Mon, Feb 25, 2013 | 06:36 GMT
Sony President admits he hasn’t seen final PS4 design
Are you annoyed with Sony’s inability to show the actually the PS4 at Wednesday’s New York reveal? Well, don’t be. Even Hiroshi Kawano, President of Sony Computer Entertainment Japan, has indicated he doesn’t know what the final console will look like.
Kawano was asked about the physical PS4 design by 4Gamer in an interview translated on Kotaku. His response, quite humorously, wasn’t particularly conclusive.
“If I’m being honest, I also haven’t seen its final design. Even the controller we showed today, I saw the final design around yesterday or so.”
While Kawano will have seen plenty of working designs, the final console still eludes his gaze. He also suggested the final Dualshock 4 controller design probably didn’t pass his eyes before the big reveal.
“I’ve seen numerous prototypes from when it was still codenamed ‘Jedai’, and I heard that an onboard touch pad was in the final specs.”
Let’s hope the new console is too heavy to carry.
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Posted in: PS4, Sony
Tags: dualshock 4, Hiroshi Kawano, PS4
11 comments
#1
Karooo
22/02/13, 10:18 am
They did show the PS4. The form factor wasn’t shown but Nintendo did the same thing.
#2
Erthazus
22/02/13, 10:20 am
Jedai… More like Jedi.
Star Wars.
#3
SplatteredHouse
22/02/13, 10:25 am
This ties in with what Jack Tretton was reported as saying, post-conference. “As for the console itself, its absence makes some sense in light of today’s news from SCEA prez Jack Tretton that the console’s internals are “still in development in terms of final specs and design.” – Engadget
#4
HauntaVirus
22/02/13, 11:21 am
Sounds like he’s a little out of the loop, that’s a bit scary.
#5
Samoan Spider
22/02/13, 11:22 am
@4 Its a massive loop though so to be fair he can’t be expected to see every product but as he’s in charge of SCE you’d assume he’d have at least an inkling what they were doing. He must be a very hands off type of guy.
#6
spatuluk
22/02/13, 12:26 pm
I hope it’s just a box, like a DVD player. There’s no reason for consoles to be like some kind of work of art
#7
Ghil
22/02/13, 12:42 pm
No reason to, but it’s always better when they are. :p
#8
MadFingerz
22/02/13, 2:44 pm
@5 No, you were right at the start, but don’t assume that. Can you imagine if the president had to be on par with the design of every Sony product? Product design is something that keeps changing until close to release and it’s not like the man has nothing else to do than seeing the new plastic thingy the engineers put on the box that wasn’t there last week. There’s really no point for them to show him how it’s looking when they are still working on it. Delegating such stuff to a product manager is the smart thing to do.
#9
Samoan Spider
22/02/13, 2:51 pm
@8 Aye, ’tis true. Only thing I was thinking with my assumption (whether right or wrong) is that this guy is the president of SCE which is an arm of Sony Corporation specifically so this guy is focussed on the game studios and hardware divisions for the Playstation brand. Micromanaging is a sign of a bad leader though so yes, its someone else’s job to know what it looks like.
#10
MadFingerz
22/02/13, 3:20 pm
^Just president of SCE Japan though, the president of SCE has been Andrew House since Kaz moved to be Sony’s chairman. I do wonder where are producing the PS4, if in Japan or elsewhere and if they have design teams from all areas working together or what.
#11
Diingo
23/02/13, 8:29 am
For decades Sony had a raging boner as they were on top of the world. The PS1 & PS2′s success made their boner even firmer than before. That momentum carried onto the PS3 which Sony thought they would once again dominate because they had flashy buzz hardware such as “CELL PROCESSOR SUPER FAST AND SOUNDS AWESOME”, which ended up becoming their downfall. Not only that, their online has been a painfully slow progression.
But now… it seems Sony isn’t using that boner momentum to pave their way through the industry, it seems now they’re truly relying on the developers and gamers opinions to sculpt the PS4′s infrastructure. A company truly innovates when there’s a strong need to survive, and I think the PS4 will be a beautiful console from the getgo.