Deoxyr1bose

Actually a pretty great showcase. Stellar Blade is launching sooner than I thought, the Sonic Generations remaster looks more than impressive, The Short Message looks fun, Judas looks great as well, Death Stranding 2 looks insane as always, and we’re getting a new Kojima espionage game in probably 5 years. No Silent Hill 2 date and no first party stuff were the lowlights.

These games trials have been pretty disappointing so far. What PlayStation fan who subscribed to the premium tier of PS+ would need a 2 hour trial of the biggest Sony release this generation to be the deciding factor on whether to buy it? Theres so many more games that would benefit from these types of demos and trials. PS+ premium is a joke.

Kinda related, but I really wished we could see what the budget of games like these. It clearly has a lot of marketing behind it, but the production values definitely aren’t as huge as something like Suicide Squad or FF7Rebirth. Even if those games sell more, this might be the most profitable release of February (especially considering the Microsoft marketing deal)

Really expecting this is gonna water down a lot of the drama regarding TLOU2’s development. Crunch, leaks and the initial wave of hate and transphobia among the fanbase that spawned, Druckmann’s Israeli Palestine inspirations, inspiration behind incredibly controversial story decisions. I doubt that something like this would touch on these things.

There were 9000ish layoffs from last year across the entire gaming industry reportedly. This alone is about 5% of that. Combine that with the 2,500 that was previously reported last week and we’re already at about 1/3rd of the total estimated layoffs from 2023. It’s January 22nd. If there isn’t an implosion of almost every AAA dev by the end of the year I’d be shocked.

Can’t wait for Suicide Squad to top the charts over the 2 other better games releasing that weekend just because of the IP

There have already been 2.5k layoffs this year, and we’re only halfway through January. This year is 100% gonna be worse than last year in terms of layoffs.

@InsaneWade I mean it would help. A $10 DLC with costumes, cut levels, a developer commentary, and a new mode with new playable characters is a much easier sell. Advertise it as a PS5 exclusive DLC first and foremost like Burning Wilds, then call it definitive edition or something.

They really should’ve called this director’s cut instead of remastered. I feel like that would’ve stopped a lot of the negative feedback towards the game. Remastered brings an expectation of it with visual improvements especially. The fact that Metroid Prime Remastered and TLOU2 Remastered both share the same label is laughable.

The gameplay looks very arcadey and honestly kinda fun when viewed in isolation from the purple = weakness, live service, and barely representing the actual elements of The Suicide Squad things. I honestly think if their original IP multiplayer wasn’t a live service, it could’ve been pretty well received.

I think this is gonna be an even worse year for the industry than last year. We’re only a couple days into the year and so many big tech companies have already done layoffs. It’s the same state without the big releases for many companies bringing in revenue.

For Sony specifically, I think we’re gonna see Xbox 2022 levels of bare releases. Sony, besides the PS5 blow out showcase, has tended to announce their first party releases far in advance. So far the only games on the horizon are Fairgame$, Concord and Wolverine. Two of them are live service (one of them having no info and the other one being hated) and the other one not releasing this year. I don’t think Sony will reveal and release something like GoT 2 in a year. I think Jim Ryan’s push for live service is gonna affect this gen more than people realize. Dev times have gotten way longer, so if any first party games get announced they’re either gonna be single player games very far out from release, or live service games with some process (which isn’t an ideal scenario either way).

@sd7232 I mean that’s only in Japan. Worldwide, system sales are on a decline. It’s been 7 years since the Switch launched, it’s appropriate timing for a successor. Not to mention next year’s lineups gives all the implications of a successor being on the way like the last years of the Wii and 3ds before their successors came out (Smaller scope remakes and remasters and smaller eshop sized games).

Only unique thing is seeing Baldur’s Gate and Alan Wake get boosts from The Game Awards. Rest is just generic top selling shlop you always see.

More worrying is the lack of any PS5 games in the top 10 software sales besides the game bundled with a lot of PS5s. Theres more large scale Japanese appealing games not on switch coming this year (Granblue, Persona 3, Rise of the Ronin, FF7Rebirth, Like a Dragon Infinite Wealth, Tekken 8, Stellar Blade), but idk if it’ll be able to crack the Nintendo stronghold. Sony really needs to invest in smaller games. Idk if the reports of Sony not considering $100 million dollar games AAA are true, but if that’s what they consider mid budget then they’re completely out of touch with a decent portion of the gaming audience.

It’s unfathomable that Warner Brothers, with their current absurd debt and negative image, is looking at the single player Hogwarts Legacy selling 22 million copies during Feb last year vs this inevitable train wreck coming out at the same launch time and going “yeah, we should double down on live service player engagement games”. I didn’t like Hogwarts Legacy but I thought it could actually have a good impact by Warner Brothers increasing their single player output.

