Well it took a little over two years, but thanks to the uptick in Sony’s output of Playstation 5s, I finally… finally was able to get my hands on one. It now sits happily on my TV stand, one shelf below my Xbox Series X, and between my prior gaming commitments, I have been giving it a healthy amount of attention. So far, my thoughts have been largely positive. I don’t have many complaints, and the ones I do have are (so far) pretty minimal. I have no doubt that, as I get more playtime and start to really experience the system, there might be some issues that pop up, but we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.

The Hardware

The Console
Ok, so my first beef I have is, of course, the size. This has been well documented, and it was something I was expecting when I brought it home and unboxed it. But it’s not until you get the thing in your own home, trying to arrange it on your shelf, amongst your other electronics, that you can truly appreciate just how gargantuan this thing actually is. You might have noticed, when I mentioned it above, that I said it was one shelf below my Xbox. There are probably some fanboys out there bringing up some kind of imaginary nepitism, but the honest truth is, I tried to put them side by side on my shelf and the damn thing is just too big. It’s too high to sit on the top shelf without blocking my tv, and it’s too long (on its side) to fit comfortably alonside the Xbox. And I wasn’t going to rearrange the Xbox. So it went on the bottom shelf. I’m not even 100% happy with it down there, either. I usually don’t put anything on the bottom shelf because it’s so close to the floor and that’s just where all the dust settles. This is hopefully a temporary arrangement, but I literally don’t have anywhere else to put it at the moment. It is what it is.

The Controller
I will admit. I like the controller more than I expected to. I had held the controller on a demo unit at Walmart, but you know, they bolt those things down in a way that prevents you from holding it the way you naturally would. So when I tried to grip it at the store, I wasn’t really digging it. It didn’t feel very ergonomic. Getting it home, however, let me truly hold and experience it. It feels pretty good. It’s solid, it has a little bit of heft to it, and it feels quality. Will it hold up to extended play sessions? Time will tell.

I like the click of the buttons and the feel of the D-pad. As primarily an Xbox user, the Xbox controllers have never really gotten the feel of the D-pad quite right, and I absolutely loathe the cheap-sounding, clicky D-pad of the Series controllers. Seriously, I feel like I’m announcing it to the entire household every time I’m clacking through a menu. But the D-pad here feels comfortable and responsive, so far.

I don’t quite know how to feel about the adaptive triggers. I tried playing Gran Turismo 7 and my fingers were legitimately tired after two races. As someone who also struggles with arthritis flare-ups from time to time, the idea of any more resistance on my fingers than a small spring is… not a fun thought. As far as the motion controls and accelerometers and speakers and microphones… eh, I can take or leave any of them to be honest. None of this stuff is new, and they’ve been implemented and abandoned in multiple controllers in the past because the developers just don’t utilize them enough. Sony first-party developers might find some cool things to do with them, but we’re looking at a handful of games per generation. 90% of the third party multiplatform games won’t bother with it.

Overall, I like the controller a lot, and aside from the fact that, ergonomically, the Xbox fits in my hands more comfortably, I can’t find many faults with it. I’ve been plugging the controller in after each play session so I can’t comment on the battery life just yet.

The Software

The Dashboard
This will be one of those opinions that will likely change as I get more time with the system. So far it’s… okay. It certainly looks nice, it’s very sleek and smooth, but I do feel like some actions require one or two button presses too many. Despite my experience with every single previous Playstation, it still took me a while to figure out how to close a game, and at the time of this writing, I don’t think there’s any way to just “view the dashboard.” As in, a plain background, with no game selected, or PS Store tiles, or challenges, etc. I’m still not a fan of audio playing according to whatever game I have highlighted. I have to scroll over to the Library tab just to have a blank screen. Maybe this can be changed in the settings. I haven’t checked yet, so we’ll see.

I do feel like the PS5 does handle video recording a bit better. I haven’t tried the “share” options yet but I have been recording video and then copying it to a thumbdrive and that seems to be working pretty well so far.

I can’t really speak to any of the social aspects of the system, since I don’t have any friends on the platform.

The Service

PS Plus Premium has gotten a healthy amount of criticism, some of it justified and some of it a bit ridiculous. I’m not going to go into details on which is which, but I will say that I’ve been a PSNow subscriber for a little over a year now, and I’m grand-fathered into the PS Plus Premium tier at the PSNow price, which I will ride out for however long they let me.

I don’t use it much, to be honest. Mainly because it would’ve been on my base PS4 which, suffice to say, feels really old in 2023. That’s not to say it doesn’t work. I was using it to play Ys VIII and a few other PS4 games, as well as streaming a PS3 title or two. It works well enough, but it didn’t really feel like it belonged on the PS4. The integration of it into the PS5 dashboard makes it feel more like it’s part of the system, as opposed to this tacked-on service that’s compartmentalized away in a subset of menus. Much like how Xbox has made Game Pass fully integrated into the operating system, Sony has done the same with PS Plus, and in my opinion, it’s the better for it. Couple that with the fact that the system feels like a true “new” system, I’m excited to be utilizing this service more often.

While the service doesn’t hold much value for anyone that’s been in the ecosystem for a while, for someone like me who has been outside the PS5 circle, booting this up and signing into my account gave me instant access to Demon’s Souls, Returnal, Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade, and Ghost of Tsushima. That’s a shit ton of value right there, and I can’t complain about that one bit (for now.) After I finish these games up and burn through any other first-party offerings, things just might dry up and my opinion on this may change. But for now, I’m a kid in a candy store and I get to play all these games I’ve been reading about for two years now, and that’s awesome.

That said, I still absolutely despise the fact that Sony still insists on listing anything I’ve downloaded through PS Plus as “purchased.” I hate that. I didn’t “purchase” it. If I canceled my subscription tomorrow, all of those “purchased” items would no longer be available to me. I get that it was something they had to do on the PS4, since it was introduced later in the console’s life, but the PS5 was created with this service in mind, and I find it hard to believe they couldn’t have figured out some kind of workaround or something to differentiate the software that I’ve downloaded via the service and software I actually own. It’s just really annoying.

In Closing

So far I’m really enjoying my time with the PS5. Time will tell if the feeling holds up, but I am loving playing on a newer Sony system. As someone who skipped the PS4 Pro (and who was never really impressed with the PS4 to begin with) I’m excited at the changes and updates, and absolutely thrilled I don’t have to bother with the DualShock 4 anymore. Hallelujah for that.