Titntin

Top 5:
Crimson Desert
Elden Ring
BioShock's Rapture
Horizon Zero Dawn
Skyrim

Is it the one cliffhanger I'm still waiting on resolution for. Never thought I'd get invested in the story, but I did.
I need closure - and hopefully a good 50 hours to get there!

I'll certainly pick these up, but I'm not in a hurry as I have so many games to play.
I'd love to try big walk - if I ever get friends I'll give it a go for sure!

Sounds like something I'm going to enjoy and will definitely play soon.
I hope it does well and encourages this dev to continue to develop outside its comfort zone.

This is the game that has my wife using the Series X continually meaning I cant play Forza Horizon 6! I have to say its looks fantastic and she would highly recommend this to anyone. I doubt I'll ever get a chance to play it

@Northern_munkey No mate - Push will continue stirring the pot and wonder why they have the most rabid complainers and non fans of all of the major websites by far. I need to change my habits and stop coming here - its starting to smell stale.

Its difficult to make a bad game from this as its such a great game.
But £50 for a 25 year old game with no online multi player is a tough sell.
Perhaps I've not played enough of this remake yet (I have it on Game pass), but it feels 'off' to me. Elites have stupid AI, the colour palettes don't have any of the subtly of the original, I don't know. In some ways I wish I was justy playing the original version or the Master chief collection version. Maybe I'll warm to it. Luke warm sales do not suprise me.

@DefShepherd Coming on here is the first mistake - this is one of the most negative websites involved in gaming and has therefore attracted people who share that view.
There are still plenty of people who genuinely love gaming and celebrate their passion, but those of us still here are much quieter as we will often be shouted at by the stone throwers, and as you say, we love games for the escape!

Don't despair friend, Push Square is not even remotely representative of real players any longer and gaming is and still will be a great place to escape reality for a long time to come 👍
We might just need deeper pockets 😃

I appreciate the move away from the F2P model but I do wander if that still leaves game mechanics like 'daily check ins' and its like which is giant red line for me. I'll play a game when and how I want, any forced engagement and I'm out!
I'll be very interested to read the reviews once its out for PS - that level of engagement on steam is impressive..

I'll play it on game pass. I would have bought it for PS, but I think its far too expensive for a game thats 25 years old with the MP removed. If they had priced it appropriately it would have sold much more, but at this price I'm not sure they will sell many at all....

@TensuraFan7 Hey sorry if I misquoted you, not my intention, sometimes with all the back and forth posts you can lose track!

The point of mentioning burglary and fires was that sometimes having your 'licence to play' tied to a physical disk can be a disadvantage as they can break, get damaged or stolen and then they are gone for ever, which is clearly not the case for a digital licence. I'll be honest with you, I cant really remember which point I was answering though, but I did mention it as it seems to be rarely brought up in the discussion!
Have a good day!

@BentIeyma That's a fantastic tip - thanks for that. I rarely want to return anything, but in future, if I'm in doubt, I'll try on an alt account first!

@TensuraFan7 "There's absolutely no sane way of denying that fact."

I know three people that lost their entire physical collection of games - two from burglary one from a house fire. No way they can ever get them back. Not surprisingly, they would disagree with your assertion and I believe they are all buying digital now.
Its simply not as black and white as people like to pretend.

@Leonm "I was far more impressed with the series x i got 2 years after my ps5. That runs pc games."

No it doesn't. I have a series X and I have a gaming PC rig. Series X runs Xbox games, PC runs PC games. The Pc code is not able to run on both.
We are all expecting project Helix to be a PC that will run PC games , but I'm afraid stating that a series X does so is just madeupium.

Still AC Black Flag for me, a life on the ocean waves is still keeping me entertained.
I've bought Palworld now it's v1.0, and I'm looking forward to starting that too.

Whatever you are playing this weekend, I hope you have fun!

Ah memories . I was working on a game very much like this after leaving Bullfrog in 2000. A lot of our team had worked on Theme Park World. Though we chose to use a colourful aesthetic, our designs and models were much better than this even though we were back in 2001.
We were a first party Sony funded studio then, and it all stopped when Sony pulled the funding. Yes it was happening back then too!
Its weird to see this now (I missed its earlier PC release). I hope it does well, it kinda shows that our concept had legs....

@Northern_munkey I'm also right there with you buddy. People who live in echo chambers often think its everyone - its no such thing.