Sega really has never had a completely cohesive amazing era. Even during their Genesis days there was a ton of infighting between Sega of Japan and Sega of America. They’ve been putting out good games recently, but all of those have either been RGG or Atlus games with a lot of the other games being pretty mid. If leadership actually has good expectations, good practices, and if these upcoming throwback games are great then I think we’re in for maybe the best SEGA ever.

@jamison1993 Yeah I don’t even need to mention the Star Wars fandom. The internet has definitely facilitated more harassment in entertainment industries, especially to groups that have historically received hate. People are more connected, and thus it’s easier to become numb and feel disconnected with the words you’re saying and how they impact real people.

There is a lot of misogyny within the gaming community, especially towards real life people. Look at how Laura Bailey was treated for her role as Abby or Lily Gao for RE4 remake. Look at how a lot of people hate character designs for prominent female characters like Aloy just because they aren’t sexualized. It’s not just one gaming fandom, there’s seeds in all of it. There needs to an accepting culture facilitated across the entire gaming industry. I don’t know how we get there, but it’s absolutely a necessity.

Them porting Hi-Fi Rush to switch or PS5 would be my favorite and worse mistake they could make. I am genuinely considering picking up a Steamdeck for Hi-Fi Rush, and if Xbox makes a native gamepass app for Steamdeck I honestly might subscribe. However, I’d rather just get it on switch or PS5. The worst part is how this signals what Microsoft believes to be their priorities. I do not care at all for really any other Xbox first party series or games. However, Hi-Fi Rush just clicks with me so much that it makes me the most envious I’ve been of an Xbox game since forever. If they don’t think Hi-Fi Rush is worthy enough to be a system seller, than why should I buy an Xbox if the games that matches what I want are likely to be ported to other platforms?

Persona 4 Golden being that much higher than Persona 4 base is wild to me. The original is such an amazing vibe that Golden just tramples on.

@KundaliniRising333 I could see this with Last of Us Part 1 Remake but not with this. It’s a simple remaster with a small amount yet interesting new content. It’s not like Naughty Dog chose to release this over a brand new from the ground up Jax and Daxter game. Remasters usually supplement output from studios making new games in terms of development time and effort, not overtake it.

I keep on saying I wanna replay Last of Us 2 or buy the remake for Last of Us 1, but everytime I think about it I lose the motivation to do so. I still want to do so, maybe if ND announces LoU 3 I’ll play it again in preparation. I don’t understand how this remaster got so many people mad tho when it’s pretty much just $10 DLC.

It’s so weird that in all the discourse about Tekken 8’s colorblind filter, barely anyone brought up tons of the other blindness filters, covering multiple blindness and color blindness to varying degrees. It honestly looks like the best visual accessibility in any fighting game. The Tekken 8 team should do more effort to describe the intended functionality and purposes of each filter so someone with one form of blindness doesn’t unintentionally use the other filters which could potentially be harmful to their needs. It’s not a quick addition but the work the Tekken 8 team has done should be admired.

@somnambulance I think we can see Stellar Blade as well. But idk with how long development times are getting and Sony’s sudden push and reported shift away from live service, I think it’s more likely that this is a quieter year for Sony than not.

@Grimwood It looks great, it just won’t be eligible for this site.
@somnambulance I mean a lot of those big AAA games a lot of us say are GOTY usually have a kinda long reveal to release cuz of increased development times. There’s not really many officially announced undated ones I could see coming out. Hopefully publishers stop announcing games more than like 2 years from release and maybe we could even see some surprises for this year.

It’s gonna be so interesting seeing what’s gonna be the reader’s GOTY next year. There’s not really a major high profile traditional 3rd person action adventure game on the level of previous years. Doesn’t mean next years bad for games tho.

@themightyant bro why do you keep calling Baldur’s Gate fans furries it’s so weird

I think Larian and Capcom are the two closest for the best game developer. One developer put all of their attention and resources into not only one phenomenal game, but also the community of that game. The other released multiple fan favorites in beloved series, have announced exciting upcoming games, and has been rereleasing a lot of older games as well. They’re like a way higher level RGG. I know a lot of people are gonna say Insomniac but I think it’s less for this year and more for the PS5 gen in general, not to mention how I feel like Spider-Man 2 definitely was not that polished and rich as some other games released by developers this year despite having Sony backing.

This was the same scenario as last year. A sequel to a Sony first party game that built off of a critically acclaimed original won this site’s GOTY over the general GOTY winner which was a massively critically acclaimed RPG which is seen by a lot as a magnum opus of the genre. However, I feel like history’s gonna be a lot more kind to God of War Ragnarok than Spider-Man 2. The general criticism of both of them is that the story of the original was better, however Ragnarok was trying to do something a lot more fundamentally different with its story than Spider-Man while also fixing and improving the 2018 version dramatically more. I’m not really mad that Spider-Man 2 won this site’s GOTY, I just think these parallels are interesting to analyze.

