Comments 203

Re: Test Your PlayStation General Knowledge - Issue 26

Mortal

@FanCFeast that's right. Although you don't need an alt account - just use an incognito browser and you can run as many practice runs as you want to get your time down.

In general it'll take around 4-5 seconds to read a question, and a further 1-2 to find and select the answer. Cheaters find out the answers through an incognito (or guest) run and then just rush through, selecting the correct answer without reading the question.

The scoreboard is generally pointless because of how easy it is to cheat, and in itself is the reason people cheat - to see their name at the top. It's a hollow win though as we all know the sub 40 second times are highly likely to be cheaters.

Re: Test Your PlayStation General Knowledge - Astro Bot Special

Mortal

@Titntin 100% correct.

I cheated. Used an incognito browser to do it logged out, wrote the answers down and then did the quiz on my account. I've been vocal for the past 3-4 quizzes that people posting sub-30 to 40 second times are clearly either extremely lucky, or are cheating, as it should take 4-5 second to answer each question if you're rushing. So now I'm joining the cheaters AND making it obvious, as a kind of way of devaluing their efforts - if I got sub 25 seconds by cheating and admit it, all other times around mine become instantly questionable as well.

Re: Talking Point: What Are You Playing This Weekend? - Issue 544

Mortal

Following the decision to let my PS Extra subscription expire a few months back, I've been working my way through the backlog of games purchased on sale but never completed.

Decided to start that workload by working my way through HFW Burning Shore and finished that early last week, so this weekend is something completely different - Warhammer 40K: Rogue Trader.

It's lore is heavy, but the fact the game rewards you for leaning into the atmosphere of the 40K universe, and being a complete son-of-a-b to the peasents is very, very entertaining.

Re: Concord PS5, PC Sales Estimates Are Somehow Even Worse Than We Thought

Mortal

It seems that a lot of people are using this games failure as an excuse to lament "live-service" games, and they're doing so with broad strokes, lumping PvP, PvE, MMO, MMORPG etc all together because they're online games.

To me, a live-service game is a multiplayer online game where the story is constantly expanded upon in iterations, such as Destiny 2, The First Descendant, Suicide Squad - the drive in those games is the story. The story is what is expanded.

Games that focus on PvP like Overwatch 2, Concord, Warzone, XDefiant etc shouldn't be considered live-service as the PvP is the focus. The developers simply provide free expansions to keep people interested in the game. Expansions being different maps, weapons and characters.

If we're going to define live-service as any game that is online, has multiplayer (PvP and/or PvE) and is expanded upon post release, then pretty much every game that has an online component and has had expansions should be binned, with the developers focusing purely on single player, offline games that are sold complete at release, to satisfy the people that complain about 'live-service" games.

Re: Rumour: PS5 Pro Design Seemingly Leaked

Mortal

Looks ugly with the stripes. The stock PS5 is an odd looking thing to begin with, but at least you can get plates from someone like dbrand to round it out. The stripes remind me of an accordion.

Re: Capcom Fighting Collection 2 Is the PS4 Compilation of Your Dreams

Mortal

I'm always perplexed by these compilation titles - it's a bunch of old fighters that the vast majority of people stopped playing decades ago because something better came out.

Why do people buy these titles? If it's nostalgia, do they actually play them for more than an hour or so? Why not just download an emulator or take advantage of one of the many other ways to play these individual fighting games?

And does anyone actually use the gallery/music players?

Re: PS5, PC FPS Concord's Poor Player Numbers Have Predictably Gone Viral

Mortal

It's hard to say that it's poor timing with regards to going up against Black Myth, as I don't think anyone expected Black Myth to come out this strong, meaning it may not have seemed like an issue. That aside, I'd expect the PC/Steam sales to be low, because honestly, every PC gamer I talk to plays other games like Valorant, Counter Strike, Overwatch, Apex Legends... They're thoroughly entrenched in those games, so a $40 game that does near enough the same as what they're already playing just isn't appealing to them, and I (as a PS5 gamer) am along with them - if I want to play an object based hero shooter I have OverWatch and Valorant. I don't need to drop $40 to try another hero shooter.

Re: Reaction: It's Time for Xbox to Tell Us Which Games It's Bringing to PS5, and Which Games It Isn't

Mortal

As much as we may think that Xbox as a hardware provider is dead, Xbox still has a large playerbase that they need to support, at least for this console generation. If Xbox were to open the flood gates and port everything over, including tent-pole franchises like Halo, Gears of War, Forza and Flight Simulator, they'd be slapping their console owners in the face, as the exclusives available on their (and any other) console is a large part of the reason for purchase. If they give the exclusives to a competitor, why did people buy the console in the first place?

Secondly, and I think more importantly, they just announced the mid-cycle refresh with a white discless Series X and 1TB Series S. To announce now that they're bringing all tent-pole franchises to PlayStation would obliterate any reason people would have to buy in to those consoles, as they could just buy a PS5, get all of the Xbox games + PlayStation games. It just doesn't make sense to do right now.

Re: Xbox Renegotiated Indiana Jones Deal to Exclude PS5, Then Ported It Anyway

Mortal

I'm going to bet that with Microsoft taking a more concerned look at how the Xbox gaming division is being run and at what decisions are being made, someone high-up in Microsoft has pointed out to Phil that going all-in on Gamepass early on, but then buying as many developers and making as many exclusivity deals as they could, was not the smartest decision. Now Xbox gamers expect every in-house and exclusive game on Gamepass day 1, leaving Xbox losing out on sales revenue, and Phil can't back-track without potentially losing a ton of Gamepass subscribers. The only option they have to try to increase revenue is by licensing their games to their competitors. It's a pretty feable position to be in.

