Buying a PS4 in 2022, is it worth it or is it a mistake?

The lack of availability of PS5 has led to buying a PS4 is, in 2022, an option that more and more users are consideringespecially after the news that Sony was going to address the PS5 shortage by manufacturing more PS4 units. This information confirmed two things: that it was still going to be nearly impossible to get a PS5 in 2022, and that PS4 will still have a “considerable” shelf life.

I still think the same as when this information came out, producing a console of the previous generation and raise it as a “solution” to the shortage of PS5 has no sense because, in the end, it does not solve anything, just keeps the possibility of offering such a console to the user as an alternative, not as a solution real solution to a problem that, unfortunately, is not likely to be solved until 2023, and at best.

However, by this I don’t mean that buying a PS4 is, straight up, a mistake I have had such a console for about five years nowi waited to buy it because I wanted to acquire the  “Slim” revision, since this usually solves hardware problems and design errors that usually  “escape” with the first model, and the truth is that my experience with it has been perfect. I have not had any problem, neither at hardware nor software level, although it is also true that I have not given it much cane, since my main gaming platform is the PC.

Buying a PS4 in 2022

In those five years, I’ve accumulated considerable experience, and not only i have been able to see how he was agingi have also had the opportunity to compare its evolution, and its current state, with the experience we can expect from a new generation console. That experience revolves around the use of more powerful components, and the SSD, keys that, as we know, are what have defined PS5 and Xbox X-Series S.

Today I want to use all my experience to help all of you who have doubts about whether it is worth buying a PS4 this year, to make the right decisionand to be clear about what is the best thing to do right now based on your personal situation, as this is, in the end, the most important key on which any purchase decision should be based.

Five reasons why it is worth buying a PS4 in 2022

1.-⤢ PS4 still has more life ahead of it than it seems

Buying a PS4 in 2022

The first reason is that we are talking about a console that has been the winner of the war of the previous generation of consoles, and that has a huge user base. This means that it is still a candy for developers, and also for Sony, and therefore is not going to be abandoned overnight.

At the time it was said that its lifecycle could end in 2023, but looking at the current landscape i think that in the end it will go to 2024that is to say, it still has at least two years of life left. Yes, it is very likely that over those two years it will not receive the same games as PS5, and that PS5 will be left with some first level exclusives, but the important thing is that buying a PS4 will allow us to continue enjoying great games, and major triple A games, between 2022 and (probably) 2024.

2.-Offers an enviable catalog of games

Bloodborne

This is not up for debate. In its almost nine years of life, PS4 has amassed a formidable catalog of gameswith top level exclusives so desirable that, even years after their arrival on that console, they have been ported to PC and have been a huge success. One of the clearest, and most recent, examples has been God of War.

Buying a PS4 will allow us to enjoy all those exclusive games, and also the multiplatform triple A games including the Call of Duty, Battlefield and Resident Evil franchises, among others, and without having to worry about requirements or compatibility. Yes, it’s one of the classic advantages of consoles, and this doesn’t change over time.

3.-The passage of time has made games cheaper

Buying a PS4 in 2022â€

Very much so. This is something that I myself took advantage of when I decided to buy a PS4, since shortly after receiving it I got some must-haves at a bargain price, such as Bloodborne, which I acquired in a special edition along with the expansion  “The Old Hunters” for about 30 euros. This is, without a doubt, one of the games I have enjoyed the most on my PS4.

 I also knew how to wait to be able to buy other masterpieces like The Last of Us and The Last of Us Part II, and even God of War, for less than 20 euros. In addition to the numerous offers that we can find today on many must-have PS4 titles, we can also find games that are always available at a low price within the ⠓PlayStation Hits” series is very extensive.

4.-You will be able to enjoy your games on PS5 again

PS4 and PS5

It’s a benefit of the backward compatibility that Sony has introduced on that console, and the best thing is that you’ll be able to enjoy them all over again with technical improvements which, in many cases, are noticeable, such as a higher frame rate per second, higher resolution and reduced loading times, thanks to the increased power of PS5 and its high-performance SSD drive.

Buy a PS4, and get yourself a collection of games, wouldn’t be a bad idea if you know you’re going to buy a PS5 later on. Still, keep in mind that games developed with a PS5-exclusive focus are also coming, which means that in order to get access to the PS5 enhancements they include, you may have to pay extra even if you already have the original PS4 title.

5.-Remains the minimum base for developers

pS4 exploded view

Along with Xbox One, obviously. By this I mean that you can rest assured that any game that comes to PS4 should be properly optimized to run well on that consoleand thanks to the optimization and adjustments that are made from the beginning of the development, you will be able to play games on your PS4 that would not work the same on an equivalent PC, or that would not even start.

Despite its hardware limitations, PS4 has continued to receive spectacular games that squeeze every last drop of power out of the console, such as The Last of Us Part II or Spider-Man Miles Morales, and will soon receive new high-caliber titles, such as the anticipated Horizon Forbidden West.

