Playstation 5 Console Discussion

[Hero-of-Time]

1 hour ago, Sheikah said:

Yeah. When you think about launches usually you get a bunch of games that mostly aren't great, that you'll play for a bit then drop - then you're basically stuck waiting for content. Having backwards compatibility and most of your existing games improved upon makes the PS5 a very easy sell (that, and the system is far quieter).

Even if it took 2 years for a lot of PS5-specific content, I think about how much cheaper the PS5 will likely be by then and to me it doesn't justify the wait. For my own situation, if I waited 2 years before buying my PS5 then I doubt my PS4 Pro would have sold for anywhere near as much, so even if there was an official 50 quid or so discount to the PS5 by then, I reckon I'd ultimately be less well off by waiting.

Not everyone wants to sell their console I admit, but even by waiting for a potential discount, the value proposition doesn't feel there. It took 2 years for the PS4 to receive an official 50 quid discount. Some people might value that saving, but that extra 50 quid feels like a very fair price to pay for 2 years of enhanced games, a mostly silent console, and the exclusives and better versions of games that release during that time.

It’s not about the price for me but rather then content. If the exclusives were there then I’d snap up a PS5...if I could find one.  I was going to try and get one for the arrival of Ratchet and Clank but after that there is nothing else announced that I can’t get on the PS4. I can appreciate publishers still wanting to serve the PS4 user base but they aren’t giving me any reason to upgrade at this present time. As someone who isn’t bothered about things like 60fps and HDR it feels like the console isn’t for me at the moment.

It’s been a really weird generation transition, that’s for sure.

[nekunando]

19 hours ago, Hero-of-Time said:

This right here is why I’ve yet to buy a PS5..

..and exactly why I shouldn't have picked one up shortly after launch

On 30/03/2021 at 8:16 AM, drahkon said:

May I ask: Why did you even buy one?
It's not a dig at you, I just genuinely wonder since what you found to be the issue(s) has been quite apparent before the PS5's release.

I had figured I would end up with a PS5 eventually so, as has been mentioned, you may as well jump in early as there isn't likely to be a price cut of any real significance for a good few years.

Having said that, I wasn't particularly excited for the console other than getting to try out the new DualSense and the launch somewhat coincided with probably the lowest feeling I've ever had from being a Nintendo console owner.

I was keeping an eye out for stock of the PS5 Digital (the price seemed more palatable) but one day on my lunch break at work I was out for a walk and an email appeared from BT to say they had some of the £449 model in stock for their customers so I didn't really take time to think about it given the scarcity of the system.

With the amount CeX were offering for the system before Christmas and the general demand for the system, it felt like a risk-free opportunity to give the PS5 a go knowing that I could change my mind and not lose any money on it should I have a change of heart.

When I got the PS5 set up, updated and installed my library of games, I was absolutely charmed by Astro's Playroom and the feeling of the new controller. At that point, I sort of convinced myself to stick with the console now that I had it!

Fast forward a few months and whatever benefits it may have over PS4 have become much less significant and my passion for the Switch has thankfully returned. Add to that the fact that I could still sell my PS5 without ever losing any money on it and it just didn't seem like the £449 spent on it was showing itself to be justifiable over the experience I can have and will still have with PS4.

Also, if anything, with my relatively small hands I find the DualShock 4 a little more comfortable to hold than the DualSense!

Whatever the case, it has been sold now and I find it oddly liberating

Edited March 31, 2021 by nekunando

[drahkon]

@nekunando very fair points  

In other news, some of my friends were able to order a PS5 in the past few days  But one of my best mates still couldn't get one  Well, with stock coming in much more regularly it shouldn't take too much longer until he gets his hands on one.

[drahkon]

More info here

Pretty awesome

Content from both HITMAN I and HITMAN II will be available to play if you own these games.
I grabbed the entirety of the first game when it was given out for free periodically. Getting access to it on HITMAN III is a pain...you gotta have all the episodes of HITMAN I installed, start the game, download/"purchase" the Legacy Pack, then start HITMAN II so the content from HITMAN I is ready to play there. THEN you can start HITMAN III and have the legacy content ready. At least that's how I think it works...

