RBMango

"You don't pick to hunt down any of the six members of the Yotei Six in whichever order you like..."

This tidbit was one of my only major concerns, so this is a great relief to me.

As said, PlayStation deserves a lot of criticism this gen, but their willingness to add substantial free stuff to their games post-launch mostly without pimping microtransactions is really commendable. I still can't believe Ghost of Tsushima Legends didn't come with a rotating item shop and battle passes.

I think I'm done after that second season and if Mazan is calling the shots going forward, but I can't wait for him to make Abby's sex scene even more strange and awkward. That's going to be unintentional comedy gold if he tops the bizarre moment between Ellie and Dina from season two.

Well, at least it didn't get any writing noms. That's a silver lining.

It feels so strange that Barlog teased his next project at the beginning of the PS5 gen, and here we are a few years from the end and we still don't know what it is.

I'm glad they got Clare Uchima back. Her voice is incredible.

I think the game overall looks really cool, but I don't know what to make of that card system. They didn't do the best job explaining why they decided to go with it and how it encourages freedom. As others have said, it seems like smoke and mirrors. I'm also still not sold on the nonlinear path to taking down the Yōtei Six. I'd prefer a much more linear and curated main story path from a pacing standpoint.

But, like I said, everything else looks like exactly what I want from a Ghost of Tsushima sequel.

Definitely rocking that Miike mode. The more blood sprays, the better.

Once I saw 2B, I knew Cloud would be there at some point. Getting Sephiroth after finishing that hard as hell final level was icing on the cake.

@Kraven GUN is very underrated. I wish we had more western games like it.

A LOT of people have been sounding the alarm about Game Pass's blindingly obvious unsustainability for many years. The difference now is that many more people don't believe Xbox leadership's nonsense about GP being profitable and encouraging more spending on their platform. Anyone with a basic grasp of economics and how video games are made knows Phil Spencer's honeyed words about the service and its viability are almost all lies.

And for anyone reading this who is upset that I'm directly calling out Spencer, maybe you should be more upset at him for spoonfeeding you bull**** over the past two generations and fracturing Xbox's console health and culture beyond repair.

I get that the last Forza Motorsport underperformed big time and Horizon has become the new hot brand for Microsoft, but the assumed death of the series is really sad to see from a cultural standpoint. Turn 10 and FM have been Xbox staples for multiple generations.

I'd say a 7. I think it's VERY good. Very close to great in my eyes but not quite there for me. I'd go for an 8 if the main story was a tad shorter and some key scenes didn't land with a thud for me.

I couldn't care less if PlayStation brought all of their recent multiplayer games to Xbox. I'm more curious if Xbox gamers will actually buy this since it's not on Game Pass day one. If there was a time to put their money where their mouths are, this is it.

Finished Death Stranding 2's main story a few days ago. Absolutely deserves the #1 spot.

Reinforcements inbound!

@UltimateOtaku91 I'm very unfamiliar with the Wasteland series, but I imagine those don't cost anywhere near as much to make compared to most of Xbox's other games. With Clockwork, as great as it looks, I have no idea what it would need to do to be "successful" in Xbox's eyes because their metrics of success seem to frequently change internally.

@UltimateOtaku91 I think InXile will be okay, but I'm stunned we haven't heard anything about Ninja Theory.

The Initiative is one of the biggest gaming failures in recent memory. They was supposed to be a super team of industry vets, but it's clear that the project management was absolute ass. It didn't help either that Xbox's own project managers during that time were infamously "hands off" with their management style.

What a disaster all around.

"Xbox is great. I'm great. Enjoy the unemployment line." - Lord High Commander Diety of all things on this planet Phil Spencer

1 million players is pretty bad considering this was available both on Game Pass and PS Plus Extra day one. Also, couldn't anyone just login once, play for an hour and dip, and still be considered a "player"?

Stick to what you're good at, Remedy!

It amazes me what acquiring ActiBliz did to the Xbox brand. Sure, it generates huge revenue for them, but the long-term consequences have fundamentally changed what Xbox even is. And being forced to feed the colossal beast that is Game Pass certainly hasn't helped create a healthy ecosystem.

However, it has been amusing to watch the really hardcore loyalist cult of Phil Spencer twist themselves into a pretzel to praise Xbox's trajectory towards total platform agnosticism, despite them crying bucketloads on the inside that the days of true Xbox exclusives are practically dead.

