PS4: we see PlayStation as a brand, not just a box says Gara

PlayStation 4's cloud tech and Sony's acquisition of Gaikai has got people talking about the future of games consoles as services, rather than boxes. That's certainly how Sony's UK MD Fergal Gara sees it.

It follows Tekken director Katsuhiro Harada's some-what prophetic statement that PlayStation 5 will be a service, rather than a box. It's an idea that annoys and excites people in equal measure.

Now, Gara explained the future as he sees it to OPM, "We see PlayStation as a brand, not just as a box. Going out to 2013 and probably more appropriately 2014, 15, 16, 17 you’ll see start to see PlayStation 4 as a brand and a service, as a set of services, a set of experiences”.

"For the foreseeable PlayStation 4 will be the pinnacle in terms of the highest possible experiences, the most powerful service we can offer. But we can offer many many more. The Gaikai acquisition, PlayStation Vita TV capability. There are lots of pieces here that all point to that direction really. Which is: PlayStation experiences on devices, some Sony devices and non-Sony devices in time as well”.

Earlier in the piece he stated, "Whether you take PlayStation Vita TV, or the Gaikai cloud gaming technology, there clearly is a strategy here to bring more PlayStation experiences here to more people in the ways they want it. We’re more about a brand and an ecosystem than we are about a box”. So while, “1995 was all about one box”, the future is, “evolving considerably”, and that’s what seems to be driving the ideas behind Sony’s new wave of products and services."

The idea of rolling multiple online services - TV, streaming, cloud tech, music and other applications - is clearly desirable to both Sony and Microsoft. But do you care? Let us know below.