The games console is dead and has been replaced with affordable PC hardware running custom firmware shoved into a console shaped box to sit next to the TV with iterative updates and the occassion change of case and peripheral design every few years in order to remain relevant.
Meanwhile PCs themselves have become more affordable and easier to use negating the two biggest factors for games consoles to exist in the first place.
Apart from brand loyalty and game exclusivity (something slolwly going the way of the dodo.) there is absolutely no reason to buy a dedictated games console any more.
Consoles always had a place in the market because custom hardware meant they could do things that couldn't be done elsewhere. Now a new console just means the numbers of the specs go up a little bit allowing for ever so slightly smoother, crisper graphics...woo.
"But but but...this time you can buy a portable one!" I hear you consumer whores screaming. So its a Playstation with a higher risk of being lost, stolen or broken...woo.
Wake me up when someone announces a games console that does something new and interesting.
@Olmaz I'm afraid your evidence doesn't amount to anything.
You see, research on subjects such as this is highly contestable. Even leaving aside the foolish notion that you can prove a nebulous thing as psychological harm (it can show deviation from arbitrary social norms – something I will agree on – but deviation and harm are not the same thing.) there is the fact that studies that backup pre-existing ideas and popular opinions tend to vastly outnumber that go against the grain.
It's all too easy to find professionals willing to say pornography is the cause of all society's problems because pornography is a societal taboo and therefore a nice simple scapegoat.
It's not so easy to find professionals willing to say, "porn is a-okay!' because doing so is career suicide and even if they do, they find themselves up against people like you who's ideologies are so strong they cannot help but dismiss, downplay and even destroy anything that runs counter to their worldview.
Hence why I refuse to argue with you. It is a pointless endeavor.
I have built my worldview through firsthand experience, constantly asking questions and not accepting things at face value. You have been taught yours. We have two very different perspectives on reality and I learned long ago it's a waste of time trying to convince a fish in a bowl they're not swimming in the ocean.
@Olmaz So, from a cursory glance at your links, its the same BS that has been trotted out for longer than the internet's existence.
I get it, I really do and I'm not interested in arguing as I know I'll never change your mind.
I'll just say this: there will always be things that society deem to be harmful to children and in every case, those things turn out to be non-issues and attempts at stifling and controlling them turn out to do more harm.
@Olmaz Considering we now have a younger generation with more puritanical attitudes towards sex and nudity than we've had in generations, I can't say I do know it.
As I stated, pornography, regardless of how readily accessible it is, isn't the problem. It is a lack of education and parental (and individual) responsibility that's the problem.
And honestly, what harm is this non-stop erotic cavalcade supposed to be doing, exactly?
@Olmaz Pornography is not harmful in context. Prudish and puritanical views on sex that lead to children not being provided with that context, on the other hand, is.
I spent my childhood in the pre-internet days when hardcore pornography was illegal in the UK and even simulated sex was frequently censored and it didn't stop me finding my parent's secret stash of illicit tapes and magazines. The fact is, children of a certain age will take an interest in sex and will find ways and means to acess sexually explicit material.
So rather than trying to prevent this, what should be done is to educate them properly. This was something I had, thanks to my liberal parents and whilst I'm sure puritanical minds such as yourself might argue that I'm a corrupting influence because of my liberal, open-minded attitudes, the fact of the matter is, my exposure to porn and other explicit materials at a relatively young age have had no deletrious effects on me or anyone around me.
If kids are watching some of the extreme porn out there and think that's normal and acceptable behaviour outside of pornography and consensual sexual play then the fault lies with parents for not teaching their kids better in the first place and not the porn itself.
It isn't the overabundance of new games or increasingly selective gamers that are at fault, it is a lack of marketing.
Even in the days of the PlayStation and before, where the number of new releases were a fraction of what we see today, you couldn't just plop out a game and expect people to buy it. There are plenty of great games from the 90s that quickly fell into obscurity because apart from a review and a few words prerelease, they went practically unnoticed.
Relying on word of mouth to sell your game is always a risk and, if I'm honest, rarely as organic as it might seem (all those streamers and YouTubers playing and talking about your game didn't exactly go out and buy it, did they?)
To add to the problem, the choice of artwork and game's title don't exactly inspire impulse purchases as they're so generic I imagine most people wouldn't pay the game a second glance even if it were heavily discounted.
