Ooccoo_Jr

The Lost Crown is absolutely brilliant. It's a bargain at full price but is regularly on sale for about £18 and I would urge everyone to give it a go at that amount. It's rammed with content, plays beautifully and whilst perhaps not the most original it still does have some really great ideas of its own. Seriously if you like Metroidvanias you will not find much better than this one.

@get2sammyb We get it, you only like gatcha games. The rest of us though prefer carefully crafted complete experiences to being rinsed to the teeth for every penny we have for as long as they possible can.

Good article, however I look forward to the inevitable half dozen Sammy articles later today telling us how brilliant all the Gatcha games are.

"Five is right out!"

@czDante92 I'm tempted to try Ishin as I thought that looked pretty interesting. Not really played a Yakuza game but thought I would be fine to jump in here given it is a completely different setting to the others so I shouldn't be missing out by not having knowledge of the rest of the series?

"Oh good I don't actually own GTA V and can finally get to play it", said no-one.

"international readers should know that the government in question is largely inept" - Please do not state your own political opinion as fact. I do not come hear to have other people's politics rammed down my throat. This isn't the BBC (some free satire for you there).

@LogicStrikesAgain What you are forgetting though is what this means for consoles going forwards. Yes the PS5 Pro is only an option and most of us can happily ignore it and buy the base models instead, but the fear is that this sort of price point sets a precedent as to what the base PS6 is going to cost. If Sony feel they can get away with charging 700 quid for a digital only console (be it Pro or otherwise) you can bet they will translate that to future generations and that is where the trouble begins.

For me it is exactly the same deal as the PSVR2. A nice piece of kit and a no-brainer if money is no object. Arguably worth the money given the tech but for most of us the price tag is just too darn high to justify it.

I can only assume Push Square is now the official advertising branch of HoYoverse? Seems like every other day we get another cringey, sycophantic puff piece. Enough already.

Spam Javelin!

@ShogunRok Is this another 100 hour plus behemoth? I wanted to try Persona 5 but the sheer length of it put me off even attempting it.

Wasn't this already free to play? I have it in my library but certainly never paid for it. Does it have an active community does anyone know? I know it wasn't wildly successful but I don't remember hearing much about it completely tanking so hopefully it managed to find an audience.

@Broad-Spectrum The duels were fun but when it came to beating most enemies all you did was switch to the right stance and then keep hammering them to until their guard broke. It didn't require any real thought unfortunately. There was certainly potential and maybe it's on me for not engaging enough with the options available but I still enjoyed the game, i just think combat could be improved with a few tweaks.

@Nepp67 Yeah I know, but hopefully it is not a major part of the game. Presumably any firearms of this era would be really slow and cumbersome so hopefully any gun you have is just a one-shot deal with very limited ammo that doesn't get in the way of the sword fighting.

Can't wait for this one. Loved the original. I'll admit taking out yet another camp did get repetitive, especially as the combat wasn't all that exciting, but one thing I do hope they expand upon is the platforming sections which I really enjoyed. Hopefully more opportunities too to just enjoy exploring and stumble across a shrine or temple.

No guns though please - I know we are further in the future now but that isn't what I want from a samurai game.

Anyone else remember when the PS5 was revealed they were talking about 120fps?

Whether or not the technology justifies the price tag is completely missing the point, exactly the same as it did with the PSVR2. The problem is Sony having the gall to rinse the whales of 700 quid upwards for very little tangible reward, even if that is a fair price for all the extra terryfloops. The whole sorry affair just reeks of arrogance and whatever the noun for being out of touch is.

@Shalooda I make it in the office and then try and smuggle it home without her noticing. I am yet to be successful.

@themightyant she's already got me on the waitlist for that too.

@themightyant I begrudge them, I begrudge them plenty! I have two kids, I can't buy this nonsense. I already have to get my Lego purchases delivered to the office in case the wife finds out I've been splurging again. Imagine if I came home with this 700 quid white elephant. She would destroy me.

@themightyant perhaps my original post needed more sarcasm because obviously I am not shelling or for this monstrosity.

@themightyant I am. To go with my £530 PSVR2, my £180 Dual Sense Edge controller thingy, my £150 sony ear muffs or whatever and my £13 a month crazy pills prescription. Hell I'll add on the remote too while I'm at it.

And then play the whole damn thing on the £200 Portal so as not to benefit one tiny bit.

@tinCAT-zero The US pricing does not include tax as this depends on which state you purchase it, so once you factor that in it is essentially the same as other regions.

@themightyant How can you possibly compare Tetris, a game you pay for once and then own in its entirety forever, with a game that relies on you consistently shoveling money into it with no endpoint in order to see the whole game?

