Ainu20

Without getting into the whole AI topic, let's just wait and see how the market evolves and whether these price hikes have a permanent effect. For the PC consumer market, it certainly isn't looking great right now, but Sony isn't just a consumer and should hopefully have some strategic and historic partnerships to fall back on. And full production on the next console is still pretty far away.

This looks nothing like the typical Studio Ghibli AI stuff I've seen so far. Not saying this doesn't look derivative in any way, but that particular accusation just comes across as lazy. Which is pretty ironic, given the nature of the accusation.

Well this comment section is going about as well as you'd expect. That aside, it's a shame that EA still holds the rights to some of the greatest IPs in video gaming. You could argue they didn't need any help either ruining those franchises or letting them rot, but whatever hope was left is surely gone now.

Who would want any of these as their PSN avatar? They're so incredibly generic and low quality. I'm not going to lose any sleep over it though, as long as they're not using them where it matters.

@Max_the_German The guidelines are mentioned right before the lists start and they even hyperlinked to GTA 6's win in 2023.

Small mistake, Hornet is obviously not a new character but she is listed as one.

For those asking about GTA 6, it is actually mentioned on the page that if a game has already won this before, it is not eligible again (which I think is great). It specifically mentions GTA 6. Anyway, Saros is a worthy pick here.

@Vermines Excellent choice, Returnal is still the best PS5 exclusive for me. Excellent choice of profile pic as well!

I'm not completely decided but I'm definitely leaning more towards a no than a yes. Ideally, we should get reviews one or more days before a game releases, to make sure that everyone can make the most informed decision possible on release day. Shadow drops are a possible strategy to circumvent this.

The cynic in me says that's more or less what Bethesda did with the Oblivion remake, to get the most out of the shadow drop hype before everything settled down and people started noticing the flaws.

Or alternatively, dear Ubisoft, if you want to see what incredible stuff you can make without AI, look no further than your own ex-employee Guillaume Broche and the supremely talented real artists he was able to find, even without a massive budget at his disposal.

Thank the universe he left that company when he did.

Did they poll a bunch of kids that are already gamers and found that 43% percent wanted in-game currency, and extrapolated that to the entire population of US kids? Or did they actually poll a representative sample? This is coming from a data collector with a clear interest (the Entertainment Software Association), I'd be very wary of these findings.

@Vyse_the_Legend At least several of those titles have never released on a PlayStation platform before, they're well outside of the scope of this discussion. This is about emulating older PlayStation titles.

I was a little surprised to see the third person action when the gameplay started, but the first game already felt like it was trying to be more cinematic than your usual metroidvania. It was a decent enough metroidvania, but not a great one in my opinion, so maybe the genre switch isn't a bad thing.

Players have had over 3.5 years of free updates and will receive another Spec 3 update free of charge next month. Still, a day not complained is a day not lived, right?

@Max_the_German Why would you feel fooled by a price cut several years down the line? That used to be the most normal thing in the world, this generation notwithstanding.

This is usually a terrible time for my backlog, I don't expect any different this year.

@Reyzore Troy Baker is already nominated for his performance as Indiana Jones. I don't know if there's precedence for nominating the same performer for two different roles in the same year, but I'd consider that a bit overkill to be honest.

I have to admit I'm a little bit disappointed that Clair Obscur is also nominated for both indie categories. Of course, technically, it's correct, but it feels unnecessary considering the game is also up for the RPG category, which it is virtually guaranteed to win. It just makes those indie categories less interesting, it's simply going to win all of them.

Nothing against the game of course, it deserves all the awards it's going to get.

I'm always interested in showcases from any of the platform holders, but I expect most studios and publishers will keep their powder dry for The Game Awards, which are just around the corner. If this happens, it'll probably be a low-key affair.

@themightyant Even Troy Baker as best performance seems unlikely to me, I think Jennifer English will almost certainly win that. He should get a nomination though.

@Fishmasterflex96 I wasn't aware I needed any consolation. I do think KCD 2 will get a nomination though, even if I haven't quite mastered the art of clairvoyance as much as you have.

It should also be noted that Krafton has pulled some seriously shady moves at Subnautica developer Unknown Worlds. They don't even need AI to come across as the bad guys.

@ShadowRJ Possibly, though we've had nominees with February releases before. Spare a thought for Indiana Jones and the Great Circle by the way, which released after the cut-off last year but is eligible for this one, despite releasing back in 2024.

@ShadowRJ I feel like KCD 2 should be somewhere in that list, possibly at the expense of Ghost of Yotei. Expedition 33 is the big favourite of course.

The indie category is the one to watch for me personally. You'd think in the year Silksong finally released there wouldn't be that much competition, but with the likes of Hades 2, Blue Prince and surprise hit Ball X Pit it's been a really strong year.

Under the current management, I feel like we're starting to see PlayStation trying to improve their standing in the home market/industry, and this fits perfectly into that strategy. It's something I've felt since that State of Play back in June where the first 20 minutes were all about Japanese studios, and then they finished it with the Marvel Tokon announcement.

