Julius

I can think of 5-10 million units or so why they'd probably think about burying the hatchet if there is any ongoing beef, though I'll admit, this is the first I'm hearing about it. What's happening? Also, isn't Bandai Namco publicly traded? They'd have shareholders in revolt not selling one of the best-selling games of the generation on the newest and shiniest platform. Purposely sabotaged how, exactly? I know the Switch release got delayed, but that always seemed to me like it was due to low effort and poor management on their side; hardly a common occurrence in the industry. And let's not forget, the Switch was young when Dark Souls Remastered was announced and then released, so I can see why Bandai Namco might not have given it the attention it perhaps warranted in hindsight. What did EA pull with Mass Effect 3/Trilogy? Look man, I'm just trying to think ahead and plan a third Armored Core playthrough over here

Replaying Armored Core VI at the moment and at the end of a mission I found myself wondering: "huh, I wonder what this could be like on Switch 2?" I mean, it has a last gen Xbox One/PS4 version as it is, so technically it seems very feasible based on all the purported hardware leaks for the thing. And then I thought a bit more about it, and just how much of From Software's modern catalogue is very feasibly on the cards – and, more pertinent to a thread like this, I started thinking about how they'd get doled out, and their potential presence in April during the Switch 2 Direct. Demon's Souls and Bloodborne need to be taken out of the equation simply because they're PlayStation IP, and Dark Souls Remastered was the only modern From game to make its way into Switch with its Remastered version which was, uh, not the same as the Remastered releases of the game elsewhere; in fact, interestingly, some people think it might be the version which is best from a faithful remaster perspective, even with a lower frame rate than on other platforms: That leaves Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin, Dark Souls III, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, Elden Ring (and it's Shadow of the Erdtree DLC) and Armored Core VI as the currently released games which have yet to come to Switch and all of them could very feasibly come to the Switch 2 – From still hasn't made a next-gen (well, current now, I guess) exclusive title, meaning that all of these had PS4/Xbox One releases. My questions are, with there being a backlog of beloved and critically acclaimed modern From Software titles to get onto Switch 2: how do you think Bandai Namco should go about curating these games for a Switch 2 release? Which comes first? And do you think Activision take the step to release Sekiro on Switch 2, being the game's publisher in the west? For me, Elden Ring is the obvious centrepiece of this whole thing, and while I do think there would be merit and thought behind the idea of first releasing the other Dark Souls titles on Switch 2 first purely from the perspective that it is a successor series...the game is too big for Bandai Namco to be thinking that way, and I think Elden Ring arrives in the first 6 months of the Switch 2's life if it's not there at launch, and could really help set the bar in terms of what the system is capable of. I absolutely think this shows up at the Switch 2 Direct in April, regardless of when it releases, and I think I then think that the Dark Souls games get collected and released as a trilogy – similar collections are available on other platforms, and it nicely bundles Remastered with II and III in a way which means it wouldn't need its own separate Switch 2 re-release, but still adds value to a wider package. It's hard to commit to a timeframe considering that we don't know when the Switch 2 is set to launch, but I could see this trying to be squeezed in ahead of Christmas in, say, November, if not by the time of III's 10th anniversary next March. Depending on how far ahead the Switch 2 Direct dares to look - are they just focusing on launch and the following few months? Are they about to lay down a marker with every commitment being made by every party involved for the next few years? - I think there's a 50/50 chance that the Dark Souls Trilogy turns up at the Switch 2 Direct in April. The ones I can't figure out for the life of me are Sekiro: Shadows Twice and Armored Core VI. Perhaps if a new Armored Core released next year I could see them using an Armored Core VI release on Switch 2 as a way to start up its marketing cycle and build excitement, but Sekiro very much seems like a franchise which won't be getting a sequel. Similarly, I could see Armored Core VI and the Dark Souls Trilogy being thrown out by Bandai Namco as titles they're bringing to the Switch 2 without hard dates or windows at the Switch 2 Direct, but Sekiro is Activision's to publish over here in the west – and so they likely don't really care for whatever Bandai Namco has planned for their release curation with their games, and could very well like it up for a release at launch or in the first few months of the Switch 2's without giving much thought to the release of Elden Ring on the system. It's such an odd duck. Anyone have any thoughts on how they might go about handling this?

