- Sony revealed more than two dozen PS5 games at its Future of Gaming event last month, but a journalist claims that Sony “smartly held some stuff back” for a future event.
- Microsoft announced this week that it will host an Xbox Games Showcase on July 23rd, and Sony is expected to follow with a State of Play live stream in August.
- Neither Sony nor Microsoft has announced a price for the PS5 or Xbox Series X yet.
Sony made a huge splash in June with its Future of Gaming event, revealing more than two dozen games alongside the PS5 hardware itself. Unlike Microsoft’s Xbox Series X first look gameplay stream in May, the PS5 event was filled with first-party and third-party reveals alike, including sequels to PlayStation exclusives like Horizon Forbidden West, Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales, Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart, and Gran Turismo 7.
Sony’s event was so full of announcements that it wasn’t clear what the company would have left to talk about in the months leading up to the PS5’s launch this holiday, but on Monday, Eurogamer editor Tom Phillips claimed that Sony is planning to host a State of Play live stream in August to counter the Xbox Games Showcase coming on July 23rd. And it sounds like Sony may have saved a few big announcements for the stream.
In a tweet earlier this month, Phillips said that there would be three major next-gen events from late July to the end of August. First would be the Xbox Games Showcase on July 23rd, which Microsoft confirmed just days later. Sony then plans to reveal even more games via a State of Play stream in early August, and Phillips believes “Sony has 1st and 3rd party stuff still to announce.” Then, later in August, Microsoft will reveal Xbox Lockhart.
Sony has 1st and 3rd party stuff still to announce. Feels like it has quite smartly held some stuff back.
— Tom Phillips (@tomphillipsEG) July 6, 2020
Back when Sony first announced its Future of Gaming event, Sony Interactive Entertainment CEO Jim Ryan said in a blog post that it was “part of our series of PS5 updates” and that PlayStation will “still have much to share” in the days and weeks ahead. Of course, no one thought that Sony would just go into hibernation until the fall, but the company will need to respond once Microsoft steals the spotlight back later this month by showing off gameplay from Halo Infinite and potentially revealing a new entry in the Fable franchise for Xbox Series X.
Microsoft made countless unforced errors leading up to the launch of the Xbox One, leaving the door wide open for Sony to take control of the generation. Whether or not Microsoft can regain some of that ground over the next few years remains to be seen, but Sony has to know that “winning” this generation won’t be nearly as easy, especially if the PS5 is going to cost more than the PS4 did at launch. If Sony can’t beat Microsoft on price (though this has yet to be determined), it will need to do its best to prove that the PS5 library will outclass that of the Xbox Series X.
