GamingFan4Lyf

I think Sony should just switch Concord to being a film/series franchise.

The episode from Secret Level was actually pretty good. I actually wouldn't mind a movie or animate series based on the lore that was established for the game.

As far as continuing the Live Service trend...how about growing Helldivers franchise instead? It's been successful so far and could be taken very far with the right investing rather than gambling on more studios to making more live service games. Sony already has a "hit" on its hands...expand it!

On one hand, I understand the draw of GTA - for a lot of gamers, it was their "right of passage" into "mature gaming".

On the other hand, the "edgy" appeal of the series kind of wears off as you get older and you realize it's more just an accurately sad mirror of modern culture that makes you want to facepalm at yourself for showing any interest in it at all.

I remember playing the original GTA...you know, when the primary gameplay loop was stealing cars...and I thought it was so "cool" that the game had foul language, and I could play a crook and wreak havoc.

Now, I see it as rotting brain cells and nothing else. There is nothing appealing about GTA at 43.

Also - Get off my lawn!

So...uh...has this finally met Square Enix sales expectations?

Asking for a friend.

I'll continue playing Indiana Jones and the Great Circle. If I finish it either today or tomorrow, I'll start The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom

Merry Christmas and happy holidays to everyone here!

Also, happy gaming!

It would be sad (for Bethesda) if Virtuous is able to do a "Bethesda game" better using UE5 than Bethesda could do with Starfield using its own engine.

Heck, Obsidian is doing better at "Bethesda games" than Bethesda.

@Bunchesopuppies They fall over and get back up actually - LOL!

It was one of things I experiment with and, sure enough, they don't become a spot on the ground.

I will have some time off, but I won't really have any more or less time to game than my normal week.

But, in the time I do have to game, I will be continuing to enjoy Indiana Jones and the Great Circle and whatever I have installed on my PC as a palate cleanser if I need a little break from Indy.

I have only Switch games on my Christmas list, so I may dive into one of those games as well.

Sadly, the PS5 will remain off for the foreseeable future.

So now both the developer and Sony know that the userbase wants the game on PS4/PS5!

And knowing is half the battle....

While I haven't play all of the Like a Dragon series (I have played 0, Kiwami, Kiwami 2, and a little bit of 3), I only play them in Japanese.

It just feels...right.

While this game isn't up my alley, the tech behind the cloth behavior actually sounds really cool!

This is the kind of tech we should be seeing in games as hardware gets more powerful - even in instances where it's not being used to titillate, but just to simulate real-world behavior.

@OldGamer999 For the same reason GPU makers created AI upscaling - to take some of the strain off of the GPU/CPU by pushing image quality duties to the AI cores instead.

I know I'd never be able to run Cyberpunk 2077 completely maxed out and with full path tracing at 80 - 90 fps (@1440p output) if it wasn't for the AI cores in the Nvidia 4070 Super working their magic.

That kind of stuff you just aren't going to get relying on a software-based upscaler.

Sure, it's all "fake", but if it still feels responsive with a gamepad and looks the part, what does it matter?

PSSR is basically in v1.0. I think, where it needs the most work is denoising - don't know if that's something that has to wait for a 2.0 or something the model can be trained to handle, but that's its weak spot.

I bought this one on Steam mainly to support the developer.

Combat is a tad janky and the gameplay loop is a little repetitive at times, but it's still good. It is more risqué than I expected - especially that one cutscene very early in the game.

I think people were hoping for something more "Silent Hill" over something I'd like to call Horrorpunk (I don't think that's a thing...but it should be!)

Does this game have a 120Hz mode on consoles? If not, it should. I seem to recall my PC can max this game out in like the 250+ fps at 1440p. No reason PS5/PS5 Pro couldn't run this at 120. I'm not trying to be braggy or anything, just pointing out the game is pretty light on hardware.

At least Microsoft is putting its platforms first - as it should. Even if the games come to other platforms, Microsoft should absolutely focus on ensuring that games for its own platform are the best that they can be for the hardware.

