Cashews

@Toot1st you for sure will know when MS has their quarterly financial report on October 23rd.

@Agramonte Yeah that is Bethesda. Clearly design choice. Instead of Sony or Square Enix telling you that you must save the world from another impending ecological disaster, or guy with a really big magic sword who wants to re-create another timeline or whatever you are placed in a world and you use to imagination to create that world - with the the tools they give you. That doesn't really deviate from TES or Fallout.

Some people need to be on tighter rails. Some don't want that at all. More don't. Skyrim is the most successful rpg of all time by 2x.

@UltimateOtaku91 duuuuude. Microsoft isn't going to be buying anyone for a long time. They have every government watching everything they do right now. They wouldn't waste that on a company in steep decline.

@Anke I think they wanted to do what Tencent was doing but didn't have the Chinese government supporting them as a spy agency.

They have been making the same game now for about 15 years and really not much else. They aren't worth very much any longer.

Four really good games in that list.

@Tharsman MS at financial meeting:

"Bob, what is the report?"
"Well sir, So we have 1 million sales on the pc. 2 million upgrade packages on the xbox and 100,000 of the special edition sales. Gamepass subs are up 170%."
"Good, good. Anything else Bob?"
"Well sir...we have this person named Tharsman who spent $1500 on a game without dlc. We are worried the press might get wind of it and say we are anti-mental health."
"Send the chopper to pick up this...Tharsman...right away."
"Yes sir."

@HonestHick imo none of it matters - the game is a hit.

The one that truly matters comes out on october 23rd - MS's financials. If it captures this month (Idk if it does or doesn't) it will either show a significant spike on subs or it won't. MS's long term plan is obviously subs over unit sales so I believe this number matters to them a great deal. I think it will be the difference between them phasing the console out (in some fashion) or staying the course.

@MrMagic It's got over 100 posts on a PlayStation website just about UK sales (lol UK sales) and it has people like you checking it's steam numbers, reviews and watching streams on it just to cope.

I'd say it is a hit by any metric.

@MoorePs5 the reason it didn't release against any big hitters is because no publisher wanted to release on the same weekend as Starfield. The game itself pushed their timeline back or forward.

Hogwart's is about to add 5-8M copies once it releases on the Switch. I hope the game isn't a mess and is well optimized.

I hope we get a God of War re-release for 2024.

Those shots look pretty - an idyllic version of NYC. They should add degradation and despair to make it more accurate with the current time.

@somnambulance it's basically Lego MMO Minecraft without it's licensing permissions. I know of a lot of kids that play it. I asked one just last weekend what he does in it and he told me him and friends meet after school and just make up roller coaster designs. Honestly I thought that sounded like a pretty cool thing.

Well it scored better than Quake 2. So a better game than Quake II Remastered.

Start a new company > flip it to tencent > 200 million more billies in the bank.

With the sound presumably projecting in front of you (I assume you were sitting behind the unit itself) - does it still sound balanced? Like not too loud on one side of the room? Or like you are listening to a sound bounced off of the wall back at you?

I would expect the sound to be off if you were sitting too far to the left or right of the speakers themselves.

Looks like a super keen unit thanks for the review

@Fight_Teza_Fight maybe. If I had a nickel for every time funding failed and then we get an article about a developer marching on despite the crowd funding market telling them that they suck - I'd have at least $3.85.

@Ainu20 Funding anything so that others may profit is the most idiotic waste of capital that i can conceive. But in that stupid, stupid world - this one is the most stupid.

I like the names of the characters. Haptic and Feedback. Pretty clever.

I like the cardboard box art as much as anything else.

That new artwork in the game is maybe the ugliest remake I have ever seen. Thank goodness you can use the old sprites.

If the Armored Core thread was any indication - we will be losing a few Push Square users to a playthrough of Act III of BG3. Condolences to their families and may they rest in eternal peace. Amen.

@Kienda E3 was created as an elitest con where writers got to go and fans were barred. every year they wrote about the lengths plebs would go through in order to sneak in. Writers would gloat with pages dedicated to all of the loot they got to have and the arly access they got to experience.

Then PAX came out and just opened it to everyone at a price. then the internet got popular and news didn't need gatekeepers any more. Then streaming/youtube became popular and developers could just buy positive word of mouth from them. they could bypass any last vestiges of integrity the journalism industry pretended to have.

Then E3 died.

that is it's story. I left out the current timeline where ESA grovels and embarrasses themselves every time they write a paragraph. that one doesn't need a narrator.

If someone brings the hammer I will gladly bring more nails. I have all the nails necessary to bury this thing. can we please bury E3?

@Titntin the day I use some hack blogger as a litmus test for creativity and quality is the day creativity dies within me.

Critics absolutely hated God Hand. they abhored Deadly Premonition. Once both of those titles became cult classics then they re-wrote reviews...changed their mind completely and pretended they were the first to like it. This is common.

Taking reviews of game writers as a judge of anything...I mean ANYTHING...I wouldn't debase myself ever.

Those 2 games are better than any JRPG that has touched this system or the X. Everyone who has played more than a handful of these things, without rooting for some home team, knows this to be true. That's it.

@DreamlandGem It is definitely not young either. It is directly in the middle of life. Middle aged as they say.

