Balaam_

@neillaw I was thinking about that earlier. Pro is significantly more capable than the X, in fact the power delta between them is greater than that between base PS5 and the stronger X. Yet somehow Blubber team coded the game so poorly it runs worse on Pro. In pure technical terms this shouldn’t be the case. It’s straight up lack of skill at optimization.

And of course they passed the blame onto Konami who is too lazy to address it, so nothing gets done about it. All we have are 4 mediocre console versions, all flawed, where the X is the least stinky poop of the bunch. That’s no win; we all lost.

Both versions look rather poor without the RTGI the game was clearly arted around. The fallback lighting is flat and dull and ruins the presentation. That said, the framerate on the S is surprisingly smooth and makes a world of difference—those stutters and frame time spikes on Switch 2 are really noticeable. Between the two, I’d prefer to play on the S for that reason alone.

I still find it irritating Publishers/Platform holders decide to count games that they published but otherwise had little or nothing to do with as ‘first party’. I don’t consider Death Stranding or Ninja Gaiden 4 or Bayonetta 3 as first party by any stretch of the imagination. Doesn’t diminish the quality of a game by any means, but calling it ‘first party’ is a misnomer these platform holders should avoid.

Is there a current gen port/native app being worked on for FO76, or am I mistaken about that? I thought I remembered hearing something about that, but it seems this isn’t the update for it if it’s happening.

Just played through Thank Goodness You’re Here over on PS. Absolutely fantastic. Best indie I’ve played in a long time. Perfect trophy/achievement list too; I can’t heap enough praise on that. All other devs should be forced to take classes on how to design such an impeccable trophy/achievement list!

I pressed “None of these” so hard my thumb nearly punched through my phone screen and came out the other side

There was a news item drifting through most videogame news sites recently about how, in a nutshell, many Xbox devs were extremely happy to be able to finally sell their stuff on PlayStation and make big bucks off that platform. For that story to be even remotely accurate and still somehow align with what the executive is saying in this article, there would need to be a scenario where the dev is making most of its money off actual sales on PS, PC and/or Switch while being offered a decent sized Gamepass bag to boot. At that point everything aligns—they’re making actual fiscally relevant revenue off individual unit sales on other platforms while also benefiting from the ‘hey cool, we got a Gamepass bag along with it!’ Xbox approach.

Otherwise there’s conflicting info at play here. ‘Gamepass is great, yet oh thank god we also get to sell on PS because we desperately need to recoup investment’—it doesn’t mix.

7/10 Good. The game itself is excellent, and I’d have given this an 8 or 9 if not for the garbage optimization (or lack thereof). The fact that the Series X version is the best of the worst ports isn’t so much a ‘win’ for Xbox players as it is an indictment against Bloober Team’s technical inadequacies. Pro should easily be the best version even with a crappy PSSR implementation (power delta between X and Pro is significantly bigger than between base PS5 and the X), but here we see poor optimization all around. Stutters, frame time spikes galore, traversal hitches, muddy resolutions…it’s not a good showing on any console. Pity, the game deserves much better!

The shoe business is rapidly evolving and selling these only on the crocs website is antiquated business. These should be available on PlayStation Direct! More shoes for more people benefits everyone!

@Shinato2024 how is that impressive? Microsoft simply bought them. Would it be as impressive if another super rich entity had acquired them, like Tencent or Elon or the Nvidia?

Let’s not kid ourselves here. While ‘Every developer would love to have their hard work enjoyed by as many people as possible’ is certainly true, the driving force will always be money

While one platform’s userbase has been conditioned to not buy games and to just ‘wait until it’s on gamepass’, the rest of the industry doesn’t adhere to that model anywhere near as closely. Those Nintendo and PlayStation people predominantly buy games à la carte. That’s a big stack of cash sitting there for the taking, the same stack of cash many of these developers/studios/publishers used to be able to count on when projecting profits, but now that they’ve been sent to toil in the gamepass mines they view it only from a distance—until very recently. So now that they’re tasting that sweet, sweet ‘customer actually buys game’ pie again, of course they’re overjoyed.

Play Anywhere is absolutely irrelevant to me. I invested in a top of the line television and each console, along with the plushest and comfiest of furniture. My minifridge is within arm’s reach and a plethora of USB connections are at hand to charge all my devices. I am ensconced. Think Mojo from the X-Men and you’re not far off.

In other words, I have less than no desire to play anywhere else, so ‘Play Anywhere’ is nothing but an afterthought, an unutilized addendum to the core experience of gaming.

Didn’t know this wasn’t on Xbox already. Just finished it an hour ago on PS5, it’s fantastic. One of the best indies I’ve played yet this generation. Highly recommended. Brilliant trophy list, and I imagine the achievements are identical.

Resolution tops out a bit higher on PS consoles, but the series X holds to that 60fps line more consistently which is the better win. It’s a textbook example of lousy, incompetent ‘optimization’. There is more of a power delta between the X and the Pro than there is between base PS5 and the X. Anything the X can do, the Pro can do better—but it doesn’t.