I would think people here would absolutely understand that as Sony ensures its first-party games are the best they can be for PlayStation consoles before working on any PC port.

@Loamy I second, third, fourth, and millionth that people need to check out Cowboy Bebop.

Also, while I am very much a subtitled guy for anime, Cowboy Bebop feels "at home" watching it dubbed as I feel like the "cool factor" comes across a lot better.

Such an amazing series.

I am intrigued by the game. I liked the trailer. I liked the 80's aesthetic (did anyone notice the CD-Rs in her CD collection?! I know I did).

As far as product placement, it's fun to see, but I could take it or leave it. I can understand where some people may feel like it's an unnecessary expense in a time when the games industry spends way too much money to make games as it is.

I have been playing it on PC. I should really see how well it plays now as the most recent patch supposedly improved Full RT performance.

I actually was getting really good performance thanks to playing in DLSS Balanced and utilizing Frame Generation (input latency with a controller felt great), but any extra native frames are always welcome!

I hope this PS5 Pro patch is a good one! I know there have been a few "duds" along the way, but time should hopefully iron things out as Sony trains PSSR to be more effective.

Things have come full circle:

The team behind Like a Dragon are making a Virtua Fighter game.

Like a Dragon series spawned off of lessons learned and ideas from Shenmue.

Shenmue's original concept was to be a Virtua Fighter Adventure game.

I'll be skipping this one.

Cool for those who want the "Best of Souls" co-op boss battle experience, but I prefer the grand adventures over lather, rinse, repeat gameplay loops.

Finally, something from Naughty Dog that isn't The Last of Us or Uncharted related.

Man, this looks brutal!

I may double dip on this one.

I would at least wait for a technical review as, from what I have seen, FF7 Remake Integrade wasn't a great PC port.

Can't wait to see what it is! I love his games.

And...since it's being published by Epic Games, it will most definitely have a PC release.

Obsidian is doing Starfield better than Bethesda.

@AhmadSumadi I may be old school, but, when you have a high-end sound system, there is a noticeable difference between something that is streamed using Dolby Digital Plus and the lossless TrueHD (or DTS-HD MA) found on physical media.

Dune is a great example. There is just a richer bass and cleaner sound to the already incredible soundtrack. Plus, I have noticed that, for whatever reason, surround effects are a lot more pronounced when using a physical disc (or an uncompressed ripped copy of a physical disc) vs the streaming variant of the same film.

I feel like it's the difference between watching something at home vs experiencing it in the theater.

But, alas, I am a dying breed. The masses couldn't care less as most either use a soundbar, TV speakers, or watch from a phone/tablet.

As someone who still buys physical UHD (granted, I rip them into MKV and use a media player to watch them) this makes me sad.

@dskatter I don't like Bethesda RPGs. I try, but I lose interest very fast. I mean, I do think it should be played by as many people as possible, but it's not something I care about either.

There really is such a thing as "too much" and I feel like their games are full of too many distractions.

If a game is 20% main story content and 80% unrelated side content, I lose interest. Plus, I don't feel like the side content has any real reward for doing it. Getting an above average piece of loot isn't a reward to me. The "experience of doing it" also isn't a reward for me.

This is generally why I prefer JRPGs as they are like 80% main story content and 20% side content. That side content usually results in something useful - like a powerful weapon or armor piece.

@SuperBloodborneMaker You're miffed about Starfield - which didn't exactly set the world alight - yet PlayStation still got/are getting:

Doom 1 & 2
Quake Remastered
Quake 2 Remastered
Fallout 4 PS5 Upgrade
Doom Eternal PS5 Upgrade
Elder Scrolls Online PS5 Upgrade
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle
Doom: The Dark Ages

Not to mention that, unlike Sony as a publisher, PS5 upgrades from Microsoft-owned Bethesda games don't carry a $10 upgrade fee.

But, [expletive] Microsoft for keeping Starfield exclusive (for now).

