PlayStation 4 has been in planning for the past five years, according to Sony Worldwide Studios vice president Michael Denny.
“It’s been, for all of us involved at looking at what PlayStation 4 should be, a five-year journey to get to that point,” Denny told Edge.
“When you go back five years we were still really just getting PlayStation 3 off and running after obviously some early challenges in the birth of PlayStation 3. At that point, developers were really getting their teeth into it and really starting to produce some great software, but already we could see the challenges that PlayStation 3 was presenting.
“Some of our creators and some of our development teams, while the end results were fantastic, the end results to get there has been well-regaled by all, it took an awful lot of effort and took an awful lot of concentration away from the pure creative process.”
Denny added that at that point, they began speaking with developers about producing a console that “could really unleash their creativity.”
“We were in the heartland of PlayStation 3 so we couldn’t really turn around and say ‘hey, we’re planning PlayStation 4 now’,” Denny said. “We just wanted to get early feedback on the views of current-gen consoles and current-gen console development and some thoughts for the future.”
PlayStation 4 was announced on February 20 in new York. The purpose of the event, added Denny, was to broadcast that Sony has “created a console absolutely focused on gamers”—and “gamers in the broadest sense.”
Said event won’t be the last, of course. Denny said the announcement was just the first of “a number of events this year explaining what PlayStation 4 is.” A rumor earlier this month suggested we’ll see one at the end of April or early May.
And what of the actual box? Denny couldn’t share details, but teased, “you know it’s going to be another fantastic design and we can’t wait to reveal it.”
Read Edge’s full interview with Michael Denny here.