IntrepidWombat

Half the LEDs went out in the living room TV, Windows Update bricked my PC's boot SSD, and my wife's laptop is dead dead - all in one day. As much as I want one of those controllers, ehhh, it's not in the cards right now.

@playstation1995 Here we go Steelers, here we go! I hope Fautanu can go. We need him against Bosa.

Very busy weekend ahead. If I do everything right, I may have some time for Vampire Survivors, Triangle Strategy, or Diofield Chronicle.

I don't really tend to care about this kind of thing, but I will be buying a controller. That's the best a Dual Sense has ever looked.

@evasdf That's what I want. Digital purchases and physical both.

Not a lot of time to game this weekend. My son and I are playing a lot of Vampire Survivors. A little Clash Royale with my wife (FTP crew for life). I did get a used copy of Triangle Strategy off of eBay. It's not quite the spiritual successor to Final Fantasy Tactics that it was billed to be, but it's good so far.

Thirty seconds of the character's cutsie yips and yahs were all I could take - they're like nails on a chalkboard. I couldn't even watch the entirety of the gameplay demo. I'm glad there's a game out there with broad appeal, but it's just not for me. I didn't vote in the poll as I didn't play it.

@MrGawain It's usually in the game settings when it's available.

@lacerz I'd buy this if it was 100% backwards compatible with all generations including physical discs, trophies be damned.

@ButterySmooth30FPS Playing newer games at higher fidelity. Gaming the market - a sale on Steam might be cheaper than a sale on PSN. Modding games that you want to mod. Playing older games in higher fidelity. There are plenty of reasons to have both. If you want to match PS5 Pro, you don't need to spend that much.

@ButterySmooth30FPS Not necessarily - your existing console isn't going away if you already have games. I have my PS5 and PC right next to each other. Easy as switching an input between the two.

@ButterySmooth30FPS That's silly. You can build a $700 (or less) PC, use a PlayStation 4 controller, and hook it up to your TV.

That price point and no disc drive? They're out of their minds. Physical media and price are the only reason I stick with PlayStation. This is 100% "Just build a PC" territory.

I replayed this one recently and really loved it all over again. I received this one as a Christmas gift the year it came out and spent the rest of the winter break glued to it. Final Fantasy Tactics will (probably) always be my favorite, but this one scores a lot. Draw and Junction are still novel - there's a lot of depth to the game as a result. Really underrated systems.

My first DualSense is still going strong after 18 months and a few hundred hours, so no issues there. The battery life is atrocious, but it is what it is. I always turn off the haptic feedback anyway - it'd be nice if I could just use a DualShock 4 - in my opinion, the best console controller ever devised. All of the features that I want are still there. It doesn't make any technical sense that we can't use them on PS5 games.

I'll pick up a spare maybe on Black Friday and order some hall sensors for standby in case one of them goes out.

NFL is back, baby. Looking forward to tomorrow's slate of games. The Diofield Chronicle will be my primary game, though I may play around more with Final Fantasy XVI NG+. I'm winning an auction for Triangle Strategy, so maybe I'll be playing that next weekend. I've had a Switch sitting in my desk for 6 years and have never bought a game for it, so it'll be interesting to get it up and running after only really taking it out to top off the charge on the battery every few months.

I can't even fathom how this could be financially viable for these devs - it's amazing how much they've given away. The game as it is against the original release might as well be a sequel.

I remember the first run of Final Fantasy Tactics Greatest Hits for the PS1 had a bad batch that wouldn't read. It was the first thing I ever ordered online, and we had to return it to an EB Games store in the mall. That's the only time I can recall having an issue with a disc.

@BigJoze Making it F2P immediately allows for a larger audience by virtue of being free. That compounds with the fact that Sony doesn't require PS+ to play F2P titles either. It was just an example though not saying they should do exactly that, just a vector they could take with some kind of game as a service.

A new GaaS in this day needs some kind of hook. Instead of whatever the heck Concord is, Sony could have tied it to an existing IP.

