Topic: What PS3 game(s) are you currently playing?

@colonelkilgore @Yousef- The GTA cult is coming to get me!

@sorteddan Thanks for the backup. And similarly I find it hard to explain my GTA avoidance because I love RDR1&2 and consider them all-timers.

But yeah, 150 GB hard drive wouldn’t even hold Baldur’s Gate 3.

@Th3solution weirdly enough, the 98GB thing is mainly GTA online. If R* stopped being total arseholes and let you have the main campaign by itself, you’d be installing maybe 7GB. Hence why PS3 copies are more desirable.

@Yousef- GTA IV is another one of these third party games that needs a remaster for current gen, like Fallout 3 and New Vegas (and inFamous, Reaistance, Spec Ops The Line, etc, etc). If GTA IV gets ported to current gen then I’ll seriously consider joining the cult. Or I might join it for GTA 6…. I don’t know. To me GTA 6 doesn’t even look that good, actually. 😓 But we’ve seen very little. Looked kind of like Saints Row though and I tried that and wasn’t very impressed.

@Th3solution gta iv not getting a remaster is baffling and unforgivable. The most deserving game of it bar none that’s still stuck on 7th gen hardware.

Now, about GTA VI, if you’re curious how yours truly would play it, despite not owning a ps5, allow me to respond to you with this lovely image of Naito Tetsuya giving you a widened confident eye, because I have a Series S. [this a part 1 reply, I’ll write part 2 after I eat]

@Th3solution I imagine that GTAVI could well end up missing that je ne sais quoi that the previous instalments had due to the departures from Rockstar of the Houser’s, Benzies, Jones et al. For me they seemed like the guiding-lights able to balance the absurdity with moments of genius. Without those guys at the helm, I genuinely fear that VI may feel like a poor imitation… I hope I’m wrong.

@colonelkilgore it’s only Dan who left his position as VP of creativity, Sam is still in with R*, but you’re right about the others and it is a concern of mine as well.

However, and I know this’ll sound absurd but I’m quite optimistic about VI. Who know why, I don’t even know myself.

@Yousef- Definitely — get your daily dose of beetroot first. But while you ponder, know that there’s a real possibility that the Series S will have some hamstrung version of GTA6. Trade that thing in for a PS5. 😜

@colonelkilgore Oh, so I wasn’t just imagining it then. The trailer didn’t really excite me and it seemed much more generic than I was expecting. Everyone raved about it and so I just figured I didn’t ‘get’ GTA. And maybe I don’t. But if some of the creative minds are gone, then that might explain it.

@Th3solution I know you’re joking, but I’ll give a serious reply regardless, I don’t quite buy into this whole Series S discourse and feel like 99% of it comes from non owners. Series S never really gave me some kinda heavily downgraded version of any games I’ve played. It’s still capable of 120fps (though I don’t have the monitor for it), maybe not 4k but I never quite cared for 4k. I find this Series S downgrade talk either heavily over exaggerated or downright a myth. It’s not some beefed up Xbone. No I won’t trade it for a ps5 and lose access to my giant 7th gen library that’s not on ps4/ps5, I refuse.

Beetroot is awesome, don’t slander or I’ll send a drone to your house that won’t do anything harmful, but will constantly “Cult of Personality” by Living Colour because it’s a pretty cool song.

The part 2 will come, I just had to quickly address all this slander. I’m not someone to be F’d with, I’ll have you know.

PART 2 reply.

Yes inFamous not getting a remaster already is quite frankly ridiculous. It’s not deserving of being stuck on the ps3 for as long as it did, not to mention people not having an easy access to it muddies the discourse. There’s quite a number of myths that will be easily born out of games people can’t play anymore, or can’t play as easily. Sony shouldn’t disrespect its legacy for so long, especially given how gigantic inFamous was and still is. It’s a game that wanted to be a silly superhero game but slowly evolved into something far greater, and losing inFamous runs the risk of Sony losing a reasonable chunk of its history and the games that shaped the company to what it is today (you can include the other GOW games in this sentence also)

Saints Row not being your thing might be as shocking as you may think. During the Heyday of SR’s fame, people were really insecure and defensive about SR being essentially this low budget franchise and frankly? I don’t get it. I like Saints Row 2 but I have no qualms admitting it’s a low budget game. Matter of fact, some of its charm COMES from being a low budget game. It’s not an insult, it’s a fact. Your game’s quality isn’t shaped by how much money was put into it.