Re: 12 Major PS5, PS4 Games Leaving PS Plus, Including Horizon Forbidden West

Mortal

@nessisonett ahaha! I agree with you there! My Extra expired in July, as to me, seeing as the majority of Extra games are smaller, lesser known titles, it appeared that the tier is more about giving you access to games you otherwise wouldn't play, and the odd AAA gets thrown on to make it seem more enticing. With the increase in cost though, the expense vs. value didn't work out for me.

Re: 12 Major PS5, PS4 Games Leaving PS Plus, Including Horizon Forbidden West

Mortal

@nessisonett that'd make sense if Sony setup the Extra tier games catalog around allowing subscribers access to older first-party games, at that point we'd be right to expect games like God of War and Gran Turismo 7 on there, but that's not what Extra is. It's a tier that gives you access to a games catalog with both new and old games that Sony choose (providing other publishers/developers agree).

I'd imagine that as having games on a subscription service screws sales, and HFW is still a popular title, Sony are removing it in the hopes to see more sales revenue from it.

Re: Test Your PlayStation General Knowledge - Issue 25

Mortal

I created a dummy account to test a theory on how people are posting sub 1 minute scores of 9 or 10. After previously finding out the answers, I posted a 9/10 in 21 seconds, in which I didn't read a single question and just picked the answers. 21 seconds knowing the answers and NOT reading questions, so that 25 second 9/10 is looking very, very suspicious.

And someone else posts a perfect 10/10 in 21 seconds. These people are either reading and answering questions in less than 2 seconds per question, guessing or cheating.

Re: Don't Worry, Gamescom Opening Night Live Will Feature New Game Announcements

Mortal

@Zeldorf now and then I like to look up the etymology of words, just to see where they come from and learn the base meaning.

'"Geoff" is a stupid way to spell, Jeff.'

Geoffrey is the bases for Jeffrey. With regards to Geoffrey it is a derivative of Dutch "Godfried", German "Gottfried" and Old English "Gotfrith" and "Godfrith".

Jeffrey is actually a surname/last name, but is used as a first name apparently due to the simpler spelling.

Oh also - I've never really been into watching the games shows these days, as you can just catch most of the trailers on YouTubes afterwards.

Re: Beware! Scalpers Reselling Astro Bot PS5 Controllers for Ridiculous Prices

Mortal

The only crux here is that it's limited edition. Hopefully demand for the controller isn't actually that high (scalpers using bots could easily make demand seem higher than it is), and scalpers end up with controllers that they just can't sell.

Side note - you can still find plenty of listings for PS Portals on eBay exceeding the retail price, despite them being readily available in stores. Amusingly this means people trying to sell them used are checking listings for an idea of what they should list as, and also refusing to sell for less than retail.

Re: Geralt Voice Actor Confirms Role in The Witcher 4, White Wolf Will Be 'Part of the Game'

Mortal

@AhmadSumadi Witchers have emotions. They have and show emotion in the books the game is based on. They just keep their emotions in check so that they don't lose focus while in battle.

Emotions drive a lot of Geralts actions. If Geralt didn't have emotions he wouldn't pursue Yennifer (love), repeatedly have sex (pleasure), become attached to Ciri as if she's his daughter (love), wouldn't joke with Jaskier (joy)...

Re: GTA 6 Won't Be on Subs Like PS Plus at Launch Because Take-Two Makes 'Rational' Decisions

Mortal

Makes sense.

Subscription based services cannibalize sales. It's a good venture for a small time developer, that isn't guaranteed X amount of revenue from sales, but if your game turns out to be popular, you lose money by taking the deal. Just look at Sea of Stars' launch on PS Extra. The devs thought the game wouldn't do that well, so they took an offer from Sony. Shortly after launch when the game was proving to be wildly popular, the devs lamented that they regretted the PS Extra deal because they could have made more off of sales.

Any developer or publisher that knows their game is going to sell well will be wise to avoid signing day-one release deals on any platform, especially if it's something as massive as GTA.

Re: Movie Review: Borderlands - As Bland As the Brand It's Based On

Mortal

Interesting review. I've had this movie firmly in the "If it's on a streaming service and I'm bored, maybe" bin since the cast were revealed. Kevin Hart is a good stand-up comedian, when it comes to films though he needs a partner to riff with (think Hart and Dwayne Johnson), otherwise he's just a short, loud man. Cate Blanchett was actually the big head scratcher for me as she's old! Why cast a 55 year old actress in a role that would be better suited to someone in their mid-30s unless you're doing it for the star power? Blanchett recently did an okay turn as Hela in the MCU, and I assume someone figured MCU = Popular, so having an MCU star = great for the movie. Now, I'm not the biggest Blanchett buff, but aside from Hela, all of her roles have been the elegant (see also - stiff and/or rigid) upper-class female. That's not Lilith! I don't know the other two actors but Jamie Lee Curtis is the only one here that would actually catch my interest, especially after her turn in Everything, Everywhere, All At Once. So to read that the movie is bad is unsurprising.

Re: A Big Bungie Project Has Been Cancelled, But It Wasn't Destiny 3

Mortal

I wonder if Sony still consider Bungie to be the masters of live-service games. I mean sure Bungie made a popular live-service game, but you're supposed to be able to ride the revenue of that game, which Bungie failed to do. So did they just make a popular live-service game but absolutely fail to find a way to monitize it or fail to handle the revenue streams coming from it?

Re: Best Simulation Games on PS5

Mortal

@Northern_munkey me as well. I'd left a lot of the track experiences undone, but decided to give them a go a few nights ago...

They did not update those times after the update! All of my times are 1-2 seconds slower than before, yet the required times are the same.