BPX077: The State of Play

[Neon Ignition]

Since yesterdays discussions across multiple threads I found myself thinking back over what was clearly a bit of venting I was doing. It was like a blood vessel popped or something and I've come to realise how frustrated I've quietly become by the modern platforms and their fat cat, lazy as you like approach to content.

I've had numerous occasions over the years where I've not been in the mood for gaming, then been keen, changed and swapped around the systems that I felt alligned to the most. As far as I can remember, throughout all of it, there was always something to get behind.

By the time my luster for the Mega Drive was waning, I jumped into the SNES during its peak era. Whilst the early PS1 days didn't speak to me, I found a trove of Saturn and N64 titles to obsess over till they released and then enjoy and when those systems either died or didn't fulfill my interests the PS1 was much more in line with its content with what I wanted. The same happened with the PS2, its early years were dire but it didn't matter because I was practically being waterboarded with constant DC goodness and when that was taken away the early Cube and Xbox dove in followed by the PS2 being something I could refocus on. The Xbox 360 swept in as my next focus and made up for the sheer disinterest I had in the PS3, MS had a great 2-3 years and then when they decided to double down on Halo, Gears and Kinect the system lost me, but PS3 came back swinging with its wide range of frequent releases. That carried me well into the PS4's life, nuzzled with the Wii U and whilst my focus began to gravitate more to the PC I always had something to be into, follow, look forward to.

Not anymore.

I think this is the first time where nothing has swept in. It's not a phase of disinterest for me either, if it were I wouldn't care enough to be frustrated.

Nintendo
I don't need a Switch 2 because I don't really need more of what Nintendo broadly puts out. 4K Mario Golf, Party, Tennis, Pokemon etc is the majority of the content delivered and whilst it's always great when a tentpole arrives they don't arrive frequent or fast and often don't require the power of the already low powered system they are on. The Switch just received the new Zelda, a massive release with huge sales numbers and review scores. I'm just going to say it, its visually the same as BOTW and neither are or were that good looking a game, sometimes the vistas and framing can be lovely but most of the time they visually look like ass. But that's absolutely fine, they're massive RPG's on the go and Nintendo makes Scrooge McDuck money from their big releases, they can keep doing it for years if they want as far as I'm concerned as the alternative is little of note will come out for years now as we slow crawl to a incrementally more powerful system largely for the sake of it. Madness and a largely dry road ahead for a system, that for me, has never been that strong on software anyway.

Sony
The current king of market arrogance, grossly over pricing and grossly under delivering. If PS3 and PS4 era title delivery was their Disney Renaissance era then we're getting deep into their Disney Live Action Remake era now. There hasn't been anything exciting or interesting about PlayStation since the systems launch three years ago and thanks to the World War Z pile up of buyers there's little chance it will get better, or if it does that Sony won't charge you another $10 for it. The move to bring their games to PC has also really undermined the console for me, if I wait 12 months I can get the same game without being ripped off and Sony's output is increasingly becoming easier to wait 12 months for with a tunnel vision approach to what AAA's can be and a rapidly stalling output rate.

Microsoft
Perhaps the worst one of them all, I have had a lot of enjoyment from MS.... rewards. That their free points system is probably the most compelling, long term addictive experience in their ecosystem is a damning reflection of the progress they've made in the last decade of trying to address why they sucker punched themselves out of the competition in 2013. When my feel good vibes for PS5 began to waver I found myself steering toward Series X but as time goes on the level taking the **** going on at their studios is becoming intolerable. A PC already kneecaps the Series X to a fair extent but that performance advantage means nought if nothing exists to compare it anyway. We've had some nice bits, Hi-Fi Rush was a nice highlight albeit largely because of the lack of other distractions, its very much a simple 360 era style game. For the most part we don't even know when or if games will come from MS, either they remain unknown years and years after the acquistions or they're known but endlessly drag themselves on throughout the generation like Forza 8.

Three huge industry running giant console makers and right here, right now I can tell you probably all of one or two key titles they have lined up for 2023, let alone 2024... maybe, if they release them... and they're not that exciting a list of titles to begin with.

I don't feel like it's apathy that has made me this miserable about the state of things, I don't even feel miserable despite how this long intro sounds. I feel disinterested. massively disinterested - not because of state of mind but because the landscape has become so bloody boring.