I have to say I'm a big fan of this direction. The last 15 years or so, we've seen PlayStation get increasingly westernized, perhaps losing a part of its original identity in the process. I'd like to believe this is them course correcting a bit, and that we might get some of that old PlayStation weirdness back.

I would argue Naughty Dog is still Sony's flagship studio, and as such I assume he's referring to Intergalactic. But with so little to go on, who knows what he was talking about.

@LogicStrikesAgain

Sony tweeted: “A special broadcast curated for gamers in Japan and Asia”

Meanwhile western audience: I didn’t like it! 😭

This sums it up perfectly. It was entirely predictable as well.

Admittedly I don't know too much about these awards, but looking at the previous nominees, it definitely feels like there's some really specific favouritism going on.

Despite only doing this category since 2023, they've managed to nominate both Bear McCreary and Austin Wintory three times and now they've nominated both Pinar Toprak and Wilbert Roget II for the second year running for DLC on the same games they were nominated for last year (respectively Avatar and Star Wars). And they even managed to give Wilbert Roget II his third nomination in 2 years time by giving him one for Helldivers 2 as well.

I mean, come on.

@themightyant But the examples that would cost plenty to implement are not coming from SKG, that's the whole point. The "expectations" are mostly coming from those who accuse SKG of being unrealistic. If change cannot come when they are asking for the absolute minimum, i.e. any sort of playable product, then change is not going to come at all. That is unfortunately what I will take from this.

@themightyant I'm sure people would hope for the ability to host servers themselves in those cases, but it is specifically not demanded by SKG. The idea is that it is better to have something playable, no matter how crippled, than nothing at all.

You state that they lack flexibility, but they mention on their site that they don't word their demands more specifically to remain "flexible enough to give publishers and developers as much freedom as possible". That is a literal quote from their website. They couldn't possibly be more flexible.

@themightyant What I expected better from you, is to not misrepresent SKG's mission. Which you're still doing, when you're saying things like "Would people be happy with just moving around the Warzone map with no one to fight for example? That's no longer Warzone. SKG demands need to be more flexible to cater for the many examples, it isn't one size fits all."

SKG doesn't demand anything more than that it remains playable in whatever crippled form it may be.

@themightyant

To give one example: Many online games specifically work because you are playing against other humans, not bots. Developing the AI to make these type of games work offline is a LOT of work. I get the impression a lot of people think it's like flicking a magic switch. There are a lot of other hurdles to overcome all of which cost something to consider and develop. They will vary game to game.

That is not at all what SKG is asking. They're saying games should remain playable, nothing more, nothing less. That means online games should either remain playable offline, and if that's in an empty world, then so be it, or that players can host their own servers, without guaranteeing that all functionality remains as before.

Your argument is essentially the kind of strawman that its opposers have been using to discredit SKG. I have to say I expected better from you.

@Leinad7 Sony are suing them because it's a clear trademark infringement, that's all there is to this story.

@Northern_munkey Having been to several official Nintendo stores in Japan, I'm not so sure about that statement about PlayStation having the most branded merch!

On the topic, they could've just made the exact same bag without having PS5 and a Dualsense plastered all over it, and it would've been fine. I'm pretty sure you're allowed to advertise it as "compatible with PS5".

Rhythm based gameplay built around the Dualsense definitely has potential. I'm keeping an eye on this.

The only thing that is a bit of a grey zone here is the text-to-speech. If the voice actors are compensated fairly for lending their voice to it, I don't necessarily see a problem with it. But that's an important caveat.

@ShieldHero Good lord, I don't even know where to start with this. That is a lot of mental gymnastics to justify a multi-billion dollar company providing a service that is basically a copyright violation generator. I feel like we are fundamentally so far apart that there is indeed no point in having this discussion.

@ShieldHero Whether or not people end up using Sora for private or non-private purposes doesn't matter. It's a service being provided by OpenAI using stolen art. That in itself is a blatant copyright violation.

I really don't know how we can put this AI genie back in the bottle. Copyright as a concept seems dead and buried.

@Dogbreath

the market could be damaged if firms were able to lockdown such basics as robotic animals with LED lights on them

The similarities went quite a bit further than that.

@Rhaoulos I've seen similar comments to yours but I always feel like they're talking about the wrong thing. Similarities between games are fine, and so is derivative games design. But the creature design in much of the promotional material almost looked like an exact copy.

It's one thing for two studios to design something general like a skeleton warrior and have them looking alike, that can happen. Horizon's creature design however is very intricately detailed and specific, for another game to come up with designs that look almost identical? Yeah I don't see how there's any defending that.

@themightyant It is indeed a far bigger issue than just gaming. As I said in a previous post, this is a societal issue more than anything. I don't even want to know where we'll be in 10 years time. But I don't really know what the gaming industry can do about it.

