I'm still excited for the PS5, even if I won't be picking it up until next holiday season. I'll definitely be getting the disc version (I'm a physical media dinosaur), mostly so that I have a back-up PS4 and (finally!) a 4K player.
I've noticed a lot of bemoaning over the $100 gap for the disc drive. It's certainly another indication of how little customers today care about physical media. I recall during the PS2 days how excited everyone was for the DVD functionality, but fast forward to today and it appears few folks care at all that the console will provide 4K playback. The standalone 4k players still cost a pretty penny, so from that perspective, the extra $100 isn't out-of-place, but for the fact that people don't much care for it anymore.
With the developer arms race now in full swing after Microsoft's acquisition, and an even bigger giant in Amazon's Luna entering the gaming subscription space, this generation is already primed to be a massively transformative one (and it technically hasn't even started!).
Sony is undeniably coming in as the most traditional console, albeit with a nod to the reality that is knocking harder on its door. As things appear to be going now, it's hard not to envision most, if not all, of Sony's big titles appearing (at least) on PC. How fast that happens may depend on how well PS5 sells during the first 1-2 years. If sales stagger badly compared to PS4, Sony may have little choice but to release their titles on PC, though I presume it'll have to get really bad for them to do this since every PC release will take a bit away from those looking to buy a PS5.
I do wonder how hard Sony will push into its own subscription service like Game Pass. I'm not sure whether Sony has the fiscal stomach to build out a Game Pass competitor, and frankly, question whether that's even a smart move. Its recent cloud partnership with Microsoft was a strange announcement given their counter-positions in the gaming space. I could see, instead, Sony partnering with Amazon to deliver may be select titles of its gaming content through Luna. Building out an online service like Game Pass is a formidable investment, and if Sony's music and movie divisions are any indication, the company would much prefer to stick to making content and rely on others to handle distribution.
One could argue gaming is the only place Sony still plays in distribution, but that is clearly now being challenged by companies that are several magnitudes larger. There was a time Sony easily out-sized its competitors, but not anymore. There was also a moment this current gen when some believed Microsoft was going to retreat from games, but the Bethesda purchase now demonstrates the opposite. MS is going all-in. Add Google (yes, Stadia is a mess but don't underestimate the disposable income Google has) and Amazon, and let's not forget Steam and Epic, and the fight for dominance in the distribution channel increasingly looks like one Sony couldn't win anyways.
Again, excited for the PS5 but also partly deflated that this may be the last and final generation of the PlayStation console.
