Next-Gen PlayStation System Will Launch In 2018, Analyst Predicts

The wait for the next iteration of PlayStation may not be as far away as you expect, at least according to one analyst.

The Wall Street Journal reports that Macquarie Capital Securities analyst Damian Thong "said he expected Sony to release its next-generation PlayStation by the second half of 2018."

Analyst predictions don't always pan out, and this isn't necessarily based on some inside scoop. But the WSJ's reporter notes on Twitter that this is the same "analyst who correctly predicted PS4 Pro and Slim" ahead of their respective launches.

That certainly lends credence to the prediction, though in all likelihood, we won't receive any official word from Sony for quite some time. The PS4 was announced nine months prior to its release, while the PS4 Slim and PS4 Pro revisions were revealed just one week and two months, respectively, before they hit store shelves.

Announcing a new system in the near future would undercut some of the hype for Microsoft's upcoming Project Scorpio, which stands to be more powerful than the PS4 Pro. But doing so would also likely have an impact on sales of the PS4 and PS4 Pro. With Sony's console routinely outselling the competition, it may be too soon to tease new hardware.

The WSJ report doesn't elaborate on what Thong believes this system will look like--"next-generation PlayStation" could mean the PlayStation 5. Scorpio launches toward the end of 2017, and if a new PlayStation comes less than a year later, the two will inevitably be compared. Scorpio, which is essentially a souped-up Xbox One, will be capable of playing all Xbox One games (and hundreds of Xbox 360 games). If Sony launches a brand-new system soon after it, will it be able to play PS4 games, or will its library be limited to new releases? That's a key question we don't yet have an answer to.

We've reached out to Sony regarding Thong's prediction and will report back with anything--likely a "no comment"--that it has to share.