Still downloading HITMAN I and II right now...I hope there won't be any complications

[Eddage]

1 hour ago, drahkon said:

More info here

Pretty awesome

Content from both HITMAN I and HITMAN II will be available to play if you own these games.
I grabbed the entirety of the first game when it was given out for free periodically. Getting access to it on HITMAN III is a pain...you gotta have all the episodes of HITMAN I installed, start the game, download/"purchase" the Legacy Pack, then start HITMAN II so the content from HITMAN I is ready to play there. THEN you can start HITMAN III and have the legacy content ready. At least that's how I think it works...

Still downloading HITMAN I and II right now...I hope there won't be any complications

I literally bought Hitman I and II today, with a view to then pick up III when it was cheap and play the whole trilogy through III.

So If I just want to play the missions from I and II can I download this free starter pack and then play them whenever? Or would that also be limited from now until April 5th?

I must say when trying to research how to get I and II into Hitman III this morning I found it very confusing! I ended up buying Hitman II in a PSN sale and then from within that game bought the Hitman I legacy pack. Honestly have no idea if it will actually work when I do finally pick up III

[drahkon]

4 minutes ago, Eddage said:

I ended up buying Hitman II in a PSN sale and then from within that game bought the Hitman I legacy pack.

I think now you're able to play both the content of HITMAN I and II in the third one (i.e. the starter pack, or the full game if you wanna buy it). Not entirely sure, though
If I understand correctly, you need the legacy pack working in HITMAN I and then you can play it in HITMAN III.

I wish IO would've made this a little easier.

[Eddage]

13 minutes ago, drahkon said:

I think now you're able to play both the content of HITMAN I and II in the third one (i.e. the starter pack, or the full game if you wanna buy it). Not entirely sure, though
If I understand correctly, you need the legacy pack working in HITMAN I and then you can play it in HITMAN III.

I wish IO would've made this a little easier.

I'm downloading the Hitman III starter pack and it had the I and II packs available as free addons, so I guess I'll find out tomorrow morning. Can't be bothered to wait for the downloads to finish tonight, especially since it looks like the PS5 is being stupid and downloading the PS4 and 5 versions of Hitman III 

[drahkon]

7 hours ago, Eddage said:

PS5 is being stupid and downloading the PS4 and 5 versions of Hitman III 

Weird, mine only downloaded the PS5 version.

Welp, I started up HITMAN I in order to get the Legacy Pack. Did not know that you had to download all levels yet again...looks like I'll have to check again after work. No idea why IO Interactive made it this complicated...

[Cube]

46 minutes ago, drahkon said:

Weird, mine only downloaded the PS5 version.

Welp, I started up HITMAN I in order to get the Legacy Pack. Did not know that you had to download all levels yet again...looks like I'll have to check again after work. No idea why IO Interactive made it this complicated...

I just had to download this:

https://store.playstation.com/en-gb/product/EP3969-PPSA01769_00-S1GOTYH30000DIGI

Showed up as "free" because I claimed the games in the Hitman 2 starter pack when Hitman 1 was on PS+ (which seemingly unlocked it as a "proper" purchase). 

[drahkon]

2 minutes ago, Cube said:

I just had to download this:

https://store.playstation.com/en-gb/product/EP3969-PPSA01769_00-S1GOTYH30000DIGI

Showed up as "free" because I claimed the games in the Hitman 2 starter pack when Hitman 1 was on PS+ (which seemingly unlocked it as a "proper" purchase). 

Wow, that worked

Couldn't find it while looking up how to import the content I got to HITMAN III. You're a life saver (well, technically a temporary storage space saver )

[Cube]

I find the web store much easier to use. It also means that for PS+ games (and Play at Home, etc), you just press "Add to Library" and don't need to start a download (and if you don't have a PS5, you can claim PS5 games for if you do get one eventually).

[Eddage]

As I thought it did download both the PS4 and PS5 versions 

Anyway, deleted the PS4 version and deleted the install for Hitman II as all three games are appearing in Hitman III. Probably won't play it for a while, will wait for a "complete" version of Hitman III with all the DLC included, or perhaps even wait for it to be on PS+. Got so many games in my backlog so I'm in no rush

[Happenstance]

Started playing Ratchet & Clank 2016 with the new update. I’d forgotten just how gorgeous this game looks.

