I haven’t used the PlayStation Store (or the Nintendo eShop) for browsing or searching for games for years now. The site gives you pretty much all the sorting and search parameters you could ever want. It’s not perfect, but it’s leagues better than any of the console storefronts.
Not saying that we shouldn’t complain about these issues — we should expect better of them — but at least it’s a solution until the unlikely event of improvements to the store.
@RobN From the article: “If you already own the original PS5, PS4 version, the new games and timelines will be available as DLC.” Not trying to be snarky, I assume you just skimmed past the last paragraph.
Also, I recently bought the Atari Flashback Gold 50th Anniversary Edition mini console, that came with two joysticks and a set of paddles. It needed a firmware update to work well, but it came with a lot of games pre-installed, with support for ROMs.
Unfortunately (for me at least), the controllers use the original Atari connectors instead of USB, so no way to hook it up to a PC (and obviously not compatible with PS5 even if it were), but they are compatible with original hardware and the Atari 2600+.
Not sure if you already knew about it, but it’s one of the only a few ways to get paddle-ing these days, so I thought I’d mention it 👍
@TheFakulty I was going through my PS3 digital games library recently as well, looking for a specific game that I didn’t remember if I owned digitally or physically (I eventually found the disc), as well as adding everything to a collection database for future reference (I used infinitebacklog.net instead of a spreadsheet).
As I was doing this, going down that slow, prone-to-crashing list multiple times before getting to the end of, I discovered that there were games missing past a certain date. After much google-ing, I discovered that there was a better list to go through, straight from the the XMB, not in the store. It’s under Account Management -> Transaction History -> Download List.
I never knew this list existed, so I’m wondering if you didn’t either. It’s still not searchable or sortable, but it contains everything I owned, and the downloads are numbered if you lose your place, and because it doesn’t go through the awful broken PS3 Store, it doesn’t crash either. I don’t know if this will fix your particular problem, or if you already knew about it, but I figured I’d mention it just in case it helps 🙏
That seems to me like a pretty shady marketing trick. Claiming that the game is “Uncensored” when there’s no content in the game that would need to be censored. Trying to make people think that there might be some extra sexy stuff in it that hasn’t already been featured in plenty of other games without issue.
PlayStation is the worst company when it comes to making developers change game content to meet their weird standards, and they’re the advertising partner for this game. It’s completely illogical to think that any content PlayStation wouldn’t approve of was either already removed long ago, or was never in the game to begin with. It’s just a stupid marketing stunt.
I was about to make a comment about how Darude being a fan of the manga is irrelevant, and all it would take is Bandai Namco’s marketing department paying a record label a licensing fee to use the song. In my pursuit of accuracy, I ended up on the song’s Wikipedia page, to see what record company owned the rights to the song.
After seeing the many paragraphs detailing the use of the song in TV, commercials, and sports, I realized that this entire article is a sarcastic joke about the universal ubiquity of the track, and it made me realize how old I am that I don’t immediately recognize a meme from the mid 2000s 😢
I’ve always been more of a Virtua Tennis person rather than Top Spin. Though it sounds like they might have better aids to help with the shot timing, which is what I struggled with. So that’s good.
Unfortunately, it also sounds like a typical modern sports game, which means a full $90 🇨🇦, with microtransactions, season passes, battle passes, and loot boxes.
After playing PGA Tour 2K23 (when it came to PS+Essential), I’m not looking forward to winning a major tournament, telling me that I won $2 million, only to be awarded $25 of premium currency, when it costs $2000 of said currency to buy a T-shirt. I drop off games pretty hard when I don’t feel properly rewarded. I’ll give it a try next year, when it’s also on PS+.
@Th3solution I remember when the N. Sane Trilogy (remakes of Crash 1-3) came out, it was on the best selling charts for a long time — and a quick trip to Wikipedia confirms that it sold 10 million copies. It was the reason why Crash 4 was developed, and 5 million sounds believable with that taken into account.
It sounds surprising to us because we’re either not into that genre of games — and thus not paying much attention to them — or the fact that it took 3 years to reach that number. It’s probably a hit with children getting their first PlayStation, and probably found in bargain bins these days.
I remember finishing the game back in the day, so I assume I beat the tutorial. I tried it more recently, to see if the game held up to modern standards, and I never got halfway through the tutorial before giving up in frustration.
Some memories are better left in the past! Also, there were less games to play back then, so you were more likely to persist with difficult challenges. I remember passing the controller between me and my uncle, determined for one of us to beat some of the later missions in the game.
Ain’t nobody got the patience for that these days, with so many other options of what you could be playing. I can’t decide whether that’s a good thing or not! Nostalgia is weird 🤔
Well, I got all of the Steam achievements for the base game and some of the updates/DLC at one point — they’ve added more since the last time I played it — so I should have no trouble getting the Platinum.
Not sure if I should put another 83+ hours into it though! But I probably will 😣
@Quintumply No problem, I figured as much. I remember from another comment section (with some silly controversy about the Pros and Cons) the fact that the review author might not be the person that writes the Pros and Cons.
I think you should still look at the wording in the review though; it still mentions “monetisation” like Rocket League, which might be misleading.
