Jimmer-jammer

Man alive, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth is big! Big world, big checklists, big personalities, big distractions, big detours…It’s a testament to the strength of its characters and the team’s ability to craft singular moments of such awesomeness that I can be as invested as I am when, honestly, the overarching narrative is aimless to the point of hilarity. It’s all a big mess. But it’s got heart. Big heart. And I’m somehow enjoying it big time. Happy gaming!

My current top 6 are Astro Bot, Silent Hill 2, Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, Neva, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth and Unicorn Overlord. What a year!

The mileage that my family has been getting from this game is crazy. Currently my game of the year and potentially a real system seller. Congrats to the team!

I have a real soft spot for Ghostwire: Tokyo so of course I feel that’s a pretty great offering for those who haven’t played it. For me, I thought Hot Wheels: Unleashed was a lot of fun and am stoked to now get the second one. Good month!

I’m wrestling moral quandaries in Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden and taking in the sights of the Gold Saucer in Final Fantasy VII Rebirth. Happy gaming!

@mac_da_man I really enjoyed GRIS too! The team just released Neva, which is a definite evolution on the gameplay front. I’ve loved it. Worth keeping an eye on.

Nearing the end of Silent Hill 2 Remake. Wow. It’s really good. Happy gaming!

Well, regardless of Ubisoft’s direction, I’m thankful to Montpellier for crafting such a great Prince of Persia. One of the best games I played this year.

I thought the first round of DLC was rather enjoyable so I’ll likely pick this up as well. Sounds like a great update!

I thought it was fantastic. Great story, great presentation, great gameplay. Popcorn food of the highest quality. Had an amazing time playing this with my son.

I’ll be crawling through the brilliant Silent Hill 2 Remake while taking periodic breathers with the utterly stunning Neva. Happy gaming!

The very act of threading the needle between artistic expression and money hungry financiers is an exercise of immense creativity in and of itself! But, though lacking nuance, I get Layden’s point.

Just started my play through. So far, so great!

I’ll be picking up my copy today but won’t be starting it until Monday. I consider the original an offbeat, horror masterpiece. So very excited for this!

@aj21009 Won’t be a problem! It’s a self contained story and a fine entry to jump in.

I imagine this was no easy task for Bloober so huge congrats to the team! Cannot wait to dive in myself! One of those special games I plan to crawl through, absorbing every second.

This looks incredible. I think Part II’s story will benefit greatly from this format.

I don’t know about the technical side of things but the way they’ve lit the remastered Aloy in this comparison is much, much more aesthetically pleasing.

@Yousef- absolutely worth a try if you like the metroidvania style!

Oddly enough, Ubisoft (Montpellier) delivered one of the best games I’ve played this year in Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown. I’d like to see more games like that!

What isn’t a controversy these days? Anyway, it’s a very interesting direction and, if done right, could really add to Jin’s mythos as the Ghost.

Games should be properly optimized for their target hardware. This should really go without saying and it’s disappointing that sub par performance in performance mode is so prevalent. It’s why I end up playing a lot of titles in fidelity mode. RotR’s performance mode was a mixed bag. It would often be buttery smooth and then tank at times you wouldn’t think it should. It didn’t bother me often enough to play in fidelity but it’s not right and an upgrade shouldn’t be the go-to solution. Here we are though. I actually think the game is quite beautiful, in which I snapped some of my favourite photos in a game ever. Really solid game and I’m glad it’s found its audience.

Not caring about the difference and not seeing the difference are two completely different things. I can’t speak for 8k but the jump between 1080p and 4k is massive to my eyes.

@Mintie Yeah, it’s hard not to let the imagination run wild on what Bluepoint’s cooking up. For me, I’m most curious to know what Barlog and company have been beavering away on. Who can tell exactly what Sony’s PR strategy is these days, and had this been billed as a big showcase, I’d have likely been unmoved but as a State of Play, I thought there was some pretty cool stuff in there!

I can’t imagine what more one would want from a State of Play. I voted Very Good.

One of the best of the year, no doubt.

What I find most interesting about this soundtrack is the way it persistently carries its motifs throughout, creating a real sense of oneness and connectedness in line with the game’s most prevalent themes.

@XscapingReality Yeah, that makes sense. I find it a lot messier than Remake so I get where you’re coming from. For me, it’s the environmental variety and focus on the characters that make Rebirth sing. I could do without Chadley’s data collection and the clunky mini-game padding but it’s just so awesome being able to explore the world beyond Midgar within a modern presentation.

Playing Final Fantasy VII Rebirth and Astro Bot. I’m enjoying Rebirth a lot more than Remake overall, even if I think Remake did some things better. Astro Bot is just pure gaming gold. Happy gaming!

