Julius

So, anyone else staying up to check out The Game Awards tonight? I've just got up from a nap and I'm a little groggy, but raring to go there were some definite lulls at previous TGA's so I'm seriously debating whether to catch the Easy Allies stream, if anything just to not fall asleep at those times. Because we all know they're coming. My expectations are...tempered. On the whole I think it's been a really shoddy year for press conferences across the board, as I'm sure most would agree, especially with E3 being as rough as it was - the equivalent of trying to spread a knife's worth of butter over an entire loaf of bread - and more and more companies wanting to cut out their own space for digital events. It's kind of reminded me that I guess not every company is on the pulse when it comes to knowing what their audience wants, because I don't think anyone wanted what we got in the summer, which was the complete opposite problem to what we had last summer. This all being said though, Geoff has bought a bit of my hype moving forwards with how he got the Elden Ring trailer for Summer Game Fest's Kickoff event - considering that the game first showed up in an Xbox event at E3, that can't have been an easy get! Don't want to be exhaustive, but there are a few games I really want to see here, and one that I almost expect. I know there are a lot of rumours going around (some which just don't seem right, others which seem very legitimate thanks to the GeForce leak), but none I've seen have mentioned what I really want to see. Also not going to mention anything I think is too obvious (like a new Elden Ring trailer - not a guarantee, but I think there's a high chance it's here). Starfield - it's time. We're less than a year out from it's scheduled release, and all we've had so far is concept art, glimpses of in-engine footage, and some pieces of music. Xbox have a history of showing things off at The Game Awards, like Perfect Dark last year or Senua's Saga: Hellblade II the year before along with the unveiling of the Series X, and honestly alongside Elder Scrolls VI this is by far the title that I think will see people buying into the Xbox ecosystem, so there's a lot riding on it. I think it's about time we start to get some idea of what this game is going to be like outside of what Todd Howard says in interviews, so a gameplay trailer would be great I think (with a Fallout 4 styled blowout at E3 next year). I actually feel this one's fairly realistic, I'd say a solid 75% chance. Playdead's next game - so I know Somerville from Jumpship and Dino Patti is something we've seen a bit of, and is probably the more realistic title to expect to see here, but I really think it's time we see Playdead's title. It's been teased a bit with some concept art of a sci-fi world, there are rumours it might be open world to some extent, it's their first dive into 3D gameplay, and they have absolutely carved a niche out for themselves as one of the premier indie studios. Limbo released in 2010, Inside released in 2016, but going off an update the other day with a bit more concept art, it doesn't seem like their next game will make 2022, so any showing here I think could be to get their name back out there and maybe have a drive to expand their workforce for the next year or two as this game gets closer to release. I'd put this at a 50% chance. Fumito Ueda's next game / genDesign's first game - I think we've had glimpses at three separate pieces of concept art on their website throughout the last year or two, and as far as I'm aware, that's pretty much been it besides the announcement that Epic Games would be publishing Ueda's next title. That's the biggest reason I think it could turn up here, because Epic Games absolutely want to show off what I'd say is the most exciting title they've gone on their publishing slate, and I think anything by Ueda absolutely would be worthy of showing up at The Game Awards - he deserves that kind of attention for his games. It was also Ico's 20th anniversary the other day, so I'm imagining a little anniversary montage for his previous works (I can't imagine Sony not giving permission for him to do this, especially after they were allowed to share some early 1998 footage of Ico for the anniversary) before a bit of a tease of their next game. My gut says it's a 2023 title, but that's based on very little evidence. I'd put this turning up at 25%. Final Fantasy XVI - 2021 ends in just over 3 weeks, and we still haven't got the 2021 update we were told to expect in the XVI update we got towards the end of last year. People are whispering about one last PlayStation event to round out the year where this could turn up, but with that being heavily based on rumours, this is currently the only show in this last stretch of the year that I'd expect it to turn up at. Worth remembering, too, that Yoshi-P did his due diligence ahead of Tokyo Game Show to state that they had plans for something there but it just wouldn't be ready in time, and Creative Business Unit III has been very forthcoming from what I've seen with XIV over the years, so I'll be surprised if we don't see it in some capacity before the year ends seeing as they haven't said to not expect it just yet. Unfortunately, I don't think it's that likely simply because it's a PlayStation console exclusive, and I can see them wanting to save it for their own show. I'm putting this down regrettably as a 10% chance of being here. Other than that? I don't dare to predict what Nintendo turn up with. It could be Breath of the Wild's sequel with their history of showing the first game off at The Game Awards, it could be Metroid Prime Trilogy remastered...or it could be something much smaller, like a Samus Returns port. Either way, I'm excited - bit over an hour to go!

