Julius

While I'm not in any real rush to pick everything up before the May deadline - my Wii U not letting me add my card means I'm fine using eShop cards and taking my time to get things by August - today I've started to have a look through the 3DS and Wii U digital libraries to start compiling my list, and hoo boy...my wallet hurts just thinking about it I started by looking through Virtual Console games, which I've finished looking through for the 3DS, and am currently sorting through the SNES library for on Wii U; I've been using the List of Virtual Console Games for 3DS (PAL) and List of Virtual Console Games for Wii U (PAL), for those curious, to spot overlaps and get a bigger picture of what I'm looking at here. The way I'm handling it for NES and SNES is that, because I know I'm more likely to want to play those on TV rather than in handheld, any games that overlap (and that I want) are getting added to my list of Wii U games, though there have been a few where I know they have 3D Classic versions (only looked at Nintendo ones so far, but I know there are some SEGA ones too)and so I'm not 100% sure on if I'll grab both or just get the 3D Classic version. A number of these are on the Nintendo Switch Online service...but I'd rather buy the game (knowing my habits it will also just make me infinitely more likely to check them out). In any case, I'm tracking all of this in an Excel file with game titles, eShop prices, sizes (including a conversion from blocks to Mb for 3DS titles), and I'm also prioritising the games between three tiers: 1 - Buy without hesitation, 2 - Buy with hesitation, and 3 - Sitting on the fence in hesitation (any games I have no interest in I'm just deleting from the list). Tiers 1 and 2 I'm pretty sure I'll pick up, but picking up tier 3 games largely depends on just how much my total outlay potentially comes to, which I'm sure will be fun to arrive at once I finish this exercise. I've found myself referring to Nintendo Life a whole lot as I think they've reviewed most (if not all?) of the Virtual Console releases across both platforms, which has made it very easy for me to get a quick idea on if a game would be for me or not just from brief gameplay, screenshots, their general score (most things below a 5/10 aren't getting a second glance ) and flicking through their review. So far then... Don't think I'll be picking up Pokémon Silver, Gold, and Crystal - but still trying to figure out what I want to do there. I'm also trying to keep an eye on the total number of games because I know the 3DS and Wii U both have a max. number of applications (which I'm not aiming to get anywhere near!), and I also need to keep in mind that I'll likely need to expand the storage of both (which is why I'm tracking game sizes). Add to all of this the fact that going through this is making me consider picking up a replacement New 3DS XL (my current one is a fingerprint magnet and a special design, so I'd like to retire it) and yeah, this is going to be an interesting next few months think I'll try to have a finalised list of games nailed within the next few weeks!

Bit of an update on the messy situation with PS+ stacking being blocked and the conversion rate to the new tiers:

Naoki Yoshida was featured in Uniqlo's magazine this month to coincide with the announcement of the 35th Anniversary t-shirts, and gave a small but important update on Final Fantasy XVI: it's in the final stage of development! 2022 may well be back on the menu

Looks like Worms World Party and Worms Armageddon have also been listed now. Don't worry guys, at 340 games to get through with 5 games a day we should have a full list around the start of July

No, it's not; and yes, you do! caps off what l think is arguably one of the strongest decades in an individual director's filmography (Coppola also directed The Godfather, The Godfather Part II and The Conversation in the 70's). If you do get around to watching it I'd also recommend checking out Heart of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse, as it does a great job of showing just how much of a challenge it was to film.