Three reasons why it’s not worth buying a PS4 in 2022

1.-Xbox Series S offers a much better value

xbox Series S console

Think, for a moment, about the hardware that PS4 mounts. We are talking about a console that uses an eight-core AMD Jaguar CPU with an IPC similar to that of a 2013 Intel Atom processor running, moreover, at only 1.6 GHz. Its GPU is a custom solution based on AMD’s GCN 2.0 architecture, which totals 1,152 shaders, and falls between a Radeon HD 7850 and a Radeon HD 7870. It has 8 GB of unified GDDR5, of which developers only have 5 GB available for gaming, and it has an HDD with a speed of 100 MB/s.

Now let’s look at what Xbox Series S offers: an 8-core, 16-thread processor based on a trimmed-down revision of Zen 2 (its actual performance is closer to Zen+ than Zen 2) at 3.4 GHz (3.6 GHz without SMT), it features a Radeon RDNA2 GPU with 1,280 shaders equipped with hardware for accelerating ray tracingthe system has 10 GB of unified GDDR6 (about 7.5 GB are free for developers) and has a 512 GB SSD at a speed of 2.400 MB/s.

The difference between the two consoles in terms of hardware is, as we can see, huge, but we should not forget that Xbox Series S is backwards compatible with Xbox One, Xbox 360 and Xboxand that also allows us to enjoy a huge amount of games for a small monthly fee, thanks to the Xbox Game Pass. On the other hand, it should also be noted that this console will not only offer a superior experience with any current game, but it will also have a much longer lifespan.

2.-Buying a new PS4 is paying too high a price

PS4 Pro

PS4 Pro has maintained a higher value on the second-hand market, and it is normal.

The arrival of PS5, its immediate scarcity and the reduction of PS4 production, caused the stock of the latter to decrease considerably during late 2020 and mid-2021, a reality that has led us to a rather ridiculous situation, as to buy a new PS4 we have to be willing to pay absurd prices, and in some major retailers, such as Amazon, there is not even stock.

The normal PS4 price before the arrival of the new generation hovered around between 249 and 280 eurosdepending on the version that we wanted to buy and the additions that it brought. Now, there are stores where they sell it refurbished for much higher prices than the console had previously, and there have also been attempts to inflate the price in the second hand marketwhich has not worked because there is a lot of supply and less interest.

Buying a new PS4 is something we should avoid unless we can find it at a reasonable price, something very complicated having Xbox Series S available, new, from 299 euros. In my point of view, the ideal would be to buy a second hand PS4, or refurbished, but without paying more than 150-180 euros. If it includes games or controllers, we must weigh the added value that these represent, something that is not complicated, since most of its most relevant titles have long been discounted to prices between 15 and 30 euros.

3.-Optimization doesn’t work miracles either: PS4 is slacking more and more

Cyberpunk 2077

One of the reasons why it is worth buying a PS4 is precisely that it is still the base for developers. That is true, but there is a major problem, and that is that this base is very outdated, so much so that it is no longer even possible to perform miracles by optimizing and reducing the graphic quality. The new batch of games, developed with a multiplatform approach but oriented a little more to the new generation, are making that reality clear, and Cyberpunk 2077 has been one of the best examples.

PS4 has been having problems for some time to run games in 1080p with an acceptable level of quality and 30 FPS, in fact it doesn’t even get it in many exclusives that are totally focused on it, like Days Gone, Horizon Zero Dawn or God of War. As I told you, I have a PS4, and I have played those three games on that console, but I could only finish Days Gone with a lot of patience, because in the other two the FPS drops and stuttering made the experience not pleasant at all.

There are also exceptions, in fact Spider-Man Miles Morales runs very well on PS4, but this doesn’t change the fact that buying a PS4 will force us to accept all the shortcomings of a 2013 hardware. Obviously, we will continue to see highly optimized games that will stay close to 30 FPS stable, that will not be the general rule, but rather the opposite.

Endnotes: What would I do?

If I found myself in the situation of hesitating between buying a PS4 or not, I would first of all assess my personal situation, and my interests. Let’s say that I have no platform to play, and that my budget is 300 euros. I really like Sony’s exclusive franchises, but am I willing to accept the technical shortcomings of this 2013 console? In my case, and after having enjoyed Bloodborne so much, i would try to buy a second hand PS4 as cheap as possibleand I would keep a part of that 300 euro budget to keep saving until I could buy a PS5.

However, a user who doesn’t have that much interest in Sony franchises, and can’t wait any longer, should go straight for an Xbox Series Sbecause this console will allow you to enjoy a next-generation experience and overcome, for little money, the limitations of PS4. You will also be able to access a huge catalog of games for a small monthly fee, thanks to Xbox Game Pass.

Now it’s your turn to talk, What is your opinion? Would you be willing to buy a PS4 in 2022, why? See you in the comments.

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