Some consulting agency is going to get paid millions of dollars to write a report with the most straightforward information you can imagine and present it to the clueless Microsoft brass.
@KeanuReaves This here. This is what makes the greats... great.
I have gotten back into Remnant 2 and that is a game with rich mechanics, solid gameplay, and so many moving pieces behind the scenes. You can effectively play the game "casually" and have a great time, no question. Play with whatever you come across. OR you can go REALLY deep into its systems to extract specific, targeted items and mechanics and surprises. It's an absolute all-timer for me. The joy per hour (or maybe joy/satisfaction for effort) quotient is so friggin' high.
The base game was already my GotY 2023. But even just its first DLC (only just finished it) is raising the overall package to top tier of the generation for me because of its depth, surprises, and rock solid gameplay.
More developers need to take heed of what Gunfire Games is doing. They are sleeping giants of creativity and design.
As long as it plays more like Zero Dawn than Forbidden West, I'll at least keep an eye on it.
The biggest thing that worries me, though, is the longstanding evidence/rumors that this will change up the art style and lean into some sort of anime-inspired design.
Despite what flaws I think the gameplay is riddled with after Forbidden West, the art direction is NOT one of them. I think the aesthetic is still one of the best out there. And Decima as an engine can be breathtaking. So I just don't get why they'd (seemingly) abandon that for some sort of cartoon or anime-stylized look.
If that is where they land, then that would probably be the biggest thing to kill my interest. The early footage did NOT look good to me.
They went really hard into that singular body type design for the robots. I'm not really a fan of playing as a mechanical jelly bean. Looks goofy as hell.
I mean... this is pretty emblematic of Ubisoft's deeper problem: it took them until a tepid response to a Star Wars game in the year of our lord 2024 to realize releasing janky ass games loaded with problems is not a path to financial success.
Ubisoft games have been riddled with poorly thought out systems and engine jank and glitches and copy paste design for yeeeeeeeeears. But it finally caught up to them.
They were never going to fix things when people still plopped down money for their *****. And sure enough, they didn't at any broad level. But the market got wise to it and NOW they want to act like they're doing the right thing for the players. But their history shows they've never really embraced that mentality at all.
This is purely to stave off what they knew would be considerable criticism of a game they NEED to be successful. That's it. They're giving away expansions because no one was pre-ordering Shadows and no one was paying even more for the season pass. Not at the numbers they expected or needed. This isn't in good faith.
I think the problems at Ubisoft run far deeper than the rampant sexual assault allegations. That surely wasn't helping, but the bigger problem is management. That's apparent. They've had years to course correct but what have we really seen since? Immortals (undersold), Farcry 6 (awful step backwards in design and a tepid response to its release), an Avatar game that is copy paste Farcry Primal (undersold expectations), a Prince of Persia remake (delayed indefinitely due to jank), Skull & Bones (horrendously undersold expectations after years of turmoil), a solid "classic" PoP (well-received but undersold), a "back to basics" AC Mirage (undersold), a Division spinoff that got canned before it ever released, XDefiant (great launch, DEEP design problems they never addressed during years of betas and now its player numbers are cratering), Outlaws (undersold), and this... probably even more I can't think of.
I can't name a single Ubisoft game that far exceeded expectations since their scandals broke. AC Valhalla probably? But even that isn't the most beloved by the broader AC fandom because it was considered heavily bloated (after multiple titles that were also considered heavily bloated).
Their issues run DEEP and they are still present. That's abundantly clear to anyone paying attention.
@dark_knightmare2 Funny. I didn't mention the combat as being the problem. Concerned someone has a different opinion than you? You hafta white knight for a videogame now?
If this is going to primarily be about expansions/remakes/and PS5 Pro upgrades, it'll have people wishing for the one where they showed Concord gameplay.
I heard Banishers was solid, but I haven't gotten to it. It's a competitive market. If they can't break through with advertising, they need to do better with things like pricing. The booming PC market proves there's plenty of space for A-AA titles, but they have to be rpiced appropriately. I feel like their games aren't and it costs them (literally).
Make it a true jack of all trades: allow the handheld to play dedicated titles that get the requisite compatibility patches (or are from older generations), but then have built-in Portal-like streaming functionality for games that are too advanced for that. Let users have the best of both worlds!
I want this game to succeed AND be fun. I'm no Bungie apologist. It doesn't come from that.
I just think the extraction shooter genre is one that could take off on consoles in a way no game really has. And I think it's a smart differentiator in the market, something Concord definitely lacked.
I also just love the aesthetic. I think we deserve visually interesting games and this could be one of them. I adored the teaser and hope that look carries through to release.
As someone who never played a DA game, I thought DAI was bloated and boring.
