We all liked it. There’s a temptation to for us to drop a big fat shrugging emoji at the end of that opening sentence, but a far cry from the frustrated murmurs you’ll find on popular forums, we thought the latest State of Play was solid. It wasn’t mind-blowing; it didn’t leave us gasping for air like E3 2015. But as a 20 minute advertorial on upcoming PlayStation products – sure, that was worth the watch.
This was a much better curated episode than previous instalments. While tastes will naturally vary, we reckon there was a good spread of software, demonstrating the diversity of the PS4 in its twilight years. Indie titles like Humanity, Wattam, Afterparty, and Arise: A Simple Story deserved the spotlight, and we appreciated the way they were given the same billing as blockbusters like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare.
The star attraction was obviously The Last of Us: Part II, and as a precursor for Outbreak Day, the release date and story trailer was greatly appreciated. Civilization VI may not be the biggest announcement in the world, but it’s a welcome one – and the two shadow drops in L.A. Noire: The VR Case Files and the MediEvil demo will keep us occupied over the weekend. We’d argue the PlayStation VR montage – which focused on a handful of upcoming games – was the only real weak part.
In terms of format, it’s clear that Sony has been listening to feedback, as it trimmed the chatter to a minimum and focused on the content. The transitions are beginning to border on Nintendo Direct plagiarism, but we’d all agree that the House of Mario’s got this entire thing down to a fine art now, so why not borrow from the best? There’s obviously a way to go before State of Play even comes close to rivalling its competitor’s livestream series, but there’s no reason it can’t get there.
Maybe introducing this means of communication at the tail end of a generation where news is light was a bad idea, but there was really nothing wrong with yesterday’s State of Play besides poorly calibrated expectations. This was a well curated broadcast with a wide spread of content; we liked it, and we’re looking forward to the next one.
What did you think of the latest State of Play? Were you satisfied with the spread of content? What was your favourite game shown? Don't depress us in the comments section below.
Comments 89
Wheres my Batman announcement???
Poorly calibrated expectations after this?
https://www.pushsquare.com/news/2019/09/sonys_taking_next_weeks_state_of_play_seriously
"new game reveals, new content from PlayStation’s Worldwide Studios, and a host of other updates"
Sure there were a couple new game reveals. There was an update for PS+, and TLOUP2, and a new bundle for Death Stranding...and an update on Wattam and PSVR...
What was the new reveal from worldwide studios exactly?
In truth I was tired and didn't bother watching Live but catching up today I neither feel disappointed or excited. It feels like there was too much foreshadowing of everything and it was clear TLOU was going to be the big update. Everything else was speculation.
We are months away from a probable new hardware reveals - there just isn't going to be that much to show.
@Get2Sammyb I agree I'm a little surprised with the (perceived) negativity too. Seemed quite snappy with no game out staying its welcome.
From a personal standpoint, probably the main highlights were Afterparty for the indies, Medievil demo & obv. TLOU2.
Indies are always going to be subjective in appeal depending if you like what it is eg: platformer, shooter etc. And Switch unfortunately tends to grab the lions share marketing them in their directs as esp. with Sony not having its own ID@XB or Nindies type focus anymore.
Same with PS plus/VR,...i own TLOU & baseball has as much appeal as PES would've a cple months ago!
BUT that is my point-I think they tried to give a nod to Indies/VR, 3rd parties with Civ 6/COD & rounded it off with their big gun with TLOU2.
TLOU2 will be day 1 buy (hopefully),but I doubt anything would dissuade me unless it suddenly turned into an online Destinty mmo shooter thingy!
Nice assumption, but for many people it wasn't about unrealistic expectations. The problem was that the games that were announced were not our cup of tea and the rest were already announced games.
@Knuckles-Fajita It says "new content from Worldwide Studios", which there was. :shrug:
The folks at Twitch who were watching fell asleep until they saw Ellie's face.
Folks at pushsquare were more or less disappointed by the lack of anything new that, you know, actually mattered.
But Sammy liked it, so, "it was good".
Wow. Just wow.
Spoiled brat gamers are a diseased plague.
@rockertherockgod It'll be interesting to see when and where that's announced. Looking forward to it.
@naruball I mean, that's fine. I think there was a good mix of stuff that was all high quality, though. Judging from your post it seems like you were expecting big new announcements, though?
