Julius

Deserved win by Leipzig, made especially sweeter by not having Timo Werner at their disposal. Atlético were just too negative for the first half, and didn't really turn up until the last 25 minutes after João Félix came on and sparked them to life, but it was too little too late. He was superb, created some great chances, smartly won a penalty, and coolly converted. Simeone just needed to make more changes earlier on. There's no reason that the pressure we saw in the final 5 minutes weren't seen for the final 15 minutes when they were on level terms. Why do they need to go behind to come to life? Upamecano and Angeliño were absolutely the best players on the pitch tonight, the former giving an incredibly solid defensive display and showed his proficiency on the ball - I think his defensive style and possessive attitude would suit Barcelona perfectly. Angeliño was a war horse, constantly driving Leipzig forward, always dragging Atlético wide with the ball and then bringing the ball back inside with some smart passing. Leipzig moved the ball from left to right really well throughout. A great achievement for them to go from formation to UCL semis in 11 years, of course it hasn't been without its criticisms in how they've gone about it, but awesome hearing Nagelsmann's thoughts on the PSG vs Atalanta game and what he felt went wrong for Atalanta defensively in minding Neymar and Mbappé. Based on what we've seen in the opening quarter final matches, I don't think PSG vs Leipzig is as predictable game as it might be on paper. PSG has stellar individiuals, and if Neymar and Mbappé turn up they can cut through any defensive lineup, especially if Verratti is fit in time to play, but their game against Atalanta gave Nagelsmann a lot of material to find weaknesses in. Leipzig on the other hand are a great cohesive unit, and without Werner are blunted a bit in attack, but tonight showed that they can still take the battle to PSG next week. Should be a great game. Barça vs Bayern tomorrow too, which I cannot wait for. Bayern are favourites by far and ravenously tore us apart, but if the stars align, Barça can still take anyone on their day. Even if it is the weakest Barcelona side of probably the last 15 years or so, all it takes is a little Messi magic. Hoping for it to be a competitive match!

Free upgrade from PS4 to PS5 confirmed.

New image from the EW article which has just been released: Looks fantastic. Hopefully see some gameplay soon?

Gamstat showing that the game had over 8 million players as of Sunday. I've just checked and it's still at the 8.1 million players mark. Not totally accurate and I'm sure there will be slight deviation (give or take 10%) from the actual numbers, but it's still insane. Can't imagine it'll be too long before PlayStation or Mediatonic come out with an official figure, but it looks like that number could still be climbing.

Original ATLA creators Mike and Bryan are officially off Netflix's Avatar: The Last Airbender live-action remake series. A Netflix spokesperson had this to say: All faith in this project I might have had has gone completely down the drain. In an industry where leaving for "personal reasons" or "though we are departing, we have complete faith in the team" are corporate speak for "well, this is a mess", "We strongly disagree with the direction the show is heading" is completely damning. You have, in my opinion, two of the best storytellers and worldbuilders in western animation working on a remake of their own show, which has seen deserved success and a completely justified resurgence in popularity over the last few years. So whatever the changes in direction are that Netflix are making, I can't help but question who they are to - again - question the original creators in a remake project. I have full confidence that they wouldn't have done anything stupid with the franchise just going from how they have continued to build the Avatar universe since ATLA ended, but likely would have just fleshed the world out a bit more in retelling this story. There is no way that anything so drastic as a new direction for the series would have been on their agenda. What a waste of great talent, an excellent story, and an awesomely crafted fictional world...again.

Well there it is. Left it late, but in the end, deserved. Finally, PSG get their own slice of luck and best their demons. Really sparked into life by Mbappé coming on, dominated that second half after he came on. Paredes and Draxler coming on really balanced them out. Neymar was brilliant, if a bit unfortunate in front of goal. But they cannot afford to fall asleep in the first half next week, especially if they find themselves up against Simeone and Atlético. They need to come out now firing on all cylinders. Splendid game of football for the neutral, great fight shown by Atalanta. Roll on tomorrow's game!