I played a rogue/archer expecting TPS controls because of their pedigree with ME's shooting mechanics. The fact you don't actually control your shooting, as an archer, made me switch to playing a melee ally at the beginning just so felt like I had control.
Annoyed me to no end and I regret spending the time on it.
@Oz_Who_Dat_Dare As someone who absolutely adores HZD, I rushed through HFW last year and then just finished Burning Shores (because I bought it and figured I may as well see where the story goes/went), I cannot fathom for the life of me what people see in HFW that makes it better than HZD. The downgrades are numerous.
I still hold HZD up as the second best "Ubisoft-style" open world game behind only Ghost of Tsushima. It was clear, lean (by open world game design standards) and fun af.
HFW took all that and threw it out the window and padded the playtime with aimless busywork, horrendously boring loot grinding, and absolutely atrociously aggravating combat. Not to mention, it has some of the jankiest controls in all of modern gaming. Aloy turns like a tank and gets caught on countless pieces of environment constantly AND the climbing is so awfully designed I almost stopped playing it before I got to the "full" world. Anyone who says otherwise is kidding themselves.
I'm glad I played it. At least I have an informed opinion on the title, and now I can wait to see how H3 stacks up. If it leans more towards 2's design, I'll just skip it and pour one out for one of the most promising, but poorly implemented evolutions of an IP I've ever personally witnessed.
The more people that play this so Guerilla designs the next one more like Zero Dawn and far less like Forbidden West, the better. HFW was a gotdamm slog. The fact this series went from one of the most streamlined, satisfying open world action games to one of the most boring and bloated messes in only one iteration is a travesty of game design.
@knowles2 That's not at all what they did with Firewalk. Dumping $100-300mm into an unproven dev is not at all what I am suggesting.
The part of my comment about wanting to instantly go from zero to a massve hit the market may not even want is explicitly referring to their expectations/strategy for Concord.
Whether you like Bungie/Destiny or not, I always come back to, "And how much could Sony have spent on other studios INSTEAD of Bungie, and thus controlled far more IP and had a far broader range of talent and expertise under its umbrella?"
You can't tell me Bungie is an outright better, more creative, more capable development house than the likes of numerous other shuttered or acquired studios combined (Crustal Dynamics, Japan Studio, the list goes on).
If Sony wants a live service hit, the best bet is to let smaller teams cook and create unique experiences that can grow into hits, the same way PUBG and Fortnite and R6 Siege and Rocket League did. None of those games set out to set the world on fire. But over their lifespans, they catered to players, built strong fundamentals, and built large followings. Sony (and many other companies) seem to want to go from nothing to massive smash hit immediately and don't realize that's the hardest, most expensive way to become a hit. You can't run a business by way of playing the lottery.
What they need to learn from Helldivers 2 (despite its tumultuous reputation since release) is that a small team with great ideas can result in outsized performance much more easily than putting an entire single player-focused studio on a multiplayer game just because of an IP (see: Naughty Dog). Go after those HD2-like hits. Get a bigger ROI and build your broader experience in delivering said hits over time. Nurture creativity and original thinking. Let them evolve into a bigger live service game WHEN THE MARKET TELLS YOU THEY WANT IT. But don't go spending hundreds of millions out the gate on something that isn't proven (Concord) or that misaligns with the given talent (again, ND).
This actually could probably translate to a big budget flick pretty easily. Make it like a modern Enemy of the State. Make it about someone being pulled into the underground world of government surveillance and morally gray activist hackers. Could definitely see it as that sorta mid-late 90s/early 2000s action thriller sorta vibe.
Don't tie it directly to the game stories at all. The franchise isn't big enough anymore for that. Just make it independently set within that world and it could probably find a decent audience.
***** the story. Who tf pays attention to the story? Or the poorly written characters? I play AC games to be a murder machine. Everything else in these games is dime store novel trash.
All I needa know is which previous AC this most resembles (because it'll resemble at least 2-3 of them - that's the Ubisoft game design way, after all) so that I can decide if I'mma pay $20 for the complete version in 2 years or not.
@crossbit Yeah, that also would have been a great way to do it.
Think, even if they only supported a portion of 2's content at launch to push people to newer stuff, they could have simply dedicated time to bring free DLC to 3 in the form of 2's old missions (updated for 3's mechanics) over time, and then all-new content could have been packaged however they thought it made most sense (either as free expansions or paid DLC). But over time, 3 would have been brought up to the same content level as 2 AND it would have introduced all new stuff.
And they could have done so while only having to support one "platform" over time (assuming they eventually stopped supporting 2 altogether to push people to 3's "platform" approach). But either way, it would have more appropriately incentivized players to adopt 3 as a whole.
