This is partly due to the fact that Sony is finally keeping its promise by adding the suspend/resume feature that was promised when the system was announced. Why is this a big deal?

“Supported by nearly all of your PS4 games, you can jump in and out of your games with just the press of the PS button,” the Official PlayStation blog post explained “Quickly switch from Rest Mode to powered-up so you can pick up where you left off.”

No more asking for a few more minutes to get to the next save point, nor will you have to worry if say … a kid wakes up in the middle of the night and begins to vomit. You can save and pick up your progress again at any point.

The Xbox One had long offered this feature, and Sony is finally giving it to PlayStation 4 owners. It may not sound like a huge deal, but for players who are often called away on other family-related business this is going to be a life saver, and it’s inclusion in the  PS4 is long overdue.

More people will be able to play games

Here is the full list of updates for accessibility:

• Customized button assignments for DUALSHOCK 4 wireless controller.
• Zoom for displayed pictures and inverted colors for all system functions, apps and in-game.
• Text-to-speech for all graphical user interface, including Message and Party.
• Enlarged text for all graphical user interface, including Message and Party, as well as the system’s browser.
• Bolder fonts and higher contrast UI for all system applications (but will not apply to games or third-party applications).

It’s likely that many of our readers will be tempted to blow these changes off as minor to the point of irrelevance, but if you’re one of the millions of players who enjoys games and has to deal with any number of issues that impact your sight or manual dexterity this is a literal game changer.

To put it bluntly? More people will be able to comfortably play more games, and that’s a great thing. A wider pool means that more people get to swim, and Sony just took a few steps towards making the most popular current-generation console a bit more welcoming for many people. Well done.

The PlayStation 4 will be more social

Sony’s ultimate goal is to make sure you don’t even think about picking up games on other systems, and social features are a big part of why that would happen.

One of the most important steps towards that goal is making the PlayStation 4 the best platform for social gaming. People want to play on the same console as their friends, and seeing that all their friends are playing something will be more likely to push them towards making the same purchase. No one wants to be left out of the fun.

The ability to send a friend request and a real-name request in the same step is cool, as is a reduction in steps to setting up a party, but the real draw here is tighter Facebook integration and more information about who on your friends list is playing which game. Here are the two bullets points on which you’ll want to focus:

• Find Friends who play your games — Easily view what friends are playing on each game detail page with a real-time “Friends Who Play This” section, which also highlights which friends are currently online and playing it, and if you own the game, allows you to jump directly into the game.
• Join Friends directly from news feed — A new tile will be added on your What’s New feed where you can see what your friends are currently playing, enabling you to join in the game if you own it.

The idea is that you’ll get online, know exactly what your friends are playing while being able to easily join them. The faster you get this information the easier it will be to play with your friends, and Sony is making it easier to take action once you see your friends are playing a game. If you don’t have the game? Maybe you should think about picking it up.

These social features are good news for a number of reasons, but Sony knows that every friend you have playing a game is like a commercial for that title, and they want you to be constantly thinking about the fun you may be missing if you don’t pick up each new release that fills up your notifications.

More people will be able to comfortably play more games

Heck, with verified accounts you’ll now know when you’re playing with a developer or other notable person online; Sony has effectively found a way to promote the ideas of gaming celebrities playing on its platform. That’s a big new idea, and it’s likely this is just the beginning of Sony’s push for making “notable” people more visible on the PlayStation 4.

There are a few smaller features that will be added, but overall this is a powerful update that adds some much-needed abilities to the PlayStation 4 while also making sure you stay comfortably stuck in Sony’s ecosystem. If console dominance is at the end of Sony’s yellow brick road, this is what the cobblestones look like a few miles into the journey.

He brought us a Nintendo Entertainment System from a pawn shop when I was a toddler, and cemented what would eventually become a decades-long love affair with the medium in my tiny brain. I was head over heels in love with gaming and, with Dad as my guide, I was in for a whole new world of awesome.

We’d play for hours together, picking up our Nintendo Zapper guns and taking aim at dastardly outlaws in the darkness of our living room. Later, we gravitated to Mario Tennis on the Nintendo 64, where I’d throttle his Mario with my Yoshi 30-Love until he slammed down the controller in mock disgust.

Gaming was his way of spending time with me in ways he knew he’d never actually be able to, due to an early diagnosis of muscular dystrophy that confined him to walking with a cane and later on to a wheelchair for longer outings.

Whatever we could find, we’d play together, because Dad knew he’d never be able to hit the green with me in real life or run around a tennis court to best me beyond the virtual world.

Unfortunately, the years passed and our console collection soon withered away to nothing. So too did our emotional bond, originally bolstered by a shared love of gaming. It’s now 2015, and Dad is a much different man than he was when I was clad in a Batman T-shirt and leggings sitting on his lap in our living room. He’s into reading sports news online and working on his wheelchair basketball technique.

But there’s one very important thread that we do still share: Minecraft.

