AK4tywill

What is the logic of telling "150 of them that they are "at risk" of being the 90 people who will soon lose their job"?

In whose mind is it better to traumatise 150 employees by telling them they're all at risk, so they can anxiously bite their nails, instead of deciding first who the 90 are going to be and immediately telling them? Surely that would be more humane and less damaging to the morale of the company.

Even with the Bloomberg article breaking the news early, I can't fathom why they would decide to issue this warning to their staff if they really have their best interests at heart, though the cynic in me can't help but wonder if there's an added bonus of squeezing extra work out of them in their final days by having them all scramble to prove themselves more irreplaceable than each other in some twisted 'lord of the flies' performance.

Seriously, can anyone who works in this field enlighten me as to what their logic is?

@get2sammyb Clearly I need to start getting some more sleep. Aside from the fact that I didn't catch that in the massive headline, I don't know why I thought we might get February sales figures before the month's even through. I think I thought I was looking at weekly figures (do we even get those?).

Interesting that Helldivers 2 is selling gangbusters on Steam yet failed to penetrate the PS5 charts this week. I'm sure Sony is taking note.

Let this be a cautionary tale to remember when we next hear grand plans of mass industry consolidation.

Oh dear. Didn't take long at all for the "that's a man" crowd to show.

Fantastic month. My only complaint is that I won't have the time to play everything I want. But wow, The Outer Worlds, Resistance, NFS, AC Valhalla and Tales of Arise (the first in the series to pique my interest)! Hard to complain with those headliners.

@get2sammyb Yes. People forget that "Second Party" is a term that we, the fans, and the gaming press invented ourselves to distinguish between games from Studio's the manufacturer owns and those it doesn't.

The term isn't really used internally, at least not in any formal sense. To Sony, a title is either first or third party.

I only played the first 3 Gears and thought they were massively over-rated. 3 of my picks made the top 5. They were The Elder Scrolls, Indiana Jones and Forza Horizon, the other 2 I picked were Wolfenstein and Sea of Thieves.

Very exciting news. I'm actually super stoked by the prospect of Sea of Thieves on PS5. I've wanted to give that a go for a while. Maybe this means Spyro and Crash are saved as well! It's gonna be a long week.

I came for the horror of no platinums, I stayed for the horror of speedrun trophies.

@DennisReynolds

1) My point is that people would accept sacrifices in order to achieve a 60fps mode. 900p is one example.

2) The majority might not care, but Dragons Dogma isn't a mainstream franchise, and there is a large contingent of enthusiasts who will only play games that offer a higher frame rate. Majority? No. Significant? Quite possibly.

Very disappointing. Developers have to learn that we want 60fps options. If it means you have to turn the resolution down to 900p, so be it, but give us the option. This will lose them sales.

On principle I always hate it when the first game/film has no subtitle but the sequel does. I also don't like non title-distinguishing subtitles: 'On the beach' sounds like it could have been used for the first one. I hear people in a future with multiple Death Stranding titles asking of this alleged title : "Which one was that again? I'm sure they all went on the beach at some point".

That being said, I'm really not fussed. I'm sure the game is going to be excellent based on how phenomenal the first one was.

And a State of Play in the next two weeks? Nothing of substance to complain about here.

@Widey85 Personally I don't rate her. She also wrote the Tomb Raider reboot games and they had terrible stories imo, but if you recommend Lost Words and it's not too long I'll give it a try before it leaves.

@J_e_f_f__D Objectively it is. See? We're arguing.

Now this is how you announce a game of this sort. 2 months before launch? Perfect! Get it into people's hands while their interest is piqued.

@Fiendish-Beaver I think it's fair to say that if a Spyro game is going to be released anytime soon then it started development long before the ABK acquisition. Turn-around isn't that quick. The only likely impact MS could have is cancelling an already-in-development PS5 version like they did with Starfield and Indiana Jones (though obviously I hope that's not the case).

Top tier subheader Khay.

Don't... don't give me hope.

I recently finally got back into Batman: Arkham Knight and I'm enjoying it a lot more than the first time around, so this weekend I'll be finally finishing that story and then trying to mop up all those Riddler trophies

Is Last of Us: Part 2 Remastered really one of 2024's biggest titles?

What a great shame. Couldn't future development and maintenance have been moved over to another studio (maybe custom built) a little after initial launch?

Obviously if having had to choose between a single player Naughty Dog studio and a live service one I'd pick the former; I still don't understand why that was a necessary choice to make.

I can't help but wonder, based on all the leaks, where this project would be had Bungie not been brought in. That acquisition is looking to be the worst of Jim Ryan's legacy.

As the Game Awards go, I think this has been one of the better ones - at least for Playstation fans.

As always well done Push Square staff on your excellent reporting and for making this useful hub, it's always my go-to resource after the show.

@LiamCroft Views on the game aside, I do also think this is rather unprofessional. As staff you are and should be held to a different standard than other users and you should want your comments section to be a place that invites all expressions of opinion providing they're relevant and are not abusive.

This looks like the most un-inspired style and setting I've seen in years. It feels AI generated.

I just saw Killers of The Flower Moon and it's got me in kind of early 20th century USA mood, so after trying to decide between revisiting Mafia and Red Dead Redemption 2, I've gone with the latter (I know, it's technically 1899).

Still in the phase of getting used to 30fps again. Thanks Rockstar (and 2K for not updating Mafia trilogy).

@Northern_munkey Surely it's 60fps. I can't imagine a world where a game like this is 30fps on PS5. Even crappy shovelware hits 60.

