TheDudeKenobi

The game is noticeably easier compared to past entries in the series, however, as you progress into high rank and start fighting tempered monsters the difficulty does ramp up. Tempered monsters are still easier in this game IMO than they've been prior, but I can't really say I miss spending more than half an hour failing a quest several times before finally getting a win, only to not get the materials I need. At least now I can win fast, be disappointed at the drops, and jump back into another hunt quicker lol

@B0udoir Not at all, the game is actually leaps and bounds better than I think anyone could've expected from the beta. On the one hand it sucks to have the lower textures, especially while I'm on PS5 Pro and my wife is behind me most of the time with her PC and better performance (though not as much better as you'd expect on a high end PC) but on the other hand it's still Monster Hunter, and if you love the franchise then this still feels right at home. The vibes of playing a new MH game in 2025 are immaculate either way. RIP to the folks on Xbox Series S though

I originally thought all the locales would be interconnected, and you'd be able to travel between them without any loading, so I was partially forgiving of the textures and resolution being lower to make that possible with all the moving parts in between. Now that we've gone hands-on and know the locales are separate and you do need to load in between them, I'm confused as to why it performs the way it does. To it's credit the fast travel is, well... fast, but MH World looked better in a lot of places and that sticks in the back of my mind when this game can often look blurry or hazy due to poor implementation of graphics and effects. Honestly though, the game is still peak.

@Kingy That's honestly a fair criticism of the game's content and how it presents its crossovers. As much as I might enjoy a new character skin coming to the game, it can feel rather hollow if they don't have any pomp and circumstance, or if their representation and inclusion stand in direct opposition to the way they are in their source material. Sometimes the crossovers are out of place, or ugly, and they can be a real letdown due to the lack of polish. I wasn't trying to imply people disliking something is inherently negative or a bad thing either. If anything negativity towards a project can push a game or a dev team in a positive direction to make changes people want to see. I was more so making a general statement that the criticism being thrown in the direction of this crossover just because it's happening in Fortnite seemed a bit redundant, and maybe a little toxic coming from people who already aren't and wouldn't be interested in what happens in this game otherwise. I appreciate people love Cowboy Bebop and hold it near and dear, which is why I'm surprised the reception to it getting some spotlight in a popular title would carry a negative connotation with its fans simply because it's in something they don't personally enjoy. Again I appreciate that it may not be well represented in their view, however, it's not like the few comments before my initial post were all that detailed and thought out anyway, so it just came across as people knocking a game and it's player base because something they love got put into something they dislike. Throwing shade by saying things like a majority of the player base isn't old enough to even know about Cowboy Bebop is pretty telling of the energy they're bringing to the table.

@Kingy You must really not like Fortnite my guy

They should bring Nergigante back! He'd be a great monster to throw hands with at a higher level!

@Loamy That's a fair take, and I def agree it often comes across as cheap if the content is lacking in some way or just dropped out of nowhere. Even this Cowboy Bebop collab feels out of left field, but hey it's neat enough to warrant some interest. It's definitely getting a bit crazy with every game seemingly trying to do collabs and crossovers constantly, oversaturating the market. For me, Fortnite is just a dumb game to play with friends after work, and if there's a cool new skin or song to grab that will add to the enjoyment then I'm into it. I don't really care about the themes of what's currently happening in the game if the content on offer appeals to my preferences.

@Kingy No, I'm able to enjoy content regardless of what other people think if it hits for me. I just think the constant negativity in gaming spaces when something that's pretty inoffensive drops is unwarranted. In this instance, it seemed like some people in the comments were throwing shade with no real reason other than it's because it's in Fortnite.

Seeing some unwarranted hate in these comments thrown at Fortnite and its players for doing a cool collab. Very sad times for the gaming community. Do y'all play the game or just hate to hate? The jukebox emote is sick, grabbed that this morning. Let the people who like the game have their fun!

Pac-Man World Re-Pac. Heck yeah.

Greece had it's time to shine in GoW. We all loved Greece, we all wanted to see Greece's remnants or a snippet of Greece in the Norse saga (kinda got it with the DLC) but do we really need to tread more ground in the history of a character who is no longer allowing himself to be held back by his past? Remake/remaster what's come before, sure. It'd be great to play the old stories with a new coat of paint, but I think the more interesting direction for a new game is what comes next for either Kratos or Atreus post-Ragnarok. I genuinely don't think there's anything to add to the mythos/Kratos as a character by going back to Greece. It'd feel like, "But did you guys know about this other awful thing that happened while Kratos was in Greece? Spoiler, he killed it."