Boy oh boy am I having a blast revisiting this. Today I completed Chapters 2 and 3, and progressed into the Arena up to and including giving all of the A-ranks an ass-whooping. It's been really fun revisiting these levels and blasting my way through just to be like "oh wait, wasn't there a hidden combat log/dialogue or combat option/part/piece of lore over there?" and just beaming from how much this game clearly drilled itself into me the first time around just some 16 months ago. I'm now up to v6 of Jericho: Now, I love the more typical Souls games I've played: Demon's Souls, Dark Souls, and Elden Ring. Dark fantasy is cool as hell, but I think something I've touched on before is how I never felt I was playing those games how I felt I *wanted* to play those games. I always felt like I was playing the game on the game's terms, and it wasn't until much later in the game, once I'd fleshed out a particular build or play style through levelling and honing my skill, where I felt really comfortable going around and showing those worlds who was boss. Then I played Bloodborne, which felt *exactly* how I wanted to be playing the Souls games. The gothic horror ~and other weirdness~ vibe is unparalleled. There's a focus on speed, dodging, parrying with a gun, blood-spurting viscerals: while it still really feels like it takes a while to be showing that world who's boss in the story sense, it felt to me like that point came much earlier on in Bloodborne compared to the above games, and through some skill and confidence early on, it felt like you were exacting vengeance on the world. Be it skill or play style or the way you'd built your character, very early on I felt a sense of earned empowerment in Bloodborne. While Armored Core VI isn't as challenging as Bloodborne or Souls games, it still manages to find the balance of providing a feeling of earned empowerment rather than a true and proper power fantasy, which I love it for. It is much more forgiving in helping you find your builds than other From games, as you can sell parts back to the store at cost; the Training and Arena programs both do a great job of inspiring confidence from an early point in the game; and, what's more, despite an obvious narrative throughline of "what the hell is going on with this sci-fi story? Who are these people? What is this world? There's something that feels unmistakably...off", there's a sense of being a part of some greater story while also getting to regularly see the impact you have on it, whether it be through choosing one particular mission over another when branching paths arise, the way you interact with other characters (who are all brilliantly voiced, by the way) and make occasional dialogue choices, or, again, the simple freedom of building your AC how you see fit with little repercussions outside of the construction limits the game places on you. This is a game which feels customisable in so many different ways from the get-go, and is incredibly moreish to boot. Again, going back to that feeling earned empowerment: you earned this cash; you chose these parts; you made this mech; you chose this mission; this victory is *yours*. Simply brilliant. Oh, and I never really talked about it the first time through, but there are so many visuals in this game which will just leave you going "well, damn": This game just radiates cool; it's by far the coolest I've ever felt playing a game. It's a second playthrough, so I know what's coming, and yet I'm just as excited to dig back into it every session as I was the first time around. There's an awkward boss that I know is coming up that I'm mentally steeling myself for, but honestly, I can't wait. Bring it. This genuinely might be my favourite game of the gen so far.

Has anyone else been getting an occasional error message when trying to access the site? It's fairly sporadic and never lasts too long, but I've been getting it occasionally for a few days now, maybe a week? I've had it on both my phone and my PC. This next part could be just bad luck and checking it more frequently over the weekend, but it also seems to be increasing in frequency as I've seen it a couple of times today?

Agreed with pretty much all of the above, that's how I see it playing out too. I think evergreen titles - you mention BOTW and Odyssey and I think both would absolutely fall under that umbrella - will be the ones to get true and proper remasters, and others will probably be brute forced into better performance where possible on a per-game basis. The only evergreen titles I struggle to see getting remasters are games which have since had sequels and are likely candidates for further sequels (such as Splatoon 2 and 3), as well as the Pokémon games. I could see them offering an upgrade path if you already own the game, purely because PlayStation do the same with their PS5 remasters of PS4 titles, and I think there's potential for bad publicity if it's not offered and the only way to play a higher fps, higher fidelity version of, say, Breath of the Wild is by dropping £60 or £70. But then, it's Nintendo, so who knows While I generally agree, I think the release of the OLED means that they pretty much have to jump to 1080p if they're going to backpedal to an LCD screen. I'd argue a 720p screen should've got more blowback than it did back in 2017 with the initial Switch reveal and launch - purely because of where phones and tablets were at the time - and I think anything sub-1080p and which doesn't allow you to throw "HD" in there for marketing purposes is a terrible idea, even if it is a battery drain. It also leaves them room for a 1080p OLED model down the line, which, I'll be honest, sucks when it's more than feasible to have that from launch, but it is what it is. This is the most positive/optimistic I've ever seen you about either game since the launch of BOTW but yeah, I'll hop aboard this train. This is genuinely the first time I've heard about the OLED having such great battery life and now I'm even more gutted we're probably back down to the 4-5 hours range with an LCD for Switch 2 Nah, I'd vote Joi-Con instead, every day of the week

