Rich33

@Voltan
Maybe there are plenty more 'announcements' yet to be made, but its the tone of their communication that concerns me in terms of 'who' it is actually aimed / focused at.
I mean, you can appeal to both audiences (hence why I mentioned SF6 and WT mode), but it could backfire and they appeal to none.

This game in my opinion does not really know who its targeting.

It looks like it should be targeted to a more casual audience, but doesn't have even remotely enough SP content or characters announced yet to satisfy this audience.
However, I do see a massive gap in the market here.
I am definitely part of this 'casual' market when it comes to fighting games, and the last I bought was SF6 - purely because of the World Tour mode.

On the other hand they sound like they are far too desperate to attract the hardcore audience, which is already well served these days.

If they are not careful they will end up with no real audience for it...

@TrollOfWar
There is not a doubt in my mind that exclusivity to PS5 generates far more hype, interest, and coverage for PS5 owners than a game which isn't exclusive.
Of course you can name a few exclusive games, some of which were deeply flawed, that didn't sell huge numbers of copies - this doesn't mean that they wouldn't have sold far less on PS5 if they had not been exclusive. For all we know, those games may have sold double what they would have done if not exclusive - its all relative.

If a dev team is having trouble scaling back to Series S and Switch 2, it would make perfect sense for them to 'self impose' a period of exclusivity on PS5 consoles in order to generate the hype / interest and hopefully sell more on PS5, whilst continuing to work on other versions in the background.

Maybe they already know they can't scale far enough to S2, and the amount of work needed to get it running well on Series S may not make Xbox versions a priority at all, considering likely sales.

I haven't seen the DF preview, but using Wuchang as an example doesn't sound hopeful - it runs terribly on Series S (DF even called the fps mode the 'lesser evil' - 10:06 timestamp on their review) and looks awful imo too. The only version I would consider buying of that game, even on offer, is the PS5 Pro version.
Plus we know different dev teams have vastly different levels of ability.

Maybe this game is a paid for exclusive dating back a few years or more - I don't know.
But in general terms (which is what I was talking about), I think Sony are less interested in paying 3rd parties for exclusivity these days (after the self implosion of Xbox). Though for the reasons I have stated, and for marketing / tech support as pointed out by @PuppetMaster , we may still see 3rd party exclusives for the remainder of this generation.
Of course Sony may be looking to go in to deals which also prevent sales on PC, but I doubt we will see that until PS6.

@PuppetMaster
Certainly makes sense too - particularly if the deal includes marketing and tech support.

I just don't see it being a simple case of Sony purchasing too many exclusives in the current market - though mid 2023 would likely be plausible as (if I remember correctly) Xbox were still active competition back then.

For what its worth though, I haven't read anything that convinces me that Sony had any part in console exclusivity for BMW.

I am starting to wonder whether in cases like this there is an actual 'deal' in place with Sony, or if it is self imposed to try to generate more sales.

If the devs are having difficulties scaling it down to Series S, and particularly Switch 2, coupled with potential low sales on Xbox, its perfectly plausible that they are the ones imposing console exclusivity (and will work on Series S / S2 if even possible in the meantime) - in order to try and drive higher sales / coverage on PS5.

Or, maybe this is an 'old' deal with Sony - but it doesn't seem as likely that Sony would have 'inked' a recent deal for this game for just console exclusivity (maybe if said deal kept it off PC too, I could see a point).

@Leinad7
Ive played both GoT and GoY, and thought GoY was in a different league altogether. I thought GoT was OKish, but GoY was 10/10. And, in my opinion GoY should have won GOTY, amongst other awards - the fact that it won 0 however, just shows the bias against it or for other games.

Edit: oh and there are other games that deserved awards that didn't get anything, including KCD2.

And this is why I will never watch these game awards.
9 awards for CO and none for the infinitely better GoY (amongst others as well) is just ridiculous.

So, either:

MS/Xbox Fallback Plan 1: say nothing is changing when massive changes are planned, but still try and convince people otherwise.

MS/Xbox Fallback Plan 2: Say it's "Too big to fail" / "everything is amazing", and stick heads in sand.

Slightly worried this is going to be RE6 all over again...

Ghost of Yotei is an easy win with nothing else even close.

The list is missing Lost Soul Aside, which whilst nowhere near my 1st pick, would have been on my list.

