Kevw2006

@Fiendish-Beaver I'm not disputing that there may be some bias in Push Square's review scores but there are occasions where I feel like it is legitimately justified. Their review score for Oblivion Remastered was cited above and criticised at the time when it was getting universal praise at release. However, after the nostalgia settled it has been generally accepted that it is a poorly optimised mess, funnily enough with the PS5 version suffering the most from this. Are PS not entitled to mark the game down accordingly because they find the performance issues bad enough to warrant the lower score. Too many other reviewers often acknowledge a plethora of issues with games and still award them an 8+, with some even giving 10s to games that have a multitude of issues. Digital Foundry's review also states that there are some pretty glaring issues particularly with the PS5 version of The Outer Worlds 2 so are they not justified in giving an inferior score because the reviewer played what seems to be an inferior version. I always find that Push Square tend to give fairly fair scores across the board and if they do encounter issues they are one of the few reviewer's that reflect this in their score and don't just ignore those issues to award a higher score. It has been stated on here that the reason for PS giving a higher score to Indiana Jones than PX did was because they had played a more complete version of the game where bugs had been fixed, if this is to be accepted then we also must accept that they are entitled to give lower scores if they are playing a version of the game that has more bugs and issues.
Another thing to add is that PS gave Spiderman 2 an 8 when it's sitting at 90 on metacritic so they theory that they score first party PS5 games higher doesn't really hold up.

@OldGamer999 That's not strictly true, I can still buy a DVD/Blu-ray movie or CD/vinyl album and the content is still on the physical media and doesn't require it to be downloaded.

@ZuneTattooGuy Oh I'm well aware of that. It's just not exactly fair how Americans fired for this but the rest of the world has to suffer too because companies won't just pass on the full increase to Americans and spread it around instead.

@ZuneTattooGuy That would explain the prices being increased in America, but why would the rest of the world need to be included in the increases?

@Wisegamer Considering unit sales were up 60% on PlayStation and Steam I don't think Sony will be too worried about anything at the moment. Also, it may have had the largest single number of new subscribers in a day but that can't really be classed as a success if they don't retain those subscribers for long enough to make more money than they would have made from an outright purchase from those users. It those users just subscribe for one month and then cancel them that would be a loss for them. Also those statements don't really mean much if they don't tell us what those figures are, what is the current single highest amount of new subscribers in a day? Without knowing this we don't know how impressive breaking it really is. There's just too many unknowns at the moment to consider it a success.

@Major_Player I'm genuinely curious as to where you have heard this as any comparison I've seen says it's marginal bit it does perform better on PS5.

@Hexamex-Tex Looking at the gameplay it looks very suited to being played in vr so perhaps we will get a PSVR2 patch too 😂

@eduscxbox The difference is though, that Nintendo has never marketed the Switch as "the world's most powerful console" and heavily promoted 60fps as a selling point.

@Sifi Technically yes, but the PS5 digital is still cheaper. Although the more concerning thing is if they were already struggling to sell consoles in Japan when it was cheaper, when you take away the one incentive that they had how do they expect anyone to pick an Xbox over PS5 in Japan now?

Are they bundling a controller in with the tv's, if not they're really missing a trick. Give people everything they need and all they have to do is pay the subscription and they will gain a lot more traction on this.

@BAMozzy If I was guessing I'd say that most people that have Game Pass Console probably don't play online so likely aren't too fussed about the online element, and possibly CoD too. Otherwise they would have just signed up to ultimate rather than having to pay for two different services.

@cragis0001 While it's true that they don't disclose sales information, the one thing they are usually very vocal about is download numbers and engagement stats. It's the lack of any of this that I find more telling than any sales figures.

@Llamada to be fair, the "competition" didn't even try.

@BacklogBrad The PS article from this morning actually does reference the map size being twice as big in the article so it's not something that the writer has forgotten about. However, crucially the article also says they only increased the scope by 25% and not the size, which are two different things. It's a poor translation so we don't really know for sure but it's likely that the comments weren't relating specifically to the map size and may have been referring to something else.