The seeming lack of second screen support of any kind is interesting to me because the Switch seemed to allow access to as many past generations as it could without one, bar the GameCube and Wii – which both got some representation with select remasters here and there, and are surely next in line for their NSO plans. DS and 3DS games in particular just being left to the wayside is very odd, just considering massive IP like Mario and Zelda will inevitably have incomplete libraries on Switch 2 without their presence, and severely limits the potential catalogues for NSO to cash in on, not to mention I feel like DS and 3DS nostalgia is starting to well and truly kick in from a potential marketing perspective. The potential to turn around and say that the Switch 2 is more or less a one-stop shop for every generation of Nintendo would be too much of an opportunity to leave on the table in my head. They could have their own "Everyone* is here" moment. *okay not everyone but you catch my drift I know @Dcubed has mentioned plenty of times that he wanted this thing to have a second screen so that we could get access to those games that way, which I always thought was a cool (if potentially expensive) shout, but unless they're planning some sort of attachable screen or to utilise the Mouse-Con as a stand-in for the stylus "pointer" while playing docked - which, let's be honest, while a possible route to take probably wouldn't be the best way to play those games without some retooling, so I feel like we're probably talking remasters more than we are access to something closer to the original versions of DS games like we saw on Wii U - I'm struggling to see it. Which would be a shame. Yeah, I remember reading similar, and also that because of that unpredictable nature and the sheer amount of possibilities, it'd potentially be a question of power and a loooooooot of time being put in to get results. I guess I was looking at it more from the perspective of "hey, the Switch 2 has more power, so if you're going to take the time to remaster Smash Ultimate anyways...rollback netcode?" admittedly I haven't played Smash Ultimate online that much - I mean, I also just haven't played Smash Ultimate as much as I thought I would - so if it's functional and works, I guess that's good enough? Love the online arena suggestion, seems like a natural progression and streamlining of the old Download Play on DS when you had everyone over playing Mario Kart in one spot. Loved that that was a thing.