And had they gone F2P, they could have made the platform (generally) F2P, maybe with a rotating set of heists available to play at any given time (the way MOBAs often have a rotating cast of free characters). Then if new 3 players wanted to unlock permanent access to certain heists from 2, they could pay outright. Meanwhile, 2's players would unlock all 2's content for free at release once it was in 3. But maybe everyone pays for all-new 3 heists? Or something? I dunno. It just could have been handled better, for sure.
@crossbit I'm always surprised that Starbreeze didn't try and take the R6 Siege (or in some ways, Fortnite) approach and try and continue to expand on the existing title by re-baking the core gameplay, while retaining all of 2's content and features.
I'm not a player of 2, but I've kept my eye on it. it seems 3 tried to overhaul core systems and introduce new ones. I feel it would have been in Starbreeze AND the consumers' interests to simply redo the core engine, update the gameplay systems, but make the game into more of a platform for the content. Not a distinct release.
Hell, they could have made it F2P with all the DLC and add-ons they've pumped into from what I understand. If they made it "the place to go to play this sort of experience" and let 2's player base retain everything they've dedicated time to, they likely would have been better off. Even if that would have been difficult. Then again, developing an all new title and having to support both is ALSO risky and difficult. Seems they just didn't make the right call.
Isn't Starbreeze notoriously bad at supporting console versions of their titles? The IDEA of playing a heist-focused game intrigues me, but they're basically the only real big developer catering to that fantasy and from everything I hear, they're pretty terrible developers.
Not really all that surprised at any of this after the debacle that was the Payday 3 release.
@Westernwolf4 PCGamer had at least one preview of this a week or 2 ago that discussed the combat and the swapping mechanic in more detail. I don't know if they are doing a full review of it, though.
I wanted to like Void Bastards, but the slow pace and sim elements didn't gel with me. A more straightforward combat-focused approach may be more my thing right now.
But I'll wait for a sale so as not to waste as much time and money like I did before.
(Personally, I think I like spiritual successors nowadays over direct sequels. Maybe that's impacting my impressions of this, as well.)
Plucky Squire looks utterly charming. And Chernobylite has recently caught my eye while checking out previews for Stalker 2, so I've wanted to try something in that vein.
@The_Wailing_Doom And literally no one thinks Microsoft selling that Xbox at that price makes sense. It's unfair to use "bad business decision" as the basis to justify a bad business decision.
If the current (disc) system would have dropped to $400 and then this was $600, I think it would be a far different reaction.
I don't have a single gaming friend who is willing to shell out for this (all adults with good jobs, in our 30s). 3-4 of us (out of about 8) upgraded to a PS4 Pro last gen.
When you continue to design the same old ***** and refuse to do anything original or innovative in any of your titles for well over a generation, people are going to catch on.
And I say this as someone who has played and adored A LOT of Ubisoft titles.
They've killed numerous teams that made smaller, more unique games. And they've killed numerous smaller projects before letting them see the light of day.
I am legitimately beginning to lose faith in Sony decision makers.
@MrPeanutbutterz It's as much of a badge of honor as any trophy. FOR TROPHY HUNTERS it'll be a unique tchotchke to have in your collection. (I'm not a trophy hunter, to be clear.)
They find loopholes and easy games to grind trophies/achievements all the time. It's not always about HOW it was acquired it's having it at all.
Take the assets and craft a game in a style that players would play. Make a co-op campaign where you travel the galaxy. Let your crew pull off heists and do some backstabbing and adventuring and whatever else. Craft an ACTUAL IP worth giving a damn about. (CoD/Halo/Overwatch in space, with a fat campaign, would be an actual differentiator!)
Then throw this multiplayer suite into the package. And add a mode or two that truly differentiates itself from the barest minimum of the market. (Extraction mode? Heist mode? SOMETHING unique?!)
And for the love of all that is holy, assess the dreadful visual design of the majority of the cast of characters.
It could be salvaged. But it has to be something it isn't yet for that to happen. Simply making it a F2P suite of the same gameplay/modes, after this disaster, will not move the needle. That may be the easier route, but it's not one that will truly change market perception. Recreating the base premise of the package is certainly harder, but it's the only way to save it from itself.
Gamers feel this is ridiculous because of the game division's insistence on scoring a live service hit above just making games.
If they reset expectations and fostered good, solid titles using their dormant IP, they could reinvigorate them, make a bit of money, and build a war chest. Then they can safely wait to come across a big smash GaaS naturally while they sip profits off the top of 3rd party GaaS titles on their platform as they have been doing.
