gaston

I am trying to get the remaining trophies in call of the mountain. Still an awesome game, and the vr game closest to tomb raider to date.

At the same time I really hope that there will be at some point such a VR game without all the invisible walls, and in which all the hand-holding is optional.

@Shrek_Realista The rumor is that Sony sold 270k headsets within the first month. So, that is the only number out there.

I don't think that everybody who bought a headset would buy hogwarts but given that there are very few games of such a caliber, I could imagine that quite a few of these early adopters would buy it anyway, even though they are only very very remotely interested. Ha, ha me included ...

I would assume that studios are not shutdown because a game flopped, but because of the next project not looking convincing, or because there are too many problems within the team(s) or between the studio and higher up management.

Shame. But I guess in the end their ideas did not work out.

If they want to sell another 270k copies, they should consider a psvr2 version.

I really loved resogun, and returnal (despite being really bad at playing returnal). I liked nex machina to a lesser extend. Anyway I am very interested in what they are doing next.
Though, I am still hoping that a vr mode is added to returnal, before they move on.

@maybemaybemaybe Yes, that was very good news. I don't know whether red matter 1 and 2 are linked in any way (presumably not in a meaningful way). But it is still a shame if new people directly start with red matter 2 or skip it entirely because they haven't played the first one.

@Futureshark I also only played maybe the first hour of re7 before I chickened out. But, recently I finished it. And one has to say, that it is one of the best psvr games despite it shortcomings (ds4 only). Same with Re8 on psvr2 (I haven't finished it yet, so I only have a very limited idea of the game. But one section was so awesome that I immediately replayed it a few times). One should not finish games one does not enjoym but re7 (and re8) are really good vr games. There are few of similar production value.

I think MS would just drop an additional 2.9 billion as tip. It's peanuts.

Arca's path is an odd choice. Maybe I did not give this title the attention it deserved.

Also missing:

• here they lie
• resident evil 7
• fracked + some skiing challenges
• red matter
• the room vr
• sprint vector
• vader immortal (in particular the dojo of the first one)

Though from this list I presumably only would replay here they lie, since the resolution was quite poor on ps4. But I guess it would require quite some work to increase the resolution of all the textures.

But I have to admit that I would be even more interested in VR versions of some ps4/ps5 games, since I rarely replay games.

@Arnna I played the ps5 version and I did not encounter any serious issues. I really liked the atmosphere of the game and would consider it to be good (and would rebuy if there was a VR version) But it does not do anything special game-play wise, and if I remember correctly the AI was not particularly smart.

I wonder whether the decima engine will get or has vr support. Since call of the mountain used unreal. I suppose it does not have vr support yet.

@stua12t If people claim that they save money by subscribing to GP, then they apparently spend less on games, thus developers get less money and consequently have less money to develop games. The quality has to go down. Unless, the subscription model is so much more attractive compared to full price game purchases that the player base grows in the GP model but not in the conventional model. But, there is no indication that that is the case. It is possible that GP is profitable, because there are mostly lower quality titles on the service than what people would typically purchase or because developers sold their games for a bargain price to MS. But it is hard to believe that GP is profitable and that many high, quality exclusive AAA games appear on the service soon. Somebody has to pay for the development. So, if people pay less then there are either fewer games or lower quality games. Or people do not pay less but just think that they pay less. Or only the people who play a lot of games pay less but the typical people actually pay more.

@nomither6 Not sure how much of a wake up call that would be. Sony would be forced to create COD competitor (which they are probably trying anyways). But that would not force sony to create innovative games. An amazing, innovative hellblade or ever wild would be a much better wake up call.

@stua12t But somebody has to pay the bill if it is not cheaper for the developer, it cannot be cheaper for the gamer, unless subscription services pull in more people (up to now there are no signs of that).

@nomither6 Would it not be better if MS would start developing great games rather than buying up the entire industry ?

@stua12t How does gamepass help in making game development cheaper ? If not then either the game quality will go down or the subscription fee will increase. MS will not bleed money forever.

@Fiendish-Beaver Maybe MS is not not loved because of them being market leader but because of their EEE business strategy (for example they nearly locked down an open standard to IE6-html) ?
I doubt that the next console will be 800-1000$ (unless there will be a super-inflation). I think even evil sony understood that one needs a player base, and you won't get that if the entrance fee is far too high. On the other hand there is psvr2, and it still needs to be seen whether the VR entrance fee is lowered after the enthusiasts opted in, and once there are enough games to offset a loss of hardware sales.

I guess there was not enough booze at the last MS banquette with CMA attendees. For the appeal they will do better.

Dreams was wonderful. It also provided a great playground for VR. In that sense it would be great if it got psvr2 support at least. But maybe the next project is even better ?

Given that Moore's law is dead, I don't see 4090 performance level in consoles any time soon. At least I don't such a performance can be squeezed out of 200W. Unless somebody has a really good idea how to do more with less.

Always looked like a game to me that would be awesome in VR. A PSVR2 would be fantastic.

