Topic: PlayStation 5 --OT--

Just been watching some of the trailers from the state of play, some cracking looking games headed out way. I'm especially excited for all of The Like a Dragon games. Currently playing Yakuza 6 and it's brilliant. Loved all 7 entries I've played so far.

I'm not bothering watching GoW Ragnarok trailer, can wait the 7 weeks to experience the game for myself.

@MightyDemon82 Y6 is a strange one for me. I really liked the story and the reduced “bloat” from previous games but it had so much stripped out of it with so few of the other big characters involved, lots of the classic side content gone, and areas of Kamurocho cut off.

I did like the new area too though (and the spear fishing!). It’s also a very achievable platinum compared to the other games if you don’t mind the grind in clan creator!

@Thrillho I'm really enjoying the story, Just started chapter 7 and I don't mind if it's a bit stripped back because I'll be replaying them all for the platinum eventually. Pretty much just doing the stories but I do love going off on a tangent in these games.

@MightyDemon82 You don’t need to do a whole run through on Legendary to get the plat for Y6.

You can reload a save just before the final fight, bump the difficulty up to Legendary, and then get the trophy once you’ve tiger dropped the boss.

@Thrillho Oh cool thanks for the tip.

lol Just got my fourth invitation to buy a PS5.

Anyone else struggling to find one still? I feel like these things have become way more available online in recent months.

@Ralizah Maybe it's just the gods telling you that it's better than your Switch.

Joking aside, i guess it's good to know that you can get one if you want one from Sony if they keep sending you the invites. That's how I got mine last June.

I also forgot... In the world of Xenoblade Chronicles, there are no gods. (Yes, I just finished it).

@SinfulDestroyer Wow. They might not be actively sitting on store shelves, but it seems like it should be pretty simple to obtain one at this point.

@KilloWertz I just can't get over a company "inviting" me to spend half a grand on a product of theirs, like they're doing me a favor.

It's a way better approach to buying one than trying to haunt the stock drops online retailers receive.

The shortage obviously isn't over, but I feel like the days of PS5s being as common as unicorns is behind us now. It especially is for Microsoft. I actually saw a couple of Series X consoles just sitting behind a case at Wal-Mart a few days ago!

Oh, nice. How'd you get on with the game, once all is said and done? I recall you saying you weren't as gaga over it as you were hoping to be.

@Ralizah In a way they technically are doing you a favor though by making it a lot easier process of getting one. I get why you feel that way, but it was an extremely easy process when I got mine and I'm grateful it was.

Yeah, things seem to finally be getting better at least. Hopefully by sometime next year they will finally be readily available for everybody so the generation can finally fully start. It's going to be a long one regardless.

I'd say it was good. It definitely improved once the story kicked into high gear in the last few chapters, with the only real weakness for me still being the combat (besides the awful side quests). I did play the whole final chapter on Casual though as I was not grinding to get to a level where the fights in the final chapter were fair. The strength of the story and most of the characters elevated the game, and I thought they ended it really well. Not one of the greatest JRPGs like Nintendo Life declared, but a solid 8/10.

@KilloWertz I'm glad they're finding better ways of reaching the average consumer, but still, it's just them behaving in their own self-interest. Sony isn't Willy Wonka, and I didn't find a golden ticket.

Xenoblade combat is inherently pretty weird. I can't think of another series that feels similar, in that regard. The sequels add a ton of wrinkles to the basics introduced in XC1, which people have different feelings about.

In general, I'd say Xenoblade Chronicles overall is one of my favorite modern JRPG series, but the first game just never grabbed me like it did with some other people.

Any plans on playing Future Connected, or just moving on to whatever the next game is?

@Ralizah Fair enough. I get it, although I was just happy to get one easily when it was even harder 16 months ago.

The combat itself is simple for the most part, but at times felt a bit too simple. There's obviously wrinkles to it and such that I just simply didn't bother learning. I'll at least give it credit for not being overly complicated like some, as it was strangely nice at times to run into each battle without much concern for the mechanics, but I'd still consider it a weakness. Worse was the fact that the game wanted you to grind to get to certain levels so fights would be a lot more doable, but with the awful side quests, I eventually broke down and just chose to put it on Casual at times (mainly later in the game like I said earlier).

It was still a solid enough beginning that I still look forward to playing the rest of the series (especially XC3). While Shulk, Melia, and Fiora were the only 3 characters I ever really got attached to in the game (Riki was funny at times, but still), it was still good.

I haven't decided yet. I will play Future Connected before I play XC2, but I'm not sure if I will play that next or take a bit of a Xenoblade Chronicles break. The game had me at 92 hours even with skipping out of the side quests in the second half (with my profile saying at least 95). It's definitely getting played though as Melia was my favorite character for a lot of the game.

