Yes, it's another next gen thread.
1. An attractive price point - $400. This will provide a very significant jump in visuals, physics and more importantly in recent years, multi-tasking, whilst keeping the PS4 affordable and competitive (it also doesn't need to lose money at launch). $50-100 will be very risky for Sony, anything above $500 would sell like a whore in the Vatican, but $400? That'll sell more like prepubescent boys statues of the Virgin Mary in the Vatican. To get an idea of the boost provided by a $400 console over our current gen system, we can look at Battlefield 3. On PS3 BF3 runs at the equivalent of low settings at sub-720p/30fps, however a $400 could run at on Ultra at 1080p/possibly 60fps considering it's a closed system that'll be well optimized for. You can view this post for a more detailed look at what I expect will be in PS4, and what a $400 console is capable of in 2013.
2. Massive launch window titles, including 2 big system sellers. I would suggest:
- GT6 - This is a worldwide seller, and will almost guaruntee Sony's dominance in Europe over Microsoft, and maybe over Nintendo. The Japanese also like it and it sells well in 'Merica as well. I can see this title alone selling millions of PS4s.
- Uncharted 4 - ND now has 2 teams, one working on The Last of Us, and the other? Probably working on Uncharted 4. By the time PS4 comes out, the UC team would have been working on a game for 2 years, which may just be enough development time considering the other team could help out for the second year of development as TLOU will be completed.
- Something for japan - Final Fantasy? I don't know, I'm not a fan of Japanese games, so I'll leave this up to someone who knows gaming in Japan better than I do. What would sell systems in Japan?
- A new IP - We know Guerilla games, Sucker Punch and Media Molecule are all working on New IPs and have been for quite some time now, I believe there's a high probablity that at least one of these titles will be release in the PS4's launch window, and each studio has great potential.
- Third parties! - I'm sure plenty of these will be available at launch, most notably Battlefield 4, which is due to release next year and could be fantastic game to showcase what the PS4 is capable of along with UC4 and GT6. If DICE get there way, it'll for sure be a next gen title, and they have a pretty big development team, so a launch window release date is feasible.
3. An online service on-par with XBL and Steam - PSN has made great strides over the last few years, but it's still not quite up to standard yet, the launch of a new console is the best oppurtunity to revamp the online service and give competitors a run for their money.
4. A brilliant marketing campaign - Show us how amazing the games look, show us the new features, show us why this is a superior system to PS3 and next-gen competitors (even if it isn't, just make it seem that way!). You know those awesome montages you make with the cool indie music and the epic dubstep and rock all the time? Cut them down to 30 seconds and put them everywhere! This is probably asking a lot from Sony, they've been arguably (definitely) the worst out of the big 3 when it comes to marketing for the last 6 years... PS1 and PS2 had some excellent ads, so maybe just rehire those guys?