I think last year everyone was comfortable with the first party PlayStation game taking this site’s GOTY over the choice most outlets chose cuz God of War Ragnarok was just that phenomenal… but Spider-Man 2 is not that phenomenal.

No Final Fantasy XVI is actually criminal and the most baffling omission in any of these lists

@Ainu20 Last month had Sable and PowerWash simulator, both very quality games but in niche genres, and people hated that month

Looking at the result of the poll, it really does feel like people judge the quality of PS+ based on if there’s a cinematic 3rd person action adventure game in the lineup.

Honestly I’m surprised Like a Dragon Gaiden isn’t on here (assuming top 3 is Baldur’s Gate, Resident Evil 4, and Spider-Man 2). It was on a lot of your staff’s top 5s, and it seemed very high up there as well.

This is tough cuz like, Final Fantasy XVI is one of my favorite games of the year. However as an RPG, I think it’s pretty lacking. It’s my favorite RPG of the year but at the same time stuff like Octopath II and Sea of Stars were way better on the RPG front.

Next year looks literally insane for JRPGs tho. Like a Dragon 8, Persona 3 Reload, Granblue Fantasy Relink, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, Dragon’s Dogma, Unicorn Overlord, and Rise of the Ronin the first three months

Im predicting SM2 is gonna be on this list, which is gonna be weird seeing it in the upper half of this list when it was only rated an 8/10 on this website. I know this is a site wide list and a review only has a couple of reviewers at most, but yeah idk fascinating regardless.

PushSquare ruined my Christmas by reminding me FairGame$ is a game that exists

I really liked Spider-Man 2 but man it does highlight how kinda a poor year Sony had and is facing next year. Their only games this year were a VR game and a licensed game that, while great, was a lot more evidently flawed than some of their previous output. It dominated the conversation for not only being Spider-Man, but for being the only big game PlayStation fans wanted to sink their teeth into. It looks true for next year as well, the only exclusive Sony games are 3rd party deals and Helldivers 2. The only upcoming single player party game mentioned is another Marvel game that will probably takes multiple years to come out. Hate to be pessimistic over this simple poll but yeah (Sony if you release Ghost of Tsushima 2 next year I’ll take back literally everything I said)

Makes sense Alan Wake would go on sale this fast. Despite the acclaim it hasn’t been selling a lot. Really think a physical edition would’ve helped out a lot. Yeah most games are bought digitally nowadays but Alan Wake is a moreso niche series with a dedicated fanbase, and if you’re really into it you’d want a physical copy.

This is definitely a failure of PlayStations studios all around. Naughty Dog got too ambitious, and Bungie’s evaluation ended the last glimmer of its original concept. I don’t want a live service last of us. Literally just give us Factions 2, just a decently sized but really fun multiplayer mode that doesn’t need additional updates. I hope they revisit factions for Last of Us 3 and I’m happy to hear that SP is their focus (would definitely rather have this future than the one where they’re a live service studio), but man I just wanted another Factions

Genuinely the only reason I haven’t bought it yet is the lack of a physical edition. As soon as they do so, I’m buying it.

@Snick27 Bros never looked at a map of the Persian empire

@OldGamer999 I sure do love how this comment is relevant to Prince of Persia

The hate this game gets is unfathomable to me. A new and sick looking Prince of Persia game by the developer of Rayman Legends got hate for being 2D? I want the Sands of Time remake as well but this is a separate team making a separate project.

This is definitely gonna be either
1. Rebooted by Disney and given to a more seasoned studio
2. The rights will be held on by Embracer Group so tightly that they throw literally every studio at it just to make it work

No matter what the original concept of the game is definitely dead

It sure is a Ubisoft Avatar game

It Takes Two and DMC 5 are like, better than the past 3 months of extra/premium games combined. It’s insane how much I don’t want to renew my subscription. I’ll just grind out the remaining PS+ games I’ve wanted to play in the next couple months.

Surprised at how little love No Rest for the Wicked is getting. Ori was phenomenal, and the footage we’ve seen looks great despite being a huge departure. Metaphor was my favorite trailer but that was the biggest surprise.

Decent announcements, horrendous handling of the awards

I think Spider-Man 2’s only win will be for Yuri Lowenthal’s performance. Every other category I feel like it gets outclassed.

I think Alan Wake II will win narrative and art direction and that’s it. It’s not impossible for it to win GOTY tho imo.

I think Baldur’s Gate 3 is gonna win the most with 4 awards: Best RPG, Best Community Support, Best Direction, Game of the Year