H-o-T, you've just helped me solve one of my longest standing gaming mysteries. I had to look up Silent Bomber as I swear I'd heard of it somewhere before, and well, I looked it up, and I've never seen that game before in my life. I then had to look up Heart of Darkness out of sheer curiosity about whether or not it connected to Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness (adapted in film into Apocalypse Now and also a clear inspiration in games for Spec Ops: The Line), because that would be a crazy thing to try to adapt to begin with, let alone on PS1. And well, it didn't according to its Wikipedia page. But then I saw its cover: When I was young, every weekend or two I'd go over to my cousins' while my parents got on with being adults, and we'd normally end up watching films or playing games. In the dead of summer one year, she let me borrow a game which definitely seemed a bit on the creepy side for my age, and I couldn't have been more than 5 years old looking back, as I didn't have my PS2 at the time. Now, the drive from my house to theirs was probably only 5 minutes at a real push on empty roads, but there must have been construction going on, because I was in the back of the car in a traffic jam after being given the game and waving goodbye for what felt like hours (so, in earnest, was probably no more than 20 minutes). The cars were barely rolling along, and so I did what every kid does with a new game and given the time: I looked at the back and front of this game's box over, and over, and over again. It might have been missing it's manual, as I don't seem to recall flicking through one. I don't know what it was - maybe it was the heat, maybe it was the slow roll, maybe it was me constantly reading the back and flipping the game to its front, or maybe even a combination of the three - but I felt absolutely awful after a short while: I'd somehow managed to get myself motion sick in a car which was barely moving, and it's my first memory of ever getting motion sickness. Heck, I feel nauseous just thinking about it Since I "more seriously" got into gaming, I kind of just assumed it was Abe's Oddysee for whatever reason, I think I might have just got the two mixed up in my head somehow, but I'd always sworn the game had a red background to its case, a dog, and some dumb kid on the front. The only real confirmation I needed though was looking up the rear cover: Yeah, there's no forgetting that I looked up the rest and the only one other one I seem to recall - I'm leaning towards having owned it? - was Devil Dice. Okay for this one I remember absolutely nothing about this game other than the weirdly covered die Man, talk about repressed memories, now I'm stuck trying to think of some more of the lesser known PS1 games I haven't thought about in a long time! That's actually why I mentioned Destruction Derby @Dcubed, had no idea it was already up anywhere - hopefully it comes to the service! - but I had a lot of dumb fun with friends sitting on the living room floor playing that game.

Damn you're right, I hadn't even thought about that. I think Forza typically has a 5 year deal (or something around that length) for licensing on cars before they're out, doubt it's much different for GT. Not to mention some of the music too Sooooooooo...Destruction Derby when?

Obligatory: Interesting that this time we're getting third party games popping up after the first party stuff the last time some games popped up, hopefully means we might not need to wait all the way until their official word for some of the potentially more exciting titles? Hopefully Ridge Racer turning up doesn't negate the possibility that we're going to see the old Gran Turismo games on here, as I'd definitely be in the mood for them - especially if there were trophies - after I finish with 7. We're three and a half weeks away or so from the service launching in Asia, so I'm curious to see when and how they show this off and open the floodgates. I think a 15 minute State of Play on the service, showing the UI, confirming the games for launch, showing some footage to help us confirm the quality of emulation/streaming, etc., would probably be the most you need to do. I'm just hoping it's not another PlayStation Blog update...maybe we see something the week after next?

Not-E3 begins the usual week of E3: Xbox have confirmed their Xbox & Bethesda Games Showcase will take place on Sunday 12th June 2022 at 18:00 BST... Right then, time to see how Starfield is turning out and if it's on schedule for me to make the silly decision of picking up a Series X for that and the few legacy titles on Xbox I want to play. And Forza. Think they're the first to do confirm a date and time? So now we just wait to see who joins them