This is sort of selfish, but I honestly have no problem with the gaming industry shrinking. As long as "our" generation is still around, there will still be a demand for great single-player games, and still incentive for studios and publishers to create them. At the moment, there's such an over abundance of those that I will never be able to catch up. Perhaps we've simply already gone over the limit of what this market can support and it's time for a step back.

That's a painful process for the people working in the industry, but that's a harsh reality that can't really be avoided. It's also a painful process for the shareholders and capitalists running all of it, and I couldn't care less about them.

@themightyant You recognize it as a huge threat to the future of gaming, but what then? Do you want or expect gaming companies to start chasing the attention of young people on TikTok? I personally dread to see what that may look like, or what that may do to the future of gaming.

All forms of entertainment are competing for time and attention, but I don't find this a very compelling argument to support the idea that gaming platforms aren't competing against each other as much as against outside threats. If those kids prefer to spend their time on TikTok, you're not going to convince them to spend that time playing games anyway. There's already an endless supply of mobile games out there, and if they don't even have the attention spans for those, what are Sony or Microsoft going to do? This feels more like a societal issue than anything gaming companies are going to solve.

No, focus on the people who do want to play games first, despite what Microsoft's execs might be claiming.

@Questionable_Duck What I stated: "Three major releases, one of which as decorated as Astro Bot, is not a negligible fraction."
What you make of that: "You act as if these three games are a third of Sony's entire output this gen, when that isn't really true."
I'm being careful in my wording, so I would appreciate if you don't misrepresent them.

As for your other post, I don't see how one could possibly overstate how much Sony prioritizes the platform. That is their entire business model, the 30% cut they make on third-party sales and add-ons far outweighs anything else. They will be looking to diversify their revenue streams, because as you say this model is reaching its limits and might come under threat in the future. But for now, that remains their biggest source of revenue and thus their priority. Whatever decisions they make will be carefully evaluated to make sure they don't negatively impact that.

And to clear up any misunderstandings (your choice of the word pipe dream implies one), I'm not here to say which is better (as I said before). I don't need or want Sony to have exclusives, it doesn't affect me one way or the other as long as they continue to create platforms and games I personally enjoy.

@Questionable_Duck
I replied to HonestHick's post by stating it wasn't entirely correct, and then qualified that by giving examples. That's not a hill to die on. It was your choice to start picking apart that reply.

You keep referring to those examples as a few exceptions, but as we all know, Sony's output has not exactly been prolific this generation. Three major releases, one of which as decorated as Astro Bot, is not a negligible fraction.

The main reason I disagree with your notion that they'll bring everything to PC, is that Sony fundamentally still believes in their platform. They have no choice, as that is how they make their revenue; bringing people to their platform far outweighs selling a few more copies on other platforms. As such, I still feel that, if at any point they decide that bringing games to other platforms works against drawing people into their ecosystem, they will abandon the non-exclusive strategy in a heartbeat.

@Questionable_Duck I mean, you're not wrong, but this sounds suspiciously similar to me saying they decide this on a case by case basis, with most games getting a PC release. Why are you so intent on disagreeing with my comments, when you don't really have much reason to?

@Questionable_Duck

The facts indicate that Sony has brought nearly every single game it has released in the last 5 years to PC. That, to me, indicates that Sony's plan is to bring every single one of its games to PC. Exceptions may occur on rare occasions, but that doesn't mean it's not Sony's plan.

Close. The facts indicate it's Sony's plan to bring most of their games to PC. You may think I'm acting pedantic, but that was basically what I said in my original post.

@Questionable_Duck I don't have to act anything, because I'm sticking to the facts. Three major current-gen releases have not been brought to PC yet. Sony has never outright committed to releasing every game on PC going forward. There really isn't much more to say about that.

@Questionable_Duck No, you can't argue that. HonestHick was talking about Sony porting games to PC and thus having no exclusives, I countered by giving examples that are not on PC. All the Microsoft published games you mentioned, were released on PC from day 1. It's two completely different things.

I'm not here to say which is better, I'm here to refute his statement. Sony hasn't gone all-in on abolishing exclusives (yet). You claim there isn't anything to suggest they've suddenly changed their mind about bringing games to PC, while in my opinion, there isn't anything to suggest they've decided to bring ALL their games to PC going forward, rather than judge it on a case by case basis.

@HonestHick It's not entirely accurate to say Sony has no exclusives. Gran Turismo 7 has been out for 3.5 years and is only available on PlayStation. Astro Bot has been out for over a year and there isn't a lot of expectation of it releasing on PC. Demon's Souls has been out for nearly 5 years and it doesn't look like it's coming to PC.

These might only seem like a couple of exceptions, but they were all released after Sony started releasing games on PC. That means there is no guarantee of all Sony games eventually coming to PC, let alone in a timely fashion. We don't really know what Sony's future plans in that regard are, but as it stands, Sony has both timed exclusives (which have more value than you give credit for) and true exclusives.