At Gamescom Sony confirmed one of the most anticipated features of the PlayStation 4. Called SharePlay, the feature allows PS4 owners to join a gameplay session with a friend even if they don’t necessarily own a copy of that particular title. Sony didn’t go into much detail about the feature when it was announced a couple of days back but now Shuhei Yoshida, the boss at Sony Worldwide Studio, has shed more light on SharePlay.
In an interview with Weekly Famitsu Yoshida said that SharePlay could essentially be called a “mini PlayStation Now.” The way it works is that players send an invitation to the person they want to play with who can then accept and play the game while watching the video that is streamed to their console. The one who receives an invitation doesn’t need to own a copy of that game, and unlike PlayStation Now, they won’t be charged for it.
Now might think that some limitations may be placed on SharePlay but that’s not the case. Pretty much any title that is playable using the DualShock 4 controller can be accessed using SharePlay, an obvious limitation is on titles that require a PlayStation Camera. Game developers don’t have to do anything to make their games compatible with SharePlay.
Even if a player progresses through a title that they don’t own, they will have the ability to save the game data to their account instead of that of the host. So when the finally purchase that particular title they can pick up right where they left off.
SharePlay will be rolled out exclusively to PlayStation 4 with PS4 software update 2.0, which is expected to be released this fall.
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