FreasurePlanten

@oopsiezz Yeah, I can only imagine it will be a negotiating mess. Just what Sony needed at the moment: less goodwill.

Just a headsup that Jason Schreier is not another leaker or wannabe leaker. He is a journalist for a reputable outlet who regularly interviews and talks to devs at several studios.

I kind of expected these two peaks. I use it way more than 15 hours a month. I wonder if this will affect GFN? I use that to have the best in-game settings on my TV. I have also been exploring that Vita app you guys helpfully mentioned the other day. Works surprisingly well! But I will probably start using it to remote play my Series S when the app starts allowing for that.

@bert0503 Looks Hela fun!

The amounts of hours are ridiculous...

Having had a look at the XCT website, it seems there's an awful coincidence of games from certain publishers all not working. I'm thinking of Ubisoft and SEGA, for instance. Square Enix too, iirc?
This makes me worried that it will be up to publishers to decide whether they'll allow it or not, and I'm not surprised these particular companies would be against it. Just... sad.

Nice to know that Gravhounds is coming to Game Pass, it looks fun. It's going to be a struggle in February with two juggernaut RPGs. And both look amazing.

I'm always a bit concerned when executives say innovation and are vague. Often those innovations are not great. And people are being encouraged to take credit or pay instalments, which is not great. Let's see how it goes, but Sony and Microsoft will be in a pickle concerning next gen consoles.

I don't like the format that Xbox is going for. It reminds me of the IGN panels. I'd prefer it if they concentrated all the news in a one to two-hours showcase.

@Fiendish-Beaver Unfortunately, I think so many developers rushing to avoid GTA VI will prove their undoing. Talk of "Oversaturation" is an understatement for what we'll be witnessing the next couple of months. I really hope it doesn't happen, but sadly I see many layoffs coming as a result of this.

@deadmaker Totally agree.

@deadmaker I think the only exception is when the companies funds the project. For instance, Bayonetta 2 wouldn't exist if Nintendo hadn't funded the game's development. But it doesn't seem to be the case here.

Timed exclusives seemed to be on the way out, so it's sad to see them coming back. It's literally an investment not in game development, but in keeping games accessible to less people.

You wouldn't download a car

@FraserG Yap! I'm making heavy use of my wishlist. Especially for older games that don't get much space to shine anymore.

I would probably wait for Helix if they have any installments based plan.

I have fully completed Ball X Pit on 4 different platforms now. It's really good, give it a try!

Forgot to add in my last comment, ao apologies for double posting. But... while I do understand the financial motives for this, I think it's always a shame when companies delist older versions of media when they release remasters or remakes. The newer versions shouldn't be seen as replacing the old ones, but rather as new ways of (re)experiencing that media.

@Fiendish-Beaver Indeed, I also pondered if I should really write that comment. So I tried to convey it in a way that, I hope, can be taken as light jesting.

@Balaam_ Completely agree. I hope this whole situation with Sony having become more mainstream that some legislators start paying more attention to the issue of digital ownership. I'm particularly hopeful about EU legislation, as they have taken a number of moves to protect consumers over the years. A lot less sure about those who live outside the EU, who I assume are most of the people coming here.

@Jenkinss I don't mean anything by it, but the way you worded that can be given a different reading and that gave me a chuckle. To the point of the article: for me they sometimes click and I keep visiting for short bits everyday, but it's not a genre I play a lot.

@cronogold Rockstar has the luxury of not needing to do that, as they know people will come back anyway. They're getting away with a Netflix exclusive gameplay showcase lol

Netflix exclusive trailers, I'm sure, make even less sense for the consumers. Sadly this game is already going to be a huge success from the pre-orders alone (and we haven't even seen any gameplay!). But I really wish it would crash and burn, they're pushing, and incentivizing others to push, a bunch of anti-consumer practices.

I'm looking forward to it. Having something signaling that you got all achievements, even if it's just a decorative thing like on Steam helps with the satisfaction of doing it all!

I think I won't tune in for the broadcast, but instead will follow your coverage here. I really like the artworks and animations for TGS.

I'm curious to try out Date Everything. And as for value, this is just half a month, and we just got two exclusives day-one. For my part, just the number of hours I have on Forza Horizon 6 would have justified the price since then

I think October might be when we get achievements for some og Xbox games, then.

@Balaam_ I can digitally buy Xbox and 360 games on Series consoles. I can't do the same for PS3 games on PS5, and the offering of PS2 games is often meager or arbitrarily restricted to PS Plus Premium. Plus they have just started BC on PC. They're the ones that are making more effort from all 3 in assuring you keep your games.

Among these, the only one I have an interest in is Firewatch, but I already own it on a different platform and it goes for really cheap very often.

It's kind of sad to reflect that my expectations are very much tempered concerning Beast of Reincarnation because I know it's made by Game Freak. This was exactly the opposite about 15 years ago. I hope they can prove themselves with this and the next gen Pokémon games.