@Hyena_socks
I'm talking about where the company shuts the site and moves the work elsewhere ONLY BECAUSE of union involvement in the site. Some companies will go this far and there is no stopping them - they will of course not state this reason publicly.

In some cases, particularly if the company is large and multinational, too much union involvement and a company could easily shut the site down and move the work to a different country which has no real unions.
This may well be the best solution as far as the company is concerned, and can be a major loss for the country, not just the workers.

The choice can easily become - keep out of any union and keep your job, or lose your job - in which case having union help for severance is not really a plus point.

Both GOWR and GOW2018 are both easy 10/10 games for me, with Ragnarok being the slightly better of the 2. The fact that they are cinematic masterpieces is one crucial part of what elevates them above most other games.

For me, the previous games were just ok, but 2018 is where the series really became special.

One thing people need to be very careful of relying on / joining unions, even here in the UK, is that if the company does not want this, it is all too easy for them to simply shut a site, and move the work elsewhere - sometimes even to a different country.

@Apkorv
1) Is this game even launching on PC? (And I don't mean eventually, because eventually PS6 will be out and play it >60fps).
2) A number of dev teams have shown it is perfectly possible to target 80fps+ in AAA games on PS5 CPU's, they just have to design the game suitably.

@Chip-Douglas
They might have excessive usage on the CPU, but its not like they were originally making this for PS6 and could easily have designed around the PS5 CPU.

@Chip-Douglas
It is - I literally cannot play games that aren't 60fps (or that dip too often / too hard). I wouldn't play a 'bad' game either, but I could play and enjoy a mediocre game at 60fps.
I can't believe that they are incapable of designing/achieving 60fps in 2026/7 (whenever it launches)

If GTA6 isn't 60fps, there will be literally hundreds of games I would rather play...

Is it just me, or is it Capcom's policy for male protagonists in this series to grow a beard at a certain age?
(Nothing against beards, just an observation)

@Czar_Khastik
You are certainly not alone in this, but I do worry that we are 'too far down the rabbit hole now' and things will likely get worse, for a while at least.

@Czar_Khastik
I think that is a criticism that can be levelled at most fighting games these days - they are just not very good for casual fans.

I have played many across the years, but I do not have the time, or inclination, to study/practice 1 character to that degree anymore.

I thoroughly enjoyed SF6 (which I bought on sale) purely because of the World Tour mode, but other than this I think fighting games in general have forgotten what made them 'fun', and got lost in a quagmire of balancing and layered systems.

Bring back the Bloody Raw games and let me turn into a werewolf before smacking my human sized Rabbit opponent 30ft through the air!

@Northern_munkey
I swear one of these days I am going to set myself up a whole bunch of PC site accounts, and comment on EVERY SINGLE ARTICLE about new GPU / CPUs / RAM / SSDs etc etc "No point in this as I already own a PS5 Pro, which is much less hassle / more powerful than the average PC, and cheaper - particularly as I already own it!"

@Bizzy
You are probably right - I will 'touch wood' and shut up now lol.

@tangyzesty
That's the curious thing with 'luck' isn't it.

Have I been exceptionally lucky with pads this gen, or have you been unlucky?

@LogicStrikesAgain @species

Talking generally here, it is normally caused by someone wanting something, but not being able to have it - and I don't just mean because they can't afford it, but maybe because they can't justify the price to someone else (eg a partner), or any other myriad of reasons depending on what said 'thing' actually is.

They then rebound into being highly (and often vocally) negative about said thing.

One of the easiest ways to tell if this is the case, is that if someone has genuine negative feelings they will normally only express them rarely and as part of a wider point, or if asked.
The above tends to generate almost a 'need' to be regularly and vocally negative - often stating that the thing in question is 'unnecessary'.

I don't know why this article has suddenly added stick drift as a major talking point, but I have worn out 4 controllers this gen, and all 4 were through the batteries finally giving up through normal (over) use - ie takes longer to charge than the charge lasts.

I have not had to replace 1 pad through stick drift in all this time.

Last gen, I regularly had to replace pads through stick drift indicating that either I have been ridiculously lucky this gen, or the PS5 pads are far superior in this regard.

@Frmknst
"Literally not a single end consumer sees or will see any difference"

I'm a single end consumer.

I can easily see the positive difference PSSR makes in the bulk of enhanced games, where the devs have done their job properly.

