8bit4Life

I struggled to get through Rebirth, and I'm a guy who loves long RPGs. Rebirth didn't feel like the right kind of long RPG. Don't look at my save file for Xenoblade 2 at over 600 hours and scoff at me.

I haven’t touched my PS5 Pro or Nintendo Switch since early August. It was at that time when I relapsed into MMO gaming with WoW Classic on the PVE Anniversary server. It’s currently in vanilla, with Burning Crusade looming.

I have Dragon Quest 1 & 2 pre-ordered, so I will return to the PS5 in a couple weeks.

Definitely looks similar to Horizon, just with a more Eastern aesthetic.

If I weren’t such a solo player (even most of the time in World of Warcraft) I would likely play Battlefield 6. Games that require teamwork don’t appeal to me because I like to go off on my own and play at my pace.

Perhaps I will finally give the game a proper try. Years of Game Pass and I couldn’t get myself to play it. Now I’m Game Pass free. Never purchased a single game on my XBOX.

I didn’t particularly enjoy Rebirth because it felt too long, mostly due to the mini games. It is a quality game, but my opinion is that it’s just ok, not great. Xenoblade Chronicles has become my favorite JRPG series, and those games are crazy-long, too, but I enjoy the journey so much more.

PS6 will probably be a system where performance mode games are 4K / 120 fps, upscaled. Quality mode may be true 4K / 60 consistently. Throw in ray tracing here and there, and you have a PS6. Oh, and you will still be playing PS4 and PS5 games most of the console’s lifetime. Yeah, I will still probably buy one.

I enjoyed Battlefield 2142 back in the early 2000s. The mechs and future combat was fun. It’s the only one in the series that I have played.

This game looks interesting, one that I will watch after it releases to see performance and gameplay before I buy it. Lately I have been much more discriminating in my purchases, but this title looks like it has potential.

Clair Obscur is easily the best game I’ve played in 2025. It’s nice to see their continued success.

Sales are always happening. Unless you absolutely cannot wait to play a game, just wait a month or two. Only early players are paying $70-$80+ for games. Unless you’re playing Nintendo IP.

I can’t help but believe that the Bungie buy was a poor decision. Destiny is not in good shape right now, and Marathon is looking very Concordish.

If Ghost of Tsushima gets a proper sequel I will probably buy it. Jin Sakai still has more to do. Yotei does not really appeal to me.

I’m a PS5 Pro user. Not a huge improvement so far over my launch PS5, although it does seem to run Dragon’s Dogma 2, Cyberpunk 2077, and Monster Hunter Wilds a bit better.

@Apkorv Yeah, Kiefer is a goofy-looking fellow. The good part is that the characters get to change appearance once they get to a certain point in the game, allowing class changes. I won’t say more than that to avoid big spoilers.

I would love an “ultimate edition” that included playable versions of the PS1 game and Nintendo 3DS.

I took my Xbox Series X w/ disc drive to work several months ago and told everyone they could buy it for $400. Barely touched, maybe used 50 hours. Nobody bit.

Now I'm going to put it on eBay for 550.

I’m totally fine with a slightly refined and trimmed-down version of DQ7. I played through the Nintendo 3DS version and it took about 100 or more hours to finish the game. It is a great game, but a bit too long.

I grew up playing games like Ninja Gaiden and Mega Man on the NES, where similar learn or die mechanics were necessary to progress. It was fun as a kid, and I beat all those games. Now that I’m older, the style doesn’t appeal to me anymore. It’s one of the reasons I just don’t enjoy souls-like titles, even though I want to like them. Hollow Knight was one of the first games where I realized that I love everything about the game, except for the pattern recognition and reaction.

It took me awhile to warm up to MSG5 once I learned that Snake's voice actor was different, but once I gave it a fair go, I quickly began to enjoy it. There is nothing as satisfying as finding a great 80s cassette and then having that soundtrack echo out across the battlefield as your helicopter comes in overhead. Dancing With Tears In My Eyes was heard by many of my enemies whenever I called for air support.

That figure is a spot-on Ben Starr. Should be wearing a Clive Rossfield outfit.

