“We’ve omitted the disc drive to keep the price of the ps5 pro competitive” - Sony
Reality is, a digital only console gives Sony a 100% revenue stream on all software. The $99 disc drive has a sizeable mark-up. If they were to include it at cost I’m sure it wouldn’t push the cost of the machine up by anything close to $99. By not providing a disc tray they’re setting themselves up for greater revenue and eliminating software resale. They’re also taxing anyone who wants to buy the disc tray by virtue of a significant mark-up. Not really a pro consumer move.
In the uk the ps5 pro will be launching at roughly 1.8 times the price of the ps5 slim digital edition. So for 1.8 times the cost you’re only getting roughly 1.45 times the render speed according to Mark Cerny. Somehow making £700 seem even more expensive.
The pro will also require developers to put extra work in to properly harness and maximise that extra power and feature set. PS4 pro saw minimal extra provision outside of first party and didn’t really set the world on fire in terms of sales vs base model. The price point of the PS5 pro suggests it won’t come anywhere near PS4 pro sales, especially in the current economic climate.
Yes games will perform better on the pro than the base console, but in the vast majority of titles you won’t be getting an 80% performance lift, especially given the cpu is largely identical between models.
People buying this have money to burn. PS6 will be out in a few years for $1k without an external case, ram or a hdd - if you want those additions it’ll cost you an extra $600. Wouldn’t you rather save for this inevitability?
I think it’s more a case of Sony leaning heavily upon tried and tested IP. I’m really hoping that naughty dog’s next title is a new IP rather than another last of us or remake.
Returnal from housemarque games is a new IP that had a relatively successful launch at the beginning of this generation, although I’m struggling to think of anything else.
Sony aren’t there yet, but they are moving closer to replicating the 360 days of relying upon third party and only releasing sequels to the same big three first party blockbusters.
Sony are really all over the place this generation.
The ps5 console hardware is a huge success and dominating pretty much every market, but then you have psvr2 which seems to just be on life support and feels like it has been abandoned by Sony. Especially true after the announcement and release of a pc adapter that doesn’t even support the headset’s usp - foveated rendering and eye tracking.
Helldivers 2 broke steam records when it launched on ps5 and pc, then concord followed, was closed down within 2 weeks of going on sale and will be remembered as the single biggest flop in video game history.
Returnal 2 was an amazing new IP that launched to critical acclaim from studio housmarque games and was a hugely ambitious follow up to their previous ps4 game resogun. A studio that has managed to exceed expectations and ship an absolute aaa banger. There have also been some well received sequels from insomniac with spider man 2, Santa Monica studios with god of war ragnarok and horizon forbidden west from guerrilla games.
However, Naughty dog, arguably Sony’s flagship studio, have shipped 2 games on ps5. One of these being a remake of a remaster of a ps3 game, and the other being a remaster of a game that thanks to backward compatibility already ran at 60fps on ps5 and still looked pretty much identical to the remaster. They also had their live service game, factions, cancelled. To date, we have absolutely no idea what the studio is working on.
This Sony generation has been a rollercoaster of ups and downs in my opinion.
I bought a pc purely because I wanted a consistent 60fps that didn’t look like I’d smeared Vaseline all over the screen of my tv.
Final fantasy 16 was the console game that convinced me to buy a pc and I haven’t looked back since. Consoles are a great entry point, but outside of Nintendo I currently don’t see any reason for me to buy the next PlayStation or Xbox iteration when I can enjoy better versions of those games on pc (I don’t mind waiting on PlayStation’s pc ports).
I’m looking forward to mh wilds and have zero concerns about performance or visuals thanks to owning a capable pc. The same is true for avowed, a title that won’t have rtx or 60fps on series x at launch.
It’s not that consoles are dying per-se, it’s that the margins on hardware are considerably slimmer and the cost of triple A development considerably higher and more time consuming.
Nintendo have been quite smart, whether by accident or design, by bowing out of the console hardware arms race. In doing so, they have slowed the costs of software development and have been able to focus more on gameplay than pushing 4k textures, ridiculously high poly character models and huge asset stacked open worlds.
The switch has also always been sold at profit and the margins have increased significantly over its lifetime.
@OldGamer999 just curious, but how do you define a triple A? I think Astro bot looks absolutely fantastic if you love platformers, but I’m not sure I’d personally consider this a AAA game.
I think ratchet and clank rift apart looks far more visually impressive from a technical level while Astro bot definitely looks like it could run on a ps4. I’m sure Astro bot will have amazing gameplay, but it doesn’t look like something AAA that had a budget of $100+ million. Which I guess is how I would technically define AAA, and why I would consider rift apart to fall into that AAA category.
Would you consider hi-fi rush a triple AAA title for instance?
@Artois2 clearly there’s very few people that “like different things” on pc. In fact it seems there’s several million that like familiar souls-like things in the form of wukong.
I feel bad for the developers and those that worked on the game, as if this game fails I’m not sure where that puts the studio.
Having said that, making a live service game is a high risk venture in itself and as other titles have shown, costly to maintain and difficult to sustain engagement. To have any chance of success you need to be beating the current competition in either gameplay, character design or reach. This game does neither.
The gameplay isn’t ground breaking, the characters are forgettable and the title isn’t available on switch, xbox or mobile. It’s also not f2p which further limits its potential audience.
I don’t think anyone is surprised by the fact that this, at least on pc, isn’t ripping up the market.
I think the big issue with 60fps on console is two-fold:
Firstly, how many of the people picking up a title care about high frame rates on console? They’re a mass market machine, and the casual market tends to account for the majority of sales. This casual player base is often the same player base that state they can’t tell the difference between 30 and 60fps.
Secondly, higher frame rates are usually preferred not for the way a game looks, but largely for the responsiveness and feel of that game when playing. When it comes to marketing a game, it’s far more effective to do so with graphical fidelity than with frames per second.