Last official game would be the end of last month in the Coupe de la Ligue final, think they had a friendly since though. Their core of Di María and Verratti missing is really showing, it just gives them that balance in midfield a bit more and connects their attack a bit better. Looked much better since Mbappé came on, mind. Draxler being thrown on with Paredes might help things a bit more.

They've done really well so far, been solid in midfield where most of the battles seem to be going down, and PSG have allowed them to walk all over them. The biggest problem they are going to have going into this second half is that they are giving far too many chances away. Neymar's shooting boots aren't on and he should have got it closer to the goal when he lumped it wide towards the end of that half, but this PSG side has far too much attacking potency for someone else to not turn on to the chances they're getting. Worst case, they'll throw Mbappé on. For all of the glitz and glamour of this PSG side, and all of the solid individuals they have on their team sheet, there's no cohesion to their play. They're like untamed beasts. He might have misfired so far, but Neymar looks hungry, he's chasing things down, and he's putting a shift in. Now is his time to turn up. Hopefully see some more goals in this second half. Going by the first half, it looks open for the taking for whoever can turn up now. Looking forward to it!

A second update: the lighting has returned, the thunder is very audible, and there are thick and heavy grey clouds hanging over my area. I can already feel that the air has cooled. Let this be it! Just checked the forecast and they're saying rain and thunderstorms for the next week... PLEASE Update to the update to the update: IT'S RAINING

Yeah, totally agree, I said the same I worded it weirdly, which is my bad. What I meant to say was it's not ideal to have to charge a controller every night if you are going to have a window where you are playing for much longer than you might otherwise - as I said before, and want to reiterate again now having a scan through some of the other replies, is that this is absolutely not a big issue. It's just something I wished they would improve, in much the same way I wish my Switch would last for longer off a full charge, or to keep it more relevant to what's being discussed, that the Joy-Cons would last longer off a full charge. Just to give an example of what I mean though drahkon, I had to charge my main DualShock 4 up fully before playing Final Fantasy VII Remake for the first time, and charged it fully again another 3 times and changed to my backup controller twice during the 38 hours or so it took to finish the game in the following days. My preference would be to have a controller I needed to charge maybe once during that time (at parity with the Switch Pro Controller). Sure, probably not the best thing for me to compare it to, maybe something like the Switch or the Switch's Joy-Cons in particular like I mentioned above would be more appropriate. The only thing I would say that is different for phones and controllers is that anecdotally I know that I almost always have my phone on me, which is why I'm probably a bit more tuned into its battery life and keeping it fully charged, when compared with something like a game controller, where I'm much more likely to go days - sometimes even weeks - at a time without playing. Maybe one way to get around that, or perhaps to just help keep people more aware of their controller's battery state, is if they just showed the controller battery life from the main menu of the PS4 vs the menu which pops up when you hold the PS button? I don't know, just a though. I'm sure someone's going to say we can already do this but I just don't know @bob he did the thing! But agreed drahkon. That very short look we got at the startup screen has me hoping it runs a bit more smoothly and is a bit nicer to look at and use. Totally sidetracking from the discussion about the controller for a second, but I know you're a big PlayStation fan, and I know roughly where most people on here are landing from the last few pages, but can't remember where you were at with the PS5. Are you already onboard, or is there anything holding you back? Anything you'd like to see PlayStation do in the next few months which would make you want it more? Absolutely agree on the PS Store being the pick of the bunch, but still far from great. I don't have an Xbox, so won't comment on that, but for the PS Store they've done a good job of making it fairly functional in the last few years. I remember there was a point where it would try its hardest to not launch in the app, or take my payments, so I would have to open the site in my phone's browser. Still a bit slow on the console itself at times, but think it's just being weighed down by quite a bit of bloat. As for Nintendo eShop, I agree that it's probably my least favourite of the two I use, it hasn't got great curation and only the most basic of lists to work through. Something I do love about it is wishlisted games going on offer and receiving that email to say X, Y and Z are 50% off and swooping in to pick them up, away from the console space the same of course goes for Steam with this. I don't know if it's something PlayStation do at the moment? But if it is, I genuinely have no idea. As for the OS, maybe it's just my model (first batch of 1TB PS4's that got that matte black look all over, instead of the one panel having a gloss to it), but it's got a bit of bloat now and I experience slowdown and lag while looking through my menus a few times a month. I also just kind of wish it was a bit more pleasing to look at and sort through. I don't think me and @Ronnie were saying that it was really important, more that it was something we would like to see them improve and would be a convenience which brings them closer to parity with their competitors, which is why I'd be glad with a longer lasting DualSense by comparison. It's a little odd (maybe that's too harsh...a sticky wicket? ) to me that my most played console (the PS4) has a controller with a battery life comparably much shorter than my least played (the Switch), so I would like to see it improved. And the environment is the living room where I sit a good 7' or 8' away from my TV before anyone suggests it, the idea of a long charging cable makes me envision scenes of disaster in my living room, don't think it's the best option for where I live right now