@Nickolaidas What kind of announcements would, you know, "actually matter" to you? It was only 20 minutes long so the folks on Twitch must have terrible attention spans if they can't keep their eyes open that long. Or they could choose to watch a different commercial if they prefer?
I think it was a competent State of Play. Maybe some people have just not accepted as yet that we are at that point in the console generation that not everything is going to be a banger third party announcement or first party tentpole. Those days for this generation are quickly shrinking in the mirror. That said, we should all remember that we've had arguably some of the best gaming experiences this generation, especially from the PlayStation camp, and look forward to what's coming next from all the platform holders.
I called it. People expect a mini E3 every time haha
Idk, I only really was interested in Wattam and Afterparty. I think after the last Nintendo Direct being that good, I expected Sony to up their game but it’s the end of the PS4’s lifetime and Switch has many years left.
I am so happy Civ 6 is coming to ps4.... Here it goes again me play for 6 hrs straight forward. Goodbye night sleeps
@nessisonett
To be fair. It was teased on and on by so.many people the state of play would show off TLOU2. If people aren't happy with the delivery its too bad.
The show is good, not great but just good.
With no E3 presence and borderline silence for months, yeah, expectations were high, of course they were. Sony made it out to be something exciting and it missed the mark in spectacular fashion
The problem with state of plays is the fact that they're too short. 5-6 trailers and that's it. So unless 2-3 of said trailers are games you absolutely want to see, disappointment is more or less guaranteed.
I remember the time people were going 'a TLOU2 tease and Sony wins E3' haha
Weird
I don't think expectations were unrealistic. If Sony's holding almost everything back for a next-gen release presentation, they it shouldn't even be doing SoP presentations right now. Having a show implies you have something to present to people. Why not a deeper dive into TLOU? Or a new Death Stranding trailer? Or more information on Concrete Genie? Instead we got a demo announcement (good, by the way; a highlight of the presentation), a new TLOU Part II trailer, and then a bunch of games I've practically already forgotten about (especially disappointed by the game from the Katamari guy; what the heck was that even supposed to be?)
The biggest thing missing was an element of surprise. One of the best changes in Nintendo's Direct format is their tendency now to surprise the audience with "one last thing" each time. Sometimes these announcements are good enough to partially salvage an otherwise forgettable Direct. Not everyone will like every announcement, but it's always fun to have the best announcement of the night to look forward to at the end of the presentation.
The format is on point, though, as with recent Nintendo Directs, which keep the prattling to a minimum and just focus on a rapidfire series of announcements. So nice not to have to sit through ten minutes of Muppet gags/people talking about yarn/etc. during recent E3 presentations.
would appriciate if they would put some own ideas in the format instead of just blatantly copying nintendo's format
My personal issue was that with the games announced, I had no clue what was actually meant to be happening in them. Humanity for example, it was not entirely clear to me what was actually happening. I just saw two hoardes of zombies (based on how they moved and fell) running into each other. Wattam is a similar case.
Arise: A Simple Story whilst looking pretty, did not really get me interested in wanting to know more. For some reason, it feels like similar games with the same idea have already been made.
VR was irrelevant, although that is on me rather than Sony due to personal preferences.
The Last of Us 2, and I know I am going to get downvoted for this, but honestly, I could not care less. I did not like the ending to the first one, and even then, didn't feel like it needed a sequel.
The only real thing that I found good was a demo for MediEvil and announcement for Civ VI being released. Although I have never played MediEvil, the fact that there is a demo makes me interested in trying it out. Civ VI was a genuine surprise which I wasn't expecting.
In short, I think the big issue for me is that what was shown was either something we already knew about, or was not well explained with no real surprises at all. Perhaps for me it would of been best to wait until they start talking about the PS5.
@arnoldlayne83 i played A LOT of Civ Rev last gen
Nothing really for me, The Last of Us 2 looks just like you’d expect and I’m not a huge fan of the series. I’ll get it for sure, but I wasn’t ever looking forward to more footage or confirmation that it was (obviously) coming out next year. What else? Medievil demo is pretty cool.