I mean, yeah, the question was about Switch games you would play if they were remastered Since you brought it up and with how much you lot talk about your love for Four Swords Adventures, though, I would absolutely love to see it remastered and brought back to life. Agreed on all the above, and a Smash Ultimate remaster with enhanced visuals and *maybe* a couple more characters, stages, idk maybe bring trophies back (okay forget the characters and stages please just bring trophies back!) could be great. Especially seeing as we're all hoping Samurai's next game isn't a Smash game, it'd be a smart way to tide us over until mid- or late-gen with the Switch 2 if they want a new one out. I'm surprised you didn't mention probably the best case for a Smash Ultimate remaster, though: rollback netcode. I know we heard that for whatever reason Ultimate couldn't implement it, but hey, if you're going to take the time to potentially remaster it for Switch 2, I'd argue getting functioning rollback netcode would be *the* reason to do so. Yeah, this is pretty much where I'm at as well, I'm not sure if/when I'll revisit BOTW and TOTK, but if I do I feel like it's a long ways away. I guess what brought the question on was I got recommended one of those "4K60 RTX on" BOTW vids on YouTube and while the smoothness of 60fps in that game is visually weird, there's no doubt it's a looker and the art style pops perhaps that little bit more. Potentially change up assets so that they're higher quality and there's more visually interesting things going on from a tech perspective? I could see myself maybe not playing through the whole thing again, but wanting to play around in that world with higher fidelity for probably a good chunk of time, just to mess around. As for the frame rate issues in BOTW, I do think that it's *generally* overblown - I mean, the game world is massive and running on a Switch, and what they manage in TOTK with different map planes and how you move between them is WILD (heh) - but they're there. I'm especially susceptible to frame rate changes as if a game goes from running smoothly to chugging I'll feel physically sick - Dragon Quest XI's tall grass back on PS4 when I first played I remember being an issue - until my mind adapts, which can take a few sessions if it's a consistent issue. I never had that issue with BOTW, even if I did notice the frame rate drops, but how a certain forest area in that game was presented was almost completely undermined by just how shoddily the game performs there. I'd love for them to just so that more people could enjoy the games, and it would also make PlayStation a heck of a lot of money, but if rumours from a few months back are to be believed, PlayStation seem to be considering a handheld device for next-gen, likely to try to get them some traction in Japan – if there's any truth to that, I don't think it would happen purely because it would be a showcase for it to run on that system. Then again, they're on PC, and already available on Steam Deck, and if PlayStation aren't doing a handheld thing for next-gen? I can't really see much reason not to, other than them needing to cling onto their first-party IP crazy hard right now with almost all of their GAAS going up in flames. I'm still gutted that Tears didn't look much different. I remember us all speculating ahead of release - maybe it was ahead of E3 2021 when we got that second trailer? - what they could do, and I remember really wanting them to just change up the grass colour so it was darker, and change up the weather in certain spots in the game, just so that when I recalled it in my mind there'd be some sort of identifier. The journeys kind of blur together in my head a little bit apart from the starkly different things each game had which kept them unique, which feels like a real shame.

There's been a lot of talk about a Breath of the Wild Remastered at or around launch, I'm guessing akin to something like Spider-Man Remastered where it might be accessible via an upgrade path as well as sold as its own SKU, and similar to Spidey, it was supposedly shown off behind closed doors to the press back at Gamescom 2023. If it were to become a reality, assuming you enjoyed Breath of the Wild (there are...like five of us on here, but still ) do you think you'd pick up a Remastered version of the game engineered to show off the Switch 2's strengths? And for those that didn't: are there any particular Switch games you'd like to see get visually remastered for Switch 2? Or do you just want to see them boost games to utilise the Switch 2 as is where possible, and would rather they didn't have unique Remaster SKUs on Switch 2?

Updated the first post with your pledge progress @Hero-of-Time, great stuff already getting your second pledge game cleared! been fun reading your thoughts on Grandia, and appreciate you sharing clips and pics as you've been going through as for whatever reason I only had the game's cover art stuck in my head, but no real idea of what the game itself looked like. With your recommendation it's definitely getting filed in my head as one to make sure I get to...eventually @Happenstance your Yakuza 0 timing has been uncanny; one of my friends is finally committing to playing through a copy of 0 I bought him during lockdown after trying here and there (albeit very half-arsed) to get through it in the past, and just last night when discussing it with him and my Yakuza/RGG-loving friend, we very nearly joined him. It's certainly put Infinite Wealth at the front of my mind, that's for sure! looking forward to hearing your thoughts on Rebirth when it drops on PC next week too!