For me it's less about the longer sessions and needing a backup controller for them, and more about needing to charge the controller on an almost daily basis. Again, it's a nitpick, but when I'm playing the PS4 I don't want to have to stop playing because I forgot to charge the controller last night, and from Sony's side of things, I'm sure they'd rather have us playing games on their platform. I don't buy into the Xbox vs PlayStation vs Nintendo console wars, because I think it's pointless and what everyone wants out of their console is different, but I do buy into the idea that they are competing for our time. If the battery running out interrupts a playing session, they've lost time that I could potentially be playing on their console. Of course it's down to each user to keep these things charged, but as someone who does make sure to charge their controller regularly, it can get a little grating. I'm not even looking for parity with the Xbox and Switch controllers, but I don't see any reason why PlayStation's controllers shouldn't be on the same level as their competitors. Same argument for longer battery life in smartphones. It's convenience if nothing else, which is a selling point. It's not especially bad, so like I said I don't hold it against them, but yeah, I'd like if the controller for the system I play the most could get by for longer on one charge. Again, it's not the end of the world, and I think PlayStation have bigger fish to fry, namely the handling of applications, how poorly the OS can run at times, and the PlayStation Store - latter definitely isn't specific to PlayStation, just think it's important going into next gen, especially with an all-digital console on the way, that they get it right.

Yeah they are definitely leaning to the more extreme side of most gamers when I do that I'm sure, with The Last of Us Part 2 and Final Fantasy VII Remake for example I booked time off for them so would get up nice and early, brew some tea, and dig into the games for most if not all of the day. It's not every game of course, and definitely not my usual playing style, but the last thing I want during these sessions is to be swapping to a different controller because my battery's dying. My DualShock 4's probably last 6 - 8 hours I'd say, but worth mentioning they are the older models. Talking about this makes me miss H-o-T, I'm sure he knows the struggle It's crazy to me because even my DualShock 3 has a longer lasting battery, I remember I got through both Mafia II and Metal Gear Solid 2 on one charge. Similarly for the Switch, though I admittedly don't use it as much as my PS4, I've put nearly 200 hours into my most played games and have only charged the Pro Controller 3 or 4 times since. It's not a problem for me, so I don't want to make it seem bigger than it is, but I would be very happy if we see at least a 15 - 20 hour battery life this time around. It's made that much more noticeable to me because I sink so much time into my PS4 compared to the other consoles I own, the last thing I - and PlayStation, I guess, purely from a numbers side of things - want is for me to have to put the controller on charge and stop playing, and sink time into something else. One of those where it's not something I hold against them, but would be happy if they improved upon

Leaked photos and impressions of the DualSense have come out. 1560mAh battery. Crazy that we're getting to the point where all the major hardware bullet points are doing the roads from actual manufacturing and testing of the product. As for the battery, for reference, the old DualShock 4 had 800mAh, and the newer V2 model I believe has 1000mAh, whereas the Switch Pro Controller has 1300mAh. This coming in at 1560mAh has me hopeful that I'll finally be able to rely on one controller for a day-long gaming session, because at the moment I have an older DS4 and have to keep another one fully charged as backup when I get the chance for longer gaming sessions.