Media has no right to subject us to middle age. their job is to make us feel young and beautiful not halfway done with life. It is a travesty and I will not stand for it. i am writing a strongly worded letter to Hollywood demanding they release us from this assault to our senses.

I'll likely end up grabbing this one after the big hitters settle down a bit. I'd guess early next year.

She is kind of an old lady at this point. A pretty old lady but an old lady.

@sentiententity a shame. You are missing out on the best system of the generation - and you can walk around with it on an OLED without wifi. Xenoblade 3 and Shin Megami V are better jrpgs than anything on the X or PS - objectively. Shmups it isn't even an argument. Platformers. Lol. Quirky, weird games that Sony abandoned circa the PS3 era - no contest. Splatoon 3 is arguably a better shooter than most of the hifi ones of this gen. Action - I'd put Bayonetta up against GoW any day of the week. With the price of their online sub you could successfully argue it is the best of the three. Sony's online is by far the worst. et cetera.

PS/X have great western rpgs, better fighter selection, better person to person connectivity (also can be seen as a con depending).

But like what you like of course. It isn't close to me I couldn't imagine not owning the fairly inexpensive machine this gen. cheers

@Deadlyblack No normal person complains about it ever. Just froot loops who stalk places like digital foundry. DF always being an absolute plague on the industry. people have to worry about nonsense apparently. making up sicknesses.

@themcnoisy swing and a miss!! The PS4 didn't get it right because it was more expensive and it didn't focus on kids. The PS4 got it right because it had the better games - in spades over the competition.

The Switch has the best games and it isn't even remotely close. Sure there are people who like one thing over another - there always are. but if you look over the entire library of games. The RPG selection, the shmups, the platformers, the FPSs, etc...the switch is in a class that won't be topped - and when it is - it will have moved on. Will the next one flop? That is the most interesting topic of the next 3-5 years.

Not to mention saying the other consoles have more adult games is just dumb. There are more adult games on the Nintendo - way too many in fact. Downright raunchy. personally I wish they were gone but such is their grody eshop.

For all of these people who pass out if the game drops to 54FPS - what did you play before this was a possibility?

This was always meant to be a Switch first game - Sony and MS just handed them a free pile of money. I'm playing it now under subscription but I fully intend on buying it once it releases in physical for the god-tier Switch.

@4th_at_EVO The fact it came out at the slowest time of the year made it more of a standout than it should have been.

@Shepherd_Tallon I didn't bother finishing the main story of D3. It was that bad to me. I decided I'd rather play Path of Exile again for the 5 millionth time.

Skipped 4 because 3 was so terrible. And I really hate Blizzard.

@homelesscretin I wasn't surprised about Mario - maybe exactly HOW much money it made - but not that it was popular. It also didn't hurt that it had some pretty huge VAs doing the work.

It seems the movie did well enough - especially since the big hitters couldn't promote it because of the strike. I hope it gets a sequel the artwork and VA were top notch. I'm really enjoying the fact that cartoons taking chances on animation style - like Spiderverse and TMNT - are getting more attention than the super-tired Disney style of soulless CGI.

@Gbarsotini dlc just came out - august 31. Grats you got your sequel.

@Darylb88 GTA 6 is going to get so much attention that reviewers will bomb it just for the clicks. A massive reason why games journalism is dying an increasingly quick death today. In five years it will be all but gone.

It is really goofy that people are putting so much stock in these numbers - like it is a game itself where you are rooting for your home sportsball team.

@MasterChiefWiggum I was watching some of those butler ads for nostalgia on youtube and some of the Wii copies were so bad. I forgot how sad Move's ice cream cones were and how lame the Wii Mii copies in Mod Racers looked.

I wonder if a console can get over the hump of - massively successful and universally loved console > slight upgrade and not particularly liked console > massively successful and universally loved console > slight upgrade and not particularly liked console > forever...

cycle that PS and Nintendo go through. I think we will find out soon when Nintendo releases info on their next VR Neo Switch.

@TheCollector316 the ad looked like more of a spot for the Wii than for the tires even. I get why Sony didn't enjoy the tire ad.

@homelesscretin I feel like the movie should have been more popular. I liked the Mario movie for what it was - but I thought TMNT was much, much better. And I am not a turtles fan in the slightest. It was just well done all-around.

@MagisterMagi hmmmm I don't remember that!

edit: hah I'm watching it now! If he had an agent - that was a really boneheaded move!

They should have kept Butler around a few more years. Made him the 'Flo' of Sony. He was the last ad spokesman for a console I can remember.

@VideoGameBoy When you pay a monthly sub you are, in fact, entitled to have an opinion about it.

@Bentleyma what he said is still correct. SE just sharded out another pixel "remaster". It cost nothing - pure profit. 16 cost a great deal to make.

It may not be the game of the year but it is certainly in the conversation. Excellent game and I'll be getting any dlc they put out if it is the quality of the base game.

I did not expect to see Hogwart's at number 1 until the Switch release. When it does finally release on the Switch it will be a juggernaut that will dwarf it's previous sales - if it doesn't release a buggy, unoptimised mess.
Code in a Box sales for Starfield charting top 10 is impressive.
A lot of games are coming back into the mix as people collect the games they missed with these PS5 discounts. That is good for the developers and good for the playstation.

If any of the big 3 don't make a lot of money this season it could be a curtain call!

@Matroska that is true MK is a big one.