I did though admittedly the first time it kind of swoops in I was already spinning in circles trying to figure out where it went like a bit of a mad man Honestly, I think you'd fare pretty well. There's an intimacy you need with the weapons and their abilities, Overloads, range and fluidity of movement, dodge timings, cooldowns, etc., that reminds me of how getting to know your weapons and character in a From game thoroughly is going to do you plenty of massive favours down the road, so I'd have to imagine it'd be like getting back on a bike. It's a bit different obviously in that each run can throw a different weapon at you to get to grips with, but because there aren't so many, it's feasible to still get really comfortable with all of them. Speaking of which, was there a weapon you favoured when playing the game, even if only marginally? I've found the Tachyomatic Carbine really suits my range run-and-gun approach though there is a cool weapon you first see in the second biome which is also a blast (heh)

Yes please! My Great Marsh luck has been terrible. Kangaskhan was my daily Pokémon but not one of the ten I ran to would get in the damn Safari Ball before fleeing the next turn

Masayuki Uemura, lead architect of the NES and SNES, has passed away at 78. Imagine the lives of a lot of people who have had some experience with video games would be very different without him, may he rest in peace. There is a Nintendo Life article on his passing and contributions here.

Exploding Hisuian PokéBalls... Hisuian Voltorb/Electrode inbound?

Well: it clicked. Beat the first boss on my first run yesterday on probably my third or fourth attempt at it. I found that ranged attacks and, as @drahkon pointed out, dodging (a lot) really helped. That last phase definitely gets wild, though! Put the game down after as it was a bit late, but then picked it up in the second biome today. Yeah, this game still looked gorgeous in a completely different hue, and the enemy variety and enemy composition of some of these rooms was just a whole lot of fun to take on. And man, some of those enemy designs are just so...alien, for lack of a better word, that I've got to double down on what I said before about some of them looking Lovecraftian. This game is basically the lovechild of Prometheus and Edge of Tomorrow, and I love it. There were a few times today where I was on the brink of death but really getting to grips with different types of weapons, all of the abilities at my disposal, and learning about new mechanics through experimentation (though I do think the lack of explanation of some mechanics does make the game a little tough to get a read on early on) really pushed me to feel like, even this early on, I've already got some level of mastery over Selene's capabilities, and have the confidence to turn the odds around. This is to say: it feels good. Today I got about two thirds through in the second biome on my first attempt at it (continuing yesterday's run), before dying in a room where I learned far too late that dodging was disabled...meaning that I tried to dodge phase through some lasers as I finished reading that the dodge was disabled at the bottom of the screen Second run of the day, spent a fair bit of time in the first biome getting the right gear before carrying on, and got all the way to the second biome boss...and I killed it on my first try! An Astronaut Figurine did save the run, but I managed to get it down to a sixth of it's final health bar before I needed it to kick in, which I was pretty chuffed with! Such a fun but challenging boss fight (the shmup-styled craziness was ramped up here, and I imagine it will be with every boss), I would love a Boss Rush or survival mode because it's so rewarding to just dial in and focus. Very intense at times, but man, it's really just clicked the last few runs. There's a definite flow of the game and understanding of it which is making it very satisfying to wade through. Stepped into the third biome where I suspended my cycle and will kick on tomorrow!

PC features trailer for God of War, which is still coming 14th January 2022. Also put out a handy graphic for the system requirements of the five configurations for the game:

Well, hot damn. That would match Sword & Shield's first week of sales, meaning it's double what Let's Go did in its first week. The remakes don't tend to have legs when it comes to sales anyways (so don't expect it to keep pace with Sw/Sh), and I know the Switch install base has grown significantly since Let's Go released in 2018, but considering this was outsourced to ILCA and likely cost less to produce than Let's Go, it's hard to not see them being given a shot at more Pokémon titles. I really just hope they get more time next time around. Will be very surprised if we return to Johto in a Let's Go game rather than remakes of HeartGold & SoulSilver by ILCA. The overlevelling might help with the awful level curve (or lack of one altogether) in the second half of those games, and the foundational knowledge of faithfully remaking a DS game in Unity is there for all to see, so would be happy to revisit that adventure relatively stress-free.