I had the same thought about Game Pass as Shawn Layden back when it started up. The numbers never made sense to me when I tried to imagine how the developers could be paid. Game Pass seemed to be more of a hook to get players onto Xbox more than any other reason, even at the cost of developer profits. In the end, Xbox became the platform where few players buy games at all, which is exactly what many foresaw.

Not to be Negative Nancy, but I don’t see Marathon being very popular. It’s just too weird in the art style, and extraction shooters have a limited audience to begin with.

As much as I love Cyberpunk 2077 on PS5 Pro, I do not see the reality where I confirm an online order for a body pillow, and then sleep next to it in the following nights.

I'm re-playing Witcher 3 on PS5 Pro, so the Henry Cavill line hit me in the feels.

Also, I have no idea who she is, but I like her.

@Jrs1 I was the nerd in my friend group for liking JRPGs in the late 80s through the 90s. But I didn't care, and I didn't play their sports games.

@Jackthelad93 You are right in this viewpoint. As a huge fan of JRPGs in the 1990s, I thought this too as I played the games I loved. Turn-based seems pretty silly.

Of course, here comes the 'but'.

But, when I played Final Fantasy 1-6, or Dragon Quest, or Lufia, and others, I saw turn-based RPGs as more of a limitation of the technology of the time. The world maps represented huge spaces that couldn't fit on a cartridge. Then towns or castles expanded on that a bit when you entered. Turn-based battles were (in my mind) another way to imagine a massive fight that couldn't be shown on-screen at the time with current tech.

Now, games like the Witcher 3, Zelda BotW, Cyberpunk 2077, Elder Scrolls, etc, my childhood dreams have been fulfilled. I have the huge open world without a map screen. I can enter towns and talk to the people, and combat is fun without pressing ATTACK, ITEM, SPELL, RUN. So for me, JRPGs were the first open world games. But for other people, the mechanics were what mattered, such as turn-based systems.

I'm fine either way, and can enjoy a good turn-based game, but I really enjoy an open world with stories and good characters.

I bought an Xbox Series X just to play Starfield at launch because I didn't have a gaming PC. Turns out that wasn't a great buying decision.

I was expecting Skyrim in Space, with No Man's Sky style of traversal between planets, and much more hand-crafted content. Turns out that we got too much procedurally generated content and more loading / fast travel screens than any of us could have imagined.

Elder Scrolls Online never really clicked with me. I loved Oblivion and Skyrim, and I also loved MMOs like WoW, EverQuest, and FF11 and FF14. The problem is that ESO just didn't click or seem to be like any of the above in the right ways.

One thing that immediately threw me off with ESO was that after playing hundreds of hours in Skyrim, I was expecting the world and physics of Skyrim, but in a world inhabited by other players. That wasn't the case, as it doesn't feel the same at all, except for a 1st person viewpoint. And it doesn't feel like a traditional MMO either, comparing it to WoW or FF14.

So who is ESO for then? If you like the lore of Elder Scrolls and the music, but are ok with a fundamentally different experience, you might enjoy it.

As a 10 year-old in 1990, my choice of Dragon Warrior (Dragon Quest) and Final Fantasy on the NES was certainly not mainstream among my peers. They all wanted to play sports games or scroller-shooters like Contra. They would say, "Why read a game when I have to do that at school?" And they thought that turn-based was boring. That probably still exists to a pretty good extent in the player base as a whole. I still hate FPS and sports, and I'm sure lots of people don't enjoy RPGs, turn-based or otherwise.

I have so far put more than an hour into Lies of P. The story is interesting, the music is great, and the graphics are very pretty.

BUT I HATE THE COMBAT! I'm giving it a try because this is my daughter's current obsession game. She loves it so much. Me on the other hand, I can't enjoy souls-like combat, no matter how hard I try. Elden Ring? Paid 60 bucks for it and regret it. Dark Souls Remastered? Gorgeous and interesting, but I put it down after the first irritating, clunky-feeling fights.

I want to like these games. The closest to the souls-like formula that I have truly enjoyed are the Star Wars: Jedi games. They have a lot of the same mechanics, but the controls and character movement feels so much better.

Has Lei Wulong made it to Tekken 8 yet? He has always been my favorite character.

I played quite a bit of CP2077 yesterday on PS5 Pro in performance mode. Since I didn’t see VRR mentioned in the settings, I wasn’t sure if it was working, but even Dog Town is buttery smooth on my LG OLED’s 4K 120hz screen.