Consoles have always tended to prioritise graphics over frame rate. This priority also seems to get worse the further into a generation we go and the more dated the hardware becomes.
Both ps5 and series x launched with very strong GPU’s (close to the equivalent power of the 2070). But the CPU’s, whilst being an upgrade, would still have been considered something of a bottleneck by pc standards at launch.
I think the biggest issue with game’s not being able to hit 60fps today lies more with the CPU’s of modern consoles than it does the GPU’s.
Is this confirmed to be gameplay running on a ps5 rather than a high end pc? If so, it looks very impressive and makes me feel a lot more confident about its performance on console.
@Logonogo well if you’re playing on a console you’re never going to get absolute perfection from a third party multi-platform title of this scope, especially on dated hardware.
The only games I use my ps5 for are first party titles - they usually have amazing optimisation, look great and have a locked performance mode.
The current consoles balance price with performance and as a result there will be compromises. The only reason a PC can offer better performance is because the hardware can be exponentially more powerful and therefore usually capable of brute forcing less optimised titles.
@Logonogo “absolute perfection” - no one on pc is asking for absolute perfection, having a game that literally pauses when traversing the world or mid-combat is so far from perfection it’s not even close. Having some frame drops is fine, as you say nobody is expecting absolute perfection from a small studio. In fact, if you play pc, you’re very much used to games not having perfect optimisation.
Unreal engine seems to have massive issues with frame stutter on pc. I noticed it a lot when playing lords of the fallen, it’s present in hellblade 2 and in this game, it’s even present in Fortnite epic’s own title.
I find these stutters borderline unplayable - to go from 80+fps to 0fps is incredibly jarring and borderline unplayable for me. Especially when they persist throughout the game. With this issue plaguing pretty much every recent unreal title on pc I’m at the point now where I’d rather devs use any engine other than unreal on pc.
@Vaako007 pc gaming currently has 3 major gpu manufacturers - Nvidia, AMD and most recently Intel. Neither of the three have exclusive software and all three offer unique versions of upscaling technology and AI computation.
Some software is sponsored by a particular manufacturer and may offer features unique to that gpu - Nvidia rtx is a relatively prevalent example of that feature set.
Wukong released today - it’s an Nvidia sponsored title with RTX and DLSS technologies. It is not an exclusive title and can still be played on AMD and Intel gpu’s supporting both FSR and XeSS.
The only people to benefit from software exclusivity are corporate shareholders. I’ve never had any issue with PlayStation owners having access to Xbox studio titles - it has absolutely no impact on the enjoyment I gained from playing those titles on Xbox. In regards to multiplayer titles with crossplay it actually benefits Xbox players by virtue of providing a larger player base from which to match. The argument can also be made that a good game has more chance of getting a sequel or continued support the more copies it sells - multiplatform games typically sell more titles than exclusives.
The more people that get to enjoy a game the better in my view. Ideally people shouldn’t have to own two sets of very similar hardware just to be able to play certain titles that are restricted to one machine.
I’d hate to have to have an AMD, Intel and Nvidia pc just to be able to play a specific game
I’d happily junk my ps5 if Sony were to release their first party titles day and date on pc. As it is I’m waiting on Spider-Man 2 to either hit pc or become available on ps plus extra. Not sure I’ll be prepared to do the same once naughty dog’s next title hits though
@0niguy if true, fantastic. But also, if true, why not provide ps5 copies for reviewers that specifically cover consoles? Push square being one example that would have benefited hugely from having access to the ps5 version.
Tbh I’m not surprised there’s no early access review copies for ps5 available. Nvidia have been championing all the rtx and dlss features for wu kong since the game was first revealed - they also released a feature set video the other day.
Game science aren’t a massive studio and I’d imagine Nvidia have been providing them with support to ensure the game is properly optimised for their gpu’s. It’s also being given away free for anyone buying a 40 series card.
I’ll be very surprised if this game launches without performance issues on ps5, especially given how graphically demanding it is.
If you own a ps5 I’d recommend waiting until the game has launched before buying. The lack of ps5 coverage is definitely a concern.
@Chasloyal buying them as presents, I have absolutely no issue with. Buying them to sell on and make a profit, yeah, I think it’s a scumbag move. I’m entitled to my opinion, and I’m clearly not alone in it. If they’ve sold out, you’ve essentially stopped someone from buying it to add to their collection or use at the RRP just so you can make some money for your own pocket. Sorry, that’s just how I see it.
@AstroBottom thanks for that, I have a degree in business economics so I think I might just about understand how market forces work 😉
The RRP is set by the manufacturer of the product. The item’s price is based on the supply provided to licensed sellers and the projected demand for the item. Scumbags who reduce supply by bulk buying the item with bots and then artificially inflate the price is not how a competitive free market is designed to work.
We saw many examples of the same scumbags with rooms filled with ps5’s when the console first launched. Hoarding and artificially restricting supply and then increasing the price by 100%.
Imagine if governments implemented a law that items still in circulation could only be sold at a maximum of their rrp by third party sellers. Would completely put an end to the business of scalping and send these scum bags back to whatever hole they crawled out of 😁
I’d be far more interested to know software attachment rates for this generation than hardware sold. (The number of games bought per system sold).
I’d imagine it would be a lot higher on PlayStation than Xbox due to gamepass. But would also be interested to see how it compares with last generation given how popular some of todays f2p titles are.
@trev666 it is a shame if you like this type of game. Like the senua games, you can’t blame people not buying something that they don’t enjoy playing.
I thought Alan wake was just ok so I’ll probably pick it up the sequel when it’s heavily discounted and when I have a 60 series gpu to run it properly 😁
@Kienda I agree, although much of the mainstream media outside of gaming don’t share that rational understanding.
In 2011, after the horrific massacre in Norway by the right wing terrorist Anders Behring Breivik, many uk newspapers were claiming he’d used call of duty as a training aid. Absolutely ridiculous.
I don’t blame capcom for removing the feature in case of negative publicity from non-gaming media.