Nick Offerman has been cast as Bill in HBO's The Last of Us series. Took me by surprise, but then I quickly came around to it. It was probably that photo

Uncharted: Legacy of Thieves Collection is coming to PS5 on 28th January 2022. Those wanting to play on PC will need to wait a bit longer for a release date. And the new PS5 features for the games: And yes, there will be an upgrade path for existing owners of the games, likely at £10 a pop. I still haven't got around to playing Lost Legacy, so I guess this will be a good excuse to? Also worth noting: - owners of the PS+ version of Uncharted 4 will not be able to upgrade. - multiplayer mode is cut from this release. - limited movie ticket offer for a standard ticket to a showing of Uncharted in February. Limited to residents of Australia, New Zealand, UK, and US.

Yeah, I'm up for it I also caught a Nosepass yesterday, so I'm good there thanks. Now it's just that illusive Yanma...

Yeah for sure, also noticed I was basically strafing at points when going towards the boss clearly would've been the easier way to avoid some of it's ranged attacks

After picking this up as part of the Black Friday (/week/month) sales, got around to starting it up this evening as my time with another game starts winding down. Only spent a bit under two hours with it, so these are very early impressions. To start off with setting the atmosphere, the game's sound design is great, some of the enemy and object designs are unnerving (almost Lovecraftian - especially those tentacles that drag you up to higher levels, running into those without noticing them made me jolt several times ) and so far the enemy variety has been pretty good. The environment in the first biome is basically a spooky, ancient alien woods, and I dig it. Unhinged Dagobah is probably the most succinct way to describe it. Game is one hell of a looker, too: In terms of gameplay, it hasn't quite fully clicked for me yet - but I have only had three runs, getting further each time, and I'm having fun with it, so I think it's just a case of early game adjustment. The dodging is snappy, the sprinting is just about right for the size of each new room you enter, I love the Alt Fires I've picked up and tried out so far, and the DualSense has elevated a lot of the experience even this early on, from similar input setups to what we saw in Rift Apart (half-pressing L2 to aim, fully pulling it to access Alt Fire) to the haptics in the controller itself, with honestly the best use of it so far being the long press of [Circle] to back out of Photo Mode and the way it feels like winding a camera reel (though, admittedly, it does take longer than it needs to in backing out of Photo Mode). I love the bullet hell nature of some of the combat encounters too (personally only really experienced this in third person elsewhere in NieR: Automata), it's been fun, and really nice and tense at times. To nitpick - and again, this is early on, where all of my nitpicks normally come out as I'm fresh to the game anyways! - I'm not a fan of the camera position relative to Selene, it made me a bit nauseous in the first half an hour or so, which I haven't experienced in any other third person games outside of crazy frame pacing and frame rate drops. Think I've started adjusting, but it's like over the shoulder but at a distance; I get it from a game design perspective (they want that wide field of view and the camera to be able to go around and under Selene when traversing/in combat), but for me it was a little disorienting. Some of the fights so far have got so loud and busy that I've not been able to reliably track when my Alt Fire is ready based on the sound made (honestly the best time I've had with this was in my first attempt at the boss), so I've been going off of the DualSense haptics, but this early on - and with how they're used quite heavily in fights anyways - I'm not yet used to what I'm supposed to be feeling for, so it can get lost in the shuffle a bit. Again, not really a big deal, just a nitpick. Outside of those, the only other thing really is the jump can feel a bit floaty, and I definitely accidentally missed a platform early on because of it. It's early on, I'm sure I'll adjust. There's also clearly a deeper narrative going on both with Selene and separately for the history of Atropos, and while the breadcrumb nature of the story so far definitely suits being a roguelike, it hasn't really got me invested in Selene, which is what it feels like it's going for with certain sequences I've seen so far. I'm pretty interested in the history of Atropos, though, it seems pretty neat. The furthest I've got so far was the first boss on my third run, which I died to, so I'm looking forward to kicking his/her/their/it's ass and getting revenge. And there was also this funny moment I had when I picked up an item... Anyways, solid start (albeit with some nitpicks), but I'm looking forward to getting back to it. The only other roguelike I've really played before are the Pokémon Mystery Dungeon games, which are a whole different kettle of fish compared with this and what I normally think of when I hear the word "roguelike"/"roguelite", so I'm happy I'm not bouncing off of it. Yet to try a Malignant item/enhancement out other than one in my first run, so maybe I'll flip the coin and see if that makes getting to the boss a bit faster

