@Vertere I agree with ALMOST all of what you said except:

FTC documents showed Microsoft modeled that Game Pass sustainability required 77 million members by 2026 and 100m by 2030.

This isn't quite right. Those weren't ever labelled as sustainability numbers they were just internal targets, that isn't the same as what they needed to make it profitable.

But I agree their forecasts were wrong. They thought buying up those studios and adding them to Game Pass would double their subscriber base by 2026 which was already nearly maxxed out on Xbox and PC buyers weren't as keen.

Incredible game. Although parts of it have aged poorly.

@ShadowRJ Fair!

@ShadowRJ We all have different levels of buy in.

Does yours mean you won't be buying GTA6 at launch for example?

Had to double check it was only this year!!! Hell would have bet my house on 2025 or earlier.

Great i'll wait and put my money where my mouth is.

I think "no disc no buy" is too simple, instead:

Digital only = not a day 1 buy, unless it's GOTY material.

@Vertere You are right there are differences between Xbox and Netflix, between gaming and TV/movies. You are also right that some games individually cost a lot more to make, and take longer.

But at the end of the day, when you get down to brass tacks, it comes down to the same things profit and loss, which is dictated by subscribers, churn, etc.

For example Netflix budgeted $20 billion for content this year. Xbox don't release accurate numbers, but we know it will be a lot lower. i.e. they announced they spend over $1 billion a year on third party titles on Game Pass and while we don't have exact numbers for all their studio costs it won't remotely come near Netflix's total content spend. But then they don't have Netflix's subscriber count either.

My point is that there is a level at which Game Pass can work, and a tipping point where it doesn't, but we don't have access to enough information to show where this is.

I would posit however that it worked a lot better before they added ABK and Zenimax, while they have never been totally transparent, the numbers they put out back then showed the Xbox division was making good profit margins, even if the total profit wasn't as high as they wanted.

The trouble is they spent $70 billion on those studios, worse they added around 15,000 jobs - around $2+ billion in studio feed - and in return Game Pass saw very few new games added. Moreover gamers have limited time, even if they added twice as many games each month it doesn't change how long we have to play, it only makes the choices more varied. But that's a harder sell to customers.

So they put themselves in a tough position where they really needed to increase revenue by either getting more subscribers (not easy) or putting up subscription fees, but most users didn't see the value in that. Hence when they did put up fees they lost a lot of subscribers and immediately had to back track.

I still think the large mistake was buying ABK and Zenimax. Until then it seems like they were on the right side of the balance.

@PuppetMaster thanks. I’ll wait and out my money where my mouth is.

Sad news, although not surprising, BioWare hadn’t had a hit in over a decade. Sadly not the studio they once were. Hopefully something can be done with the IP. Still love Mass Effect.

That’s in line with what Tom from Moores Law is Dead said too, and that was the job he used to do in the industry.

Great to hear, and a rarity. Well done.

I think the truth is somewhere in the middle. Game Pass absolutely can work as a business model, but you need enough subscribers to make the numbers work. It particularly works with lower budget titles.

But even with expensive games that costs hundreds of millions of dollars they could include a FEW with the 35ish million subscribers they have, but what they seemingly can't do is include as many as they added, especially since Zenimax and ABK. Then numbers start to no longer work, there is a tipping point.

Obviously for Call of Duty costing circa $800 million and releasing every year, this is no go, but where is that tipping point? It will depend on the numbers of subscribers. If they had 50-100 million - they don't - then having everything included wouldn't be so crazy.

you've not seen anything like this

Proceeds to show another game with combat like Genshin Impact or Wuthering Waves.

It does look bonkers though. Not sure if it's my type of nuts though.

Not sure I will have time to play Talos 2. Will have to add to the wishlist.

Assuming that they sold me on both the hardware and games to play on it then YES I’d likely buy it day 1. But I am an enthusiast, gaming is my #1 hobby, and I have a little disposable income.

Yet don’t expect most people to do the same, and that it a problem for the console model to work you need tens of millions doing the same.

But way I see it is if you buy day 1 you get the maximum use out of it, likely 7-8 years, and split across that time $1,000 is around £115+ a year, as far as hobbies goes that’s not all that much imo. I have friends who spend more than that going to the football every weekend.

Additionally, if it’s the same as this gen, then it’s only likely to increase from launch price.

@Almost_Ghostly Really depends WHAT games. You would probably struggle to fit the last ten CODs on there, or you could have several hundred indie games. I always find I am about at capacity, even with another 1TB m.2 drive installed, though I try to keep around 150GB for updates and if I want to install something.

Digital only = wait for a sale, unless it's GOTY material for me.

@Realist Appreciate the reply. To be fair if that was my experience I would probably be the same, but thankfully it isn't. My only issue is there isn't a pause button if I want to go to the little boys room!

It looked like it could perhaps be interesting IF they pulled it off, but launched with almost no marketing / hype to bad reviews (51 on Metacritic) and users didn't seem to vibe with it any better (5.4 Meta and Mixed 56% on Steam). That makes it one of the worst reviewed games of the year.

