breakneck

I was happy until I read Kraftons name. They just recently made news for removing nearly three months of dev time for Callisto Protocol.

"Famously Passionate". Sorry bud but this community is FAMOUSLY TOXIC. But let Arrowhead suffer imo. They thought they were hot ***** when they sent review bombers to harass and review bomb other Sony games on PC.

Give PC gamers an inch and theyll take everything.

So a few issues:
1. Alan Wake being a decade old console exclusive release meaning a huge chunk of the audience won't care for a direct sequel.
2. Going the full survival horror route which hasn't really worked for any game in AAA that's not Resident Evil.
3. Gameplay just isn't very good imo despite enjoying the artistic choices, cutscenes and music. The game is slow, bosses suck, the mind palace is too limited.
4. Backtracking for the platinum sucks but this is a me problem lol.
5. A game you can watch on YouTube and have the full experience minus the bad part that is actually playing the game.

It is really weird that they made this when they had some of the best gameplay in Control and it's incredible movement. Night Springs was a step in the right direction. Leaning into the whackiness while also having less combat overall.

@IamJT sony q1 earnings showed full game sales are now 80% digital.

No games but experimental indies should be out day one on subs. Games like KunitsuGami and Animal Well make sense.

If any bigger game is on a sub day one I usually assume it's because the devs know they have a mediocre game and would rather take the upfront money instead of fighting it out in the market with a Metascore of 65-72.

@LordAinsley the trains in Hong Kong have to put ads reminding people not to do that and that it is a criminal offense.

@Thumper the difference is tone. In Bg3 it always consential between the player character and their romantic interest and the relationships are built with care.

Going around taking silly shots of Zombies is juvenile and nowhere near the same thing.

They've gone Sbi or Dei or woke or whatever. Time to make a 45 minute video on YouTube crying about this while selling Nord VPN subscriptions or something.

In all honesty, it's quite silly to remove this but I also understand they want to be a little more sensitive now that they're a big company and stuff like this will get discourse one way or another. Maybe it no longer reflects the feeling of the devs and team and they're embarrassed by the feature.

@PsBoxSwitchOwner the amount we earn is nowhere near equal to the increase in prices for most products including games. CPI and inflation have gone far beyond the salary increases of the working class. Since 2022 most lower and lower-middle income british households have cut their spending and reallocated it to electricity bills and food.

Europe has been hit far worst than the rest of the world when it comes to inflation.

I think I used the other characters in ME1 because they were so dumb and Dragon fights In Inquisition because of how long those fights were. Otherwise I only command them in the tutorial then forget they exist the rest of the time.

This is why you don't announce things until you're sure it's ready. It's sad but game development is difficult.

Playstation is taking over the Backend and it was done for cost restructuring. Sony is taking more direct control of Bungie and there will more focus on Destiny and Marathon development (no more incubation).

Source: financial call yesterday. First question asked to Hiroki Totoki.

@PsBoxSwitchOwner the last time Playstation had an unintented exclusive was Bg3 which was a easy game of the year. So maybe they're going two for two this year 😅

@Intr1n5ic oh that sucks. I'm usually mixed on Obsidians games but I always respect their commitment to making interesting worlds. Oh well the December time frame now looks more likely for Black myth.

Definitely interested in this but it will have to wait. Next month has ASTRO and Zelda and October has Metaphor and November probably has The Veilguard. In between all of that is Indy and Avowed. This game will probably only be given serious consideration by December end or Jan.

@LowDefAl I agree. But I think they could try leaning into looking a little less corporate. I don't know how to explain it. Maybe just have a little more of a presence. I think the tv/movie stuff is helping with that. Otherwise I actually prefer this 'keep you cards close to your chest approach'

@AdamNovice also, Sonys big games are supposed to start dropping next year onwards as per their previous financial calls. This year feels like a gap year after 2022 and 2023 had so many big releases.

Mochizuki has always been pessimistic on Sony so I'm not surprised.

Personally I think being behind to the ps4 by 1.8million units while being in a recession period, having covid shortages and having a price Increase while already being more expensive is actually stronger than I expected. I don't think it'll beat the PS4 lifetime but I also never expected it to because the covid bump was false growth (I don't think the Switch 2 will hit the Switch 1 numbers either).