An update on this, it's actually hotter than it was yesterday... WHY GIVE ME THAT FALSE HOPE WORLD? WHYYYYYYY?!

Well, this seems promising. Zelda trademark registered last month seems to potentially be pointing towards an onslaught of Zelda goodness next year for the 35th Anniversary, assuming that this year's Mario Anniversary games still come to fruition. I would really like to play Wind Waker for the first time, so I'm going to be selfishly optimistic here

I feel for their PR team having to stretch what's left, doesn't give me much confidence that they have a trump card to hand. Title of the update: I just hope the game is everything Halo fans have been waiting for when it does release, because it would be terrible for them (and the Xbox brand) if not only the game was delayed from launch, effectively dooming their chances of competing with PlayStation in the early months of next gen, but it was delayed and still ended up being not willy received. Subjective of course, but I've read a lot of posts concerned about 343's handling of the franchise, and as an outsider, it's hard to not feel for them. Yeah, I'm not even sure if a Series S at £199 could save this launch period for them. Would it do well? Maybe, though I still think there's the potential for mixed messaging (we're inevitably going to see "most powerful console ever" and "1080p/1440p" or whatever it's going to show things off at is not strong and clear messaging going into next gen in my opinion). But it needs a killer app, and even with the third party offerings they've got lined up as exclusives, I can't see any of those being that and bringing new people into the Xbox ecosystem. They're stuck in this weird middle ground right now. As someone who wants Xbox to do well and wants to see competition out of the gates getting into next gen, and who has been waiting for any reason to jump on, this sucks. It doesn't give me much hope for the rest of their lineup either - things like Forza being without a trailer for instance, I feel like that will get pushed further back. Only thing they can do to combat it really is what @Kaepora_Gaebora mentioned, and that's throw Game Pass at it. They're already leaning into it with their messaging in the above press release revealing it's launching in November, offer 6 months or 12 months, they need to do whatever they can to just be part of that conversation. But it's so difficult to do that when it's basically mixed messaging of "Play these old games, a handful of smaller exclusives, a handful of weird third party timed exclusives (Yakuza 7), and multiplatform games." I'm sure it'll be enough for the Xbox hardcore - by that I don't mean those willing to blindly support the brand, but rather those so embedded in the ecosystem that they have little choice if they want to carry over purchases or existing profiles on online games - but for the average consumer, it's a really hard sell. Sadly, everything I've read today (and some articles I've read before) seem to point to this not always being the case. I think Jason Schreier's Kotaku article from January, Game Delays Cause More Crunch, is probably the most succinct in detailing why delays can be just as bad, if not worse, than the normal crunch before a nearing deadline. I can't recommend that read enough. I'm sure it's not necessarily the same at every studio, but it's a very widespread thing, seemingly especially at the biggest of AAA studios, and the gist of it is that basically, the studios will now see this is a great opportunity to drain you even more, beyond even just the normal levels of "polishing the game". Those features that got thrown around in a meeting last month, but wouldn't be ready in time for launch? We have another three months, plenty of time to squeeze that in. That new multiplayer mode which seems to have taken off, do you think we've got time to do something like that? It's quite frankly appalling. Even in games where from the perspective of most gamers it's "just polishing what's already there", on games such as TLOU2 and RDR2, it means another 3 months of overtime. So while I'm glad that 343 are getting more time to polish the game to the standards of Halo fans, and that Xbox weren't willing to push them to the edge right now to have the game ready by November, I can only wish them luck with this delay in trying to bring the game up to snuff, because it seems like there's a lot more work ahead of them in getting this game ready.

Just seen some brilliant flashes of lightning off in the distance completely lighting up the sky (a lot of clouds hanging over us right now by the looks of things), with an almost inaudibly quiet rumble of thunder. Hopefully that means we'll be joining you in enjoying a cooler time soon! I love being out in the sun, but boy is the humidity it brings about indoors in the middle of summer not for me. Today was definitely the most uncomfortable I've felt working from home so far. And that's saying something, seeing as I hate working from home, guess the trick is that I'm always uncomfortable

As @Happenstance mentioned in the Series X thread, this has been delayed to 2021. Huge blow to the Series X launch, but I'm happy that 343 are being given the extra time they feel they need to make a game that they're proud of.