Hence while always sad to see studios fail, especially ones trying something a little different, it isn't surprising at all.

@Dodoo Understood, and fair enough, I slightly conflated your reply with the other guy who said "I refuse to step foot in a theatre ever again", which I found a bit extreme, was just curious as to the why?

No. Taxes are high, especially in the USA and take a huge chunk (especially when Trump's Tariffs were anywhere between 20% and 60% for most Asian countries!!!). Marketing, distribution, retail and other costs will also take a slice.

The fact that this is the first console generation that keeps getting more expensive rather than cheaper hints that they just chose to pass on the added costs to the consumer.

Yes. But why should it be otherwise? Should they just swallow the $100+ dollars per device of ADDITIONAL cost and make even larger losses per device? No, of course not, almost no business would do that.

All corporations seem to be on board, not just Sony.

Or, perhaps, the FAR more logical answer is that all corporations are in the same position of technology that is getting more expensive outside of their control. Hinting this is some sort of group price fixing is bad conspiracy theory BS.

@Dodoo @Realist Out of interest just wondering why you both have no interest in going to the cinema?

@arto @MFTWrecks What makes you think Sony ISN'T still subsidising the consoles? The estimated Bill of Materials (BOM) has increased to around $507 last month according to Tech Insider, and is increasing daily.

While a base PS5 currently retails at $650, Sony doesn't get 100% of that as they sell to retailers at a lower wholesale price and Retail likely takes a 10 - 15% cut. On top of that there are distribution, marketing, TAXES and other costs not covered in the bill of materials.

When you add it all up it's likely Sony is selling PS5's at near cost or perhaps a little either side. While we don't have enough information to say for certain whether it's a small profit or a small loss, we do have enough information to say there clearly isn't a large profit there, it isn't just "greed" as you say.

Sadly this is just what tech costs in 2026.

@LogicStrikesAgain in the short term there are enough people with disposable income (K shaped economy) that the PS6 will likely sell out at launch and be hard to get for the first 10+ million consoles, even if it’s very expensive.

But longer term the existing financials of console gaming only really make sense if many tens of millions of players get involved. That’s true both for platform holders but also game makers.

How this ends up panning out will largely depend on whether parts prices ever return closer to normal. If there isn’t an affordable alternative for the masses many people will just stick with what they have, cross-gen will have to go on for even longer and next-gen exclusive games will be in very short supply.

—

Furhermore it’s not just gaming. I think we have been lucky enough to live in a period where many people can afford a lot of consumer electronics whether that’s a smart phone, tablet, smart watch, laptop or gaming console. With prices going through the roof for all these we could end up with an even wider split between those who can afford newer tech and those who have to either skip it or go for a much more basic models.

Will be interesting to see which way it goes.

@Northern_munkey @Titntin that exchange made me chuckle heartily. Have a great Sunday guys.

@XenonKnight Fair point perhaps, but the 5090 was already that price BEFORE the recent cancellation.

But even look at the 5080, a card with an RRP of £950, that is selling for around £1500.

You have to go down the technology stack to get better prices v RRP, but that’s not where the console will be. It will GDDR7 with a Zen 6 CPU.

I loved Stray. It's world building and environment design are often underrated. It feels greater than the sum of it's parts.

Current pricing on high end components is nuts.

• 32GB of DDR5 Ram was around £75 last year and is now around £425. A 5x - 6x increase
• An RTX 5090 was circa £2k last year now it's £5k - £6k. A 2.5x - 3x increase
• A high end 1TB m.2 NVMe Gen 4 drive was around £65, now it's around £175 - £200+. A 2.7x - 3x increase.

Madness.

I think it’s more likely Rockstar has their own solution in place. QSSR is great for companies that don’t have the budget or skill to create their own engines or upscalers but this doesn’t apply to Rockstar and GTA6.

At the end of the day it doesn’t matter what tech it uses only the final image resolve.

@GirlVersusGame I felt exactly the same as you until COVID and then watched a few streamers playing games I liked to pass the time. At the end of the day they are just Entertainers and you watch them for same reasons you might watch any entertainment. Plus it can feel social, like you are part of something larger. I can understand the appeal.

But I don't watch much anymore, it's just too time consuming, and like you said i'd rather be playing games.

I usually agree with you on most things but this feels so far off base. 70? Really?

For reference the last 5 mainline GTA games have scored 97, 95, 95, 98 & 97 on Metacritic. If it’s 70, or even 80, it’s going to be a MASSIVE disappointment and ain’t winning jack.

Great to hear. I haven’t played it yet but this was one of those games I bought just to support the devs.

Looking forward to getting around to it, perhaps next year after Gears, Ocarina & GTA.

Justice slaps. Great pick. Genesis is a favourite headbanger.