My Wrap-Up Highlights:

• 13 games played (11 PS5 and 2 PS4)..apparently the first game I played this year was Horizon Zero Dawn on 1/14...strange, but..okay.
• Top 5
  Final Fantasy VII Rebirth (89 hours)
  Final Fantasy XVI (67 hours)
  Stellar Blade (36 hours)
  Lords of the Fallen (34 hours)
  Horizon Forbidden West (25 hours)
  Spider-man 2 missed the cut at 21 hours
• 52% of my gaming time was playing RPGs
• 301 total hours played
• 224 Trophies earned
  1 Platinum (probably Astro Bot)
  6 Gold
  36 Silver
  181 Bronze
• Finished 15 Campaigns for PlayStation Stars
• Play style is Role Player

I haven't played a game on PS5 since October. The only game I see playing for a while on my PS5 is Astro Bot for the Holiday-themed DLC level.

I have no idea when I will play my PS5 next. My PS5 days might be done for the foreseeable future since I have the gaming PC.

But, if I never turn on the PS5 again, I can say that 2024 was a solid year and I played it over 3x more than Series X (before I got rid of it).

Sheesh, who would have thought that poker would be so popular.

Congrats to the developer!

Guess this gives me a reason to turn on my PS5.

Love me some Astro Bot!

“PlayStation's profitability forecast for the current fiscal year was actually increased, with Sony's reasoning being increased hardware [prices] and third-party game sales.”

Fixed that for you! 😂

Seriously, you walked right into that one!

Not working in US, either.

I guess the cake was a lie.

Has this game been ripped off? I see other games pop up on my Facebook feed using similar pool design but has monsters chasing the player.

His interpretation is pretty spot on!

I can't imagine how many times he had to sit and watch the older movies to get the voice right.

I debate deleting Black Myth Wukong from my PC pretty regularly.

I enjoyed it when it was new. But then lost interest. Then gained interest again for a level or two and then lost interest again. I haven't returned to it in months.

I was super hyped for Shadow of the Erdtree, but when I saw it had a new mechanic where your level didn't mean so much and you had to get some new type of item just to be able to capably fight in the new realm, I lost interest in getting it.

Never played a gacha game and probably never will.

All-in-all, I am not impressed with this list.

I think there will always be a market for a simple "plug and play" machine to play games.

I do think the idea of generations is slowly declining, though. It may get to a point where people only upgrade consoles either as enthusiasts or after their current machine dies. But support for multiple generations will continue to grow longer and longer.

@PapaGlitch "If I go there looking for gaming news, I don't want to see a dozen posts ranting about wokeness, DEI or Sweet Baby Inc for engagement before I find an actually informative post"

See, there's your problem: you're going to a social media platform to look for gaming news instead of going to gaming news websites to find news.

The problem with all of the social media platforms is that people are going there for news rather than going to a news organization site for news. Social media should be about sharing opinions and connecting with people and, rarely, healthy debate. It's not a place for unbiased reporting.

Social media "news" will skew whatever information is out there to fit an agenda - no matter what side of the political aisle you may lean. So, it's all just matter of which skewed headline you agree with rather than pure facts.

Even the weather can be politicized:
"Cold front on the way with temperatures in the 20s for the week"

can turn into

"Climate change is causing records lows in parts of the world as temps reach the 20s"

can turn into

"So much for the Global Warming agenda as temps reach the 20s"

People should get their weather from the Weather Channel (or whatever local equivalent if there is one), not social media.

Pretty neat!

A shame Sony is making it temporary.

That being said, I do still prefer the regular boot up.

@MrPeanutbutterz Such is your preference.

I'm allowed to prefer my games be one way, and you, yours.

People are still putting hours upon hours into Smash Bros. Melee and it was pre-DLC. Heck, there are whole tournaments surrounding the game.

Marvel vs. Capcom 2 community still exists. No DLC.

Heck, EVO still supports Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike. No DLC.