This isn't all to say this is factually how things are, people are enjoying all sorts of games via all sorts of methods right now, this is to ask you -
What is your current mental state of play with gaming right now?

[Asura]

A big factor in all this, for me, is VR.

VR's great because it feels experimental. If you're set up to use PCVR and SideQuest in particular, there are loads of weird projects, experimental things that are trying new things in the space. It feels like back on the PS1/Saturn, where we were getting all manner of good and bad 3D games with strange approaches to what 3D gaming might be; for every Resident Evil, we got a Fade to Black, and that was fun. Things are sticking out of some games and catching on, or not catching on for reasons which only feel obvious when you get to try them.

But in terms of flatscreen gaming, it's a really trying time. So many of the bigger games are just garbage. I think, if I'm to single out one title, it's Square's Avengers, which just seemed to be a game that was built, as if cooked up in a lab by an AI to be the perfect example of a game which was both financially insanely expensive to make, while being absolutely, totally devoid of literally anything interesting. They've made bemusment into an artform.

I also feel the industry has lost touch with its roots. We're seeing too many reboots and remakes which just seem to lose the plot. Going to trash a darling here but the Final Fantasy VII Remake springs to mind. A videogame is, in my eyes, a package deal; the experience of playing it isn't just in the gameplay, or story, or visuals, but in how all these things interact to create the experience. As a result, you can "swap out" an aspect of a game, but in doing so, you create something entirely new. If you swap out Resident Evil's combat with Puzzle League-style puzzles, it could be fun, but that's very distinct from Resident Evil. With the FF7 Remake it feels like Square swapped out its combat for something entirely different, as if FF7's story, characters and setting are the game, whereas I wanted the remake to be (1) an upgrade to everything from the original and (2) to actually be a remake of the game - the lot - Midgar, Junon, the mountain with the eagle, buying a house in Costa Del Sol, all the rest of it.

I feel we've reached a point where the industry is too driven by what has come before, and this is no better shown than how we're seeing Hitman ("1"), GRID ("1"), Mortal Kombat 1... Where SEO is driving companies away from just making new things and instead, flogging older things. This attitude is ultimately cannibalistic and leads to things feeling samey.

This is part of the reason I'm much closer to the indie space, these days. Those developers take risks and try new and exciting things.

[QualityChimp]

Whereas I love that gaming can be a relatively cheap hobby if you're happy to be a generation behind and play games that aren't brand new, I think it's a bit of a shame that this generation has barely any exclusives and the majority of them are remakes.

I'd love to upgrade to a PS5, but I can't think of a single reason other than PSVR2, so that's one hell of an outlay when I still have PSVR1 games to play.

I mainly play PS4.
This is because it's the console most of my friends are on, plus it had some exclusives like EDF.
I love it, I have hundreds of physical, digital and PS+ games I could play - more than a lifetime's worth.

Backup is the XBox One. That's in the lounge for all the telly stuff, but occasionally dip in for either 360 BC games or games like Titanfall 2 that I got for peanuts.
I LOVED the 360 and was so disappointed in the way the One was launched with all the always on, teevee teevee, no sharing or 2nd-hand games anti-consumer stance. I thought I'd be Microsoft forever, but they pissed it away and I'm now engrained in the Sony structure and it's hard to change. Like someone who's had Apple for years isn't likely to lose all those apps by moving to Android.
I'm not a fan of the "Netflix" style of gaming MS are currently championing. I'd rather pay for a game and own it, than being tied to constantly paying a rental charge or risk the game not being playable from month-to-month.

I might move it to the playroom as we've had a new Virgin TiVo 360 box that does a lot of the "smart" stuff now. The telly is a 15yr plasma that has none of those features.

I have the PS3 hooked up for a few games because the PS4 isn't backwards compatible.
Mainly Gradius V, but also things like Initial D.

The 360 is still hooked up, but mainly for games that aren't BC on the One.
Import Tuner, Rock Band and Guitar Hero.

My kids have a Switch each now, but I've only dipped into a few Dreamcast Shmups like Zero Gunner 2.
That's the only reason the DC is now packed away.
It's their consoles, but there's nothing I've been desperate to play.
Maybe the new Zelda might change that?

The game I've played the most this month is Darkest Dungeon on the Vita.
I think the Vita is ace and a more practical size when out and about than the Switch.