If this PSSR upgrade is even only partially as good as is being suggested/rumoured it is going to be very noticeable (to me, and others), and will top off this great mid gen refresh very nicely.

@gamepadnomad
I sort of agree - though I think GTA6 will boost Pro sales, its going to be very late in the generation so might not have a massive effect.

Though the current RAM issue could easily push PS6 back a year or more, so may have changed the landscape a bit.

Far better to buy the excellent PS5 Pro now (or as I did at launch) so you get to enjoy it for longer!

Really like my PS5 Pro. MUCH bigger/better upgrade(s) than the PS4 Pro in my opinion, particularly on non enhanced games. The 2Tb storage is useful too.

@graymamba
Glad you are enjoying it. There are some really good enhancements in a lot of 3rd party games.
Sadly those very few 3rd party games where the devs have done a poor job get an incredible amount of media attention, and the far more common excellent upgrades get very little media attention.

@OldGamer999
I don't think Sony are making a penny on the Japan only models - they may even be subsidising for all we know.

@OldGamer999
And yet despite dropping the price, sales of the new Japan only cheaper digital variant dropped quite a lot in the last set of data from Japan.
In fact, if I remember right, Pro sales were almost the same as the Japan only cheaper PS5.
Price is not everything.

On the other hand, A short term price reduction will usually generate good sales purely as people know that price will not be available again for some time.

@PuppetMaster
Yeah. I can't say I'm not interested - just very wary until we have something concrete.

Have been interested in this one ever since the SoP trailer a good few months ago. As usual though, I try not to be too excited about 3rd party games until reviews are published and we know for certain that they are launching in a decent, polished technical state.

Interesting that Pro at (presumably) full price is selling nearly as many units as the heavily reduced base digital model. To me this shows that low cost is not as big a driver of sales as some would have you believe.

NB I am not including time limited 'sales', as it is the time limited part which is the 'hook' for them.

Another reason not to expect PS6 in 2027.

@LogicStrikesAgain
It often confuses me why it isn't used more if the game more or less locks to 60fps - eg Astrobot is as flawless a game there is terms of framerate. I would guess the overhead is such that on some levels you could expect framerates to hit 100fps, particularly on Pro where you could leverage the extra CPU clock if this becomes limiting. It just seems like a win win if you leave it as an option.
I am replaying Hogwarts at the moment, and after patches and the Pro enhancement that runs uncapped at around 80fps or (sometimes much) higher in a lot of areas (particularly outside Hogwarts itself).

@LogicStrikesAgain
And on both these points I fully agree with you.

My thoughts are wholly dependent on it being easy and quick to implement, and really only apply to really well made games like this where it makes such a positive difference (for me personally the difference between 60fps and 80fps is REALLY visible and pleasing).

@themightyant
Didn't the head of said dept (or at least one of its leads) do part of the original teardown video for PS5?

@DennisReynolds
I intend to do just that come the new year, as soon as I get a gap (NG+ with 120hz uncap).

Though it would be interesting to know just how much work is needed to implement a 120hz uncap, as I am under the impression it is very minimal, hence my comment.

@themightyant @Hordak
Personally I'm a strong advocate of a lot more graphics settings.

Have a couple of pre-set 'profiles' for those that either don't want too many settings or don't understand them, then have a number of settings behind these in an 'advanced" settings menu that you can adjust should you want to, to tailor the game to your liking- for example I can literally 'see' framerates.
This would by far be the best set up to keep everyone happy.

@DennisReynolds @LogicStrikesAgain
I'm a bit in 2 minds over this.

As you guys note, this game was released in a fantastic technical state - something that is becoming increasingly rare sadly.
The Pro enhancements are excellent allowing for example - either approx double pre upscale res in performance mode; or the addition of RT to the performance mode; and all using an excellent implementation of PSSR.

On the other hand, 120hz uncap using VRR seems such an 'easy win' to please owners of 120hz TVs - which are becoming far more common these days. Particularly on Pro versions and where you have such clear headroom inherent to a game that runs at practically locked 60fps.

I tested it out the day of the patch - both the Pro RT mode, and the performance mode - and I was pretty impressed with the boost on PS5 Pro.

I tried out a few areas and it seemed to be much closer to 80-90fps most of the time.

