Comments 393

Re: God Damn! Alan Wake 2 Just Looks Incredible on PS5

truerbluer

I'm cautiously pessimistic about this. I've always found Remedy games to have a great premise behind them but they always drop the ball when it comes to gameplay execution. This video does nothing to alleviate my concerns and the shockingly poor frame rate for a game so close to release doesn't help either.

Re: Final Fantasy 16 Producer Reckons One Gaming Platform Would Be Better for Everyone

truerbluer

Anybody remember the dark ages of Internet Explorer 6?

Well that's exactly what would happen if there was only one gaming platform; massive hardware stagnation with no motivation for innovation. Of course devs would love this because then they could maximise sales by targeting the lowest common denominator and put the least amount of effort into development. It makes no business sense for them to push for high spec requirements because they'll never make their money back if only tiny segment of the market has the means to play the game at all, and we'll all suffer from shoddy looking games.

That's why consoles specifically are crucial for video game advancement. Without a base console to target we would just be getting mobile phone tier games from most devs.

And you can't conflate music and movies to video games because unlike music and movies, games require a minimum base spec of hardware and software to run, hardware that's continually evolving, which isn't the case for movies and music.

Re: PS5 Showpiece Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart Jumps to the PC Dimension in July

truerbluer

@naruball You're the one being disingenous with your comparison, "It's gone as low as 29.39 USD" but your own link shows the game is currently $69.99

And the irony of saying I'm cherry picking when you're listing Amazon prices for physical copies when I clearly stated I made a like-for-like digital retail store comparison. The Amazon prices are worthless to a Digital PS5 owner.

If I wanted to cherry pick I would have just listed any number of legitimate cd-key sellers for PC that price games even lower than on Steam.

I mentioned piracy because everyone that has a PC has that option available to them. It's entirely up to them whether their conscience allows them to make use of this. Consoles will never have PC beat when it comes to digital game pricing unless they incorporate DRM that prevents piracy.

Re: PS5 Showpiece Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart Jumps to the PC Dimension in July

truerbluer

@naruball I'm comparing like-for-like digital retail stores at their normal selling price.

Steam has it at £49.99: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1895880/Ratchet__Clank_Rift_Apart/

PS Store has it at £69.99: https://store.playstation.com/en-gb/product/EP9000-PPSA01474_00-RATCHETCLANKRIFT

I'm not including temporary discounted prices or subscription addons here. If you want to use these as a price win over PC just remember PC owners can just as easily pull out the piracy card and end the comparison right there.

Re: PlayStation Showcase Completely Divided Fan Opinion

truerbluer

The majority of games showcased here were of the quality you'd expect from a Game Awards/Summer Game Fest/PC Gaming show. A bunch of no-name indie devs should not be the main attraction to any console maker's big showcase event, especially when they're not even exclusive in the first place.

Xbox manages to get away with these kinds of game reveals because they at least advertise that all the games on their show will appear on GamePass from day one, so at the very least subscribers will check out games that interests them. Sony on the other hand actually believes their audience will go out and buy most of these games. They're completely out of touch if they sincerely believe the average PlayStation fan/owner cares about 90% of the titles they showcased, which were nothing but CG trailers, live service games and low budget indie titles that don't even justify the need for PS5 hardware.

Re: Reaction: Sony's PS5, PC Live Service Strategy Won't Work If It's All Samey Shooters

truerbluer

@TrickyDicky99 It's already happening: the fine print during the Helldivers 2 trailer says "PS Plus membership required for online multiplayer", though it's not clear if that also means for PC but I very much doubt it if they have any hope of actually selling the game there.

I've always maintained that Sony should either drop the paywall when cross-play is involved or charge PC players to access PSN players while still allowing them to play with other PC players for free. Those are the only equitable solutions.

Re: Marvel's Spider-Man 2 Swings Back with Stunning PS5 Gameplay Trailer

truerbluer

This honestly was pretty disappointing from a visual standpoint. I was hoping to be blown away after all the hype about how Insomniac will fully utilise the PS5's capabilities, but other than the instant loading there's nothing about this that screams current gen only. The textures in particular are still too blurry, like they were on PS4. It also doesn't help that the gameplay isn't shown in 60 fps.