[Happenstance]

Bought 13 Sentinels in the PSN Spring Sale. Always been interested by it and I’ve heard that the story is excellent so I’m looking forward to jumping in.

I love it’s art style as well.

[Hero-of-Time]

Jason has posted a good article over on Bloomberg about how there is a lot of unrest over in the PlayStation camp.

Quote

(Bloomberg) -- Sony Corp.’s Visual Arts Service Group has long been the unsung hero of many hit PlayStation video games. The San Diego-based operation helps finish off games designed at other Sony-owned studios with animation, art or other content and development. But about three years ago, a handful of influential figures within the Visual Arts Service Group decided they wanted to have more creative control and lead game direction rather than being supporting actors on popular titles such as Spider-Man and Uncharted. 

Michael Mumbauer, who founded the Visual Arts Service Group in 2007, recruited a group of about 30 developers, internally and from neighboring game studios, to form a new development unit within Sony. The idea was to expand upon some of the company’s most successful franchises and the team began working on a remake of the 2013 hit The Last of Us for the PlayStation 5. But Sony never fully acknowledged the team’s existence or gave them the funding and support needed to succeed in the highly competitive video game market, according to people involved. The studio never even got its own name. Instead, Sony moved ownership of the The Last of Us remake to its original creator, Naughty Dog, a Sony-owned studio behind many of the company’s best-selling games and an HBO television series in development.

Deflated, the small group’s leadership has largely disbanded, according to interviews with eight people familiar with the operation. Many, including Mumbauer, have left the company entirely. Mumbauer declined to comment and others asked not to be named discussing private information. A representative for Sony declined to comment or provide interviews.

The team’s failure highlights the complex hierarchy of video game development and in particular, Sony’s conservative approach to making games for the PlayStation 5. The Japanese conglomerate owns about a dozen studios across the world as part of its PlayStation Studios label, but in recent years it has prioritized games made by its most successful developers. Studios such as Santa Monica, California-based Naughty Dog and Amsterdam-based Guerrilla Games spend tens of millions of dollars to make games with the expectation that the investments will pay off exponentially. And they usually do. Hits including 2018’s God of War and 2020’s The Last of Us Part II are exclusive to PlayStation consoles, helping Sony sell some 114 million of the PS4. Rival Microsoft Corp. has taken the opposite approach, relying on a wide array of studios to feed its Netflix-like subscription service, Xbox Game Pass, which allows users to pay a monthly fee for unlimited access to a variety of games. 

Sony’s focus on exclusive blockbusters has come at the expense of niche teams and studios within the PlayStation organization, leading to high turnover and less choice for players. Last week, Sony reorganized a development office in Japan, resulting in mass departures of people who worked on less well-known but acclaimed games such as Gravity Rush and Everybody's Golf. The company has informed developers that it no longer wants to produce smaller games that are only successful in Japan, Bloomberg has reported. 

This fixation on teams that churn out hits is creating unrest across Sony's portfolio of game studios. Oregon-based Sony Bend, best known for the 2019 open-world action game Days Gone, tried unsuccessfully to pitch a sequel that year, according to people familiar with the proposal. Although the first game had been profitable, its development had been lengthy and critical reception was mixed, so a Days Gone 2 wasn’t seen as a viable option.

Instead, one team at the studio was assigned to help Naughty Dog with a multiplayer game while a second group was assigned to work on a new Uncharted game with supervision from Naughty Dog. Some staff, including top leads, were unhappy with this arrangement and left. Bend's developers feared they might be absorbed into Naughty Dog, and the studio’s leadership asked to be taken off the Uncharted project. They got their wish last month and are now working on a new game of their own. 

Emphasizing big hits can also be counterproductive because sometimes games that start small can turn into massive successes. In 2020, Sony didn’t put much marketing muscle behind the quirky video game creation system Dreams, by the PlayStation-owned Media Molecule in the U.K. As a result, PlayStation may have missed out on its own version of Roblox, a similar video game tool. Parent company Roblox Corp. went public earlier this year and is now valued at $45 billion. 