Did you ever get around to starting this up H-o-T? Anyways, to explain how I got here – I finally got to a point in The Witcher 3 I've never got to before: the game started to feel like it was getting good. It took, like, 13 hours for that to finally happen, and I absolutely understand why I and others have dropped the game after several attempts at getting into it, but still. There are good things and bad things about those 13 hours - which I'm sure I'll get into at some point - BUT, what really stood out, was that the combat in that game sucks ass. In fact, the combat in The Witcher 3 sucks ass so much that it genuinely had me craving a game with any semblance of combat which was good fun. Hence, a second copy of Fires of Rubicon arriving at my door this morning I thought there was a decent chance I'd buy a second copy of Armored Core VI this year, but I didn't think it'd be so soon. So, with lessons learned from Persona 3 Reload last year about when to put a game down and when to go with the wants of my gaming gut, I've put The Witcher 3 down for a bit to tear into some good ol' mech combat and revisit ACVI. And I'm having a blast – I mean, that shouldn't be too surprising considering it was nearly my 2023 GOTY, but still! Last time I went with the pilot name Galileo (because, ya know, guy who discovered a bunch of planets, seemed fitting) and naming my ACs after the Knights of the Round Table; this time around, I've gone with the pilot name Ozymandias, and am thus naming my ACs after ancient and/or fabled cities which might have been the works we'd be looking on and supposedly despairing over. Currently I'm on the v3 build of my Jericho AC... ...where I'm using the reverse joint legs to allow for a greater weight limit while also keeping some of the speed of my favourite builds from my last playthrough, especially in dodging, allowing me to bypass some of the weak points of my Tristan build on the last page by having much more capable munitions on board. I didn't use the reverse joints much, if at all, on my last playthrough, so it's been fun to try a new type of build, and I think I might try the tank treads at some point - which I also never tried last time out - too. And yeah, I've just unlocked the Songbirds, so the game is about to become real breezy for this build. I'm about 3 hours in and I've just completed Chapter 1 and downed for the first time against a boss in Balteus, which, eh, is fine, it was only the once, and it was Balteus. I thought I'd hit Up on the D-pad to repair but forgot that when you're stunned that it doesn't register (even to apply the repair a bit delayed once you're no longer stunned) and so got taken out after thinking I was supposed to be healing. Whoops! Also finished the Arena up to and including E rank so far, as well as all the Training missions. Not quite sure how far I intend on going with this playthrough. Is it just NG? NG+? NG++? Am I going for the Plat again? I genuinely have no clue. I'm not even sure I get straight back to The Witcher 3 after this, whatever the case, purely because one of my mates is very far ahead and I'm in no real rush to get through it, whereas another has dropped off TW3 to finally play Yakuza 0 and is loving it, so Infinite Wealth had been very much on my mind (also spotted @Happenstance playing 0 too!). My group kind of agreed as a collective it was a good idea to get through The Witcher 3 together, and it has helped two of us to push on and see it through to a point where it starts to finally click, but we've also agreed in retrospect that agreeing to play a game as undemanding and long as that in January of all months might not have been the best idea. Whatever I choose to do with this and what I play next, so long as I'm having good fun with it, I'm on the right track

Where I'm at with combat in The Witcher 3:

The 'Tickets on sale Now' tweet for Brave New World dropped yesterday. Not showing up on Odeon for me right now, but only a matter of time before they're added I assume? I have pretty much zero excitement for this right now, which kind of sucks. Hopefully it turns out well and word of mouth can pull me in!

