FullMetalWesker

@Flaming_Kaiser - To be fair, if it weren’t for the black wing “bonus” item, I’d say “you don’t have to buy it” is a perfectly valid defense when it comes to multiple content packs like this. Why? Because these bundles are usually targeting different types of customers, which means that, unless you’re a completionist, chances are you won’t have much reason to buy absolutely everything. Think of it like a shoe store: there are a variety of shoes targeting different needs, budget’s, etc. With the way those shoes are priced, the price of buying one of everything is insane, but that’s fine, because no-one is expecting to buy one of everything, just the one or two pairs they want. The same principle applies here (or would if they hadn’t added an incentive for players to splurge on everything at once).
———
Yeah, that’s actually kind of dodgy. Charging $10 per pack is a bit much on its own, but locking a premium item under a condition that you buy them all, when there’s 36 packs sounds straight up manipulative, especially if they’re heavily advertising that item. Even if there were ways to earn these apex coins (dunno if there are, haven’t played the game since it launched) it wouldn’t mean much, because you’re basically incentivizing them to say “screw it, I’ll just buy them all now” and splurge hundreds of dollars just to get something that’s maybe not even worth 10% of that.

@Deoxyr1bose - As prominent as that is these days, I’m not sure if that’s the case here. There wasn’t any mention in the message about the people attempting to get in touch with her spouting hateful messages or anything like that, just that “some followers” attempted to contact her directly (one via phone) when she would prefer them not to, which, to me at least, sounds less like misogyny and more like an invasion of privacy. I could be mistaken on that, but that’s how it read to me.

Tekken 8, LaD 8 and FFVII Rebirth are still my only must buys, though considering how long it’s taking me to get through my current stuff, I’m fine keeping it like that.

@Fighting_Game_Loser - Going by what I’ve read of the comments sections on most SF6 articles here, that sounds about right. That said, MK1 isn’t here either, which tells me it’s more a fighting game problem than a SF one specifically.
But hey, at least it made it on the main list, so that’s something.

@TooManyBrownies - Was literally in the process of saying this , but yeah, these numbers become less ‘revealing’ when you realise it’s like trying to compare film and tv viewership by overall runtime.

@Gamer83 - I dunno if I’d go that far. If nothing else, the fighter pass has been decent so far; a small price to earn some extra goodies (icons, music, etc.) and with the option of then going on and earning back what you spent on it, allowing you to spend that on the next one, effectively rewarding you for engaging with the game, while potentially providing (imo) pretty good value for money by the end.
(I’d also argue their release of new characters isn’t bad either, relatively speaking anyway)
———
This could probably pass for my final list to be honest; admittedly I haven’t played Alan Wake yet, but from what I’ve heard of the game, I wouldn’t be surprised if I put it at no.2. But everything else? AC has been a solid mech game so far, LaD Gaiden is another great entry in the Yakuza/Like a Dragon series, Resident Evil 4 Remake is an excellent remake that’s just been getting better the more I replay it, and finally, Street Fighter 6 might just be one of my all-time favourite fighting games. I’ve already sunk more hours in it than any other Playstation 4/5 game, and we’re only 6 months in. Everything about it, from the new artstyle, to character movement, to the new mechanics, the new characters, the battle hub, the training room, the music, the arcade mode, everything the game had at launch has been a blast to play, and I’d highly recommend to anyone who hasn’t played it yet, especially if they’ve never played a fighting game before.

@PinderSchloss - People were asking the same question, but comparing XIII with X, and the answer in both cases is the same; X and XVI are not just endless corridors, whereas XIII, until you escape to Pulse, is. With XVI, you have a hub you regularly go back to, wide fields you can run around in to break up the linear structure, and the ability to revisit old areas, where you can talk to residents and take on side quests. None of this is in XIII; instead, with one or two exceptions, you have nothing to do but move forward to the next cutscene. That’s why it gets a lot of flak, while XVI doesn’t (at least not for that anyway).
———
Surprised to hear they’ve already moved on, but then again, from what I understand, they were only put together because everyone else was busy, so there probably wasn’t much thought put into any post-XVI plans.
Be interesting to see which direction the next game takes, and whether/how much this “accumulated experience “ ends up factoring into it. Hopefully at the very least we’ll get to control more than one character, because that’s one of my favourite aspects of FF games, yet it hasn’t been a thing in mainline games since XIII.