For their first solo project, Mumbauer and his crew wanted to pitch something that would be well received by their bosses at Sony. Recognizing the risks and expense involved with developing a new game from scratch, they decided to focus on remaking older games for the new PlayStation 5. Remakes are considered a safe bet since it’s cheaper to update and polish an old game than it is to start from scratch, and they can be sold both to nostalgic old fans and curious new ones. The team originally planned on a remake of the first Uncharted game, released by Naughty Dog in 2007. That idea quickly fizzled because it would be expensive and require too much added design work. Instead, the team settled on a remake of Naughty Dog’s 2013 melancholic zombie hit, The Last of Us.

At the time, Naughty Dog was in the thick of development on the sequel, The Last of Us Part II, which would introduce higher-fidelity graphics and new gameplay features. If Mumbauer’s crew remade the first game to have a similar look and feel, the two games could be packaged together for the PlayStation 5. In theory, this would be a less expensive proposition than remaking Uncharted, since The Last of Us was more modern and wouldn’t require too many gameplay overhauls. Then, once Mumbauer’s group had established itself, it could go on to remake the first Uncharted game and other titles down the road. 

But pivoting from doing finishing work for other games to making your own is difficult, since original development teams are “competing against hundreds of other teams from all over the world, with varying levels of experiences and successes,” said Dave Lang, founder of Iron Galaxy Studios, which has served as a support team and a development studio.

“The people funding the work are often risk-averse, and if they have to pick between a team that’s done it before, and someone trying to do it on their own for the first time, I can see why some people pick the prior developer over the latter,” he said.

That’s just what Sony did. Mumbauer’s project, code-named T1X, was approved on a probationary basis, but Sony kept the team’s existence a secret, and refused to give them a budget to hire more people, leading many to wonder if the company was really committed to letting the team build a new studio. Still, the small team kept working and by the spring of 2019 they had completed a section of the game designed to showcase how the rest would look and feel.

At that time, Sony was going through a management shuffle and the new boss wasn’t impressed. Hermen Hulst, the former head of Guerrilla Games, was named head of PlayStation’s Worldwide Studios in November 2019. He thought the remake project was too expensive, according to people familiar with the matter, and asked why the planned budget for T1X was so much higher than remakes Sony had made in the past. The reason was that this one was on a brand new graphical engine for the PlayStation 5. Mumbauer needed to hire more people to help rework the graphics on new technology as well as redesign gameplay mechanics. Hulst wasn’t convinced, the people said.

Just when it hoped to enter production on the remake of The Last of Us, Mumbauer’s team got called in to help when another big game fell behind. Release of The Last of Us Part II had been pushed to 2020 from 2019 and Naughty Dog needed the Visual Arts Service Group to polish it off. Most of Mumbauer’s team, along with some of the 200 or so other staff at the Visual Arts Service Group, was assigned to support Naughty Dog, slowing down progress on its own game.

Then, the roles got reversed. Sony sent word that after the completion of The Last of Us Part II, some people from Naughty Dog would help out with T1X. Mumbauer’s team saw this as their short-lived autonomy being stripped. Dozens of Naughty Dog staff were joining the project, and some had actually worked on the original The Last of Us, giving them more weight in discussions about T1X’s direction. The game was moved under Naughty Dog’s budget, which Sony gave more leeway than the Visual Arts Service Group. Soon it was apparent that Naughty Dog was in charge, and the dynamics returned to what they had been for the last decade and a half: The Visual Arts Support Group aiding another team of developers rather than leading.

To Sony, the move made sense. Naughty Dog is “one of the key studios” for Sony’s ability to sell PlayStations, said Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Matthew Kanterman. “Sony’s competitive advantage has always been exclusive content over Microsoft and more new games as well as remakes of classic titles from such a storied team can help sustain demand for PS5.”

But those who had wanted independence were disappointed. By the end of 2020, most of the T1X team’s top staff had left, including Mumbauer and the game’s director, David Hall. Today, the T1X project remains in development at Naughty Dog with assistance from Sony’s Visual Arts Support Group. The future of the remainder of Mumbauer’s team, which has come to be jokingly referred to as Naughty Dog South, remains unclear. 

Yeah, I'm not liking Jim Ryan's running of PlayStation at all at the moment. 

[drahkon]

Interesting.
Looks like they need to sort a lot of things out internally, or it might become  much worse in the future.

For now, everything is fine, I'd say. PS5 selling like crazy, games are on the horizon, PSVR2 in the works.

