Why The PS5 Converted Me From PC To Console
Throughout the majority of my teenage years, I was a die-hard PC gamer. I built my first rig at 14, meticulously researching which components offered the best bang for their buck.
After a long summer of countless paper rounds, I'd finally saved up enough cash to put it all together. It was an absolute clanger of a machine, held together by duct tape, hopes and dreams, but it was mine.
It just about had enough horses in its tank to run Minecraft, and that's all I cared about. Over the following years, I descended into a megahertz, frames per second and voltage fuelled obsession. Every game had to look its best, and be smooth as butter while doing so.
If it couldn't be modded, it wasn't worth playing. TL;DR, I became one of those insufferable PC gamers. The thought of even looking at a controller would instil sickness, and don't get me started on those 720p vaseline graphics.
However, with the release of the PlayStation 5 in 2020, something inside of me snapped. All of that pretentiousness withered away as I finally understood why the draw of a home console was so appealing.
Of course, we all change as we grow older. Our circumstances and priorities adapt. But there's something about the PS5 that I absolutely love and has ultimately left my PC passion in the mud.
Work Hard, Play Harder
Click to enlargeThe biggest straw that broke the camel's back for me was a drastic change in perspective. Fresh-faced out of University in 2020, I was desperately looking for a writing job in the games industry.
The pandemic dashed all hopes of moving to the Big Apple to look for something in person, so I essentially became chained to my desk at home.
This is something that anyone with a work-from-home job can relate to. Sure, the ability to work in your pyjamas and drink from your favourite mug without judgement is unrivalled. However, sitting at the same desk to work through the day and play in the evening is soul-destroying on another level.
I quickly found that there needed to be some separation between my work and leisure lifestyles. Of course, the easy answer is to either move the work laptop or gaming PC to another space. But having a living space large enough to accommodate two full-size work desks is not something everyone is privy to.
That's where the PS5 comes in. It may be massive and look like a spaceship designed by Porsche, but it fits neatly into my already existing entertainment system. Doubling as a 4K Blu-ray player, the PS5 came along as the perfect jigsaw piece that I didn't know I was missing.
Convenience Is King
Click to enlargeIn a similar vein, the last thing that I wanted to do after pressing buttons at a workstation all day is to spend my evening pushing buttons at a gaming station. After a full day of fighting fires and solving technical issues in my work life, who'd want to spend their leisure time tackling similar problems?
It can't be avoided - PC gaming is a right faff. It's unbelievably common to load up a brand-new game only for your monitor to light up like a Christmas tree with errors. Did you update your drivers? What do you mean you didn't verify the integrity of your game files?
Just wait one second while we re-install the shaders. Oops, the friend you're trying to party up with has a different game version. Have you tried turning it off and on again? Console gaming isn't perfect either, don't get me wrong.
If I had a pound for every time the PS5 tells me it's going to boot me out of the game because it can't validate my game license, I'd actually be able to afford a PlayStation exclusive on launch day. But the frequency at which I run into these issues is far, far less frequent than I ever do while trying to launch a simple indie game on PC.
The SSD in the PS5 has completely revolutionized how I play games and still impresses me two years on. Awakening the console from rest mode, more often than not, puts me right back into the game in under five seconds. I'm a pretty hectic player, so being able to hop in and out of games on a whim, saves me an insurmountable amount of time and headaches.
On top of that, I'm also incredibly guilty of checking my phone at every available opportunity. If a loading screen is any longer than instantaneous, you'd better believe I'll spend that time doomscrolling. Thankfully, it's very rare that I ever spend more than a few seconds looking at pretty concept art or tips before that delightful "Continue" button appears.
Mind The Gap
Click to enlargePerhaps the biggest reason that I took to the PS5 is that it isn't all that different to a PC at all. This latest leap in horsepower is the largest we've seen in consoles for a while, with the PS5 consistently able to deliver a 4K 60fps experience in most games.
On top of that, accessibility features have come a long way on the platform in the last several years. I live with nystagmus, a condition that means my eyes constantly move involuntarily. It's something that's rectified with spectacles, but ultimately means that my eyesight is awful and focusing on screens makes me extremely tired very easily. A perfect combination for someone who writes and reads words on a screen all day, huh?
Accessibility features in games like God of War Ragnarok and The Last of Us have helped me enjoy games to a new degree these last few years. Being able to scale HUD elements and subtitles to something more comfortable has finally let me play games into the late hours without feeling fatigued.
I used to dread collectable hunting due to their minuscule nature, but the high-contrast view modes have helped me conquer that fear too. These are features that are likely available in some PC titles, but the PS5 has finally let me access these game-changing features from the comfort of my sofa and on a much larger screen.
I haven't left PC behind just yet. Competitive shooters still feel at home to me with a mouse and keyboard, and Game Pass continues to give me a reason to keep one in the house. Ultimately though, the PS5 is closing the gap between what it means to play on PC and console, and I feel that it's enhancing my gaming lifestyle because of it.