@MFTWrecks so you think both titles will be around for multiple decades?
In the current economic climate and given the failure rate on live service titles, particularly new IP, it’s quite unlikely that they both achieve the success that Sony would demand in order to achieve continued funding and support.
I know nothing of marathon, but the current situation at bungie is obviously pretty dire and rumours have suggested multiple shifts in direction for the game during development. Concord is a known, and the play tests have not really set the world on fire and the uptake on the open play test was pretty lacklustre.
I don’t want either to fail as I don’t want any of the devs working at the studios to lose their jobs. Unfortunately for both, Sony and its shareholders will be measuring their success against that of helldivers.
Edit: Jason Schreier just recently had this to say: "[Marathon] sentiment is not great, there's a reason it slipped a whole year and some developers don't even think it'll even hit it's current deadline"
@Colour I only got into mh when world released so I’m relatively new to the series, I tried some of the older titles on the Wii and 3ds but didn’t gel with them.
I would say, experiment with all of the weapons. Some are considerably slower than others and require a good understanding of a monsters attacks and openings in order to use effectively - the great sword is one such weapon.
The sword and shield has pretty high mobility and is a lot faster than many of the other melee weapons, as are the dual blades. This means they’re slightly more forgiving when it comes to landing hits and avoiding monster attacks.
@Sergo all these previews were made using remote capture - a technology with significant latency and fidelity compromises that is also impacted by geographical location and local internet speeds.
As such, none of the current previews are likely to give any real insight into the actual technical performance of the game. I would guess it will perform similarly to Ubisoft’s avatar game on ps5 as that is the latest title to use the snowdrop engine. Obviously this will also depend on optimisation, but I would anticipate, as with avatar, a performance and fidelity mode on console.
@thefourfoldroot1 totally agree, the lack of eye tracking and foveated rendering on pc are slightly disappointing. I guess it’s still a nice bonus for those that have a decent gaming pc and only own a psvr2 headset.
I do also wonder if Sony might port call of the mountain to pc at some point in the future.
As someone that’s played a fair bit of overwatch 2, the reason I downloaded it in the first place was the fact it was f2p. I wouldn’t even have looked at it were it a £40 title. Similarly with marvel rivals, if that’s a f2p title, I’ll definitely download it and give it a go.
Warzone, Fortnite, valorant, apex, overwatch and many other PvP centric games have set an expectation for a lot of gamers, particularly the casuals, that access should be free. You absolutely have to be nailing everything - character design, gameplay, progression etc if you’re going to charge for access and want to have success in the market.
Concord by all accounts seems “fine” at best which I don’t think is enough for it to be competitive.
I’m assuming all these people that value ownership over licensing own record players, cassette decks and cd players for their music and still buy their music albums on vinyl?
The other thing that might be skewing the data is the fact that any second hand sale of a physical game copy does not register as an actual sale.
Every CeX, eBay, facebook marketplace etc sale of a pre-owned title potentially costs the developer money in lost sales. I’m sure publishers and developers would be absolutely fine with pushing physical copies if they could somehow guarantee that they wouldn’t be sold again whilst new copies of the game are still in circulation.
Just from a software sales perspective it’s actually in the interest of all developers and publishers to push digital. A digital sale is non transferable so therefore carries no risk of being resold and cutting the dev/publisher out of any resale revenue.
@Jamesblob I also have a ps5 for the record, so I do “have money in the game.” If I only had a ps5 I’d be paying for a month of Ubisoft plus too.
I also used ps+ extra for a month to play returnal, horizon forbidden west and demons souls. Hope this makes you feel better. I didn’t pay £70 for them either. Oh and I haven’t bought a single physical game for my ps5 - the only action my disc tray gets is for the occasional blu ray 😊
I look forward to your response
Edit: your response seems to have been the removal of your comment
@Jamesblob ok, I’ll be blunt with you. I play on pc, I don’t give a crap about physical releases. I haven’t had a disc drive in my pc for 15 years and last time I checked nobody else on pc gives a damn about physical media - in fact we all welcome the convenience of the digital medium.
I play 90% of single player games through once and then never touch them again and have never played through a Ubisoft title more than once. I’d happily rent every single player game for £15 a month if I could.
I never subscribe to a service to play a game blindly - I’ll wait for reviews and for the game to be released into the wild before I commit to a month of a service.
I win when I pay £15 to play a new title, I don’t win when I pay £70. The math is quite simple.
With regards to games being released in an unfinished or buggy state - the casual market (the one that actually makes companies all the money) rarely, if ever plays a game through to completion and couldn’t tell the difference between hd, 4K, 30fps or 60fps. I doubt any of them would view the videos of the latest preview as being unfinished.
As far as bugs are concerned, I’ve played every Bethesda title at launch so I’m well versed in bugs - provided there’s nothing game breaking I’m able to get past most. Yes, ideally, there shouldn’t be any bugs at launch. I can’t remember the last title I played that didn’t have multiple patches over the first few weeks of launch. Even Nintendo have had to patch their games for bugs at launch - skyward swords hd remake famously launched with a game breaking bug that required an update to fix.
If you’re worried about bugs you shouldn’t play any game day one - in fact, you should probably wait 6 months or for the goty edition.
@Jamesblob if you’re not buying the game, then obviously don’t subscribe for a month.
I subbed for a month to try the Metroidvania prince of Persia, assassins creed mirage and avatar. It would have cost me over £100 to buy these digitally and would have provided Ubisoft with 100% of that revenue as I play on pc. Instead I paid £14.99 for the month and got to play all three.
Depending on reviews I want to check out outlaws and also assassin’s creed shadows. I’m not paying £70 for each, I’ll sub for a month and do it that way.
If you have no interest in any Ubisoft game, that’s fine. Other people do, let them play what they want and if they want to buy the game outright, fine. If they want to sub for a month to do so, also fine.
I don’t tell other people what games they can and can’t play or how they choose to pay for these games.