(And sorry for the pedantry. I have no idea why I care about this so much 🤓)
@gbanas92 Thanks for the review! Forgot that the game came out, was wondering if it was any good. But I do have some things about your review that seem unclear or are not mentioned, that I think your readers should know. TLDR:
There are no microtransactions in the game
There is a single-player mode, Time Trials
There are no local multiplayer options
I was confused about the mention of microtransactions, because I went to the PlayStation Store to see how bad they were in terms of cost. But there were no currencies available to purchase, only a few packs of cosmetics. In my quest to clear up my confusion, I read the (currently) only review on Metacritic (where I found out about the other stuff), and I checked out the Steam page for the game, where I realized that I owned it (got the Early Access version in a charity bundle, apparently) — so I booted it up to confirm.
The in-game economy looks like one that would be used for microtransactions, so I understand, but the way you described the economy and the mention of microtransactions in the Cons might lead people to think that there are currencies that could be bought with real-world money.
The single-player mode is only Time Trials, so I understand not mentioning it in the review because it seems inadequate, and thus irrelevant — but I figured I’d give it a quick mention.
The lack of local multiplayer is a big one, for me at least. My sister likes playing Golf With Your Friends with me, and I thought it could be another game to try, so that would be a dealbreaker for me (if I didn’t already own it, of course!). Could be another bullet point in the Cons.
Only minor criticisms, though (and I understand that this is a Mini Review for a low-profile game, so you probably couldn’t go further with the details). Thanks again 👍
Yeah, they could develop their own console. Can’t imagine it being very good.
I think a better idea would be for Putin to end the war in Ukraine, step down as a leader, let the Russian people actually democratically vote for their own president, and go to jail for war crimes. Then Russians will be able to buy the same consoles everyone else has!
@ShogunRok Copied from a comment I made in a previous article, that sums up my opinion on the matter, and I think you’d agree with:
I hate when developers put booster/level-skip microtransactions in their games. Even if the game is balanced enough to not really need them, it’s basically telling people, “Hey, our game is a grindy chore to play, so give us more money so you can play it less.”
Played the demo on Steam Deck. The game has an awesomely weird style that I really dig.
Unfortunately the gameplay is not for me. There was one puzzle that was so obscure and unlike any of the puzzles before it, that almost made me quit the demo, but I happened to discover the solution accidentally.
I did quit the demo during the chase sequence. I don’t appreciate games that insta-kill you before you have a chance to figure out where you have to go, making it a trial-and-error QTE. I died 4 or 5 times before I found the one spot I could climb, only to die 10 more times because I was getting killed before I could even choose which direction to run in.
There are going to have to be some good accessibility/difficulty settings added to the game before I would consider getting it.
Very disappointed, because I love the game’s atmosphere — unlike the over-abundance of comments I’ve read that complain about the clash between the historical setting with the 8-bit videogame UI and sound effects. I thought that was the best part, because of how unusual and unique it made the game.
@nessisonett I don’t remember Rock Band 4 being much much worse than 2 or 3, maybe missing a little bit of the spark the older ones had. About 90% of the older games’ catalogs could be exported to 4, and most of the DLC is forwards compatible. (Of course one of the songs that were not compatible was the only song in the game by my favourite band!)
But, lucky for me, I think most of the guitars I own should be in working condition, and I recently added the PS3 back in my lineup of consoles that are hooked up to my main TV, so I’ve got no excuse to not go back to play either of them.
I was just hoping the new guitar wasn’t outrageously expensive, because I remember having some connectivity issues with the older instruments (I never bought new ones when 4 came out), and y’know, shiny new toy and all that. That, and the lack of people to play the game with — solo, like with Helldivers, is a little lonely 😢
I might finally download Fortnite and see if it’s not as bad as I think it probably is, might get me back in the groove 😆
By the time I found out that they were up for pre-order, they were already sold out. They’re also $180🇨🇦, way too much to spend with my current financial situation.
I’ll have to dust off the 4 or 5 other guitars I have if I start playing Rock Band again or try out the Fortnite stuff. I was hoping the new guitar would get me back into it, but I’m gonna have to hope that they’re still selling them when birthday/Xmas comes along (if there’s nothing else I want more by then).
The game industry has been like this for a very long time. Profits over people. But the sheer amount of layoffs over a short period of time — due to greed and mismanagement — has become too massive to ignore.
I hope Vincke has gained enough clout that publishers actually listen to what he’s saying. A fool’s hope, fer sure, but hope nonetheless.
I’m also having the issue with weapons and voice resetting to default every boot. Seems to be everyone.
I’ve also noticed that the gun settings (aim zoom, fire rate, flashlight) reset when you respawn. That’s a little annoying. (Also bad that they don’t teach that feature in the tutorial.)
Also been having a lot of instances of clipping through the environment. Maybe hard to avoid with procedural generation, but still an issue. And a bit of a nitpick, but it also kinda bothers me that your character’s feet clip through the floor every time you get back from a mission.
And — unrelated to glitches and bugs — I just found out yesterday that there is a limit to how many Medals you can save up. It caps at 250. I was saving them up for when I got enough Super Credits to get the new Warbond, and didn’t realize I wasn’t getting any more. Lost out on a bunch of Medals because of this, because I didn’t notice for a day or two. Something else that you should be told about in the tutorial (or at least communicated in some way).