A whole new, blocky, world

Mojang’s colorful and imaginative sandbox in which you can erect any sort of architecture or interact with nearly any type of character by way of mods is a mainstay in our home. When my father wakes up, he de-stresses by farming some experience with a monster spawner. In the evening, to relax, he’ll create a minecart system powered by redstone to better navigate the castle he’s erected, an exemplary bit of architecture that took him months to construct.

I’m thankful. I’m able to share the medium I’m most passionate about with Dad thanks to his introduction to the world of Minecraft. He became enamored with Minecraft from the moment he loaded his first world, and I couldn’t have been happier. This was his ticket back into gaming.

For the uninitiated, Minecraft is a juggernaut in the PC gaming world, with a bustling mod community, dedicated Let’s Play streamers, and hundreds of variations on play to keep things fresh. Nearly everywhere you go, even in department stores, you see the gaping mouths of Creepers, blank stares of Steve heads, and even diamond pickaxe styluses. It’s not so much a game as an industry, a cultural force that extends past the computer and consoles.

The circle of extra lives

We’ve managed to bypass the disconnect that often occurs between older parents and their aging children, having come full circle. This time, Dad’s the one amazed by what modern gaming is capable of, and I’m the one cheering him on from the sidelines.

I’m convinced it could be this way for everyone, whether it’s via Minecraft, Terraria, or other similarly accessible games. These games, and their casual contemporaries, are very much “gateway drugs” for non-gamers and even those who enjoyed them before, but for some reason strayed from the path.

I’d like to take credit for being the sole introductory conduit through which Dad could finally come to life via the world of gaming again, but I really have to hand it to streamers like Tobuscus or CaptainSparklez, whose combined hundreds of videos went a long way when it came to introducing him to the basics of the in-game world or which mods were worth downloading.

He’d start with a few downloads a night on my own personal Minecraft account, and in a few months he had a small library of mods with his own game key and more saved worlds than I thought I’d see in one lifetime of play.

The spread of gaming content on non-gaming devices has made learning about games more accessible than ever

He’d begin rattling off advice to me about how to create items in-game when I found myself faltering, and when life dictated I spend less time within the enormous world he and I played in, he soldiered on to create his very own worlds, reveling in a plane where he could not only run and jump to his heart’s content, but that he ruled with absolution.

It didn’t end with Minecraft, though. I’ve seen his rampant enthusiasm come out during televised commercials for the PC release of Diablo III, and most recently, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. He’s not so sure his rig would be able to run the PC version of CD Project RED’s game these days, but when I mention that I could stream it via PlayStation 4, he’s keen on sitting by and watching me.

He’ll talk about a possible future Wii Sports Resort playoff run or a rousing game of Mario Kart too, if I ever bring my Wii U over to play. In these moments I can rest easy knowing my dad has returned to my realm. He’s eager to speak with me about my favorite activities again just as I’ve learned the jargon of his. And I’m hoping I’m able to preserve it forever.

This is very much a relationship and an experience that I believe any parent can have with their child, even if there’s a dormant enthusiasm for gaming or it’s never been there in the first place. And it doesn’t have to stop at the parent and child relationship.

It can extend to anyone in your life, but particularly older family members or acquaintances whose lives could be further enriched by video games, especially those who have a lack of mobility or the physical means to get up and get out into the world to do something.

Games have changed so much in the 20-odd years I’ve been following them. Online play has never been as welcoming as it should have been, and Xbox Live and other modern venues have all but blown it out of proportion.

PC titles can take so much effort to run if you don’t have the latest and greatest equipment, which some gamers can’t always afford. And it’s a lot easier to play with what you’re familiar with, which for my father was first-person shooters and PC titles, hence his jumping right in with Minecraft.

I also bristle when people say that the world of Let’s Plays and streaming is only for children, as my father proves otherwise. Experiencing games in this way allowed him to learn about them, and watch me play. There’s no age-appropriate bucket for video-based gaming content, and I’m glad it’s there alongside more traditional gaming media.

Anyone dismissing Let’s Plays as a youthful pursuit are missing the boat

He started with Tobuscus, because I showed my dad some Happy Wheels videos he had done. We’d sit in the living room and watch YouTube on our smart TV and I’d suggest videos for us to watch. I hadn’t broached gaming again before that day. One day he stumbled upon the Minecraft videos Toby had created and it snowballed from there.

The spread of gaming content on non-gaming devices has made learning about games, and how to play them, more accessible than ever. Anyone dismissing Let’s Plays as a youthful pursuit are missing the boat; they’re an amazing way to introduce anyone to gaming.

Watching Minecraft revitalize my father’s love for the video gaming world has me spending a bit more time on games that I would normally play through once and move on. Having video games be your lifeblood can sometimes blind you from the pleasures that simply playing, not just beating, games brings. He’s not rushing to any end goal, he’s enjoying the journey.

So when I spend 80 or more hours with Geralt, or in Thedas, or catch every Pokémon, I don’t feel the itch to simply move on. I take inspiration from my dad, who keeps soldiering and creating.

It’s worth taking the initiative to find that special game that can connect you to your loved on