If you really want to play this at launch but don’t want to play the full asking, price Ubisoft plus exists. A month’s sub seems like enough time to finish the game or bail without having wasted that much money should the full release match the previews.
Raising prices to make more money seems to be standard practice for both Sony and Microsoft right now. As a consumer obviously you want companies to act in your best interests - unfortunately most companies are ruled by shareholder sentiment and therefore profits and returns will always rank highest in priority.
For me, someone that mostly plays single player games once to completion over the course of a month game pass ultimate still represents great value for day one releases. I’ll continue to sub for a month when there’s a new title I want to play - $20 vs $70 is a no-brainer for me.
Still waiting for Spider-Man 2 and the last of us part 1 to hit Sony’s subscription service. Microsoft have made $70 games far less appealing than they once were. I’ve had a ps5 for about 3 years the only games I’ve bought for it have been ff16 and ragnarock - everything else I’ve played through ps plus extra which I’ve had for about 3 months total.
Genuinely feels sorry for people that have become so dependent on trophies that they’re willing to skip a fantastic experience just because of an absent trophy list. Especially in the case of someone that did multiple playthroughs, beat all optional bosses and cleared a ton of side-quests from the main game.
I can understand having had your fill of a game not having any further desire to play additional content released several years latter. But to not play something purely based on trophy support seems insane to me.
I’ve seen comments from people saying they’ve absolutely hated grinding out a platinum for a particular game too. Why are these people playing a game that they’re not enjoying just to gain an extra number and icon for their psn profile?
I’m so glad that I can just play the games I want, for as long as I want without worrying about trophies and achievements.
@OldGamer999 “sometimes it’s not about selling the most, but also about making more profit instead.”
Yes, charging consumers more whilst producing less is definitely one route to larger profits.
I miss mid generation ps3 and launch ps4 Sony - they were at their best with their backs up against a wall and having to actively work for market share and sales. They’re more like complacent 360 era Microsoft right now and that’s not a good thing
@HotGoomba I agree that consumers don’t always know what they want if it’s something they’ve never experienced before. All your examples, bar Zelda, were new, arguably, genre defining IP. This is an existing well known AAA rpg franchise turned into a seemingly generic Lego game.
@rusty82 I think Microsoft have realised that the more platforms a game launches on, the more money it typically makes. There’s a reason why gta, cod and fifa sell so well and are in the top ten sales chart for the whole year. Whereas exclusives always dip out after a few weeks or months.
Sony are essentially losing sales with every ps5 exclusive launch in the hope that they will recoup that lost money through hardware sales and subsequent software and service purchases through their closed marketplace.
I really hope that mh wilds doesn’t suffer from the same cpu limiting issues present in dragons dogma 2. I know those problems were mostly limited to the populated town areas and have been attributed to the complex behaviours of multiple npc’s in a small area. I’m slightly concerned that the gameplay mechanic of wilds revolving around ‘herds’ of monsters might lead to similar issues due to the numbers present in one area at a time.
Hopefully capcom have learnt from dragons dogma, although the fact we still haven’t got any more optimisations for the game since launch month suggests not.
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Re: Prospective PS5 Pro Buyers Cause Surge in Disc Drive Sales
“We’ve omitted the disc drive to keep the price of the ps5 pro competitive” - Sony
Reality is, a digital only console gives Sony a 100% revenue stream on all software. The $99 disc drive has a sizeable mark-up. If they were to include it at cost I’m sure it wouldn’t push the cost of the machine up by anything close to $99. By not providing a disc tray they’re setting themselves up for greater revenue and eliminating software resale. They’re also taxing anyone who wants to buy the disc tray by virtue of a significant mark-up. Not really a pro consumer move.
Re: 'It Felt Like Putting New Glasses On,' Claims First PS5 Pro Hands On
In the uk the ps5 pro will be launching at roughly 1.8 times the price of the ps5 slim digital edition. So for 1.8 times the cost you’re only getting roughly 1.45 times the render speed according to Mark Cerny. Somehow making £700 seem even more expensive.
The pro will also require developers to put extra work in to properly harness and maximise that extra power and feature set. PS4 pro saw minimal extra provision outside of first party and didn’t really set the world on fire in terms of sales vs base model. The price point of the PS5 pro suggests it won’t come anywhere near PS4 pro sales, especially in the current economic climate.
Yes games will perform better on the pro than the base console, but in the vast majority of titles you won’t be getting an 80% performance lift, especially given the cpu is largely identical between models.
Re: Talking Point: Is PS5 Pro Way Too Expensive?
People buying this have money to burn. PS6 will be out in a few years for $1k without an external case, ram or a hdd - if you want those additions it’ll cost you an extra $600. Wouldn’t you rather save for this inevitability?
Re: PS5 Pro Announced, Costs $700 and Out in November
Going to be quite humorous if the ps5 pro can’t run both monster hunter wilds and gta 6 at a locked 60fps for £700
Re: PS5 Pro Announced, Costs $700 and Out in November
Somehow Sony have found a way to make pc gaming look like good value
Re: Sony Execs Seem to Think the Company Doesn't Have Enough Original IP
I think it’s more a case of Sony leaning heavily upon tried and tested IP. I’m really hoping that naughty dog’s next title is a new IP rather than another last of us or remake.
Returnal from housemarque games is a new IP that had a relatively successful launch at the beginning of this generation, although I’m struggling to think of anything else.
Sony aren’t there yet, but they are moving closer to replicating the 360 days of relying upon third party and only releasing sequels to the same big three first party blockbusters.
Re: Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 (PS5) - Grimdark Shooter Is an Instant Co-Op Classic
Will the operations missions have matchmaking when the game launches?
Re: Reaction: PlayStation Needs to Take a Long, Hard Look at Itself
Sony are really all over the place this generation.
