Reliable rumours from the gaming industry have uncovered reports that Sony, developer of the PlayStation line of systems, has secretly begun work on a portable PlayStation 5 platform. This enormous announcement is huge news for long-time Sony fans and mobile gamers as a whole, with the potential to bring handheld gaming to a level never before explored. Though these leaked reports state that this PS5 portable system would still be years away, it’s an exciting idea that’s not as far-fetched as it might originally seem.
History and Purpose
Sony is no stranger to the handheld space, once acting as a serious competitor to the always-dominant Nintendo. Back in 2005, they launched the massively successful PSP, a system with vastly more processing power than Nintendo’s then-available Game Boy Advance. The PSP did so well that it still finds a place in the top fifteen best-selling systems of all time, though it ultimately failed to live up to the total sales of its main competitor, the Nintendo DS.
The follow-up from Sony, the PS Vita, was a failure compared to the PSP, underperforming despite strong market success from Nintendo. This failure combined with the initially lacklustre sales of the PS3 drove Sony to play more conservatively, abandoning their handheld plans for the time being.
In the years that followed, better business decisions from Sony led the company to regain its former console glory. The PS4 was enormously successful, and the PS5 currently leads the new generation, with a huge sales advantage over its main competitors in the Xbox Series. Now with more success and hindsight, Sony has seen the value Nintendo acquired by fusing its console and handheld lines, and Sony again want another chance to claim a piece of that market pie.
The Challenge of Going Portable
Making a system portable isn’t as simple as strapping a battery to an existing system and calling it a day. While this approach is theoretically possible, it would mean creating a huge system that’s too bulky and heavy to carry, while also lugging an enormous and costly battery. Instead, portable systems usually have to shift focus, and this produces development challenges.
For an illustration of these challenges, we could look at the Nintendo Switch. This system launched in 2017, four years after Sony’s PS4. Despite the time difference, the Switch’s internal hardware was around 55% that of the PS4 (as measured by FLOPS). Given four years of technological advancement, how did this happen?
The answers come from four primary areas, miniaturisation, battery capacity, cooling, and cost. For a device to be truly portable, it needs to be smaller than a base console. A PS5 is not a small machine, so internal components will require updating through smaller chips, made possible through the arrival of smaller upcoming process nodes. As a side effect, smaller chips require less energy and produce less heat, which helps address battery life and cooling concerns.
Cutting-edge tech costs are trickier to manage, but will likely be addressed through Sony selling the platform at a loss, making up the difference through game sales and only subscriptions. It’s quite probable the system will be digital-only, which makes it easier for Sony to mitigate lost funds through second-hand sales.
Possible and Likely Inclusions
A portable system built entirely on the PS5 is unusual, as almost all traditional gaming consoles act as self-contained and original devices. This makes perfect sense from a business perspective, however, as it extends the success that Nintendo made with the Switch.
By developing a PS5 portable, Sony has access to an enormous range of backwards compatible titles on the system. Without the need to create original titles, the risk is low, especially considering how successful the PS5 already is. This means classic titles like Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning and their re-releases across five generations could be fully available, for a launch library of thousands of games.
What we hope to see is Sony embrace better app availability, even if it’s through a simple system like web browser support. These options alone would similarly massively grow the gaming library, meaning they could potentially open up to services like online casinos and their games. Websites like GoldSpin and RTBet feature welcome bonuses and thousands of games, and could be as popular as they’ve been on mobiles and desktops. Such an approach would also give Sony an edge, as browser support like this is an area other consoles typically lack.
With early rumours still swirling, we wouldn’t expect to see any PS5 portable launch until at least 2026. This would place it well after the arrival of the yet-unnamed Switch follow-up, and potentially around the same time as Microsoft’s confirmed Xbox handheld. We could be in for a whole new generation of handheld wars, which makes us wonder if Nintendo finally has something to fear.
