@jrt87 it's one thing not to like the story but suggesting that the last of us 2 is average from a mechanical/gameplay perspective seems very disingenuous when I think most would agree it's the currently at or near the pinnacle of 3rd-personn stealth/action.
I think a 'created by' or 'special thanks' would have been a nice touch even if perhaps not necessary by the letter of the law.
It's worth remembering that the story was Druckmann's that he brought to Naughty Dog. Clearly he considers it his baby. But Strahley was co-director so surely had a huge influence in shaping every aspect including story and characters, even if nominally I think he was overseeing gameplay.
@Paranoimia it's not even just about the fact that they can do it in theory. Just think about the disruption from content moving between platforms in the last few years as every publisher tries to establish a streaming platform. All the stuff netflix lost to Disney plus, shows like the Expanse starting on one platform and ending up on another.
Now it's getting to the point where it costs as much as sky to have access to everything.
The thing people overlook with Game Pass Netflix, HBO Max etc is that these subscription services are still in the early stages of a disruptor business challenger model whereby you make a compelling offer that's cost attractive too undermine the legacy market leaders. Then once you have market share you scale back and raise prices. Just look at Uber. Netflix is further along this path and the value is getting worse as they produce more crap, cheap content and raider prices.
Ultimately the problem for me is if I want to watch a specific film or listen to a certain song and it's not hugely popular, it often isn't to be found on any of the platforms. Just serves to push more emphasis to Triple AAA and kill the middle of the market. Fancy watching Minority Report tonight? Die Hard? You're gonna have to pay 6 pounds to 'rent' them because they're not in any other platforms.
That's not even getting into the issues around pay for the actual content creators.
jumping in at number 3. Assuming the engine and graphics have improved between 1 and 3, is this a case of playing the older levels in the Hitman 3 engine?
@Thelegend159
"Sadly this game’s ambition outstripped the PS4s and Xbox capabilities and CDPR knew this but went ahead any way."
I've seen this line of reasoning a few times but not sure I follow it. Nothing Cyberpunk is doing seems to be happening at a level that should have this much negative impact on PS4/XboxOne. I agree that CDPR's ambition outstripped their own capabilities to manage and prioritise a project on this scale. But neither the graphics (severely downgraded), performance (terrible), AI (non-existent) or systems (half baked) should be that taxing - and certainly not when taken altogether.
I think it would be an issue if they had clearly designed the game with this in mind. They may have done, I haven't played it. But I assume if this was overly grindy, even by Assassin's Creed standards, people would have been complaining about that for the past month.
As long as it doesn't impact future DLC or whatever, I think this seems ok. Publishers will always be looking for new revenue streams and this gives them that without taking anything away from those who want the traditional experience (as long as it doesn't change design).
At this point, it's probably things like this or less of these Triple AAA 100 hours+ open world games, they just cost too much to make. And costs have gone up a lot more than game prices, certainly in the past 20 years.
I still remember my parents bought me Street Fighter 2 on Megadrive for christmas the year it came out for £50+ in early 90s. I don't know if they were scalped or if that was the MSRP and shops just went with it cos they knew people would pay for it at Christmas. Either way, inflation has apparently risen by 80% since, so the prices we're seeing now aren't much more than in line with that.
@Max2574 I hadn't thought too much about this in the previous generation because I had ubiquitous fast internet and the console and games would update themselves quietly in the background.
But since PS5 launch, I've moved and don't yet have internet. So playing the unpatched version of Miles Morales without the RT Performance mode and realising how out of sync with the current narrative you can be if your console isn't offline, even when your'e playing the same game as everyone else.
Certainly if we still believe reviews to have any moral duty to inform consumers, they should be based on the lowest common denominator, which is the gold version on the disc, but then could make mention of improvements brought by subsequent patches.
If games were reviewed more harshly for their day 1 performance issues, especially AAA, publishers might become less likely to release them so broken. Especially when we know bonuses can be structured around aggregated review scores, etc.
Are the AI, gunplay and driving better on a high end PC too? I would understand performance issues more if the systems themselves seemed next gen. But from lots of comments, it's the graphics on a top end system (ray tracing) where this really shines from a technical perspective. The other bits people are praising - story, characters, world building - are great but not technically demanding.
Is it just that their engine is terrible at scaling? Or another way to ask: in technical terms, why is this game still so demanding on consoles when frame rate, resolution, density and IQ have been cut so drastically? Because it doesn't seem to be animation, AI, emergent systems or any of the things that seem perfectly possible on other recent open world games. Genuinely curious tbh.
Comments 10
Re: Bruce Straley Wasn't Credited in HBO's The Last of Us, Calls for Unionization
@jrt87 it's one thing not to like the story but suggesting that the last of us 2 is average from a mechanical/gameplay perspective seems very disingenuous when I think most would agree it's the currently at or near the pinnacle of 3rd-personn stealth/action.
I think a 'created by' or 'special thanks' would have been a nice touch even if perhaps not necessary by the letter of the law.
It's worth remembering that the story was Druckmann's that he brought to Naughty Dog. Clearly he considers it his baby. But Strahley was co-director so surely had a huge influence in shaping every aspect including story and characters, even if nominally I think he was overseeing gameplay.
