@RogerRoger haha cheers but I really am a n00b at excel. It looks pretty but in terms of execution, you only arrive at "elegant" solutions when you have to do a lot of a single task. When something becomes laborious, you look it up or ask a friend and find a better way to do it.
The best way to learn it is to have something to do on it. Unfortunately there is not much call for me to make spreadsheets in my life so I haven't learned a lot and there is a lot more to be learned!
I honestly don't think I'll get through it by May. I'm going to start with the AAA games because they are typically <8 hours and have a low difficulty. I also expect a lot of games to be trash or not my cup of tea so I would hope that I have the inclination to put them down after a few hours and cross them off the list.
Currently I think I will only renew if the sub becomes available for £30 on sale. I'm not keen on doing it because I barely play online and the monthly games have resulted in this behemoth of a spreadsheet. When I let it lapse last year, I felt a cold wave of relief wash over me at the loss of such an extensive and uninteresting back log so it's a bit of a mixed bag. I have to balance the satisfaction of getting my money's worth against the economy of my own available time!
@ralphdibny I just renewed for the year, fortunately had a discount code, and usually they pop up a few times a year. I feel the pressure to keep my sub active so I can dip into the IGC at will, even though like you I scarcely use the online gaming. I do have cloud saves, which is nice. And I might buy a game in the current sale and save a few dollars due to membership — usually take advantage of a PS+ related sale 2-3 times a year. So there’s $10-15 in saving per year.
Speaking of, if you let yours lapse, don’t forget to download your cloud backups onto a storage device or something.
“We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.”
@Th3solution honestly I've never made a point to use the cloud saves. I always turn them off on PS3 games and never used them on PS4 even though I think they automatically save to the cloud.
I'm probably quite lucky that the hardware hasn't failed on me - I really should do back ups. But if I start here then where does it end? 😅 It will get quite expensive if I start doing back ups of the 10tb hard drive on my PC and various other hard drives!
But yeah that pressure really does suck. You kind of don't want to miss out on something just in case. On the flip side, I dislike having a monthly game I was planning to buy on disc because it gives me less incentive to buy it. There's very few games that I feel I've "discovered" through PS Plus but I'm glad I did. Stuff like Anna, Darkstalkers Resurrection, Torquel, The Bridge, even Just Cause 3. That small amount is probably not worth the sub for me. There might be some more gems in my list though!
I guess I have taken advantage of the PS Plus discounts on the store. I know the price is gold and it gives you a breakdown but I never really check it. If it's a game I want at a decent price I'll just buy it so I have no idea how much value I've got out of that aspect of it. It always seems like a false economy to pay a sub to gain access to discounts so as opposed to the instant game collection, online play and cloud saves which I think are the crux of PS Plus, they are what you pay for, the store discounts always seemed like a "perk" to me.
I've had discussions with people about what PS Plus is and what you pay for and what is "free". I've strongly disagreed with the use of the word "free" when it comes to the IGC so I won't blame you if you disagree with me about the discounts being a perk rather than a paid service!
It is a weird one though, I hate that Amazon touts "free delivery" as part of their Prime membership. It's not free, you pay £80 a year for it! I'd really think our government here in the UK would crack down on nonsense like that, they are normally quite strict about false advertising but I imagine that Amazon is in their pockets so they probably won't do anything about it lol
@ralphdibny I’m usually pretty conscientious to not call the PS+ IGC games “free”, although it really is a matter of semantics. “There is no such thing as a free lunch” in the grand scheme of things anyways, much less, as you say, there a fairly direct cost a member is paying for access to the games. I guess they get around this because as a matter of fact, historically speaking, the PS Plus membership was designed simply to pay for online access. That’s it. That’s what you’re technically paying for. PS Plus was started as a competitor to Xbox Live service that was the charge for online access on the green team, but Sony added the “bonus” of a downloadable game at no extra charge monthly. Of course, then Microsoft had to respond and then they started including “Games with Gold”, or whatever it is they call their version of the “Instant Game Collection” or aka “free” PS Plus games. So, again it’s semantics, but the games are “free” from Sony’s point of reference because the charge is for the online gaming.
Anyways, from the consumer’s point of view, there is a cost to access the games so they aren’t “free.” Just like Netflix doesn’t let you stream movies for “free.” However Amazon Prime I think you technically are paying for the shipping so the access to the movies and music is touted as “free.” I’m not sure.