The ps5 console hardware is a huge success and dominating pretty much every market, but then you have psvr2 which seems to just be on life support and feels like it has been abandoned by Sony. Especially true after the announcement and release of a pc adapter that doesn’t even support the headset’s usp - foveated rendering and eye tracking.
Helldivers 2 broke steam records when it launched on ps5 and pc, then concord followed, was closed down within 2 weeks of going on sale and will be remembered as the single biggest flop in video game history.
Returnal 2 was an amazing new IP that launched to critical acclaim from studio housmarque games and was a hugely ambitious follow up to their previous ps4 game resogun. A studio that has managed to exceed expectations and ship an absolute aaa banger. There have also been some well received sequels from insomniac with spider man 2, Santa Monica studios with god of war ragnarok and horizon forbidden west from guerrilla games.
However, Naughty dog, arguably Sony’s flagship studio, have shipped 2 games on ps5. One of these being a remake of a remaster of a ps3 game, and the other being a remaster of a game that thanks to backward compatibility already ran at 60fps on ps5 and still looked pretty much identical to the remaster. They also had their live service game, factions, cancelled. To date, we have absolutely no idea what the studio is working on.
This Sony generation has been a rollercoaster of ups and downs in my opinion.
Re: Failing Manufacturers Are Pushing the Narrative That Consoles Are Dying, Says Ex-Xbox Exec
I bought a pc purely because I wanted a consistent 60fps that didn’t look like I’d smeared Vaseline all over the screen of my tv.
Final fantasy 16 was the console game that convinced me to buy a pc and I haven’t looked back since. Consoles are a great entry point, but outside of Nintendo I currently don’t see any reason for me to buy the next PlayStation or Xbox iteration when I can enjoy better versions of those games on pc (I don’t mind waiting on PlayStation’s pc ports).
I’m looking forward to mh wilds and have zero concerns about performance or visuals thanks to owning a capable pc. The same is true for avowed, a title that won’t have rtx or 60fps on series x at launch.
Re: Failing Manufacturers Are Pushing the Narrative That Consoles Are Dying, Says Ex-Xbox Exec
It’s not that consoles are dying per-se, it’s that the margins on hardware are considerably slimmer and the cost of triple A development considerably higher and more time consuming.
Nintendo have been quite smart, whether by accident or design, by bowing out of the console hardware arms race. In doing so, they have slowed the costs of software development and have been able to focus more on gameplay than pushing 4k textures, ridiculously high poly character models and huge asset stacked open worlds.
The switch has also always been sold at profit and the margins have increased significantly over its lifetime.
Re: Mark Cerny's Feedback on PS5's Astro Bot: 'Now This Is a Game'
@OldGamer999 just curious, but how do you define a triple A? I think Astro bot looks absolutely fantastic if you love platformers, but I’m not sure I’d personally consider this a AAA game.
I think ratchet and clank rift apart looks far more visually impressive from a technical level while Astro bot definitely looks like it could run on a ps4. I’m sure Astro bot will have amazing gameplay, but it doesn’t look like something AAA that had a budget of $100+ million. Which I guess is how I would technically define AAA, and why I would consider rift apart to fall into that AAA category.
Would you consider hi-fi rush a triple AAA title for instance?
Re: Spare a Thought for Secret Level's Concord Episode
@ShogunRok is that the same world where poverty doesn’t exist, there are no wars and hunger isn’t a thing?
Re: PS5, PC FPS Concord's Poor Player Numbers Have Predictably Gone Viral
@Artois2 clearly there’s very few people that “like different things” on pc. In fact it seems there’s several million that like familiar souls-like things in the form of wukong.
Re: PS5, PC FPS Concord's Poor Player Numbers Have Predictably Gone Viral
I feel bad for the developers and those that worked on the game, as if this game fails I’m not sure where that puts the studio.
Having said that, making a live service game is a high risk venture in itself and as other titles have shown, costly to maintain and difficult to sustain engagement. To have any chance of success you need to be beating the current competition in either gameplay, character design or reach. This game does neither.
The gameplay isn’t ground breaking, the characters are forgettable and the title isn’t available on switch, xbox or mobile. It’s also not f2p which further limits its potential audience.
I don’t think anyone is surprised by the fact that this, at least on pc, isn’t ripping up the market.
Re: People Are Already Freaking Out Over Monster Hunter Wilds' PS5 Frame Rate
I think the big issue with 60fps on console is two-fold:
Firstly, how many of the people picking up a title care about high frame rates on console? They’re a mass market machine, and the casual market tends to account for the majority of sales. This casual player base is often the same player base that state they can’t tell the difference between 30 and 60fps.
Secondly, higher frame rates are usually preferred not for the way a game looks, but largely for the responsiveness and feel of that game when playing. When it comes to marketing a game, it’s far more effective to do so with graphical fidelity than with frames per second.
Consoles have always tended to prioritise graphics over frame rate. This priority also seems to get worse the further into a generation we go and the more dated the hardware becomes.
Both ps5 and series x launched with very strong GPU’s (close to the equivalent power of the 2070). But the CPU’s, whilst being an upgrade, would still have been considered something of a bottleneck by pc standards at launch.
I think the biggest issue with game’s not being able to hit 60fps today lies more with the CPU’s of modern consoles than it does the GPU’s.
Re: Capcom Debuts 1 Hour of Raw Monster Hunter Wilds Gameplay on PS5, Looks Outstanding
Is this confirmed to be gameplay running on a ps5 rather than a high end pc? If so, it looks very impressive and makes me feel a lot more confident about its performance on console.
Re: Black Myth: Wukong Becomes Steam's Biggest Ever Single Player Launch
@Logonogo well if you’re playing on a console you’re never going to get absolute perfection from a third party multi-platform title of this scope, especially on dated hardware.
The only games I use my ps5 for are first party titles - they usually have amazing optimisation, look great and have a locked performance mode.
The current consoles balance price with performance and as a result there will be compromises. The only reason a PC can offer better performance is because the hardware can be exponentially more powerful and therefore usually capable of brute forcing less optimised titles.