I was up until silly o'clock last night as I couldn't sleep (my sleep has been all over the place lately, anyways) and so I was watching Mario Kart 9 and Switch 2 analysis and speculation videos by the handful. And it was absolutely glorious. Haven't done that for new hardware really since the Switch when I was watching all the GameXplain NX and Zelda U analysis and speculation videos, which incidentally is the rabbit hole I went down which landed me here. I think the hype is starting to well and truly to kick in for me, as even if it does feel like there's less to speculate about compared to the OG Switch, it still feels like there's a good deal to do so over, what with Mouse-Con, that mysterious C-button, and of course the launch line-up itself Same team does Splatoon, right? Splatoon 3 was 2022, New Horizons was 2020... I could see it reasonably landing in the first two years of the Switch 2, and the only reason I hesitate over saying it'll be Year 1 is purely because of the install base potentially not being there for it to break sales records vs New Horizons, even if they do sell 20 million units in the first year – I think the only way you can do that really is have it be cross-gen, and there's not much reason for Nintendo to not make it Switch 2 exclusive. Then again, you can't reproduce being 3 years into a console's life + the perfect nightmare storm of COVID lockdowns, and I get the impression Mario Kart 9/10/whatever probably arrives in those first three months following launch - if it's not actually at launch - and so that kind of throws that reasoning out of the window for me. @BowserBasher might be right, I think it really could be there in the first 12 months or thereabouts. I think it could show up at the April Direct, too, but I think that really hinges on how they're positioning this Direct, which we don't really know too much about. Do Nintendo go the E3 June 2017 route of listing off new entries in countless franchises, some of which we won't see anytime soon (such as, at the time, the first "true" core series Pokémon game, aka Sword & Shield, and Metroid Prime 4), with June just a few months away and potentially being around the time of the Switch 2 launch? Or is this going to focus mainly on that launch line-up across first- and third-party titles and the plan for, say, the first 3 months, alongside the other launch details like price, NSO, etc.? I want to say the former, but again, the timing just seems...weird if they plan to have a Direct in June as they typically do. I also think having the April Direct be like their E3 2017 showing comes with the benefit of making promises for a number of franchises you might not see Day 1 but, hey, start saving for that Switch 2 because we're bring your favourite franchise to the system sooner rather than later! That's adorable Does your mom know what you did to Timmy..? It's interesting, because, while I do agree that the Switch 2 probably won't surpass the base Switch in terms of unit sales, I still see it doing 100m+ pretty comfortably in its lifetime so long as Nintendo don't do anything stupid to get in the way of that, like a poor release cadence, or a Wii U-type silly name – and the former is apparently the reason it's seemingly been held back for release this year, and just calling it Switch 2 is a home run and the right business move...even if the '2' they're using is generic and boring as hell. The point you bring up about multiple Switch units in a household and probably only one person upgrading I think rings true – for launch. I think at launch you see your young and/or hip parents, young adults with their first jobs, and teens with parents who spoil them just the right amount mainly being the ones who are going to be there Day 1, through the love of gaming, tech, just general hype or perhaps all three. Let little Reggie or Regina in the corner play on their Switch Lite until this Christmas or a couple more years, as Nintendo are going to continue bringing new games to them, before they get a Switch 2 Lite or their own Switch 2 down the line – heck, little Reggie/Regina may have even upgraded from their Switch Lite to a Switch proper (or maybe even an OLED, the lucky little gits) as a hand-me-down from Dad/Mum/big bro/big sis/Uncle Luigi when they upgraded to the Switch 2 – that's how my family got a PS1 when I was little, from a family friend upgrading to a PS2 (who then gave me a spare Dualshock 2 and Memory Cards when I bought my own PS2 around the time he was upgrading to PS3). I think there's serious potential here for a very steady and healthy first few years while they transition from the Switch to Switch 2. BUT - and it's a big but, and one I haven't really seen people bring up, as I think it's the biggest switch-up from their proof of concept Switch trailer - the important thing here is Nintendo doubling down on their marketing for the original Switch, focusing on those hip and/or young parents, adults and teens in their marketing early on rather than aiming at kids. That time will come, but the launch marketing campaign is not the time at all. And yes, I'm saying hey, let's even go older, let's get the old people's homes in on this and go Blue Ocean with this thing

Watching a mate do Splashing Sprint through a shared screen, and it's freaking hilarious he hasn't figured out how to handle the missiles in that top corner yet so he's just getting chased constantly by them and I'm cackling, I didn't realise they tracked you as long as they do Had to tell him to ask if he wants tips so I don't end up backseat gaming

Reminder: Switch 2 Experience raffle entries are now live. That's a direct link to the London event (11th to 13th April), which the page on their site doesn't seem to be sending people to just yet... Going to try for Saturday from 14:00-15:00 myself, but got to imagine that'll be the busiest window. Good luck to anyone entering!

Thanks for confirming H-o-T, I'd totally forgot about that but yeah you're right, they had that whole Nintendo World Championships weirdness last year! Damn, that feels forever ago now. Yeah, I think at minimum they'll probably expect you to have a Nintendo account – that's needed for the hands-on events sign-ups, even! I think this time around they're the ones I'm going to be prioritising getting a pre-order with, I just imagine that might be a bit of a task with them being the official store and all As an aside, I also just love getting an order from them, their packaging is lovely