@Toot1st Yes, thanks for pointing that out, your right I had not considered it. I still don't think the numbers of players is very high given its availablity on GPU, PC and PS5, as I suspect 15 million could try it at no cost.
But as you rightly point out we have no way to verify the number of GPU subs, so that number is clearly a guesstimate.

Given their ambition to keep on developing I can only hope the title will continue to improve and reach the heights of the very best Bethesda games.

Have a good day.

@Toot1st I think you are missing the point. You provide details of games where you need to buy the game to play it.
Starfield is available at NO EXTRA CHARGE to the 30 million gamepass subscribers for them to try and yet less than %60 bothered to do so. That has nothing at all to do with sales, so why do you bring it up?

So theres 30 million Xbox players and just over 50% tries starfield. Its obviously worse than that as they have sold on PS too. Why would you trumpet such a poor rate of even trying it?
Regardless, theres some decent stuff here if you can ignore the jank and awful stories and poor scripts. I really wanted to like it and put over 80 hours into it, but ultimately the only stories I enjoyed were the long faction quests which were much better than the main story. I'm hoping they return to form for ES6.

Insomniac always delivers a hit and this game looks like it has all the elements to make a big splash. Look forward to checking this out soon...

Excellent! It has a great history to build from and everything I've seen so far suggests its going to live up to this. I look forward to trying this for myself.

@themightyant meanwhile Xbox have clearly decided they are all digital and haven't had the balls to confirm it. That's better than giving 18 months notice?
Anyhow, cant be bothered to discuss further, as even you don't make any sense to me. Have a great day. F1 practice in 50 minutes, far more interesting.

@themightyant "3 paragraphs and tumbleweeds."
Given the ridiculous reaction, theres no way they could get a message across without just inviting more flaming. I cant even question peoples motivations without being personally attacked. What kind of atmosphere is that to get across future plans and provisions, it will all get drowned out in a crying shouting mess.

@ButteredCrumpet Just play me mate - I'm old and will be an easy win
Sorry to hear about the accident. I hope there is a full recovery for you in time 🙏

@themightyant Its you who is jumping the gun. Of course they cannot tell you about a console that has not even been announced, what are you thinking?
Your normally reasonable and balanced and I count you as a friend, but on this issue it seems like your brain cells just melt away.

This is looking really good, everything I've seen so far has been pretty positive.
Another fantastic world to get immersed in - where can I find the time? I'll manage

Its on game pass so I'll give it a look for free after such a positive review. I'm not sure its gonna be my thing, but it will cost me nothing to find out, and I do appreciate the silliness and bombastic design.

Very pleased to get 'Rise of the Ronin' - its been on the wishlist for ages but they have not offered a decent enough discount for me to get it. No need to pay now...
Couldn't care less when it arrives as long as it does - what a silly thing to get upset about.

I'm dead interested in trying this once its out. I have the nacom stick, so I'm unlikely to shell out for another, but I do like the design of this...

Three plays through to get Elden Ring plat (unless you save scum) and that's one of the best games ever made. Trophies are optional.
I like the look of this one.

@somnambulance I hope its still good mate. I'm not always bothered by older games, but some are good enough that they are always relevant!

This is a good game, but I wont try it till /I get further in Guitaroo man!

It is the high seas for me - I'm really enjoying Black Flag all over again! I'm having to odd go of guitaroo man as I'm stuck on early levels and need to get through,. But its mainly Black Flag.

What's ever you are playing this weekend, I hope you have fun.

I loved the original and am so pleased to be able to say I'm loving it all over again. Its a delight to be on the high sees again!

@1UP-HUSKY Thanks mate, yeah I too enjoy a chat that doesn't descend into 'the bad zone', and Ienjoyed our discussion. I hope chat again...take care.

@1UP-HUSKY That's fine mate, if you want a console constantly offline, and you happen to have discs where the entire code is on the disc in a usable state, then you may argue having a plastic licence is worth for you.
But you must admit, that would be a pretty rare experience and that most hoping on this hate bandwagon seem to think their disc lets them own the software, instead of just granting a license. It astonishes me how few people even know what they are protesting about!
Anyway, thanks for the chat, I hope you and your kids will enjoy gaming for years to come. Have a good one!

@1UP-HUSKY It doesn't matter what is on a disc, full game or not. A disc is a license to play, same as digital ownership. Never been any different. Feel free to use your fave AI to go check the details and enlighten yourself. Fans of physical media who think they don't have just a license are deluded.
There are of course many other reasons why you may like physical, I'm not disputing that. But this stuff about not wanting a license is a falicy as that's all you have ever had.

