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PSVR

If you were worried about Sony'south walled garden limiting your enjoyment of the PlayStation VR, you can breathe like shooting fish in a barrel at present. Sony just pushed an update to the PS4's Media Role player app, and the new features it brings will undoubtedly make the PSVR much more than appealing to some of us.

In a mail service on the European PlayStation weblog, Sony outlines a few of the new features added to version 2.five of the Media Player app. With this newest update, FLAC playback and "sound upscaling" for MP3s and AACs with Sony's own DSEE HX tech are now available to all. That'southward great news for console-loving audiophiles, but the new features specifically tailored for the PSVR headset are much more than interesting.

With the new software installed, the PS4 now supports 360 degree videos and photos, merely for proper playback, they'll need to exist equirectangular. Unfortunately, that means some existing 360 degree content won't work out of the box. Equally for file formats, MKV, AVI, MP4, MPEG2 PS, MPEG2 TS, AVCHD, JPEG, BMP, and PNG files are all capable of being viewed with Sony's software, just y'all yet won't exist able to store the files straight on your PS4. You'll either need to use a good old-fashioned USB stick, or simply store them on your local media server. Thankfully, streaming to the PS4 isn't very difficult.

So, what kind of content does this open upward? Well, y'all could shoot your ain 360 caste photos with the Google'due south Street View app, and immerse yourself in your memories later. Take 360 caste photos of your Christmas decorations, your trip to the Grand Canyon, or capture your whole crew at the family reunion. And if you lot ever desire to experience new places in your pajamas, you can easily find other 360 degree photos online.

Services like Hulu and Vrideo already have dedicated apps to allow PSVR users sentinel curated 360 degree video, but having support broiled into the Media Histrion lets smaller content creators have access to a brand new audience equally well.

Of course, this also opens upward the PSVR to a swath of content that Sony would never allow directly on PSN. 360-caste pornography has been around for quite a while now, and we know PS4 users already tend to watch a lot of porn. Non every video service will have PSVR-optimized video right out of the gate, but it's fait accompli that distributors will be targeting the PlayStation VR. Sony is selling this headset as a mass market device, and the porn industry will desire to reach early on adopters who are only itching for new ways to apply their gadget.

My PSVR headset but arrived today, so I haven't had a run a risk to put whatsoever of these new features through their paces yet. Simply rest assured, we'll exist diving deep on what the PlayStation VR has to offer in the next few days. Keep an eye out.