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With every console generation, the jump in technology gets less and less noticeable to the point where Sony had to zoom in on the most hard-to-notice background details to sell its new PS5 Pro. We'll likely never have another brain-frying moment, like the jump from 2D to 3D, but lead PlayStation architect Mark Cerny still believes in generational hardware leaps.
When asked about whether drastic generational leaps can still exist in an interview with Digital Foundry, Cerny explained that the company isn't producing PCs - they're making consoles that are supposed to give developers a new benchmark. "We're not making PCs," he says. "We're making a few very specific things, right? How many PCs are there? You can't even answer that question because you can combine the components in any way you want to."
Talking about the differences between less dramatic mid-gen refreshes and properly new hardware, Cerny elaborated that consoles like the PS5 Pro "are very tightly targeted around GPU" and are designed to push graphics rather than offer anything new on the gameplay side. "But when a new generation starts, then it gets opened up to 'What are we doing with the CPU? What are we doing with the amount of memory? What are we doing with haptics?' It's a whole new experience that developers can go at."
Elsewhere in the chat, Cerny mentions that the company's work with machine learning tech will continue after implementing PSSR upscaling, which automatically analyses your screen and improves your image quality, on the PS5 Pro. "It's been just great digging into the M.L. (machine learning) aspects of this and gaining some knowledge there, because we know that's the future we are heading into," he says. "We're definitely continuing with development of these ML-based libraries for game graphics. It's just that there's so many targets to go up against."
Just bought the souped-up console? Check out the best PS5 games to play right now or look to the future with our upcoming PS5 games of 2025 guide.