@CheesyOatcake lol. I'll accept virtual pollution... Though theres no plastic in Edward timeline 👍

@1UP-HUSKY You are aware that your physical disk is simply a licence too? I ask as you seem to be implying it's not. The only difference is that its tied to the disc rather than tied to an account, but either way your access to software can be removed. So many seem to not understand this.. your investment has been in physical license keys that can be taken away at any moment . You own the plastic only, the licence can be removed at any time by Sony, just like with digital purchases.

@Kiltedhaggis I do think it was better my friend, it was smaller. Talent wasn't expendable and fewer money men were involved. I enjoyed leading small teams, it was personal and you were all bound in your desire to make the best game you could. By the time you have 60 or 70 in your art team alone, it was never quite the same.

At least in my day you tended to know most of the talent out there. If a studio collapsed another one would be waiting for you as you left to offer you new work. I'm sure modern development has its plus points, but I don't see it now and I'd probably forgo AAA games now to work with small indies and try and retain the vibe I Knew and loved

@RS1 Well I'm glad we can agree on some things, such as the need for better digital rights.

As for why I'm here, I've been asking myself a similar question since the site started to go downhill. I've been here 5 years, I've made 3000 posts and I have made some good friends here, people I respect and care about. I pay yearly to be a supporter but that's getting harder to justify as I despise the rage bait headlines they have come to specialise in. Apart from the friends I met here, anyone else I know into games stopped coming here a while ago due to the falling standard of articles and reviews and the clear move towards incitement of hate. I know I'm not the only one thinking this, many other old timers have expressed this concern in their posts here. I see you have been here a long time too. Surely you have noticed the change?
Anyhow, I have a pirate ship awaiting its captain so I'm gonna go do what I've always loved and been excited for - playing games.
Maybe we are opposite ends of this debate, but I will genuinely wish you a good day regardless.

Thanks Arron, good review. If I were a multiplayer sort of gamer, I think you would have convinced me to give this game a try!
However, I'm going to sails the high seas and sing some sea shanties instead. Yo ho ho!

@1UP-HUSKY I get what you are saying, but the digital slim edition of PS5 is consistently the highest seller in Japan, so theres clearly plenty of appetite for consuming games without discs there?

@RS1 Sony quoted the metrics and they have been rising every year. The majority of people buy digital and are clearly happy enough to do so - its you who is ignoring the metrics. These are published figures for a corp to its shareholders. Wheres your figures? A vote on a website known for stirring up unrest and hate? Are you seriously offering that as a reliable metric? You need to touch some grass mate.

Were we living in the past where a decent version of the game with all the day one patches and updates were available, then there would still be value in having physical discs from a preservation point of view. But those days are long gone and discs have been reduced to download tickets. I don't buy any discs for years for all my media as I care about the plastic pollution in the world. While such a position is not gonna fix the ills of plastic pollution its still something I care about very much. Generating all that plastic waste to only have to download the game anyway is ridiculous.

Getting better deals and maybe more ownership from digital products however, is another argument and I'm fully on board for improving the rights around digital ownership. That's not the same as keeping your plastic download ticket.
I'm not protecting Sony, what a silly take. A multi million pound corp doesn't need my protection and doesn't care about me, just as I don't care about it. Its shares have seen a nice bump since the announcement.
I'm just happy to use digital services and buy digitally on switch 2, Series X and Steam as well my PlayStation's and music, and books and anything else that can be consumed digitally without wasting resources.

You really need to a get sense of proportion if you think a few thousand votes in an echo chamber website like this means anything to the broader customer base. It really doesn't.

@Bluemoon2008 There clearly no point in talking to some who clearly knows nothing about the industry. I've worked for Sony, Microsoft, Electronic Arts and many more for over 20 years and studios simply do not do what you are suggesting. If you want to know what your talking about, then yes you absolutely do need the insight instead of wild guessing and false equivalency.

@Bluemoon2008 You clearly know absolutely nothing about how a studio runs and operates.

@RS1 But the majority of us are perfectly OK with the news, we ain't boycotting nothing.
Sitting in echo chambers all day seriously makes you think you are some kinda majority and that's just not the case.

Of course they wont be changing their mind.
What I hope they may do, is explain how all 3rd parties can sell digital codes so we have competition in pricing.
How

@naruball OOO - that's great information thank you! I'll try it next time - probably next month