Truth be told, this article is doing a far better job of raising awareness of the title than anything... Which my eternally cynical mentality wonders is the whole point.
@Brundleflies21 The movies may not have been good (although 3 is a fun horror movie and Bloodlines is far better than its given credit for.) but Barker himself, however wrote a direct sequel, The Scarlet Gospel, which I've heard good things about so there's no reason this can't be good as long as he's involved.
Iron Galaxy need a spine transfer as they're clearly lacking one of their own.
Honestly, I am beyond tired of this toxic, narcissistic culture we're forced to live in where criticism or any form of friendly deprecating humour is considered an attack that demands supplication or risks punishment.
SS2 is still a great game but when you take off the rose-tinted glasses, it has a few issues that detract from the overall experience – especially for new players coming in fresh.
It's also fair to say that although System Shock 2 laid the foundations for everything from Dead Space to Dishonored, the games that followed in its wake have superceded it.
System Shock 2 might be a classic but it's not beyond reproach and after a quarter of a century, it's showing its showing its age, not enough to make it unplayable but certainly enough to lose it a point or two when it comes to reviewing this rerelease.
I've been a subscriber of the top tier for the last 5 years and I've seen the selection go from including games I wanted to play to games I already owned, to the digital equivalent of a bargain bin with one gem of a game every few months or so.
Then there's the retro collection which started off poorly and has somehow managed to get worse each month. That this is one of the rare benefits of Premium just makes it sting even more.
I had to pause my membership for a month back in April and saw absolutely no reason to go back as its not worth it to play the occasional round of Street Fighter 6 and odd discount on games I want.
That they even went and cancelled the Playstation Stars program was the final nail in the coffin and it will take substantial efforts on Sony's part to regain my trust and tempt me into resubscribing.
I picked it up purely based on word of mouth and have not been disappointed. It's the best original Final Fantasy game I've played since IX and deserves the praise being heaped upon it.
What I find curious about this, though, is that it shows gamers know genuinely great games and yet for some reason are perfectly content with overproduced slop 99% of the time.
I don't understand the mentality (although I suspect marketing, media hype and undercritical reviews play a substantial role.) Surely this is the quality we should expect from games all of the time (even if they do fall short) instead of being so rare they become newsworthy for months?
@mvhess Why am I here? Because I've been playing games on the Playstation since I got my first back in 1995.
Believe it or not, gameplay and story are not mutally exclusive and many of my favourite games manage to both tell a good story and be fun to play (for example the Metal Gear Solid games.)
Frankly I have resented the AAA games industry's push towards cinematic experiences above gameplay since they began dumbing the gameplay down and removing challenge about 20 years ago (it came as a response to people complaining they didn't have the time to 'git gud'.) Thankfully the rise of indie games and FROMSoft's uncompromising attitude kept me from giving up on the hobby entirely.
At the end of the day, I like shiny games with pretty graphics. I like games with good stories and cinematic flair...but more than either of those, I like video games to be games and not merely a collection of interactive elements with the occasional mild challenge thrown in to give me the illusion I'm achieving something like I'm a lab rat pushing buttons for food.
And although Sony and the other Western AAA publishers refuse to do that any more, there are plenty of developers) that get the balance between gameplay, production values and cinematic storytelling just right.
@LiamCroft I have and you seem to gloss over and dismiss their faults. You mention traversal gets annoying in the last 10 hours or so (that's the length of an entire video game!) and that while combat is improved, there's still about the same amount as the original.
The fundamental problem with Death Stranding is that the core gameplay mechanic isn't engaging enough to warrant the effort needed to progress further. If that remains unchanged then all the improvements elsewhere are meaningless.
it doesn't matter how much glitter you cover a turd in, its still a turd at the end of the day.
I'll wait to hear word of mouth on this as that review score appears to be for the narrative and technical achievements rather than the game itself which is more of the same and, frankly, the gameplay of the original bored me to tears.
I swear video game reviewers forget that gameplay is a very very important (arguably the most important.) aspect when judging a game's quality.
I know that sometimes a video game narrative is worth dealing with average gameplay but that shouldn't be glossed over or outright ignored when reviewing them. After all, they are meant to be GAMES, not movies I have to jump through hoops to see to the end.