Companies want Fortnite money but want to jump from "doesn't exist" to "global phenomenon" forgetting that Fortnite didn't set out to become what it is. It rolled out at a small scale and grew naturally by word of mouth. Epic never saw that coming. They didn't TRY to make it what it is initially. It surprised everyone. It was never the goal.
If Sony would just focus on great games, they'd eventually hit upon something that exceeded expectations (say, maybe, like Helldivers?) that they could then invest in and support to create a bigger hit (something they have NOT been doing behind the scenes with Helldivers, it seems, as that game and its tech is still a ***** show as its small dev still struggles under the weight of the success).
I'm beginning to lose faith in Sony knowing what the heck they have in front of them and what to do with it. They wouldn't know a potential hit if it literally landed in their lap. They've proven that earlier this year!
There's no way in hell that whatever Factions or Twisted Metal were would have faired worse than Concord. No way in hell. Just BEING a new entry in a storied IP would have been enough to exceed the player numbers. Easily. Concord was that catastrophically bad.
But instead, Sony kills games before they have an iota of a chance to prove themselves, thinking that they know better than the market. If Concord proved anything, it's that Sony has no f'ing clue what the market wants and they're not listening to them when they say what they want.
Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts 2 is going to be free on the Epic store in a few days, for anyone not able to grab it and play it on PS before it gets removed.
Comments 1,736
Re: Assassin's Creed Shadows Reportedly Has a Co-Op Game Mode in Development
Ah, yes! That would be the type of innovative gameplay we can expect from Ubisoft these days: co-op.
Re: Microsoft Is Investigating Why Devs Are Prioritising PS5 Over Xbox
Some consulting agency is going to get paid millions of dollars to write a report with the most straightforward information you can imagine and present it to the clueless Microsoft brass.
Re: Lords of the Fallen PS5 Sequel Prioritising 'Elevated Production Values', More 'Commercial' Art Style
@KeanuReaves This here. This is what makes the greats... great.
I have gotten back into Remnant 2 and that is a game with rich mechanics, solid gameplay, and so many moving pieces behind the scenes. You can effectively play the game "casually" and have a great time, no question. Play with whatever you come across. OR you can go REALLY deep into its systems to extract specific, targeted items and mechanics and surprises. It's an absolute all-timer for me. The joy per hour (or maybe joy/satisfaction for effort) quotient is so friggin' high.
The base game was already my GotY 2023. But even just its first DLC (only just finished it) is raising the overall package to top tier of the generation for me because of its depth, surprises, and rock solid gameplay.
More developers need to take heed of what Gunfire Games is doing. They are sleeping giants of creativity and design.
Re: Explore Hell Is Us PS5 in Extensive Developer-Led Gameplay Trailer
This is giving me Returnal/Control/The Surge vibes. And I am here for it.
Re: PS5 Firmware Update Annoys with Unwanted Deluge of Ads, News Feed
This is atrocious and Sony should be ashamed of themselves. This is going to annoy the ever living ***** out of me.
Re: Sony's Live Service Push 'No Joke', A Lot of People Working on Horizon Online
As long as it plays more like Zero Dawn than Forbidden West, I'll at least keep an eye on it.
The biggest thing that worries me, though, is the longstanding evidence/rumors that this will change up the art style and lean into some sort of anime-inspired design.
Despite what flaws I think the gameplay is riddled with after Forbidden West, the art direction is NOT one of them. I think the aesthetic is still one of the best out there. And Decima as an engine can be breathtaking. So I just don't get why they'd (seemingly) abandon that for some sort of cartoon or anime-stylized look.
If that is where they land, then that would probably be the biggest thing to kill my interest. The early footage did NOT look good to me.
Re: Underperforming XDefiant Pours More Misery on Embattled Publisher Ubisoft
Anyone who has played Siege knows full well that Ubisoft's skin designs are atrocious and rarely worth money.
Re: Random: Xbox Boss Complains About X Button After Being Handed PS5 Pad
Says the guy whose company had at least 2 standard placements for X before they built a controller and they chose neither.
Re: Notorious Gambler Lando Calrissian Playing for Keeps in Star Wars Outlaws DLC
Has Ubisoft tried polishing and improving games before they release to tepid sales? Maybe they should give THAT a try some time.
Re: Bandai Namco's Big Cross-Media Bet Synduality Kickstarts PS5's 2025
They went really hard into that singular body type design for the robots. I'm not really a fan of playing as a mechanical jelly bean. Looks goofy as hell.
Re: Ubisoft 'Fully Mobilised' After Soft Star Wars Outlaws PS5 Sales
They should have tried designing a better game.