I’m totally ok with the PS6 getting pushed back to 2028 or later. We’re at a place where a new system simply runs existing AAA games with higher fidelity, so I’m happy to squeeze a few more years out of my PS5 Pro.

The PlayStation Store is where I buy discounted games all the time. Not sure if it’s different in other countries, but PS store sales are constantly going. Is there really a problem with inflated prices?

I thoroughly enjoyed playing through MHW on PS5 Pro. My experience was limited to single player, going through the main scenario and all of the low rank optional quests.

Right as I finished the main scenario, Xenoblade Chronicles X Definitive Edition landed on Switch and I never made it back to MHW.

Someday I’ll return and maybe even try multiplayer.

Ciri's in-game model looks terrific. Hopefully this tech demo quality comes to the finished product.

I’m playing it via Game Pass on Series X. So far I’ve not noticed any issues, but I also haven’t played super long stretches.

I’m one of those Game Pass players for Doom. While it seems like a solid game, it’s definitely not something I’d want to pay full price for, especially since I got about half an hour in, and have not played it since.

Clair Obscur on the other hand is a game that I pre-ordered on PS5 and absolutely loved it, going so far as to also buy the digital deluxe upgrade later as a thank you to them.

I just hope that the normally silent protagonist is now voiced by Ben Starr.

The Switch 2 version will be the best RPG on the console if it comes out early. That would probably be more popular in Japan.

I’ve been playing on Series X via Game Pass. This isn’t something I have noticed, but I have only played a few short stints in between long sessions of Expedition 33.

It might be a $100 launch game.

That’s ok. I didn’t play GTA5 until it was available on sale for less than $30, with plenty of patches and other stuff that wasn’t there when it launched.

Since I am in no rush to play GTA6, I’ll pick it up around 2028 on PS6.

This may give them time to get a PC version ready for launch. Launching only on consoles like they did in the past seems like a bad idea these days.

I finally purchased BG3 a few weeks ago, mostly just to see what my new M4 Pro MacBook Pro was capable of. It plays very well, in case anyone was curious. It also ramps up the fans and turns the entire body of the laptop into the heat sink, so a cooling pad is recommended.

Since tabletop is not my favorite, I have not put much more than a few hours in, so I can’t agree with the best of all time, nor if DLC is needed.

Still a good game. I was brought up on JRPGs, so it’s always been difficult to enjoy the isometric PC style RPGs. I will eventually finish!

I agree with this rating. Expedition 33 is a special game.

There is a bit of worry about the upcoming movie adaptation. Is this going to blow up into a massive “too much” thing like we’ve seen with Star Wars or the MCU?

Hopefully not. It’s easy to see how the struggling film industry would leap at such a new and vibrant story, since there hasn’t been a lot to get excited about on the big screen.

I’m one of the people who is absolutely loving Clair Obscur right now. It feels like the Chrono Trigger moment of 2025 with a fresh twist on turn-based combat.

But I think that’s only a small part of the game’s broader appeal. There is a David and Goliath aspect that people have been drawn to, seeing the tiny studio come out of nowhere and seemingly show everyone else how to make a good game.

The writing, voice acting, music, and artwork are so impressive that people are taking notice and Clair Obscur is becoming something of a phenomenon.

I have tried all 3 tiers of PlayStation Plus, and my 2 years of GamePass Ultimate ends in August.

The reasons listed above for why people don’t flock to subscriptions lines up with my experience. GamePass has been a complete waste of money for me, as the only game I played to completion was Jedi: Survivor. I downloaded a few other games, including Starfield (the reason I bought the XBOX in the first place) but gave up on that after 40 hours.

For PS Plus higher tiers, I ran into similar issues. There just wasn’t enough content that I wanted to download and play, or when I did find something, it was a game that leaves the service after a month or two.

It’s far better to simply buy the few games that I really enjoy, so I stick with Essentials for PS Plus, and won’t be subscribing to anything else in the future.

I will probably play Oblivion remastered eventually. The original version was my introduction to The Elder Scrolls on my barely-capable PC at the time, and I loved it.

My gaming focus will be on Expedition 33 once it launches.

Last night I turned on my PS5 Pro and just listened to the game screen music and watched the countdown timer until I can play.