I have paid £70 for video games precisely twice: Tears of the Kingdom and FFVII: Rebirth.
Likewise, I've paid £60 for two games: Baldurs Gate 3 and AstroBot.
These games offered exceptional quality and exceptional value for their price point and apart from AstroBot, I didn't begrudge the price I paid.
The problem with most AAA games is that they don't offer both of those so asking a quarter of the price of the console itself doesn't cut it.
If you want to charge luxury prices then you need to supply a luxury product. Glitchy, bug-ridden messes with lots to do, highly polished games I can complete in a weekend with no incentive to return (we used to call these rentals in years gone by.) or polished games bulked out with an overabundance of repetitive filler (looking at you Ubisoft.) just don't cut it.
I'm happy paying £30-35 for janky but fun or polished but short.
I will reluctantly pay £35-50 if they are especially entertaining.
Asking anything more than that and you need to be offering the absolute creme de le creme of interactive video game experiences that I'm going to remember my time with for years to come.
And nothing Microsoft are knocking out comes even close to that.
Life is better with pizza and ice cream but you don't need it to enjoy life. Same thing for high frame rates and high resolutions: they're nice to have but you don't need them to enjoy games.
This kind of reaction is one of the reasons I disassociate myself from gamers and nerds.
I'm glad to see this announced. I loaded Golden up after beating P3Reload and was floored by just how dated it looked in comparison. Still perfectly playable but I found myself missing the tiny details found in Reload and finding the bobblehead look of the characters and flat environments distracting.
Nothing that wouldn't have become inconsequential after a couple of hours of playing but anyone who thinks a newer shinier version is a bad thing is a mental case – especially given how the previous remake they did was phenomenal.
Really happy to see this announced. I bought the GBA port many years ago and it left a huge impression but ended up losing the cart before getting too far in to it so I'm glad I'll finally be able to give it the time it deserves.
Now I just need to get my arse into gear and finish off Tactics Ogre before it hits.
Interesting to see this arrive just a couple of weeks after I realised a Digital Eclipse Williams collection ala Atari 50 would be phenomenal but wasn't sure if it would even be possible.
A shame there's no proper version of Deadly Alliance, though, but I suspect including the PS2 would be far too much content for what is, ostensibly, a collection of arcade games.
An impressive showing. Normally these shows leave me bored to tears or rolling my eyes but for once they had a consistent line-up of interesting new titles and surprise returns of classics.
I'm guessing the people complaining about it are spoiled enough to own multiple gaming systems and need first party exclusives to justify their purchase of a PS5 but for folks like myself who aren't hardcore gamers and don't feel the need to own every console and a high-end PC, this was a fantastic showcase that showed off a great selection of upcoming games.
@Bunchesopuppies Qlipoth is a term from kaballah and refers to the 'outer husks' of the 10 sephirot on the tree of life and represent the opposite or undesirable qualities of each one.
These days it tends to be used mainly by edgelords as a source of inspiration for acts of 'evil' and game developers looking to impart a bit of darkness and edginess into their games.
Comments 73
Re: Rumour: Leaked PS6 Specs Reveal Affordable, Power Efficient Next-Gen Console
I...really don't care any more.
The games console is dead and has been replaced with affordable PC hardware running custom firmware shoved into a console shaped box to sit next to the TV with iterative updates and the occassion change of case and peripheral design every few years in order to remain relevant.
Meanwhile PCs themselves have become more affordable and easier to use negating the two biggest factors for games consoles to exist in the first place.
Apart from brand loyalty and game exclusivity (something slolwly going the way of the dodo.) there is absolutely no reason to buy a dedictated games console any more.
Consoles always had a place in the market because custom hardware meant they could do things that couldn't be done elsewhere. Now a new console just means the numbers of the specs go up a little bit allowing for ever so slightly smoother, crisper graphics...woo.
"But but but...this time you can buy a portable one!" I hear you consumer whores screaming. So its a Playstation with a higher risk of being lost, stolen or broken...woo.
Wake me up when someone announces a games console that does something new and interesting.
Re: UK Citizens Using Death Stranding 2 on PS5 to Bypass Porn Blocks
@Olmaz I'm afraid your evidence doesn't amount to anything.