@Ep_13 I fully agree that meta is flawed but a review is just someone's opinion and you can't say someone has reviewed a game incorrectly just because their opinion does not match your own. If you think it is a piece of gaming perfection and a 10/10 then that is perfectly fine, it's great that you enjoyed it so much. However, if someone thinks the game is flawed, or lacking in the gameplay department and feels like the game is a 5/10 then their opinion is just as valid as your own opinion and is in no way incorrect.
I'm fully aware that people deliberately post low scores to troll and skew the scores, but people also post 10/10 scores just because of who made it to skew the scores the other way too. In most cases these balance each other out and the end score is just about what it should be.

@Sol4ris The thing is, both Sony and MS have been doing third party deals for along time. Maybe MS don't do it on the same scale as Sony, bit they both still follow the same practices.

@Ep_13 From reading the review a 7 seems like a very fair assessment. I would hold that score in more regard than any review that gives a 10/10 despite the review highlighting obvious flaws in any game.

@Cikajovazmaj That is a possibility, however MS having already confirmed that they are working in new hardware the will be the biggest technical leap ever. That, along with talk of them launching the next generation early to try and get a head start suggests to me that the console market is still very much important to them.

@Cikajovazmaj I completely agree. Despite what anyone says I refuse to believe that MS don't view console sales as important. You don't spend millions developing a new console with features such as quick resume, auto HDR and a massive backwards compatibility programme and simple not care if people buy it.
Privately I would imagine that the higher ups are very concerned about the figures and trying to work out what they can do to improve sales.

Call of Duty has done this on PlayStation for a while now so I would expect that to be another one to add to the list.

@BAMozzy PushSquare did an article yesterday on the US and Europe charts where it lists Sea of Thieves as being the top seller in Europe which ties up with this article.

PS Store Sales Charts - Europe (April 2024)
Sea of Thieves
Grand Theft Auto 5
Helldivers 2
Stellar Blade
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3
EA Sports FC 24
TopSpin 2K25
Grounded
It Takes Two
Fallout 4
Dragon's Dogma 2
WWE 2K24
Need for Speed Unbound
Hogwarts Legacy
Cyberpunk 2077
NBA 2K24
Resident Evil 4
Gran Turismo 7
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
Rise of the Ronin

@GeeEssEff Funnily enough a few posts down on this very site there is a review for a game that has just released on game pass this week for a game that is releasing on everything apart from PS.

@GeeEssEff It's like people seem to forget this type of things happens all the time and happens both ways too. There are many indie games that release on Xbox that don't come to PS until later, or sometimes not at all. It being in PS Plus Extra does indicate that there may be some sort of exclusivity period in place but it could also just be Xbox being a lower priority due to the lower install base. It could also be similar to Baldur's Gate 3 where MS didn't see it being a hit so didn't pursue any sort of deal so Sony got in there and did a deal and got priority.

@RIghteousNixon It's not as easy as you make it sound though. Out with putting the new CoD on game pass day one and not raising sub prices anything they do is going to be a PR disaster at a time when trust in the Xbox brand is at an all time low. They have marketed game pass on a promise they all fist party games would be on game pass day one. This includes CoD, Phil Spencer even reiterated that point just a few months ago. They also stated numerous times during the ABK saga that game pass prices wouldn't increase as a result of the acquisition. If they don't stick to both of these statements then there is going to be an element of the fan base that isn't happy. Whatever they decide to do they are going to have to be very careful how they communicate it to try and limit the damage done.

@Gollum That's even worse when you consider you can literally buy Battlefield 2042 for less than the price of a month of game pass these days.

@Phil-Spencer-Gate The cracks are already beginning to show that even a company the size of MS is struggling to sustain game pass in it's current format, with more and more concessions needing to be made. Job losses, studios being closed, games going multiplatform, adjustments to rewards points and a seeming pivot from first party studios having freedom to make smaller niche games to bigger, and likely safer, games all point to the service bleeding them dry and MS needing to do something about it.
It is widely reported that sub numbers for subscription services is stalling and gamers will be getting wiser that they can just sub to game pass for a month just to play a new game they want and then unsub and they are playing the game for a fraction of the price and there's no way that would be sustainable.

