If you are picking up your PS5 today then happy PlayStation 5 launch day! Sony’s new console not only looks very different compare to its predecessor but comes with a fancy-schmancy new DualSense remote and a completely new UI to get used to. Now, I have spent over a week with the console and discovered some nifty little features the device can do which, unless you go looking for them, you won’t even know it is there. I decided to put together a quick guide on some awesome features the console has which may be important to know. Make sure catch up on my review of the console here as well as my review of the PS4 Pulse 3D Wireless Headset here.
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The PS5 Download Speed is Fast Even While Playing Games
One issue the PS4 had was its download speeds. They were often slow even without a game running and worse when you were playing a game. Often, users had to sit and wait out of a game while their new pre-orders, purchases, or updates downloaded just to save time. Not to mention the sluggish speeds when playing multiplayer games and even worse when “copying” an update.
Thankfully, the console’s snappy SSD and powerful CPU means this is now a thing of the past. The PS5 downloads speed is fast when playing games both offline and online. It manages to keep its max cap to whatever internet speed you have. There’s no need to sit and wait for games to download. You can carry on with your business. With the console’s limited SSD storage space, this will come in handy when you need to delete games and re-download them to make space for new ones.
Game Presets Let You Choose Difficulty and Performance
The joy of the PlayStation 5 is its power and the ability to not only enhance new games but also older PS4 titles. This comes in handy when specific games such as Horizon: Zero Dawn and God of War, which includes graphical options, are now enhanced even more. The PS5 now includes a setting that automatically chooses a performance mode to set the game to if you want one preset across all supported games. This means that no matter what game you load up, it will automatically keep its “performance mode” or “resolution mode” without you having to go change anything.
In order to make use of this feature, you need to head to the Save Data Game/App menu on the PS5 in the settings. Here you will find the Presets menu where you can choose what mode you want to have enabled across all supported games. This not only includes performance but also a difficulty mode. Keep in mind that you can still change this in the game itself but this helps create a standard for users.
Check Your Active Game Time on PS4 and PS5 Games
The PS5 included a nifty feature that tracks your active game time across PS4 and PS5 games. Yes, even games you spent hundreds or thousands (me with Destiny 2) of hours playing on your old console. It is a pretty cool feature and it is quite interesting to go back and look at your game time for older games which never tracked time in-game.
In order to find this, you need to click on your PSN profile picture on the top right-hand side of the home screen. Here, you will find “Profile” and in there click on “Games”. Here there will be a full list of PS4 and PS5 games you played in the order in which you played them. You can go all the way back in time to actually see how much of your life you wasted on Anthem, for example. You will never get that time back… Just saying.
Save Storage Space or Lose More by Tweaking Trophy Recordings
Earning a trophy on the PS5 is a joy. The system automatically records a few seconds of gameplay before you unlock it and a few seconds afterwards. It then edits a cool video of the trophy popping up with an overlay too. This makes for some great reminiscing of those good times you had across all your games. However, it takes up precious storage. Even though it is not a lot of it, each 30-second clip can amass to 100MB. Games have 50 trophies max and you will probably unlock 30 of them without much work. That is 3GB of storage.
You have two options here depending on your preference. You can either turn off the feature completely if you are worried about storage space or increase the duration if you want to have the default 15 seconds changed to 30 seconds. I changed mine to 30 seconds because one day I will go back and enjoy rewatching the memories.
To find this option, click on the settings cog on the top right-hand side of the home screen. Scroll all the way down to “Captures and Broadcasts” then to “Trophies” and fiddle with what you want.
Load Into Games Quicker by Using Activity Cards
It may take a while to get used to but the PS5 does not require users to boot up the game from the icon on the home screen. This icon loads the game but often you have to watch the intros and even go to the main menu. It takes up time and it is a PS5 so you should not have to wait anymore. Thankfully, once you master the Activity Cards it will save you so much time.
Each game has a unique way it uses the Activity Cards. To find them, hover over the game icon on the home screen. Pressing down will take you to the cards. Here, you can select a range of them depending on the game. Anything that has “Resume” underneath it means it supports the faster loading directly into the game. Sackboy: A big Adventure lets you instantly load into the next level. Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla, when clicking on the “Eivor’s Saga” card automatically loads the last autosave without going to the game’s home screen. Demon’s Souls let me fast travel to a different Archstone. Fiddle around with these cards and they will save you so much time.
Of course, the console has so much more to discover but these 5 tips I thought were pretty cool and I had to go looking for them in order to find them.