You see, research on subjects such as this is highly contestable. Even leaving aside the foolish notion that you can prove a nebulous thing as psychological harm (it can show deviation from arbitrary social norms – something I will agree on – but deviation and harm are not the same thing.) there is the fact that studies that backup pre-existing ideas and popular opinions tend to vastly outnumber that go against the grain.
It's all too easy to find professionals willing to say pornography is the cause of all society's problems because pornography is a societal taboo and therefore a nice simple scapegoat.
It's not so easy to find professionals willing to say, "porn is a-okay!' because doing so is career suicide and even if they do, they find themselves up against people like you who's ideologies are so strong they cannot help but dismiss, downplay and even destroy anything that runs counter to their worldview.
Hence why I refuse to argue with you. It is a pointless endeavor.
I have built my worldview through firsthand experience, constantly asking questions and not accepting things at face value. You have been taught yours. We have two very different perspectives on reality and I learned long ago it's a waste of time trying to convince a fish in a bowl they're not swimming in the ocean.
Re: UK Citizens Using Death Stranding 2 on PS5 to Bypass Porn Blocks
@Olmaz So, from a cursory glance at your links, its the same BS that has been trotted out for longer than the internet's existence.
I get it, I really do and I'm not interested in arguing as I know I'll never change your mind.
I'll just say this: there will always be things that society deem to be harmful to children and in every case, those things turn out to be non-issues and attempts at stifling and controlling them turn out to do more harm.
The road to hell and all that...
Re: UK Citizens Using Death Stranding 2 on PS5 to Bypass Porn Blocks
@Olmaz Considering we now have a younger generation with more puritanical attitudes towards sex and nudity than we've had in generations, I can't say I do know it.
As I stated, pornography, regardless of how readily accessible it is, isn't the problem. It is a lack of education and parental (and individual) responsibility that's the problem.
And honestly, what harm is this non-stop erotic cavalcade supposed to be doing, exactly?
Re: UK Citizens Using Death Stranding 2 on PS5 to Bypass Porn Blocks
@Olmaz Pornography is not harmful in context. Prudish and puritanical views on sex that lead to children not being provided with that context, on the other hand, is.
I spent my childhood in the pre-internet days when hardcore pornography was illegal in the UK and even simulated sex was frequently censored and it didn't stop me finding my parent's secret stash of illicit tapes and magazines. The fact is, children of a certain age will take an interest in sex and will find ways and means to acess sexually explicit material.
So rather than trying to prevent this, what should be done is to educate them properly. This was something I had, thanks to my liberal parents and whilst I'm sure puritanical minds such as yourself might argue that I'm a corrupting influence because of my liberal, open-minded attitudes, the fact of the matter is, my exposure to porn and other explicit materials at a relatively young age have had no deletrious effects on me or anyone around me.
If kids are watching some of the extreme porn out there and think that's normal and acceptable behaviour outside of pornography and consensual sexual play then the fault lies with parents for not teaching their kids better in the first place and not the porn itself.
Re: 'Increasingly Selective Consumers' to Blame for Underperformance of Blades of Fire
It isn't the overabundance of new games or increasingly selective gamers that are at fault, it is a lack of marketing.
Even in the days of the PlayStation and before, where the number of new releases were a fraction of what we see today, you couldn't just plop out a game and expect people to buy it. There are plenty of great games from the 90s that quickly fell into obscurity because apart from a review and a few words prerelease, they went practically unnoticed.
Relying on word of mouth to sell your game is always a risk and, if I'm honest, rarely as organic as it might seem (all those streamers and YouTubers playing and talking about your game didn't exactly go out and buy it, did they?)
To add to the problem, the choice of artwork and game's title don't exactly inspire impulse purchases as they're so generic I imagine most people wouldn't pay the game a second glance even if it were heavily discounted.
Truth be told, this article is doing a far better job of raising awareness of the title than anything... Which my eternally cynical mentality wonders is the whole point.
Re: Pinhead Is Back! Single Player Hellraiser Horror Revealed for PS5
@Brundleflies21 The movies may not have been good (although 3 is a fun horror movie and Bloodlines is far better than its given credit for.) but Barker himself, however wrote a direct sequel, The Scarlet Gospel, which I've heard good things about so there's no reason this can't be good as long as he's involved.
