Sony has released more details on PlayStation Plus for the PlayStation 4, detailing new features for subscribers, as well as what will be available to all PS4 owners. As mentioned at E3 2013, owners will need to have a PlayStation Plus subscription to play online multiplayer games, but the social features of the PS4 and auto-updates will sit outside of PlayStation Plus.
“A PlayStation Plus subscriber for PlayStation 4 comes away with a hell of a lot,” says Sony Europe MD Fergal Gara. “First of all, the subscription applies across all three platforms, so if you have the three platforms then you have an instant game collection on all three.”
Access to catch-up TV and online movie services also sit outside of PlayStation Plus, so it will be available to all users. Gara says that the inclusion of Gaikai into PlayStation Plus hasn’t been decided, though, and could still be behind the £40 a year subscription fee.
The PS4’s Remote Play feature which works with the PS Vita “uses some Gaikai technology,” says Gara and could require a PlayStation Plus subscription to use. “Will that be part of PlayStation Plus? I genuinely don’t know. Will that require some other, different charging mechanism? Perhaps. We just haven’t sat down to answer that question yet,” says Gara.
Sony will introduce Gaikai’s PS3 playback in 2014 in the US, and will roll out to other territories at a later date. The technology will allow PS3, PS Vita and PS4 owners to play PS3 games over the cloud, though Sony hasn’t yet clarified how this will work. Hopefully, your existing PS3 library will be playable without charge.