Bluemoon2008

Shouldn't be a surprise to anybody. It's a by the numbers extraction shooter, why would a niche genre suddenly become a big hit when it offers absolutely nothing unique to entice people towards it?

Said all along it either needs something unique and good or at the very least, something borrowed from other popular mainstream genres to attract an audience to this genre. It appears to have none of that so of course it has no buzz.

Loved borderlands. borderlands 2 was an absolute masterpiece. pre-sequel felt like a step back and 3 felt dated with nothing new but still decent enough.

This will be the first borderlands game I'm not purchasing day 1. Feel like the franchise needs a big overhaul, if we get it then I'll play it when it inevitably comes to ps+ just as every other borderlands game to date has.

It's 4th but that tells us nothing. Just look at the list, it's behind a game that's multiple years old and is available on ps+ extra now.

People act like they're paying £20 a month for premium over extra and not £20 a year. 1 game a month on top of the other perks is more than adequate for what you're paying for it. Go see what that money will buy you on the ps store if you don't think it's good value.

And I'm saying that as somebody who doesn't really use premium, the games haven't interested me, I'm only subscribed to it because I'm grandfathered in and it's cheaper than extra

Absolute weirdos. But at least it keeps them busy, I wouldn't care to imagine the deprived stuff these people would get up to otherwise if it wasn't this.

Gamepass day 1 is just an accelerated escalation of the ever present existence of rapid post launch depreciation. It's just the next step along from games being 50% cheaper 12 months after release. They're not victims to gamepass either, they've countered against it by raising prices and by making special editions and introducing paid early access along with micro transactions and siphoning off parts of games to release as paid dlc.

There's nothing forcing them to accept a gamepass deal if that's what they believe, it helps many smaller or new studios survive and brings exposure that could lead to them prospering if they make a quality product.

They're speaking as if they had absolutely no idea of what state the game was in. They actively chose to release it in this state, you don't essentially try and con people into paying for something broken and unfinished and then say sorry and expect all to be forgiven.

I might need to revise my claim last week that this would be on ps+ in December. If scores are as harsh across the board it might be even sooner.

Woeful. Barrel scraping hitting new depths by the month at the minute.

Fewer games being offered, more and more online titles, the majority of which are or soon will be dead, More games that have already been on ps+, more games that are broken with unobtainable platinum. Feels like almost deliberate sabotage at this point.

To the surprise of absolutely nobody with eyes and common sense.

@Flaming_Kaiser it's fair because that's the price of having Xbox games on Playstation day 1. They ultimately want you on xbox/gamepass so its either enticing you to them or youre paying a premium to help fund their platform.

Whether you choose to pay it is upto you. Personally, despite playing as much if not more than ever, I've bought just 2 games on release this decade. With the market flooded with quality games and not enough time to play everything, there's really no need to buy anything on release for full price nowadays, buying day 1 is essentially just another form of early access that you're paying 50% extra for.

Why is this kind of thing still making headlines? The industry became contract based about decade ago now if not longer.

People have specific roles within the game development, for a lot of them, they can only do their roles at certain stages of development. games cost so much and takes so long to make now that it no longer makes financial sense to employ somebody to literally do nothing for months if not years at a time so they're laid off and they'll re-hire for that role when it's required.

This kind of process is common throughout many different industries, it's nothing new it has just become the norm in the gaming industry yet people are still unwilling to accept it and act like all devs should pay people to do nothing for vast quantities of time.

As an example, If you're working in construction, you're not going to bring in a contracted specialist roofer whilst you're still laying foundations

Biggest red flag in gaming. Has there ever been a game that hasn't been at least underwhelming that didn't send out early review codes? At this point, even if the game is dreadful there would be less negativity in the reviews than there is by simply not allowing early reviews. A PR disaster and its shocking anybody is still making these basic errors.

Screams Decembers ps+ essential game.

I don't blame Microsoft for this. They're putting it on gamepass, they're bringing it to other consoles day 1 but the consequence of that is you have to pay top whack. I think that's fair. Nobody is forcing anybody to buy it, just don't buy it at launch and wait for the inevitable price drop 6-12 months later, waiting that like would only be similar to a timed exclusive release anyway like say Indiana Jones.

Victim of its own over-extended hype. I really enjoyed hollow knight but it wasn't this unprecedented masterpiece it's morphed into whilst we wait on a sequel. There's been loads of similar metroidvanias since hollow knight and a lot of them have at the very least been on a par if not better.

Hasn't made any sense to buy full price games for half a decade now anyway.

Games aren't progressing much anymore, a 5 year old game looks largely similar, even 10 year old titles aren't much different and with there being more and more games released every year and a limited time to play them there's always a backlog waiting to play either via a subscription service or buying heavily discounted.

One of the better showings, shows promise but that name is truly abysmal.

