theheadofabroom

theheadofabroom

Disabled Ex-Dev with shiny new PS5

Comments 1,551

Re: Updated PS5 Model Registered in Japan

theheadofabroom

Could be adding support for a new WiFi standard that won't be relevant for another 5 years, could be reduced Bluetooth latency, could be literally just cutting costs by using a new single chip that replaces 4 or 5 discrete components from the launch model.

It has to be something that makes it worth the costs of retooling factories, but beyond that, without a press release or a teardown, who knows?

Re: PS5, PS4 Exclusives Will 'Deteriorate' if Launched on PS Plus, Says Sony CFO

theheadofabroom

@SplooshDmg always fun to watch.

Nobody really knows how to make a runaway success. I've worked places whereas their first of second thing was huge and then they spent a decade trying to recapture the magic, spending the money they gained from their success and not wanting to take the risks they did first time around. (Spoiler alert: trying to recapture the magic usually ends with redundancies. You're much better taking risks and trying something new)

It's easy to spot that something's bad, but when when it's good, for online stuff you have no idea what the community will do with it, what it'll become.

Re: PS Store Extended Play Sale Flogs Pricey PS5, PS4 Ultimate Editions

theheadofabroom

@Dudditz09 also trying to exercise self-control for Empire of Sin.

@The_Moose XCom 2 is definitely worth the money, as is War of the Chosen. It follows a failed run of the first game, so you don't really have to be that familiar with it. My only pause for thought is that if you have a PC that will play it, then it's probably better bought on Steam so you get access to the extensive library of mods to expand your experience once you've beaten the vanilla gameplay (i.e. what's available on console)

Re: Rumour: New Mafia Game in Development, Is a Prequel to the Trilogy

theheadofabroom

@Santifa Clay unlikable? Compared to Vito, the only protagonist in the series who got into it just for the money and the glamour? IDK man, I liked Clay a lot, almost as much as my old friend Tommy 😉

Also having played both versions (I bought them all on PC first when they came out, except the remake which I bought through the trilogy on PlayStation), the console edition of 3 was rough, I think all three are kinda better on PC if I'm honest.

Re: Feature: What's Next for PS5, PS4?

theheadofabroom

I voted GoW:R, but really I'm looking forward to all of the top 3. I don't really care about showcases, but the GoW reboot was excellent, I'm looking forward to playing a few of the games announced already with the new Plus tiers, and VR2 is getting some hype within the industry, which is always a good sign.

Re: Hands On: Sifu's New Difficulty Settings are a Superb Addition

theheadofabroom

@Gunnerzaurus difficulty levels area blunt tool that allows some games to be more accessible to people with some disabilities. That much is a fact. They're not enough for everyone, they're not needed by everyone, but they do help a lot of people.

I am disabled. I also run a Discord server for other disabled people. @Richnj's points are perfectly in line with points a number of my server's members have made. It's not too late to admit you're wrong.

They're are a lot of different ways that the human experience varies, and point I've made myself is that if your aim as a developer is to provide your players with a certain level of challenge, you absolutely cannot do that without tailoring each player's session to how they experience the world, because each player has their own level of skill and their own level of impairment, and so their perception of difficulty will be different when presented with the same stimulus requiring the same inputs. Otherwise you're not making it hard enough for some, and you're making it far too easy for others. As mentioned elsewhere, finer grained control of difficulty such as that in Fallen Order and Forbidden West give the best player experience, but obviously having 3 set levels is less work for the studio.

Re: Hands On: Sifu's New Difficulty Settings are a Superb Addition

theheadofabroom

@Gelly they had a vision which will have been heavily compromised to get the game out of the door within a reasonable timeframe. If difficulty levels weren't a cut feature then I doubt it would have been coded in a way that allowed them to be added so quickly.

I have worked in games too, as a Developer, a Tools Programmer, an SDET, and originally as a QA tester. I've been in many types of meetings with pretty much all the stakeholders at some point and I've seen how things work.

The features released this close to the initial release are almost certainly things that were supposed to be part of the game, but had to be cut because there wasn't enough time to fully balance and test everything.