The mistake you are making is trying to equate the small number of people complaining about this online, to the total number of people affected. They aren't the same. My whole point was about NOT looking at the tiny number of voices online complaining and instead looking at the number of people who are impacted.

e.g. Over 50% of Wolverine sales in Europe were on disc, that's a LOT more than a few thousand people. Same with the number of PS5s sold with a disc drive, this affects tens of millions of people.

Exactly same thing will happen with GTA 6.. oh no wants code in the box, I everyone's gonna wait for pc blah blah, game comes out, biggest selling thing in human history and not a disc in sight

GTA6 is an outlier. I won't typically buy AAA games digitally at full price, but I will probably make an exception for GTA6 if it's the only way to get it. Will I buy most other games digitally full price? No. The two aren't the same. In future if it's digital only I will likely just wait for a sale. Many already do.

20-30 hour campaign sounds great. 70+ hours for completion sounds long - do they really have good enough side content to more the double or triple the game length? - but better than many other JRPGs.

Famitsu it always a bit hard to trust for these types of games, it often elevates the scores, so I'll wait for more. But it's a good start.

Usually not a huge fan of controller designs, but this is really nice.

I think this applies to most social media in general, it's riddled with bots. Is this issue any worse or better than others in terms of bots, probably not.

Regardless look at something like Wolverine's disc sales, or the number of PS5s with disc drives and it's clear that no discs affects a large proportion of the audience, far more than Sony's would like you to think. Keep it up.

Very solid month indeed. Not that I will have much time to play any of it!

It's a tool that devs will use or they won't, I'll let THEM decide.

Honestly announcing story DLC just makes me want to wait to play the entire game later.

Almost certainly, because a platinum is up to the developer, most games have it, but some don't, whereas by my understanding Mythic Achievements will be a system level feature for when you complete all the existing achievements in the base game.

There's pros and cons to each approach.

Personally I like that when you get a Platinum it significantly adds to your Trophy Level (1 Plat = 3.33 Golds or 10 Silvers or 20 Bronzes), it actually adds to your total rank, whereas it seems like a mythic achievement will add nothing to your overall Gamerscore. In most cases like this I prefer the PS solution as most games have Plats.

Yet in this case, for games without a Platinum, I prefer the Xbox solution. Pros and cons.

@PuppetMaster re-read my comment. We are saying the same thing. Some people’s 6/10s are others 9/10s, we all like different things.

@ShadowRJ I feel you there. I've been loud and vocal about that.

@ShadowRJ The thing is you can still collect the game (for now). It's just not in this box. I think it's complicated because many people are digital only but still want the collectors edition.

Yet I still don't understand why they can't just have a dropdown at checkout which is code in the box or physical disc and keep both sides happy. (I say I don't understand but I do realise there are logistical issues with that)

@dwayne91 I thought you said it far better, and more succinctly, than I did! Liked immediately. Great minds think alike...

Yet it is complicated. I don't think 7/10 is a bad score, but unless you are a huge fan of the genre or IP I think it may be a wait. There's just too many games to choose from.

@The_Jobbo & @PuppetMaster More widely on the 7/10 not being a great score... I think this is complicated. I certainly don't think 7/10 is a BAD score... but the reality is that most gamers can only play a small handful of games this year.

For example I could ONLY play 85+ Metactritic games, of which this is one, and still never keep up with all the releases. (FYI there have been fifty-eight 85+ games so far this year)

So on one hand why ever play a 7/10?

At the same time, thankfully, gaming isn't so one dimensional, scores are subjective and one man's 6/10 may be another's 9/10, or vice versa if you don't like the genre. In fact I tend to often like those aggregated 7-8/10 games that try a bit more than others that aggregate 8.5-9/10 that are well polished but more by the book.

But I can also understand people being disappointed in a 7/10 score, even if that isn't the same as bad, we only have so much time to play games.

@The_Jobbo I actually largely agree with you.

You are right that reviews are always subjective, one man's chalk is another man's cheese. As I said in my first comment, and my reply to you, I think I will like this game and am going to take a punt on it. £24.99 is a more than fair price imo. Whereas if it was £49.99, or more, I would likely wait for a sale.

FWIW I played the demo, which while very short, had enough to make me think this will be up my street. Though I did also have some reservations so I was interested in waiting for reviews.

Me too. I just skip them. No one needs to 100% games if they don't enjoy it.

This is the great misunderstanding with AI code, you still need coders to understand what they are inputting and what AI is outputting, it's just using AI to write the code itself. It's true you may perhaps need fewer coders in total, but it's not replacing "nearly all jobs".

@The_Jobbo I don't think it's that simple. People were hoping for, and perhaps expecting more than just another competent metroidvania, which is what the words of this review say far more than the score. I don't think ANYONE has acted like it's a 2 out of 10, that's hyperbole on your part, but lines like the following are quite damning in a genre that has singnificantly evolved.

I just don't feel like it's particularly standout in any way, really. The combat is okay, and the way the game unfolds is enjoyable if unsurprising.

But I agree about your F1 analogy, if you like Castlevania you will likely like this. I suspect I will too.