But I think I need to put the word in quotes just one more time. I’m going for a record: “free”
There. I did it. 😂
As far as cloud saves, you can disable the automatic backup saves actually. So you may not be utilizing it, depending on your PS4’s settings. And come to think of it, in all the years of having PS Plus, I’ve never had to use my cloud saves as a way to recoup a hard drive failure, but I’ve used it a couple times as a way to cheese the system in order to get a trophy or something. It’s pretty useful for that, but exceedingly rare circumstance.
@Th3solution I thought online gaming was free on the PS3, I never had to pay for it and I didn't sub to Plus until a year or two after I got my PS4. I remember the adverts for Plus on the PS3 but I could never really work out what it was but I am sure it was just access to games and discounts when it first started and changed to include the online gaming when the PS4 came out. I could be wrong though!
I don't think Sony touts the IGC as free at least, its just third party websites that say things like "free games in March are:" etc.
Amazon is a weird one, the next day delivery portion of it was something like £60 and when they added Prime Video, the price increased to £80. I cant remember if there was an option to have one or the other or indeed if there still is. Honestly I just dont like Amazon at all though, despite the fact that I order from them quite a lot. For games at least, prices are rarely as low as other websites. I often receive damaged goods from them too. Their customer service is shockingly bad and really hard to get a hold of e.g. Download an app>talk to a bot>talk to a human bot that copy and pastes a script and doesn't understand english.
So yeah, I kind of just don't like how they got to the position of being the largest online seller by being cheap and having good customer service but now that they are there, having crushed all their competition, their customer service has gone to pot, damaged items are frequently sent out and not to mention the various worker related controversies that they have been reported to be involved in.
But yeah even if you add quotation marks to the word "free", its still a lot better than just saying free by itself! You get to use the easy to remember term but demonstrate its debatable inaccuracy by adding the quotes. Honestly, I wish I could perceive the IGC as free - then I wouldn't have to worry about getting my moneys worth by playing all these games!
@ralphdibny
You are correct. Playing games online on the Playstation 3 is and has always been free.
When ps+ was first introduced it was to provide subscribers with games every month. They added other incentives as the service grew, such as saved games being automatically uploaded. And then when the PS4 arrived, Sony made ps+ mandatory to be able to play most games online.
@LieutenantFatman that's good to know. Weirdly, I was just looking for a way to buy Darkstalkers Resurrection to keep even though I have it claimed through plus and I found an instance on the PS Blog where they describe the games as free. I don't/didn't frequent the PS Blog so I didn't know that. On the PS Store, I've only ever seen the games referred to as "monthly games".
@ralphdibny
Yeah, just a matter of semantics really but I guess it could be potentially misleading using the word free.
If you ever fancy some matches of Darkstalkers Resurrection btw, let me know. I'm not particularly good but always wanted to play against someone else.
@LieutenantFatman yeah could do! I just added you (assuming your PSN is the same as your username 😅, if not then God knows who I've added!) Hopefully it's come through, I did it from my PS3 because I'm currently getting merked by some baddies in the furnace area of God of War Ascension!
@ralphdibny@LieutenantFatman Well, shows you what I know. 😅 Disregard that whole paragraph I posted of falsehoods.
I could have sworn PS+ was designed primarily as online gaming charge. I remember that online was free for a long time on PS3 and it was a point of much squabbling between the Xbox fans who were having to pay for Live services and the PlayStation fans who got the PSN for free. (Although XBox Live always seemed to function much more stable) Then when Sony started charging for online the Xbox guys all pointed and laughed that they had to start paying too. But the inclusion of IGC games helped to cushion the blow of paying for online gaming. I think I just fabricated that in my memory and forgot that it was actually the other way around and the service was developed simply as a club to get “free” games and online was tacked on later as a benefit. I wasn’t a member at the time until PS4, so I just remember hearing about it.
@Th3solution the perception of it is different from person to person! It's really not worth getting into an argument with anyone over. I'm always going to fall on the consumer side of things. I'm so extreme in that regard that I consider a pre-order bonus/extra goodies to be part of what you are paying for, I had a disagreement with the UK Nintendo store over this before lol. Why would anyone pay a premium to order from a certain store unless there is some added value which therefore progresses into that added value being priced at the difference between what the two retailers charge. Seems logical to me! You get what you pay for and nothing in life is free are two common phrases that I agree with (there are plenty of phrases I don't agree with that others might which again comes down to personal perception!). Anyway, I bet you can tell I'm just the life and soul of the party 🙄 haha
@ralphdibny Agreed and I’m with you. There is always a cost, whether seen or unseen. And value is inherently subjective too. Price and cost is objective, but value is in the eye of the beholder.