But more and more issues about how PlayStation is run are coming up. Right now, only us gaming enthusiasts know about it, but it could become huge if things continue like this for two or three years.

Times are weird, man.

[Cube]

Bloomberg are claiming unrest, but nothing in their article suggests anything close to "unrest", it seems extremely mild stuff that I'm pretty sure happens in all studios. 

[Glen-i]

Honestly, I'm just reeling from the fact that someone in 2018 looked at 5 year old super mega hit The Last of Us and thought, "We need to remake this"

That's a big "WTF?" from me. Seems way too soon to consider that.

[Sheikah]

Honestly, I'm just reeling from the fact that someone in 2018 looked at 5 year old super mega hit The Last of Us and thought, "We need to remake this"
That's a big "WTF?" from me. Seems way too soon to consider that.

I know, right. Unless it's a Shadow of the Colossus style remake, it does seem a bit of a strange choice.

[Ronnie]

5 hours ago, Glen-i said:

Honestly, I'm just reeling from the fact that someone in 2018 looked at 5 year old super mega hit The Last of Us and thought, "We need to remake this"

That's a big "WTF?" from me. Seems way too soon to consider that.

Really, really bizarre. Seems a total waste of time.

[Happenstance]

On 05/04/2021 at 4:44 PM, Happenstance said:

Bought 13 Sentinels in the PSN Spring Sale. Always been interested by it and I’ve heard that the story is excellent so I’m looking forward to jumping in.

I love it’s art style as well.

Played a couple of hours of 13 Sentinels and I'm enjoying it so far. The combat in the game isn't the most engaging yet but as I'm mostly just playing for the story that's fine. The story itself is being told out of sequence, jumping from point to point so it's quite interesting trying to follow everything and piece together what's happened.

[Will]

On 4/9/2021 at 8:25 PM, Cube said:

Bloomberg are claiming unrest, but nothing in their article suggests anything close to "unrest", it seems extremely mild stuff that I'm pretty sure happens in all studios. 

Yeah it doesn’t sound anything like it, just business as usual for a game developer. Either there is something more to this or they’re just trying to sensationalize the fact that Mike Mumbauer and some of the team have left which again, is totally normal.

I have Mike as a connection on LinkedIn and have been wondering for a while where he’s going, didn’t expect to see such an odd story related to his leaving Sony.

On 4/10/2021 at 3:44 AM, Glen-i said:

Honestly, I'm just reeling from the fact that someone in 2018 looked at 5 year old super mega hit The Last of Us and thought, "We need to remake this"

That's a big "WTF?" from me. Seems way too soon to consider that.

I’d say this is more a case of doing something that can be ramped up quickly and probably was probably intended as a PS5 special edition rather than a full on remake. It makes sense for a new internal team to work on something like that and get used to tech and production pipelines than go straight in on a bigger project.

[Goron_3]

On 10/04/2021 at 9:30 AM, Happenstance said:

Played a couple of hours of 13 Sentinels and I'm enjoying it so far. The combat in the game isn't the most engaging yet but as I'm mostly just playing for the story that's fine. The story itself is being told out of sequence, jumping from point to point so it's quite interesting trying to follow everything and piece together what's happened.

I've heard amazing things about this game. I'm tempted to buy it given that it's 50% off. @Zell Not sure if I've mentioned it before but 13 Sentinels is supposed to be an incredible visual novel, with light gameplay elements too.

 

[Sheikah]

50 minutes ago, Goron_3 said:

I've heard amazing things about this game. I'm tempted to buy it given that it's 50% off. @Zell Not sure if I've mentioned it before but 13 Sentinels is supposed to be an incredible visual novel, with light gameplay elements too.

 

After checking this out it does indeed sound good, and well received. It is the sort of game that you have to wonder if it might come to Plus though, or get even cheaper down the line.

[Julius]

On 09/04/2021 at 12:36 PM, Hero-of-Time said:

Jason has posted a good article over on Bloomberg about how there is a lot of unrest over in the PlayStation camp.

Yeah, I'm not liking Jim Ryan's running of PlayStation at all at the moment. 

When I read your post on Friday, I kid you not, I laughed and then realised we were over a week removed from April Fool's Day.

First: the leak of The Last of Us remake. 