@UltimateOtaku91 I think it’s the other way around. The grind is there in the game to push vulnerable people into buying microtransactions.
I hate when developers put booster/level-skip microtransactions in their games. Even if the game is balanced enough to not really need them, it’s basically telling people, “Hey, our game is a grindy chore to play, so give us more money so you can play it less.”
It’s pure psychological manipulation, used to take advantage of kids (or their parents), neurodivergent people, and people with more money than sense.
@Kiefer-Sutherland There’s a few of reasons I can think of.
First, there are new people being born all the time, and those people all turn 17 at some point (or whatever age their parents feel they’re old enough to play it).
Second, GTA is a legendary series, and it’s probably the first game someone buying a new console would buy with it.
The main reason though, is Shark Cards, the premium currency for GTA Online. Buying a copy of the game bundled with a Shark Card is usually cheaper than buying Shark Cards on their own, so people just buy the game again to get them. This is probably done intentionally by RockStar to inflate their numbers and stay up in the best seller charts artificially.
With the framerate issues — and my extensive backlog — this will probably be the most I’ll play of this game for a while. I like a good character creator, so I’ll get some enjoyment out of this. I’ll play the full game when the remaster comes out on the PlayStation 6 🤣
Little mistake there. Totilo worked at Axios (after leaving Kotaku). Jason Schreier works at Bloomberg (after leaving Kotaku). Understandably easy to mix up.
It's trite to say that a game isn't for everyone in a review since that could broadly be said about any video game, but it's worth mentioning that if you're not a fan of slow-burning fiction, or excessive reading, or spending time chatting with sullen-faced peasants about which one of their kids didn't survive the winter then perhaps this isn't a game for you.
While I’m sure these weekly new game release articles do pretty well traffic-wise, I think having a new comments section for them every week — letting people discuss what games they’re looking forward to that week — would get a lot of engagement, maybe as much or more than What Are You Playing This Weekend?. Maybe adding a poll asking which game they’re most excited about as well, just like you do with the monthly PlayStation Plus announcement articles?
Just my two cents, maybe there’s a good reason for not doing it behind the scenes that we don’t know about. Thanks 👍
Sounds like everything I hated about Remake turned up to 11. I found it to be way too long and bloated for my tastes, and I never gelled with the combat system — I’d much prefer it if it chose real-time action or turn-based instead of trying to be both.
I’ll be waiting for this to go to PS+ Essential like Remake did, if I even bother to play it at all. I think I’m gonna have to try playing the original FF VII again in the meantime, because I think my unfamiliarity with entire plot has hampered what seems to be an elaborate sequel instead of an actual remake.
I really wish they just remade the original with modern graphics, since that has been the main roadblock to me playing the original. PS1 graphics just don’t age well, especially if you have memories of them looking awesome, like what I remember the original looking like when I saw a friend play it back in the day.
This was the most exciting announcement for me in the Nintendo Direct. Glad to hear it’s coming to PlayStation as well. Could go for some split-screen co-op Galactic Conquest with my niece, like we did years ago.
Just wish it was out today. It’d be a good replacement to tide us over while we wait for Helldivers 2 to straighten itself out.
@Quintumply Not a question, but a PSA for people that might be interested in the game, but don’t like some of the survival and roguelike parts of it.
If the PS5 has accessibility options the same as it does on the demo I played on my Steam Deck*, a lot of things can be tweaked or disabled. This includes:
changing buttons holds to presses (which should help somewhat with the fiddly process of turning on the car and shifting gears)
disabling survival elements, like maintaining health and repairs
disabling roguelike elements, like losing resources when you die
disabling death altogether, so you can experience the whole game even if you end up finding it too hard
I mention all of this for the people like me, who like a lot of roguelikes and survival games in look and feel, but end up getting bored of making slow incremental progress. It’s made my decision to eventually buy this game a lot easier, knowing that I can finish it no matter how hard the game is.
*For complete transparency, I had to turn every graphics option to the lowest setting just to get the game to run — and thus didn’t actually play past the tutorial because it looked and ran so bad — so I cannot speak to how these accessibility options work in practice, or how good the game is to play with them enabled, and I also might be remembering some of them wrong, so don’t take my word as gospel 😊
There is no word yet on how Western bodies like PEGI and ESRB will rate the game, but we'd wager it'll align with this initial ruling.
This is incorrect, at least when it comes to the ESRB. The Adults Only (AO) ESRB rating is usually only given to games with graphic sex in them, and would never be sold on consoles. The Mature (M) rating — which equals 17+ — is what this game will be rated in North America.
Had an amazing time playing on Friday and Saturday, co-opping with my niece. It very frustrating not being able to play on Sunday, due to all the connection errors. Hopefully they’ll be fixed soon, if they aren’t already.
Just played the demo on my Steam Deck yesterday. Never got very far into it. I found the dodge/parry system to be too rigid for my tastes. And while the art style was very colourful and unique, I had a very hard time distinguishing between enemies, pickups, and background elements, since everything kinda smooshed together without anything to contrast one from the other. Maybe it gets better farther in to the game, but those were my first impressions.
