mac_da_man

I finished Doom - TDA last weekend. It was fun, but its not a perfect game by any means and its not my favorite Doom at all. I hope the next Doom is more like the 2016 one.

I also picked up Still wakes the deep on a sale, but playing it on the ps5 this time. Great game imo!

And, its summer. I want some relaxing games giving that feel good vibe so I got
Forza Horizon 5 - for the ps5 pro. Its not the best racer (not my favorite Horizon game either) but it really fits the critera above 🙂 looks amazing on the Pro.

TES Oblivion - with the patches coming I cant hold off anymore 😅 it might be so buggy it'll make me furious instead of happy and relaxed, but its one of my favourite games and some parts are better than Skyrim imo so hopefully I can get through it without to much bugs and technical trouble 🙂

Its been mostly Doom - The Dark Ages for me this last week. I’m a couple of chapters from the end and I’m enjoying it. Its good old fast paced action fun with some great level design. The shield is a fun addition, however I do feel it gets a bit to arcadey with different colored attacks for deflecting etc but its a minor complaint. Also, rest assured that even if you find yourself in the belly of the Beast, you’ll find Sentinel Shrines there so you can upgrade your gear. A bit less of that sort of thing would have been better imo. But all in all, very fun 🙂

Finally some patches, been waiting for that before playing! Guess it’ll need a couple more and then maybe its time to play 🙂

@FarmDog08

Enjoy 😀 I thought the journals had bugged out for me but turns out there are a couple of the unknown ones and I had missed one. Just in case 🙂

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 - Its done, and the platinum trophy is mine 🥹 Its high on my list of the best games I’ve ever played, imo a true masterpiece in every aspect and it will stay with me in that way that truly great games do! I’ll replay it every now and then and I’ll also listen to the soundtrack from time to time.

Doom - TDA - Barely just started but seems like what I need right now, all action and no brain, and it runs good on the Series S so far.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 - I’ve finished the story now. What an amazing game, absolutely love it. Its one of my favorite games of all time. Finishing of some collectibles and bosses for the platinum. Not really looking forward to finishing it, dont want it to end as I enjoy it so much and I always get that hollow feeling after completing a great game and need a day or two before starting something new.

Think play I’ll Doom next, might be the perfect palette cleanser.

If they can patch performance and memory leaks Im all in on this amazing classic, but not touching it again until then.

Mainly Clair Obscur - and I love it. On act 3 now, still absolutely amazing and its really a game were I’m enjoying exactly every aspect of it which doesnt happen very often.

I hope they can fix the problems, I remember playing Skyrim on the PS3 which wasnt the best experience. Especially when the save file grew big 😬

Since last week I´ve finished a decent game and started playing a true masterpiece

Lost records: Bloom & Rage - So I've finished the game, its not bad but its not nearly as good as I had hoped and pretty much expected from Dont Nod so I´m a little dissapointed. Maybe thats unfair, maybe my expectations were to high, but thats how I feel.

Clair Obscur: expedition 33 - Wow, what a game!!! At the beginning of act 2 and its just amazing how good this is . All of it, the design, the soundtrack, everything. Most likely my GOTY right here. If you like RPGs and dont hate turn-based combat - play it! Or maybe play it regardless 🙂

Halo would sell like crazy on other consoles, I dont think MS want to miss out on that now that they´ve seen the success of other former exclusive titles so I guess it-ll make the jump this year or early next year. Starfield seems obvious to go multi plat and later this year makes sense. But then I believe no Xbox games will be exclusive going forward other than for a period of time.