Roll on PS5
I have only one complaint: where is the release date of Iron MAN VR?
i didn't have unrealistic expectations i just don't have any interest in artsy indie titles, i don't have a VR, i never liked the Civ games and i'm not interested in The Last of Us 2
so what did that leave Modern Warfare? so for me it was a bad showing
@kyleforrester87 yea at this point as far as exclusives are concerned....Concrete Genie and FF7 are my most excited. I really enjoyed TLoU and will get 2 for sure. But im not 11/10 hype. I know its gonna be awesome.
@FullbringIchigo well...cant please everyone. Hoping for a Batman announcement i take it?
@manu0 its short, concise and to the point. To change something for the sake of it seems silly if Nintendo has a proven format that works
@Nyne11Tyme while a Batman announcement would have been cool i never thought it would be on a State of Play video, WB will announce that themselves probably on social media or YouTube, they wouldn't do it on a PS4 update video, or a XB1 update video either
i was hoping for a bit of info on Ghost of Tsushima though, maybe even a release date
This was full of info that had been leaked already and very little else.
I went into this with low expectations and expecting to be underwhelmed and I was.
@FullbringIchigo gotcha. Will sony so far ahead i think it would be safe to drop Batman on State of Play. Chances are Sony will have something exclusive for the next one anyways. With Spidey being a phenom on the platform and Iron Man VR looking sweet i think Sony wants the "super herostation" title as well lol. I mean Infamous was the precursor to all this imo
@gamer89 oh thanx for info. Lol. To bad i responded already
I don't really think it was worth watching, if I'm honest. I watched it, and I feel like I could have used that time more wisely by doing pretty much anything else. It's not that it was bad. I'm not sitting here angrily typing PlayStation Sucks! into Twitter hoping someone will listen. But these State of Plays have yet to really justify themselves as far as I'm concerned.
Last night's honestly could have been a Tweet with the release date for The Last of Us and I'm not sure we'd have missed much.
@LocalPenguin They hyped it because TLOU was been shown. They didn't promise anything else.
@Nyne11Tyme you know i'm quite surprised they didn't try to get some form of advertisement deal for the upcoming Avengers game
I bet I'm not the only here ignoring this kind of events. When the games will arrive, we'll see them for what they really are. This is just some kind of a party for the marketing departments.
Yes, I'm getting old.
Q. What did you think of the latest State of Play? Were you satisfied with the spread of content?
A. I didn't watch it and I don't really care about the spread of content which I missed.
If I see an available game, which I'm interested in, I buy it. It's as simple as that, and it also saves a lot of personal time by not watching self-promoting, corporate spin shows.
To be fair, sites like this (which I love, don't get me wrong) and others are important cogs in the hype machine for these events and help to ramp it up. It stands to reason that there will be people who read into it all that are left with a "meh" feeling afterwards.
@andreoni79 You posted just before I did. As you can see, you're not alone with your views.
After three of these State of Plays, I'm just not sure Sony are a good fit for this format. Like Shawn Layden once said, they have a real knack for showmanship. Sometimes it works (E3 2016) and sometimes it doesn't (E3 2018), but almost all of their big live conferences this gen have been very impressive. I just don't think they've found a way to translate that excitement to this pre-recorded presentation format. I've liked all three State of Plays to varying degrees, but I miss the live stuff with an audience and big massive reveals. I hope they drop this State of Play thing next year, and go back to conferences at E3, Gamescom, and TGS.
Please forgive the long essay.
I really enjoyed it. My only issue was that they rolled straight in with Call of Duty. I could almost feel eyes rolling across the internet. That would have been better placed mid-way through the show imo
@get2sammyb "unrealistic expectations"
And who's fault is that? Sony announces a 20 minute trailer a week in advance, of course people are going to have expectations. Who says - "Get ready for a show next week" unless they have something outstanding to show? Nintendo only announces theirs these days 24-48 hours in advance, and even that is too much sometimes. The whole 20 minutes could have just been dropped on Youtube w/o warning. How many more sales is that CoD section going to get for CoD? If "Story mode" was a PS4 exclusive, multiplayer only on XBox, then Id' say it was a big deal and expect it in a SoP.
Now, if you want to complain about people over-complaining on social media, death threats and all that, well I'm behind you 100%, even if the show sucks nobody needs a death threat or personal insults or to be fired (not really sure if that was an issue with this) over 20 minutes over boredom. But Sony basically told people - "Be here at exactly this time and give us 20 minutes of your undivided time." - so if people want to complain b/c Sony over-promoted a lackluster SoP, well that's on Sony, people complain, Sony should expect it.