@Specky I don’t play early access games either. I don’t buy games at launch either, since most might as well be called early access. I’m just saying it would be more honest than what CDPR did with 2077, and people like myself would stay away until it’s done and fully patched.
Something to look forward to tomorrow morning, waking up to multiple emails from my Deku Deals wishlist telling me what’s discounted. Hoping to find at least one game that’s cheaper than the last 500 times it’s gone on sale. 🤣
Yeah, they’ve got the talent. Now all CDPR has to do is let the team finish the game before they release it, instead of still patching it over 3 years later. Or at least call it early access, like Larian did with Baldur’s Gate 3. That seemed to work out well for them.
That was a weird trailer. I like it. Will definitely check this out. I’ll see if the demo runs on my Steam Deck.
But I would really like to applaud 11 Bit Studios — for moving the entire team to a different country — as well as acknowledge the bravery of the developers to stand against an oppressive regime. I only wish all Russians could have the opportunity to do the same.
Anybody who was excited about Konami getting back to making video games — or specifically Silent Hill games — has got to be feeling pretty deflated right about now.
With the Metal Gear collection being a low-effort re-release, the garbage that was Silent Hill Ascension, and now this — things are not looking good for fans of Konami properties.
I hope I’m wrong, and the teams they’ve hired to develop the rest of the titles can push through Konami’s lack of quality control.
This might finally get me back into Rock Band again. It’s been awhile. I still have my old guitars, but having one that’s native to PS5 (with a rechargeable battery) will help me pick it up on more of a whim. I hope it doesn’t cost too much.
The Mass Effect tie-in with No Man’s Sky got me to go back to that game for a little bit, at least until I unlocked the Normandy for my fleet. Then I realized that there was no point in getting items for a game that I’m never going to play again, and a complete waste of time. So I’m not going to bother to boot up Destiny 2 for this.
Burnout 3 is one of my favourite games of all time, and I enjoyed the rest of the series a lot as well. So I hope this game is real, and lives up to that heritage. But I’d still like a remaster/remake of 3 at some point.
@ZeD I had the same reservations, definitely not into soulslikes, or hard games in general. The thing different about Steelrising is that it has plenty of difficulty settings, including the option to turn off taking damage. So if you have trouble with a boss, you can just give yourself invincibility.
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Re: We Find This PS5 Wishlist Issue Irrationally Irksome
I just use Deku Deals.
I haven’t used the PlayStation Store (or the Nintendo eShop) for browsing or searching for games for years now. The site gives you pretty much all the sorting and search parameters you could ever want. It’s not perfect, but it’s leagues better than any of the console storefronts.
Not saying that we shouldn’t complain about these issues — we should expect better of them — but at least it’s a solution until the unlikely event of improvements to the store.
Re: Atari 50 Enhanced Adds Another 39 Titles to Excellent PS5, PS4 Collection
@RobN From the article: “If you already own the original PS5, PS4 version, the new games and timelines will be available as DLC.” Not trying to be snarky, I assume you just skimmed past the last paragraph.
Also, I recently bought the Atari Flashback Gold 50th Anniversary Edition mini console, that came with two joysticks and a set of paddles. It needed a firmware update to work well, but it came with a lot of games pre-installed, with support for ROMs.
Unfortunately (for me at least), the controllers use the original Atari connectors instead of USB, so no way to hook it up to a PC (and obviously not compatible with PS5 even if it were), but they are compatible with original hardware and the Atari 2600+.
Not sure if you already knew about it, but it’s one of the only a few ways to get paddle-ing these days, so I thought I’d mention it 👍
Re: Epic Mickey PS5, PS4 Remaster Gets a 24th September Release Date
@TheFakulty I was going through my PS3 digital games library recently as well, looking for a specific game that I didn’t remember if I owned digitally or physically (I eventually found the disc), as well as adding everything to a collection database for future reference (I used infinitebacklog.net instead of a spreadsheet).
As I was doing this, going down that slow, prone-to-crashing list multiple times before getting to the end of, I discovered that there were games missing past a certain date. After much google-ing, I discovered that there was a better list to go through, straight from the the XMB, not in the store. It’s under Account Management -> Transaction History -> Download List.
I never knew this list existed, so I’m wondering if you didn’t either. It’s still not searchable or sortable, but it contains everything I owned, and the downloads are numbered if you lose your place, and because it doesn’t go through the awful broken PS3 Store, it doesn’t crash either. I don’t know if this will fix your particular problem, or if you already knew about it, but I figured I’d mention it just in case it helps 🙏
Re: Fear Not, PS5 Exclusive Stellar Blade Remains Uncensored in All Regions
That seems to me like a pretty shady marketing trick. Claiming that the game is “Uncensored” when there’s no content in the game that would need to be censored. Trying to make people think that there might be some extra sexy stuff in it that hasn’t already been featured in plenty of other games without issue.
PlayStation is the worst company when it comes to making developers change game content to meet their weird standards, and they’re the advertising partner for this game. It’s completely illogical to think that any content PlayStation wouldn’t approve of was either already removed long ago, or was never in the game to begin with. It’s just a stupid marketing stunt.
