Sony Computer Entertainment of America chief executive officer Jack Tretton has stated that games for the PlayStation 4 will range in price from US$0.99 to $60.00, not marking a price increase from the current generation.

You’re going to see some of the greatest games ever created and the consumer is going to have more ease of use, the ability to sample games before they buy them and have more breadth of games than they’ve ever seen before.

Sony hopes to make it easier for independent game developers to develop titles for the PlayStation 4, although all developers will still be required to purchase a development kit in order to publish on the platform.

Downloadable content

The system will feature downloadable content including complete games, similar to what’s available on the PlayStation Portable, PlayStation Vita and PlayStation 3. All PlayStation 4 retail games will be downloadable. When a game is purchased, only a portion has to be dowloaded before it can be played. The remaining part will download during gameplay. This is accomplished via the system’s secondary background processor. The PlayStation 4 will feature technology that attempts to determine games a player is likely to purchase next, and then automatically downloads those titles in the background in an effort to save time.

Backward compatibility

The PlayStation 4 hardware will not include the ability to natively play PlayStation 3 titles. This is a consequence of moving away from the Cell architecture of the PlayStation 3 in favor of x86-64 for the PlayStation 4. The PlayStation 4 will also not natively support PS3 format PlayStation Network titles. Sony is considering emulation or cloud options for PlayStation Network games, although with regards to native support, Sony Worldwide Studios head Shuhei Yoshida said “But native support, no, sorry.“ There is a plan to launch a cloud-based streaming service via Gaikai, a company purchased by Sony, which will render PlayStation, PlayStation 2 and PlayStation 3 games and stream them to the PS4.

Trophies

Although trophies were not mentioned at the Future of PlayStation conference, the PS4’s user interface confirms that games on the console will support them. The PS4 will have an improved User Profile for players, showing recent activity, their full name and other details in addition to their unlocked trophies.

Used games

Eurogamer’s Tom Bramwell met with Shuhei Yoshida after the PlayStation Meeting 2013 conference and inquired if the PS4 would be able to play used games. Yoshida responded to the question: “Yes. That’s the general expectation by consumers—they purchase physical form, they want to use it everywhere, right? So that’s my expectation.” This approach could provide a point of differentiation with the successor to the Xbox 360.

In development

Games expected to launch with the PlayStation 4 include Killzone: Shadow Fall and Watch Dogs. Joystiq believes that DriveClub may also make the launch. Some publishers have indicated that they are developing titles for the PlayStation 4 without explicitly stating what those titles would be. Joystiq has compiled a number of such companies. Sony claims to have “every” significant third party developer developing for the PlayStation 4. Game titles announced for the PS4:

• Cyberpunk 2077 by CD Projekt RED
• Deep Down (working title) by Capcom
• Destiny by Bungie
• Diablo III by Blizzard Entertainment
• DriveClub by Evolution Studios
• Final Fantasy (TBA) by Square Enix
• Infamous: Second Son by Sucker Punch Productions
• Killzone: Shadow Fall by Guerrilla Games (launch title)
• Knack by SCE Japan Studio
• Rocketbirds 2: Evolution by Ratloop
• The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt by CD Projekt RED
• The Witness by Jonathan Blow
• Watch Dogs by Ubisoft Montreal (launch title)

Some titles which caught our attention are…

Knack

The first game that was shown in the PlayStation conference was a new platformer being develop by Mark Cerny, Marble Madness creator and PlayStation 4’s system architect. Using the Unreal Engine 4, Knack will star a robot that can allow him to incorporate substances in his body like ice and metal and can turn into a giant. Sony in their event  describes the gameplay of Knack as “a little bit like Crash Bandicoot and Katamari Damacy, with a touch of God of War“.

Killzone: Shadow Fall

Second game that was shown in the event was Guerrila Games upcoming game for the Killzone franchise, Killzone: Shadow Fall. The game will take place after the events of the previous Killzone games. The brief gameplay demo below features the Vektan and Helghast factions of the series in a large city that is divided by a security wall.

Driveclub

Third game shown in the event was Evolution Studios (best known for the MotorStorm games on PS3) upcoming team-based racing game, Driveclub. Matt Southern from Evolution Studios claim in the conference that the studio had trademarked the name ”Driveclub” almost 10 years ago, but were waiting for the technology to create their vision of the game.

inFAMOUS: Second Son

Fourth game shown in the event was Sucker Punch Productions upcoming game for the inFAMOUS franchise, inFAMOUS: Second Son. The game takes place years after the event of inFAMOUS 2 where an authoritarian state-run city of Seattle controls people lives so that never repeat the catastrophic events of Empire City and New Marais. New character of the inFAMOUS series name Delsin Rowe, who’s not respectful towards authority, finds himself that he;s not going to go quietly.

The Witness

Fifth game shown and the most surprise one of the bunch is Jonathan Blow’s The Witness. The Witness described by Blow is “an exploration-puzzle game on an uninhabited island.” The Witness will not be exclusive to the PS4 but it will be a time-limited exclusive title for the PS4 over other consoles, though this will not impact the releases of its Windows and iOS versions.

Watch_Dogs

Watch Dogs (stylised as WATCH_DOGS) is another upcoming open world action-adventure video game, developed by Ubisoft Montreal for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Wii U, and the Xbox 360. The game centers on the player’s ability to hack into various electronic systems, either to obtain and control information or to destroy those devices completely at specific times. It was first unveiled during Ubisoft’s press conference at E3 2012. In Watch Dogs, players enter the dangerous world of Aiden Pearce, a new class of antihero whose ability to hack into any connected system could be his most powerful weapon. Whether it’s triggering a 30-car pileup by manipulating traffic-lights to trap an enemy during a downtown shootout or tapping into the city’s omnipresent security cameras to access anyone’s personal information, Pearce is capable of coercing and controlling almost every element of the world around him. ARVE Error: The [[arve]] shortcode needs one of this attributes av1mp4, mp4, m4v, webm, ogv, url