Video game economics is murky. The price of games have been held in check for a while at $60 but simultaneously we get half finished products, carved out DLC that is sold back to us later, microtransactions, loot boxes, etc, etc. They make their money somehow. And if not, then it’s coming from other sources — in game product placement, publisher or retailer deals, market share jockeying, etc, etc.
Speaking of price, cost, and value — I was just admiring the Returnal trailer and then saw the comments was filled with ire about the game because it’s $70. I mean, sure it may not be worth it, we don’t know yet, but I feel inclined to respect Sony for asking the price they feel it’s worth, rather than hiding microtransactions or DLC or upgrades, etc. We’ll see when the reviews drop but it’s getting a bad rap unfairly, I think. As opposed to the questionable pricing structure of annualized sports games that people fall over themselves to pay full price for, year after year. More power to them I guess, if that’s their passion, but personally I value a new IP that gives us a novel experience over a reskin of a game that comes out yearly and will be outdated in 3 months.
@Th3solution haha that reminds me of my other favourite saying "I'll believe it when I see it". I think I'm way too cynical about certain things but I find it really hard to get excited about new games. There's very few games (and hardware) I'd pay full price for, normally it would be have to be in a series I absolutely love for me to go all out. Even then I'd be put off if it had a season pass and I'd have to wait for a "complete edition". I still haven't bought Mortal Kombat 11 and Street Fighter V for that very reason! With hardware, having been stung by the Xbox 360, I always wait a year or two for some quiet revisions to iron out the bugs and a price drop...except for Nintendos, I have a bad habit of buying Nintendos not long after release 😅
But yeah it does seem unfair to bag on a game before release. Price not withstanding, unless the Dev has a bad rep, you just can't know if a game is going to be good or not until it's in your hands! My cynicism goes both way in that instance, future releases are neither good or bad until they've been played. You might call that optimism or uh, just unbridled (and wholly dull) neutrality! 😅
I remember being on a job a number of years back and someone was telling me how good Guardians of the Galaxy was going to be based on the first trailer. He seemed really offended that I wouldn't buy into the hype. Obviously the film came and I ended up loving it but I don't regret remaining neutral until that time came. I'm normally more polite if responding to enthusiasm but I was more persistent with that guy because he was so insistent that I get excited as if it was a matter of honour or something lol.
That being said, I am quite excited of the prospect of that new Tesla they are releasing next year, even if it's like 150k out of my price range - which shows how poor I am! If they are saying it's got something like a 620 mile range before recharging that is on par with and better than a lot of petrol vehicles. If that becomes the norm and the price is reduced then we are one step closer to get ridding of our gas guzzlers. For every day use that is, I have a high respect for car enthusiasts that want to keep certain cars, especially classic cars. Those users will be a drop in the ocean (or is that the atmosphere?) though when school runs and work commutes are taking place in electric cars.
I'm not into those sports games but then again, I'm not into sports. It's a weird one, I don't like to insult and I also want to respect the games people choose to play (for the most part). There's plenty of gamers on this site with a varied palette that seem to also enjoy those sports games but in comparison, out of my real life friends it is much more divided. The bigger gamers in both playtime and variety (out of my friends) disregard those games (and COD) whereas my friends who are less of an enthusiast/hobbyist seem to only play FIFA and COD. It's funny that maybe 10-15 years ago, you might describe a 1337 COD online gamer to be a "hardcore" gamer but these days it seems to be quite the opposite! I don't mind the campaigns of COD and I'll play them if they get added to PS Plus or are unique like the Wii versions (Wii zapper ftw! 😂) but I'll never get into the online part of it, unless of course it's for socialising with a friend who has moved away or something.
I've always looked at the games you get with ps plus as free, that is the way I've always seen them labelled having joined it shortly after I got a ps4. I've never paid full RRP so always feel I get good value from it. Think i paid 30 quid for it last time for a year.
Life is more fun when you help people succeed, instead of wishing them to fail.
Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt.
I still think it's a pretty good value for money, even though some argue we get less than we did earlier*. Being a Switch Online member, has certainly made me more appreciative of anything PS Plus. :')
I don't fully believe this is true. The PS Plus collection is pretty nice for PS5 owners.
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