Re: The Ultimate Crossover: Sand Land Snags Sandstorm by Darude in Its New Story Trailer
@ShogunRok Thanks! 😊
(I think? Or is that another sarcastic joke that’s gone over my head? 🤔)
See also: “How to tell someone you’re autistic without telling them you’re autistic” 🤣
Re: The Ultimate Crossover: Sand Land Snags Sandstorm by Darude in Its New Story Trailer
I was about to make a comment about how Darude being a fan of the manga is irrelevant, and all it would take is Bandai Namco’s marketing department paying a record label a licensing fee to use the song. In my pursuit of accuracy, I ended up on the song’s Wikipedia page, to see what record company owned the rights to the song.
After seeing the many paragraphs detailing the use of the song in TV, commercials, and sports, I realized that this entire article is a sarcastic joke about the universal ubiquity of the track, and it made me realize how old I am that I don’t immediately recognize a meme from the mid 2000s 😢
Re: Interview: Hangar 13 on TopSpin 2K25's Triumphant PS5 Return
I’ve always been more of a Virtua Tennis person rather than Top Spin. Though it sounds like they might have better aids to help with the shot timing, which is what I struggled with. So that’s good.
Unfortunately, it also sounds like a typical modern sports game, which means a full $90 🇨🇦, with microtransactions, season passes, battle passes, and loot boxes.
After playing PGA Tour 2K23 (when it came to PS+Essential), I’m not looking forward to winning a major tournament, telling me that I won $2 million, only to be awarded $25 of premium currency, when it costs $2000 of said currency to buy a T-shirt. I drop off games pretty hard when I don’t feel properly rewarded. I’ll give it a try next year, when it’s also on PS+.
Re: Whoa! Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time Has Sold More Than 5 Million Copies
@Th3solution I remember when the N. Sane Trilogy (remakes of Crash 1-3) came out, it was on the best selling charts for a long time — and a quick trip to Wikipedia confirms that it sold 10 million copies. It was the reason why Crash 4 was developed, and 5 million sounds believable with that taken into account.
It sounds surprising to us because we’re either not into that genre of games — and thus not paying much attention to them — or the fact that it took 3 years to reach that number. It’s probably a hit with children getting their first PlayStation, and probably found in bargain bins these days.
Re: Random: The Brutal PS1 Driver Intro Even Bested F1 Pro Lewis Hamilton
I remember finishing the game back in the day, so I assume I beat the tutorial. I tried it more recently, to see if the game held up to modern standards, and I never got halfway through the tutorial before giving up in frustration.
Some memories are better left in the past! Also, there were less games to play back then, so you were more likely to persist with difficult challenges. I remember passing the controller between me and my uncle, determined for one of us to beat some of the later missions in the game.
Ain’t nobody got the patience for that these days, with so many other options of what you could be playing. I can’t decide whether that’s a good thing or not! Nostalgia is weird 🤔
Re: Top-Down Phenomena Vampire Survivors Confirms Platinum Trophy on PS5, PS4
Well, I got all of the Steam achievements for the base game and some of the updates/DLC at one point — they’ve added more since the last time I played it — so I should have no trouble getting the Platinum.
Not sure if I should put another 83+ hours into it though! But I probably will 😣
Re: Tomb Raider Trilogy Remaster Updated on PS5, PS4, Here Are the Patch Notes
Hopefully Aspyr will put in the same amount of work patching up the Star Wars Battlefront Classic Collection 🙏
Re: Mini Review: Turbo Golf Racing (PS5) - Fun, if Slight, Golfing Game Is Worth a Little Drive
@Quintumply No problem, I figured as much. I remember from another comment section (with some silly controversy about the Pros and Cons) the fact that the review author might not be the person that writes the Pros and Cons.
I think you should still look at the wording in the review though; it still mentions “monetisation” like Rocket League, which might be misleading.
(And sorry for the pedantry. I have no idea why I care about this so much 🤓)
Re: Mini Review: Turbo Golf Racing (PS5) - Fun, if Slight, Golfing Game Is Worth a Little Drive
@gbanas92 Thanks for the review! Forgot that the game came out, was wondering if it was any good. But I do have some things about your review that seem unclear or are not mentioned, that I think your readers should know. TLDR:
I was confused about the mention of microtransactions, because I went to the PlayStation Store to see how bad they were in terms of cost. But there were no currencies available to purchase, only a few packs of cosmetics. In my quest to clear up my confusion, I read the (currently) only review on Metacritic (where I found out about the other stuff), and I checked out the Steam page for the game, where I realized that I owned it (got the Early Access version in a charity bundle, apparently) — so I booted it up to confirm.
The in-game economy looks like one that would be used for microtransactions, so I understand, but the way you described the economy and the mention of microtransactions in the Cons might lead people to think that there are currencies that could be bought with real-world money.
The single-player mode is only Time Trials, so I understand not mentioning it in the review because it seems inadequate, and thus irrelevant — but I figured I’d give it a quick mention.
The lack of local multiplayer is a big one, for me at least. My sister likes playing Golf With Your Friends with me, and I thought it could be another game to try, so that would be a dealbreaker for me (if I didn’t already own it, of course!). Could be another bullet point in the Cons.