Not great. Seemed to be an abundance of multi-player games, many of which I expect will have a very short lifespan.

With Xbox owning half the game devs nowadays and wanting to do their own thing and sony having pretty much nothing thanks to the swathe of cancelled live service guff and so had to prop up their own poor SoP with 3rd party stuff there wasn't much left for Geoff which is why it felt more pc centric than ever.

Jurassic world evolution 3 was probably the only surprise announcement I would genuinely want to play day 1. New drinkbox game looked sweet.

Incredibly mediocre in my eyes. Nioh 3 doing the heavy lifting pulling it up to mediocre from an otherwise poor showing. Worst state of play we've seen in a while for me personally. Last one was miles better.

Nioh 3 for me by a country mile. Only game I will actually buy. Can understand the love for Bond, it looked good and IO are excellent.

Surprised how popular the marvel fighting game is. Not because it looks bad or anything mind, genuinely thought fighting games were much more niche than it would appear

Possibly an unpopular opinion but I think it looks incredibly dull.

Comfortably the best announcement of the entire state of play. Delighted it gets a much deserved third game.

Kind of meh to below par but mostly because the majority of the main stuff just wasn't for me.

They spent an eternity on that marvel fighting game at the end and I simply couldn't give a toss about it. I'm sure for people who enjoy fighting games its a big deal but i think that's a niche market.

Nioh 3 is the big one for me, nioh is the best soulslike for my money. 007 looks good too, trust IO to nail that.

I predict we'll see a tease of the next Horizon game. Either horizon 3 or that online monster hunter style version they're supposedly doing, whichever is in line to come first.

Other than that, they'll be an overly long dive into death stranding 2 and some ghost of yotei taking up the bulk of it. Might also see the wolverine game.

Sounds good to me. When they rebranded ps+ I said back then that they should set up or acquire a couple of small teams to work on much smaller budget side projects for existing IP with the intention of bringing them to ps+ day 1, the last bit seems unlikely but the rest of it fits the description of this game perfectly. I'm very interested in this.

@PocketHotDogs completely agree. Said as much in a separate comment. Should be all or nothing, seeking to cater to both just leads to a sub-par game for both audiences.

I actually think this patch is a bad idea. they wanted to do a co-op game, they've balanced it for co-op so lean all in on it, make it a co-op only game and don't waiver on it by making it possibke to play solo. You're just going to end up with a game that's awkward to play solo because that isn't the intention and then you're going to end up compromising on the co-op experience to ensure that its still playable solo.

I've been a souls fan since I imported demon souls from Asia on ps3 before it even got a european release, this is the first one I've not bought, I've no interest in the co-op mode so I'll just sit this out and wait until the next proper single player souls game comes.

@PocketHotDogs I think that was literally the point though. To do something different. They wanted to have a bash at a co-op title and that's their prerogative.

Hard mode in this is making Manchester united relevant again.

The two smaller additions are sound but the main headline title of yet another NBA game that nobody outside of the US is interested in ruins it completely.

Sports games should never be offered on essential, at best add them to extra alongside a handful of other titles. With annualised sports games, those interested in them, buy them on release, nobody is holding off thinking oh I'll pick up NBA 2k25 in a couple of years on the cheap when the game will be defunct and the servers closed.

The only surprise is it took this long to cancel. A terrible idea from the start.

Of course they are. No chance they wasn't going to be.

Expect, death stranding 2, marathon, ghost of Yotei to do the heavy lifting for Sony. We might get a look at wolverine, the rumored god of war spin off or as an outside shout, what guerilla games are upto as a one last thing tease but the first three will be the big ones.

Certainly looks like a throwback to a late ps2, early ps3 style of game in the way it plays.

I suspect this won't review well critically but those that are in the market for that kind of nostalgic feel game will enjoy it a fair bit.

Screams ps+ title in 12 months time.

Will definitely play another Crabs treasure and probably eventually try skull and bones too when I thin out the backlog.

These bonus offerings they do are more solid than most monthly refresh. Didn't we get dredge and Dave the diver last year?

YAY! the annual American sports game that will be offline within 18 months anyway that I've zero interest in ever playing....

Alone in the dark is just "meh." No issue with it but feels likes a ps+ extra game that doesn't make the headline list rather than an essential offering.

Bomb rush cyberfunk seems good as the smaller indie offering.

Destiny was inevitable. Not sure who it's really for though. Maybe wrong but feeling like new players or long time lapsed players can't just jump back in at the end.

Whilst it's not up there with the legendary hard platinums, it's still an impressive achievement. It's more grindy than anythplatinum, as it requires a lot of favourable rng.

Got it with ps+ and am currently working my way through all the decks to gold stakes, you do start to see the limitations and design flaws in the game fairly early into the grind. The structure is very rigid, establish economy then get a source of chips, +mult, xmult with little room for anything crazy or different if you want to win on high stakes.

