Video game consoles have been around since like forever. But it was PlayStation that disrupted the industry thirty years ago. Well, thirty for North America and Europe, that is. Celebrating this first 30 years of PlayStation, the video game console maker has launched the ultimate coffee table book, PlayStation: The First 30 Years.
Published by Read-Only Memory, this definitive 400-page literature is a new large-format photography book. The book is a visual journey through PlayStation history, offering PlayStation devotees a rare glimpse into the brand’s evolution through the generations.
This isn’t just a book; it’s a 5-kilogram (11 lbs) museum you can flip through. Across its 375 x 295 mm pages, The First 30 Years reveals never-before-seen prototypes, concept sketches, and development models—everything from awkward early PlayStation mockups to the sleek alien curves of the PlayStation 5. It’s the kind of stuff that makes design nerds and nostalgic gamers cry in unison.
The book features commentary from the people who built the legend, including Ken Kutaragi, Teiyu Goto, and Yujin Morisawa, peeling back the curtain on the creative chaos that birthed DualShocks, Memory Cards, and that startup sound burned into every millennial’s brain.
Photographed by Benedict Redgrove, the guy who made NASA’s rockets look sexy, and art directed by Michael C. Place (yes, that WipEout designer), this massive tome is available in two versions: a Standard Edition for US$125, and a Deluxe Edition limited to 1,994 copies—complete with a clamshell case, exposed binding, exclusive prints, and design so clean it could sit next to a PS5 and look like part of the hardware lineup. The Deluxe commands US$325, and the edition number is a nod to its launch year in Japan, 1994.
In short, it’s the definitive celebration of three decades of polygons, innovation, and controller-throwing frustration—bound in hardcover and ready to crush your coffee table. Shipping Spring 2026.
Images: PlayStation.