So, it's not like anyone is wrong for liking fighting games that don't have DLC characters, just like there are people who like it.

@LogicStrikesAgain What multi-platform games has Sony bought other than Destiny?

I'm not arguing with you. I don't know.

• All released multi-platform games from Bethesda stayed multi-platform (DOOM, Quake, Fallout, etc.). Xbox didn't get any exclusive content/updates from any of those IPs.
• Double Fine still released Psychonauts 2 on PlayStation. The only "exclusive" feature Xbox got from Psychonauts was HDR via system-wide AutoHDR. Running the game on PS5 had the same benefits as the "native" Series X|S version (which was still essentially the X1 code running on a better backwards compatibility layer and given a "Series X|S" flag).
• Call of Duty stayed multi-platform.

@KayUK This game is using the latest IdTech iteration and targets 60fps on consoles. Seeing as how DOOM Eternal was 60fps without issue, I think it's safe to say this will be solid.

@Smooshy @Korgon Probably because this is a PlayStation fan site and Sony makes mostly third-person cinematic games - which is what Sony fans crave.

I, for one, can't wait to play this!

I never played the Riddick games, but I see this more akin to a stealthy Metroid Prime (which also combines first-person and third-person).

@LogicStrikesAgain The only studio that I know that Sony ever kept independent is Bungie - but even that is now coming into question now that Sony has stepped in after Destiny failed to meet expectations.

What publisher has Sony bought and kept them multiplatform?!

I'm genuinely curious.

@TrannosaurusBex Tough to say. Nintendo has the dominance it has without every game it makes costing the GDP of an entire country in development and advertising costs. It doesn't do spectacle advertising.

The thing is, I don't think Sony needs to go this far anymore. Apple has dominance in the mobile arena and do you see it redesigning public transportation with new iPhone ads?

There is so much complaint about ballooning development costs and the need to pick up the slack elsewhere - mainly off the backs of the consumer.

How about, cut some PR money, instead?! Sony doesn't need to do what it does anymore, it's already solidified its market out of sheer gaming habit alone.

YouTube videos generation millions of views. Pretty sure making a YouTube video doesn't cost nearly as much as overhauling public transportation aesthetics.

Any Sony ad big or small will get the most hits and interest because it's solidified itself as the market leader - much like Apple is solidified as the mobile market leader.

Maybe Sony wouldn't be chasing Live Service so hard if it cut costs elsewhere. Maybe the Pro would have had a disk drive because it could afford a small loss selling the console. Perhaps Sony wouldn't need a PC strategy (since a lot of people here seem to hate that Sony even has a PC strategy at all) to recoup costs partially spent on crazy advertising.

Now, that isn't to say it should go the route of Microsoft (where advertising is all but non-existent), just...scale back the spectacle.

Plus, from an environmental standpoint, it's less trash once its use has run out.

As long as FromSoftware stays multi-platform, I don't care.

Even as someone who turned to PC for the majority of my gaming needs, I don't want FromSoftware to follow Sony's whole "Will we? Won't we?" stance on PC releases.

Even though most modern first-party games have had a PC release at some point, it still doesn't feel like a guarantee that a game will get a PC release.

I lost interest in anime long ago, so I couldn't care less who owns what in that arena.

@PsBoxSwitchOwner @MrPeanutbutterz It's really just two different mindsets at play here.

On one hand, yes, not having to "wait" for characters for a new game release is nice. It keeps people engaged and the game "fresh" (and allows the developer to make more money on DLC).

But on the hand, why not just wait to release the game with all the characters available and make them secret unlockable characters (remember the days when characters needed to be unlocked)?

I personally prefer option 2, but, to each their own (plus, publishers want that extra coin).

Apparently this game has loads of hidden details throughout.

I should really go through New Game+ and see what I can find.

Maybe if the episode is good, Sony can give the IP over to Sony Pictures to see what it could do with it.

It sounded like the game had some kind of story outline to...maybe it could work in other media instead of games?