@NEStalgia yes, that would boost sales by a lot. But, I would be very, very surprised despite the spiderman psvr1 demos.

the obligatory: there would be even more haptics to play with if there was a psvr2 mode. Just sayin'

Anyway, I hope PSVR2 will be a success. I think like always success will depend on the catalogue. The hardware is good enough, there are good demonstrators. Now, developers have to follow suite. I could imagine that it takes a bit longer than everybody is hoping, because AAA game development takes longer and longer it seems, and it will take some time until bigger developers jump on the VR wagon.

I enjoy VR much more than playing flat games. So if VR dies off I might stop playing games. Also, when ever I was playing a VR game, I was thinking that it would be so much better in VR (even if it is the exact same dual sense game in third person. I guess a lot of people will disagree, but personally, I preferred to play in VR pretty much every single dreams game which allowed to be played in VR, even if it was a bit janky).

I find it weird to compare a headset launch with a console launch in terms of sales and lineup (at least I have the impression that is what is kind of done in the article). Yes, psvr2 is more expensive than the ps5, but VR will still remain a niche market. If psvr2 sells better than psvr1 e.g. 10M lifetime sales. That would already be an achievement.

Since the VR market will remain relatively small, one cannot expect as much budget for psvr2 titles as for the ps5 titles. The best one can hope for are indie titles similar to the psvr1 catalogue and more AAA ps5 titles which also provide a VR mode. I think it is illusionary to expect more vr only titles like call of the mountain or even bigger ones. But who knows maybe the new unreal or unity tools allow for such titles even within a relatively small budget.

Concerning announced titles: there are also very few playstation titles announced for ps5. Why would you expect that bigger hitters are announced for psvr2 than for ps5 ?

@NEStalgia I think it will sell with the software. At the moment there is presumably only gt7 which convinces some people to purchase a headset (excluding vr enthusiasts) If there are more such titles. It will sell (But obviously it is very unclear what titles will appear in the future) And, certainly if it appears in stores at some point il will sell better.

Wasn't the projection 1.5M-1.6M by the end of the year or fiscal year i.e. 1.6M/9 months or less then 200k units per month in average. So, 300k for the first month seems ok, I would say. Nobody is expecting psvr2 to sell as good as a console. It is of course possible that 300k is all the VR enthusiasts which are left. But, I would say it is far too early to call it a vita. And one has to wait and see whether more big PSVR2 games will join GT7, village and call of the mountain. Or whether that is all that is planned.

@Juanalf where to jump to if gamepass killed all competition ?

Btw. will happen to COD without sony money ? Will MS fill the gap ? Or will they just cut corners ?

anyway this means: more acquisitions. What good will MS do next ? Save the workers of EA or ubisoft ? What will tencent buy next, or will amazon or apple enter the bidding game? Yes, the future is bright. Thanks to "more competition" through more mergers.

I suppose the regulators etc. just got a good enough deal on office 365.

The saddest part about the Zenimax and ABK squistiions is that this also means that there will not be any VR versions of deathloop, ghostwire tokyo, skyrim, doom and COD. Maybe that was never ever a thing. But deathloop and ghostwire tokyo really look like VR games. Maybe MS will also provide a VR headset at some point in the future. But since they discontinued all the AR/VR projects and they focus on providing the same experience on all platforms down to cell phones. It is very unlikely. Anyway, this only concerns this niche of VR enthusiasts. Everybody else will be happy to play COD and the other remaining franchises competitively with touch controls on cell phones, or maybe even on your apple watch.

It is a shame that MS will get through with this. They will be praised for improving the working conditions. Nobody will talk about the golden parachutes, xboxers will be happy until they realise that instead of getting more games they get less games, because there is not more but less competition.

I really enjoyed the demo, although I sucked. I tried to create something similar in dreams but I did not manage to tweak it in such a way that it was actually fun and not just frustrating. I would be interested if it is not overpriced.

Not sure whether it is due to the choice of colours or my bad eye sight, but I had a hard time to judge the distance of the ball once the ball was close.

@StylesT "...not just upgrades of existing games or tacked on vr modes...."
What is wrong with "tacked on" vr modes? GT7 and village are in my opinion very worthy psvr2 games. I rather have games in VR with AAA budgets (i.e. games which can also be played in flat) than games with 1/10th of the budget or less (i.e. a budget according to the player base).

It might be difficult (or a lot of work) to teach the AI to match the historic setting, or the eventually variable tone of the story.

As long as the AI ghostwriter is reviewed by a real author and it is not used for the entire script e.g. mostly for side quests or ambient "noise", I do not mind. It may give more time to the team to work on the main story line. For example in watch dogs most of what NPCs say does not matter, but is only there to give the the illusion of a living world. I could absolutely see an AI ghostwriter to be useful in such situation and improve the illusion.