That being said, I can’t speak as highly for 3 and 4 and especially the reboot. It feels like as Volition went on as a company, they begun to give less and less of a shyte about their games being even… functional. Saints Row 3 on its original version (which I’ve no clue if it’s fixed in the remaster) has a glitch where radio becomes permanently mute, forcing you to drive in deafening silence through the entire game…. Lovely stuff.

And honestly? Forget technical stuff. Visually and stylistically SR became increasingly less and less appealing overall, and that’s on top of gameplay already getting stale. Franchise was losing identity, model quality stayed in Early ps2 era (which is ironic because their only high profile 6th gen release was punisher), story had this sense of non-caring and amateur-ishness to it (apologies if my wording is confusing) and just… it’s like they stopped caring.

Actually? I think it’s not an if, it’s a when, they actually admitted in an interview they stopped caring about paying attention to detail in certain stuff because they thought “the player wouldn’t care” yeah but you SHOULD care, you’re the DEVELOPERS. ITS LITERALLY YOUR JOB TO CARE UUUUUUUHHHHHHHHHHH.

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@Yousef- All due respect to beetroot and Series S… I love them both. Call off the drones!

But seriously, the one thing the Xbox side did much better is the backwards compatibility and, what to they call it — smart delivery, or something like that? Where the current gen console will play back compat on the previous generations and will automatically spruce the older games up a little without the need for remasters.

Unfortunately the PS3’s cell architecture make such a thing impossible on PlayStation, but I can imagine having the flexibility to boot up PS3 games on my PS5 would make for some real convenience, especially for the games mentioned that are still stuck on there.

I’ve considered buying a Series S or X, one of the reasons would be so I could play the older library also with the new. But I just barely can keep up with one ecosystem, and it’s just not wise for me to try to add more to my already ridiculous backlog.

I also have become a graphics fidelity snob. If the game is available in 4K, I feel like I need to experience it that way. I think I’ve just become broken by my 4K OLED TV.

Edit: Ah nuts, I forgot to comment on the Saints Row issue — I only played some of SR4 and then the new reboot when they gave it out on PS+ I tried it. I finished neither one, but after a few hours of each I just felt my IQ draining lower and lower for every hour I played them and so I abandoned each in due time. I guess there’s silly fun to be had, and actually SR4 was quite fun at times, but the writing, characters, and setting just weren’t my thing.
But maybe GTA isn’t quite as… stupid?

… at that, I’ve officially had enough… I thought you were cool 😔… hang about I think the matrix just glitched 🤔

@Th3solution nah you’re spot on tbh, in the Saints Row games are sillier than the GTA games. Having said that I still love the Saints Row games… and GTA can be extremely silly but with the latter… it’s class in a trashy way, while Saints Row is just fun in a trashy way.

Why hello there, you caught me right in the middle of a DW8 session on my steam deck. Err, don’t worry about Lu Su there. I’m sure he doesn’t mind the skip prompt covering his eyes.

Now moving along:

@Th3solution I’m gonna be honest with you and say I don’t know anything about smart delivery as I don’t think I live in a place where I can take advantage of it. Xbox/Microsoft does not have a branch in Kuwait, this means I cannot set my Xbox account to Kuwait and can’t get advantage of that kinda stuff, my account is set to USA- oh my apologies I’ve re-read that paragraph and now better understood what you wrote there.

I’ve made my peace with ps3 emulation likely never being possible on a ps5, ps6 though? Who knows. And no, steam deck isn’t great for ps3 emulation. Sorry. But hey, at least I got Dynasty Warriors 7 on it. That’s all I ask since it has the best story in the whole series.

I don’t think a Series X would be up your alley, friend. I have a Series S to enjoy GTA IV, Saints Row 2, Dead Rising Case Zero, Deadly Premonition, Metal Gear Solid collection (before they got re-released), MGS PW, Ninja Gaiden Black + OG2 (they’re better than theyr sigma counterparts, the older CoD games, the demastered CoD games (I hate large file sizes), Battlefield 3 and many, many, many other games. Clearly, I have my brain far too marinated in 7th gen to truly abandon it and no, ps3 and xbone are slowly becoming less justifiable to use. PS4 is still a great console though, I will die on that hill.