People forget that The PS2 was also bolstered by extremely strong third parties mixed with First party software.

I do think two areas Sony need to improve on is building hype (TGS may bring this back) and mixing more smaller AA games from younger teams (miles morales type) to keep the first party looking strong.

@somnambulance I think Metaphor and ASTRO stand a good chance. Otherwise I think Balatro is it's biggest competition this year so far.

Regarding the sales of Rebirth I'm not surprised.

Releasing in a crowded JRPG schedule fighting for the same group of players is bound to hurt it. Especially with Squares inflated judgment of sales success.

It doesn't help that they're comparing a pandemic launch at the end of the console lifecycle to a mid gen console within a time of economic messes and high inflation.

The extremely high budget and divisive nature of the game doesn't help either. Most people would wait for the third game to buy the triplet package if they were smart too.

Square going aggressively multiplatform won't give them the success they hope for until they reduce budgets heavily. The PC market mostly buys games on sale/cheaper based of basic reading and research, the Switch 2 could have potential but I don't honestly see it being more than another mil or 2 units.

@NEStalgia that's not true. Nintendos success in software is almost completely first party software. Third party support while better than before (especially for indies) is still not very strong. They recently hired a former Playstation man to help them get more third party support.

Keep the budget under 20 mil like Neon/A24 and it'll have good chances of success.

I don't think a lot of players will have issues unless it is really broken but games media and online buzz will likely be overwhelmingly negative given Bloober and Konami's reputation.

Personally it doesn't appeal to me but I've always thought SH was overrated but had great creature and atmospheric design.

It is a good list of games not aimed towards the 40-50 year Olds who frequent this site.

@Drago201 tbf most game publications are ***** at remembering the financial stuff or understanding the money side of the business (I think Last Stand Media is the only one that actually understands this well despite not liking the podcast overall) mostly focusing on pushing their agendas (recent Capcom shareholders asking silly questions) while ignoring the actual meat of the calls.

They are especially bad with regards to Sonys financial calls. They pay a lot of attention to Nintendo (especially because of the Switch 2 and how much engagement Nintendo articles get) and Microsoft being the biggest company in the world gets worldwide coverage.

I'm so tired of this. From seem really happy making new IP. Sony don't seem interested. Let it rest. I also think Bloodborne never needed a sequel. Dark Souls 2 and 3 weren't great and 3 especially relied on fan service.

You can't on one hand scream for new games while also begging like children for an old game to be remade/remastered.

If you read the Financial calls early this year Hiroki Totoki specifically name dropped Bungie as being mismanaged/not understanding how to work while praising the work ethic of the SIE studios overall. I'm not surprised by any of the allegations. Especially since Bungie has messed up relations with MS at the peak of their gaming strength, ABK and fumbled independence so quickly that the Sony payout probably saved the studio.

I'm somewhere on the middle where I think the money could've easily been used to incubate new studios but at the same time Destiny Is still a very valuable IP in terms of its universe and multimedia potential (bigger player count than HD2 rn on Steam) and Bungie still have some of the best art design and Gun feel in the industry along with longevity most GAAS games can only dream off.

I think Sony's mistake overall is coming into Live Services very late and while now most of their studios have moved back to SP, the time and money lost on cancelled projects has been costly. Especially when they all over hired during covid.

Bungie management has been bad since Halo 2 though.

When will it hit publishers and devs that there are too many ***** games coming out with no visibility especially in the indie side.

Especially in an age where small releases are expected to come day one on subscriptions. We can constantly bring up that stupid Twitter ' cheaper, shorter, less pretty' nonsense but that is not reality.

I know one thing for certain. Sony is marketing the hell out of this game. In HK I just saw Deadpool 3 in Imax and they had a IMAX TRAILER for this!

Early this year they had Stellar Blade video promos in the train station!

@StrickenBiged it's a double edged sword and something I think Nintendo seems to have a handle on quite well. Let them be approachable/quirky but avoid too many public/live interactions.

Phil Spencer is too approachable to the point that it backfires when he backtracks because he's the friendly one.