@XscapingReality Queens Blood is fantastic, isn’t it? It’s amazing just how much a well executed mini game like this really adds to the world. More so than, say, stealthing around Chocobos! Hope you continue to enjoy it, game seems huge.

Marketing costs, hours of motion captured story bits, outsourcing…all very expensive. IF this report is true, I don’t see Hulst having an extended future in his current position, and that’s without knowing how much Factions cost Sony either.

When the only nitpick I can muster is the inability to adjust the audio settings, it’s safely a 10/10 game for me.

I’m currently playing through Rebirth. I am by no means a pixel counter but it’s plain to see that performance mode really does tank the image quality. It’s a bit bizarre to be playing a sequel on more powerful hardware that doesn’t, at the very least, match the visual bar set by its predecessor.

Big proponent of physical media here. When are we going to stop the alarmist rhetoric and collectively realize that this approach not only saves us money in the long run but also gives security to the growing niche market we support? I’m all for this approach.

@Dodoo And that’s a completely fair assessment. I’m disappointed as well. Of course I am, I’d love to order one tomorrow. My comment was directed towards the general hysteria - which I find very difficult to empathize with in a world in which over a quarter of the population can’t access clean drinking water - not any one person’s legitimate reasoning as to why they can’t justify the purchase. As for me, I’m going to see what I can scrape together over the next few months without altering the budget 😄

For fun, I ran the launch prices of PlayStation’s console lineup through an inflation calculator. These numbers($US) are not definitive and are only meant to provide a rough idea of where PS5 Pro lands on the spectrum.

PS1 $299 = $617
PS2 $299 = $546
PS3 $599 = $934
PS4 $399 = $538
PS4 Pro $399 = $522
PS5 $499 = $606
PS5 Pro $699 + extras = $807

Yep, it’s expensive.

@naruball Guess I better not mention to those worried about the price of a PS6 that, assuming it releases in 4 years, they only have to start putting away about $25/month now to completely alleviate their worries.

The base PS5 is perfectly fine. The Pro is a luxury purchase that one can either afford or not. I don’t see what the big deal is.

Looks pretty sweet to me! I plan on buying one, just likely not at launch. Need more time to get the funds together. Hopefully around February/March.

He’s entitled to feel however he wants to feel about how the character he created is being used in his absence. It’s just unfortunate that he can’t share in the joy it seems to be bringing everyone else. His loss.

Finally started my Final Fantasy VII Rebirth journey, and Astro Bot. Both are just superb thus far. Happy gaming!

@rusty82 Agreed! Pretty stoked to be getting another good one 😄

The only way I might buy into the author’s position is if Astro Bot was completely phoned in. By all accounts, it wasn’t. In fact, I’d argue that the game breathes new life into characters that would have otherwise remained lost to the uninitiated, and gives new relevancy to ones thought forgotten in the dust bin. All without mentioning the game itself is its own I.P. pushing the medium forward.

Cannot wait to start this, and share the excitement with our kids. Maybe this will get people in the mood to give Psychonauts 2 and Sackboy the love they so deserve!

Wow. Folks are really riding the wave of this flop (and what a flop, granted) but outside of Concord, Sony have released some excellent quality and well selling games this year, one of which is a live service title, that also holds the same price point. I’m not defending this poorly calculated risk, by the way. I just don’t think it’s Sony’s death knell either.

@Nem Agreed. Emphasis on ‘magic’ I suppose 😄

@Ilyn Exactly. Speaking on the most surface level, I could set up a gaming PC today but I don’t because I don’t want to. There are presumably many others out there in the same position.

This is an entirely speculative discussion that in reality will be determined by the market. I’d be rather curious to see how the market would react if someone hit the magic button tomorrow that made streaming any game from any device an actuality. That takes a lot of infrastructure and the world is very large. I speculate that consoles will be around for a long while yet.

Very bizarre series of events. The claim of a secret exclusivity deal doesn’t add up at all. Definitely need some official statements but then, why comment at all if it’s untrue?

I’m also in the ‘show me no more’ boat. Not long to go, looks incredible!

Pre production is a huge chunk of the process. This is great news!

Very excited for this. Looks incredible.

Good article. I agree with the proposed correlation between Sony’s first party silence and the resulting impression that live service is all they’re working on. For the asking price, I think a campaign of some sort would have went a long way to giving players a more immediate sense of value. As for the question, this thing is unfortunately dead. I’ve seen bigger numbers show up to the local battle of the bands on a Tuesday night. Cut the losses and move on. And maybe start planning a heck of a showcase before the end of the year.