Obligatory Keighley hype trailer:

Footage of a lap of the Deep Forest Raceway was dropped yesterday: Looking good!

I mean, technically Holland's films are a joint production between Marvel and Columbia (Sony), and Sony still distribute, as Sony still own the movie rights to Spider-Man. This is why we get very tense and public standoffs over contracts, such as when a little while back Sony seemingly wanted to not re-up and take the character back out of the MCU. Obviously they came to the decision that this was a stupid idea, but still. It's a weird one. Potential studio and IP monopolisation, like the Disney purchase of Fox, is scary, but before the purchase, we were seeing a stupid amount of Fox-owned Marvel properties get shows, films, etc. This has been the same with Sony and the Spider-Man films. They've been trying to get a Sinister Six film up and running for as long as I can remember, and naturally want a piece of the superhero movie pie, which is why we've seen standalone spin-off films like Venom and the upcoming Morbius. Well, kind of spin-off. That's complicated too. So yeah, how much it is people enjoying it vs Sony wanting to make money...the circle of life for movie studios I guess I don't remember it being any good (at all), but there was also a Japanese Spider-Man movie made back in the 70's which I had growing up on VHS, think I got it a school fayre. Apparently there were two of them (one theatrical and one made-for-television?), and I have no idea which one it was that I watched, but I would not recommend it from what I can remember

I think he means not part of the MCU?

See, this is where I'm confused. It's like we're having two different discussions here. I'm not asking who cares about these potential legacy libraries possibly being cloud streamed versions, nor am I asking if PS Now is a cloud streaming service, nor am I implying at all that anything in the Bloomberg article indicates that these versions will run natively (I mean, let's be fair, it also doesn't say they won't be - though I agree that they would most likely be cloud versions, at the very least for the PS3 titles). You clearly don't care about these changes, which is perfectly fine. But you asked "what's the deal with this?", to which I gave the answer that the article states games and libraries not currently available to play on current platforms - even through PS Now - are planned to come to this service. You mentioned PS2 games already being on PS Now, to which I said there are ~20 PS2 titles (it's actually 17) currently available through the service (again, all of which are PS2 Classics), so naturally if they expand the number of PS2 titles available on the service, the addition of these titles is something new. The addition of PS1 titles and PSP not currently available on PS Now is something new. The potential addition of more PS3 titles to the service is something new. The fact that they are rebranding and seemingly merging PS Now with PS Plus is something new. That the report says they plan for three different tiers would be something new. Now if we want to talk about the quality of how we're going to be playing these titles, and whether they are going to be native versions or streaming from a PS3, that's a whole other discussion, and whether this is a good idea at all is a whole other discussion. But that's not at all the question I was answering. Just because it's not a huge deal to you because it's not running natively and is a product from PlayStation is an opinion of yours I'll respect, and hey, naturally I would love for these to be native versions, but we just don't know. For all we know, Schreier is a hundred miles off and there's something totally different that they plan to implement instead, or not at all. But when one of the platform holders is clearly positioning themselves - if a move like this really is happening - to be more nimble and ready for the future, for if they do truly want to offer something akin to Game Pass (which, in my opinion, is clearly the entire point in the reported rebrand and restructuring; it's foundational work), I'd say that's a pretty big deal. I'd say the same if it were Nintendo, and I said the same when it was Xbox.

I'm a bit confused by what we're debating here. Does PS Now currently include a library of PS1 and PSP games, outside of what is already included in PS3 collections available on the service? No -- so why wouldn't we consider a library of PS1 and PSP games coming to this PS Now/PS+ hybrid to be "new"? Even if it does utilise streaming of PS3 emulations of PS1 and PSP games, games not already available on a service being added is something I would consider to be "new", regardless of whether any additional work was put into bringing them to the service. How would an extension of the PS Now service with games and consoles not currently available on the service not be considered new? If the N64 catalogue on Switch only included ports of the Wii U versions, would we not consider those games coming to the service to be a new addition?

