I've spent just over two glorious months with my PlayStation 5, and I love it. It might be the widest lad ever to have entered my home, but the bulky design of the thing doesn't bother me when it's tucked away underneath my TV stand. I can't get enough of the DualSense controller, it's myriad of immersive features, and the super-fast loading times of the console itself.
Yes, I have almost no regrets about my PlayStation 5... although there is at least one fairly major flaw that I think I'd change if I could.
As I'm sure you all are aware, turning off a console or putting it into a rest mode is a pretty simple process. Whether it's the Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, or PlayStation 4, you simply hold down the home button and select the option you want. Easy, right? You hold it down. This is a behaviour I, and many others, have instinctively taken on board over the last few years.
You can imagine my surprise then, when I learned that to turn off the PlayStation 5, you have to tap the home button. Holding it down will take you back to the main dashboard. This wouldn't be such a problem if I hadn't spent the last ten years or so holding down home buttons to shut down consoles. It's been two months, and I still instinctively hold down the DualSense's home button to turn the console off, only to be taken to the dashboard as I remember bitterly that's just not how Sony wants us to do things anymore.
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I want to make it clear before I'm accused of moaning about something that really doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things that this hardly ruining my next-gen experience... but I'm not exactly loving having to un-learn what every last-gen console made universal. Thankfully I'm not alone in questioning Sony's decision to mess around with us like this. Social media is filled with gamers who are still holding down that home button thinking it will give them the quickest route to rest mode.
"It's been 45 days and every day I'm still holding down the PS button on my controller thinking it will provide a shortcut to rest mode," rizzlenizzle wrote on Reddit. "Anyone else still doing this? I hope they bring the feature back!"
Users widely agreed, with many pointing out that it's not so much that the new way of turning the PS5 off is clunky... it's just that it's at the expense of the muscle memory developed from the PS4.
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"Instincts take over," agreed duvelsuper. "Why isn't holding the button working?! As I remind myself new system= new button scheme. Going to take a while to get used to button press instead of holding."
A number of users have called on Sony to revert the hold PS function to what it was on the PS4, or at the very least include an option to switch between the two at will. It's unlikely Sony will do this, of course, especially as time ticks on and more and more PlayStation users get used to the new way of doing things. As long as the PlayStation 6 doesn't unexpectedly switch it back again, I think I can just about live with this change... though it'll be a while yet before I'm completely used to it.
Featured Image Credit: SonyTopics: GAMING, News, PlayStation