Re: Sony Won't Back Down on PC Ports, But PS5 Is the Priority

truerbluer

When Jim Ryan said 2-3 years for games to go to PC I hope he meant the big tentpole single player titles will take at least 3 years and not 2. A 3 year gap is just inconvenient enough to make a PS5 purchase worth it but 2 years absolutely isn't. I don't mind if the less successful and more niche titles go to PC within 2 years though like Returnal since they clearly aren't system sellers.

Ideally would have preferred a 4-5 year gap since that's the typical time it takes for a studio to release their next game, so while the old game is releasing on PC the new one is about to come out on PS5.

Re: Media Molecule to Cease Live Service for Dreams, Now Working on a New Project

truerbluer

Right from the start when Dreams was announced many people could tell it would be a colossal flop. How can a big budget first-party AAA studio not foresee that the kind of "game" Dreams was aiming to be would only appeal to an über niche audience? Did they really expect people to devote valuable time and effort learning to create free content and expect nothing back in return?

Talk about a fundamental misunderstanding of who your core audience is. It also isn't shocking that this project led to some high profile departures from the company. Hopefully now they understand their next project has to be something that actually appeals to their primary audience and not just a freeform tech demo stretched into a retail release. Nail down the gameplay loop first then build a game around that.

Re: Talking Point: Is 2024 Too Soon for PS5 Pro?

truerbluer

It makes no sense to release a PS5 Pro. People who are obsessed with playing at the highest frame rates and resolutions will simply choose PC over console. It makes even less sense to release a Pro model for the PS5 because Sony's first-party titles are all releasing on PC now so why would anyone interested in high-end gaming pick a PS5 Pro over a PC?

At least back when the PS4 Pro released Sony had actual exclusives that couldn't be played elsewhere so it made sense to market that console as the best place to play their first-party titles as a last ditch attempt to retain players from migrating over to PC.

A PS5 Pro would be relegated to an incredibly niche audience and I can't imagine it would be profitable.

Re: Poll: Did You Love Sony's Latest State of Play Livestream?

truerbluer

RE4 is the only thing here that interests me and even that was a let down. I really dislike this remake's art direction. The game is way too dark, the colours are over saturated and the overuse of fog looks awful. The original had a way better visual style to me that actually captured the desolate village feel. The game will probably play fine but can't say I'm happy with the way it looks.

Re: Resident Evil 4 Fronts Game Informer Issue, New Gameplay Revealed

truerbluer

That rain looks awful and the overall graphics just don't look any better than the RE2 and RE3 remakes on last gen systems. The lack of graphical progress is really getting annoying now; we're in the 3rd year of this generation and most third parties simply aren't pulling their weight when it comes to visuals. I guess they have no real incentive to when they continue to make cross-gen games and have no hardware to sell. To date there's still nothing that comes close to Demon's Souls visuals, and that was a launch title!

Re: The Last of Us: Part I on PC Costs $20 Less Than PS5 Version

truerbluer

What's more dumb is the PC release gives Sony a 70/30 revenue split so they stand to make even less on PC. Sony is sabotaging their console customer relations and really testing their tolerance with moves like this. Loyal console owners are being punished with a more expensive, technically stunted version of the game while new PC players outside the ecosystem are getting the unfettered bells and whistles treatment, and this time it only took a mere 6 months for this ever shrinking port turnaround.

Like it or not this is the direction Sony is heading in; expensive PS5 games at launch going to PC not long after with additional features making the "definitive" version for sale cheaper with no PS+ requirements for online multiplayer. Hopefully a large number of PS5 owners will start to recognise this pattern as more of these ports continue and respond accordingly.

Re: The Last of Us: Part I Endures and Survives on PC in March

truerbluer

I'm not mad that they announced this PC release, in fact I applaud Sony for clearly communicating that it would release for PC not long after the PS5 version. At least they gave us the heads up to make our purchasing decision accordingly so nobody needed to rush getting it on PS5 out of port uncertainty. They should take the same transparent approach with all their future announcements so we can really judge for ourselves whether the PS5 is a worthwhile purchase at all.