Doom obviously but Vermintide can be fun co-op so maybe some of that with my son if hes up for it 😀

Somehow I dont really think this will look and run all that good on a series S…

Lost Records: Bloom & Rage - and I'm a little dissappointed as its not as good as I hoped, meaning Life is Strange good, but its good enough for me to want to finish the story and see how it ends. It helps a bit that we're on a family trip and I'm playing on the portal (bloody awesome little device that), and this is the perfect kind of game for it. I might have dropped it otherwise and started Clair Obscur instead but I can wait a few more days to play that 🙂

I’m very happy gaming revenue is up for Xbox even if hardware sales are down, which in part means their current strategy of releasing games on all platforms is working and that means that they’ll be a very sucessful publisher regsrdless in the future 🙂

@Kaloudz

I played the game for a bit on the S and its playable but having the option to play it on the Pro is something I cant resist even if it means buying the game instead of playing on gamepass. It doesnt make it a better game but I will enjoy it a more with a much sharper and smoother image in 60 fps.

Pretty much every game on Gamepass will sell more on other platforms, its sort of the point of gamepass. As for how much each developer gets to put their game on the service, I guess its depends and each developer (not owned by MS) will have to make the choice to take the safe Gamepass-money or gamble that their game will sell with a bigger total profit than they get from MS. Some win, some loose. Either way, we win. Granted, I’ll buy some games from Gamepass just cause the Series S is a bit weak for some games imo but thats just me.

Thats why I wont be playing on my S and I did give it an hour. My son loves the game playing on his X despite some minor issues but overall they’ve done a great job!

Having more trouble than usual picking what game to focus on as right now there are both new games I reeeeaaaally want to play and at the same time the games in the backlog are looking at me with those puppy eyes wanting to be played as well. Ah well, its a nice problem to have. On to the games 😅

South of Midnight - played and finished. Its pretty good, loved the world and the art design and the soundtrack is very interesting and the story was decent. The fighting and the gameplay loop got a bit tedious but overall I enjoyed it!

Lost records - Started this before Oblivion remastered shadowdropped all of a sudden and Clair Obscure turned out to be a must play but I’ll finish this first. Its good, I’m not blown away yet but hopefully it’ll get there soon as I’ve not played for long but its not the same instant love as I had with LiS!

Also, the son really loves the Oblivion remaster. Its awesome to watch him play and be able to help him with some stuff instead of him watching YouTube videos for hints, I’m surprised how much I remember as I havent played this for 17 years or so. Cant wait to play it again myself 🙂

@themightyant

If I had an X instead I would probably have played it on Gamepass as the difference as you say between X and Pro isnt that big but its a huge difference going from the S to the Pro and for games like these I’m a bit of a graphics and framerate whore 😂

@themightyant

Sound really promising. Tried it for a bit on the S just to see how it runs, but might have to get it for the pro instead so I can really enjoy the world and the art design which is amazing!

I might double dip when it gets a deep sale just to experience the game on the Pro, which will be a pretty big difference compared to the S.

Looking forward to this, and I hope it runs well enough on the S!

As I just commented in another article, having played the Series S version for an hour I´ll wait and see if they can improve the performance (maybe even add 60 fps?!) and if not I´ll get it on a sale for the Ps5 as I really want to play this masterpiece and get the best experience possible.

I played for an hour on the Series S and it runs sort of ok but I´ll wait and see if they can patch it or I´ll wait for a sale and play on the PS5 instead. Dont want to play this masterpiece with subpar performance

AC Shadows - I had a lot of gaming time this past week, so focusing on the main story I managed to both finish and platinum the game. Loved it, its my favorite AC since Black Flag. Dont really feel finished with the game though, even if its massive and I've played so many hours I just enjoy the world and the gameplay so much I might have to do some more side missions and castles. Brilliant game imo 🙂

Next up is South of Midnight and some smaller games on VR perhaps 🙂

Nah, I’m gonna pass. As always, think its kind of *****. This at least includes some form of DLC which could be good but also suck. So no.

@Friendly

My guess is because of the games, Xbox games will be playable on Playstation but not the opposite.