I generally like the direction Xbox has been taking of late (though you may argue that they could have done with less layoffs or handled it a bit more gracefully), but I'm getting quite tired of this corporatespeak from her. There's almost no content in this message, and it's so vague that it could mean anything. Just buzz words.

@Markatron84 But in this case they would be the same version/copy of the game regardless of where you play it, right?

Since this is back compat, does it mean that some of these games I bought on Xbox Series could be played on PC?

I know it's very unlikely, but I'd love for older Forza Horizon games to come back, if they sorted licensing.

@Fiendish-Beaver I think they're set to reveal the multiplayer component of E-Day by the end of the month!

I would have been excited if it supported Xbox Play Anywhere and they stopped requiring going through Ubisoft Connect. This being the case, I don't see much purpose

Are 360 games already playable on PC? Or any word on them coming over? I'm particularly excited about achievements coming to og Xbox games.

@Fiendish-Beaver I agree with everything you said. I'm just currently skeptical that Sony's live service side of the business will get much better, as many projects were duds or cancelled, and they seemed to be relying on Bungie's guidance... which is not ending up well. And given all the negativity I've been seeing around regarding next gen, I'm not sure they could take so many losses on live service games again, without having to branch out to other platforms. Of course, if the PS6 is a hybrid system, they might be able to make a more interesting case for a digital-only platform. It will for sure be interesting to see. I think the real test case for Xbox will be when Helix releases. I don't think many people are keen on investing in a Series console right now, when we know that Helix is coming in a year or two. So it will be then, I think, that we will see if Microsoft can bring players back to their ecosystem. I think that in that context it makes sense for them to have some exclusives again.

@Fiendish-Beaver I think they can have a halfway approach, sitting between not bringing any games to PS and other platforms, or bringing them all day and date. There will probably be a period of testing, and Forza Horizon 6 seems to be one of those experiments, and the other games that will be exclusive are also part of this experiment. Sony strategy for now seems clearer, but given that their live service strategy hasn't brought the results they wanted, and especially given the situation at Bungie, they might have to go back on putting games on PC. It will be interesting to see how things go. But I expect to see mixed messaging on exclusivity for a while, from both sides.

@Millionski I think their approach seems to be on having the biggest franchises and live service games like Minecraft and Candy Crush bear the burden of lower revenue that GamePass brings. Perhaps some other franchises will join CoD, or perhaps they give more incentives, like having more atractive features behind premium editions. They also seemed to be considering a customizable model where each one could choose what features they wanted. I myself find that including Fortnite stuff was a big mistake given that many people who play such games won't want to play much else.

@Millionski The amount of people who gave up entirely on their subscription with the price increase, or the amount of people going to lower tiers was very likely higher than they expected and even with higher costs, they probably weren't making enough revenue. Otherwise they wouldn't have decreased the price so soon after. Same with the increased price of games which they went back on.

I think this sentiment is due to the fact we're still in a transition period. I don't think many people would say that music, series or movies have been devalued by now being streaming and part of services. But there are music events and cinemas while struggling keep bringing a lot of revenue. Gaming is probably going to follow a similar procedure where a balance is struck. But I don't agree that being on Game Pass automatically devalues games.

@Balaam_ I was coming to comment exactly on this, the difference in metric used is telling

I hadn't even heard of either of these games, which is surprising given the number of players and how often I check on gaming news. I've been testing some f2p games on Xbox, and I might give them a look.

I have a Vita with a custom firmware installed, so I have to give this a go. This is why I love homebrew and fan-made content. Will it be a good experience to play many XCloud games on the Vita? Of course not, but being able to do it is satisfying enough.

@Henchdog Indeed! Vita's aftermarket life and homebrew scene are very active and worth getting into.

@kuu_nousee I agree, a Switch-like device might get me to get one, I have absolutely no need for a PS6 that would just be more beefed up. Helix might be interesting too if they indeed open up the platform for other storefronts and make it basically a PC.

@Banjo- I'm very curious about how they're going to name their portable system if it ends up being a thing. I guess it's technically the third PSP? But there never was a PSP 2. And if they want to emphasize it plays PS6 games on the go, they probably want to have the "6" somewhere in there. I imagine it will be something like PS6 Go or simply PS6P

@Seioni I do it on the Steam Deck and it's also pretty good. I'm close to the router, which is a factor for 5G networks, but I'd encourage people to check it out.

In broader terms, I still would like for hardware like consoles and handhelds to keep being a thing. Having almost all powerful parts concentrated on a few servers sounds risky both due to potential power imbalances between service providers and consumers, as well as worse consequences in accidents like fires and so on.

@HonestHick One of the problems with the current version of XCloud is that even though the architecture is based on Series X, they run the games on Series S profiles so as to maximize their server-side resources. I believe that's why games often look blurry on the service. Xbox Game Pass games are on GFN as well and it's a night and day difference. I even tried a very time sensitive game like Clair Obscur and it worked flawlessly.

@Coletrain Ah, yes, I agree with you. But in the eventuality where Xbox and PlayStation become like Amazon Luna sticks, I think they'd still want to keep all those subs they got over the years.