Re: Black Myth: Wukong Becomes Steam's Biggest Ever Single Player Launch
@Logonogo “absolute perfection” - no one on pc is asking for absolute perfection, having a game that literally pauses when traversing the world or mid-combat is so far from perfection it’s not even close. Having some frame drops is fine, as you say nobody is expecting absolute perfection from a small studio. In fact, if you play pc, you’re very much used to games not having perfect optimisation.
Unreal engine seems to have massive issues with frame stutter on pc. I noticed it a lot when playing lords of the fallen, it’s present in hellblade 2 and in this game, it’s even present in Fortnite epic’s own title.
I find these stutters borderline unplayable - to go from 80+fps to 0fps is incredibly jarring and borderline unplayable for me. Especially when they persist throughout the game. With this issue plaguing pretty much every recent unreal title on pc I’m at the point now where I’d rather devs use any engine other than unreal on pc.
Re: Rumour: Xbox's Indiana Jones Game Coming to PS5 in First Half 2025
@Vaako007 pc gaming currently has 3 major gpu manufacturers - Nvidia, AMD and most recently Intel. Neither of the three have exclusive software and all three offer unique versions of upscaling technology and AI computation.
Some software is sponsored by a particular manufacturer and may offer features unique to that gpu - Nvidia rtx is a relatively prevalent example of that feature set.
Wukong released today - it’s an Nvidia sponsored title with RTX and DLSS technologies. It is not an exclusive title and can still be played on AMD and Intel gpu’s supporting both FSR and XeSS.
The only people to benefit from software exclusivity are corporate shareholders. I’ve never had any issue with PlayStation owners having access to Xbox studio titles - it has absolutely no impact on the enjoyment I gained from playing those titles on Xbox. In regards to multiplayer titles with crossplay it actually benefits Xbox players by virtue of providing a larger player base from which to match. The argument can also be made that a good game has more chance of getting a sequel or continued support the more copies it sells - multiplatform games typically sell more titles than exclusives.
Re: Rumour: Xbox's Indiana Jones Game Coming to PS5 in First Half 2025
The more people that get to enjoy a game the better in my view. Ideally people shouldn’t have to own two sets of very similar hardware just to be able to play certain titles that are restricted to one machine.
I’d hate to have to have an AMD, Intel and Nvidia pc just to be able to play a specific game
I’d happily junk my ps5 if Sony were to release their first party titles day and date on pc. As it is I’m waiting on Spider-Man 2 to either hit pc or become available on ps plus extra. Not sure I’ll be prepared to do the same once naughty dog’s next title hits though
Re: Poll: What PS5 Games Do You Most Want to See at Gamescom 2024?
7% - “yes, I expect plenty.”
Tell me you’ve never watched anything from gamescom before without telling me you’ve never watched anything from gamescom before
Re: Hands On: Black Myth: Wukong Is Brilliant, But We Have PS5 Concerns
@0niguy if true, fantastic. But also, if true, why not provide ps5 copies for reviewers that specifically cover consoles? Push square being one example that would have benefited hugely from having access to the ps5 version.
Re: Hands On: Black Myth: Wukong Is Brilliant, But We Have PS5 Concerns
Tbh I’m not surprised there’s no early access review copies for ps5 available. Nvidia have been championing all the rtx and dlss features for wu kong since the game was first revealed - they also released a feature set video the other day.
Game science aren’t a massive studio and I’d imagine Nvidia have been providing them with support to ensure the game is properly optimised for their gpu’s. It’s also being given away free for anyone buying a 40 series card.
I’ll be very surprised if this game launches without performance issues on ps5, especially given how graphically demanding it is.
If you own a ps5 I’d recommend waiting until the game has launched before buying. The lack of ps5 coverage is definitely a concern.
Re: Beware! Scalpers Reselling Astro Bot PS5 Controllers for Ridiculous Prices
@Chasloyal buying them as presents, I have absolutely no issue with. Buying them to sell on and make a profit, yeah, I think it’s a scumbag move. I’m entitled to my opinion, and I’m clearly not alone in it. If they’ve sold out, you’ve essentially stopped someone from buying it to add to their collection or use at the RRP just so you can make some money for your own pocket. Sorry, that’s just how I see it.
Re: Beware! Scalpers Reselling Astro Bot PS5 Controllers for Ridiculous Prices
@AstroBottom thanks for that, I have a degree in business economics so I think I might just about understand how market forces work 😉
The RRP is set by the manufacturer of the product. The item’s price is based on the supply provided to licensed sellers and the projected demand for the item. Scumbags who reduce supply by bulk buying the item with bots and then artificially inflate the price is not how a competitive free market is designed to work.
We saw many examples of the same scumbags with rooms filled with ps5’s when the console first launched. Hoarding and artificially restricting supply and then increasing the price by 100%.
Re: Beware! Scalpers Reselling Astro Bot PS5 Controllers for Ridiculous Prices
Imagine if governments implemented a law that items still in circulation could only be sold at a maximum of their rrp by third party sellers. Would completely put an end to the business of scalping and send these scum bags back to whatever hole they crawled out of 😁
Re: PS5 Continues to Dominate a Slow UK Games Industry in July
I’d be far more interested to know software attachment rates for this generation than hardware sold. (The number of games bought per system sold).
I’d imagine it would be a lot higher on PlayStation than Xbox due to gamepass. But would also be interested to see how it compares with last generation given how popular some of todays f2p titles are.
Re: Alan Wake 2 Still Hasn't Made Remedy Any Royalties, But Work Is Underway on Max Payne's PS5 Remakes
@trev666 it is a shame if you like this type of game. Like the senua games, you can’t blame people not buying something that they don’t enjoy playing.
I thought Alan wake was just ok so I’ll probably pick it up the sequel when it’s heavily discounted and when I have a 60 series gpu to run it properly 😁
Re: Dead Rising's PS5 Remaster Will Strip Bonus Points for Erotic Photos
@Kienda I agree, although much of the mainstream media outside of gaming don’t share that rational understanding.