Seems like a win, but it isn’t. Consider—if Konami had let Sony develop it in-house, we could have seen a scenario where Nixxes did the PC port. Which would be the best version, and playable on Magnus next gen. Which would mean Xbox would have the best version, but it would be a case of having the best version without any compromises. As things stand, the X version is the ‘best’ version but it’s a poorly optimized port that’s only marginally better than the already garbage PS5 version.

Can’t wait for the DF assessment. It’s a great game, but plagued with incessant performance issues on PlayStation. Very curious if it was fixed, or if they just pushed out the same poorly optimized code. The game deserves better.

Expedition 33 winning ‘Best Visual Design’ is a travesty of justice. The game does a lot of things right, but it’s hideous. The design aesthetic is truly grotesque. I can think of 5 other games already nominated (and several that weren’t) that all have visual design language orders of magnitude above what 33 brings to the table. This is clearly pandering to everyone overhyping this game and trying to turn it from something simply great into ‘Greatest game in the history of the universe times infinity, bar none, and shall never be outdone’ nonsense.

This was basically the equivalent of Sony’s last show; a decent amount of variety, but nothing really screamed ‘must play’. D+ or C-, in that range.

@Cakefish Depends exactly how the guessing game tiles work. If it’s only giving one correct letter clue, possibly. If it’s more like Wheel of Fortune where a correct letter appears in all spots it’s located in, then it’s a No.

Magic 8 Ball says “Signs point to Microsoft acquiring Rockstar, then shutting down studio and cancelling GTA6 prior to release”

This is unintentionally disturbing. Making the nexus button or whatever it’s called one of SpongeBob’s eyes only reminds me of the technique of using x’s for cartoon character’s eyes to insinuate death or some other extremely negative state.

Her statement implies everything they’re doing is the best decision possible. Only a fool misconstrues things that are ‘bad’ and ‘worse’ for things that are “new” and “different”. In other words, “prioritize what matters most” means ‘that which makes the most money as quickly as possible, no matter what’s actually better for gamers’.

A true master of prestidigitation.

‘Pay no attention to the focus of Satya, Amy Hood and the other corporate overlords; dismiss the mixed messaging and multiple 180 degree U-turns we’ve made over the past two generations; ignore the handwriting on the wall; just focus on me right now while I misdirect you.’

@Lup that’s like saying since the ozone layer will inevitably become more depleted as time goes on that factories should start spewing out more pollution sooner rather than later.

Let me see, if I remember right the first year is paper, the second is cotton…25th anniversary is to give away the most iconic franchise you own—your most treasured exclusive—to your former competitors, right?

@fatpunkslim That “team dedicated to multiplatform” you mentioned doesn’t refer to what you think, it’s for exactly the type of content @Fiendish-Beaver spoke about. Predominantly live service multiplayer fare on PC (and Xbox if financial prognostications make it seem like it’s worth it), as well as smaller spinoff stuff like that crappy Lego Horizon game on Switch. If you think you’re going to play a native version of God of War or something on an Xbox console (a real xbox console, not a pc with some Xbox compatibility layer) you’re way out in left field.

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Steam Deck wasn’t the first pc handheld, but it undoubtedly defined the market for these things. ROG ally X represents validation, if nothing else. It’s a niche market, but one at least profitable enough for the manufacturers to consider worth pursuing.

@themightyant I was thinking the same thing. I bet the people who worked on these games find it frustrating though. I wonder how fast this issue would be resolved if instead of affecting these ‘never heard of it’ games, it was affecting CoD or Minecraft…

I’m of the David Lynch-ian mindset when it comes to handhelds in general: you will never get the best experience with any given game on a handheld. Period. It isn’t the same; it isn’t even close. Handhelds are neat from a strictly technological perspective, but are an inferior experience compared to enjoying the same game on the big screen—in this case, any decent modern television set.

I grew up with gameboy, DS, PSP etc and while those were fun distractions while riding the schoolbus I’m a grown man now. I’m not going to sacrifice framerate, resolution, screen size and possibly VRR or other bells and whistles (depending on the handheld) just to have an inferior experience ‘on the go’. My Switch has seen handheld play 2 or 3 times in its life, all of which happened during power outages. It’s been docked 99% of the time.

Tiny screens, compromised settings, blurry visuals chugging along at substandard framerates, one eye on the action and the other on an ever depleting battery—and all for exorbitant sums of hundreds or perhaps a thousand dollars or more? No thanks.

Do yourselves a favor and invest that $1K in a pc that’s orders of magnitude more capable than any overpriced handheld.

More choice is good, huh? Reeks of insincerity. How about we get more first party games shipped on disc with the full game on disc minus any internet download BS? We don’t get that ‘choice’ very often anymore.

Not being able to carry over saves and needing a restart isn’t as big a deal when the game is of this level of quality 👌

Younger me could never afford a 3DO when that system was on the market, and now that I’ve become more involved in the retro scene I wish I owned one at the time. I wonder if the Series machines will succumb to the same fate many years from now? I could see 8-10 year olds without a job right now not being able to afford a $600+ series X, and wishing they could have 20 years from now.

