – but the experience is nevertheless surreal. As for screenshots and videos, I have my own personal wishlist – uploading videos to YouTube, exporting to a personal computer, having access to multiple frames worth of screenshots rather than just one, and slightly more advanced editing tools – but for now, this is a really cool foundation for a feature that I would expect to be much more clunky out of the gate.
As you can probably tell by now, the Internet is more central to the PlayStation 4 than it ever has been on a home gaming console, and while the machine is not an ‘always-online’ device, using the PS4 offline is a much less exciting experience. That made for a pretty rocky launch day – PSN was, in my area at least, completely down until late in the afternoon, leaving me with very little to do for the majority of Day One – but once the PS4 gets online, it works wonders, in ways I have already described and in others I have not the time to describe. One of the nicest surprises of the PS4 is that once I did manage to connect it to the internet, I have found my connection to be consistently faster and more stable than on previous-gen devices. Downloads are vastly faster via the PS4 than they were on the PS3 – and I have both connected to the exact same router via LAN – online gaming has been stable and free of lag, and applications that use the internet (PSN Store included) are speedier than their PS3 counterparts. And while I have already touched upon this a little bit, the fact that the PS4 can manage itself while the user is away – downloading games and patches, uploading saves and video clips, performing installs, etc. – is a miraculously efficient breath of fresh air.
But the best – or, at least, coolest and most promising – of the PlayStation 4’s many new or improved features is, to my mind, Remote Play, which, in my experience, works exactly as advertised. Your mileage will vary, of course, depending on internet connection and speeds and home layout, but as I have used it – with the PS4 plugged directly into LAN, with a high-speed connection – Remote Play is amazingly seamless. After pairing your PS Vita (a piece of hardware that paved the way for many of the PS4’s coolest features, actually) with your PS4, you simply launch the “PS4 Link” app from the Vita, wait for it to connect, and marvel as the entirety of your PS4 interface is streamed directly to the Vita’s gorgeous OLED screen. You can use the Vita as a controller for TV playing, if you wish, or you can turn off the TV and play on the Vita screen, in the room your PS4 is in or another (depending on connection strength).
I have been able to use Remote Play successfully throughout the lower level of my house, which means I have use for it in a variety of circumstances. Just earlier today, my brother wanted to play some Mass Effect on the Xbox, so I gladly gave the TV up – and continued playing Knack on my Vita, on the same couch. That’s likely going to be the main attraction for most gamers, but I was even more excited by the prospect of playing my PS4 from bed at night via the Vita, which is, astoundingly, possible. While trying to go to sleep last night, I booted up the PS4 directly from the Vita (which is possible when the PS4 is in standby mode), launched Assassin’s Creed IV, and went around finding collectibles in Havana before going to sleep. And when I’m done playing remotely, I can put the PS4 back to sleep as well – no physical contact with the console itself is required to make Remote Play work, which is perhaps what excites me most about it.
There are limitations, of course; Blu-Ray, DVD, and Streaming movies will not play over Remote Play (though I didn’t necessarily expect them to), and even though the feature has largely worked perfectly for me so far, I do encounter lag and slowdown every now and then (though this can usually be remedied by making sure doors between rooms are open). But when Remote Play works – and for me, hiccups are the exception – it is an insanely cool feature. And it should be noted that part of what makes it work so well is the Vita itself, which has robust and comfortable enough controls to pull the entire thing off. I’m sure the connection between the Wii U gamepad and the Wii is a bit more stable, but I’d much rather play remotely from the Vita – the best-designed handheld I’ve ever encountered – than I would from the monstrous Wii U gamepad.
Overall, the PS4 user interface and functionality is mighty impressive, and while there are improvements to be made – some that have been announced, others that fans are calling for (more on that in a little bit) – I think this is about as good a foundation as any gamer should hope for on a brand new console.
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