Re: Assassin's Creed Shadows Delayed on PS5 Until 14th February
I mean... this is pretty emblematic of Ubisoft's deeper problem: it took them until a tepid response to a Star Wars game in the year of our lord 2024 to realize releasing janky ass games loaded with problems is not a path to financial success.
Ubisoft games have been riddled with poorly thought out systems and engine jank and glitches and copy paste design for yeeeeeeeeears. But it finally caught up to them.
They were never going to fix things when people still plopped down money for their *****. And sure enough, they didn't at any broad level. But the market got wise to it and NOW they want to act like they're doing the right thing for the players. But their history shows they've never really embraced that mentality at all.
This is purely to stave off what they knew would be considerable criticism of a game they NEED to be successful. That's it. They're giving away expansions because no one was pre-ordering Shadows and no one was paying even more for the season pass. Not at the numbers they expected or needed. This isn't in good faith.
I think the problems at Ubisoft run far deeper than the rampant sexual assault allegations. That surely wasn't helping, but the bigger problem is management. That's apparent. They've had years to course correct but what have we really seen since? Immortals (undersold), Farcry 6 (awful step backwards in design and a tepid response to its release), an Avatar game that is copy paste Farcry Primal (undersold expectations), a Prince of Persia remake (delayed indefinitely due to jank), Skull & Bones (horrendously undersold expectations after years of turmoil), a solid "classic" PoP (well-received but undersold), a "back to basics" AC Mirage (undersold), a Division spinoff that got canned before it ever released, XDefiant (great launch, DEEP design problems they never addressed during years of betas and now its player numbers are cratering), Outlaws (undersold), and this... probably even more I can't think of.
I can't name a single Ubisoft game that far exceeded expectations since their scandals broke. AC Valhalla probably? But even that isn't the most beloved by the broader AC fandom because it was considered heavily bloated (after multiple titles that were also considered heavily bloated).
Their issues run DEEP and they are still present. That's abundantly clear to anyone paying attention.
Re: Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered PS5 Is Official, Out 31st October with $10 PS4 to PS5 Upgrade
@dark_knightmare2 Funny. I didn't mention the combat as being the problem. Concerned someone has a different opinion than you? You hafta white knight for a videogame now?
Re: Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered PS5 Is Official, Out 31st October with $10 PS4 to PS5 Upgrade
As long as they didn't tweak the gameplay to play like Forbidden West. I still can't believe what a downgrade that sequel was.
Re: Poll: What Did You Think of Sony's State of Play for September 2024?
Hell is Us, Archeage Chronicles, and a GoT sequel?? That was solid af for my interests.
Re: Ghost of Yotei Is the Ghost of Tsushima Sequel We Needed, Slashing to PS5 in 2025
What a mic drop.
Re: Sony Appears to Leak Many Games from State of Play
If this is going to primarily be about expansions/remakes/and PS5 Pro upgrades, it'll have people wishing for the one where they showed Concord gameplay.
Re: Don't Nod 'Disappointed' by Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden, Jusant Sales
I heard Banishers was solid, but I haven't gotten to it. It's a competitive market. If they can't break through with advertising, they need to do better with things like pricing. The booming PC market proves there's plenty of space for A-AA titles, but they have to be rpiced appropriately. I feel like their games aren't and it costs them (literally).
Re: Rumour: PS6 Could Span a Console and Handheld Device
Make it a true jack of all trades: allow the handheld to play dedicated titles that get the requisite compatibility patches (or are from older generations), but then have built-in Portal-like streaming functionality for games that are too advanced for that. Let users have the best of both worlds!
I'd be all over that.
Re: Jaw-Dropping 30th Anniversary PS5 Pro Console and Accessories Will Bankrupt You
I legitimately need a new controller... but I'm sure the markup on these will be unreasonable.
Re: Fresh Marathon Details Cover Heroes, Pricing, and Bungie's Silence
I want this game to succeed AND be fun. I'm no Bungie apologist. It doesn't come from that.
I just think the extraction shooter genre is one that could take off on consoles in a way no game really has. And I think it's a smart differentiator in the market, something Concord definitely lacked.
I also just love the aesthetic. I think we deserve visually interesting games and this could be one of them. I adored the teaser and hope that look carries through to release.
Re: Dragon Age: Inquisition Massively Oversold Projections, Remains BioWare's Biggest Game
As someone who never played a DA game, I thought DAI was bloated and boring.
I played a rogue/archer expecting TPS controls because of their pedigree with ME's shooting mechanics. The fact you don't actually control your shooting, as an archer, made me switch to playing a melee ally at the beginning just so felt like I had control.
Annoyed me to no end and I regret spending the time on it.