Re: Tony Hawk's Latest Game Mistakenly Trashes Dead Activision IP
Iron Galaxy need a spine transfer as they're clearly lacking one of their own.
Honestly, I am beyond tired of this toxic, narcissistic culture we're forced to live in where criticism or any form of friendly deprecating humour is considered an attack that demands supplication or risks punishment.
Re: Mini Review: System Shock 2: 25th Anniversary Remaster (PS5) - Cult Classic Returns, Cybernetically Enhanced
@willi3su They have a point though.
SS2 is still a great game but when you take off the rose-tinted glasses, it has a few issues that detract from the overall experience – especially for new players coming in fresh.
It's also fair to say that although System Shock 2 laid the foundations for everything from Dead Space to Dishonored, the games that followed in its wake have superceded it.
System Shock 2 might be a classic but it's not beyond reproach and after a quarter of a century, it's showing its showing its age, not enough to make it unplayable but certainly enough to lose it a point or two when it comes to reviewing this rerelease.
Re: Now Your PS5 Is a Bona Fide KORG Synthesiser
Without the ability to export audio, this is just another toy with little practical use.
Re: PlayStation Thinks Its PS Plus Games Are 'Improving' Every Year
HAHAHAHAHA!
No.
I've been a subscriber of the top tier for the last 5 years and I've seen the selection go from including games I wanted to play to games I already owned, to the digital equivalent of a bargain bin with one gem of a game every few months or so.
Then there's the retro collection which started off poorly and has somehow managed to get worse each month. That this is one of the rare benefits of Premium just makes it sting even more.
I had to pause my membership for a month back in April and saw absolutely no reason to go back as its not worth it to play the occasional round of Street Fighter 6 and odd discount on games I want.
That they even went and cancelled the Playstation Stars program was the final nail in the coffin and it will take substantial efforts on Sony's part to regain my trust and tempt me into resubscribing.
Re: The Expedition 33 Story Keeps on Getting Better with 'Unusual' Sales Increase
I picked it up purely based on word of mouth and have not been disappointed. It's the best original Final Fantasy game I've played since IX and deserves the praise being heaped upon it.
What I find curious about this, though, is that it shows gamers know genuinely great games and yet for some reason are perfectly content with overproduced slop 99% of the time.
I don't understand the mentality (although I suspect marketing, media hype and undercritical reviews play a substantial role.) Surely this is the quality we should expect from games all of the time (even if they do fall short) instead of being so rare they become newsworthy for months?
Re: Death Stranding 2 (PS5) - A Masterpiece in Every Sense
@mvhess Why am I here? Because I've been playing games on the Playstation since I got my first back in 1995.
Believe it or not, gameplay and story are not mutally exclusive and many of my favourite games manage to both tell a good story and be fun to play (for example the Metal Gear Solid games.)
Frankly I have resented the AAA games industry's push towards cinematic experiences above gameplay since they began dumbing the gameplay down and removing challenge about 20 years ago (it came as a response to people complaining they didn't have the time to 'git gud'.) Thankfully the rise of indie games and FROMSoft's uncompromising attitude kept me from giving up on the hobby entirely.
At the end of the day, I like shiny games with pretty graphics. I like games with good stories and cinematic flair...but more than either of those, I like video games to be games and not merely a collection of interactive elements with the occasional mild challenge thrown in to give me the illusion I'm achieving something like I'm a lab rat pushing buttons for food.
And although Sony and the other Western AAA publishers refuse to do that any more, there are plenty of developers) that get the balance between gameplay, production values and cinematic storytelling just right.
Re: Death Stranding 2 (PS5) - A Masterpiece in Every Sense
Removed
Re: Death Stranding 2 (PS5) - A Masterpiece in Every Sense
@LiamCroft I have and you seem to gloss over and dismiss their faults. You mention traversal gets annoying in the last 10 hours or so (that's the length of an entire video game!) and that while combat is improved, there's still about the same amount as the original.
The fundamental problem with Death Stranding is that the core gameplay mechanic isn't engaging enough to warrant the effort needed to progress further. If that remains unchanged then all the improvements elsewhere are meaningless.
it doesn't matter how much glitter you cover a turd in, its still a turd at the end of the day.