Strange, I do not see a submit button.
Anyway:

• I love call of the mountain, village (despite not being a horror fan) and gt7. They are in my book all excellent games. Are they perfect ? No (e.g. there is room to improve the graphical fidelity of GT7, I dare to say; I don't understand why there is no free combat in call of the mountain, the story feels more like a side quest, and the smooth turning could be smoother; the world could be more interactive in village and I am not a big fan of the melee combat. But, If You look beyond these issues. They are all excellent. GT7 has a very addictive game loop, and is so much better in VR than in flat. I don't understand why anybody would prefer to play village in flat (excluding nausea). It looks fantastic. And call of the mountain was one of the few games I could not stop playing (it is presumably more an uncharted game or tomb raider than horizon, though). So, far I only have finished call of the mountain, and I just had my first "run" through the castle.
• kayak mirage looks beautiful, but I only have limited interest in its gameplay. I got it for the visuals.
• I like pistol whip, but besides the head haptics which are excellent, it is not so different from the psvr1 version, which was already very good.
• swordsman plays certainly better with sense than move controllers, but I still had the most fun with VR "sword" fighting in the dojo of vader immortal 1 on PSVR1
• after the fall plays much better with thumb sticks, but I still miss a better motivation (something which makes me want to explore the world e.g. a better story).
• I am undecided concerning runner. I was a bit disappointed by the soundtrack. I really liked the soundtrack of the trailer, which was the main motivation to actually buy it.
• I played the demo of tales from the galaxy's edge. I think I will like it besides its flaws, but it feels a bit pricey to me.

shocking! I personally think that some of the ubi-soft games are actually very enjoyable. Having said that, I enjoyed the most the more linear sections e.g. the opening of syndicate, the battle at the light house of Alexandria in origins, or in days gone the saw-mill quest. In these sections the local maps are designed in a more interesting way, the enemy encounters are more surprising, the dialog bits seem to matter more. I suppose, It is just too difficult, or better said too time consuming, to fill an open world in an interesting, meaningful way (either manually or with the help of sophisticated algorithms).

@Bricktop33 In the headset the game looks better than horizon zero dawn on ps4 to me, and better than shadow of the tomb raider or jedi fallen order. It clearly surpassed ps4 quality in my opinion. Though, the background (images) are a bit washed out. Not sure whether that is an artistic choice (e.g. to make the foreground stick out), or whether that is to avoid aliasing.

I don't quite understand why everybody things psvr2 is a failure if half life alyx is not coming to this platform. Although there are rumours that it will come, but anyway it is a valve exclusive title, so Valve may not have a huge interest to bring that to psvr2.

I would say it was a solid show, nothing ground breaking, though. But there cannot be something ground breaking in every show.

• synapse: the n-dreams title looked certainly cool, though it might be a bit shallow
• foundation: this looks very interesting, though it is difficult to judge from the trailer
• the ninja storm title looked pretty good, although presumably not a game for me.
  And then we have new trailers for already announced titles but still:
• Re4: Maybe people are not interested anymore in a Re4 remake. But, if there is Re8 like VR support ...
• tchia: looks very charming
• before your eyes: maybe not a title with mouth watering graphics, but certainly something very unique.
• humanity: also seems pretty unique, but it is hard to judge how it plays.
• green hell: to be seen how good it will look on psvr2, and maybe survival games are not everybody's taste

one nearly has the impression that there was some kind of pandemic for 2 years which delayed titles. Or that there was a beloved humble trillion dollar company which by bringing games to more people buys up the entire gaming industry, which somehow, surprisingly leads to less announcements on certain platforms.

Would not mind waiting a bit longer if they add a psvr2 mode. Please !

I presumably have no idea of how business works. But, I do not see how playstation will continue to do business in the same way as before with the remains of activision. I obviously have no idea since when sony knewn about the deal, or whether all of this is just some theater for the judges. But, I would say, sony will stop pumping money into cod (people call this typically "money hatting" i.e. paying for exclusive content). Either MS will take over sony's share, or the quality of cod will go down. Since there are contracts cod will stay on playstation for another few years. But, confidence is lost and cod will play a lesser role on playstation. Whether players will then move over to MS, or whether there will be an interesting enough alternative is to be seen.

This month I am only looking forward to play call of the mountain.

It is really difficult to satisfy people:

• "no psvr 1 backward compatibility" -> "What? I cannot play my old games on my shiny new (incompatible) hardware. Deal breaker!"
• a list with a lot of great old titles -> "What ? who wants to play these old titles on psvr2, i can play all of these elsewhere. Deal breaker!"

All the haters and pessimists completely ignore that this is not the lineup for the next 3 years but for the next 1-2 months. Of course it is possible that nothing but quest ports will be released after that. But, village and likely GT7 show that it should be possible to port flat games to PSVR2 without too many graphical downgrades. According to the reports Village looks identical or even better on PSVR2 than the flat version. Thus, from a technical point of view there should be little reason not to complement flat games with a VR mode. Whether that is economically interesting for developers is a different question.
Then there were COVID and the supply chain issues (presumably also impacted dev kit distrubution), which certainly delayed the developments.
Clearly if there is nothing compelling on this list. It makes sense to wait and see whether psvr2 will be supported. On the other hand if nobody buys the headset, there is also no reason for developers to support it.