What really irks me here is the price difference between the PS5 and PC versions. They spent all that time justifying the £70 price hike in articles and tweets from devs only to price it cheaper on PC, whose storefronts split the revenue 70/30. So in the end they release a better version of the same game that isn't crippled by console limitations and reward the PC players with a cheaper price while PS5 owners get royally screwed yet again.

The case is even worse for Returnal which won't even have the PS+ requirements for online play on PC and was falsely marketed as a PS5 exclusive. The minimum specs for Returnal are listed as only needing a GTX 1060 and an SSD is only "recommended" not required. So we have more proof that these games are not designed to fully utilise the PS5 and we will probably never get any true games made just for PS5 now that they're all seemingly PC bound.

Re: Uncharted PC Port Has Lowest Player Count of Any Sony Game at Launch

truerbluer

I don't buy the excuse that it's selling poorly due to PC players not having the prior games for backstory. The Uncharted games are largely self-contained stories anyway. Explain how Metal Gear Solid V was successful on PC when neither MGS3 or MGS4 ever came to PC.

I bet Sony will still come out and say they were pleased with these pitiful numbers though and will have zero effect on how quick they release their PC ports.

Re: Despite Scrapping PS4, Gotham Knights Is Just 30fps on PS5

truerbluer

This is nothing but developer incompetence. They spent the last 9 years (!?) developing this PS3 looking game and they still can't manage to achieve 60fps on current gen hardware when almost every game released so far has at least offered a frame rate priority mode in their games.

According to their Steam page, all that's required on PC to achieve 1080p/60fps is a GTX 1660 Ti, which is far weaker than what these current gen consoles have.

Re: Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales Crawls onto PC in November

truerbluer

@Sqush-Pare I can think of a few reasons:

  • People were mislead into buying a PS5 for the better performance believing it was a Sony exclusive game
  • The game costs £39.99 on Steam while it's still £49.99 on PlayStation Store with no signs of price parity in future
  • The rhetoric that games are being designed to incorporate PS5's unique features (SSD, DualSense etc.) will never come into fruition as long as these PC ports continue to target low and mid spec PCs with slow hard drives and keyboard/mouse controls, so PS5 owners feel they've essentially just bought an upgraded PS4 Pro
  • Online features will still require paying for PS+ while being completely free on PC

Re: Shocking: Sony Doesn't Want Game Pass on PlayStation, Microsoft Has a Pop at PS Plus

truerbluer

Some things need to be clarified here. If Microsoft wants to bring Game Pass to PlayStation, do they intend to port over all their 1st party games to run natively on PlayStation? Or are they only offering deals with 3rd party publishers on Game Pass for PlayStation?

If it's the former it makes no sense at all because then PlayStation would receive everything Microsoft produces as well as Sony's own 1st party games so why would anyone ever get an Xbox at that point? Even if they are staggered releases Microsoft would stand to lose even more Xbox customers from this, which would be disastrous to their business.

Whereas the latter offer of only 3rd party games on Game Pass for PlayStation is nothing but a trojan horse to undermine game sales on PlayStation and provides a backdoor for Microsoft to directly make money from PlayStation customers while Sony loses out on the 30% cut it would get from purchased games. If Sony were to accept this it would certainly raise suspicion of collusion taking place.

Re: PS5 Exclusives Will Take at Least One Year to Launch on PC

truerbluer

@Agramonte Sure but not everyone has the luxury to get a disc PS5, many settled for the digital PS5 just because that's all they could find.

There's no way anyone can defend the optics with the PC price though. Not only is the PC version full of all the bells and whistles unavailable on console (ultrawide, mods, free online etc), they have the gall to price it lower than the console release. It makes no sense to charge less on PC where they're additionally forced to take a 70% cut, it just shows pure contempt for their console customers. The message being received here is "go to PC to play our games cheaper and better than what our console can ever offer, and now you only have to wait a year for new releases!".

Re: PlayStation Bigwigs Won't Shut Up About PC, Smartphones

truerbluer

All the signs are clearly pointing to a console exit strategy.