Re: Death Stranding 2 (PS5) - A Masterpiece in Every Sense
I'll wait to hear word of mouth on this as that review score appears to be for the narrative and technical achievements rather than the game itself which is more of the same and, frankly, the gameplay of the original bored me to tears.
I swear video game reviewers forget that gameplay is a very very important (arguably the most important.) aspect when judging a game's quality.
I know that sometimes a video game narrative is worth dealing with average gameplay but that shouldn't be glossed over or outright ignored when reviewing them. After all, they are meant to be GAMES, not movies I have to jump through hoops to see to the end.
Re: 'Good Luck with That' - The Outer Worlds 2 $80 Price Has Gone Down Horribly with PS5 Players
I have paid £70 for video games precisely twice: Tears of the Kingdom and FFVII: Rebirth.
Likewise, I've paid £60 for two games: Baldurs Gate 3 and AstroBot.
These games offered exceptional quality and exceptional value for their price point and apart from AstroBot, I didn't begrudge the price I paid.
The problem with most AAA games is that they don't offer both of those so asking a quarter of the price of the console itself doesn't cut it.
If you want to charge luxury prices then you need to supply a luxury product. Glitchy, bug-ridden messes with lots to do, highly polished games I can complete in a weekend with no incentive to return (we used to call these rentals in years gone by.) or polished games bulked out with an overabundance of repetitive filler (looking at you Ubisoft.) just don't cut it.
I'm happy paying £30-35 for janky but fun or polished but short.
I will reluctantly pay £35-50 if they are especially entertaining.
Asking anything more than that and you need to be offering the absolute creme de le creme of interactive video game experiences that I'm going to remember my time with for years to come.
And nothing Microsoft are knocking out comes even close to that.
Re: Digimon Story Time Stranger Disappointment as 30FPS Cap Is Confirmed on Consoles
@Drago201 Better doesn't mean necessary.
Life is better with pizza and ice cream but you don't need it to enjoy life. Same thing for high frame rates and high resolutions: they're nice to have but you don't need them to enjoy games.
Re: Atlus Says It's 'Actively Preparing' for the Future of Persona as Revival Gets Rough Reception
This kind of reaction is one of the reasons I disassociate myself from gamers and nerds.
I'm glad to see this announced. I loaded Golden up after beating P3Reload and was floored by just how dated it looked in comparison. Still perfectly playable but I found myself missing the tiny details found in Reload and finding the bobblehead look of the characters and flat environments distracting.
Nothing that wouldn't have become inconsequential after a couple of hours of playing but anyone who thinks a newer shinier version is a bad thing is a mental case – especially given how the previous remake they did was phenomenal.
Re: Final Fantasy Tactics Enhanced Remaster Announced for PS5, Out in September
Really happy to see this announced. I bought the GBA port many years ago and it left a huge impression but ended up losing the cart before getting too far in to it so I'm glad I'll finally be able to give it the time it deserves.
Now I just need to get my arse into gear and finish off Tactics Ogre before it hits.
Re: Mortal Kombat Legacy Kollection Rips the Spine Out of PS5, PS4 This Year
Interesting to see this arrive just a couple of weeks after I realised a Digital Eclipse Williams collection ala Atari 50 would be phenomenal but wasn't sure if it would even be possible.
A shame there's no proper version of Deadly Alliance, though, but I suspect including the PS2 would be far too much content for what is, ostensibly, a collection of arcade games.
Re: Poll: How Would You Rate State of Play for June 2025?
An impressive showing. Normally these shows leave me bored to tears or rolling my eyes but for once they had a consistent line-up of interesting new titles and surprise returns of classics.
I'm guessing the people complaining about it are spoiled enough to own multiple gaming systems and need first party exclusives to justify their purchase of a PS5 but for folks like myself who aren't hardcore gamers and don't feel the need to own every console and a high-end PC, this was a fantastic showcase that showed off a great selection of upcoming games.
It seems Sony are finally learning.
Re: Completely Free PS5, PS4 RPG Features Unknown Heroes from Other Games
@Bunchesopuppies Qlipoth is a term from kaballah and refers to the 'outer husks' of the 10 sephirot on the tree of life and represent the opposite or undesirable qualities of each one.
These days it tends to be used mainly by edgelords as a source of inspiration for acts of 'evil' and game developers looking to impart a bit of darkness and edginess into their games.