The PlayStation Classic is Sony's blatant attempt to cash in on the recent Nintendo
craze, but in this video game court, it's Innocent Until Proven Guilty!
Court is now in session for an epic & exciting episode of Innocent Until Proven Guilty!
In the nearly five years of this series' existence, I've successfully defended & punished
a wide array of offenders in the realm of gaming & movies, but I've yet to tackle a console.
There have been plenty of potential trials waiting in the wings, spanning from the Virtual
Boy to the CD-I, and while I'm eventually going to try each of those at some point in
the future, I've finally found, with the help of Emily on Patreon, the perfect test
case to experiment with the format.
Without further ado, here, at long last, is the first system based IUPG on the one & only...
PlayStation Classic.
Initially announced during the Tokyo Game Show & released in December of 2018, the PlayStation
Classic is the most recent in a string of nostalgia-fueled throwbacks intended to cater
to the retro marketplace & it not surprisingly follows the formula established by its much
more successful Nintendo predecessors.
As with the NES & Super Nintendo iterations, the PlayStation Classic comes in a box designed
to emulate the packaging of its source material, with the contents printed on the sides & a
colorful display of the roster of titles emblazoned on the back.
Inside the box, there are the required HDMI cable & power supply, as well as two original
model controllers with wired cords that are a bit on the short side.
I personally had no problem with the length of the controllers, because the shelf that
I placed the device on is fairly close to where I sat during my capture session, but
the power supply is a whole other ball of wax entirely.
You see, most companies putting out a product of this nature would include some kind of
AC adapter or base charger to turn it on, but Sony, for some strange reason, only tossed
in a USB cable.
To say that this is one of the most dumbfounding business practices in the history of the industry
would be a massive understatement, but to their credit, they were up front about this
& placed a very visible warning on the upper corner of the packaging.
Regardless, while the solution to this issue is an ordinary 5 volt, 1 amp phone plug, which
I fortunately happened to have a spare of, the fact that Sony cheaped out on their audience
left a bad taste in my mouth, but I shook it off & continued with my capture session,
and what awaited me was a bit of a mixed bag.
Upon powering on the unit, a start-up screen appears, accompanied by the most iconic jingle
from the fifth console generation, and this attention to detail was very much appreciated
& provided a warm rush of nostalgia that brought me back to my teenage years.
The subsequent menu interface lacked the fancy bells & whistles of the Nintendo machines,
sporting a flat purple & black background and a rotating wheel from which the included
titles are selected.
As with their vintage counterpart, the buttons on the faithfully produced piece of plastic
function in a manner resembling their initial purpose, with the Power button turning on
the device, Reset returning to the main menu & Eject being responsible for advancing the
narrative within Final Fantasy 7 and the other multi-disc adventures.
Selecting a game from the menu will make it run as it traditionally would have, but the
biggest difference is that the HDMI output results in the resolution being boosted to
720p, which is a vast improvement over the RCA signal of old, but a huge disappointment
in comparison to the 1080p & 4K standard of the modern era.
Nevertheless, in the A/B test I conducted between the PlayStation Classic running straight
into my Elgato HD60 & my Framemeister upscaled PS2, the difference in the picture quality
between the imitation and the real thing was mostly negligible.
The graphics were equally sharp, with plenty of eye-popping pixels, and the sound was unaffected
by the emulation.
The frame rate, for the most part, was pretty solid, but I found a few exceptions to the
rule, and these were mainly due to the first major source of pre-release controversy.
In an understandable, but ultimately flawed move to make the product universal, Sony decided
to ship the unit with PAL region ISOs.
This may not sound like such a big deal, but it turned out to be a major deal breaker for
many consumers, and anyone familiar with the gaming regions & their lack of compatibility
should know full well why that is the case.
I have plenty of experience with playing PAL ROMs on NTSC hardware with my Everdrive cartridges,
and they usually run inefficiently if they even work at all in the first place, and the
same concept applies to the PlayStation classic.
Loading a 50 hertz file on a 60 hertz piece of equipment led to a slight decrease in frame
rate, and while this was barely noticeable for the bulk of the titles, it really put
a damper on the fighters.
Performance issues aside, the PlayStation Classic's roster itself is a pale shadow
of those offered by the Nintendo systems, with the expected heavyweights like Resident
Evil & Metal Gear Solid being sandwiched between a slew of non-exclusives & questionable legacy picks.