Re: Horizon Zero Dawn's PS5, PC Remaster Is Very Much the Real Deal
@Oz_Who_Dat_Dare As someone who absolutely adores HZD, I rushed through HFW last year and then just finished Burning Shores (because I bought it and figured I may as well see where the story goes/went), I cannot fathom for the life of me what people see in HFW that makes it better than HZD. The downgrades are numerous.
I still hold HZD up as the second best "Ubisoft-style" open world game behind only Ghost of Tsushima. It was clear, lean (by open world game design standards) and fun af.
HFW took all that and threw it out the window and padded the playtime with aimless busywork, horrendously boring loot grinding, and absolutely atrociously aggravating combat. Not to mention, it has some of the jankiest controls in all of modern gaming. Aloy turns like a tank and gets caught on countless pieces of environment constantly AND the climbing is so awfully designed I almost stopped playing it before I got to the "full" world. Anyone who says otherwise is kidding themselves.
I'm glad I played it. At least I have an informed opinion on the title, and now I can wait to see how H3 stacks up. If it leans more towards 2's design, I'll just skip it and pour one out for one of the most promising, but poorly implemented evolutions of an IP I've ever personally witnessed.
Re: Horizon Zero Dawn's PS5, PC Remaster Is Very Much the Real Deal
The more people that play this so Guerilla designs the next one more like Zero Dawn and far less like Forbidden West, the better. HFW was a gotdamm slog. The fact this series went from one of the most streamlined, satisfying open world action games to one of the most boring and bloated messes in only one iteration is a travesty of game design.
Re: Sony Pulled Bungie's Head Out of Its Ass, and an Ex-Lawyer Reckons That Was a Good Thing
@knowles2 That's not at all what they did with Firewalk. Dumping $100-300mm into an unproven dev is not at all what I am suggesting.
The part of my comment about wanting to instantly go from zero to a massve hit the market may not even want is explicitly referring to their expectations/strategy for Concord.
Re: Sony Pulled Bungie's Head Out of Its Ass, and an Ex-Lawyer Reckons That Was a Good Thing
Whether you like Bungie/Destiny or not, I always come back to, "And how much could Sony have spent on other studios INSTEAD of Bungie, and thus controlled far more IP and had a far broader range of talent and expertise under its umbrella?"
You can't tell me Bungie is an outright better, more creative, more capable development house than the likes of numerous other shuttered or acquired studios combined (Crustal Dynamics, Japan Studio, the list goes on).
If Sony wants a live service hit, the best bet is to let smaller teams cook and create unique experiences that can grow into hits, the same way PUBG and Fortnite and R6 Siege and Rocket League did. None of those games set out to set the world on fire. But over their lifespans, they catered to players, built strong fundamentals, and built large followings. Sony (and many other companies) seem to want to go from nothing to massive smash hit immediately and don't realize that's the hardest, most expensive way to become a hit. You can't run a business by way of playing the lottery.
What they need to learn from Helldivers 2 (despite its tumultuous reputation since release) is that a small team with great ideas can result in outsized performance much more easily than putting an entire single player-focused studio on a multiplayer game just because of an IP (see: Naughty Dog). Go after those HD2-like hits. Get a bigger ROI and build your broader experience in delivering said hits over time. Nurture creativity and original thinking. Let them evolve into a bigger live service game WHEN THE MARKET TELLS YOU THEY WANT IT. But don't go spending hundreds of millions out the gate on something that isn't proven (Concord) or that misaligns with the given talent (again, ND).
Re: Filming on Ubisoft's Watch Dogs Movie Has Wrapped
This actually could probably translate to a big budget flick pretty easily. Make it like a modern Enemy of the State. Make it about someone being pulled into the underground world of government surveillance and morally gray activist hackers. Could definitely see it as that sorta mid-late 90s/early 2000s action thriller sorta vibe.
Don't tie it directly to the game stories at all. The franchise isn't big enough anymore for that. Just make it independently set within that world and it could probably find a decent audience.
Re: Faaast Penguin Is Chaotic PS5 Multiplayer Fun from Japan
@Fishnpeas Kids, dude. And people that like feeling like kids. Not every game hasta be for everyone.
Re: Faaast Penguin Is Chaotic PS5 Multiplayer Fun from Japan
My daughter is going to LOVE this.
Re: Assassin's Creed Shadows' Japan Looks Stunning in New Open World Showcase
***** the story. Who tf pays attention to the story? Or the poorly written characters? I play AC games to be a murder machine. Everything else in these games is dime store novel trash.
All I needa know is which previous AC this most resembles (because it'll resemble at least 2-3 of them - that's the Ubisoft game design way, after all) so that I can decide if I'mma pay $20 for the complete version in 2 years or not.
Re: PAYDAY 3 Creative Lead 'Stepping Away', PAYDAY 2 Remains Much More Popular
@crossbit Yeah, that also would have been a great way to do it.