Holy. Crap. This is huge! As Miyamoto said: "A delayed game is eventually good, but a rushed game is forever bad." I think it's absolutely the right step to take from how I came away feeling about that demo they showed us, I know the game won't be completely overhauled in this time, but I think it can be pushed more than it has been to be a system seller. I did not come away wanting to throw money at Xbox for Halo, and I feel like that's where they wanted everyone to be. I'm glad that Xbox are giving 343 more time to let them put out a game that they can call their own, and are proud of. I always found it kind of odd that they gave us a timeframe so far out, and of course everything else that's happened this year surely hasn't helped. In terms of the Series X(/S) launch? Unless there's something Xbox has up their sleeve, or some major third party AAA game they've just made exclusive, I can't believe that Xbox actually let 343 have more time. This was their chance to come out swinging into next gen, and now this Christmas and launch window is ripe for PlayStation to run away with (if it wasn't before). Early momentum is definitely something to take seriously, and this a huge blow to Xbox to hit the ground running. Even if the Series S turns more heads than Xbox could possibly hope for, it's asking a lot for the current/launch palette of Game Pass games to go toe-to-toe with Spider-Man: Miles Morales, it just doesn't have that killer app to launch with now. Fully expecting them to blow the roof off now with that marketing deal they have for Cyberpunk 2077, it's going to need to be pushed hard. Very, very, very interested to see how the next few weeks pan out from both PlayStation and Xbox. If Xbox has a trump card up their sleeves other than the Series S, now would be the time to pull it. It's time to put all their chips on the table for launch.

Oh man, now I miss Chowder

Yeah I think that's the case for NPD's and other major charts, but the UK chart, or at least the one referred to in the article, is all physical. They do go onto mention in the article as well how some games currently on sale are potentially being hampered by distribution and stock issues as a result of COVID, which isn't too surprising. And definitely don't want to take anything away from Nintendo, their figures are nuts. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is guaranteed to be a place or two higher than they always say, it's crazy! Something I think Nintendo does better than just about every other major publisher is be transparent about how many units they've sold, I feel like it really helps to inform what we should perceive as success as video game fans. Yes I know it's only quarterly and for games that they've published, but I think it's a much more informative statistic to know how many units have been sold vs. $/£ sales; with the box office for example, while ticket prices do go down as the weeks go on for blockbusters which are normally frontloaded with a premium for actually supporting the film and seeing it on its release day/weekend, there isn't much potential for variation in ticket prices for a blockbuster film after a certain point. Compare that to video games and while, yes, Grand Theft Auto V has absolutely killed it when it comes to sales, that game is nowhere near its original RRP even without sales! Compare that to Nintendo who are stubborn *almost to a fault) about keeping their RRP's fixed, it speaks a lot to the brand and their confidence in their products. but it also means it would be nearly impossible to compare $/£ sales with that of other major publishing arms, just with how quickly their RRP generally falls off when compared with Nintendo. I would LOVE to know how many copies of some of the other biggest games of the year, like The Last of Us Part II or Final Fantasy VII Remake, have sold so far, instead of getting an update a weekend after launch, and then at the end of its first quarter, and even then it can sometimes be the nebulous "we have sold in or shipped X million units". That's great, but all it really tells us is that your marketing team killed it in convincing retailers to buy a lot of copies of your game which might not end up being sold to consumers anyway. I was listening to an old podcast the other day just to have some background noise, and they were talking about how Mafia III shipped 4.5 million units in its first week. That's insane! But mainly because I guarantee half of those copies were not sold to consumers in that first week. And even when we do get these sales figures early on, beyond that? Almost always complete radio silence. By the way, same goes for their historical consoles figures being honestly and openly shared with us too. PlayStation have done this too with their consoles, and I think it's great. I know Xbox "lost" the generation, but shying away from sharing these figures just makes it so much more difficult to dig into how the Xbox has really done. The Switch might have only just passed it in sales, and we would have no idea! It's awesome that we have these figures as reference points, and before anyone mentions that Nintendo has shareholders to answer to, so do a lot of these other major publishers. I think it's something worth highlighting anyways, nothing better to me than being able to go "wow, Xenoblade deservedly sold really well! And isn't it kind of nuts that Animal Crossing has passed the GameCube?!" Why can't Sony tell me that The Last of Us has outsold the Vita? P.S. I own a Vita, so before anyone turns up trying to torch me, know I'm just teasing