At this point, I’ll assume it’s dead until I see definitive proof that says otherwise. There’s too little to go on to really justify doing otherwise.
That said, despite being a fan of the original, I wouldn’t be too fussed if it doesn’t work out. Not only is the original available on almost every system (PS5 being one of the few that doesn’t) but also, with so little information on what the remake would do, I’m having a hard time imagining what they could do to improve the overall experience, outside update the game’s models to look more realistic/detailed.

For me, the big three are FF VII Rebirth, Tekken 8 and Like a Dragon 8, with Rise of the Ronin and Star Wars Outlaws as potential additional hits, depending on how they turn out.

@zhoont - To be fair, I feel like Street Fighter 6 had a solid case for winning it, but yeah, looking at the nominees, it ain’t a great list, especially if you take those two out.

@ShogunRok - To be fair, is there any reason why you’d be buying the whole set? You don’t need to buy any to see them on your opponent, and unless your main is random select, you’re probably not using the entire roster yourself, so why not, for example, just buy two for whoever you’re playing as and leave it at that?
—————
While it’s certainly bad, I don’t think it’s egregious. Egregious was the TMNT stuff, where a single ‘costume’ cost more than two of these, and didn’t look nearly as good (well, except for maybe blanka-chan).
That said, the lack of a 300 fighter coins option, as well as the lack of reasonable means of earning the coins in-game, does make it worse, and is where I feel the real problem lies.

Dunno about the other two, but Powerwash Simulator is a nice surprise at least.

@ChromaticDracula - Most likely explanation: the survey was asking kids/teens, whereas this poll is drawing from PushSquare visitors, who are probably a bit older on average.

@MikeOrator - To be fair, buying a digital game or dlc isn’t the same as in-game currency. Also, the poll asks if we’re getting it for Christmas, not in general, which is a different situation.

Finally, I can’t speak for anyone else, but to give you feedback from one person who voted no; I regularly buy digital games and dlc, but I almost never buy game currency, and when it comes to Christmas, I almost always ask for physical stuff, especially recently. Why? Because digital content, especially currency, feels empty as a present, especially compared to something physical (also, most games I play don’t have much in the way of microtransactions, so it’s pretty easy to avoid).

@AgentMantis - To be fair, there was a six month gap between Inquisition releasing(Nov 2014) and The Witcher 3 (May 2015), so I’d actually say that game was fine in that regard. This game though? Not a chance, and while it’s likely going for more of a Dragon’s Dogma approach(going by what little footage we’ve been able to see), the comparisons to BG3 will probably happen regardless, and it won’t be in DA’s favour.
———
While I imagine it could very well be a November release like Inquisition, I’d be surprised if it was next year, given the lack of content that’s been released so far. Would be nice though (even moreso if it’s actually great).

Honestly, I quite like it. The console itself is nice step up from the PS4, and the new games have been pretty fun for the most part. My only complaint is a lack of themes, and that’s probably tricky to do with this UI, so atm I’m not too fussed.

Trying to wrap up my playthrough of Yakuza: Like a Dragon in preparation for Gaiden next month; just finished chapter 12, so only two more to go.
Also trying to get the platinum trophy for Street Fighter 6, which I’ve almost done, but getting that last tournament win is proving more annoying than I would like.

I’m not really a fan myself, but from what I’ve gathered, his appearance is a large part of it. Add to that his gothic styling/mannerisms, extremely popular theme song, and powerful abilities that not only give him a presence, but also lead to moments like his boss fights in Kingdom Hearts, and his fight scene with Cloud in Advent Children, and you have all the ingredients (I presume) for a popular character.

@Toot1st - As one of those who “missed out” the original is still very much available, which is what I did back in 2014.
Also, if you’re expecting a 1-1 remake, you might be better off with Ever Crisis, as that (from what I’ve seen) fits the bill more than this ever will.