I may be missing something but $1.5m from at least 45 million pre registered users doesn't sound overly impressive as it only works out at around 0.03-4 per user.

For a handheld Xbox to be successful it would need to offer something that nothing else does, or at least do what it does better than anything else on the market. The Switch is massively successful because it is the only place available to play the latest Nintendo games, however with an increasing number of handheld PC's on the market that are capable of playing the majority of Xbox games, either natively or via the cloud, then it would need to bring something extra to the table to stand out from the crowd. It's unlikely people are going to invest in a third handheld if they already have a Switch and handheld PC for portable gaming.

@BAMozzy Unless you're severely limiting yourself to purely XGS first party games do PC or cloud streaming really offer a true reflection of the full Xbox experience? There are many third party games that release on Xbox consoles that aren't available on PC that you would no longer have access to if you "upgraded" to PC. I'm aware of the irony in using a Sony developed game as an example but just look at MLB The Show 24, that is releasing on Xbox consoles but there is no sign of it on PC and this is just one of a number of examples. A lot of people are console gamers because they prefer to game on console and if they aren't already PC gamers then the chances are that there is a reason for that which isn't going to change if MS were to state "PC is our Xbox Pro".

@jesse_dylan The starter edition contains the same content as the free trial, however the trial version has some restrictions on some of the more social aspects of the game that the starter edition will allow you to do.

@BAMozzy I get the reasons for why the accounts are required, but it would still be nice to have to option to remain single platform only and bypass the need for extra accounts. My default position is to disable cross play for any game that includes cross play with PC to avoid being placed in games with hackers and cheaters on there.

@Sifi As much as I agree on the pointlessness of petitions like this there is clearly an appetite from many people to play the game. I mean most of the "plenty of issues" you mention have been directly caused by how wildly popular it has been so it must be doing something right.

@Shushibda 100k PS5 players was just based on an estimate that was worked out from the servers being capped at 450k players so the Steam concurrent players at the time meant there was roughly at least 100k PS5 players accessing the servers at the same time. There actual sales will likely be much higher due to players that couldn't access the servers, of just not being online at the time.

@PsBoxSwitchOwner I'm not sure where they myth about PS not allowing early access games came from as there have been quite a few early access games on PlayStation in the past few years. Most notably one of their own first party games, Dreams, launched in early access and Wayfinder is a game that is currently in an early access period on PS.

@InterceptorAlpha There's every reason to believe Sony would prohibit game pass on PlayStation in its current format as if it includes third part games then that will directly affect Sony's sales of any games that are included on game pass, it would also make it direct competition for PS Plus. The only way they could maybe allow it is it it's first party Xbox Game Studios games only. The only problem with this is reducing 90% of the games available significantly reduces that value of game pass so the sub price would need to be adjusted. Would a heavily reduced priced game pass on PlayStation really be an attractive prospect for Microsoft to offer?

@BacklogBrad If they did that they would be admitting that they are deliberately releasing an inferior product on a competitors platform, which still wouldn't be a good look. If the rumoured PS5 pro does emerge that would cause them an even bigger headache as either they have to make games run better on that, or deliberately withhold features.

@BacklogBrad It they release a buggy mess on one platform and it runs flawlessly on another then yes that is very damaging for the brand. Plus the average gamer doesn't have any interest in watching Digital Foundry nit pick at miniscule differences in frame rates and resolution. I have a passing interest in it and I very rarely bother to watch their videos myself.

@BacklogBrad If I buy an Xbox studios game on PS and it runs like trash that's not going to make me want to buy an Xbox, it will just make me reconsider buying any Xbox games in future. Plus it would be a poor reflection on the brand as a whole if inferior ports were a regular occurrence.

