A new Sony patent aims to get us playing games as fast as possible, even while they’re still installing.
A new Sony patent could allow players to get stuck into games while they’re downloading, splitting big installations into chunks. The patent focuses on getting fans playing a game as soon as possible, instead of leaving us with long wait times on launch day.
The patent was filed last August, but was recently spotted by VeryAli Gaming, then discussed on NeoGAF. This would differ from pre-existing systems, which sometimes allow you to play early portions of the game while the rest installs, as it would separate the entire download into chunks, “discreetly” installing each part as you progress through the game and predicting how long it will take for you to get through each part.
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It’s not clear what this would mean in practice, but if it means we could start playing the game much sooner and hardly notice the rest of the installation taking place in the background, it would be a game changer. In recent years, we’ve simply become accustomed to waiting hours for games and patches to install as soon as we pick up a new title, but if this works as intended, it might mean we’re booted up and playing much sooner.
Each “chunk” of the download will have its own “playtime information”, seemingly so it knows roughly how long players will take to advance to the next “chunk”. Hopefully, this would mean it can prioritise the parts we need. Right now, games often give us very limited access while it’s installing, and it doesn’t take long to hit a brick wall in which we’re asked to wait for the rest of the game to finish downloading.
While the patent is exciting, it doesn’t tell us how Sony would implement the technology. We don’t know whether it would be possible through an update on existing PlayStation 5s, or if it would require new hardware altogether. What it does tell us, however, is that Sony is looking into ways to cut down the waiting time, as download sizes only get larger.
Sony hasn’t commented on the patent publicly, so this is all we have to go on right now. For the immediate future, we’re stuck with the current, very limited system, in which we often have to wait until most of the game is installed just to get to the main menu. It’s not clear when – or if – Sony is planning to roll this technology out.