Hulst even said in the interview that all PS games will come to PC after "at least a year" from the PS release with the exception to live service games coming day and date. A one year gap is simply worthless, just go day and date and be done with it already.

Re: Sackboy: A Big Adventure PC Version Dated for 27th October

truerbluer

So just in 2022 for PC we have firm releases for:

God of War
Marvel's Spider-Man
Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales
Uncharted 4: A Thief's End
Uncharted: The Lost Legacy
Sackboy: A Big Adventure

And already announced/leaked for PC:

The Last of Us Part I
Returnal

And these are just the ports for one year; the gap is getting smaller and smaller.

Meanwhile not a single new first party PS5-only game has been announced in all of 2022.

How can anyone honestly feel that PS5 is still the main focus at PlayStation? Even key PlayStation employees like Shuhei Yoshida and Cory Barlog are constantly posting images of their SteamDeck on social media. I can't think of any other business that would allow their public figureheads to repeatedly undermine the product they're selling by promoting a direct rival like this.

Re: Resident Evil 4 Remake Is Now Coming to PS4 as Well

truerbluer

Only the second time in history that I can recall where two different games with the exact same name released on the same console. The first time being Need for Speed: Most Wanted on Xbox 360.

As for this RE4 remake, the reveal video left me unimpressed and this announcement only reaffirms that it's deliberately being held back from what it could have been.

Re: Tekken 8 Officially Revealed for PS5

truerbluer

I wish these modern fighting games would at least bring back the single player modes that have become absent in recent entries. I don't understand why they removed classic staples like Team Battle, Survival and Time Attack modes from the latest games. I'd even settle for a new Tekken Force mode instead of the lousy Story mode from the last game. The Story mode ends all too quickly and has zero replay value.

I also miss having to actually earn new characters by unlocking them from completing the Arcade mode, but I understand why that's no longer possible due to the heavy online focus these days and requirement for immediate access.

Re: PlayStation Acquires Savage Game Studios, Focusing on Mobile Games

truerbluer

I don't understand how PlayStation fans truly think diversifying into mobile and PC is a good thing for the console. The alleged claim is the money generated there will be pumped into more single player AAA console games but there's absolutely no evidence of that and I can't think of ANY other game company that has successfully used this as a strategy.

All we know for certain is that Sony aims to release 12 live service games by 2025, no mention of any AAA single player games (other than the ones we know, SM2 + Wolverine).

There's already a price hike of £70 for first party games on console and we've yet to see how that's contributed in any way to the improvement of future releases. I'm more willing to believe the price hike is actually contributing more to the mobile and PC divisions and it's the console gamers who are being bled dry with nothing to show for it.

Re: Don't Be Surprised if Sony Brings PSN Integration to PC Games

truerbluer

@ryanburnsred So you'd rather have console users continue getting screwed over paying for server costs so that PC players can enjoy playing for free? PC players who can freely create infinite accounts to cheat and hack games with no repercussions? A paywall would greatly deter that from happening and ruining cross-play like it already has for Warzone. Once PSN gets into the mix they're no longer separate ecosystems. I'd wager it would be a greater PR nightmare for Sony when their core console players realise they're being taken advantage of and the only ones forced to pay for the same cross-play servers PC gamers are using.

The PSN during the PS3 era was awful, did you forget about the 2011 network outage where data was stolen? It was because of that that people accepted the need to pay for online for a better more secure service and PSN drastically improved as a result.

If PC players have no issues paying for MMO subscriptions, they shouldn't have an issue with paying a subscription for these upcoming live service games.

Re: Don't Be Surprised if Sony Brings PSN Integration to PC Games

truerbluer

@Nepp67 That's exactly why I'm eager to see how they'll handle it. They even went to great lengths to remove multiplayer from these new versions (Uncharted, TLOU) on both PS5 and PC. So I can't wait to see what happens when they release a game with online multiplayer and they don't address the PS+ requirement discrepancy between console and PC. I really hope PlayStation players speak up against any paywall discrepancy if it ultimately does exist, unlike Xbox players who let Microsoft steamroll them into paying XBL Gold for Netflix and free to play games which are otherwise completely free on all other platforms.