Basically the same as last week 🥳

AC Shadows - and still loving it! I dont burn out on these games, which is great for me 🙂 the patch that dropped earlier in the week was great, it made an already stunning world even more stunning on the Pro! What a world they've built, cant get enough! Also you can now sell/dismantle multiple items at once, but why the f that wasnt there from release is just baffling. Dont know how much of the main game I've done, I'm still on act 1 as I keep getting sidetracked and I love it 🙂

South of Midnight - Been looking forward to this so had to try it for a little bit but I could tell from that short time its s game I'll probably love. Very promising. But first Shadows, then this 🙂

AC Shadows so far!

I was so curious about the game I had to try it, which meant playing about 30 min and I really liked it, seems like a game I will love. Will finish Shadows first, but cant wait to play more South of Midnight!

Everything being an Xbox means I’ll also get to play Nintendo games on my new Xbox handheld also known as the Switch 2 when I get one. Makes sense for Xbox as a publisher but not for Xbox as a console in the future. But thats a good thing imo.

I hope we get the older CoDs on gamepass, would be fun to play the campaigns again! but as stated above, they still sell copies so...

Mainly AC Shadows - and I really, really enjoy it! As been said, it looks amazing. The seasons are a fun addition as well. I've changed the settings so that quest markers arent added to the map automatically but I need to either use scouts or search myself, increasing the immersion. I prefer playing as Naoe, as Yasuke feels a bit to powerful but he has his uses sometimes, like storming a castle and wreaking havoc! I also really like to expand and build the hideout. I've spent some time making japanese gardens, very fun. Cant wait to play more!

Atomfall - I've played about an hour but it didnt really click for me. Might be because I just want to play Shadows instead, so I'll leave it for now but might go back to it in the future!

I’m a bit worried about the performance on the Series S but I’ll give it a try!

Great game, nice more people will get to play it. Interested in the Pro version, as I´ll likely double dip at some point and do a 100% playthrough!

Since it released I´ve taken every chance to play

Assassins Creed: Shadows - Im around 4 hours in and so far this is really good. First off it looks amazing on the Pro, been switching between 40 fps and 60 fps and Im settling on the balanced mode of 40 fps. Last night as I was climbing a tower there was a thunderstorm, and I ended up just sitting there enjoying the show. Very beautiful game. I also tuned the hud, removing health bars on enemies for example which makes it a lot more immersive. Gameplay and combat is great, combat is a lot better than I expected as playing as a ninja really means you need to be sneaky most o the time as open conflict against several opponents (they´ll come running from the noice) often ends with me dead. Exploration is fun, but its been done before as it’s an AC game. Cant wait to play more, I love these kinds of games and this one is very good on top of that so Im probnably looking at 60-100 hours of pure fun here 😊

@Master_Cthulhu70

Nice to see Outlaws get some love 🙂 enjoy Avowed as well, found it to be a good game 🙂

Dragon Age: The Veilguard - So I´ve practically only been playing Veilguard as there are games coming soon I want to play and didn’t want to be in the middle of this game. It’s a good looking game with a sense of being in a beautiful fantasy world, art direction is great, and combat is good enough and exploration, meaning finding hidden chests etc, is fun. I finished the story and got the “bad” ending since I focused on the main story and did little else. There are some things I wish were better though, the story could have been more “seamlessly” told and some of the dialogs (and topics in those) I wasn’t interested in felt forced on me. However, after having watched the other endings, I feel like the one I got made the most impact on me and sort of felt right given the game is about fighting really powerful gods. I mean how good can that end?

All in all I enjoyed the game more than I expected, and don’t regret not doing all the side stuff that would have given me a “good” ending and I don’t see myself going back and completing all the side quests and go for the platinum which I often do in games like this, I´ll just be satisfied with my playthrough and leave it at that as Im happy with the ending I got.

@Lup

Yes, thats always the best way to make sure the game is in the best state when playing but I’m very grateful for people playing at release so they can give feedback to the developers 🙂

That said I played and finished it and didnt have to many issues so it still worked out good with this game 🙂

I want this so bad, but I need to keep the hype level down until it gets confirmed and I get to see the improvements they've made. Love the game

Played since last week
Avowed - I’ve finished the main story and I feel done with the game. It was a fun game once I started playing it for what it is and not what I wanted it to be. Looks good, great world thats fun to explore but too shallow for it to be a great game imo.