GTA is more serious and has more care into it. If you would describe the distance in quality between gta and saints row, the worst 3D gta is a planet, no, a whole solar system worth of difference in quality compared to the saints row franchise. Thad’s how highly and lowly I think of each respective series. Hopefully this puts things in perspective for you.

To give you a taste, San Andreas bases itself on the Los Angelos riots back in 1992.
GTA IV is a fish out of water immigration story.
Vice City bases itself on movies like Goodfellas (gta 3 kinda does that too)
GTA V is pretty similar to the Sopranos but it’s moreso a heartfelt story about family, life, hardships and the true meaning of friendship.

I wrote my reply before seeing yours but this is also a great description.

@Yousef- @colonelkilgore Ok… you’re starting to sell me on it… I might be pressured into trying a modern GTA game.
The possibility would hinge on this question:
Compare GTA 4/5 with Red Dead Redemption 1/2. Is it in the same ballpark narratively?

I always just assumed GTA is mostly about stealing cars, shooting cops, hiring prostitutes, and generally wreaking havoc as a thug on the streets of an urban setting. If you’re telling me that there’s some decent human story somewhere in there and that maybe characters have some redemption arc then maybe I can tolerate the criminal angle.

I’m fine with playing as a criminal by the way, but if it’s pointless antagonism coupled with a bunch of thoughtless destruction for the sake of seeding chaos, then it’s less interesting to me. I loved Arthur Morgan and John Marston’s individual plights as anti-heroes who were good people caught in a series of unfortunate events and bad choices, trying to get right again.

@Th3solution same ballbark? IV exceedes RDR1 and is an entire echelon of phenomenal storytelling. To even insinuate that IV even remotely struggles to keep up would be the highest of insults to that game’s incredibly deep and thought provoking narrative.

V and RDR2 however go separate ways, and believe it is unwise to group them together. See, this is where comparative writing becomes detrimental, rather than beneficial and it’d be smarter to abandon it. Because there is no purpose or gain in knocking one game to elevate the other, although I am aware that’s not what you’re strictly implying. It is however to essential establish that as the foundation of my argument in order to maintain a comfortable and easy-to-understand flow.

I believe all these 4 games stand on their own. R* never misses. 4 and 5 are masterpieces in storytelling. Simply no cap.

I always just assumed GTA is mostly about stealing cars, shooting cops, hiring prostitutes, and generally wreaking havoc as a thug on the streets of an urban setting. If you’re telling me that there’s some decent human story somewhere in there and that maybe characters have some redemption arc then maybe I can tolerate the criminal angle.

You are simply buying into the same crap internet gamers sell you. It’s always like this when people who don’t play the games have louder opinions that are easier to buy into for other non players, while people who do enjoy the games tend to mind their own business.
But Y’know? I tell you what, you tell me anything you heard of these people, and I will explain very carefully why it simply cannot be.

I’m fine with playing as a criminal by the way, but if it’s pointless antagonism coupled with a bunch of thoughtless destruction for the sake of seeding chaos, then it’s less interesting to me. I loved Arthur Morgan and John Marston’s individual plights as anti-heroes who were good people caught in a series of unfortunate events and bad choices, trying to get right again.

Buckle down, bucko. You have not had a sniff of these games and you’re already expecting the worst of the worst.
Do you even realize these games tend to share the same writers? Or did you really believe all R* games all exist within this magical bubble? The Houser brothers are in charge of storytelling for most of major R* releases. You should relax a bit before jumping to these gigantic wild conclusions and assume you’re playing some game version of The Room.

The apple does not fall far from the tree.

@Th3solution honestly, there’s some really well done narrative work in both GTAIV and GTAV… though V plays quite a bit better.

@colonelkilgore I find IV’s driving and shooting more fun, but I also love the special abilities in V.

they could do ps3 games on ps5 they just dont want to invest in the time and money it would take on each individual title to do a bespoke optimised emulated version of every single game they would have to alter the code for each game and as such approach each publisher about each game to be allowed to do it

Sony prefer a one size fits all hardware emulation approach and that just isnt possible for ps2/3

they certainly dont want you to just be able to put an old disc in and it recognise that has the licence to play the game like they do on xbox. they want to sell you each game again

@trev666 interesting insight thanks for sharing

Yeah they want to monetize everything, everything has to has back to them somehow it’s why majority of ps2-on-ps4 titles back in 2016 were primarily Sony owned titles with some exceptions.