PS5 pre-orders could go live in March (or not)

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Making sense of all the cryptic tweets

(Image credit: Christian Petersen / Getty Images)

With February here and still no word on an official PS5 unveiling, one potential leaker on Twitter has identified March as the month when all will be revealed, and preorders for Sony's next-generation console will finally go live.

This nugget comes from @PSErebus, who first stated as much on Twitter on Dec. 28, and then again more recently on Jan. 31. @PSErebus has also claimed Sony's launch event will take place next month, and that preorders will also go live for Gran Turismo 7 in the spring. Gran Turismo 7 was first rumored to be a PS5 launch title last April.

Finally, @PSErebus says that while the DualShock 5 controller will be revealed alongside the console, it will also be on display at the 2020 Game Developers Conference in San Francisco, which takes place the week of March 16. For what its worth, Sony debuted its PlayStation VR headset at GDC 2016, so there is some precedent to the company revealing new hardware at the show.

We don't know much about the DualShock 5, apart from an official mention by the system's lead architect, Mark Cerny. In an article published by Wired in October, Cerny spoke of the pad's adaptive resistance triggers and advanced haptics.

That's obviously a ton of information, and these are far from @PSErebus' first bulletins surrounding the PS5. The same account has also reiterated many times (with a curious degree of regularity and often cryptic choices in phrasing) that the system will offer full backwards compatibility for every Sony home platform from the original PlayStation all the way through to the PS4.

The question then is, should these rumors be trusted or dismissed? @PSErebus doesn't have an established track record for accurate leaks; though, as TechRadar points out, they did happen to correctly report the original release date for The Last Of Us Part 2.

Given the whirlwind of rumors flying about surrounding Sony's launch plans, it's easy to make such claims with little effort. Some of what @PSErebus is saying has been reported elsewhere and earlier, like the point regarding backwards compatibility. Others, like the March launch timeframe, are vague and can be very easily explained away should they not come to pass. Perhaps, then, these rumblings are best left in "pinch of salt" territory.

That said, the cycle of hype has ramped up in a big way for both the PS5 and Microsoft's upcoming Xbox Series X — so it likely won't be long until we know for certain how credible the claims really are. 

Adam Ismail

Adam Ismail is a staff writer at Jalopnik and previously worked on Tom's Guide covering smartphones, car tech and gaming. His love for all things mobile began with the original Motorola Droid; since then he’s owned a variety of Android and iOS-powered handsets, refusing to stay loyal to one platform. His work has also appeared on Digital Trends and GTPlanet. When he’s not fiddling with the latest devices, he’s at an indie pop show, recording a podcast or playing Sega Dreamcast.