Comments 777

Re: American Senators Continue to Target Sony Over PS5, PS4 Timed Exclusives

TooBarFoo

@naruball @get2sammyb They may seem different but this has all been about access to content. From a regulatory view point, a market leader paying to keep content away from competitors is every bit as important as A&M activity. How much each action costs makes no difference when viewing competitive regulation. You could spend nothing to force content makers to act a curtain way as market leader and find yourself in a ton of bother. Those "A few timed exclusives" that Sony has paid to keep off Xbox over this and last generation amount to many more games than Xbox has made exclusive from large buyouts to date.

I'm on no side here. I play PC, PS1-5, Switch and current Gen Xbox. I do have a lot of experience consulting for Tech companies, including a number of parties involved in gaming industry, and have dealt with regulatory bodies on a number of occasions. I get most folks here want to fight for one side or the other but that does not change the why and how that regulatory bodies work. We all know the importance of having media on release, It's why movie theatres exist and why many will pay £/$70 for a game they could get for £/$30 just a few months later. Sony as used is position as market leader to cost affectively get 3rd parties to withhold services from its smaller competitor (Sound strange calling MS small but this is viewed not from a Horizontal business perspective, but a vertical market view.) Sony's actions successfully achieved it's objectives of limiting competitor growth and solidifying its leading position. Did this cross the line from fair competition too market manipulation? I don't know. What I do know is Sony would have known, or should have known, trying so hard to stop this would bring their own actions under examination and it has.

There was a point when Sony were in a great position to negotiate a great 10 year deal due to their lobbying but that time has long past, Sony turned it down and started getting absurd in it's statements as MS strategy of "expanding access" through other deals started to make ground with regulators. As Sony's submissions looked more and more like desperate attempts to protect it's own status as market leader and less and less about competition questions were bound to be asked about the wider state of competition in the gaming space. Sony way overplayed their hand, not a little but a full mile and now they will have to deal with the blow back. Sony will ride out these "investigations" without concern I'd guess but I don't know if or how they may affect future deals. The fact is Sony went from a winning position to the only looser in the industry from this whole oversight process. You could say Sony went full Spursy.

Re: American Senators Continue to Target Sony Over PS5, PS4 Timed Exclusives

TooBarFoo

I think Sony set them selves up for this to some degree. As @Dezzy70 says, If you are going to attack someone on competition grounds you need to make sure you can stand similar scrutiny. When your the market leader eyes are going to turn your way. Jumping up and down asking for your position to be protected is going to bring you into the spot light.

Re: Soapbox: Hold On, Is the PS3 a Retro Console?

TooBarFoo

No way, or am I having a mini crisis also.... I see the PS2 but the PS3 feels part of the modern wave of HD consoles. It least in MY head I see the split between HDMI and pre HDMI and yes the PS3 defaults to composit output but the HDMI port is there and HDMI is not retro.

Re: Poll: What Review Score Would You Give Resident Evil 4 Remake?

TooBarFoo

@Nintendo4Sonic VRR is a must feature, It can make payable a 40-60 fps range mess smooth. some of the time at least. RE4R was a amazing well optimised game. Consoles are really only running ultra low RT and I never bother with it, just not worth the hit, even with VRR. I do have a beastly PC so makes console RT
look worst. But for 90% of games today PC performance is ***** on launch (Not RE4R) So if I want to play early I go to console.

Re: Poll: What Review Score Would You Give Resident Evil 4 Remake?

TooBarFoo

@NeonPizza @Ear_wiG I don't think the PS5 (or the xbox s/x) are Ray tracing consoles. It's a bit like the 20XX graphics cards. It's a feature, have a look at it but then turn it off. Maybe the Pro models of this gen will have the power but no-one wanted $1000 consoles so they made the right choice in price to power, IMHO anyway.

Re: Poll: What Review Score Would You Give Resident Evil 4 Remake?

TooBarFoo

One of the best games ever made. I just loved this game. My son just bought, tried to play and refunded TLOU on PC. I told him that even though it's a great game, RE4R has the very same DNA but it just better in every way. TLOU was always in my top 10 but now it's been replaced by RE4R. I spoke to him a hour or two ago he's 10 hours or so in and told me to piss off and stop disturbing him. Him and Leon have some urgent work to get done. He's loving it.

