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This is apparently a photo of a real PS4 controller prototype hooked up to a developer unit. The snap, which seemingly appeared on Destructoid, looks convincing, and matches up with previous leaks, but is it the real deal?
Sony has, of course, denied it, or rather said it “can’t comment on rumours or speculation”. Kotaku’s sources say this is legit, but it’s worth bearing in mind that what early developers get might not be the final hardware you get to place in your eager hands once it goes on sale.
Apparently the touchpad on the front will be capable of two-point multi-touch, basically the same as the one on the back of the PS Vita. All this could be complete bunk, of course, so take it with an enormous pinch of sodium chloride, but it looks legit to me. I’m not sure about having to reach that damn touchpad with my thumbs, though; it looks like it’ll be quite a stretch. I guess we’ll find out on February 20th. [Destructoid via Kotaku]
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As people on other sites have mentioned, the actual release controller is likely to be more refined. The prototype will just be for devs to get used to the layout.
I personally quite like it. It’s not far from the standard DS3 design, and has a few extra bits and bobs to keep things interesting. Re. the touchpad – I doubt it’ll be too far a stretch, given that it’s pretty easy to hit the PS button on the current DS3 pads. Additionally, it’s probably something you’d use an index finger on.
The only thing I’m slightly confused about is the lack of Start/Select buttons, which is a fairly major change from previous iterations – maybe the touchpad will be used for this?
That’s promising change to the thumbstick caps. And I see Sony are making the most of the expiry of Nintendo’s patent on their d-pad (although Sony’s was probably the best non-infringing one in any case).
The d-pad is pretty much identical to the one on the Vita, for reference.
http://www.geekerific.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/ps_vita_d-pad1.png
I still miss the D-pad from the Mega Drive. Could pull off hadoukens so much better with that than I could any other d-pad.
No sure I like the stupid blue light..
Could be used for Playstation Move esque stuff?
Yeah, that’s exactly what it’s for – a Move-enabled controller. Makes sense, given that Move will play a fairly large part in future games I think.
Nothing a bit of black & nasty wont fix I guess
WAAAAAAY too wide.
I lov it
I honestly hope this is a fake, or at least the final design gets changed: it looks like someone tried to stuff the wii u’s gamepad feature and motion control into the playstation’s already pretty unergonomic controller