In 2011, after the horrific massacre in Norway by the right wing terrorist Anders Behring Breivik, many uk newspapers were claiming he’d used call of duty as a training aid. Absolutely ridiculous.
I don’t blame capcom for removing the feature in case of negative publicity from non-gaming media.
Re: It Took PS5 Longer Than PS4 to Pass 4 Million Units Milestone in the UK, But There's Context
@Member_the_game sounds like someone fell for the “we believe in generations” tagline 😉
Re: Bungie to Reveal the Future of Destiny and Its Next Multi-Year Journey Soon
@MFTWrecks so you think both titles will be around for multiple decades?
In the current economic climate and given the failure rate on live service titles, particularly new IP, it’s quite unlikely that they both achieve the success that Sony would demand in order to achieve continued funding and support.
I know nothing of marathon, but the current situation at bungie is obviously pretty dire and rumours have suggested multiple shifts in direction for the game during development. Concord is a known, and the play tests have not really set the world on fire and the uptake on the open play test was pretty lacklustre.
I don’t want either to fail as I don’t want any of the devs working at the studios to lose their jobs. Unfortunately for both, Sony and its shareholders will be measuring their success against that of helldivers.
Edit: Jason Schreier just recently had this to say: "[Marathon] sentiment is not great, there's a reason it slipped a whole year and some developers don't even think it'll even hit it's current deadline"
Re: Bungie to Reveal the Future of Destiny and Its Next Multi-Year Journey Soon
@MFTWrecks I am genuinely interested to see which multiplayer game survives longest - marathon or concord
Re: God of War Ragnarok PC System Requirements Revealed Ahead of September Launch
@WhiteRabbit “PC crybabies gonna crybaby”
Do your parents know you’re on the internet unsupervised? 😉
Re: The Monster Hunter Wilds Marketing Machine Kicks into Gear with New Gameplay Videos
@Colour I only got into mh when world released so I’m relatively new to the series, I tried some of the older titles on the Wii and 3ds but didn’t gel with them.
I would say, experiment with all of the weapons. Some are considerably slower than others and require a good understanding of a monsters attacks and openings in order to use effectively - the great sword is one such weapon.
The sword and shield has pretty high mobility and is a lot faster than many of the other melee weapons, as are the dual blades. This means they’re slightly more forgiving when it comes to landing hits and avoiding monster attacks.
Re: Preview: Star Wars Outlaws Thrives in Its Rewarding Open World
@Sergo all these previews were made using remote capture - a technology with significant latency and fidelity compromises that is also impacted by geographical location and local internet speeds.
As such, none of the current previews are likely to give any real insight into the actual technical performance of the game. I would guess it will perform similarly to Ubisoft’s avatar game on ps5 as that is the latest title to use the snowdrop engine. Obviously this will also depend on optimisation, but I would anticipate, as with avatar, a performance and fidelity mode on console.
Re: PSVR2 App for PC Now Live on Steam
@thefourfoldroot1 totally agree, the lack of eye tracking and foveated rendering on pc are slightly disappointing. I guess it’s still a nice bonus for those that have a decent gaming pc and only own a psvr2 headset.
I do also wonder if Sony might port call of the mountain to pc at some point in the future.
Re: Marvel Rivals' Closed Beta Is Putting Concord's Player Numbers into Perspective
As someone that’s played a fair bit of overwatch 2, the reason I downloaded it in the first place was the fact it was f2p. I wouldn’t even have looked at it were it a £40 title. Similarly with marvel rivals, if that’s a f2p title, I’ll definitely download it and give it a go.
Warzone, Fortnite, valorant, apex, overwatch and many other PvP centric games have set an expectation for a lot of gamers, particularly the casuals, that access should be free. You absolutely have to be nailing everything - character design, gameplay, progression etc if you’re going to charge for access and want to have success in the market.
Concord by all accounts seems “fine” at best which I don’t think is enough for it to be competitive.
Re: Capcom Says It Won't Give Up on Physical Games, Despite Utter Domination of Digital Sales
I’m assuming all these people that value ownership over licensing own record players, cassette decks and cd players for their music and still buy their music albums on vinyl?
Re: Capcom Says It Won't Give Up on Physical Games, Despite Utter Domination of Digital Sales
The other thing that might be skewing the data is the fact that any second hand sale of a physical game copy does not register as an actual sale.
Every CeX, eBay, facebook marketplace etc sale of a pre-owned title potentially costs the developer money in lost sales. I’m sure publishers and developers would be absolutely fine with pushing physical copies if they could somehow guarantee that they wouldn’t be sold again whilst new copies of the game are still in circulation.
Just from a software sales perspective it’s actually in the interest of all developers and publishers to push digital. A digital sale is non transferable so therefore carries no risk of being resold and cutting the dev/publisher out of any resale revenue.
Re: Star Wars Outlaws Boasts Ubisoft's Biggest Ever Marketing Budget, Strong Launch Expected
@Jamesblob I also have a ps5 for the record, so I do “have money in the game.” If I only had a ps5 I’d be paying for a month of Ubisoft plus too.
I also used ps+ extra for a month to play returnal, horizon forbidden west and demons souls. Hope this makes you feel better. I didn’t pay £70 for them either. Oh and I haven’t bought a single physical game for my ps5 - the only action my disc tray gets is for the occasional blu ray 😊
I look forward to your response
Edit: your response seems to have been the removal of your comment
Re: Star Wars Outlaws Boasts Ubisoft's Biggest Ever Marketing Budget, Strong Launch Expected
@Jamesblob ok, I’ll be blunt with you. I play on pc, I don’t give a crap about physical releases. I haven’t had a disc drive in my pc for 15 years and last time I checked nobody else on pc gives a damn about physical media - in fact we all welcome the convenience of the digital medium.