Re: Hands On: Sifu's New Difficulty Settings are a Superb Addition

theheadofabroom

@badbob001 that's the ideal for sure, I use these in games like Horizon and Fallen Order to make sure that even if I struggle with, say, getting the timing on stuff just right, I'm still going up against the full moveset of enemies, still having to overcome everything, just with slightly more forgiving timing/health/whatever option it gives me on that front

Re: Sony Dumps Funds into Live Service Software Firm

theheadofabroom

@BoldAndBrash my avatar isn't any logo, it's a cartoonised photo of my face while wearing a cloth mask. I enjoyed the GTA games back when I was a teenager (SA came out when I was 16/17 and I loved it), but honestly they're just kinda annoying now that I've grown up a bit. My point was exactly that it's not either/or. There are plenty of companies out there still making stuff that's low-brow and deliberately offensive which appeal to the GTA crowd, and it's great that Sony are making sure that other gamers are covered too.

Re: Sony Dumps Funds into Live Service Software Firm

theheadofabroom

@BoldAndBrash I'm not sure how you can call them inoffensive when they get folks like you in such a tizzy? They're appealing to a broader set of tastes that they used to, and it's not like you can't still find plenty of games made with 16-25yo edgelords as their target demographic.

Re: Embracer Group to Buy Multiple Square Enix Studios and IPs in Huge Acquisition

theheadofabroom

I'm glad it's not a console-manufacturer and I'm glad these franchises might get some new games finally.

I don't think $300,000,000 is that low when with weigh the value of under-utilised IP (which SE constantly say underperform) against the liabilities of a large studio like that which likely doesn't have anything meaningful in production. Staff are, in business terms, a liability, as 1,200 heads it's likely to mean a yearly salary somewhere in the range of $60,000,000 - $180,000,000 plus other on-costs (licenses for professional creative software tend to be per-seat, and also eye-watering). Then you've got any existing debts, etc etc.

It's likely that the IP would have gone for more in its own, but that either there's some sort of legal agreement where some of it belongs to the studios, or neither party wanted to make 1,200 people redundant.

Re: Poll: Are You Happy with Your PS Plus Games for May 2022?

theheadofabroom

@Flaming_Kaiser yeah, I can see Americans referring to American Football as just "Football", but to proclaim it as the only "real" football is a bit rich. I'll entertain arguments about whether Rugby Football or Association Football get that title.

Association Football at least has the purest "the foot is what touches the ball" essence, while Rugby Football is the oldest standardised form of the game, from which American Football derived, and it's not uncommon for players in any position to kick the ball.

Also Rugby players don't bother with all that ridiculous padding that just results in traumatic brain injuries /half-joking

It feels like it could have been better if American Football had called itself American Rugby, because at least then it shares something in common, and we'd just be asking, "yeah, but League, Union, or American?"

Re: All DualSense PS5 Controller Colours

theheadofabroom

@Rural-Bandit I might even just buy whatever's cheapest and spray it - I want to keep the ones that came with the console stock in case I have any issues and need to send it in, so they're staying white.

As for the house, that's the idea. We're trying to find a bungalow or a cottage, I've spoken before about being disabled, it would be nice to be all on one floor so I'm not having to plan everything around managing to get up and down the stairs. A lift would be an option too, but given our budget and needing to be commutable to where my partner works, we're unlikely to get enough space while still having the budget to do building work.

Re: Best PS5 SSD 2022: Boost Your PS5 Storage Capacity

theheadofabroom

@SystemAddict IIRC it's actually one of the fastest SSDs on the market, mostly because you only get up to 1TB per NAND chip, so they need 8 of them, which is the most you can fit on a card, with all the parallel access benefits that brings when paired with a decent memory controller.

Re: Cyberpunk 2077 Dev Reassures Fans That Expansions Are in the Works

theheadofabroom

@Americansamurai1 the early game is particularly weak, but if you keep at it then it rises to the lofty heights of "fine". By the time you've hit level 20 you're starting to get some interesting skills and some legendary gear, and it's almost interesting?

I'm at level 34 and some of the later side content is good. One or two of the characters are interesting and well fleshed out. I guess some people will have strong feelings either way about how often this game is horny on main?

Re: PS3 Emulation Allegedly in Production for PS5

theheadofabroom

I could see them getting a limited amount of the PS3 library, the games that didn't make the most of the architecture, working well on the PS5, but I'm pretty sure there will be games which will only run with serious regressions in performance.

If they do this just for PS Plus Ultimate or whatever they're calling it, they can be selective about the library they offer, as well as making sure that remasters and remakes of some of the games which don't make it are included.

If they just roll it out and say you can play your old games, but only these ones - they're going to have a messaging nightmare.