I expect there to be a lot of corporate talk and buzzwords where they talk a lot without really saying anything, leaving us all just as confused as we already were.
In all seriousness though I honestly have no idea what they will announce. Although if reports of some sort of internal civil war over the plans are to be believed then chances are they haven't finalised things yet and they still don't know themselves exactly what will be announced yet.

@ZuneTattooGuy You could also argue that a good company wouldn't find themselves in a position where leaks have led to rumours and massive hysteria all over the internet, leaving them to scramble to put together an announcement that they clearly weren't ready to make yet.

@Trmn8r You just need to look at the Baldur's Gate 3 saga to understand that porting from PC to Xbox isn't just the changing of a few lines of code that a lot of people seem to think is needed. There is a lot of time and effort goes into it and if a developer doesn't get the return that the feel has warranted their effort then they are well withing their rights to consider not releasing on a particular platform. It is absolutely possible that if sales are low enough on a platform it will not cover the costs for porting to that platform. It is then down to the platform holder to give the developer some sort of incentive to release on their platform. Just look at Palworld, for example. I'm sure Sony are doing everything they can to try and make sure a PS port happens due to how popular it has become.

@Kaloudz The hud display is heavily customisable and practically every section of it can be moved, resized, or even removed completely so you can have it as cluttered, or as neat and tidy as you prefer. There are certain sections that would be highly recommended that you have on display though. The game doesn't really do a great job of explaining that side of things though so it does take a little bit of trial and error to get things how you want.
You can also bring up a main menu that does have a LOT of different options in it but these are separated into categories to make them easier to find. As you progress through and unlock new features there is often a little window that pops up with a brief tutorial to explain what it does so it doesn't get too overwhelming.

@Sol4ris You can still buy a version of the PS5 with the disk drive included though. All digital with the optional extra disk drive isn't the only option available. It's exactly the same options that were available from launch. The only difference is you can now choose to add a disk drive later if you decide that you want one. I honestly don't understand why people thing this being available as an option is a bad thing. Surely more choice and the ability to change your mind can only be a good thing. I mean if you buy a Series S and decide you want to use physical media later your only option is to buy a while new, and more expensive console.

Would love to have voted for New Vegas but I can't vote for a game that released with so many bugs that were never fixed so Stick of Truth it is.

@BacklogBrad One of the biggest selling points of consoles is their simplicity to use over PC. Overcomplicating things with more frequent releases with different versions and minimum specs will just drive people elsewhere as they honestly sounds even more hassle than PC gaming is to me. PS and Xboxes are already close enough to bring glorified PCs, we don't need them going any further down that path.

@Gloki_junior Microsoft cut their workforce by over 10,000 just last year alone, this is exactly the sort of thing they have done before and it will likely happen again unfortunately.
You could see it coming a mile off they they were going to eventually have to cut numbers after buying massive publishers. I just didn't expect it to be quite so severe.

@Sifi Given the amount of games that are released in a year just being in the running is an achievement on itself. Maybe you should try giving praise for the games winning the awards instead of bashing other games for not winning.

I would have originally said third person in an instant but I thought it looked like the first person worked really well for the game. I'm not a fan of the cut aways to third person view though as it looks like it will break immersion a bit.

I was expecting it to be similar in length to the first game so I'm not surprised by this at all. I think it's the type of game that's suited to a short runtime as the gameplay grows stale pretty quickly. Even with it's short runtime I never ended up finishing the first one as I grew pretty bored of it and Hellblade 2 looks like more of the same. Quality over quantity will make it a far better game.

A solid B from me. Avowed looked nice but the combat looks really slow and uninspiring, it reminded me of an old PS3 era Move game. Hellblade looked good but the presentation for that felt very rushed to me. Indy was definitely the star of the show by far. I was sceptical when they said it was first person but the footage won me over and I think it was the correct decision. The camera transition to third person when interacting looked a bit clunky and felt unnecessary but otherwise I thought they captured the look and feel of the movies perfectly.