@Gaia093 - My guess is Aerith; she died in the original and these people want to make sure she does in the remake as well (which is kinda ironic, considering the main reasons the death was so impactful in the first place are because it was unexpected and because players didn’t want the character to die)
Alternatively, there may be some new characters from the first part that people aren’t too happy with that they may want gone.
————
Yeah, I’m well and truly in the “let ‘em cook” camp. Given how good Part 1 turned out, and what I’ve seen so far from Part 2, I don’t think there’s too much to worry about, especially if it’s one of the original’s basic story beats like Aerith’s death. (Though to be fair, I’m also not a stickler for this remake hewing to the original, so that may be affecting my position on this point…)

@Ravix - For clarity, the main series goes like this: 0, Kiwami, Kiwami 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, Like a Dragon, Infinite Wealth. There are also two spin-off series (Judgement/Lost Judgement, and Kenzan/Isshin) and two single spin-off games (Dead Souls, and the upcoming Gaiden).
The reason why the Ichiban games feel so different is because it’s making a conscious break from the Kiryu games and going in a whole new direction.
———
Not surprised to find out that it was originally DLC, it always seemed like a short side story before the next main installment. 6 month dev time tracks as well. Thankfully, that fits in perfectly with my plan to play it throughout December, and with Infinite Wealth coming out in late January, there’s just enough downtime to let it sink in before moving on to that game.

On a related note, I’ll be interested to see if it has a platinum trophy, given its DLC roots.

Looks like a trio of decent, 6-7/10 games to me *shrugs *. Thankfully I’ve only played Aliens before, and that was on PC, so I should be able to get a couple of weekends worth out of these at least.

@NotSoCryptic - *sigh * What I was trying to do was point out what I thought was obvious, nothing more, nothing less. Because ultimately this ‘game is incomplete until dlc is finished’ train of thought is leading to unhealthy, innacurate attitudes towards dlc as a concept, where people won’t be satisfied with the base game, regardless of how much content it has, purely because ‘more is on the way’.
But all that’s irrelevant I guess, as apparently my posts have been removed for crossing an etiquette boundary. Not sure how, but regardless, I’d like to offer a general apology to yourself and anyone else affected by my mistake, and bow out before I do myself any more injury.

@NotSoCryptic - Again, the base game is the complete game. The game post DLC is the complete game, with extras. Having DLC does not make a game incomplete. Seriously. *sigh *
———

Like others have said, this was a good move, especially if they wanted more time to work on the game anyway (also kinda surprised that they were allowed). Now, not only do they avoid SF6, but also MK1, and get a decent amount of extra time to polish the game as well. Looking forward to seeing how it turns out.

Wow, a couple of decent titles for Premium for once. Not sure if it’s worth upgrading for as yet, but at least it’s something.

@somnambulance - I think you can take SSB Goku being confirmed as basically a confirmation that at least the Super anime will get included (I imagine the movies will as well). The manga stuff though, I don’t see being included, purely because games like this don’t really adapt manga, from what I understand (probably because they generally see the anime as the manga adaptation) so we’ll likely have to wait a bit longer for any Moro/Granolah stuff (which is a shame, since that means we won’t likely get anything newer than 2018 besides the Gohan movie).

Makes sense that they’d save some characters for part 3, especially since we’re still getting two and a half new characters in this one.
Coincidentally though, these two being saved for part 3 means I’ll probably end up with the same endgame party I had in the original, at least for a bit.

And while I don’t actually care for Cid that much in the original (not sure where the article is getting “hard to define” from, it’s pretty easy to figure him out) going by how they’ve been handling the original’s characters so far, I wouldn’t be too worried about how he’s treated here (in fact, if he is as good as the others, he’ll probably be a lot better)

As for my preferred party members from the original, personally the only one I actually liked was Aerith, with Cait Sith, Vincent, and Red XIII being decent.