Square Enix could straight-up steal the exact same combat and skill systems from E33 for FF17 and I'd be perfectly fine with that. Hell, use the Rebirth combat system for all I care. Because whatever confused and misguided action tripe they were trying to do with 15 and 16 is not what I want from modern Final Fantasy.

I get what he's saying, but he shouldn't feel like a fraud. He was fantastic and made a significant contribution to the emotional power of Expedition 33.

@AdamNovice If I were a gambling man, I'd bet on the next batch of characters (no doubt including Wolverine) being announced at either San Diego Comic-Con next month or EVO USA in August. It would be nonsensical to miss either of those two opportunities for a big splash with this being a Marvel fighting game.

I very highly doubt Tōkon will be here. I'm sure PlayStation is eager to save that for EVO or whenever their next State of Play is.

I've dropped almost 140 hours into this now, and Level-5 seems intent on keeping me hooked.

I'm really curious to see what this looks like because I'm fully onboard with PlayStation embracing different genres using their more popular IPs. Lego Horizon Adventures was a major bust, so hopefully this will work out a lot better.

Expedition 33 is my favorite of the year by a gigantic margin.

Fantasy Life i and Blue Prince are great too.

Please God no.

@Balaam_ Which extensions do you use? Like you, I'm sick to death of looking at so many of these gutter trash grifters being recommended to me by YouTube.

I'm 100% confident this won't get cancelled, but even with a delay, I still don't think Marathon will reach the level of success that PlayStation and Bungie want it to.

Again, what a gigantic waste of nearly $4 billion on Sony's end.

Look, I think Marathon is in deep $**t, but this article is very obvious clickbait. You can write articles about Marathon's woes without having to resort to using poll results on your own website full of people who are not Bungie's target playerbase. I expect better from this site, to be frank.

It could be free and I still wouldn't play it

@Ainu20 100% agree. Tōkon is a step in the right direction of what Sony's live service philosophy should be. As you correctly said, it's all about recognizing genre and niche demands and seeing what you can do to satiate them. A stylish and tag-team Marvel fighting game is absolutely a void that PlayStation has the unique leverage to fill.

Maybe PlayStation executives (including Hulst) hyping themselves up into a delusional frenzy calling generic dreck like Concord "the future of PlayStation" and a "Star Wars like IP" was part of the problem too.

Also, if they have really learned anything, they'll cancel Fairgames and gut Bungie's C-suite ASAP.

Bloober Team already nailed the way more thematically complex and sensitive game in the series, so this should be a walk in the park by comparison.

@get2sammyb Assuming this project is going to take at bare minimum four years to come out, it's wild to think there will be at least a decade long gap between Days Gone and their next game. And that exceeds the long gap between Golden Abyss and Days Gone all those years ago. It's a miracle Bend is still around at all.

A 30% staff cut for a studio like this is nuts. What makes this worse is that Bend, Oregon is far from a thriving game development scene, so these devs and their families will be in for an even more rough time ahead if they worked on-site. Yet another long-term and potentially devastating consequence of PlayStation's terrible decisions this generation.

@DennisReynolds You mean you didn't enjoy fighting the same copy and paste big dude with an axe by using the same slash-slash-dodge combo over and over and over and over and over and over again?

There are absolutely some games I'm willing to spend $80 on.

Outer Worlds 2 ain't one of them.

I thought both PlayStation and Xbox put on their best summer presentations in years. Over these past few days, I've seen an insane number of games I want to play, and there's still a possibility Nintendo will hold a Direct soon.

Blinx the Time Sweeper 3 confirmed, son!

This looks sick. I'm glad Mortal Kombat is finally getting some competition with a super gory fighter.

This was maybe the worst "one more thing" I've ever seen in a games showcase...

This trailer screamed "too good to be true" for me. The animation, physics, and visuals look so smooth and good that I don't believe it.

I wonder if the different eras featured in the story have unique gameplay mechanics and combat styles. The 1915 section resembles the traditional brawler Yakuza gameplay, whereas the 43 section combines detective and investigative elements with the action. Even the choice to spare or kill was intriguing and new for RGG.

That was a masterclass in trolling from Capcom during the presentation.

The one-two punch at the end of Stranger than Heaven and Resident Evil Requiem saved this from a "very poor" score from me.

After checking out the When They Cry series, I have complete faith in Ryukishi07 delivering a killer story.