Sony SOWS the expectations, they REAP the disappointment.
@Ralizah Your post should have 44 up votes.
Question - are you also on NL and end your posts "ciao"?
Much as I'm excited for TLOU 2, I think they should have just banged in the release date for this and left it to the actual media show they were having at the same day to cover everything else. They could and should have showed more of ff7 and ghosts, and that batman announcement that is definitely coming soon (.....) perhaps.
My opinion is State of plays would nicely supplement the big conferences showing smaller games and giving updates and release dates but as Sony hasn't done any big show in 15 months these state of plays are a bit lacking. In 15 months since E3 2018 we have had 3 state of plays I think so that's about an hour of news from Sony. Compare that to what Nintendo and Microsoft have done in the same period both there e3 showings beat what Sony have showed in the last 15 months. I know they are busy concentrating on PS5 but does feel there letting the PS4 slowly die.
@Hengist yet a good time usage is you replying to an article you have no interest in reading or insist wanting to know anything about. FAIL.
@rjejr That's a very specific number of upvotes.
I was a regular on NL for years before I really became active here. But, no, aside from responding to your question now, I don't think I've ever even typed the words "ciao" in my life.
I just see stae of play as a bit pointless. You would get just as much traction by releasing trailers over a week period. All the websites pick up the stories/trailers anyway. If anything having all of them grouped together dilutes and makes some titles forgetable. Players will remember this state of play for tlou 2 and not much else even though there were significant other announcements.
We’re almost one year away from a new console launch and people want Sony dropping new game announcements as if they were a mere 2 1/2 years into this console’s life. That’s the Switch. I, for one, want next gen announcements leading up to the next gen console. Until then, Death Stranding, TLoU2, Nioh 2, MLB The Show, Concrete Genie, MediEvil, Wattam...and everything else coming over the next 12 months will work.
@Ralizah Must be your doppelganger. And now I'll have to go figure out who it is.
OK I give up looking. I'll come across them again eventually.
@get2sammyb Nope. I wasn't expecting big announcements, just something I'd be interested in. Unfortunately, there wasn't anything. Plus some of the games look low quality for such an event. Especially the one that looks like "Touch my Katamari".
@FullbringIchigo I keep hearing Ghost of Tsushima is being held back as a PS5 launch title which makes sense as now the early 2020 release is TLOU2. If I'm honest I'm looking forward to FFVII and Cyberpunk much more than that game, even though I liked the first, looking back the gameplay was serviceable at best but the story was amazing and carried it through.
As for the state of play, it was fine given that we are in that awkward time where we likely know all of the games left for this gen, whilst the next gen games are still under wraps
@carlos82 yeah FFVII Remake is at the top of my list
and it really wouldn't surprise me if Ghost of Tsushima became a PS5 launch title
People need to understand that it's just a bunch of trailers. It's no E3. Having said that, it was good.
The weakest point the announcement of probably the worst PS plus lineup I've ever seen.
@carlos82 it needs to release on ps4. Ps5 is fine as well. But that would be a massive financial waste
My expectations were firmly in check, just nothing they showed appealed to me personally. I get why people enjoyed it but the only thing announced in the 20 minutes that I will get is MLB the Show on plus. Not saying it was bad just nothing for me
it was great little segment considering a new console is coming soon.
MS inside Xbox show last night showed a trailer that was 3 weeks old not stirring! just trying to show a little bit perspective, some on this site get all bent out of shape a little too easy.
@andreoni79 I almost never watched the E3 or other stuff i just looked up the info the next day on a site. I think big things like E3 are a massive waste of money.
@Cycologist 'yet a good time usage is you replying to an article you have no interest in reading or insist wanting to know anything about. FAIL'
Okay, let's break your ridiculous statement down. First YOU (not me), are assuming that I have no interest in reading this article. I have never stated that I wasn't interested in this article. It seems quite apparent that I am, or why would I have read it? In case you have a problem with your reading skills, may I direct your attention to the fact that I was obviously referring to the Sony State of Play show, and not this article, as you have incorrectly interpreted it as so.