Only minor criticisms, though (and I understand that this is a Mini Review for a low-profile game, so you probably couldn’t go further with the details). Thanks again 👍
Re: Mega Man Collab Brings Exoprimal Back to Life Later This Month
I’m not sure this will bring Exoprimal back to life.
It’s more like using a defibrillator to shock a person that was declared dead hours ago 🤣
Re: Random: Vladimir Putin Considers Creation of Russian Gaming Console
Yeah, they could develop their own console. Can’t imagine it being very good.
I think a better idea would be for Putin to end the war in Ukraine, step down as a leader, let the Russian people actually democratically vote for their own president, and go to jail for war crimes. Then Russians will be able to buy the same consoles everyone else has!
Just a thought! 🤔
Re: Next Final Fantasy 16 Patch Makes Side Quests Quicker, Adds Ability Loadouts, and More
I like the customizable control scheme. That was my biggest complaint about the demo. One or two of the mappings felt wrong to me.
Just waiting for a bigger price drop. Got my backlog in the meantime — so I might be ready to play it by 2080 🤪
Re: Dragon's Dogma 2 (PS5) - The Apex of RPG Adventuring
@ShogunRok Copied from a comment I made in a previous article, that sums up my opinion on the matter, and I think you’d agree with:
Re: Unique PS5 Indie Game INDIKA Takes the Devil for a Religious Ride in May
Played the demo on Steam Deck. The game has an awesomely weird style that I really dig.
Unfortunately the gameplay is not for me. There was one puzzle that was so obscure and unlike any of the puzzles before it, that almost made me quit the demo, but I happened to discover the solution accidentally.
I did quit the demo during the chase sequence. I don’t appreciate games that insta-kill you before you have a chance to figure out where you have to go, making it a trial-and-error QTE. I died 4 or 5 times before I found the one spot I could climb, only to die 10 more times because I was getting killed before I could even choose which direction to run in.
There are going to have to be some good accessibility/difficulty settings added to the game before I would consider getting it.
Very disappointed, because I love the game’s atmosphere — unlike the over-abundance of comments I’ve read that complain about the clash between the historical setting with the 8-bit videogame UI and sound effects. I thought that was the best part, because of how unusual and unique it made the game.
Re: Get Your Hands On PDP's Pricey $130 Riffmaster Wireless Guitar Controller
@nessisonett I don’t remember Rock Band 4 being much much worse than 2 or 3, maybe missing a little bit of the spark the older ones had. About 90% of the older games’ catalogs could be exported to 4, and most of the DLC is forwards compatible. (Of course one of the songs that were not compatible was the only song in the game by my favourite band!)
But, lucky for me, I think most of the guitars I own should be in working condition, and I recently added the PS3 back in my lineup of consoles that are hooked up to my main TV, so I’ve got no excuse to not go back to play either of them.
I was just hoping the new guitar wasn’t outrageously expensive, because I remember having some connectivity issues with the older instruments (I never bought new ones when 4 came out), and y’know, shiny new toy and all that. That, and the lack of people to play the game with — solo, like with Helldivers, is a little lonely 😢
I might finally download Fortnite and see if it’s not as bad as I think it probably is, might get me back in the groove 😆
Re: Get Your Hands On PDP's Pricey $130 Riffmaster Wireless Guitar Controller
By the time I found out that they were up for pre-order, they were already sold out. They’re also $180🇨🇦, way too much to spend with my current financial situation.
I’ll have to dust off the 4 or 5 other guitars I have if I start playing Rock Band again or try out the Fortnite stuff. I was hoping the new guitar would get me back into it, but I’m gonna have to hope that they’re still selling them when birthday/Xmas comes along (if there’s nothing else I want more by then).
Re: Larian Studios' Swen Vincke Blames Mass Layoffs on Publisher Greed
The game industry has been like this for a very long time. Profits over people. But the sheer amount of layoffs over a short period of time — due to greed and mismanagement — has become too massive to ignore.
I hope Vincke has gained enough clout that publishers actually listen to what he’s saying. A fool’s hope, fer sure, but hope nonetheless.
Re: Rise of the Ronin (PS5) - A Safe, Outdated Open World Game
@LiamCroft Have you tested the co-op features in the game? They weren’t mentioned in the review.
Also, any thoughts on the character creator? Probably not exceptional if you didn’t point it out much, but just some general impressions.
Thanks!
Re: Latest Helldivers 2 Patch Introduced a Pesky Crashing Issue, Developer Is On the Case
I’m also having the issue with weapons and voice resetting to default every boot. Seems to be everyone.
I’ve also noticed that the gun settings (aim zoom, fire rate, flashlight) reset when you respawn. That’s a little annoying. (Also bad that they don’t teach that feature in the tutorial.)
Also been having a lot of instances of clipping through the environment. Maybe hard to avoid with procedural generation, but still an issue. And a bit of a nitpick, but it also kinda bothers me that your character’s feet clip through the floor every time you get back from a mission.
And — unrelated to glitches and bugs — I just found out yesterday that there is a limit to how many Medals you can save up. It caps at 250. I was saving them up for when I got enough Super Credits to get the new Warbond, and didn’t realize I wasn’t getting any more. Lost out on a bunch of Medals because of this, because I didn’t notice for a day or two. Something else that you should be told about in the tutorial (or at least communicated in some way).
