Comments 512

Re: More Rumours of 'Major' Third Party PS5 Exclusives Return

MrGawain

I wonder if triple A 3rd party exclusives can exist any more in 2020 with rising development costs? At least not timed ones. Atlas seemed tempted to put Persona 5 elsewhere and Capcom have been pretty cagey with their comments about SF5 exclusiveness after a limited success. Even 1st party games have had to to find different platforms to make back production costs.

Re: Poll: When Will You Buy a PS5?

MrGawain

At this moment there have been no games announced that I want. Although I did enjoy a few games on the PS4, it did let me down a bit with the sort of games I like, not to mention several build quality issues.

I’m not going to rush into anything at the moment, especially while I still have so much to play on the Switch.

Re: PS5 Games Could Cost $10 More Than PS4

MrGawain

I can remember some N64 launch games being up to £90 at launch.

I suggest buy a PS5 with a Disk Drive. More likely to get discounts on physical, plus the 2nd hand market and borrowing/trading is about to become bigger again.

Re: Report: PS5's Price Could Be $50 Cheaper if You Go for the Digital Edition

MrGawain

Would you pay £50 to add backwards compatibility, and the ability to play CDs and DVDs? And would you spend £50 more on a console when you know You can save up to a tenner a game buying it on a disc instead of using the digital store instead?

To me buying the digital edition is a false economy, even if you only use the disc drive sparingly.

Re: Of Course The Last of Us 2 Is Being Review Bombed

MrGawain

I think the problem is the internet has trained people into binary Opinions of either the Greatest or Worst, Yes or No, Left or Right, PS or XB. There is no shades of grey. And being of one opinion means they think they should right any opinion that isn’t theirs.

For me TLOU isn’t the sort of game I play, so I have no opinion of it. But if I was interested in it, I would find the opinion of one or two reviewers that like the sort of games I like to inform my opinion.

Re: PS5 Console Revealed, Standard and Digital Only Edition

MrGawain

I bet retailers are overjoyed with the prospect of selling a digital version. Or not.

And seeing it took me 20 hours to download the day one patch of Arkham Knight on my cruddy Internet, the prospect of downloading entire higher definition games is even less appealing.

Re: Naughty Dog Blocks The Last of Us 2 Trolls with New Twitter Feature

MrGawain

Unfortunately we live in internet world where we can’t have anything to be surprised by now, or not be coloured by extreme opinions by every twit with a keyboard. Perhaps it’s a curse for the single player narrative existing in a world that now wants everyone to play online and converse with everyone else that’s played it? And TLOU is the extreme case of this in narrative lead gaming, because it relies so deeply on the story- perhaps more than any other game.

Re: THQ Nordic, Koch Media Owner Has a Ludicrous 118 Games in Development

MrGawain

I remember as a kid in the SNES/Megadrive era that the original THQ were absolutely atrocious, reponsible for some of the most hideously broken knockoffs and licensed games ever. Then through acquisitions they managed to bring their reputation up.

THQ Nordic should be careful not to spread itself so thinly as to repeat history. Also, I wonder how many of these games are for the mobile market?

Re: PS5 Approach Is Different But 'Not Necessarily a Bad Thing', Says Former PlayStation Boss

MrGawain

The Switch was revealed on October 20th, 2016 in a 4 minute sizzle reel. We got a look at the First few games and Joycons on Jan 13th. It launched on March the 3rd.

I don’t think it hurt Nintendo to keep quiet until the last minute and then bombard us with reveals, and I don’t think it will hurt Sony, whereas MS has shown scraps early, and devalued their message so far.

Saying that, when they do reveal, Sony needs something to excite the fans game wise.

Re: PS5 Fans Expecting an 'Entire Slate of Games' at Reveal Event

MrGawain

XBox seemingly can beat the PS5 on tech and price (because they’re willing to lose to win), but I’m yet to be convinced that even with their studio acquisitions that they’ll have compelling titles like Sony had last year. PlayStation needs to lean in on their already popular IP. We’ve already had the talk on SSD’s and Raytracing, and seeing the reaction online a large percentage of PS customers just want to play Spider-Man and GOW sequels.