Think, even if they only supported a portion of 2's content at launch to push people to newer stuff, they could have simply dedicated time to bring free DLC to 3 in the form of 2's old missions (updated for 3's mechanics) over time, and then all-new content could have been packaged however they thought it made most sense (either as free expansions or paid DLC). But over time, 3 would have been brought up to the same content level as 2 AND it would have introduced all new stuff.
And they could have done so while only having to support one "platform" over time (assuming they eventually stopped supporting 2 altogether to push people to 3's "platform" approach). But either way, it would have more appropriately incentivized players to adopt 3 as a whole.
And had they gone F2P, they could have made the platform (generally) F2P, maybe with a rotating set of heists available to play at any given time (the way MOBAs often have a rotating cast of free characters). Then if new 3 players wanted to unlock permanent access to certain heists from 2, they could pay outright. Meanwhile, 2's players would unlock all 2's content for free at release once it was in 3. But maybe everyone pays for all-new 3 heists? Or something? I dunno. It just could have been handled better, for sure.
Re: PAYDAY 3 Creative Lead 'Stepping Away', PAYDAY 2 Remains Much More Popular
@Jaz007 Good to hear. I always heard that 2 failed to get the sort of support it deserved on consoles.
Re: PAYDAY 3 Creative Lead 'Stepping Away', PAYDAY 2 Remains Much More Popular
@crossbit I'm always surprised that Starbreeze didn't try and take the R6 Siege (or in some ways, Fortnite) approach and try and continue to expand on the existing title by re-baking the core gameplay, while retaining all of 2's content and features.
I'm not a player of 2, but I've kept my eye on it. it seems 3 tried to overhaul core systems and introduce new ones. I feel it would have been in Starbreeze AND the consumers' interests to simply redo the core engine, update the gameplay systems, but make the game into more of a platform for the content. Not a distinct release.
Hell, they could have made it F2P with all the DLC and add-ons they've pumped into from what I understand. If they made it "the place to go to play this sort of experience" and let 2's player base retain everything they've dedicated time to, they likely would have been better off. Even if that would have been difficult. Then again, developing an all new title and having to support both is ALSO risky and difficult. Seems they just didn't make the right call.
Re: PAYDAY 3 Creative Lead 'Stepping Away', PAYDAY 2 Remains Much More Popular
Isn't Starbreeze notoriously bad at supporting console versions of their titles? The IDEA of playing a heist-focused game intrigues me, but they're basically the only real big developer catering to that fantasy and from everything I hear, they're pretty terrible developers.
Not really all that surprised at any of this after the debacle that was the Payday 3 release.
Re: PS5 Fans Think Sony's Accidentally Leaked a Wireless PSVR2 Headset
PSVR2 support failed me and my interests. I got a Quest 3 and am quite pleased with it.
That being said, a Quest 3 versus a wireless PSVR2 would have been a MUCH different choice for me to make.
Re: Mini Review: Wild Bastards (PS5) – Way More Bastards, But a Lot More Void
@Westernwolf4 PCGamer had at least one preview of this a week or 2 ago that discussed the combat and the swapping mechanic in more detail. I don't know if they are doing a full review of it, though.
Re: Mini Review: Wild Bastards (PS5) – Way More Bastards, But a Lot More Void
I wanted to like Void Bastards, but the slow pace and sim elements didn't gel with me. A more straightforward combat-focused approach may be more my thing right now.
But I'll wait for a sale so as not to waste as much time and money like I did before.
(Personally, I think I like spiritual successors nowadays over direct sequels. Maybe that's impacting my impressions of this, as well.)
Re: 13 More Games Join PS Plus Extra, Premium Next Week
Plucky Squire looks utterly charming. And Chernobylite has recently caught my eye while checking out previews for Stalker 2, so I've wanted to try something in that vein.
Solid enough month for my tastes!
Re: Poll: Would You Buy PS5 Pro If It Was Cheaper?
@The_Wailing_Doom And literally no one thinks Microsoft selling that Xbox at that price makes sense. It's unfair to use "bad business decision" as the basis to justify a bad business decision.
Re: Talking Point: Is PS5 Pro Way Too Expensive?
If the current (disc) system would have dropped to $400 and then this was $600, I think it would be a far different reaction.
I don't have a single gaming friend who is willing to shell out for this (all adults with good jobs, in our 30s). 3-4 of us (out of about 8) upgraded to a PS4 Pro last gen.
So... yeah.
Re: Ubisoft Investor Calls for Company to Go Private, and CEO Yves Guillemot to Be Replaced
When you continue to design the same old ***** and refuse to do anything original or innovative in any of your titles for well over a generation, people are going to catch on.