These metrics aren’t bad at all. Good showing for both systems. Say what you will about a million questionable decisions regarding CoD, but these developers consistently push fairly impressive tech under the hood on all platforms. Kind of depressing this junk runs so well while Oblivion is a seizure inducing stutterfest.

It would seem gaming never moved forward between the NES and the launch of the Xbox Series Consoles, what with all the exclusives and closed ecosystems and all.

This was expected sooner rather than later. Gabe is going to press the advantage and gain a foothold in the living room before Microsoft’s Steam-esque UI ambitions come to fruition. Xbox isn’t competing with TikTok, it’s competing with Steam and that’s a battle I don’t think they can win.

This is one of Xbox’s first and most successful pivots, namely the acknowledgment that Forza Motorpsort just can’t beat the ambition and lavish attention to detail of the GT games, so they needed to carve out a new path. Nothing like Forza Horizon existed on PS, still doesn’t, and Playground Games managed to dominate this subgenre for decades.

I like the translucent green motif. Reminds me of the glory days of the original Xbox; I had a controller with that same aesthetic way back then.

No Wandering Sword or Tokyo Xtreme Racer? ☹️

Where is the ‘I was never subscribed. I buy-to-own, I do not pay-to-rent’ poll option?

Reggie, E3 2004: “I’m here to kick @ss and take names.”

Reggie, Game Business interview 2025: “There’s one less @ss to kick, and one less name to take.”

Fantastic game. Some of the best real time combat out there. I played this immediately after FF16 and it reinforced how much of a repetitive spamfest of a joke 16’s combat was by way of comparison. Stellar Blade looks great, plays great, and was different enough story-wise to keep me interested to the end.

The best part? The trophy list was an absolute joy, perhaps the most perfect platinum I’ve ever had the pleasure of unlocking. All other developers should take notes regarding their own trophy and achievement lists.

If this ever comes to Xbox, do yourself a favor and don’t sleep on it. Stellar Blade is eminently worthy of a playthrough or two.

Every multiplayer live service focused title should be multiplatform. Keep top tier single player experiences exclusive to create a compelling reason to draw players into your ecosystem, then let third parties and multiplayer multiplats keep them satiated until the next major tentpole exclusive reminds them why they stick around.

The only time(s) this tried and true formula has failed is when a platform holder either cannot create good enough first party exclusives or the third party support has been woefully lacking. The first half of PS3’s lifecycle, the WiiU, and the past couple Xbox’s all demonstrate a failure to walk this line. In contrast the first half of the Xbox 360’s lifecycle, the second half of the PS3’s lifecycle into the PS4 generation, and the Switch all demonstrate the proven success of this formula.

Series S has a lot of positive points working in its favor (or at least it did prior to exorbitant price hikes), but the decision to exclude a disc drive or any possibility of ever attaching one immediately killed any desire I would possibly have had for it.

It’s an anti-consumer decision that tries to strongarm people into being held hostage to the Xbox marketplace where you own nothing and can’t resell used games, or have any way to revert back to a previous version of a game if devs screw it up with a bad update.

The hardware capabilities are excellent. I don’t think anyone could nitpick the actual tech, especially back in 2020 when it launched.

Implementation is another story. Things are often done in the worst possible way (ads? On my console dashboard? Fire the person responsible.)

Games are hit or miss. Sometimes they launch in a crap state but slowly improve (Halo Infinite), sometimes they’re awesome right out of the gate (Forza 5), sometimes the game is great but worthless corporate stupidity and greed drag it down anyway (games like Outer Worlds 2 that get a disc version which could hold the full game but instead there’s a worthless 50mb keycode on the disc), and other times the game is just irredeemable broken garbage that no amount of time or attention can fix (Starfield).

Overall the generation was a disappointing letdown.

Is it just the faceplate and the hard drive that’s custom? I didn’t notice anything about the console itself, unless I missed it

Tried this on gamepass at a friend’s house. Seems to be identical to the physical disc copy I already bought? I couldn’t notice any gamepass specific differences, but simply knowing I don’t own this version and that it can be removed at a moment’s notice (and that it requires an internet connection to stream or download) makes it the less enjoyable experience of the two.

@DennisReynolds this is true. Although technically it’s ‘free’ in one of the PS+ tiers if you’re one of those people that enjoys renting games

“With multiple Halo titles in development, we’ll need our whole team's combined focus to deliver new experiences with the same passion…”

Halo Infinite was one game and the whole team was focused solely on that, and look what state that launched in. Now they’re splitting the team’s focus between multiple entries…? I can only imagine what state each of these will launch in.

@fatpunkslim That’s the most ludicrous thing I’ve heard all week. It isn’t launching into PC, and Microsoft’s console market share is a drop in the bucket. There’s no incentive for R* to partner with Xbox. They aren’t in need of any cash and it’s highly unlikely Microsoft would offer enough to make it worth their while, not with Amy Hood guarding the books. And since you don’t believe in coincidences, when your speculation turns out to be utterly inaccurate, does that mean you’ll understand why it would never have happened? Or will you chalk it up to coincidence?

Good game. Story beats felt unfinished/unpolished, but it had a lot of great stuff going for it too.

And people say Xbox fans don’t buy games!