Re: Reaction: Sony Needs to Show Us a True, Next-Gen PS5 Exclusive After Lukewarm Inside Xbox

MrGawain

I think we forget every generation of PS and XB has been lacking in genuinely exciting games at launch. Things might look prettier, but it takes developers a while to really come up with really innovative games. Either console you choose to buy, there will be one okayish exclusive, one racing game, FIFA, Madden, Assassin’s Creed and COD as the main choices- and this time you can buy most of them on the previous gen and then shift when you’re ready... or are able to get hold of the box of your choice.

For me I’m happy to play my Switch and some PS4 titles I’ve missed, and make the jump if or when the water is the right temperature.

Re: PlayStation Disables Likes, Dislikes, and Comments on The Last of Us 2's New Trailer

MrGawain

I think we know in 2020 that people have got a little self entitled over demanding that stories in books, tv, and games have to go the way they imagined they would in their heads, but then Sony wants the Last Of Us 2 to be true to an artistic vision and sell millions of copies. Those two things aren’t normally comfortable bedfellows.

Until the thing comes out we can’t tell the true quality of the product, but if there is an unpopular story point it will put off certain people from buying it. I mean look at Game Of Thrones and Star Wars.

Re: Soapbox: I Want Better Levels on PS5, Not Bigger Worlds

MrGawain

As much as they aspire to be, video games can never entirely recreate reality. There will always be an invisible wall somewhere or an NPC who will start repeating themselves. We still have a controller in our hand and press a button to perform an action. So why sweat the minor details in the distance and accept the boundaries. The best music is usually made when they can only record on 16 tracks or less, and a lot of the best TV programmes can happen when they’re set in one room. Limitations push innovation.

Re: Xbox Boss on PS5: We Have a Plan That Can Win

MrGawain

I’m of the opinion that in business you don’t ‘win’ against someone else. You set your stall up with a decent product and a polite attitude to your customers, and you try to make more money than you spend.

If success is just about selling more than the other guy no matter what it costs you, you will eventually be out of business. And if you make a billion quid and the other guy makes a billion and one quid, why should you be judged as a loser?

Re: Reaction: PS5 Will Solve All Your PS4 Pet Peeves Once and for All

MrGawain

@Flaming_Kaiser

‘MY’ problem with the PS4 is I paid £349.00 for something that stopped working correctly a year after warranty, similar to the fate of my PS1 and my PS2, and 2 Sony DVD players I have owned. And I’m a little sceptical the PS5 will be any different in it’s build quality to be honest. I do not see it as a fair solution that I can fix this problem by buying a more expensive model.

Plus there must be greater rules put in by Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo that stops broken, unfinished games being released before they are ready. With the size of patches getting bigger and taking longer to download, this goes against the concept of a console where you just put the game in and play it. That’s why we choose to play on consoles instead of PC, because the product should come to us fully formed, or as close as it can be.

Re: Guide: Best PS4 Kids and Family Games

MrGawain

Just reading through this list, it really does show how the PS4 really has all of it’s quality games aimed at older audiences. It’s better than the XB1 lineup, but Sony could really do better in catering for families with the PS5.

Re: Reaction: PS5 Deep Dive Was As Expected, But Was Shockingly Misjudged

MrGawain

Releasing this information was fine- but it only needed to be in a press release. Posting it on YouTube where the whole point of the platform is to show moving pictures of stuff was a big mistake. Very few customers and fans needed such an in depth explanation of how SSD works, and I bet most developers didn’t need the concept explained to them either.

Re: PS4 Has Reportedly Sold a Ridiculous 68 Million More Units than Xbox One

MrGawain

Seeing the start they had, and the fact MS started selling the few exclusives they had on PC this isn’t surprising.

The only thing I question about the next gen is can we compare who is ‘winning’ if you can play the exclusives elsewhere, and if such expensive machines will be sold at a loss? If that’s so, then getting people to play on PC is actually more cost effective to the manufacturers, and less cost inhibitive to the market.

