As the PlayStation 5 nears its four-year anniversary, the platform team at Sony is continuing to cook up small new improvements to help players get the most out of the console. The latest batch of changes we’ll soon get to test are hyper-niche, but still pretty cool.
The first new feature, going into early beta access starting July 25, is D audio profiles for headphones and earbuds. Instead of needing to tweak the settings each time, the console will let players save custom settings based on what sounds best to them and for certain games. Maybe you want a different set of tweaks when you’re playing a multiplayer shooter versus a moody horror game.
“For example, your personalized 3D audio profile may enable you to better sense the positions of characters and objects in a game world more clearly than before, making the experience more immersive,” Sony’s VP of product management, Hiromi Wakai, wrote on the PlayStation Blog today.
Custom Remote Play settings are also going into testing. This will let players authorize which friend-and-family member accounts have authorization to access their console for streaming to their phones, laptops, or PlayStation Portals. I’m now tempted to see how well I can play games on my buddy’s console five miles away. Both of these new settings options are available on all PS5 models.
What Sony is calling adaptive charging for DualSense controllers and other peripherals, however, is only available on the new slim PS5 models released last year. This feature will save power by only charging your connected controller when its battery is low, rather than keeping the USB ports powered on even when the devices are fully juiced.
While most users will have to wait until these features go live in an official update to try them, everyone will get to play around with the PS5’s latest firmware version out today. Players can now ask their consoles to show them game help for a game rather than needing to find it on the home screen. They can also share links to their game sessions with QR codes. I can’t wait to invite everyone I know to play Foamstars with me.