PS5 firmware update renders several games unplayable with severe graphics issues — this week, the best way to play PlayStation titles is on PC

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The just-ported Final Fantasy XVI is impacted, as well as several other major titles, including Death Stranding and Black Myth Wukong

Official screenshot of Final Fantasy XVI
(Image credit: Square Enix)

According to several reports on the web (Reddit, Twitter, etc.), this week's PlayStation 5 firmware update has resulted in severe graphical errors and crashes for several high-profile PS5 and PS4 games being played on Sony's base console hardware. This is the same week as the PS5 Pro's announcement ahead of its November, and two major PS5 timed exclusives making their way to PC has been interesting.

Considering how much the console gaming business model hinges on a plug-and-play gaming experience that "just works," this certainly isn't a good look for Sony. Final Fantasy XVI, one of the aforementioned major PC ports releasing this, is the most reported game suffering from the issue this week.

Still, others include Death Stranding, Star Wars: Jedi Survivor, Elden Ring, and more, according to user reports. Fortunately, not all base PS5 owners are experiencing this issue— and if you are one of them, we highly recommend you postpone that firmware update if you still can— but those who do bear witness to what may be described as "glitch horror."

So, you may be wondering: what's the cause of this issue, how will it be fixed, and when can we expect that fix? Unfortunately, we don't have answers to any of those questions, but we know the issue has been brought to Square Enix (Final Fantasy devs) and PlayStation's attention via a Tweet. With any luck, we can expect a fix sooner rather than later— consumers paid an effective fee of hundreds of dollars to play these games on this hardware, so it should just work.

However, one can't help but notice that at least this week, it does seem like PC is the best place to play PlayStation 5 games. Sure, you have to wait a year or two for the PC port, but you get support for multiple image upscalers, you get way more graphics, resolution, and FPS options, you get mod support...and you don't have to wait for Sony to fix the problem for you. On PC, a lousy driver update or a harmful component is easily reverted or replaced— not so on the console.

Christopher Harper
Christopher Harper
Contributing Writer

Christopher Harper has been a successful freelance tech writer specializing in PC hardware and gaming since 2015, and ghostwrote for various B2B clients in High School before that. Outside of work, Christopher is best known to friends and rivals as an active competitive player in various eSports (particularly fighting games and arena shooters) and a purveyor of music ranging from Jimi Hendrix to Killer Mike to the Sonic Adventure 2 soundtrack.

4 Comments Comment from the forums
  • ivan_vy
    "...and you don't have to wait for Sony to fix the problem for you."
    remember The Last of Us part I and Horizon Zero Dawn? they released badly optimized .
    Reply
  • TheyCallMeContra
    ivan_vy said:
    "...and you don't have to wait for Sony to fix the problem for you."
    remember The Last of Us part I and Horizon Zero Dawn? they released badly optimized .

    poor optimization is still much better than the condition these games are currently in on (some) consoles- not really comparable situations at all
    Reply
  • thisisaname
    Have they putting it simply over clocked the PS5 and some of them can not run that fast leading to the hardware crashing?
    Reply
  • eichwana
    They pushed the Ps5 Pro “encouragement“ patch a bit early
    Reply