I've been thinking about it over the weekend, and the question which keeps springing to mind is "What the hell are they thinking?", not to mention my continued disapproval of Schreier's reporting stance being that it's fine to leak the existence of secretive projects. Maybe it's just me, but it's very, very rare that the existence of a game is leaked before it's official reveal and actually benefits from it (Mario + Rabbids comes to mind as one of the few examples, and that's simply because people were so against it that it leaking actually had people positioned to be blown away by how it was presented). I think back to Elden Ring's reveal at E3 2019, and everyone just immediately going "Oh, hey, look, it's Elden Ring". Can you imagine just how big that reveal would have been if it had never been leaked beforehand? Instead, I've got friends who are big fans of Game of Thrones and G.R.R. Martin but had no idea the game existed for the longest time, because it never wound up in their social media feeds, because it was expected and it felt like there wasn't nearly as much traction to it as there should have been for a game developed by From Software and worked on (to some extent) by G.R.R. Martin. 

It's an industry largely driven by hype these days, so yes, I do think you're robbing developers of their moment in the spotlight to some extent if you're revealing what they've been working on ahead of any official word. This isn't to say that a potential The Last of Us remake would be met with applause from all directions, but I know that for myself, even having just played the original for the first time last year and it easily being up there as one of my favourite games, I can totally see myself getting excited if you nail the reveal trailer (and this is a first party PlayStation game, so you know they can at least put those out in excellent fashion). Now, if and when it does get revealed, it's people rolling their eyes and going "urgh, it's The Last of Us". Hell, even just think back to The Last of Us Part II's reveal at PSX 2016 and people initially thinking it was something we'd already seen like Days Gone.

So yeah, I'm not here for Schreier leaking these things, even if he does good work in bringing light to the plight of many developers out there. I don't think anyone's even come forward to comment on the leak of TLOU's remake in particular and corroborate it, so I think it was fairly shortsighted of Jason to just outright name it (oh, and as if Naughty Dog hasn't gone through enough over the last year or so when it comes to online drama and The Last of Us). Does the article really lose that much if you don't outright say it? I don't think it would, if you just highlight the fact that PlayStation are remaking a legendary first party game from a couple of generations ago...I don't know. There are a few games that could be in my mind, and I think it's pretty different to found footage leaks where companies haven't done their due diligence in keeping their materials safely under wraps (I'm thinking the Elden Ring leaked trailer from a couple of months ago, or the Harry Potter leak we had years ago now). 

On 09/04/2021 at 8:44 PM, Glen-i said:

Honestly, I'm just reeling from the fact that someone in 2018 looked at 5 year old super mega hit The Last of Us and thought, "We need to remake this"

That's a big "WTF?" from me. Seems way too soon to consider that.

Yeah, agreed. Again, I played it for the first time last year, and that game holds up really well, not to mention the updates it's had over the last few months which have virtually cut loading times out. One of those where if it was a big visual upgrade beyond what The Last of Us Part II managed I could see it doing well with a reveal trailer, but being shared with us for the first time in this way just completely kills it in its tracks for me. I'm just thinking of the first game in Part II's engine when I read this, and well...anyone who's played Part II understands. 

But back to the article itself, yeah, I agree with H-o-T in not liking how Jim Ryan has run PlayStation since taking over. The problem with only having tentpole releases and being this risk-averse is that you end up with, well, what cinema (and the box office in particular) largely became over the last decade: a collection of reboots and sequels founded on already beloved IP decimating smaller projects. And don't get me wrong, there are some directors who can still thrive when times are like this (Christopher Nolan and Hideo Kojima are quite alike in this regard I feel), but those are very rare exceptions. I think of how Days Gone flourished in Japan in particular, and I do wonder if Jim Ryan and co. just couldn't give less of a damn about Japan (think it's become increasingly clear over the last few months that they don't give them a second thought), and I think it sucks massively that Sony Bend won't get another crack at it - and this is as someone who hasn't played the game themselves, but I mean, it's a massive first party game which is free on PS+ this month, and has been part of the PS+ Collection for PS5 since launch too? Having only big games just puts too much pressure on the team, but more than that, it stifles creativity. Think about some of the biggest trilogies in film and more often than not you'll find directors and writers working on other projects inbetween, and I think it helps to stave off burnout, but also to just flex other creative muscles and ideas. Christopher Nolan in particular comes to mind again, because between Batman Begins and The Dark Knight you had The Prestige, and then between The Dark Knight and The Dark Knights Rises you had Inception; there's a "one for you, one for me" kind of attitude with it, such as we see with many actors who take up bigger gigs so that they can comfortably work on projects their passionate about (I think of those under the Disney umbrella, and actors like Adam Driver in particular). 