I owned a PS1 back in the day, but my collection wasn't that big, so there were a large number
of these that I'm only just playing for the first time right now & I was quite surprised
by my reactions to what Sony apparently considered to be the cream of their crop from that illustrious era.
For example, I went into this uncertain about the legitimacy of Intelligent Qube's inclusion,
as it seemed like such an oddball choice, but I ended up really enjoying my time with it.
The original Grand Theft Auto & Rainbow Six, on the other hand, are rightfully celebrated
for the franchises that they spawned, but they themselves, with their clunky controls
& primitive presentation, haven't aged well at all.
There are a bunch of eccentric obscurities that add variety to the lineup, some of which
I ended up becoming a fan of and others were respectable additions that brought fresh elements
to the table, but weren't to my particular taste.
As I've mentioned in other videos, I was an RPG junkie as a kid, so the PlayStation
Classic did an exceptional job of sating that itch, but there was one area of the overall
package that hampered the fun factor and that is the controller itself.
The controllers that come with the PlayStation Classic are replicated from the models that
hit store shelves at the launch of the PS1, and as anyone who's personally used those
controllers should know, they're completely a product of that time period.
The fifth console generation saw tremendous advancements in the realm of 3D gaming, and
the controllers inevitably evolved in order to keep current with them.
The twin stick format we've long become accustomed to was introduced to meet this
need and the PS1 revision paved the way for the benchmark Dual Shock line, so the fact
that Sony decided to pass it over in favor of its
inferior predecessor is beyond my comprehension.
This most certainly lends an air of authenticity to the execution, but it's also incredibly
awkward & it, along with the PAL ISOs, paltry lineup, & $100 price tag ultimately led to
the PlayStation Classic's downfall.
It's clear as day that Sony put in the minimal effort to ride Nintendo's coattails and
these boneheaded blunders handicapped what could have been a pint-sized PS1 powerhouse,
but I'd be lying if I said I didn't appreciate it for what it is.
While the pre-installed games vary greatly in quality & they're often marred by technical
difficulties, this pale imitation of the NES & SNES blockbusters still has enough positive
traits to give it a soft recommendation, especially now that it's received a significant cost reduction.
The original Resident Evil & Final Fantasy 7 were two of my constant companions during
that segment of my youth, so to be able to revisit those quintessential landmarks along
with several other top notch action adventures & RPGs in an adorable little piece of plastic
that fits in the palm of my hand was an undeniable treat.
However, as great as that feeling is, I can't help but wonder about how this could have
been under the right circumstances.
Imagine if this had been supervised by an impassioned project lead that cared more about
paying tribute to a legendary system than making a quick buck.
We'd have nothing but true PlayStation classics and they'd be crystal clear on all HDTVs
at a continuously smooth 60fps.
Parappa the Rapper would be rubbing elbows with Crash Bandicoot as Jet Moto blew by them
at an adrenaline pumping speed & that would just be the tip of the spectacular iceberg.
I know that this is all just a pipe-dream & there's no point in pondering over all the "what if?"
scenarios, but it really is impossible to wrap my head around how this didn't come to be.
It makes far more sense from a business perspective to give the consumers what they want rather
than half-ass it with a lot of filler.
Just look at what Nintendo accomplished.
They dropped the ball on the cord length, too, but at least they put together two undeniably
brilliant & crowd pleasing compilations, whereas Sony doesn't even have the common courtesy of
including a simple AC adapter, & that is one of the many reasons that I rule that the verdict is...
Guilty!
This may have been a predictable outcome and I was probably grasping at straws to come
up with a viable defense, but I was 100% sincere in stating that I appreciate the PlayStation
Classic for what it is & I'll go on the record as saying that it's nowhere near
the disaster it's made out to be.
It was definitely overpriced at the start & its available options are admittedly underwhelming,
but it also reunited me with Final Fantasy 7 after a twenty year absence & it got me
to make this video, so that's win-win as far as I'm concerned.
If you're in the market for some Sony nostalgia, then this is an absolutely viable way to seek
it out now that it's not exorbitantly priced, but if you're looking for a pristine pixelated
experience, then you're better off going with the digital downloads.
Anyway, now that I've sentenced this notorious cash grab to the IUPG jail, I've got to
work on another Cygnus video.
Be sure to come back for that & leave any suggestions for future trials in the comments
or on my social media accounts, but until then, court is now adjourned!
For more infomation >> 1986 Royale Sabre - Raw Classic Cars - Duration: 5:39. 
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