I play 90% of single player games through once and then never touch them again and have never played through a Ubisoft title more than once. I’d happily rent every single player game for £15 a month if I could.
I never subscribe to a service to play a game blindly - I’ll wait for reviews and for the game to be released into the wild before I commit to a month of a service.
I win when I pay £15 to play a new title, I don’t win when I pay £70. The math is quite simple.
With regards to games being released in an unfinished or buggy state - the casual market (the one that actually makes companies all the money) rarely, if ever plays a game through to completion and couldn’t tell the difference between hd, 4K, 30fps or 60fps. I doubt any of them would view the videos of the latest preview as being unfinished.
As far as bugs are concerned, I’ve played every Bethesda title at launch so I’m well versed in bugs - provided there’s nothing game breaking I’m able to get past most. Yes, ideally, there shouldn’t be any bugs at launch. I can’t remember the last title I played that didn’t have multiple patches over the first few weeks of launch. Even Nintendo have had to patch their games for bugs at launch - skyward swords hd remake famously launched with a game breaking bug that required an update to fix.
If you’re worried about bugs you shouldn’t play any game day one - in fact, you should probably wait 6 months or for the goty edition.
Re: Star Wars Outlaws Boasts Ubisoft's Biggest Ever Marketing Budget, Strong Launch Expected
@Jamesblob if you’re not buying the game, then obviously don’t subscribe for a month.
I subbed for a month to try the Metroidvania prince of Persia, assassins creed mirage and avatar. It would have cost me over £100 to buy these digitally and would have provided Ubisoft with 100% of that revenue as I play on pc. Instead I paid £14.99 for the month and got to play all three.
Depending on reviews I want to check out outlaws and also assassin’s creed shadows. I’m not paying £70 for each, I’ll sub for a month and do it that way.
If you have no interest in any Ubisoft game, that’s fine. Other people do, let them play what they want and if they want to buy the game outright, fine. If they want to sub for a month to do so, also fine.
I don’t tell other people what games they can and can’t play or how they choose to pay for these games.
Re: Star Wars Outlaws Boasts Ubisoft's Biggest Ever Marketing Budget, Strong Launch Expected
If you really want to play this at launch but don’t want to play the full asking, price Ubisoft plus exists. A month’s sub seems like enough time to finish the game or bail without having wasted that much money should the full release match the previews.
Re: Publishers Bail on Live-Service Flops Too Quickly, Says Warframe Boss
I wish publishers would bail on live service games before they even get to the development phase.
Re: Talking Point: Was Sony Right to Resist Adding PS5 Exclusives to PS Plus Day One?
Raising prices to make more money seems to be standard practice for both Sony and Microsoft right now. As a consumer obviously you want companies to act in your best interests - unfortunately most companies are ruled by shareholder sentiment and therefore profits and returns will always rank highest in priority.
For me, someone that mostly plays single player games once to completion over the course of a month game pass ultimate still represents great value for day one releases. I’ll continue to sub for a month when there’s a new title I want to play - $20 vs $70 is a no-brainer for me.
Still waiting for Spider-Man 2 and the last of us part 1 to hit Sony’s subscription service. Microsoft have made $70 games far less appealing than they once were. I’ve had a ps5 for about 3 years the only games I’ve bought for it have been ff16 and ragnarock - everything else I’ve played through ps plus extra which I’ve had for about 3 months total.
Re: Poll: Are You Playing Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree?
@Bunchesopuppies “No point in trophy less DLC.”
Genuinely feels sorry for people that have become so dependent on trophies that they’re willing to skip a fantastic experience just because of an absent trophy list. Especially in the case of someone that did multiple playthroughs, beat all optional bosses and cleared a ton of side-quests from the main game.
I can understand having had your fill of a game not having any further desire to play additional content released several years latter. But to not play something purely based on trophy support seems insane to me.
I’ve seen comments from people saying they’ve absolutely hated grinding out a platinum for a particular game too. Why are these people playing a game that they’re not enjoying just to gain an extra number and icon for their psn profile?
I’m so glad that I can just play the games I want, for as long as I want without worrying about trophies and achievements.
Re: Sony Skips Gamescom Presence for a Fifth Year in a Row
@OldGamer999 “sometimes it’s not about selling the most, but also about making more profit instead.”
Yes, charging consumers more whilst producing less is definitely one route to larger profits.
I miss mid generation ps3 and launch ps4 Sony - they were at their best with their backs up against a wall and having to actively work for market share and sales. They’re more like complacent 360 era Microsoft right now and that’s not a good thing
Re: LEGO Horizon Adventures Is Official, Out on PS5, PC, and Nintendo Switch
@HotGoomba I agree that consumers don’t always know what they want if it’s something they’ve never experienced before. All your examples, bar Zelda, were new, arguably, genre defining IP. This is an existing well known AAA rpg franchise turned into a seemingly generic Lego game.
Re: Many, Many More Major Xbox Games Are Being Plotted for PS5
@rusty82 I think Microsoft have realised that the more platforms a game launches on, the more money it typically makes. There’s a reason why gta, cod and fifa sell so well and are in the top ten sales chart for the whole year. Whereas exclusives always dip out after a few weeks or months.
Sony are essentially losing sales with every ps5 exclusive launch in the hope that they will recoup that lost money through hardware sales and subsequent software and service purchases through their closed marketplace.
Re: Dragon's Dogma 2 Patch 1.150 Drops as Players Still Wait for Better PS5 Performance
I really hope that mh wilds doesn’t suffer from the same cpu limiting issues present in dragons dogma 2. I know those problems were mostly limited to the populated town areas and have been attributed to the complex behaviours of multiple npc’s in a small area. I’m slightly concerned that the gameplay mechanic of wilds revolving around ‘herds’ of monsters might lead to similar issues due to the numbers present in one area at a time.
Hopefully capcom have learnt from dragons dogma, although the fact we still haven’t got any more optimisations for the game since launch month suggests not.