Avatar is such an interesting property to me because despite holding a stupid amount of box office records for so long and needing a franchise like the MCU to spend 10+ years building up to surpassing it, it really did never permeate pop culture. I've seen a smattering of pictures online of people who cosplayed as Na'vi in the years immediately following the film's release, but beyond that, I feel like it's referenced more when talking about James Cameron, qualifying which Avatar you're talking about ("Avatar – the kid with the blue arrow tattoos, not the blue people", or "Avatar – the great one"), and gets a few nods in "nerd culture" shows like The Big Bang Theory, but it never crossed that threshold really. I feel like there are a lot of reasons for this, mainly James Cameron being the creative and likely having so much power over the intricate details of the property. It's had minimal supplementary material at best, no presence on toy shelves, and he's been given over a decade to put out a sequel (and produce multiple films at once) because he wanted to put them out. Only other comparison I can really think of with a creative in film taking their time to going back around to something is George Lucas and the gap between the original trilogy and prequels. But I'm there with you. I think the film is fine, it's not great, and based on the first film alone I don't think it deserves to be mentioned in the same breath as something like Star Wars, other than from the perspective of its visuals, sound design, and its impact on the industry and how higher-ups looked at 3D and the box office specifically (it singlehandedly revived 3D and it will do it again this December after it has waned in recent years). I just think it lacks any meaningful depth. Personally - and yes, I'm saying this as a huge Star Wars fan which throws together loads of things like Hidden Fortress, Dune, Flash Gordon, etc. - I also just think the film lacks any ambition in its storytelling and writing. I hate to say things have been "ripped off", or at least try not to say it so flippantly...but from a story perspective, Avatar is a weird concoction of many elements of much better films, like Princess Mononoke, Dances with Wolves, and Pocahontas. I think this film could have some interesting stuff going for it, though, first off being that it's got it's awkward first film out of the way which did a lot of heavy lifting in terms of world building, and I kind of think anything from now on should just be an improvement in quality. Long form storytelling and intricate world building has exploded in TV and film over the last 10 years, so if Jim put as much time into the next few films as he did the first, I think it's going to get a hell of a lot more appreciation. This. I'm in this for the IMAX. I actually didn't get to see the film in cinemas ( because that was a rare occurrence for me growing up anyways); fell asleep watching it on DVD as a kid (you know, for a blockbuster, looking back that really should have been a sign that it wasn't going to permeate the mainstream if it sent some of its target demographic to sleep, but the length of the film didn't help!); but I did get to watch it on blu-ray - and 3D blu-ray at that, the only one I've ever bought because I knew if anyone is putting the time into that crap it'll be James Cameron - and the film remains a spectacle to this day. The quality of the CGI in the first film is still of the absolute highest quality and it is consistent all of the way through the film, which I can't say is frequently the case for Star Wars or the MCU. You can really tell they let it cook in those servers I cheekily think it should get a nomination for Best Animated Picture rather than Best Picture if it ends up in the running, though

To not cause further confusion between Avatar and Avatar, the subtitle for the new Avatar was announced yesterday at Cinema Con as being 'The Way of Water', where some new footage was also shown off: The trailer for the film will be attached to Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness exclusively for one week before it is released online.

Celebration schedule is up: Looks like a fun line-up, but what a bizarre way to confirm the long rumoured Tales of the Jedi as being a thing. Curious to see exactly what sort of length we're expecting considering they're calling it a collection of "animated anthology shorts", though. Yeah, I get what you mean. For me a lot of them have been pretty great in mid- and wide shots, but it's the close-ups where things fall apart a bit, like with a certain gunslinger in BOBF. Not a huge deal, but yeah, character first and then costume after, but I think it definitely resonates more on the occasions where they manage to nail both. Poor Sung Kang... That's good, sounds like you're in for a great time! Thanks for the offer re: potentially sorting signed stuff, but I know how busy it'll be there and how hectic signings specifically can get, so wouldn't want you to take up any of your time there! Fingers crossed that you do come across some of the folk you hope to see though and can get signings from them, that would be really cool I might take you up on the offer for a little something of merch if possible? I don't know if they've shown any of that stuff off, but I know SWC always seems to nail it with exclusive items (I remember seeing their Loth-cat plushies and thinking they were awesome), so if I see anything once it's announced I might drop you a line if possible? But no big deal if not, I just want to hear about the crazy things you end up picking up during your trip Yeah, you're right, they've definitely left a little late before, and I mean we've got panels now at least. I guess I kind of felt that way because in 2019 I think we had a really clear picture of what to expect before the schedule was even announced (Rise of Skywalker, Mando, etc.) whereas, at least now, it's definitely more spread out, and there's so much in the works simultaneously that it almost feels like they'll have a smaller % of things to show in a way? Speaking of which, I don't seem to see a video games panel – wonder if that's something we'll get confirmed closer to the time, but it's pretty curious, as that's something I really expected to see? I guess there are other panels they could just drop a Jedi Fallen Order sequel trailer at, though I hear you on the busyness of some of those panels and the slim likelihood of getting in. It's a weird one and I think a great time can be had not going to every panel, but if/when I ever go to Celebration, I'd definitely want to make my way into some of the main ones...but the chance just seems so slim without a Jedi Master VIP pass, which it feels like you need to be seduced by the allure of the Dark Side for, otherwise I think waiting in line could simply take up too much time which could be spent elsewhere at Celebration? Which YouTubers/Podcasters are you referring to for the combined panel? That sounds like it could be very cool, and honestly maybe more than the hype for new stuff, the allure of Star Wars Celebration has to be just spending time surrounded by other huge Star Wars fans. I'm sure you'll have a great time!