I'm genuinely curious why everyone thinks Rockstar is just suddenly going to change how they release their games. Everyone was speculating about an increased price point for GTA 6 because the game is so big, but RDR2 was also enormous for the time it came out and released at the same price point as everything else. Now there's talk of a potential stand-alone multiplayer sold for a premium, which again doesn't make any sense when you consider how Rockstar has made their games over the past 2 decades. They've always come out of the gates swinging with a solid single-player campaign, and either offered multiplayer as a feature or a later addition for free to keep the community engaged. I just don't get why everyone is theorizing that all of a sudden they're going to switch up and not only charge more for the base game, but also double dip on access to the multiplayer, when more likely than not the multiplayer will be a bundled-in or an added later microtransaction fest that emulates what we currently have in GTAV. Honestly feels like people are just saying stuff with no actual basis.

*Huffs Copium
Get ready folks!

Now I have to learn to play Spider-Man properly. My team is going to hate me lol

Want to start this by saying I loved Zero Dawn and Forbidden West, and actually just finished replaying both. IMO the real problem is that Sony is creating projects for this IP that are unwarranted. Horizon was already a video game, so adapting it into another kind of game entirely that strips the story and combat elements was a choice that's proved to have been foolish. Lego Horizon toys? Cool, put it on the shelf. Lego Horizon game? Meh, I already have a real Horizon game with these characters and a proper narrative.

Horizon I think could've worked better as a Netflix show with time to let it breathe, but I struggle to see a world where a movie comes out that succeeds in covering Aloy's backstory as an outcast up to the proving, traveling from the Nora sacred lands to Meridian and all that came with that, meeting Sylens (RIP Lance!) learning about the old world, potentially the frozen wilds of they wanted to cover that, so on and so forth. It's a lot to pack in, this would have to be a 2.5+ hour movie, and that'd just be scratching the surface of Zero Dawn's narrative. It seems more likely that Zero Dawn alone would be broken up into multiple films to properly flesh out those characters and narrative.

I think they need to just focus on making Horizon 3 for the time being. I'm all in for more Horizon content, I just don't want them to oversaturate the brand with potentially rushed projects, or things Sony execs think will sell.

If I'll be back on within a few hours, rest mode. If I'm stepping away for a bit longer, power down. I've seen that PS5 shut down incorrectly screen too many times over the years from power outages and whatnot lol

@Creature666 I wouldn't say MS is abandoning the console, because they'd still be making games for the Series S & X. I'm saying it shouldn't be a requirement to have all the games run on both when one of the machines is flat-out weaker than not just it's counterpart, but its competition in the PS5 (I have a series S, a PS5, and PS5 Pro. Series S is the worst performing machine hands down-no surprise there) I don't think a developer should have to sacrifice their quality standard just to put a game on weaker hardware. In my opinion, MS is making a poor decision for its player base by saying no to devs who don't want to compromise and make their game work on a lesser machine. If devs are not happy with a certain level of performance as the people who made the game, they're entitled to that. Unfortunately, it's not as simple as just "Make game work on all machines or don't bother at all." Wukong seemingly would've gone to Xbox which I'm sure would've made Series X players happy, but that requirement cut out an entire player base.

I love my Series S for game pass, but that's about it. Just finished Indiana Jones on the Series S and it was rough looking. Good game, but you can tell it's supposed to be running on something better. MS might be shooting themselves in the foot by continuing this requirement of games running on both Series S & X.

Surprising amount of people think Astro Bot was GOTY material. I loved it, but the whole thing being done within 3 days make me feel like it can't hang with some of those larger experiences. I think FF7 deserves it, but I think Wukong, Elden Ring, or Metaphor are the real contenders next to it. Astro Bot and Balatro just seem too niche.

I was hoping the disk drives might come back in stock during this whole thing, but I guess not. They really just ran out of those things and aren't saying anything about when they're coming back.

I can't speak for PC or PS5 Pro, but the performance of the beta on a launch PS5 was pretty disappointing. With over 300 hours in MH World and a lot more in the earlier ones, this just wasn't it, and it all comes down to the performance. The game mechanics are awesome, but the fidelity mode feels sluggish for what this game is, and the performance mode makes it look like a Wii game. It honestly reminded me of the days playing MH4U on the 3DS again with how blurry the visuals got at times in the performance mode, obviously not where we want to be for a current-gen game being made by a seasoned developer like Capcom. I hope the performance gets fixed, or at the very least that the game can be played offline/in private lobbies which will hopefully alleviate a majority of the frame dips and loss in fidelity. Really want to like this game and be able to play it without upgrading to a PS5 Pro!

These scalping issues could be easily avoided if they sent links to people with active PS+ memberships to purchase these kinds of things first, and not just active memberships but people who've had it for something like 6+ months. These items should be reserved first for people actively playing on PS consoles, then opened to the general market after an exclusivity period of like 24 hours if anything is left. Sell to the player base that makes things like the 30th Anniversary bundle possible first.

I wanna see the Raphael boss fight on Honor Mode like this

For what's on offer as an upgraded model, I think $600-$650 USD with a disk drive included would've been fair. Realistically the PS5 Pro was always going to be at least $100 more than the base PS5, but that $700 price tag with no disk drive is an insane ask.