An upcoming PS5 firmware update will add Discord support and other quality of life changes, and the beta for it is already in the wild. Sony announced the beta kicked off in six places. People it notified in Canada, France, Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States should be getting email invitations to take part on February 2, 2023. They’ll get a first peek at additions that may or may not appear over 2023.
One of the big changes is the requested Discord support for the PS5. It will allow people to enable a Discord voice chat after linking their accounts. General linking is already available, so anyone could show their Discord friends what they are playing on the system. However, it is also important to note that the PlayStation Blog’s description makes it sound like you’ll still need to use Discord on a PC or mobile device for PS5 voice chatting.
Sony broke down other additions by how they’ll change certain elements. In the social section of the announcement, it went over other ways to connect. People will be able to send screenshots and videos to the PS App, instead of relying on the automatic function. The Friends Who Play hub tiles will have more information. You’ll also see Join Game in Party Chat and Share Screen option in profiles. In the gameplay sections, there will be things like VRR 1440p support, new game filtering options, and Online Multiplayer Session “Who Can Join” and “Who Can Invite” presets. New PS4 to PS5 save data and PS5 to PS5 data transfer options will appear. The Screen Reader will be more comprehensive, indicting directions, if someone uses that. There will also be a DualSense update that allows you to update the controller without plugging it in.
Finally, one PS5 firmware beta feature feature is only for people in the UK and US. You can use certain voice commands to record gameplay. Some of the example commands shared by Sony were “Hey, PlayStation, capture that,” “Hey PlayStation, start recording,” and “Hey PlayStation, capture the last five minutes.”
The new PS5 firmware beta invites are now being emailed out to select users in Canada, France, Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