Example: Bring back Resistance as a fully-fleshed out single player game. Knock it out of the park. Put your best and brightest studio to work on it. Then release the multiplayer component as a free to play game with bonuses for progress in the campaign. Give it multiple modes like 4on4 or some PvE horde mode. Make an overarching goal like taking back parts of Europe. The primary development costs are recouped by sales of the single player title while the GaaS multiplayer element brings additional cash flow. If it doesn't support itself after a few months, pull the plug and call it a success since they released a strong single player game with a good campaign.

Not super excited for anything for the rest of the year. I played the Diofield Chronicle demo and fell in love with it, so I'll probably grab it - it's super cheap on eBay right now. Episode Aigis comes out this month, so I will look forward to the reviews of that. The physical release of Conscript comes out on Oct 1st, so I'll buy that day one only because physical copies of indie survival horror don't usually last long (Daymare titles excepted). I'm going to hold out for reviews on Metaphor and Silent Hill 2. That should about be my year.

I am not a fan of Ubisoft games at all. I am a fan of pre-Disney Star Wars - the EU is so very rich. Timothy Zahn's original Thrawn trilogy would have been a slam dunk for sequel films with a fresh new cast. The Knights of the Old Republic lore is some of my favorite too. The only bright spot for me in the last 10 years or so has been Jedi Fallen Order.

Absolutely a day 1 for me. You can tell these devs were fans of classic RPGs - the Legend of Dragoon influence is awesome. This is what I wanted from Final Fantasy XVI.

@Ralizah "Games starting at full price and dropping in sales is about adjusting prices to account for lessening demand, not milking your biggest fans for everything they're worth."

To continue playing the devil's advocate, I could argue that most games (barring exceptions for truly exceptional titles) are never more in demand than in their early release windows. What any commodity is worth is determined by the market - if the market is willing to pay $110 for a game, then that's that game's full price, and the $70 price point is the first price drop based on a projected fall-off of demand. I'd also argue that the publisher telling people up front, "Hey, the price is going to drop in three days" is a pretty stand-up thing to do. They could just say, "We're going to launch the game at $110. We will drop it eventually, but you're going to have to guess when. Either be patient or buy it now, but we're not telling." Given that people are willing to pay the price, I'd say that's between those people and the publisher.

Ubi's credibility went out the window ages ago. This doesn't hurt their brand image because it's already in the toilet, but that doesn't stop people from buying the corporatized garbage they continue to spew out. If Capcom announced a Resident Evil Code: Veronica remake and that I could play it a few days early for an extra $30, I'd do what I've done for the last 20 years any time a Resident Evil game comes out: take the day off work, ensure that I had it in hand as early as possible, and play the hell out of it with a smile on my face. Who am I to say that people who eant end to do the same thing with this game are wrong?

@Ralizah Is it really gross though? People want it, and they're willing to pay the price, so why not make a buck? When you think about it over the life cycle of the game, isn't that how it's always been? If you want to play it first, you're going to pay the most. The price will naturally drop due to decreased demand, so those who waited are rewarded with a discount. I dislike the Ubislop experience, but this to me is just downright clever. Monetize the FOMO.

I've been bouncing off of every turn-based game I've tried lately - SMT V Vengeance, Soul Hackers 2, Dragon Quest XI, Lost Odyssey... I really enjoyed Stellar Blade, so for giggles and grins, I booted up Final Fantasy XVI NG+ for some more action goodness and am enjoying it on Final Fantasy mode - more so than I did my first time around.

I was in from day one, but the trailers are having the opposite effect - I'm kind of in the 'wait and see' camp now. Conscript's physical release is my top October want.

My brother from another mother has a big Italian family on his mom's side. He's closing in on 50, but he still plays games. I'm thinking this will make a great gift for him.

I'm definitely interested in it once I can buy a disc. I haven't had a lot of time to play anything lately, maybe 10 hours total this month.

@Specky There have been some token attempts at this - Skyrim for example has an in-game mod manager and browser, but it's not as extensive as PC. The developer has to be in on it, and I imagine most would opt out - whatever mods could be introduced by the community are features that they themselves could sell for a profit.

Boy that was rough.

Come on Tokyo Game Show!

@QiaraIris Or you just have that kind of disposable income?

Expedition 33 and Metaphor are at the top.

I also want to see Resident Evil Anything-at-all and some more HD2D of Squaresoft classics - Xenogears and Final Fantasy Tactics.