And I say this as someone who has played and adored A LOT of Ubisoft titles.
Re: Sony: It's Massively Important PS Studios Develops Games in Various Genres
Actions speak louder than words.
They've killed numerous teams that made smaller, more unique games. And they've killed numerous smaller projects before letting them see the light of day.
I am legitimately beginning to lose faith in Sony decision makers.
Re: Star Wars Outlaws' Instant Fail Stealth Sections Will Be Reworked in Upcoming PS5 Patch
They let this stuff release and then struggle to understand why sales numbers and reception aren't what they expected.
Instant fail stealth in a 2024 action game? Years after Ubisoft releases have moved away from the mechanic? These companies are led by morons.
Re: Soapbox: I Spent 3 Days with the Concord Trophy Hunters Who Dedicated Their Lives to Unlocking the PS5, PC Platinum
@MrPeanutbutterz It's as much of a badge of honor as any trophy. FOR TROPHY HUNTERS it'll be a unique tchotchke to have in your collection. (I'm not a trophy hunter, to be clear.)
They find loopholes and easy games to grind trophies/achievements all the time. It's not always about HOW it was acquired it's having it at all.
That's all I'm saying.
Re: PS5, PC Disaster Concord Is Now Officially Offline Indefinitely
Take the assets and craft a game in a style that players would play. Make a co-op campaign where you travel the galaxy. Let your crew pull off heists and do some backstabbing and adventuring and whatever else. Craft an ACTUAL IP worth giving a damn about. (CoD/Halo/Overwatch in space, with a fat campaign, would be an actual differentiator!)
Then throw this multiplayer suite into the package. And add a mode or two that truly differentiates itself from the barest minimum of the market. (Extraction mode? Heist mode? SOMETHING unique?!)
And for the love of all that is holy, assess the dreadful visual design of the majority of the cast of characters.
It could be salvaged. But it has to be something it isn't yet for that to happen. Simply making it a F2P suite of the same gameplay/modes, after this disaster, will not move the needle. That may be the easier route, but it's not one that will truly change market perception. Recreating the base premise of the package is certainly harder, but it's the only way to save it from itself.
Re: Soapbox: I Spent 3 Days with the Concord Trophy Hunters Who Dedicated Their Lives to Unlocking the PS5, PC Platinum
This will likely go down in history as the rarest platinum in PS history. Like, what could possibly be harder to get?
Kind of a wild badge of honor to have.
Re: Space Marine 2 Already Struggling With PS5 Server Woes, Days Before Its Full Release
"Wait. What's 'server capacity'???"
Re: Sony Execs Seem to Think the Company Doesn't Have Enough Original IP
Gamers feel this is ridiculous because of the game division's insistence on scoring a live service hit above just making games.
If they reset expectations and fostered good, solid titles using their dormant IP, they could reinvigorate them, make a bit of money, and build a war chest. Then they can safely wait to come across a big smash GaaS naturally while they sip profits off the top of 3rd party GaaS titles on their platform as they have been doing.
Companies want Fortnite money but want to jump from "doesn't exist" to "global phenomenon" forgetting that Fortnite didn't set out to become what it is. It rolled out at a small scale and grew naturally by word of mouth. Epic never saw that coming. They didn't TRY to make it what it is initially. It surprised everyone. It was never the goal.
If Sony would just focus on great games, they'd eventually hit upon something that exceeded expectations (say, maybe, like Helldivers?) that they could then invest in and support to create a bigger hit (something they have NOT been doing behind the scenes with Helldivers, it seems, as that game and its tech is still a ***** show as its small dev still struggles under the weight of the success).
I'm beginning to lose faith in Sony knowing what the heck they have in front of them and what to do with it. They wouldn't know a potential hit if it literally landed in their lap. They've proven that earlier this year!
There's no way in hell that whatever Factions or Twisted Metal were would have faired worse than Concord. No way in hell. Just BEING a new entry in a storied IP would have been enough to exceed the player numbers. Easily. Concord was that catastrophically bad.
But instead, Sony kills games before they have an iota of a chance to prove themselves, thinking that they know better than the market. If Concord proved anything, it's that Sony has no f'ing clue what the market wants and they're not listening to them when they say what they want.
Re: Concord Will Remain in Prime Video's Secret Level Anthology Series
Fitting, seeing as the game looks like the sort of generic videogame you'd see in a Hollywood production.
Re: PS Plus Extra's September Cull Has 4 More Great PS5, PS4 Games Added to It, 16 in Total
Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts 2 is going to be free on the Epic store in a few days, for anyone not able to grab it and play it on PS before it gets removed.