NB - to all those NOT intending to uncap to 120hz - mine defaulted to VRR 'Off' when the patch came down, and if you have a VRR TV you will manually need to change to 'smoothed' (I think that is what it was called - its the middle option).

@Member_the_game
Firstly apologies, I only just saw your reply to me - for some reason and only on rare occasion, the site fails to notify me when a post is directed at me.

I understand exactly what you are getting at.
I commented only as there were arguments (in particular on the side of PS5) being made that were based on data that to put it frankly was not fit to make any sort of comparison based on.

I did add that the article itself does not claim that the data is fit for the purposes on comparison. (I tend to ignore article titles for the reasons I see you and others discussed above.)

Part of my job (and university education) is around data analysis and use of that analysis, and despite the fact that I suppose you could say that I am firmly 'on the side of PS5' (because I have no interest in owning a S2), the 'conclusions' being reached were not what I would class as even partly 'robust', so I was agreeing with yourself and Mr/Ms Moose in this regard.

In fact, the only point of interest is the fact that in October PS5 outsold S2, but even that is somewhat dubious in its value - is there such a thing as a post launch slump (where shortages are non existent of course)? I also put no value on monthly sales comparisons where 1 item is on price reduction sale - thats just meaningless.

Just to answer a specific point you raised - I agree, the full year vs part year thing was just point of incomparable data.

@Gunbeld
There is absolutely no need to be angry / rude.
You seem to be thinking for some reason that I am somehow on the 'side' of Nintendo. I do not own a Switch2, have no interest whatsoever in owning a Switch2, and game purely on a PS5 Pro (though my old PS5 is still in my household).

I understood perfectly well what you are saying.
The reason why "People seem to be hyper focusing on comparing them launch aligned" is that this is of FAR greater significance than an odd month or 2.
(I would add that with PS5 on heavy sale this month, and if S2 is not, if PS5 beats S2 this month it is absolutely meaningless anyway).

The articles source also compared sales over a different quantity of time (ie 'this year' when S2 launched mid way through), which is simply bad practice.

The thing is, if you were to look at launch aligned data, obviously considering the caveats in my previous post, it may just be that the situation looks much better in favour of PS5 - I very much doubt that sales of PS5 over the last few months are close to its 1st 6 months on sale. The main caveat being I don't know by how much PS5 sales were negatively affected by the supply issues at launch (a problem that has not really affected S2 sales, due in part to Nintendo's more robust planning) - certainly, Sony would have sold more in this early period had they not been supply constrained.

@Oram77
So definitely happening and just waiting to be announced then lol.

And yes, I am just clowning around! (Although with this industry, who knows!)

@Oram77
I don't know - I thought BB remaster was confirmed as a PS6 launch exclusive. I keep watching the SoP's hoping to see it announced early.

Or am I getting confused with Bloodborne 2 ?!?

He is letting AI do his social media posting! Lol

Not a good month at all in my opinion, and thats not normally something I regularly have to say about the monthly PS+ games.

@RoomWithaMoose @Gunbeld
Unless I'm missing something, or misreading something, none of this is a particularly valid comparison anyway.

The data is not launch aligned ie it is not a comparison of the 1st 6months of PS5 from launch, vs the 1st 6months of S2 from launch. Its not even 'how did it compare in month X after launch'.

Even then, that is not statistically valid because they launched at completely different times of the year eg the 1st 6months of PS5 included an Xmas period; and if you compare month 5 or 6 from launch we are coming towards Xmas period now for S2, whereas the same for Sony would have been Springtime.

Add into that that Nintendo were FAR more prepared for launch, with very little in the way of shortages - something that Sony really (really) need to improve ready for PS6, and even when the full first year sales data is available this will be skewed if you are looking to compare 'popularity' in a particular market.

All in all, the info provided here is just not fit for the purpose of any real comparison (and to be fair I don't think the article is claiming it is).

@Matthewnh
Hogwarts Legacy is highly under rated, though I think to get the best out of it you need to play it on Hard.

It has a very deep combat system when you get into it, get a few spells, and start ignoring basic cast.

I would add:

Hogwarts Legacy
Spiderman 2
Lies of P (particularly if Overture is included)

(All of which I think are genuine 10/10 's)

And Ghost of Yotei would be a very close 9.5

RE4 and AW2 - I wouldn't give 10/10 to. They aren't bad, RE4 is excellent, but not quite 10.