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Comment by Nursie | Hacker News Reader

>> Not sure I follow - what is stopping non-licensed developers from developing and testing games on their own PS4s now that this has happened?

I don't want to come across as being mean or anything but...

How charmingly naive!!

Sony (and the other console makers, to be fair) go to absolutely incredible lengths to make sure that people absolutely do not get to run their own code on these machines. And then they sue anyone that finds a way to do so.

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>Sony (and the other console makers, to be fair) go to absolutely incredible lengths to make sure that people absolutely do not get to run their own code on these machines. And then they sue anyone that finds a way to do so.

Also, to be fair, PS4 is the first Sony's home console that does not run user's code. All the previous Playstations had such an ability in one way or another:

Net Yaroze on Playstation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_Yaroze

Linux Kit on PS2 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_for_PlayStation_2

And the PS3, initially, came with the ability to install user OSs http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OtherOS

I don't see a reason to buy a console unless it has a large number of exclusive titles that are worth playing. (Which in itself is anti-consumer. I want the games not the hardware)

PC gaming is currently the best choice. All the freedom combined with better hardware. The only disadvantage is the high cost of entry but you can easily save money by buying games during the big sales on steam.

Handhelds are a different story though. The games are often a lot better than mobile games.

Well....I have both a beefy gaming pc and a next-gen console. Yeah, my PC is more powerful and can run anything you throw at it. But most of the time I simply enjoy just sitting on the sofa with a controller in hand, one click the console is on(and it turns my TV and amp on as well), another click and the game is launching. The system is quiet and uses less energy - my £1200 gaming machine sure has an overclocked CPU and a custom cooling system,but it doesn't change the fact that it has a total of 7 fans and uses 400W while running games - I had it in my living room for a while but didn't enjoy the whiz of air. In fact, I bought Dragon Age Inquisition on PC to enjoy better graphics, but after the latest Nvidia Driver broke the game(huge FPS spikes, artifacts everywhere) I just bought a console version. Pop the disc in, go. No drivers, no config, it just works. Sure the graphics are slightly worse,but not enough for me to care. And the price of games was literally never an issue for me - just the lack of time to actually play them.

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