Warhammer 40k Space Marines 2 - Cant stop playing 😅 I got the platinum earlier in the week but I’ll keep playing it now and then as its so awesome. For the Emperor!

Dragon Age Veilguard - Hadnt planned to play this now but since it dropped on PS Plus I decided to give it a shot! I’m enjoying a lot so far, they’ve created a beautiful world that feels magical and I like the gameplay. Its not perfect but better than I expected after all the ***** surrounding the game.

Really looking forward to this game, looks really great. Will play it on the PS5 pro though, not the Series S (obviously perhaps given the choice, had it been on game pass I would have given the S version a try)

Warhammer 40k - Space Marines 2 - I'm still having so much fun with this game. With there were more of everything with this game 🙂

Avowed - The game has grown on me. The solution to enjoying it more for me was that I stopped treating it as an AAA rpg (its to shallow and lacks that immersion and interactivity for that imo) and instead as an AA adventure game with fun exploration in a beautiful world and that works good. Mainly just doing the main quests with a bit of extra running around. Also lowered difficulty, dont want to have to grind for levels. So yeah, not a perfect game at all but enjoyable 🙂

It might be that VR always will be niche due to cost, a bit more effort when playing compared to just sitting relaxed in the sofa/chair, motion sickness etc but imo its a shame as some of the best experiences in gaming have been VR games for me. So from a business standpoint I understand them. But Halo, Forza etc would be awesome in VR.

A man can dream 🙂

"Happy with the sales" makes me really curious about what numbers we´re talking about.

Good they are happy regardless and great for them with the positive reception of the game

Warhammer 40k - space Marines 2 - still having so much fun with this games. Been playing some multiplayer and some of the operations, and I feel like I will keep playing this game for a long time. Might even go for the platinum 🙂

Avowed - I´ve managed to get maybe 6 hours in, and the game is growing on me despite some minor issues I have that might be something others dont really care about. The physics of the game is a bit all over the place which sadly my brain really registers and it brakes the immersion for me. Like, mugs are all breaking the laws of physics and cannot be moved whatever you do, grass doesnt catch on fire, NPCs are mostly (all?) standing still and also cant be hit with anything, unlimited arrows that dissapear after a few seconds, enemy weapons dissapear when they are defeated etc etc and Skyrim for example did all that a lot better 14 years ago. Its just something I expect in a first person RPG but that may be a non issue to some but its going to take some getting used to for me.
It does look pretty good though, and runs fairly well on the Series S. Exploration and movement feels really good, combat is ok and the story and side quests so far are ok. Im a big fan ot these kinds of games and I love exploring the world. Hoping the game keeps growing on me and I really should try and enjoy it for what it is, not what I want it to be 🙂

@dreadful

I would say that is a very unlikely scenario. But if so, I’ll get a new Xbox. Not for CoD though, but other former Xbox exclusives.

Xbox console sales declining, no exclusives and ”everything is an Xbox” at the same time means I’m very sceptical of getting a next gen Xbox. Dont see MS getting that one out by 2026 either given its just got greenlighted.

But; I hope Xbox stays relevant in the console space, we need competition and not Sony dominating. And for those wanting a next gen Xbox its great that its coming.

My thoughts, shortened down a bit because I dont have enough time

Xbox isnt doing well as a console. Thats a fact, given sales numbers. That means they cant keep first party games exclusive, as that doesnt generate enough income to cover the cost of development (and turn a profit) and given the fact that they are release on gamepass. Hence the move to publish games on other consoles, which secures more income.

That last part is good, it means Xbox can keep releasing games and us gamers get to play them on a console.

There will be consoles in the future, for a good while at least since there is a demand for it. Gaming on PC is much more of a hustle and streaming isnt yet good enough.

Peace!