@Marquez - Wish I could say the same; unfortunately I caved and bought it yesterday on Switch, which couldn’t be worse timing

That aside, this looks like a decent selection of titles, both from a quality and variety standpoint. Might try them out if/when they become available.

Gotta admit, I didn’t think they’d bring back Pocket Circuit, thought that was long forgotten at this stage, (but I’m glad old man Kiryu gets to enjoy his life-long passion of beating kids at a toy racing game )
Sounds like the coliseum is taking its gameplay from the Majima Construction mini-game from Kiwami 2, which could be interesting (though I feel like I’ll probably end up preferring the 0/Kiwami model).
Overall, it looks like this won’t be too small a game compared to the usual, which is nice. Currently still going through LaD, so not sure when I’ll be able to pick this up, but judging from what I’ve seen and heard, it might make for a good Holiday/New Years game, so that would give me a good amount of time to finish everything beforehand.

Also, thanks for removing any faint chance I’ll ever try the cabaret mini-game Sega, hopefully it won’t be in the main story either.

Nice to see the game people were dunking on back when it was announced, that kinda disappeared for a while (or at least I don’t remember hearing anything about it) got released and turned out to actually be pretty good. Might pick it up, depending on the price tag, and my schedule, but I hope it does well.

Normally, a game with this much praise would be a no brainer, but some of the things I’ve been hearing and seeing from this game have really been turning me away from it. As a result, if I do play it, it won’t be for some time, and probably not till a deep sale, which is a shame, but *shrugs * it is what it is.

Yeah, I can get him saying this; I’m not quite sure if I’d agree with it completely (have only played the demo so far), but based off what I’ve seen and heard, I can understand someone like Sakaguchi seeing FFXVI as the closest realisation of the series base concept (at least from a storytelling and presentation perspective).

As far as favourite protagonist goes, my answer is probably Terra. But since this is asking for the best character, which is something different, then my answer would have to be Zidane, with Tidus close behind.
That said, I can’t speak about Clive, as I’ve yet to play XVI outside the demo, and apparently I missed Noctus’s character development while playing XV, so there’s room for change.

Not sure where people are getting the idea this is a feud from, even a fake one: everything I’ve seen has been pushing the two as a double feature, with plenty of people publicly saying they were getting tickets to both and watching them back-to-back. Certainly nothing about pitting one against another.

@JustPlainLoco - Can we try and keep this to the topic at hand? No one benefits from trying to start another flame war. (And before you try to claim “they started it” that doesn’t justify your response, which escalated the situation far more than it needed to)
———————————————————

I gotta say, as someone who has Street Fighter 6 in my top 3 for the year, I’m a bit disappointed to see it rank even lower than the Horizon expansion dlc. I get that it’s mostly a genre thing, but still, I would’ve thought it’d at least rank higher than an expansion pack (though to be fair, I guess it’s still a lot better than Wo Long, which isn’t even in the top ten, despite presumably being a solid Nioh clone).

That aside though, yeah, it’s been a pretty packed year so far, which is always great to see. Kinda curious to see how the final end-of-year lists turn out, and where the currently upcoming games end up (including the heralded Starfield), but either way, I’d say this year is an overall successful one for games.

@Uncharted2007 - And you’re welcome to change your outlook at any time just saying.
———
I don’t have much experience with battle passes in games, but so far these ones have been okay, though admittedly that’s mostly down to being able to earn back the coins you used to get it. But still, currently they seem to serve as a string of small rewards you get as you play, which to me at least doesn’t seem too bad (The only outstanding issue I’d have is that, by being seasonal, they are limited in when you can get them, but even then, the content you get from these isn’t anything too crazy, so you’re prob not missing out on too much if you do happen to miss some).

@EEZY541 - Not even close. Open World games usually have massive, seamless areas to explore in; KotOR had small-to-medium areas connected by loading screens.
So far, the closest Star Wars has come to an open world game (not counting the MMO’s) is Jedi Survivor, which imo is pretty good, but even then, it’s closer to God of War then, say, Assassin’s Creed Valhalla or Far Cry 6.

