We’re still being treated to the juicy morsels of courtroom banter from the Microsoft versus Federal Trade Commission (FTC) battle it seems, with court documents published showing Microsoft making some bold claims about what it believes are Sony’s PlayStation hardware plans for the near future.
As part of its refutal of some of the FTC’s arguments, Team Xbox spent some time highlighting the different price and performance options available on the market for customers looking to purchase a gaming console (including the Switch) and in doing so, told courts it expects PlayStation to release a PS5 Slim “later this year” as well as a PS5 Pro mode “in the near future.”
You can read the full published document here or see the statement in question below:
“Equally important, the FTC’s analysis considers only the high-end models of Xbox (Series X) and PlayStation (Standard Edition), thereby ignoring the differentiation within Xbox’s console lines. In fact, the entry-level versions of the current Xbox and Switch are offered at the same price point ($299.99), and the Xbox Series S is sold for $50 less than the Switch OLED model ($349.99). PlayStation likewise sells a less expensive Digital Edition for $399.99, and is expected to release a PlayStation 5 Slim later this year at the same reduced price point.
“Xbox and PlayStation are also differentiated on performance. The less expensive Xbox Series S has less GPU processing power, system memory, and internal storage and renders images at a lower resolution than the Xbox Series X or PlayStation 5. PlayStation, meanwhile, currently offers two different versions of the PlayStation 5—one with a Blu-Ray player for physical media (Standard) and one without (Digital)—and is anticipated to release further differentiated Pro and Slim models in the near future. These models are differentiated from Xbox offers [Redacted section follows].”
A new development in Microsoft's legal battle with the Federal Trade Commission reveals that an all-new version of the PlayStation 5 may be imminent. https://t.co/GRX9I7OHcN
— Game Rant (@GameRant) July 4, 2023
While it’s hard to say whether Microsoft genuinely has some knowledge of Sony’s hardware plans and has decided to spill the T in court, or if the above is pure speculation on its part, word of a new PS5 model has been making the rounds for some time now.
One of the first stories to come out of serial leaker Tom Henderson’s outlet, Insider Gaming, when it first launched was a report that suggested Sony is gearing up to release a new PS5 Slim model in September this year with a detachable disc drive.