The third tier including PSP and PS1 games, as well as extended demos, would be new. I haven't looked at PS Now in a while, and have never used it myself, but looking at it now it seems like there are only ~20 titles playable on there from the PS2, which I think might be limited to the PS2 Classics that were released for PS4 anyways. Maybe I'm taking the ball and running with it a bit here, but I feel like the implication of it including a "classic library of PS2 games" is that there will be more games added to this than what's already on there. A whole lot of PS1, PS2, and PSP games haven't been made available on the PS4 or PS5, so seeing those come to a service like this would be nice, though obviously depending on how far this library would go.

I 1000% agree with this, very well said. Heck, I get choice paralysis because I've got too many games I've bought sitting on my shelf, but I do intend to play them all -- that's why I bought them! Giving me access to tens if not hundreds of games I am only tangentially interested in? For my style of play, where I enjoy focusing in on one single player game at a time, it just doesn't work. It's why something as cool as Quick Resume doesn't move the needle for me, because I personally wouldn't be juggling multiple games at once. Re: microtransactions and Battle Passes, by all accounts - from everything I've read and heard - Halo Infinite has quite possibly one of the worst implementations of the system that we've seen in the last few years from a free-to-play model. In case it wasn't already crystal clear that it wasn't sustainable from Day One, the egregious ways in which it's been worked in there really do boggle my mind. It's even worse when somehow Halo Infinite has managed to become an underdog when it's backed by a company which dwarfs both PlayStation and Nintendo in almost every tangible way. And re: games not having their best content at launch / not being frontloaded experiences, I suppose the other issue which could arise from it - and which we've seen a whole lot as of late - is games launching in unfinished states to "relaunch". They grab headlines by being broken (at launch or even in a trailer), in some cases become underdogs, and so can easily grab headlines again when they return because they already have mind share. It's becoming something we're seeing increasingly from AAA studios, which firstly shows that the AAA model (as I feel we all know) just isn't sustainable with things getting bigger and more detailed, and more importantly just completely buries smaller titles. Halo Infinite has been my example so far, so I'll use it again here: it's launching twice, in effect, which means smaller titles (and even some bigger ones) need to avoid an even bigger window for launch. And then there's also the fact that you literally can't make games fast enough to fill up a service like this, which causes the concerns over acquisitions potentially forcing the industry giants towards monopolisation, whether that's they're intention or not. Yeah, I feel the only reason PlayStation are really doing this is to not fall too far behind Xbox so that if/when they do ever pivot to launching first party titles on Day One, the service is there and ready to go. PlayStation Plus and PlayStation Now being separate things means they're competing with themselves somewhat for mind share from a casual audience, and PlayStation Now is losing (and how), so making it one service - which they can charge more for - makes a lot of sense. Not that I think first party PlayStation titles need to come to a service like this in Day One any time soon, because those titles sell like crazy anyways. Their hardware and software sales are soaring, and Xbox not being in that position is why they needed to pivot towards Game Pass in the first place, and obviously having the backing to bring third party titles into that and acquiring a number of studios is what we saw come as a result of what for a very long time was a weak first party lineup. I think my biggest problem with PS+ is that, obviously, PSN used to be free. With more subscription services coming out, and the potential transition we'll see here in the next few months, it should be feasible for us to go back to PSN being free off the back of strong subscription attachment rates, yet it seems to be getting used as an opportunity to add even more tiers. Funnily enough, if I buy a Series X, I plan on doing the opposite: subscribing to Game Pass to experience a game, and then picking it up on the cheap when a few years have passed just to get it physically. It definitely seems to be needed in some cases due to licensing, such as with Forza. It is a scary thought that physical games could be phased out, the biggest reason for me obviously being accessibility to older titles. These subscriptions could be great for bringing back smaller titles which ended up costing a fortune physically - like the Suikoden games on PS1 - but for some reason I really doubt that we'll see them come, or if they do, it's going to be quite a ways into the catalogue. Right, I genuinely think this is the problem with subscription services above all else - for pretty much every form of entertainment. Not only does it cheapen some experiences, making them disposable as others have rightly