Despite hardware shortages and the near impossibility of getting a PS5, it is approaching its second release anniversary. Around this time, you may be expecting to hear announcements for a Pro model, a precedent set by the previous console generation. But while those rumours are still abound, the most recent leakster report is with regards to a Pro controller, rather than console.
Via Try Hard Guides, industry leakster Tom Henderson claims to have seen prototypes of a Pro controller for the PS5. Or, as the report describes it, a “genuine professional controller”. Codenamed Hunt, it is expected to be revealed in the coming weeks, according to his sources.
So what entails a PS5 Pro controller, as one of Henderson’s source calls it? What would a DualSense Pro be like? In essence, it’s simply taking many of the features that you’d find on an Xbox Elite series of controllers, like removable analogue sticks and trigger stops, and putting them on the PS5 controller.
Henderson, who also claims to have seen photos of the prototype, says Sony Interactive Entertainment is taking things a bit further. Rather than just letting you swap analogue sticks around, the prototype indicates that you can completely remove the stick unit itself. This means that when wear and tear starts causing your analogue stick to drift, you can just replace the stick unit rather than the whole controller.
Then there’s the addition of extra buttons in the form of flappy paddles at the back of the controller itself. This is something that’s probably more commonly found on third party controllers, but SIE has also made an accessory for the DualShock 4 that gives it just that. We’ve also seen patents that indicate these additional buttons being added to what was thought to be the DualSense at the time. While that didn’t come to pass, perhaps this new Pro controller is what the patent is describing instead.
Unfortunately, Henderson did not share images of these prototypes. Understandable, as they may lead back to said source.
As mentioned earlier, this supposed PS5 Pro controller is expected to be revealed “soon”. Though SIE is reportedly also planning a hardware reveal event which involves other items, and it’s not clear of this new controller is part of said reveal event. Instead, what sounds more definite than anything else is that there won’t be a new console, let alone a Pro variant.
(Source: Try Hard Guides via VGC)