Secondly, I note that you end your reply with the word 'Fail', in capital letters. Now it's my turn to interpret your comment. I assume that you use the word 'fail' as a type of auto-signature, which reflects upon your own personal intellectual capabilities?
@CB7Tuner91 because they're offering a sport game and another that you already have?
Any news about TLOU 2, Ghost of Tsushima, Death Stranding, and FFVII Remake is totally irrelevant to me at this point. I've already made decisions on all of those games. Months ago. The announcement and hype cycle is TOO. LONG.
Where does that leave this State of Play? Civ VI is nice. The demos are nice. CoD doesn't really need promotion. A couple small game announcements, one of which was utterly incomprehensible. TLOU 2 release date.
It's certainly pretty thin. Barely enough content overall to justify having the show. Just because I LIKE some of the things (like TLOU), doesn't mean I'm not disappointed. They just don't have enough to talk about until they're ready to start talking about PS5.
@Hengist that question was too long. I pick "C"
@Cycologist Have an upvote from me
@Nyne11Tyme yeah it'll definitely be on both, just that its held back for the PS5, similar to Zelda on Switch and Wii U
Don't watch the brief and read up on it the next day. Win win.
To me 'Humanity' looks fantastic. Excited for that one - finally an antidote to post Astrobot gaming blues.
It was underwhelming for me. I don't care for The Last of Us 2, and the new games didn't really appeal to me. The Medievil demo was the only thing that caught my eye.
It wasn't unrealistic expectations that was my problem. Instead, the announcements just weren't things that particularly interested me.
I was only watching it for The Last Of Us Part II and it delivered it fantastically.
The last State of Play was back in like May or something wasn't it? That's a long break from them, was hoping it'd be a bit more substantial. We knew it was going to be focused on TLoU2 but they didn't really give us a deep dive or developer comments/excitement or anything, just a new trailer with a date.
If they'd just released that trailer on it's own without the whole run up to a live stream people wouldn't have gotten their hopes up.
Since Sony are skipping E3 now are we only going to get news from these states of play? Should we not get excited at the possibility there will be one revealing the PS5 and other bombshell announcements? Say if the next one is in January?
@vhsodre yea pretty much. I hate baseball and I bought The Last of Us day one when it released.
I thought that for 20 minutes in length only, it was filled with content and wonderfully-paced. I understand that people may have wanted larger titles shown off, but that is just setting themselves up for disappointment, imo.
Sony made it clear that The Last of Us: Part II was going to be the star of the show. Anyone expecting another huge title to make an appearance like Ghosts of Tsushima were just being unrealistic, because the main focus was intentionally put on TLoU 2.
I happen to like creative indie games and smaller titles, so I thought Humanity, Arise, Wattam, Civ VI, that drinking game with the Devil that I can never remember the name of, all looked like great games and I’m eager to hear more about them.
And like I said from the start, COD was 100% making an appearance, as it will be the best selling game of the holidays and probably the entire year, and is a major title for PS4.
If I had a PSVR, I would be curious to know about new releases on the way, so that segment was nice for those owners.
Overall I would lean towards giving it a 7/10, but TLoU 2 trailer was so incredible to me that I’m giving the State of Play an 8/10.
@carlos82 i hope it kinda follows the original Last of Us. I think perfect summer release with ps5 release spring 2021. But if its same date thats OK. I will have PS5 on launch. ::knock on 🌳:: i havent been burned by launch console (except 360...everyone was burned multiple times there lol). Ive never had a hardware failure
@get2sammyb that's quite the assumption. I think most here do have realistic expectations. Sony would easily be able to fill a 40 minute direct/indie showcase like Nintendo, but for some reason they just concentrate on a few indies that might not hit everybody's taste. Nintendo just rapid fires in a way that gives many tastes a short spotlight. That's a big reason why switch is also a preferred system for devs.
Another thing that bugs me is how Sony teases their games for what feels like years. I stopped caring about games I was excited about, like tlou2 and death Stranding.
Take Astral Chain on switch... surprise announcement in spring, released end of summer... fully hyped. Nothing needs 2+ years of promotion.
@tameshiyaku I'm with you, except it doesn't feel like years. It really is years.
The Last of Us 2 announced December 2016
Ghost of Tsushima announced October 2017
Death Stranding announced at E3 2016
And it wouldn't be so bad - they're all good looking games - except that they've focused too hard and too frequently on those games without much else.