Re: Updated PS5 Explore Page Adds New Features, Backgrounds
Looks like a potential useful feature to have. Too bad it’s not available outside the US.
Also still waiting for PS Stars to be integrated into the PS5 UI, rather than just on the app.
Re: TopSpin 2K25's Full Roster of Pro Players Is Missing Many Major Names on PS5, PS4
@get2sammyb I second that opinion about Fernandez 👍 But I’m Canadian, so I’m a bit biased. Nice to hear she’s appreciated outside of Canada! 🇨🇦
And I’m glad Djokovic isn’t in the game. Anti-vax a-hole. I wouldn’t even consider buying the game if he was in it.
Re: Dragon Ball: Sparking! Zero Gameplay Showcase Is Visually Stunning, Confirms a Bunch of Characters
Glad they confirmed some characters. I was worried that Goku wouldn’t be in it. He wasn’t featured enough in Dragon Ball FighterZ 😉
Re: Granblue Fantasy: Relink Patch Adds Microtransactions, New Quest
@UltimateOtaku91 I think it’s the other way around. The grind is there in the game to push vulnerable people into buying microtransactions.
I hate when developers put booster/level-skip microtransactions in their games. Even if the game is balanced enough to not really need them, it’s basically telling people, “Hey, our game is a grindy chore to play, so give us more money so you can play it less.”
It’s pure psychological manipulation, used to take advantage of kids (or their parents), neurodivergent people, and people with more money than sense.
Re: PS Store Sales Charts: Helldivers 2 Is Unstoppable, Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth Settles for Second
@Kiefer-Sutherland There’s a few of reasons I can think of.
First, there are new people being born all the time, and those people all turn 17 at some point (or whatever age their parents feel they’re old enough to play it).
Second, GTA is a legendary series, and it’s probably the first game someone buying a new console would buy with it.
The main reason though, is Shark Cards, the premium currency for GTA Online. Buying a copy of the game bundled with a Shark Card is usually cheaper than buying Shark Cards on their own, so people just buy the game again to get them. This is probably done intentionally by RockStar to inflate their numbers and stay up in the best seller charts artificially.
Re: Dragon's Dogma 2 Character Creator Out Now on PS5, Transfers to the Full Game
With the framerate issues — and my extensive backlog — this will probably be the most I’ll play of this game for a while. I like a good character creator, so I’ll get some enjoyment out of this. I’ll play the full game when the remaster comes out on the PlayStation 6 🤣
Re: Get Your First Glimpse of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutants Unleashed on PS5, PS4
@nomither6 You might be waiting a while, if it comes out at all: https://www.pushsquare.com/news/2024/01/tmnt-the-last-ronin-dev-reportedly-cut-in-half-after-layoffs
Re: Heavy Armour Seemingly En-Route as Helldivers 2 Mech Gameplay Leaks
I remember them being very OP in the first Helldivers. They might help with tackling the higher difficulties. Gotta get those rare samples! 😊
Re: Sea of Thieves Players on PS5 Will Need a Microsoft Account to Play
@Khayl
Little mistake there. Totilo worked at Axios (after leaving Kotaku). Jason Schreier works at Bloomberg (after leaving Kotaku). Understandably easy to mix up.
Re: Mini Review: Pentiment (PS5) - A Slow-Burning 16th-Century Murder Mystery
@PsBoxSwitchOwner @Ravix @mariomaster96 @trev666 @LordAinsley @bpomber
From the review you are all commenting on:
Re: New PS5, PS4 Games This Week (26th February to 3rd March)
@get2sammyb I agree with @awp69.
While I’m sure these weekly new game release articles do pretty well traffic-wise, I think having a new comments section for them every week — letting people discuss what games they’re looking forward to that week — would get a lot of engagement, maybe as much or more than What Are You Playing This Weekend?. Maybe adding a poll asking which game they’re most excited about as well, just like you do with the monthly PlayStation Plus announcement articles?
Just my two cents, maybe there’s a good reason for not doing it behind the scenes that we don’t know about. Thanks 👍
Re: Final Fantasy VII Rebirth (PS5) - Strong Sequel Seeks a New Direction
Sounds like everything I hated about Remake turned up to 11. I found it to be way too long and bloated for my tastes, and I never gelled with the combat system — I’d much prefer it if it chose real-time action or turn-based instead of trying to be both.
I’ll be waiting for this to go to PS+ Essential like Remake did, if I even bother to play it at all. I think I’m gonna have to try playing the original FF VII again in the meantime, because I think my unfamiliarity with entire plot has hampered what seems to be an elaborate sequel instead of an actual remake.
I really wish they just remade the original with modern graphics, since that has been the main roadblock to me playing the original. PS1 graphics just don’t age well, especially if you have memories of them looking awesome, like what I remember the original looking like when I saw a friend play it back in the day.
Re: The Best Star Wars Battlefront Games Are Coming to PS5, PS4
This was the most exciting announcement for me in the Nintendo Direct. Glad to hear it’s coming to PlayStation as well. Could go for some split-screen co-op Galactic Conquest with my niece, like we did years ago.
Just wish it was out today. It’d be a good replacement to tide us over while we wait for Helldivers 2 to straighten itself out.