@Czar_Khastik Hahaha very good.

Gravity Rush and Tearaway are probably my 2 favourite Vita games. So glad we got Unfolded and GR2, hoping for more sequels.

I only played the first 3, which were fine games but had dreadful writing. She may be a fantastic writer but considering the recent God of War games have had vastly better stories, writing and world building than Gears of War (at least the first 3 which players regularly claim were the better ones) this is a little concerning.

@roe No, it hi-lights a commitment to ensuring profitability. From what we know, the delay was a result of Bungie's intervention at Sony's request and has been delayed not for quality reasons, but because they no longer have confidence in its potential for player retention and high profitability.

When I look at Bungie's Destiny games (particularly in contrast to previous Naughty Dog titles), that move doesn't feel like one that will necessarily improve the quality of the game.

@tameshiyaku I was literally saving this one for Halloween too. How frustrating. I wonder if the timing is calculated in order to get some extra Halloween sales in.

I kinda love that this comment section has just become a Returnal appreciation thread. Bar the tiresome post-game cipher grind, it's one of the best games in a long time.

On topic: I would love for whatever Firesprite are making to fill the Silent Hills shaped hole that's sat in my heart for years, but based on what they did with the Persistence, I can imagine it will be a different kind of game altogether.

Ok here we are:

1) Dragon Age Inquisition: 383 Hours
2) Red Dead Redemption2: 341 Hours
3) Uncharted 4: A Thief's End: 328 Hours

All three are stellar games so it doesn't surprise me. It actually lists Uncharted 4 as The Legacy of Thieves Collection which I've never played, so once I do get around to playing that it'll probably jump to 2nd or 1st place.

Wow. They really picked the worst month to announce their price hike. What were they thinking?

At least I can finally check out Call of The Sea.

I must be honest. I partook in the early stages on this vote which started months ago in May, but quickly lost stamina as it dragged on and on and on. I think the vast majority of voters quit like me, hence why the more recent polls got a handful of votes.

To me, the small sample size makes this vote less meaningful. I would recommend in the future with these polls to make them far more brief (like a week) if you want to get a result that accurately represents the community's opinion. That being said, mad respect to Kidfried for their incredible dedication and endurance to this poll.

Why is he American?

The gameplay and visual styles look great, but almost everything else is a big turn off to me. Honestly this just makes me even more sad we're not getting get Gravity Rush 3.

This looks absolutely marvellous. I can not wait.

I'll be sticking to my PS3 version for another playthorugh. I've actually already unlocked all the multiplayer trophies required for the platinum, thanks to the help of a friendly stranger online and a bug that gave me XP for repeatedly shooting an opposing players corpse (cheap I know, but with the state of the multiplayer and matchmaking, aiming for max level through legitimate means would have been a study in tedium).

Sure the textures will me muddier and the frame-rate less consistent, but in the right frame of mind, there's a bit of nostalgic charm to that (I still prefer playing the Uncharted trilogy on PS3 to PS4).

Had this been a complete overhaul, or at the very least, run at 60fps, I might have opted for a purchase, but as it is (and at that price point), the PS3 version will do just fine.

@nessisonett I double second this. And the sequel!

I really effing wanted this, more than any other announced game, and based on recent comments from Bethesda spokespeople ("it's not exclusive") it sounded like a PS5 release was a surefire thing.

It's honestly so disheartening hearing MS pulled the PS5 version. I was.never fussed about Starfield or Redfall, but losing The Elder Scrolls VI was painful and as a big Indiana Jones/Treasure Hunter fan, this cuts extra deep.

Microsoft's portfolio growth route is the most ugly and cynical one in the industry. If you really can't see the difference between what PlayStation are doing with Spiderman and their other exclusives vs this you're either willfully ignorant or misguidedly trying to adopt an middle ground position.

This is predatory and worsening the video games landscape for consumers. Thank God Microsoft are taking a beating from regulators on the Activision Blizzard acquisition. They want total monopoly and they have the money to accomplish it.

We must always remember why they need to resort to these tactics: because they've proven time and time again that they're the one hardware manufacturer incapable of supporting their development teams properly. They have the most studios, yet the least appealing portfolio of games to consumers. The culture at Microsoft is known to be rotten, and their blitzkrieg of the industry should be stopped at all costs.

Great month for Extra and I'm looking forward to getting sunk into Killzone Liberation too. It always felt like a game that, were it on a platform with two analogue sticks, ought to have twin stick controls, so I'll be curious to see how I find it with just one stick.

While I'm excited for Killzone Liberation, Premium continues to have dreadful offerings and Sony should be ashamed. Even if no third party publisher agreed to put their games on the service, Sony would still have hundreds of their own games they could port to service if they were at all interested in fulfilling their promises to their subscriber base.

Extra is doing great though.

@nessisonett Honestly this reads to me as "But look at this other thing you all hated, you loved it".

I don't know of a single Prince of Persia fan who felt Jake Gyllenhaal was an accurate representation of Prince of Persia.

Is Guerilla Collective at all associated with Guerilla Games?

I sort of wish this wasn't announced so in advance as August feels ages away. Still, should be good. They own so many great IPs now. Fingers crossed for Timesplitters.

Bobby Kotick is a disgusting specimen of human flesh who oversaw and engaged in egregious abuse towards employees at Activision. He is not allowed to be disappointed in anyone's behaviour.

Well that article title gave me a headache.

@BeerIsAwesome Thanks for the heads up, I do want to try that out and it's lying about in my PS+ library somewhere (probably under 'G').