said, but it lowers the standards of design for these AAA studios. It's not about quality, because it's no longer about physical sales or reviews, but it's about moving onto the next game swiftly to ensure that the quantity is there, because they're looking for engagement and to gain mind share. I'm sure some people will hiss and squeal at me for this, but I think that design philosophy - of short gameplay loops, in games with now thousands upon thousands of dopamine bursts - has even permeated Nintendo since the move to the Switch. I'm one of the ones on here who loves Breath of the Wild (even with its flaws), but it's undeniable I think that in a game of that size, the pick and play nature of it results in a design which can at times ring hollow, such as with the lack of enemy variety, or how the game's difficulty plateaus pretty quickly. This extends to what little I've experienced of Super Mario Odyssey, where there are moons lying around left and right, and up and down, and behind your ear; yes, it makes the game easy to pick up and play for shorter sessions on a console like the Switch, but it seems like they're competing with mobile games with these design philosophies - very highly rated games, at that - rather than trying to make the best experience the game can offer. We've seen this with Pokémon too over the years, with how linear the story path of each game and each region has become since kids got lost in Diamond & Pearl, or how the Battle Frontier was taken out because players get very easily bored and frustrated, or how the EXP Share has trivialised the games to an extent in a series not exactly renowned for its difficulty to begin with. This isn't me dunking on Nintendo, but I think it's a fair criticism to levy at a number of their games - even ones I've enjoyed immensely! - because they don't seem to realise that the last things we need from quality games are these short gameplay loops for pick up and play sessions akin to what we see in mobile games (this isn't me picking on mobile games either, by the way), or games made much easier to be considered more accessible. It's like they want to be addicting - and Nintendo is not at all the only one guilty of this. Like you said Sam, I think a lot of games today can feel like they're made to be distractions, in a time when they essentially serve as distractions from other distractions (the constant social media notifications, emails, alerts, etc.). I think it's part of a much wider societal issue where maintaining our attention is no longer the aim, simply distracting us and gaining mind share is, and the fastest way to do that is in constant and short bursts (i.e. with dopamine). Monkey lizard brains and all that. Obviously, there are going to be exceptions to the rule, and these come in companies serving some sort of niche in the industry - such as From Software's games - or in the booming indie scene. This isn't me saying that there aren't quality titles around, but AAA releases have by in large become risk averse and have been for a while, and I don't think we've quite crossed the threshold into subscriptions being the way to play games, but of course that's going to be down to only Xbox really putting everything behind the concept so far. I would argue that PlayStation first party titles not coming to the service Day One - and again, probably not any time soon either - is a bit of a relief because they do put out high quality first party titles, and have done consistently for years; for now, I think it's safe to say that that's the plan moving forwards, too. But I think the AAA space could get bumpy if in the next decade we see all three console manufacturers turn to subscription-based models. Not only is it overwhelming as a consumer, I personally don't think products designed with the philosophy of small hits of dopamine to keep you hooked is going to be good for the quality of the output we see. I say this, obviously, as someone who wants to play older games on modern systems, and that's really the main part of the story I want to see come to fruition. But for me, I don't think a subscription service for games - not exactly short-form entertainment based on my preferences - is going to be right for me in the long run, either, regardless of its price.

Schreier with those PlayStation Game Pass competitor scoops, well...kind of not? No first party games Day One. Still, sounds like it could be an impressive package depending on its price. If it works out at £10/month or less a year I could see myself biting, but otherwise I'd probably just check it out in quiet months (which aren't really a thing anymore ). I just want to play the good Battlefront II, maybe force Metal Gear Solid on some friends, and see more people play Suikoden and Suikoden II. Here's hoping!

I have, it's the Palkia, though technically I've got some from older games, but I could say the same for the rest I guess

So Masuda doesn't give you a new pointless piece of paper for catching all 151 in the Sinnoh Dex as opposed to seeing them, so this will have to do: Thanks for your help @Glen-i! It's the first time I've done this since the original Diamond, and I think I may have caught a Pokémon-catching fever need to try and hold it off until Legends: Arceus!

Thanks as always Glen, appreciate it!