Comunicado oficial: DAMN IT I WANTED TO GIVE FIFA UP THIS YEAR JIM RYAN YOU MONSTER

Early reviews: Online functionality hasn't been considered in these reviews, as it will be added on Friday through a patch.

Terrific match of football, and it's one of those matches of football that's an instant classic, but what a terrible advert for defending at the top level by both sides. Some astonishing moments of skill, though, such as Mahrez's dummy and slide to the line, I was screaming at my TV that he should have chipped it, should've been one for the highlight reel! And Valverde's reverse flick to nutmeg with his back to the play and at the edge of the pitch was a thing of beauty. City were impervious in the first 25 minutes and the opening 10 minutes of the second half, and across those 35 minutes of the match, they absolutely could have killed the tie - not the leg, but the tie - off. They had the chances to, and they'll be ruing not killing this game off when they had the chance, not to mention just how sloppy they were at the back at times, practically inviting Madrid into the game. Pep will rightly be fuming. But when Real arrives, they really arrive - all of their goals were instantly memorable classics. Benzema's wonderful instinctive volley, Vinicius's excellent dummy and embarrassment of the City defence with his pace to sneak one past Ederson (though it was very poorly defended), and obviously Benzema's Panenka was pure class. They did ride their luck at times, for sure, especially considering that you didn't really notice the absence of a player like Alaba at the back once he came off, when you feel City really should have taken advantage of that. And what a great range of emotions shown by Ancelotti throughout Quick shout out to the ref: that's one of the better refereeing performances I've seen in a while, and the commentators were saying he's inexperienced at this level of the competition, and well, I think he should be seriously considered to ref the final. Didn't let anything go, but played the advantage really well at times. Second leg next week should be a cracker. Liverpool vs Villarreal has a lot to live up to tomorrow night

It was clear when Real were struggling to get the ball out of their own defensive third of the pitch that they were in for some pain, but man, they could very easily find themselves on the end of a demolition job tonight. It's already 2-0. Carlo does not look amused

Wasn't sure where this belongs, but this year's BBC Proms will for the first time include a video game concert on 1st August 2022! From Eurogamer: Link to the official BBC page for the event and redirection to tickets (which aren't up yet) here.