Re: GTA 5: All PS5 vs PS4 Differences
You left your keywords in bold!
Re: PS Now Competitor Google Stadia Ceases Internal Game Development
@Paranoimia it's not even just about the fact that they can do it in theory. Just think about the disruption from content moving between platforms in the last few years as every publisher tries to establish a streaming platform. All the stuff netflix lost to Disney plus, shows like the Expanse starting on one platform and ending up on another.
Now it's getting to the point where it costs as much as sky to have access to everything.
The thing people overlook with Game Pass Netflix, HBO Max etc is that these subscription services are still in the early stages of a disruptor business challenger model whereby you make a compelling offer that's cost attractive too undermine the legacy market leaders. Then once you have market share you scale back and raise prices. Just look at Uber. Netflix is further along this path and the value is getting worse as they produce more crap, cheap content and raider prices.
Ultimately the problem for me is if I want to watch a specific film or listen to a certain song and it's not hugely popular, it often isn't to be found on any of the platforms. Just serves to push more emphasis to Triple AAA and kill the middle of the market. Fancy watching Minority Report tonight? Die Hard? You're gonna have to pay 6 pounds to 'rent' them because they're not in any other platforms.
That's not even getting into the issues around pay for the actual content creators.
Re: Hitman 3: How to Import All Levels and Locations from Hitman 1 and Hitman 2 on PS5, PS4
@get2sammyb cool thanks for the reply
Re: Hitman 3: How to Import All Levels and Locations from Hitman 1 and Hitman 2 on PS5, PS4
jumping in at number 3. Assuming the engine and graphics have improved between 1 and 3, is this a case of playing the older levels in the Hitman 3 engine?
Re: Game of the Year: #1 - The Last of Us: Part II
It's just press forward to get to next cut scene innit
https://twitter.com/SunhiLegend/status/1277749136310382593?s=09
Re: Cyberpunk 2077 (PS4) - The Single Biggest Disappointment of the PS4 Generation
@Thelegend159
"Sadly this game’s ambition outstripped the PS4s and Xbox capabilities and CDPR knew this but went ahead any way."
I've seen this line of reasoning a few times but not sure I follow it. Nothing Cyberpunk is doing seems to be happening at a level that should have this much negative impact on PS4/XboxOne. I agree that CDPR's ambition outstripped their own capabilities to manage and prioritise a project on this scale. But neither the graphics (severely downgraded), performance (terrible), AI (non-existent) or systems (half baked) should be that taxing - and certainly not when taken altogether.
Especially given what other devs managed to accomplish on PS3, let along PS4: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsBrkLq31eM
Re: Ubisoft Shoves XP Boosting Microtransaction into Assassin's Creed Valhalla a Month After Launch
I think it would be an issue if they had clearly designed the game with this in mind. They may have done, I haven't played it. But I assume if this was overly grindy, even by Assassin's Creed standards, people would have been complaining about that for the past month.
As long as it doesn't impact future DLC or whatever, I think this seems ok. Publishers will always be looking for new revenue streams and this gives them that without taking anything away from those who want the traditional experience (as long as it doesn't change design).
At this point, it's probably things like this or less of these Triple AAA 100 hours+ open world games, they just cost too much to make. And costs have gone up a lot more than game prices, certainly in the past 20 years.
I still remember my parents bought me Street Fighter 2 on Megadrive for christmas the year it came out for £50+ in early 90s. I don't know if they were scalped or if that was the MSRP and shops just went with it cos they knew people would pay for it at Christmas. Either way, inflation has apparently risen by 80% since, so the prices we're seeing now aren't much more than in line with that.
Re: CD Projekt RED Tries to Distance Itself from Cyberpunk 2077 Refund Mess
@Max2574 I hadn't thought too much about this in the previous generation because I had ubiquitous fast internet and the console and games would update themselves quietly in the background.
But since PS5 launch, I've moved and don't yet have internet. So playing the unpatched version of Miles Morales without the RT Performance mode and realising how out of sync with the current narrative you can be if your console isn't offline, even when your'e playing the same game as everyone else.
Certainly if we still believe reviews to have any moral duty to inform consumers, they should be based on the lowest common denominator, which is the gold version on the disc, but then could make mention of improvements brought by subsequent patches.
If games were reviewed more harshly for their day 1 performance issues, especially AAA, publishers might become less likely to release them so broken. Especially when we know bonuses can be structured around aggregated review scores, etc.
Re: Cyberpunk 2077 (PS4) - The Potential of a Masterpiece, Totally and Utterly Unrealised
Are the AI, gunplay and driving better on a high end PC too? I would understand performance issues more if the systems themselves seemed next gen. But from lots of comments, it's the graphics on a top end system (ray tracing) where this really shines from a technical perspective. The other bits people are praising - story, characters, world building - are great but not technically demanding.
Is it just that their engine is terrible at scaling? Or another way to ask: in technical terms, why is this game still so demanding on consoles when frame rate, resolution, density and IQ have been cut so drastically? Because it doesn't seem to be animation, AI, emergent systems or any of the things that seem perfectly possible on other recent open world games. Genuinely curious tbh.