Just got caught up on the second episode of Night City Wire, hasn't really budged the needle much...I still want to play the game just as badly as I did before Absolutely on the fence with which lifepath I want to go with! I feel like we've mostly seen Street Kid gameplay, and while I think it looks really fun and kind of chaotic at times, it just isn't grabbing me as much as the other two. On the one hand. with the Corpo, I love the boardroom side of cyberpunk stories and would be really curious to see how that path winds, and just how much control we have over our path (for example, getting out of the corporate setting and burning it all to the ground), but for the purposes of what is promising to be a lengthy role-playing game, I think I'm leaning towards the Nomad the most. I love the idea of being an outsider looking in, being a bit of an unknown quantity to the residents of Night City, and above all else, for the purposes of playing this game, I definitely feel like it would be the one I go for just based on the context that I don't know my way around Night City, and neither would a Nomad. Still not set in stone, but definitely the way I'm leaning so far. Which path is everyone else thinking of going with? I also really liked that look we got a closer look at the music being produced just for this game, and specifically got to hear about how the singers and musicians are approaching that creative process of trying to essentially play and embody someone else's music, definitely appreciate that. And of course I still love the look of the weapons. Only thing I didn't like about it this time around was that it reminded me that I had completely forgotten about The World of Cyberpunk 2077, I had been thinking about picking it up but with everything going on this year it managed to sneak under my radar, really interested in the world they've created here. I completely get this, I can be the same way, and not even just with first-person games (though they definitely make me feel off the most). For me what it oftentimes comes down to is actually the framerate or a particular blend of art style and character movement which can make me feel nauseous, sometimes I feel like I get used to it, but other times I have had to put games down. I fortunately haven't had it too badly since early last year when I tried to play The Unfinished Swan, there's just something about indie games in first-person which manages to make me feel very dizzy, I imagine it's to do with their camera controls and them not being as perfected as AAA first-person games, because I've been fine with games like Call of Duty, or in the case of The Unfinished Swan, I think it was more that there wasn't a clear "horizon line" I could set my sights on to focus and contrast how close I was to other objects. In terms of 3D games, back when I played Dragon Quest XI I actually had a bit of a rough time early on with its framerate which made me feel sick for the first 5 hours or so, I think they put out an update which fortunately cleaned it up a bit and thank goodness they did, because I ended up loving that game and sinking 100 hours into it. So what I'm hoping is that the compression of a lot of these videos of Cyberpunk is the cause for both of us feeling a bit nauseous Ronnie, I'm not sure which gameplay video you watched, but if it was anything from previews I know those previews were carried out remotely, and hopefully the uncompressed gameplay we get to experience in November might be easier for us to deal with

Yeah, that sounds about right. It's still nuts to me though, they've already sold something like 130 million units and it still makes the top 10 every month. It's insane. Imagine that could contribute to the overall figures, but I think these charts are physical retail copies only? I think most if not all of the bundles are on the virtual storefronts, but I could be wrong about that.

Great to see Nintendo doing so well. ACNH still flying very high, and MK8D killing it as always. Personally glad to see Ghost of Tsushima up there too, very much deserved, I absolutely loved that game. It always blows my mind that GTA V is still making the top 10 both here and in America's NPD's month in and month out though. Microtransactions in the form of their Shark Cards I would understand ranking so high, but the game itself? Who is still buying this game?!

WELL THEN. 2 million copies sold on Steam! They've made a great game here. It's not without its issues, many of which we've mentioned already, but above all else it's great fun, and very hard to put down. Absolutely deserved.