Re: We Can't Make Head Nor Tail of This The Wonderful 101: Remastered Gameplay

MrGawain

It’s like Okami meets Bayonetta, except you’re a group of Super Heroes instead of a Wolf with a paintbrush, and you stop time when you dodge correctly but you can’t move the camera to see a witches’ bum.

And I think it’s a lot like Dark Souls in if you ‘get gud’ with the gameplay, you’ll enjoy it. Either it clicks or it doesn’t.

Re: Sony Reportedly Paid $229 Million in Insomniac Games Acquisition

MrGawain

I wonder if this sort of acquisition really makes financial sense? Okay, so they bought a small amount of IP, and probably an office and computers, but what makes the magic is the employees. If in an amount of time the really creative people decide to leave, what do you really have?

It’s like when Microsoft bought Rare, most of the original talent left to work elsewhere and MS was left with just the name and some IP they never use.

Re: PS5 Patent Has Some Fans Panicking Sony's Going to Push Microtransactions on Players

MrGawain

Obviously a patent doesn’t mean Sony will use an idea like this, but being too open about over selling micro transactions isn’t a good look to launch your console with. Microsoft learned that you don’t want to look like the bad guy when releasing a console with the XB1, you would hope Sony wouldn’t be too cocky to think they could get away with a similar launch for the PS5.

Re: Talking Point: Is Sony Right to Skip E3 2020?

MrGawain

Seeing everyone is talking about the PS5 BECAUSE Sony are skipping E3, I see it to be a sound business strategy.

The only thing I question is if this will damage Sony’s relationship with 3rd parties like Activision and Ubisoft, which we’ll find out at Microsoft’s and Sony’s conferences.

Re: Sony's 'Target Microsoft from Day One' Strategy Will 'Probably' Work for PS5

MrGawain

Ask yourself if the PS4 really was that brilliant last gen (in comparison to the PS1’s, 2’s, and 3’s lineup of games), or if the XB1 was dog poo awful? I would argue the XB1’s unique software was the worst since Sega Saturn.

Realistically Xbox can’t be that bad this year, but to really challenge it needs a few equivalent we’ll known exclusive titles like what PS4 had in Spider-Man. And early in it’s lifespan.

Re: Guide: Will Disney Plus Be on PS4?

MrGawain

In the UK at least, Netflix doesn’t have 12 months of continuous content. Not being one to care to watch things immediately, I just buy Netflix cards when enough stuff that I’m interested in comes to the platform and there isn’t anything better to watch on terrestrial telly.

I can see a back and forth system of maybe 3 months at at time of active Disney and Netflix subscription for me.

Re: Sony: PS5 Game Lineup Will 'Satisfy Fans', Console Set to Be a Success

MrGawain

The PS5 and XB2 will need great games straight away because they’ll be competing with the Switch and PS4 which both have huge libraries. Also with costs going up to produce flasher graphics, I wonder if they’ll be less triple A games overall released? Plus with backwards compatibility being a thing this year, I wonder if we’ll get less remasters?

Re: Talking Point: Does Death Stranding's Non-Exclusivity Matter?

MrGawain

I guess the game cost a fortune to make, and perhaps is a little to niche (or age restricted) to make it’s money back alone on the PS4. Which is the complaint Konami had about Kojima’s Metal Gear Solid 5 if I remember correctly?

Not saying it won’t be good for it’s audience, just it may be too weird to garner a Spier-Man sized player base.

Re: Talking Point: Did Sony Bring State of Play Back With a Bang?

MrGawain

In comparison to the PS3 and Xbox 360, the PS4 and XB1 haven’t had half as much to play late cycle (or anything mid cycle in the XB1’s case). But then the XB1 and PS4 launched with very little worth playing because of this. You get the feeling the PS5 and XB2 will launch with far sturdier lineups as everyone holds their stuff back. The lack of games is also made worse by seeing how much is coming out on the Switch at the moment.

In conclusion: State of Play only worthwhile if they have enough stuff worth to discuss.