AMD just debuted its new FidelityFX Super Resolution 4 (FSR 4) upscaling tech on the latest Radeon RX 9070 and 9070 Ti GPUs, and it sounds like it might not be limited PCs. According to a new Digital Foundry interview with Mark Cerny, some version of FSR 4 will make it into the PlayStation 5 Pro via a software update rather than new hardware. "Our target is to have something very similar to FSR 4's upscaler available on PS5 Pro for 2026 titles as the next evolution of PSSR," Cerny tells Digital Foundry. The PS5 Pro's PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution (PSSR) is a custom upscaling technology that lets the console run lower-resolution versions of games and make them appear like they're 4K, and by Cerny's own lengthy explanation, it was created using a combination of existing and future AMD tech. Based on our review of AMD's new GPUs, FSR 4 is not a miracle worker.

PlayStation Lead Architect Mark Cerny is back again to explain the nitty-gritty details of how the PlayStation 5 Pro achieves its various graphical improvements. Cerny first introduced the PS5 Pro in September and in a new 37-minute video, he gets into how the Pro's improved GPU uses tech from AMD and announces a "deeper collaboration" between Sony and the chip maker. The PS5 uses AMD's RDNA 2 GPU architecture originally released in 2020, while the PS5 Pro uses what Cerny refers to in the video as RDNA 2.X. The new GPU is a mixture of what was already offered on the PS5, with some cherry-picked features from the more advanced RDNA 3 architecture AMD introduced in 2022. That's paired with ray tracing techniques that Cerny says are from future RDNA tech on AMD's roadmap, and custom machine learning features created for the PS5 Pro.

With more computing power available, video games may spare increasing amounts of processing time for AI. One prospective application of the newly available resources is the simulation of large amounts of non-player characters (NPCs) in open world games. While it is relatively easy to simulate simple behaviours of individual NPCs it is much more difficult to create meaningful interactions between the NPCs.

Creating reasonable AI for sidekicks in games has proven to be a difficult challenge synthetizing player modelling and cooperative planning, both being problems hard by themselves. In this paper, we experiment with designing around these problems: we propose a cooperative puzzle-platformer game that was designed to look similarly to the mainstream of the genre, but to allow for an easy implementation of a quality sidekick AI, letting us test player reactions to the AI. The game was designed so that it is easy for the AI to find optimal solutions while the problem is relatively hard for a human player. We gathered survey responses from players who played the game online (N 28). While the AI sidekick was reported as likeable and helpful, players still reported greater enjoyment of the game when they were allowed to control the sidekick themselves. These findings indicate that the AI itself is not the only obstacle to truly enjoyable gameplay with an AI sidekick.

If you are a PlayStation fan, on March 18 of 2020 you were likely confused, frustrated, bored, or some combination of the three. On that day, Mark Cerny, the lead system architect on the PlayStation 5, stood behind a lectern and, for an hour, delivered a live-streamed presentation titled "The Road to PS5." He rhapsodized about the ins-and-outs of computational power, and, at one point, solicited users for pictures of their ears. At that stage, the console itself hadn't been shown yet, and if the live chat accompanying the feed was any indication, the talk was not landing. Games were not being discussed, let alone shown. Most viewers likely zoned out around the sentence "33 CUs at 2.23 GHz is 10.3 teraflops." But that gobbledygook -- manifest through the marriage of hardware, firmware and software, with a pinch of authorial intent and creative vision -- meant a lot to developers. After all, the stream was a version of a presentation originally planned for this year's canceled Games Developers Conference, which in its original format would reach an audience of primarily developers and publishers.

I live with a very big cat. He likes to sprawl across my lap when I play games. I often wonder what's going on behind his big wide eyes. So perhaps it's not surprising I fell so hard for Trico, the house-sized, big-eyed feline in The Last Guardian. Trico is obviously fake – he can fly and shoot lightning from his tail.

First, the Pro doesn't signal the end of video game console generations, even though its specs and launch window fit a pattern that resembles PC or smartphone upgrade cycles more than traditional console releases. Second, the Pro is valuable even if you don't have a 4K TV. Third, though most games on the Pro won't actually be rendered in true 4K, they're still much improved over the standard PS4. Sony probably feels the need to clarify these points because after it revealed the PS4 Pro in September, there was some confusion over the capabilities and identity of the new console. It was pitched as a mid-generation upgrade that would usher in an era of 4K gaming, but after the scripted presentation, it became obvious that 4K was still out of reach for most developers.

Sony unveiled a slimline PlayStation 4 during a press conference at the PlayStation Theater in Times Square Wednesday afternoon. Sony boss Andrew House kicked off the show by leaping straight to the revised system, which he said would be "slimmer, lighter, more energy efficient" than the current model, which hasn't changed since its launch in November 2013. The slimmer PlayStation 4 will be the "standard" PlayStation 4 moving forward, said House, and it's designed "to appeal to as wide an audience as possible." It'll be available by September 15 for most markets, and Sony's going to sell it for 299, or 50 less than the current model's 350 price tier. PlayStation 4 system architect Mark Cerny then confirmed the existent of PlayStation Pro, Sony's souped-up, razzle-dazzle followup to its not quite three years old PlayStation 4 games console.

Sony's 4K PlayStation 4 upgrade has been something of an open secret since before E3, but today the company officially unveiled its high end game console. It's called PlayStation 4 Pro -- and it'll be available on November 10th for 399/ 349. It boasts an upgraded CPU with a higher clock rate and a 1TB HDD. And, of course, it's designed specifically for UHD TVs and PlayStation VR. Beyond saying the Pro's GPU is twice as fast as the standard model, PlayStation's Andrew House didn't give specifics on the Pro's upgrades, but says the refresh has been a long time coming. "Display technology offers so much potential if there is content to leverage what's now possible," he said.

A Sony PlayStation 4 console display is viewed in this Nov. 14, 2013 photo in a Best Buy store on the upper East Side of Manhattan, in New York. Sony unveiled the PlayStation 4 Pro on Wednesday, which will launch on November 10 for 399. It is also rolling out a slimmer version of its video game console later this month for 299. Check out the events as they rolled out during Sony's PlayStation event in New York: And with that, the event is over. A new version of the app for PS4 Pro will arrive at launch, displaying 4K content. A similar deal has been reached with YouTube on displaying 4K content.