No one is complaining the gacha games are too much fun, we are complaining that the monetisation model relies on a small percentage being rinsed for all they are worth, whether they can afford it or not. It's grubby and I don't like it, same as all f2p stuff.

@TheAmbienWalrus Sorry to hear that mate, I can't speak with any authority here as it is not something I have experienced, unlike yourself. I just think it's important to point out that just because someone can in theory play these games paying very little that shouldn't excuse them because they rely on that small percentage of gamers paying way over the odds in order to sustain them.

You are quite right it is all F2P stuff, not just gacha games. And yes I certainly include Fifa like someone mentioned previously. That's even worse as it comes on the back of a full price game.

@themightyant And people are also free to raise concerns about games using a model that preys on those with an addictive nature in order to rinse them for as much and as long as possible.

Hooray, another predatory gacha game! We almost went 10 minutes without one.

Hooray - time to punish myself and my free time once again! Why do I play this? I've no idea, but that's what I do.

"PlayStation is paring back production"? How can they possibly produce any less than they currently are!

Unless they start physically going into people's houses and taking away their copies of Call of the Mountain, it would be impossible to have any less output than the zero they are currently managing.

My understanding is that in order to survive more than 5 minutes in the DLC you need to have a character at a ridiculous level, like 150 or something. Therefore it's hardly surprising that it has reviewed so well as the only people able to play it are already Elden Ring superfans

Perfect, sounds spot on to me. I don't care what anyone says, I'm looking forward to this one.

@MikeOrator That Tallneck set was beautiful wasn't it, I almost got it and I've never played a Horizon game. After this and the Lego Deku Tree set they have just announced I am dreaming of a Lego Zelda game next but I can't ever see Nintendo allowing that to happen unfortunately.

Am I the only one excited by Lego Horizon? Not seeing much chatter about it but I thought it looked great.

I will also be getting Astrobot even though (whisper it) Astro's Playroom was a tad overrated.

Ghost of Tsushima had a lot of similar criticisms levelled at it, namely another generic open world game full of the usual tropes, however I absolutely adored that game. I guess because I haven't played any of the Ubisoft open world games everyone seems to hate but continue buying anyway, so I don't have that fatigue. Sounds like if you are like me and are not burned out yet on open worlds you can probably add a couple to the score.

Having said that the best thing about Breath of the Wild was the exploration and discovery was left up to you. I'm amazed that 7 years on games still aren't copying it but instead sticking to their guns and just cluttering maps with icons.

@Max_the_German Hey, that's my Ma you're talking about!

I also like boobies

@Pinkman Wii U was abandoned by the players, not Nintendo. It had great first party games like Mario Kart 8, Breath of the Wild, Pikmin 3, Mario 3D world, Smash Bros, Mario Maker etc etc. First party support was actually the only thing going for it. The fact Sony has gone an entire year without so much as even announcing a game for the PSVR2 is absolutely criminal

Has there ever been a console so utterly abandoned by it's creator this quickly?

I thought Stellar Blade looked really generic, but I don't mean that as an insult, I just want to point out that it's pretty incredible that we have reached a stage in gaming where something that looks as amazing as Stellar Blade does can now be considered as fairly unremarkable.

@LiamCroft Nice review mate. How is this game for newcomers to the series?

This looks amazing! Seriously, how did they manage to make Lunar Lander look this cool?

It shows how terribly Sony have treated PSVR2 that predicting them just to release a single game for it counts as a long shot.

No. More. Live. Service.

If I were WB I would get this on Game Pass/PS+ straight away. Eliminates the bad news stories about the inevitable poor sales and increases the initial player base considerably. Would also make the grubby microtransactions a bit easier to swallow.

Worth pointing out that if you have Netflix then you already own this game on mobile so check it out there.

@thefourfoldroot1 Unfortunately you are arguing the merits of the F2P model with someone who voted Honkai Star Rail as the best game released last year. No wonder he is defending this one too. And no wonder Sony are (were?) going all in on live service. Hopefully it is not too late for them to change course.

Switch sales up 39%? That's mad for a 6 year old console! What a phenomenal machine it has been. I really hope this doesn't delay the Switch 2 release though.

It's not a "snub" just because it didn't win. There are like 200 Emmy categories ("Outstanding Main Title Design" anyone?) and only half a dozen or so Golden Globe ones so it's hardly surprising. You can't complain of being snubbed if you were nominated at least.

2017 for the Switch's first year takes it for me. Two of the all time greats in Breath of the Wild and Mario Odyssey plus so many other brilliant titles like Hollow Knight, Cuphead Resi VII, Horizon, Nier Automata, Prey etc etc.