Huh, never gave my final thoughts on Attack on Titan: Final Season - Part 2, but in short: first half of the season up until the end of Episode 6 was monstrously good, as in, in a vacuum I think that might be one of the most concentrated and consistent stretches of amazingly high quality writing in an anime series that I've watched. It really was just banger of an episode after banger of an episode. Music, OPs and EDs were awesome once again, and Wit picked up where they left with Part 1 in terms of animation, even pretty noticeably improving the CG quality of its titans. Unfortunately, I really think the second half of the season waned in comparison, and they really did just spend the latter 6 episodes setting up the next part of the story...which we then found out we wouldn't be getting for another year with the announcement of Part 3. It felt like a double blow because of this, and while I'm excited for it, I'm not excited by the prospect of having to hide from manga spoilers for yet another year. I also think the second half of Part 2 has pacing which will make sense in terms of the three Parts of the Final Season overall, but again, in a vacuum of where we finished, I think it's a weaker place to leave us than even where Part 1 left us last year. A practically flawless and almost peerless first half of the season simply let down by the pacing half of the second season and the fact we have to wait another year means this is a 9/10 for me. In the week before Part 2 finished, I went back and watched the second season of Kaguya-sama: Love is War after loving the first. It's genuinely one of the funniest anime I've watched that doesn't feel like it's trying too hard to be funny, the cast of characters are all completely relatable and loveable, and man, there are just a few too many times where I got thinking back to my high school experience and was facepalming realising how many times these sorts of things happened to me and my friends. Excellent and pretty short, can't recommend it enough, and it's nothing if not consistent in quality from start to finish. Yeah, another 9/10. As part of my Ghibli rewatch of all the films that I'm doing this year to get to some of the ones I haven't, I watched Grave of the Fireflies for only the second time; my first time was with my family, and this time I watched it alone. This film makes your soul bleed, and as an older brother...hoo boy. I used to never cry or get remotely emotional watching movies, but as I've got older and branched out, I've found myself finding more and more films which cut the onions for me, so to speak. Knowing that this is based on a book, and what's more an entire book which is a positive spin on the actual events, just really hurts. While the film does a great job of depicting the tragedy of war, more than I could the first time (again, watching it alone this time), I really picked up on how this is less a story about war, and more about Seita, the older brother and the one responsible for Setsuko, choosing pride over logic, and making poor decision after poor decision for the time he was in. Sure, some people around him were asshats, but a bunch of the kind people were screaming at him to let go of his pride and do the dutiful thing. As someone watching this for the first time on the other side of their teenage years, I think this film untangled a whole lot of pain for me when I reflect on those simpler but also really complicated times. Had this film down as an 8/10 before, but now it's a 9/10 for me, and some of Ghibli's more serious watches I feel need that second and maybe even third viewing to understand the film and what it's trying to say a bit better; I had a similar experience with The Wind Rises. I won't be watching this film again for a long while. Anyways, back to loving Wit. I watched Ranking of Kings in a couple of days after waiting what felt like a seriously long time from it's announcement to its final episode being aired, and I absolutely adored it. Some will say it's very Ghibli-esque, and while I don't disagree, I think the strength of this show in its simplicity: it feels like you're watching the stories your parents read to you as a kid. This is compounded by its exceptionally beautiful art style, Wit absolutely killed it with the animation (let's pretend to be shocked about this), the soundtrack is heartfelt with two amazing OPs (the first one captures the tone of the show perfectly, while the second is more a , and the story, while at times feeling like it's trying to overcomplicate things (and there are so many fakeout deaths it's kind of funny), is just pure joy from start to finish. Prince Bojji is looked down upon by his people, as a mute and powerless child, first son to the strongest king in the Ranking of Kings. While not physically strong, though, he is strong of heart and will, and once he finds someone who believes in him, past traumas and future hopes and dreams are brought to life as a sinister presence emerges from the shadows. This show is about bonds: it's about the people we love, the people we should hate, and the power of forgiveness and moving on. If you want to feel like a kid once again, I will scream from the rooftops for you to watch this show. Bojji is one of my favourite protagonists in recent times. 9/10 Finally, I'm watching Spy x Family. It's only three episodes deep so far but it's awesome, combining Wit's and Cloverworks' astounding animation work depicting a spy forming a family to complete a mission, with the hilariousness of something like Love is War, and this is down to having one of the cutest - and definitely most expressive - kids in an anime I've ever seen: Anya. I mean, what would you expect to happen when a spy meets a telepath who loves a show about spies and adorably manipulates situations with every chance she gets? Adorable And thus ends the post where I give everything a 9/10!