Amazon seem pretty dependable, I think it's one of those where YMMV depending on what your usual Amazon drivers are like in your area. Maybe I'm misremembering, so someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the official Nintendo Store might be the actual best place to pre-order from – I can't seem to remember anyone on here getting hardware late from them, myself included (albeit for controllers and not consoles). I got my PS5 at launch through GAME who passed my console off to Yodel instead of Royal Mail as was advertised – while it did arrive on launch day, I wasn't a fan of that, and I think with their future being shaky at best and seemingly coming out with updates on their business model pretty randomly, I'm not sure I'd risk going with them. Of the "smaller" online stores, ShopTo are generally on it, but did botch their PS5 pre-orders back in 2020 a bit as I mentioned before –though that seems to be ironed out now? There's also The Game Collection where you'll probably be able to nab a decent amount of points on a console launch. Of the big retail chains left, Argos, Smyths and John Lewis are the ones I see people generally have good experiences with, though Argos messed up PS5 Pro pre-orders just a few months ago, so maybe they're worth dodging. JL had a 2-year warranty on the Pro which extended beyond the manufacturer warranty, so if that sounds up your alley, could be worth considering. I don't think there's anywhere over here right now where I can point at them and say with 100% certainty they're the ones to go with – ShopTo are my general go-to and were going to be my first port of call for the PS5, but then they had their whole mess and I had a few games arrive late from them last year. I think if you want it delivered Day 1, your best bet is pre-ordering at a couple of places where you can delay payment until closer to launch and then seeing how those pre-orders shake out, if they actually have allocation to match, etc., otherwise an in-store pre-order and collection may be your best bet

Schreier is reporting for Bloomberg that Bluepoint's and Bend's next projects have been canned – for the former, apparently this being a GAAS GOW (yes, a LIVE SERVICE GOD OF WAR). TL;DR: From his Bluesky (1, 2, 3) And from the article itself: Cannot imagine what it's like to be at Bluepoint and Bend right now. Arguably the best dedicated remastering team in the industry between many of their efforts over the last decade plus, what with Shadow of the Colossus and Demon's Souls to the point that it's still debated if they're remakes or remasters (okay, yeah, their adherence to the original artistic intent is questionable perhaps) being wasted on a live-service God of War game? Not to mention that their MGS remasters are still the foundation of the recent MGS Master Collection Vol. 1? You continued with GAAS GOW for another year after you scrapped the actually great idea of a GAAS Spider-Man?! Bend, trying to bounce back from the disastrous launch of and workplace hell that was Days Gone -- just to get pushed to a live-service project which is ultimately canned too? It's out of control. No wonder we've all felt like it took so long for PlayStation to get going this gen, they've been shooting themselves in the kneecaps with a shotgun behind our backs all along! Jim Ryan, Hermen Hulst and whoever else is responsible for this should be ashamed of themselves. What a colossal waste of talent. Just praying they've got time to get something great - even if on the shorter side - out of these teams before the gen is up, and even more than that, that no-one ends up losing their jobs because of the Russian roulette their bosses are playing with their livelihoods by trying to go for GAAS success. Good lord, get a grip already people. Their management and higher-ups suck ass. Said it before but I really hope Astro Bot's incredibly public success last year really drove a stake through the vampire's heart that is PlayStation's GAAS approach. How had that approach not already been nuked from orbit?! To finish off, stolen and updated a quick round-up from ResetEra of the 12 GAAS projects we know PlayStation had in the works: (...did they miss out Bend or am I crazy here?) Okay, so out of 12 GAAS listed we know they had in the works, as of today: - 8 have been cancelled, including the generational disaster that was Concord (talking here about finances, not quality, to be clear). - 3 still in the works (Marathon by Bungie, "Gummybears" by former Bungie devs at a new studio, and Fairgame$ by Jade Raymond's Haven). - 1 actual successful launch (out of 2 launches, counting Concord) in Helldivers 2, which was a big success. So...they're 1 for 9 with 3 games pending. Brilliant track record that, and I'm sure that one success in Helldivers 2 totally offsets all the other failures.

Most played/some new favourites from the last few months while I've been bouncing back... This one feels particularly nuts when you then see this: but like fr damn oh, and @drahkon you'll be happy to know that Nothing But Thieves were my #1 artist on Spotify last year, I think I was in their top 0.1% of listeners or something

I still have nightmares about those furry Sonic and Knuckles Xbox controllers they put out

The legendary David Lynch has passed away aged 78. Damn. Rest in Peace.

Missed it completely before, but the official site has a separate video which shows how the new Joy-Cons detach: (exactly as you'd expect from the leaks, but still )

There's a custom Chocobo Steam Deck: I think my hands just audibly gagged...

"Demo accolades trailer" Please tell me I'm not the only one laughing their ass off at the idea of "demo accolades"??

I do. Remake Explorers already you bastards!