Re: Naughty Dog Drops The Last of Us PC Hotfix After Disastrous Launch

TooBarFoo

@Shinnok789 that's not right. My son bought it, refund after 1:55 to beat 2 hour window. It's was so bad it was funny, we laughed, a lot. He's running a 4090 and Ryzen 5900, DDR 5 128G. His machine is a beast built for scientific modelling. This beats CDPR for worst release of of the decade. It is shockingly bad. Sure it will be fixed over time but it really is the worst AAA release I've ever seen.

Re: Activision Boss Disappointed by Sony, But Commits to Best Games Possible on PS5, PS4

TooBarFoo

@get2sammyb no, not short term they won't. But just by the 10 year contracts they have signed Sony will have ever increasing competition for COD income going forward and streaming will matter. When every TV have Xbox and Gforce now apps built in at launch, that will eat income. Nintendo will take a bite as COD returns. And as these user bases grow Sony's share shrinks. And the regulators know Sony turned down the deal offered. Sony said no, now what happens in 5 years they will not care about. They don't look back. All that will remain in the regulatory case files is the fact Sony, very publicly, turned down the 10 year offer. Sony may well still get a 10 year deal but the damage has been done. And they will not get as good a deal as they could have gotten just a month ago. Not by a 100 miles. And PS players will not get the benefits they could have negotiated.

Re: Activision Boss Disappointed by Sony, But Commits to Best Games Possible on PS5, PS4

TooBarFoo

@get2sammyb I wonder just how motivated MS will be to give Sony any contact at this point. The contract offers were for the regulators. That's mostly done. I think Sony returns to the table a lot weaker than it was when it so publicity turned down the 10 year offer. If I was negotiating for MS I would now be in no hurry at all. There is a contract in place for a few years. I don't see what is on the table for MS to offer more. MS will know exactly how much Sony needs COD, they have the books now. I think, long term Sony's stand will have a cost to PS players.

Re: Poll: What Game Should Capcom Remake Next?

TooBarFoo

Capcom have become one of my top publishers over the last few years. I would like to see them tackle more than RE, MH. DMC was great and while I'm not into fighters I'm sure SF will be good. I'm not sure Exoprimal is for me but I'm happy to see them trying new things, I'm certainly going to give it a try. Although It will probably be on GP and not a purchase.

Re: UK Regulator No Longer Concerned About Activision Buyout's Impact on Console Competition

TooBarFoo

Having work with the CMA in the past I can say they never change their guidance, ever. The only way this happened was some info they placed a high weight on was shown to be fabricated. Most info is expected to be manipulated to be very beneficial to the submitting party and the does not change anything. The have basically stated they have been completely lied to by a interested party, I'm presuming that's Sony but that's no more than a presumption. It's hard to state just how rare this is and just how badly that leaves the party that lied in future interactions. I did message a contact I have in the CMA and got a instant "DON'T ASK" response so who knows but I'm smelling some very burnt bridges

Re: The Lord of the Rings: Gollum Protects the Precious in May on PS5, PS4

TooBarFoo

It seems a very strange choice still. I have read LotRs many times since I picked it up straight after finishing the Hobbit as a 10 year old almost half a century ago. And never once, in all those years did I think to myself, What I really want to experience this tale from view of the little slimy fish obsessed creature we met below the misty mountains.

Re: Resident Evil 4 (PS5) - A True Masterpiece Made Even Better

TooBarFoo

Great to see Capcom hit it out the park again. They have been on a roll of late and with the exception of RE3 which was just too little of a game, everything they have done of late has been just what players wanted. Solid games with no bull. They have taken over as the company everyone feels good about supporting.

Re: Mini Review: No Man's Sky (PSVR2) - Explore an Infinite Universe on a Whole New Scale

TooBarFoo

I have over 2000 hours maybe 3000 have not wanted to look for a long while. All in PC VR. Can't talk for PS visuals, I'm using a 4090 to push top visuals on my index so the PS5 is a long way back in power output. But the VR control scheme works very well once you have the hang off it. Just turn off teleportation and use smooth movement. I also made a magnetic dock 3d printed for ship control. I imagine there will PS5 versions on line soon.

