This looks gorgeous but the more the trailer went in the more I felt it was all very scripted and I’m struggling to get a sense of how it will actually play.

Regardless I’m surprised it was shown given the continued stories coming out about how it’s not in a good state even after years of development and crystal dynamics being brought in to help. Hopefully a sign it’s getting there but the cynic in me feels this was ordered to quell the rumours.

Played about 3 hours yesterday and after a frustrating entry period it started to click and had a good time. It’s a weird mix of battlefield & Apex wrapped in a gaudy game show. It’s solid enough at its core but different enough it stands out.

Im not sure if I’ll stick with it but it has potential. Time will tell if there’s more fundamental issues with it but given its free id say try it.

The recent trailer showed there will be modifiers applied ( looked like a flaming melee mod from the very brief clip). I think this mode will be great as TLOU2 has some genuinely good gameplay that often gets overlooked due to the heavy story focus and general controversy it had at launch.

Yeah, we’ve not had a generation run short for 20 years. Even then most last 6 years historically and I think people’s perception is skewed because Microsoft rushed out the 360 quicker than normal.

What would new consoles even be at this stage? They’re still fast, can do 4k, some ray tracing etc. and yeah they compromise on things but you need to spend more on a graphics card alone to get more on PC. The cost vs benefit isn’t there yet not to mention (anecdotally) the “general public” talk about current consoles as if they’re new, so I don’t think there’s an apatite or need.

I tend to think about Infinite this time of year and jump back in for a few weeks but holy shit! Let’s fucking go with firefight! I love this mode and if this is a good version it might get me to stick longer this time around.

What a load of crap, only a few minutes in and it’s all “games are getting worse…” when we’re in one of the strongest years for releases in ages. We’re in a year where TotK is likely to miss out of GOTA awards, that’s how good it’s been.

Games aren’t the issue here, it’s folk like the videos creator who are.

Not sure I get what a PS5 version would bring without some pretty serious tech upgrades such as Ray Tracing. There’s already a ps5 patch that enables 60 fps which is normally my personal “requirement” for new versions on cross gen games so unless this is a major uplift then I’ll pass.

I very much do move on when Im done with a game, rather than when it’s done. I mentioned that I moved on from AC Valhalla only 25 hours in, and a more recent example is when I stepped away from Armoured Core 6 after only about 5-6 hours realising it wasn’t really for me.

The problem with length is when length is the reason I stop playing. I can love a game at first and think it’s great 4 hours in. That love can turn to like if the formula is getting a little stale or the plots not going anywhere. If this continues then my like might turn to just “consuming “ to get it done, and if I’m still plugging away for long enough in this state it’s easy enough for things to slip into a negative view of the game because it’s asking more of me than it’s giving back.

Take Final Fantasy XVI this year. It took me 44 hours to finish, but imo it peaked around the close of act 2 (a certain boss fight that went hard about 30 hours in). By then the gameplay formula was established and it’s largely the plot carrying it but (imo) neither ever really got any better in act 3 but I still had another 14 hours to go. I was invested enough to keep going but I went from loving it to just liking it as a whole because it never escalated and 14 hours of treading water is a bloody big investment. This was main-lining the game too, I gave up on side quests early on, so we’re not talking about completing a game just getting through them.

It comes back to games justifying their lengths. This is going to mean different things to different people, as well as the games themselves doing different things so there’s no one size fits all.

For me, it’s not so much a question of length but whether a game should last as long as it does. There’s got to be something that makes it worthy of its run time.

Case in point, I played about 24 hours of Assassins Creed Valhalla when it came out, only to sack it off when my friend informed me that he clocked about 100 hours in it to play through. Fuck that! That game would have been a decent 20 hour Viking romp but it’s got nothing to say, show me or keep me engaged at 5x that length. Hell even at 40 hours I’d have said it was inflated, but 100! It’s madness.

On the flip side, I played Elden Ring through to completion over 80 hours and would have played for 80 more had it asked. It was engaging, exciting, full of interesting locations, characters and things to fight. There’s tension in and intrigue in just exploring this unique setting and it all adds up to an experience that’s worthy of its runtime.

Similarly, one of the only JRPG’s I’ve finished in recent years is Persona 5 Royal, which took me a huge 109 hours to finish and yet I loved it. It’s full of style, flair and a sense of fun often missing from this genre that it just got me hooked. It’s not even that the story is all that great but the characters are well realised and there’s a wonderful dynamic in the core cast that really got me to go along for the full journey. I also think P5R also did the one thing many games fail at and it’s pacing, the thing just goes and despite facts like the tutorial is about 8 hours long I never felt like I was just killing time.