Rumoured games for PS+ in May: EA clearly desperate to get me back playing FIFA after I've taken a vow to not go back

Miyamoto hacked the NoA Twitter account just to confirm the delay of Illumination's Mario movie: As a wise Shigeru Miyamoto once said, and I quote:

Can't tell whether he's trying to channel his inner Bail Organa or trying to upstage Cal Kestis here (I also dig it, just seeing someone in the shade and in a blue like that on Tatooine makes me feel cooler when I think about it) Yeah, Daiyu looks great. Absolutely like a "ground level" Coruscant knock-off, but great, and I will gladly take it seeing as you can't put Obi-Wan on Coruscant in this show! Yeah, it really shows you just how important a good angle and framing is, kind of makes the decision to give the trailer house the footage that they did even more baffling. Still don't think it looks great, but it's definitely better, so if they aren't go to touch GI up in post- then I really hope we don't get too many shots of him head-on How's the prep for Celebration next month going by the way? I saw the other day that Ewan is doing signings and photos, sounds like that could be cool! I'm a little baffled that we're just over a month out and still don't have a solid schedule of what's happening, as I was trying to figure out if I should take the Friday off and so looked up the panel times at SWC 2015 – was surprised everything was confirmed as early as March!

I think we're talking about different things here: you're justifying why PlayStation have done what they already have, and I'm saying what I think could have done to handle it better. I even said - and agree with you - that how they've handled it will have no bearing on the long-term success of the service Again, I'm not saying that they needed to announce every single game, because while it would be nice, I just don't think it's practical for a service like this, especially with third parties involved. But like @Dcubed suggests, I think we could have had a handful of games announced - or, even better, shown - alongside the initial announcement, because again, the introduction of this catalogue of games is what PlayStation is using to justify having higher tiers for PS+ and is the main thing which differentiates between the tiers. The downside to putting out so few details is that it simply opens the door to rampant speculation, which is in itself dangerous for a service (especially in this day and age where things spread like wildfire and you have extreme fans on both ends); it not having a long-term impact isn't a good justification for poor communication. For backwards compatibility on PS5 you saw the full spectrum based on the minimal details we had for the longest time, ranging from "pffft why would you get a PS5 with only 100 games available through backwards compatibility?" to "they still haven't said 'no' to PS1/PS2/PS3 backwards compatibility!". Along similar lines here with these PS+ changes, you've got a full range of speculation from "oh we should only expect what's available on PS Now with a couple of PSP games thrown in, on a shoddy emulator at best" to "dare we dream for some awesome and rare JRPGs to be on this service?".

Latest update: Yeah, they fixed the PP glitch for the Dodge SRT Tomahawk X VGT in Tokyo Expressway so that you can no longer use the fastest car in the game in a race limited to 600 PP cars, RIP. Oh wait, no, never mind, people have already got around that. Yeah, I've still been chipping away at the game, and it's probably been my main game over the last month despite the Café stuff being long done. Thanks to the above glitch after the previous update you could grind 825k in 18-20 minutes of 12 laps on Tokyo Expressway, compared with the Le Mans track which is a time restricted race which was at least 30 minutes long. As part of the previous update they also made all of the invite-only cars have invitations available until mid-May, which I've taken advantage of by grinding for and buying them all, as well as one of three legendary Le Mans cars needed for a hard to get trophy (I'm going to grind for these credits and then just sit on them until these two cars turn up on the store). I've got 6 Licence Tests to still go for Gold for, a bunch of Sport mode online races to complete, a few things related to trophies, and I've got Circuit Experiences to complete, so I think after I finish grinding away for credits I'll be tackling those one at a time; think I'll dial it back and just have an hour or so on it a day while I cruise towards those, because I want to get back to Dragon Quest VIII The game is still a lot of fun to play (giving myself the challenge while grinding of getting as fast a lap/race time on Tokyo Expressway with a car which is way too fast for a track like that has been the most fun I've had with the game!) but there's just so much getting in the way of that at times that I could easily see myself putting the game down once I get the Plat. Still, got a lot of time out of it!