Re: Take-Two Says Layoffs Necessary for 'Another Extended Period of Success'

TooBarFoo

@TommyNL Skill retention is a priory in many business cultures. It was well documented in Wii U era and would go a long way to explaining how they bounced back so strongly with the Switch and why Nintendo games are widely considered more polished and with less bugs than the market in general. The mass hire and fire approach in the game industry and spilling over to tech in general is very short termist and highly inefficient. A sign that decisions are being by those with a big stake in short term performance and little to gain over long term success.

Re: Sony Concerned Microsoft Could, Knowingly or Not, Sabotage Call of Duty on PlayStation

TooBarFoo

I don't get all the people complaining about Microsoft making Bethesda games exclusive when Sony had paid money to keep the last 2 Bethesda games off Xbox. Sony has been buying exclusives as a main part of it's growth strategy since PS3. It seems now their main worry is they will no longer be able to get COD exclusive features and are mad more people will get to play all of COD in more places.

Personally, I hope this goes through. I don't care about COD but it will be great to get other AVB games on Gamepass, and it will be good for gaming as a whole when there are less games Sony can pay to gate keep off other services and consoles. I think there will be a lot more winners than losers from this deal.

Re: PS5 Firmware Update Finally Changes How Game Discs Work

TooBarFoo

It's about time, Having to stick with the disk copy to keep the same save file made little sense. On the down side I can see disks becoming little more that licence dongles in the near future. All the console makers would like to funnel everyone through there stores for more purchases. Nintendo has done way with games on the game cards for a lot of games already and it's rare the disk copy of multi player games work un-patched even on day one so the everything is digital by default is a natural stance.

Re: The Response to Rocksteady's Suicide Squad Has Been Abysmal

TooBarFoo

When they started on this project, 8 years ago.. All they could think about was the all those King shark cards they would sell. Reminds me of the rush to MMO's 15 years ago. You would think dev's would have remembered that blood bath before they started spending everything they had chasing the live service dream. I guess not many game dev's are History majors.

Re: Resident Evil Village (PSVR2) - An Even More Intense Version of a PS5 Great

TooBarFoo

I played PC VR mod some time ago and even with the limitations of just using a VR mod it was great, although it was better to drop to normal screen gameplay wise for some points.

Some games can make VR worth while by them selves if the game really gels, For me that game is NMS. If you have a full wheel set-up I think GT7 will be all some folks need to get value out of a headset. Games like RE don't have that staying power but they fill in the gaps.

Re: Poll: Are You Happy with Your PS Plus Extra, Premium Games for February 2023?

TooBarFoo

@Toypop "Sony are double-dipping and milking you for £70 a pop, whilst simultaneously charging you a sub." No their not, I don't pay £70 for any games, I'm happy to wait 12 months. Simples. You made a choice and paid your money, Slamming your face on your desk and screaming they ripped me off makes no sense. But, if you didn't know before, now you do. Every Sony game will come out on subscription after 12 months. Make informed choices.

Re: Poll: Are You Happy with Your PS Plus Extra, Premium Games for February 2023?

TooBarFoo

@Toypop sorry, that's rubbish. We all know that 99% of games will be "free" at some point and all the big hitters are going to be on one service or another after 12 months. I really liked HZD and knew I wanted to play HFW but also knew it would hit PS++ in 12 months and PS+ in 24, Sony told us this is the plan. So I chose to wait as I have games coming out of my ears. Don't blame your lack of impulse control on Sony. You knew this too when you paid your money, even if you did not want to acknowledge it. You got to play the game when you wanted to, and did not have to wait till it was offered, that's what you paid for and that's what you got. So be happy. That has value.

Re: Poll: Are You Happy with Your PS Plus Extra, Premium Games for February 2023?

TooBarFoo

I think I'm just on a games overload these days. With the number of games given away free by epic and Amazon prime and the Gamepass and PS++ catalogues it's just why more than anyone can play. I have so many different copies of RE 7 available and I've never bought the game. It's now been offered on all 4 services. So even though this is a great month, I'll play H:FW and then cancel my PS++ Just to many games and not enough time.

Re: PSVR2 Review: Is It Worth It?