No doubt Naughty Dog has other things in the works, and so does Bend seemingly, but as a producer and distributor, PlayStation needs to recognise that they're getting in the way of some of the industry's most talented minds. Couple this article with the closure of Japan Studio (what the hell happened to their rumoured Rayspace game? And what's going to become of that heavily, heavily rumoured Silent Hill game, seeing as Keiichiro Toyama left with others some six months before the studio closed to start their own studio?), and I do think it's a bit concerning.

The difference in messaging between Jim Ryan and Shawn Layden is scarily different, though, and I do think it's very telling that I can't find a Wikipedia article on Jim Ryan. Make of that what you will. It's very clear today - and I think was to some extent back then - that this was a key part of the internal power struggle which resulted in Layden leaving. There isn't a face to attach to PlayStation these days - Shuhei Yoshida has been given the Lucius Fox treatment, Adam Boyes becoming the CEO of Iron Galaxy, Andrew House stepping down, and of course Shawn Layden stepping away from PlayStation.

Don't get me wrong: Jim Ryan is a terrific businessman, even if he does say some silly things at times. I still think PlayStation is doing the right thing by focusing on single player games, partnering with studios like Jade Raymond's, and still (for now) being the dedicated home console of choice for most of the big Japanese developers, whether it be marketing deals, timed exclusivity, etc. I still care about the games first and foremost, and for now and the foreseeable future, they're still going to be there.

And, of course, it's on Mumbauer and his team to quite an extent that it would have been a TLOU remake (my first thought was genuinely that this was to get to grips with a new engine), as they're the ones who proposed it, but what does it say that they seemingly proposed a remake to a game less than a decade old, and not in the greatest need of it? I guess the underlying message to the article is that it hints not that PlayStation are demanding these games, but that their own internal teams are playing it safe to some degree, which is even more concerning to me. Also, I'm more surprised that they didn't propose an Uncharted remake (which in my opinion needs it much more than The Last of Us, because that game definitely feels aged) or spinoff, and I don't understand the surprise that a TLOU remake would end up at Naughty Dog. Like...yeah, that does seem like it was pretty inevitable. 

I haven't seen it here, but obviously elsewhere, this has renewed the beaten to death console war narrative. Xbox is doing interesting and different things to PlayStation, as is Nintendo, but I suppose my main concern with Xbox and their single player games in particular right now is how their new studios are actually going to be managed. Buying up studios left and right is going to count for nought if they aren't effectively managed and overseen, and while I want to see them do well, I do think Phil Spencer and co. have a lot to manage over there, because unnatural growth is almost always going to result in some growing pains. We'll have to wait and see, but I hope that Playstation doesn't make a mistake in turning away from what made the PS4 such a runaway success. 

While I do think quite a bit of Schreier's article is spiced up for obvious reasons, the messaging in Layden's E3 2014 speech I'm sure went pretty under the radar back then, and sounds like generic E3-presenting stuff, but is very different today to the direction they seem to be taking today. Whereas the PS4 seemed to be a place to experiment and grow, the closing of Japan Studio and the secret San Diego team at PlayStation effectively going bust before it was ever made official, never mind all of the internal changes leading up to the release of the PS5, has made for a bit of a rocky ride, looking in from the outside at least. Hopefully it smooths over soon. 

On 05/04/2021 at 4:44 PM, Happenstance said:

Bought 13 Sentinels in the PSN Spring Sale. Always been interested by it and I’ve heard that the story is excellent so I’m looking forward to jumping in.

I love it’s art style as well.

Good to hear you're enjoying it! If I'm not mistaken, I think @WackerJr has also been looking at playing that games over the last few months. I picked it up myself back at launch but it's just been gathering dust on my shelf as other games have taken precedent and I've got busy with other things, but maybe I'll get to it after Yakuza 6!

Managed to find the buried thread for it from last summer. 

Edited April 12, 2021 by Julius