gaming Is the PS4 too clunky to navigate?

[TheMisterManGuy 344]

While I don't own a PS4 yet, I have toyed around with one at the lounge of my school. I like it, but the first thing that bugs me is the UI, and the clunkiness of certain system functions. First, the home screen just feels unintuitive. Having all your apps in a single ribbon and having to constantly scroll to the right just feels tedious. I wouldn't mind this so much, if you had any customization options. Sadly, while you can change your theme, that's about all the customization you seem to get. You can't arrange the apps displayed, you can't make folders to organize, you can't alter the grid, what you see is basically what you get. Making matters worse, the touchpad isn't even supported for navigation, at all. So an already clunky UI is made even more clunky by the limitations of the analog stick.

 

But the most annoying thing is the way it handles certain functions, particularly when it comes to closing apps, and power options. You know how on iOS or Android, or hell, Windows 10, putting the device in sleep mode is instantaneous, and closing apps is as simple as swiping your finger, which also feels instantaneous. Well, things aren't like that on the PS4. What should be second nature, feels like a hassle. First, to close apps, you have to hold the PS button, scroll down to the app you want to close, press X to close, oh wait. It has to ASK if you want to close, then you confirm, and wait up to 10 seconds for it to close the app. How is that even remotely intuitive?

 

And sleep mode? Don't get me started on that. You hold the PS button, scroll down to the rest mode option, confirm rest mode, then you wait for the system to go to sleep, before it actually does. Pressing the power button on the console is useless too, as it still feels like it needs to take it's good old time entering f***ing sleep mode. Again, what's usually instantaneous on our mobile devices, feels needlessly clunky on the PS4. These wouldn't really be problems if Sony would just let us use the touchpad to navigate the damn thing. They could've easily took the lessons the mobile platforms taught us when it comes to UI design, and simply applied them to the living room. Hell, they could've easily taken lessons from the 3DS, which by this point, has the most well designed UI on a gaming platform so far IMO. But instead, they chose to gimp cool features with archaic UI principles. These are just my opinions though, so I'm interested to see yours.

[Kyoshi Frost Wolf 41,632]

In my opinion, it is. I don't own one either but a friend of mine does and I am amazed at how they over-complicated the UI for this system when it was fairly straight forward with the PS3 and PSP. That to me worked just fine, though there was a lot of scrolling involved. To me all they had to do was replicate those and it would have been perfect due to the increased performance.

 

One thing I will give it is the dynamic theme aspect, I wish the Xbox One could have something similar.

[EverEverOn 346]

A friend of mine has the PS4, while I have an Xbox One. When I compare the two, I prefer the Xbox One much more than the PS4 in terms of navigation. The Xbox is just easier to navigate. When I first got it after not having a gaming console for several years, I was able to figure it out almost instantly. While with the PS4, I'm still trying to figure it out when I'm with my friend. It's just too confusing for my liking.

[Deae Rising Shine~ 55,765]

If you use it daily you get more used to it. I have barely problems with it and have it almost a year now.

 

However I have no XBox or mobile to compare it.

 

 

 

 

Yes, I have no modern mobile.

[EpicEnergy 23,220]

Not sure as I never played a PS4 before, but I'm sure you will get used to it being clunky if you play it for awhile.

[ZiggWheelsManning 10,701]

Never played a PS4 either, nothing to worry about over that hunk of a machine  

[Splashee 28,565]

PS4 and up are just too connected to the Internet to be moved around. As soon as they are unsupported, they become bookshelf bricks!