Re: PlayStation Boss Promises More Acquisitions Are Planned

theheadofabroom

@Rural-Bandit Eh It's basic game theory though: if you have a bunch of entities harmoniously coexisting then everything's fine, but as soon as one of them starts absorbing others, it makes sense for everyone else to absorb anything they can to grow to a size that can't be absorbed by a competitor.

Ultimately this is why without regulation, such as by strict competition authorities, capitalism inevitably leads to monopolies. If the state will not step in and say enough is enough, Sony and Microsoft are going to have to continue to acquire anything and everything they can, else lose any competitive advantage they have. Before Microsoft bought Bethesda things were going at a sustainable pace. Now that one of them has started throwing billions at the market, the gloves are off and neither can afford to stand down.

Re: Random: Ratchet & Clank's Rivet Was Nearly Also Named Ratchet

theheadofabroom

I could dig them both being called Ratchet, but every other variation there is objectively worse than Rivet.

Ratchette would have been pretty terrible, given how 'ratchet' is a word and 'ratchette' isn't - it definitely sets her up as a mere variant rather than the protagonist of the franchise in a different universe.

Re: PS5's DualSense Dubbed the Best Controller of All Time in Public Vote

theheadofabroom

It's the most comfortable controller I've ever used, and very feature rich, but I also never got stick drift on my Steam Controller, despite the gulf in build quality. My launch day controller is still going strong having been relegated to spare after 7 months use, but the midnight black is back with Sony due to left stick issues.

On the one hand its had over 1500 hours of play, but on the other hand my trusty Steam Controller has done 5 or 6 times that despite sounding like it was going to fall apart on day 1.

Re: Talking Point: What Are You Playing This Weekend? - Issue 419

theheadofabroom

After finally picking up the platinum for Horizon Forbidden West this week, I've picked up Cyberpunk 2077 for the first time, and it's... Fine?

It's not a broken mess, and it's not a masterpiece (but I wasn't expecting that). It just feels like a much older game, and I was expecting something that felt like an improvement on Deus Ex: Mankind Divided? Instead it just feels kinda bland. As I say, it's fine.

Re: Hogwarts Legacy PS5, PS4 Has the Unforgivable Avada Kedavra Killing Curse

theheadofabroom

@TheMadRabbid it's all good, this is the internet, misunderstandings happen.

While I'm cis myself, I hang around in a lot of intersectional spaces (mostly with other disabled people, but given how anyone can be disabled, it tends to be pretty diverse), and it's amazing how many problems there are with the world building in question, from so many different angles, once you understand the only inbuilt prejudices. I shan't get into it too much lest it's deemed off topic and deleted, but feel free to hit me up on PSN, same username as here.

Re: Talking Point: What Are You Playing This Weekend? - Issue 417

theheadofabroom

75 hours into Horizon Forbidden West and while I'm pretty sure there's only one main mission left, the statistics screen says I'm only 70% complete - still plenty of side-content I don't want to miss out on before I put the game down and wait for the DLC.

Edit: I'm not unconvinced at this rate that I will eventually have enough points to upgrade everything. I currently have everything except the skills for two weapons I don't really use, and a load of valor surges. I've figured out I'd need to spend 101 more points to finish everything, and there are plenty of side quests and errands waiting to be finished.

Re: 13 Per Cent of Horizon Forbidden West Players Have Finished the Story on PS5, PS4

theheadofabroom

@ATaco ah the helmets are when I started using the penetrating arrows, before that I was just using standard sharpshot arrows, and one to the head did fine. With the helmets I switched it up to use the penetrating arrows and the weapon skill that does extra zoom and damage, and I was still getting one shot kills.

Silent strike is probably the way to do it, but I prefer the sniper way of doing it: get up high, locate the leader using the focus, scan the surrounding area, picking them off along with anyone with line-of-sight to the leader. Then I glide in, snatch the dog tags, and escape with the rest of the camp none the wiser.

It feels like the smart play, and really what human can take two arrows through the skull?

Re: Horizon Forbidden West Update 1.07 Is Available Now, Here Are the Patch Notes

theheadofabroom

The only bug that's really bothering me is the Metal Flower/Firegleam bug, but not because of those - it bothers me because it also seems to affect Greenshine. When I set to track the materials for an upgrade which needs a slab of the stuff, it keeps guiding me to sites I've already taken it from, which means scrambling to some barely accessible location only for it to turn out empty.

I have faith they'll fix it soon enough, it just obviously prevents me from playing around with weapon variety as much as I'd like, as without upgrades a lot of them aren't really viable compared to what I'm already using.