Well, yeah, I think that's exactly what's happening: they're taking hundreds of games, which will take time, and, like you said, we've seen them take a similar approach with how discussion of backwards compatibility was handled for the PS5 in the year leading up to its launch. I have to imagine that negotiations with third parties are probably ongoing too, and their games will need to then be tested to the same standard, and so on. However, if that's the case, what was the need to announce this PS+ overhaul and catalogue of retro games when they did, with nothing but rough numbers and a pricing structure to announce? It was almost purely an announcement for investors, not consumers, and while I know a lot of stuff like this does happen, I think it's such a poor way to handle it. You get one chance to announce a product (and the alternative for a second announcement is basically limited to add-ons or a relaunch), and I think they kind of botched it. Now, will it matter to the long-term success of this service? No, not at all - PS+ has plenty of users already, and at worst, if no-one uses the higher tiers, they get the same revenue as they currently do. The difference with this and how they talked about backwards compatibility on PS5 is that this is the product - these games are the differentiators between tiers! The unique selling point of one tier over another is that you get access to PS1/PS2/PSP games in one and basically just PS+ as it is otherwise in another, and you get PS3 games in the top tier. Knowing what those games are going to be is a huge - arguably the main and defining - factor in a consumer choosing the top tier over the middle tier, or the middle tier over the bottom tier. The thing for me is that there was nothing really gained by announcing it as early as they did when compared with its launch date when having very few details about the service to actually share. I look at this service and I know that it's not a true competitor to Xbox Game Pass - though it certainly could transform into that one day - but the lack of details invites those questions which a truly defined and calculated announcement would instantly squash, because comparisons to a service like that as things stand aren't going to be favourable. You compare it to how they talked about backwards compatibility on PS5, and I do think it's a good point of comparison - remember just how many people came away swearing up and down that PS5 would only have 100 games available through backwards compatibility for PS4 games? There are also questions around UI, how it functions (is PS3 on the service going to be like PS Now where you get a virtual PS3?), and also what it's running on, and if anything has been improved. We don't even know if we should expect this to be HD! I don't think they needed to announce every game for the service, but 5 - 20 titles being shown off from the get-go I feel would have answered a lot of questions, especially first party games, which really should be in the bag and should be the easiest ones for them to deal with getting over the line. See, while I agree, I think this is what any third party games coming to the service should have been saved for. I think if they came out guns blazing it would have been great, but it would leave them with little else to confirm, so I think they should have considered showing off the basics (UI, confirming spec details, etc.) and a handful of first party titles which were ready to go alongside the announcement. I think third party titles is likely what they're in the process of confirming right now, so I think those titles in particular should have been the final thing to go out with on a bang before the service launch: "oh, by the way, we've been talking to our friends at Capcom/Konami/Square Enix, and can confirm that Mega Man Legends/Metal Gear Solid/Xenogears are coming to the service, alongside these other titles from them." And thing is, the longer you leave it from announcement to concrete details, you do create space for doubt and features being undervalued. For example, going back to PS4 backwards compatibility on PS5 - I wasn't really excited by the prospect by the time we had concrete confirmation that we should expect most PS4 games to work perfectly fine on a PS5, and if anything I would describe myself as being relieved that was the case, especially in the face of Xbox having clear messaging from the start with Series X (they have other issues, but how they communicated backwards compatibility on the system was not one). And even after getting that confirmation, we still got reports which instilled some fear about certain PS4 games having an asterisk next to them when played on a PS5. My expectations right now for the service are low, sure, but when they announce things like God of War, Ratchet & Clank, etc. - first party titles I would expect to see on the service seeing as they're already on PS Now - it won't be excitement I'll be feeling, but relief. I'm now not letting myself get excited by the prospect of the potential of third party games coming to the service, but hesitant. While I get why they've done what they've done, I just don't think it was the best way it could have been handled, and considering how much potential revenue is at stake through upgraded subscriptions, I'm surprised this is how they've decided to communicate the service. At least it shouldn't be too long now before we get those details seeing as it's launching in Asia on 23rd May?

Digital Foundry's video on the PS2 era of Gran Turismo games is up (aka the best Gran Turismo era, totally no bias here )