On the one hand, the impression I got was that it was the roughest of the three recently released remasters, so I get why they may want to smooth that one out, but on the other hand, surely there are less costly ways than a full-blown remake?
I dunno, just seems like an odd move, especially when the first two games could probably actually use the remake treatment.

@KundaliniRising333 - In the original you had 5 characters and four stages, now it seems to be 4 characters and 3 stages. That said, I’ve been seeing rumours that two extra characters and one extra stage will be added later, so it might end up with more content overall, but yeah, atm it seems we have slightly less content than expected.

@KaijuKaiser To be fair, these recent showcases are for characters already revealed; Law, King and Lars were already confirmed to be in the game prior to their trailer, that’s why they’re being dropped every 3 days (
That said, it does still seem surprising that they’d throw these out now, and not towards the end of the year where they’d be pretty close to the release date, but * shrugs* who knows, maybe it’s better this way.

As for Lars, I don’t have much to say about him, but I did like the reference to his time as a guest character in Naruto: Ninja Storm 2. I also wonder if he’ll factor into the story somehow; given he was the protag in Tekken 6, and is technically a Mishima you’d think he’d be a secondary character easily, but unless I’m mistaken he had no role whatsoever in Tekken 7, so who knows if he’ll even make a cameo * shrugs*

Either way, I’m eager to see who else makes the base roster (I’m hoping Feng makes it, but if not, at least I’ve got Law as a backup).

I’ll probably pick it up when it’s on sale at some point (or play it if it ends upon PS+) since it seems very much like a 7/10 kind of game (both from what I’ve seen/heard, and from the demo), but with so much other stuff coming out this year, I don’t think I can really justify getting it at full price.

I wonder if this decision to scale back the game’s scope has anything to do with Ubisoft’s recent misfortune; timing’s admittedly a bit iffy, but it would certainly make sense in light of such poor performance to cut back on some of their bigger games like AC had gotten with the past few titles.

In any case, as someone who hasn’t played Valhalla (and thus have no prior knowledge of the protagonist) this sounds like it could be interesting, and a nice change of pace from the big time-sinks that Odyssey especially was.

Can someone explain why Dissidia has a rating of 8, while 012, which is effectively a straight upgrade, has a score of 6.7? 🤔

Nice list otherwise, a lot of solid titles from a range of genres and devs that showcase the strength of the PSP’s library (though admittedly I’ve only played a half dozen of the titles mentioned).

For me, the best announcements were Tekken and Rise of Ronin, with Like A Dragon: Ishin close behind. Really excited to see how those turn out.
GoW was purely a hype generator, but I was already sold on the game and not really looking for more content prior to release, so it didn’t make as much of an impression as it might have(though it was a pretty good trailer).

Pretty easy for me this week, got 12/15.

Got 9 this time, which, going by the comments, is apparently not as bad as I thought 🙂

8/15 - A bit of a dud this time around, but *shrugs * oh well.

12/15 - Had a couple of lucky guesses, but still, a pretty good result.

Got 9/15 this time, which was a bit lower than previous quizzes, but still not too bad (bit disappointed I got the FF question wrong through).

@Col_McCafferty - Mate, your last post was literally just “haha, don’t criticism a souls game, the cult will roast you for it”. The post I responded to also wasn’t phrased like an honest comment, but essentially “I hope these games get the burning they deserve, because I really don’t like them haha”. Not to mention some of your other comments that have been pulled for being…less than constructive. From what I’ve seen, nothing can really be described as “just providing feedback” unless by that you mean “make barely concealed bitter comments about a game (and its fans) I think is getting too much praise”.

And sure, the level of some of the hate TLoU II got was obviously greater, but the general point still stands; you went from asking why don’t the haters just move on when it was a game you liked, to being a hater that similarly, can’t seem to accept that some people like a particular game, and move on when it was a game you didn’t like. As a result, I thought it might help to relay your own advice back to you, in case it helped.

Also, on a related note, you do realise FromSoft games are far from the only ones to not have difficulty options, right? Pretty sure Rockstar games for example aren’t much better in this regard, nor are most Roguelikes.