Yeah, no thanks. Can honestly say i never understood the hype and people forget, before it's release this was touted as the game of the decade, not quite gta 6 as nothing compares to that but the next best after it.

When they were announced. Concord looked miles more appealing than fairgames, that should have been a monumental alarm bell when they pulled the plug on concord.

Sonys next live service games are going to be heavily scrutinised and will have to rid themselves of the lingering stink of concord, therefore it has to be nothing short of an exceptional game, if it's not, don't even bother putting it out.

It was a free little bonus we got for doing practically nothing, you could pretty much get enough points for the £5 reward just by loading up one of the essential and extra games per month. Sad to see it being removed but can't be angry at it's closure.

Highly recommend rogue legacy 2. Inscryption and avicii invector. Platinumed all 3 and can say they're 3 quality titles and the perfect extra games.

The comparison to other entertainment isn't really a fair one. yes the cost per minute ratio is often heavily in its favour but that's not everything.

Gaming is seen as a daily thing, something done at home, it's not the same as going to the cinema or a gig or a sports event where its very much about the experience.

those are varying ranges of uncommon occurrences, if you're going to compare it to different entertainment then Netflix or other streaming services is probably the best comparison and suddenly that cost per minute ratio isn't looking so favourable.

Gamepass. You'd have to be severely cretinous to be buying it on steam when anywhere you have access to steam, you can get gamepass too and play it from that for considerably cheaper.

Secondly is just the time. People don't have time to play everything released.
Expedition 33 and oblivion came out last week, both are huge, incredibly popular games, a lot of people play 1 game at a time and will be getting through those for the foreseeable. There's no benefit to buying a game before you're ready to play it.

Only game I was genuinely interested in was humankind and then I learned it's a broken glitchy mess with an unobtainable platinum and the devs have totally abandoned it so that's a swerve. Sick of sony adding games that are broken and have been abandoned, if you're paying money to bring a game to your service you should make it a requirement that they actually work.

Marketing was practically non-existant for this and surrounded by games that were getting a lot of hype so it makes complete sense.

This is primed for an earlier than usual introduction to a subscription service, be that gamepass or some ps+ tier.

@Juanalf 100% agree with you there. It's a bizarre thing to do. Some games they do it so they can reintroduce them later as new additions. It's a really ***** practice but it at least makes sense, but the resistance games make no sense whatsoever, they've not even been on there long.

@BolkaRover Netflix have largely transitioned into producing their own stuff now but back in the day when Netflix was licensing most of its stuff, that's exactly what was happening. Some of the most popular shows were disappearing with next to no notice.

When you say ps+ premium I'm not sure what you're referring to exactly, you're comparing it to gamepass so I assume you mean predominately the extra library and not specifically the premium only benefits. Firstly, gamepass is the equivalent of £180 a year compared to £100 for extra, so there's a major caveat that's often ignored.

But yes there's no argument from me that gamepass isn't incredible value, it's brilliant for the players and should be taken advantage of because it's not financially sustainable. The constant price hikes, the change in their approach with them also bringing out tiers with day 1 stuff only going to the highest tier shows its not a profitable approach and so expecting sony to copy it is just mental. If a supermarket suddenly starts selling goods at a loss, it's not reasonable to complain that another supermarket chain isn't also selling them at a loss.

Extra should be viewed as an independent service and not in comparison to a service that's not making money, and if you do that, extra is undoubtedly brilliant value in it's own right. I have bought precisely 2 games since the pandemic yet I game basically daily because I have ps+ premium. Games are soon going to cost £70-80 a pop, if you half that or even quarter it to take into account older titles reduce in cost, you'd still only need to play a handful of games a year from the library for you to get value for your subscription. If you're not doing that, then what the hell are you doing subscribing? What i play in one solitary month is worth far more than what i pay for 12 months. The value is undeniable.

It's like some people still haven't grasped the basic concept of a subscription service. You're not meant to play absolutely everything, in yhr same way you're not meant to watch every single thing added to Netflix, you pick what you're most interested in from a wide selection.

There isn't going to be a perpetual, ever increasing number of games available, a refresh is generally a good thing you might miss out on playing the odd gane you had your eye on but if you've not got around to by the time it leaves it's generally because there's plenty of other games that interest you more so you're not short of things to play anyway.

Ultimately we don't want sony to be spending large chunks of their library budget licensing titles for multiple years that a very small section of the customers are playing, the more refreshing there is, the more potential for appeal.

@sanderson72 dire? Hogwarts legacy was added to the last update, the best selling game of 2 years back, alongside lost records part 2 as another day 1 release, blue prince was also added day 1, a massive critical hit and the best rated game of the year to date. this months essential tier has given us balatro, the winner of many goty awards last year. I'd love to hear what you'd categorize as a good month if that's a dire offering.