When I first got my PlayStation 5 Pro, I had a whirlwind first week with it. I spent days on end testing as many games as I could to determine how much of an upgrade it really was over my base PS5. I looked at five-minute chunks of games like Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart for hours, comparing every graphics mode on both systems. At the end of my testing, the result was clear: The PS5 Pro was indeed the more powerful console and, frankly, the most capable gaming device I had in my entire home.
So why, just two weeks later, am I still using my regular old PS5 so much?
Let me take you back to November 5, the day before my PS5 Pro review would be published. It was the end of the day and I’d just finished editing my write-up. With that task complete, I was free to take my consoles out of testing mode and start using them as I normally would. For the week leading up to my review, I’d been playing musical chairs with my systems. I was switching them between TVs, breaking them down to get photos, and closely examining games rather than casually playing them. With those duties done, I could hook them up to their final entertainment center resting places.
My apartment has two TVs. One set of consoles sits on a TV in my office. This is the primary screen that I test games on, so I decided to hook my PS5 Pro up there as I figured it would become the main platform I reviewed console games on moving forward. My living room TV has consoles connected to it as well, but it’s a more casual setup. My Xbox Series S is hooked up there, where it acts as a streaming box. I set up a stray Switch dock in case I ever wanted to break out something like Super Mario Party Jamboree when friends are over. With an extra PS5 now in the house, I decided to hook up my old slim model there too. Maybe my girlfriend could use it (she’s dying to play Infinity Nikki), or maybe I’d play a bit there sometime when I was too lazy to get off the couch. Either way, it was meant to be a backup.
Two games blew up that plan. The first was Lego Horizon Adventures, the first game I’d play front to back only on PS5 Pro. As far as maiden voyages go, it’s a bit of a mismatch. Like a lot of games, Lego Horizon Adventures doesn’t really benefit from a Pro upgrade in any real way. It doesn’t include a Performance Pro mode and runs perfectly fine on a base PS5. If I’m being honest, a lot of games I love fall in that same category. While I play plenty of big-budget releases every year, I tend to spend most of my time playing indies or smaller games that aren’t dependent on perfect frame rates or 4K visuals. After a week of meticulous testing to quantify the PS5 Pro’s power, I was now realizing that the math wouldn’t mean much for a good chunk of games I actually played.
When that was done, it was time for me to get back to the game I’d put down to test the console in the first place, Dragon Age: The Veilguard. Since it was one of the games I tested with, I had it downloaded on both my PS5 and PS5 Pro. One evening after a long day of work, I decided to dive back in and realized I had a choice. Would I lock myself in my office to maximize its resolution, or play from the comfort of my living room on the “inferior” system?
I had to give it some thought. My testing did find that Dragon Age’s image is cleaner on PS5 Pro. I could see that for a fact when looking closely at foliage and noticing how much blurrier it looked on my regular PS5. Shadows felt more defined on the Pro too, so it was certainly an upgrade. I figured I should stick to the Pro for those perks, but I stopped again. Did I actually care about those changes? I was only able to see these differences once I captured video on both consoles and put them side by side. Before doing that, I was convinced that there was absolutely no difference between the systems.
Eventually, laziness got the better of me. I was already settled in my living room, so I fired up my normal PS5. I figured I’d change rooms or swap my consoles if the resolution dip bothered me. It didn’t; in fact, I didn’t notice it at all. As I stressed in my PS5 Pro review, it brings big changes to games that have been enhanced, but those that have not only get a modest boost. Those gains can be imperceptible if you don’t have an enormous display. For a game like Dragon Age, standard Performance Mode is enough.
Since then, I’ve found that I’m simply not rushing to my PS5 Pro every time I want to fire up a new game. Sure, I’ll use it exclusively for Monster Hunter Wilds, which is sure to be enhanced, but will it matter for Dragon Quest 3 HD-2D Remake or Marvel Rivals? I don’t suspect it will, which means that my Pro model will be an interchangeable PS5 for the majority of games I play.
I don’t point this out to dissuade anyone from buying a PS5 Pro. Rather, this anecdote only reinforces what I pointed out in my initial evaluation. Unlike most base consoles, the PS5 Pro isn’t a one-size-fits-all device. It is for a very specific kind of player and you have to know if that’s you or not. Is your display advanced enough to take advantage of it? Are you sensitive to frame drops? What kinds of games do you usually play? Let those answers guide your purchasing decisions rather than any back of the box promises or impressive side-by-side comparisons.
Perhaps to put it more succinctly: Don’t spend $700 just to play Lego Horizon Adventures.