Playstation are too quiet atm but I feel it's because they have nothing to show for a while.

I love that it looks like he's having the time of his life working with Indie devs.

On Twitter most of the videos I've seen haven't been gameplay but the menus (they're fluid and look nice) and the character art (they're beautiful).

I bought this game, Robocop and The Sexy Brutale during the recent sale. Im quite excited to play this after Robocop (really fun game BTW) and it'll be my first tactical RPG in over a decade.

@NEStalgia You get Boeing. A company known for quality that became a joke and made aircrafts that killed people.

Aftermath (fantastic site) has some more detail. Apparently all the games currently being worked on will be passed on to a third party to handle publishing. If I were a dev I'd be ***** pissed about the publishers doing this to my game.

Also, as per the Aftermath piece Ziff Davis was upset games couldn't make quick money and needed years of effort for a result. Incompetent piece of donkey crap.

Mega Man was never my cup of tea (don't like trial and error aspects of it) but I did enjoy the Battle Network games as a kid.

@Silenos I called for help. After Eurogamers controversial (but really accurate) review mentioned quitting at the final boss I got a month of PS Plus in case I got stuck. The boss just wasn't fun so I summoned another player to help me.

@Czar_Khastik slalom was the stuff of nightmares.

Surprising with all WBs struggles and recent layoffs at NetherRealm. You'd think they'd want to curtail spending a bit.

My brother who likes Star Wars thought it looked a bit unpolished. The thing is... They're trying to make a Star Wars Uncharted but, Uncharted is one of the most polished franchises out there. If your gonna come for the king you better not miss.

@Shakybeeves similar story here. I prefer Divinity 2 as well purely because the combat didn't get on my nerves. Bg3 quite often required reloading saves because all your companions would mess up turn one or all enemies would get crits on your team. Otherwise it had brilliant writing and exploration.

Those digital Deluxe pre-orders are high on the psn charts. So the launch will be strong. I expect the same on Steam and Xbox.

I'm more curious about the reception after the previews (muted) and the Ign gameplay vid which was not well received online (a lot of people saying it looks a bit janky and unpolished). I thought it looked okay but that it is the kinda game you can wait 3 months for that 30% discount.

It is such an impressive game. Larian had said they don't want to make a game of this scope and size for a while but I don't think gamers will accept that from them just like gamers will be less likely to accept a FromSoft game that doesn't match Elden Rings scope anymore. Once you've taste mainstream success you never want to lose it.

I think I quit shortly after the Steel Foundry mission. Had to go to the hospital for 3 days because of a tendon injury and when I came back I just never went back to it.

This seems like everything LeBlanc Cafe was against (fresh beans, small business, high quality etc). But Corporations misunderstanding the art their teams created seems par for the course (square Enix Ff7 NFTs).

@DennisReynolds this is so true. Even in Hong Kong some of the biggest areas had huge posters for Spidey 2, God of War Ragnarok had a whole display at a major mall. Nintendo for Mario and TOTK put posters in trains and TV spots on local channels. Elden Ring had posters on busses.
Put in the effort and people will notice your game. Xbox are following the Netflix strategy of hoping the fanbase does the marketing for them and it just isn't working.

Xbox seem to be going out of their way to embarrass themselves. 5-6 years ago they could've gotten away with saying this but now after nearly 80 billion in mergers everyone knows it's crap and it's just Microsoft not seeing the point of marketing more likely.

I love murder mystery stuff that spans decades (any epic or Saga or murder mysteries in general are my jam) but I just bought three games today to keep me busy with Jeanne D'arc, Robocop and The Sexy Brutale. This may have to wait a bit.

It makes sense. The reason the PS4 Pro launched with such success was because they had a flagship game like Horizon alongside it to truly show off the difference.

If you don't have that heavy hitter hold on to the hardware until you do. I generally believe Playstation is learning the right lessons from Nintendo by holding on to their cards for longer.

They now just need to sort out their content pipeline with first parties and make more second party deals as well to keep the exclusives coming strong and making sure every member of their base always has something to play.

Is the list only for PS or all consoles? Because I'm surprised no Nintendo game is there.