Re: Pacific Drive (PS5) - The Car Is the Reasonably Priced Star of Deep, Dense Survival Game
@Quintumply Not a question, but a PSA for people that might be interested in the game, but don’t like some of the survival and roguelike parts of it.
If the PS5 has accessibility options the same as it does on the demo I played on my Steam Deck*, a lot of things can be tweaked or disabled. This includes:
I mention all of this for the people like me, who like a lot of roguelikes and survival games in look and feel, but end up getting bored of making slow incremental progress. It’s made my decision to eventually buy this game a lot easier, knowing that I can finish it no matter how hard the game is.
*For complete transparency, I had to turn every graphics option to the lowest setting just to get the game to run — and thus didn’t actually play past the tutorial because it looked and ran so bad — so I cannot speak to how these accessibility options work in practice, or how good the game is to play with them enabled, and I also might be remembering some of them wrong, so don’t take my word as gospel 😊
Re: PS5 Exclusive Stellar Blade Gets Adults-Only Rating for Nudity, Violence in Korea
This is incorrect, at least when it comes to the ESRB. The Adults Only (AO) ESRB rating is usually only given to games with graphic sex in them, and would never be sold on consoles. The Mature (M) rating — which equals 17+ — is what this game will be rated in North America.
Re: Helldivers 2 Is 'Blowing Through Estimates', Around 1 Million Sales In Less Than a Week
Had an amazing time playing on Friday and Saturday, co-opping with my niece. It very frustrating not being able to play on Sunday, due to all the connection errors. Hopefully they’ll be fixed soon, if they aren’t already.
Re: Ultros (PS5) - Trippy Metroidvania Tangles with Great Ideas
Just played the demo on my Steam Deck yesterday. Never got very far into it. I found the dodge/parry system to be too rigid for my tastes. And while the art style was very colourful and unique, I had a very hard time distinguishing between enemies, pickups, and background elements, since everything kinda smooshed together without anything to contrast one from the other. Maybe it gets better farther in to the game, but those were my first impressions.
Re: CD Projekt Red Musters Veteran Developers for Cyberpunk 2077 Sequel
@Specky I don’t play early access games either. I don’t buy games at launch either, since most might as well be called early access. I’m just saying it would be more honest than what CDPR did with 2077, and people like myself would stay away until it’s done and fully patched.
Re: More Than 2,000 New PS5, PS4 Deals Dropped Tantalisingly onto PS Store
Something to look forward to tomorrow morning, waking up to multiple emails from my Deku Deals wishlist telling me what’s discounted. Hoping to find at least one game that’s cheaper than the last 500 times it’s gone on sale. 🤣
Re: CD Projekt Red Musters Veteran Developers for Cyberpunk 2077 Sequel
Yeah, they’ve got the talent. Now all CDPR has to do is let the team finish the game before they release it, instead of still patching it over 3 years later. Or at least call it early access, like Larian did with Baldur’s Gate 3. That seemed to work out well for them.
Re: Wild PS5 Indie INDIKA Gets a Bonkers Gameplay Trailer
That was a weird trailer. I like it. Will definitely check this out. I’ll see if the demo runs on my Steam Deck.
But I would really like to applaud 11 Bit Studios — for moving the entire team to a different country — as well as acknowledge the bravery of the developers to stand against an oppressive regime. I only wish all Russians could have the opportunity to do the same.
Re: Silent Hill: The Short Message (PS5) - There's a Reason It's Free
Anybody who was excited about Konami getting back to making video games — or specifically Silent Hill games — has got to be feeling pretty deflated right about now.
With the Metal Gear collection being a low-effort re-release, the garbage that was Silent Hill Ascension, and now this — things are not looking good for fans of Konami properties.
I hope I’m wrong, and the teams they’ve hired to develop the rest of the titles can push through Konami’s lack of quality control.
Re: New Guitar Controller for Fortnite Festival, Rock Band 4 Revealed for PS5, PS4
This might finally get me back into Rock Band again. It’s been awhile. I still have my old guitars, but having one that’s native to PS5 (with a rechargeable battery) will help me pick it up on more of a whim. I hope it doesn’t cost too much.
Re: Mass Effect Collaboration Inbound for Destiny 2 in February on PS5, PS4
The Mass Effect tie-in with No Man’s Sky got me to go back to that game for a little bit, at least until I unlocked the Normandy for my fleet. Then I realized that there was no point in getting items for a game that I’m never going to play again, and a complete waste of time. So I’m not going to bother to boot up Destiny 2 for this.
Re: Unleash Democratic Carnage with Warbonds in Helldivers 2 on PS5
Why isn’t this the PS+ Essential game this month instead of Foamstars?
Re: New Burnout Game Possibly Teased in Developer Tweet
Burnout 3 is one of my favourite games of all time, and I enjoyed the rest of the series a lot as well. So I hope this game is real, and lives up to that heritage. But I’d still like a remaster/remake of 3 at some point.
Re: PS Plus Essential Games for February 2024 Announced
@ZeD I had the same reservations, definitely not into soulslikes, or hard games in general. The thing different about Steelrising is that it has plenty of difficulty settings, including the option to turn off taking damage. So if you have trouble with a boss, you can just give yourself invincibility.