My point is, my feelings these days are that most games aren’t worthy of being over 10-20 hours, and even less so of being 20+. It’s not a one size fits all answer and individual mileage might vary person to person but there has to be a hook (gameplay, game feel, story, characters, setting, playing with engaged friends , etc.) to warrant time invested beyond a point.

The weakest CoD in years (ever?), in a year or nothing but gold releases across every platform and it still causes waves and records. No wonder this DLC was pumped up into a full game and pushed out half arsed, why try when you win without effort.

It’s exactly a DLC that Activision realised they could make people pay £70 for instead of half that. Only a few weeks after MW2 came out it was being floated that there was no COD for 2023, and instead a Ghost focused expansion would come out to fill the void.

Don’t like it don’t buy it but FFS stop with faux shock and horror. COD is of the most aggressively monetised franchises in mainstream gaming, from a company with zero scruples. Facts that have been valid for a decade or more and the regular news cycle attached to it all gets tiring.

Ignore the bugger and maybe they’ll be forced to do better next time when this sell’s poorer (you can hope at least). It’s not like this is some long awaited sequel either, just skip this one. There’s so much more to play this year in particular.

None of these are shocking or revelations. Anyone with half a fucking brain, paying even a little attention would have a good sense these things had occurred during lockdown. It was a shower of shit from a government who would have struggled to make good on the most peaceful and prosperous of times, let alone a global catastrophe.

I really like Destiny. It plays well and the world is one that I enjoy immensely. I bought Lightfall and the annual pass this year, as i did for Witchqueen and Beyond Light in the previous years.

I have barely played Destiny this year.

Lightfall was a mess at launch that was incredibly disappointing as both a follow up to the genuinely brilliant Witchqueen and as the penultimate chapter in this near decade long “saga”. The season content this year has been fine to good however, though not enough to pull me back in.

There in lies the problem, 2023 has been a banger of a year for games with multiple titles “worth a buy” each month. This means that as someone who is invested in Destiny, not even I have the time to put into it at the moment on a lackluster year.

I feel like this game lives/dies annually by its expansion that then serves to keep players invested across that years seasons. Between a bad xpac and tough competition from tons of other games, Destiny isn’t in a great spot. This poor year also calls into question what we’re actually going to get with Finsl Shape, and whether it’ll be one of the good or bad years.

Ultimately, my point is that I’m not surprised it’s not making enough money currently, or that there’s less interest in The Final Shape. Bungie have created this situation for themselves.

Can’t agree more. I don’t think there’s a studio under MS that’s done better under their leadership/portfolio than they’d done prior to their acquisition. The studios created to shepherd Xbox franchises that original studios move on from generally have never matched the highs previously seen either.

I also don’t appreciate them hoovering up franchises, via acquisitions whilst failing to develop much new that’s if any note. All it does is condemn a growing back catalogue to mediocrity or have them disappear into the vault.

Sony aren’t perfect but their studios tend to produce top tier games that look and feel like they’re a tier above most, making the most of their “exclusivity”. Most (all?) their major releases are their own franchises developed in house too, and it feels like there’s a steadier turn out of new, quality IP to boot.

Eh, battery life sure. Form factor is debatable. I prefer the dualsense personally (own both).

Given how rough this game is (was? not sure how much its been patched) on current gen and OC I'm not hopeful about an old gen version.

Really liked the game but playing on PS5, the performance was definitely a distraction to the point I put the game down and still haven't gone back to it.

My take is that they'll go exclusive as much as they can because they'll take a short term hit on copies sold if it slowly strangles the competition. Your right there not out to hurt Sony, but they'll do it if it means they grow.

They want people to get on board with Xbox or more key, gamepass and if a big exclusive gets someone to dip in then there all the more likely to stay. This doubles down if the next big exclusive is again an xbox exclusive.

I disagree with your point that smaller titles like Doom will sell systems. I honestly think the "masses" will just not play them if there not available on their chosen platform. What I do think they do is inform your choice of platform and keep you there between the tentpoles and they look even more attractive to the casual if there "free" with your subscription.

Don't disagree with your point but it was only a 51.9/48.1 split of votes cast.

In raw numbers only 72.2% of eligible voters actually voted and so the split against the total pool was:

• 37.5% of voters for Brexit -34.8% of voters against Brexit -27.8% of voters did not vote

It is what it is and we are where we are but I feel two points quite strings about these figures:

-Little over a third of the population upset the established norm to our collective detriment on empty promises and questionable rhetoric.

• Just under a third of our population didn't even turn up and threw away there say in something that was going to be permanent and far reaching to their lives.

It just rubs me up the wrong way how so few can affect so many on such aobg term basis. This isn't on the scale of having you choice loose at an election as those are time limited. This was permanent and way more intrusive.

Incredible explanation that captures how I've felt/viewed the whole debacle.

It's discounted right now as part of the steam summer sale