A Gears of War trilogy for PS5 is somewhere on my wish list, but I'm not holding my breath.

@MasterVGuides I'm as 'murican as it gets, he's just a popular VA.

@MasterVGuides The Discworld question was the easiest of the bunch...it's always Eric Idle. Dude is in everything.

8/10, and I guessed for most of them. BRB, getting a scratch-off.

A much better trailer than the first, but the art style makes it look last gen. The Fortnight vibe is cool for a F2P or budget title, but I expected more from a AAAA EA Bioware game that's been in development for as long as it has. I haven't liked a DA since Origins, so I'll likely skip this one.

Nothing is washing the taste of that first trailer out of my mouth. It was horrendous. If that's the tone they wanted to set in introducing the game, then the rest of the game being just like that is a pretty safe bet. I'm so tired of the smarmy Marvel-esque writing. Maybe the gameplay will be fine, but if the writing surrounding it in a story-heavy RPG is that bad, it's just a non-starter for me. If that's what people truly want, then I'm happy for them.

This weekend will be BUSY. We're catching up on yard work today, and tomorrow is our annual back-to-school shopping extravaganza. My son enjoys it since there's an arcade and a restaurant visit in it for him.

If I get some time, gaming will be Trails into Reverie. I want to love this game, but holy smokes, it's 20 minutes of talking and cut scenes to every 5 minutes of gameplay. Hopefully there's a big meaty gameplay section coming up.

I get that it's 6 games. But $75. Yeesh.

Great write-up. The attempted humor of this series hits the same as an awkward teenager trying to tell jokes he doesn't quite understand.

The casting choices are weird. I don't like when actors get loud in politics. I can only ever see them as who they are rather than their characters from that point on. Call it a personal failing on my part for being unable to suspend disbelief.

They got the whole thing backwards - for a film like this, spend heavy in the writing room and in production. Use nobodies and up-and-comers in the cast. An ensemble of recognizable B-listers probably bloated the cost to make this film when it was the most unnecessary expenditure and probably detracts from the experience overall.

Yeah, I'll probably grab it straight away. I've been holding off on a second run of Reload for this to come out.

With the current economic climate, continued support of the PS4, and PlayStation franchises going to PC, it's kind of impressive that the sales have continued. I believe those factors have kept it from staying on pace with PS4, not the price.

$499 USD in 2020 had the same buying power as $605.74 today. Staying the same price might as well be a price drop with this inflation.

The combat in these games has way too much jank for them to be stressing about a card game. Maybe they could do something about that first?

3 out of 10 for me. I haven't played most of the games on this list, and I could have sworn that Tomb Raider II came out in '98, but no, that's just the year that I bought it. Oh well!

I updated my Eve client and undocked for the first time in ages. My main turned 17 this past June - time flies. I couldn't be bothered to build an alpha-friendly fit to get in some trouble with, and I didn't feel much like slapping down for Omega, so I did some ship spinning in Amarr and logged off. The temptation was there as I was longing to poke my head in to a wormhole, but alas.

I've been playing Clash Royale lately - fun little game, especially challenging if you commit to not spending any money.

I went back to Stellar Blade and am working through the Normal boss challenges. It only took me 5 tries to beat Raven this time.

I bounced off SMTV. I thought for sure it would grab me. The desert setting is so bland. I'll try again another time.

Not terribly excited to play anything else right now.

Ghost was really good, but the fox hunts, haikus, and other 'do the same thing in two dozen locations' was repetitive. I hope that's not what other studios are taking away from it. Skipping all of that made it an excellent experience for me.

I'm not about strapping a thing to my head to play games. I'll stick with a television and a regular controller. And get off my lawn.

@get2sammyb Ah, I forgot about the VR, thanks. I'll have to take your word for it.

"is this just par for the course for one of PlayStation’s best franchises these days?"

I must have missed several games, because I thought the only thing released with this character was a brief little play room game that was a tutorial on how to use the PS5. How does that and an unreleased title (assuming In haven't missed anything) make a franchise?

I think I'd have to put it down pretty quick - 2 or 3 minutes of the constant little yips and yahs were enough to get on my nerves. I might have bought this for my son a few years ago, but I think he's outgrown it? Really, really, really don't get all of the hype for this title.

I'm there day one. Let's get it!