@Ralizah To be fair, they will sell out no matter what. They don't have to send out those emails at all. If you have a PS4 and are looking to upgrade, it's a safe option I guess.

@KilloWertz Being underleveled isn't really an issue in the sequels. In fact, I had more of an issue in XC3 trying to keep my levels low enough that I could actually gain class points from battles, because those reduce to practically nothing if you're 5+ levels higher than the enemies you're fighting.

@Octane Sure, but the majority of Sony's profits derive from people buying games and DLC on their consoles. You know which purchased consoles aren't really making money for Sony? The ones sitting unused in storage units and warehouses while the owners try to flip them for more than MSRP.

I think we'll see this model of distribution that bypasses retailers entirely increase over time. Valve is enjoying great success selling the Steam Deck this way.

@Ralizah That's good to know. I would have preferred not to put it on Casual mode as it did make the final couple of battles kind of anticlimactic (although I did die once against Zanza even on Casual), but it is what it is. I just wanted to experience the rest of the story to be honest.

I guess it will pay to do side quests for the areas I'm in before moving on to another area then when I play XC3 sometime next year. I technically already do that in games that have side quests good enough to want to do most of them (like Horizon Forbidden West), but I will keep it in mind.

Butting in to another conversation, you are right that selling the Steam Deck themselves has worked out for them so far. The fact that you can only play a small fraction of the games on Steam, with some of the games marked as unplayable having no rhyme or reason (sequels to games working but not the original or vice versa). I would have considered getting one someday down the road with PlayStation going more towards PC and Xbox basically being both at this point, but not if so many games are unplayable.

@KilloWertz One thing you can do to avoid becoming overleveled while doing most/all of the side-quests (because you'll probably want to) is to turn off the Overkill setting for chain attacks, which will keep you from getting a sometimes truly ridiculous set of experience multipliers when fighting Elite enemies.

Valve has said the Steam Deck will be a long term platform for them. Their goal is to evaluate as much of the library as possible for compatibility with the system. Keep in mind that newer games are going to be much more likely to run on the hardware to begin with, since most developers won't want a reputation for having games that don't work on a popular PC-adjacent platform. Developers will likely continue to update their older games to ensure compatibility as time goes on. It's very wild west right now in terms of game compatibility, but, ideally, over time, the majority of games on the platform will be updated to run well on it.

Also worth mentioning, but a game not being verified for the Deck often just means Valve hasn't looked at it yet. It'll take them years to analyze most of the library.

@Ralizah I will try but likely fail to remember that as well.

True, but there are games on there that they have said don't work, with some of them being baffling. Like I said, it is weird that some games in a series work, but a random game won't. In the grand scheme of things, it's not a big deal, as how many more times would I really play Bioshock Infinite? I already own it twice too (counting the Bioshock Collection being free from PS Plus years ago), but still, it was disappointing to read that only roughly 10% of what's on Steam actually works on the Steam Deck so far.

Just sell your Switch and buy a Steam Deck if you think it's so great... jk

@KilloWertz It's fine. Feel free to ask questions on NL or on the Switch thread here, and I'll assist to the best of my ability.

Only 10% actually works, or 10% has been Verified to work on the Deck? Because, again, those are entirely different things. A lot of unverified games atm seem to work fine on the Deck. Many others work fine with relatively simple workarounds. It's actually just a handheld PC, so most problematic games can be made to work with some tinkering, I reckon.

Steam hosts a LOT of games, including a lot of older, poorly optimized ones, so some games will always just not work on it. It'll never have a library as optimized to run well on it as a normal console like the PS5 or Switch does. But it'll also be good for playing games indefinitely (with some obviously downgrades to performance for future AAA stuff, since this is effectively the equivalent of a portable PS4).

Aside from wanting a somewhat less bulky form factor, which I expect will come with a future revision, the only thing keeping me from ordering one is that I already have so much stuff to play on Switch and PS4 as is at the moment. I feel like I'm years away from needing new hardware of any sort unless my rig's increasingly ancient GPU gives out.

@Ralizah I reckon I’d be fine with the tinkering to get older games working on the Steam Deck given that I sat for a couple of hours tonight playing 007 Nightfire streamed from a laptop to a PS Vita with varying success 😂

@nessisonett Steam Deck is amazing for tinkering, basically. Lots of stuff to do with it.

The demographic it doesn't appeal to, as of yet, at least, is the 'set it and forget it' crowd that wants the minimum number of barriers between turning on the system and actually playing the game.

@nessisonett @Ralizah The Steam Deck seems to be an awesome piece of kit for the price, especially if you compare to similar devices out there which are almost 3 times the price.

Maybe when version 2.0 is available I will think about getting one. But I am wary about getting a second device to game on since I got the Switch, as I hardly use it these days