PlayStation 5 Pro: putting the 'pro' into 'professional scam'

Usually, within a system’s lifeline, game companies usually come out with like a mid-gen upgrade with better support, more features, and various other things in the works. Xbox had their upgrades to the 360 to prevent the red ring of death. Nintendo had the DS Light from the regular DS, and Sony had a PS2 Slim to help push the PS2 to even more people. But on 9/10/2024, Sony revealed the PlayStation 5 Pro, and it is in this reviewer’s opinion that I think that the PlayStation 5 Pro is completely pointless.

Between the showcase of games running on both systems, to the higher resolution from the currently high rate from the regular PlayStation 5, and to the atrocious price when it was revealed and lacking some bare essentials, the internet is in a very justified uproar with this fraud of a system.

For the upgrades this thing has, Sony touched up on 3 major aspects of the hardware. The GPU has been upgraded with 67% more compute units and 28% faster memory than the original PS5. Games can be loaded faster than before with this upgrade, and the PS5 already had a smooth. The second major aspect they touched upon is an even more advanced raytracing. The base PS5 already had impressive raytracing as is, so adding even more raytracing on top of all that seems like overkill.

 

The third and final major aspect of the PS5 Pro’s new hardware is AI-driven upscaling, which is perhaps its most useless feature not only for the PS5 Pro but for any system that's ever been released. Because let’s be honest: Graphics in video games have peaked. There is nothing else that could be done to improve the hyper-realistic appearances in some games. Unfortunately, some of these companies care only about the looks of the games and now feel how the actual game is. Like a car from Pimp My Ride where only the body got the upgrade and touched nothing of the interior. Game companies should focus on improving gameplay instead of the game looks. It also did not help that Sony showed off previously released games in the showcase instead of trying to release a new one as a launch title for the PS5 Pro.

Let’s not forget about the price point of this overpriced system as well, standing at 700 dollars when it launches later this year. Which does NOT include a disk drive or even a stand for the system as well. Those two are sold separately. The Disk Drive goes for another hundred dollars, while the stand goes for another 30 dollars. Add on the fact you wanna buy a game with this as well, averaging 70 dollars, which comes to a total of 900 dollars. 900 Dollars for all of this together is highway robbery, and at that point, just buy a PC. Most of the games on PS5 are heading to PC anyway (Except the Astro Bot series of games, which are a blast to experience on the PS5, and would not translate well to PC)

3/10. Get only on a massive sale or if you don't have a base PS5.