TooBarFoo

@neonpizza T5 spinal cord injury. Fell off a mountain many moons ago. I spend my days trapped in a wheelchair so in the evenings I strap on my headset and roam distant planets....

Re: PSVR2 Review: Is It Worth It?

TooBarFoo

@NEStalgia Yep, Index is old now and I would not recommend anyone buys one. Was great 4 years ago but tech moves on. If you go to the VR only reviewers, the Lens issues is pretty constant. But I don't think it will be such a big issue for VR newcomers, and for those coming from PSVR-1 this is new headset will be incredible.

Maybe see you in the NMS Nexus one fine day, just don't be like me and end up addicted to roaming the galaxy 😂

Re: Site News: Our Plan for PSVR2 Reviews Through Launch and Beyond

TooBarFoo

@themightyant I have 1000's of hours in VR, One of my son's get VR belly, It has not mattered the headset used or time. He still gets sick. One of my other boys can only play for short stretches and only then at 120Hz and that has not changed. The rest of us never had any issue unless the game chugged between vastly different frame rates. If RV made you sick before I would try before you buy. That said the PSVR 1 was a terrible headset and probably the most sick inducing headset made so there is hope.

Re: PSVR2 Review: Is It Worth It?

TooBarFoo

@Serialsid Yep, the screens are great, but the lenses are not. After a few hours you rather better lenses with middling screens than great screens with poor lenses. What good's eye tracking when you have a tiny clear sweet spot in the centre of the lens ? If your coming from a PSVR it will be mind blowing but that's because the PSVR is frankly rubbish.

Re: PSVR2 Review: Is It Worth It?

TooBarFoo

@NEStalgia "I know PCVR die-hards who play only No Man's Sky. Like non-stop life-sucking NMS-based existence, because it's an endless game" Have you been spying on me? 😅 This is me, I have 1000's of hours in NMS, all VR. It has been 70%+ of my time across all forms of media for so many years now. It's my escape from the confines of my broken body.

Re: PSVR2 Review: Is It Worth It?

TooBarFoo

I've spent about 6,000 hours in VR, but for me the number 1 issue is lens quality, or I should say image quality. VR has not been great at give a clear all round image and it's not resolution but the fact the lenses have to simulate depth to pull the image back from your face. All indications are Sony has cheaped out here, not just by sticking to Fresnel lenses but poor Fresnel lenses with a very small sweet spot. I will of course give them a try before I make my mind up. But reviews have placed the lenses below the Index (My current main vr) and the quest pro pancake lenses blow the Index lenses out the water, not that I'll buy a quest pro. Trying out the Pro's lenses was like going from Std def CTR to 4k UHD. I expect pancake lenses will be minimum spec for every VR headset I buy going forward. They should also allow for some very very small large glasses size headsets going forward, especially if they are wired. To my mind PSRV2 is a great 2019 headset but Sony made poor choices for 2023.

Re: Wild Hearts (PS5) - A Fast-Paced, Thrilling Alternative to Monster Hunter

TooBarFoo

I think this has just got me wanting to give Horizons multiplayer more head space. I'm not a fan of the fortnite building although I'm sure a lot of younger players will like it. Mostly this just looks bad and I'm usually game play over visuals but after watching a few youtube reviews, this looks worse than MH Rise to my eyes, a game made for 7 year out mobile chip. But I do think I'm ready to scratch that monster hunting itch again and Horizon's looking like the best bet right now.

Re: The Last of Us' Insane Popularity Leads to Illegal Scams

TooBarFoo

I'm sure that some will fall for it but I don't think gamers are a great attack vector, I have run security departments for some very large tech companies and while it was not uncommon for them to over estimate their tech chops they very very rarely introduced problems. Sales and marketing on the other hand were like smorgasbord of disease and viruses.

I have still not watched TLoU, I'm still holding out for a binge watch although it's getting harder and harder.

Re: The Best Syphon Filter Is Coming to PS Plus on PS5, PS4 with Trophies

TooBarFoo

I loved this game, this and GTA vice city stories made the PSP a great console for me. I can still remember the opening cinematic. I won't replay it though. Most times I've gone back to old games they have brutally ripped my rose spectacles off my nose. But this game should be top of the list for a remake. I'd be soooo hyped for that.