In my opinion there seems to be a lot 'I'm not interested in what was shown, therefore it was bad'. For me whether I have an interest in certain games is separate from whether the livestream is poor.
I was watching pretty much just for TLOU2 and felt the format was good in that in didn't spend too long on any one thing. Afterparty was the only other thing that appealed to me but that doesn't mean the stream was poor.
It's the same thing with Playstation Plus monthly games. Liking the games is a separate thing from the quality of the offering. Fair enough if the games are rarely to liking you could question the value of the service to you but that doesn't necessarily equate to a poor service.
I only caught the end of it and the recap on this site.
Maybe if I had wasted my time watching all of it I'd be disappointed, but I'm not right now.
I thought it was pretty good OK.
@Knuckles-Fajita Humanity?
@manu0 What are you on about? They're doing the same thing they did with PULSE ages ago. Take a look, bro.
It was fine.
No idea why people keep mentioning Nintendo Direct. Half the event are old ports. Last time they even tried to pass SNES and more $60 WiiU/Wii games as "news".
Im not expecting them to pull out bangers everytime they have one, I like seeing a nice range of games, but really, is it so hard to find someone who seems like they are even remotely interested in gaming to do the voiceover, what about the presenters from their very own video podcast show thing, it would give a bit of familiarity and continuity etc.
It was solid, compared to the others. But as pointed out by @get2sammyb, it is still far away from Nintendo Direct's worst days.
Well, the problem here is that PlayStation barely has news to share for PS4. Nintendo uses Directs to share everything, news, updates, nindies, developers' opinions, 3rd parties, with a nice pace to the videos, and they also avoid announcing games until they're closer to release. PlayStation announces games 4-5 years before actual release...
Anyway, there is no reason why Sony can't learn. Hopefully they use it better next generation.
While many had unrealistic expectations, I only expected Last of Us 2. But even that was disappointing because without the crowd reaction of an E3/Gamescom/Game Awards it was a game I can wait for as opposed to the hype built from hearing the cheers of an announcement at an event. The reveal of Joel should have been so much bigger. The other games as well.
I'd say they're on par with Directs in that they, so far, have all been extremely poor with literally one to 2 good announcements and a sea of mediocre titles. And the one with ff7 has been their best one so far. The new trailer alone delivered and there were a few interesting looking Indies.
This one had some of the blandest looking Indies aside from the 1st reveal. And they used this to announce the ps plus line up, promote another hardware skin and call of duty instead of actual new games. I think if they had shown batman, this would have been boring at best just like Nintendo directs but without it, it was terrible.
The issue is simple. State of plays aren’t worth the time. They could easily group a decent bit of these together and some general press announcements and have PS Experience or E3. They set a high bar for those and that’s what we want. State of plays format is incapable of feeling satisfactory enough to tune in. It’s a bad format for them and they should just drop it. A state of play will never crate the legend moments that they made at E3 and such.
Lol wut???
I thought the previous episode was miles better...
Problem with State of Play is that there ain't no surprises...
Everything is teased beforehand...
FFVII, TLoU2...
Just, why....
It was fine, I liked the start up intro. It even made me look to see why my PS4 was comming on. I know many want them short and to the point. I'm starting to miss having real people talk.
@get2sammyb
Batman game announcement.
Project Awakening new trailer.
Final Fantasy VII trailer showcasing character interactions.
Mk11 Terminator reveal trailer
Marvel Avengers Spider-man dlc confirmation ps4 exclusive.
But yeah, those don't remember-what-I-saw indie trailers more than made up for any of that.
"Was good" my a - - .
@Jaz007
Why does everyone think State of Play is meant to replace E3 or be like Nin direct though?
I ve always thought its just a way to keep people updated while there a no big event.
I never expected big games reveals at state of play. Is that why people feel disapointed? They think it's supposed to replace E3 ?
I had low to no expectations and still thought it was meh. Lol. Just a lot of games I'm not interested in personally.
I liked every state of play so far.... I think expecting them to announce anything new first party wise before announcing the PS5 is expecting too much...
This is just a semi regular update on games and playstation nation in general. Its more personal than a stage and i can watch it at my convenience so to me they are great.
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