The obvious name for Sony’s next-generation games console may not turn out to be the one that Sony opts for – sources are saying that the Playstation 4 will in fact be called ‘Orbis’.
Orbis may, of course, just be the product’s codename while it’s under development – Sony could in fact still side with the Playstation 4 name when it comes to releasing the console. For those wondering, Orbis is a latin word, meaning ‘ring’ or ‘circle’.
The news comes from Kotaku, whose sources have leaked the information to the gaming website. The same sources also stated that Sony plans to launch the console late next year, during Q4. If this estimate is correct, Sony’s next-gen console is likely to be at the top of many Christmas lists. However, take the news with a pinch of salt – the release date at least.
Some digging has proved that the rumour of the Orbis name actually has some foundation to it. Sony has developer websites for each of its games products, and they typically follow the same format – psvita.scedev.net, ps3.scedev.net for the PS VITA and PS3 consoles respectively. So what happens, for instance, if we were to try orbis.scedev.net? Would you look at that, it works! On the other hand, ps4.scedev.net doesn’t work, instead returning a lovely 404 error page. Perhaps Orbis is the codename after all…
Kotaku’s sources have said that the Orbis developer site has been open since the beginning of the year, and Sony has been sending out packs to developers and game studios since then in an attempt to get people creating content for its future games console. Sources are also stating that the Orbis won’t feature backwards compatibility with Sony’s current PS3 console. While this may come as a surprise, we expect Sony to offer titles from all previous Playstation consoles as digital downloads from the PS Store.
The Orbis will be a powerful beast, according to the information relayed by Kotaku’s sources. Processing power is plentiful, coming from an AMD x64 CPU, while the graphical grunt will be provided by an AMD Southern Islands chip. The latter is said to be very powerful, and capable of outputting graphics at a 4K resolution, which means that Sony is taking into account the next generation of High Definition TVs.
Is Orbis a good name for Sony’s next console? Can you imagine boasting about your new ‘PS Orbis’?
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Source: Kotaku