Playstation 4 (PS4) Stuck on Game Main Menus (cannot play any game) - How to Fix
David A. Wheeler
2020-01-02
Here's a potential problem:
you have a Sony Playstation 4 (PS4) and
you can move around the console menus, and select a game to start the
game main menu, but then cannot actually play the game
(you're stuck at the game main menu / game title screen /
"press X to play").
The solution that worked for me was to shut down the controller:
- Get to the game main menu / title screen, where you are stuck
- Hold down for a few seconds the "PS" central button on the
DualShock Controller until you see a menu.
- Select "Sound/Devices" (move up/down with the direction buttoms and
press "X" to select)
- Go all the way down and select "Turn off device"
- Select "DUALSHOCK 4"; yes, you're intentionally turning off the
controller you're using!
- Press the "PS" button on the controller to turn it back on;
that will start the game.
This involves some sort of subtle defect in the controller;
I've tried another controller which didn't have this problem.
You should probably get the controller replaced if you can, but this
is a useful work-around.
Here are some other techniques you can try, but they didn't work for me:
- Reboot game and/or console
- Press recessed "reset" button on back of controller
(you'll need a paperclip or similar)
- Connect the controller with USB, then
modify "settings" to disable Bluetooth connectivity (just use USB)
- Switch games
- Update game
- Hold down console power button for until you hear second beep (~7 seconds)
to go into safe mode; my contoller could not interact with the console in
safe mode.
Feel free to see my home page at
https://dwheeler.com.
You may also want to look at my paper
Why OSS/FS? Look at
the Numbers! and my book on
how to develop
secure programs.
(C) Copyright 2020 David A. Wheeler.
Released under
Creative Commons
Attribution-ShareAlike version 3.0 or later
(CC-BY-SA-3.0+).