I'd love a practical solution to the endless itch to play arcade games.
The Miyoo Mini is amazing, but I'd love something with a proper joystick.
Maybe one of those PowKiddy suitcase units.
I have a micro PC that could do the job, but not sure what stick would be suitable.
I'm not likely to ever be allowed an arcade cab in the house!

I've got a 5 year old laptop that was decent at launch and should cope with most bits I throw at it on Steam, but it's mainly stuff from the year 2000 when I played Half-Life, Unreal Tournament, Max Payne and so on.
I'm going to try that Half-Life remake soon.
I absolutely refuse to get back onto the Trigger's Broom of PC upgrading again, though.

Whereas I love time-sinks like RDR2, GTA, Fallout and Elden Ring, having a family and other hobbies means it'd be nice to try a couple of shorter games like Resident Evil 2, if anyone has any suggestions?

[Lebowski]

I'm struggling to keep up with the current crop of release, I have the new Zelda and Metroid on the switch, Legend Arceus keeps pulling me back to find a few more pokemon and the recentish switch sports Golf update is great fun. The system feels like its getting tired though and why they didnt give it a mid gen bump to the oled specs to enable higher frame rates and better resolutions is a mystery to me they updated the 3ds multiple times and they could of had a ps4/ps4 pro scenario where evertthing works but somethings just work much better on the pro system.

On PS5 i have God of War Raganarock, Deathloop, Hogwarts Legacy, Tchia, and the last bits of Destiny 2s latest season all vying for my attention. Then their is ton of VR content to get going properly on PS5 i keep finding myself just lounging on the sofa staring at the stars in Kyak VR as its super relaxing. I really fancy Resident evil 4, the Horizon Forbidden west DLC and that new Starwars Jedi Survivor game too. The reason for updating to ps5 was a no-brainer for me the improved loading speeds and faster frame rates of my fave games makes it a system that feels great to play on where as my ps4 was getting a bit old tired and noisy.

On Xbox ive been enjoying the Crap-tacualr Redfall for its sense of place and its creepy vampires and locations, which has spurred me on to getting round to playing some older Arkane games on gamepass (Prey). Bar that its pretty bleak on xbox for me with nothing bar a few small indie games all at various states of play. Bar gamepass theirs been no real reason for owning an xbox if you have a PS5 though and if i was being realistic i don't have time in my life for three systems.

New baby in the house since end of jan has propperly eaten into my gaming time so this is why i'm so behind on stuff, Nothing else big i'm aware of for this year bar Startfeild and a few bits of seasonal content for Destiny 2.

[QualityChimp]

The Xbox One was first revealed 10 years ago today, but its initial reception fell flat


*Shudder*

[Asura]

Honestly, the point at which Microsoft went back on their policy was the point at which I kinda started to lose interest in MS/Xbox as a platform.

When the Xbox One (terrible name) and PS4 were announced, it was pretty clear that they were very similar boxes - I mean, hardware wise, those two consoles are more similar than any major rival consoles have ever previously been... And the Xbox One was marginally less powerful. That didn't bode well for Microsoft.

But, while I had my concerns about what they had planned with the Xbox One, in terms of how discs didn't really do what they did on other consoles, and how everything was about digital ownership... It might've been too much, too soon, but it was something. It was a creative direction, a point of differentiation, something to help them stand out in the marketplace. It was going to do interesting things.

When they walked it back, it just felt that afterwards, the Xbox One was the PS4, but slightly weaker, with Halo & Forza.

[wakka]

Yeah, I actually agree. It was an idea, at least, as was the emphasis on the use of a Kinect and voice control as a primary, built-in part of the system. It all ended up being stillborn but it would have been interesting to see how that actually would've gone if they'd doubled down on it instead.

The emphasis on integrating with TV channels and programme recordings was strangely backwards-looking. I could never quite figure out why it would be advantageous to use your Xbox One to control your Sky box rather than just, ya know, use the Sky box (especially since you still needed the actual Sky box plugged in under your telly).

And it was poorly timed. We had just reached a moment where the importance of broadcast TV was starting to diminish rapidly anyway.

Anyway that's enough about the Bone.

My take on the OP question

Gaming is simultaneously as rich as it's ever been and as dull as it's ever been, for me.

There is SO much out there, so much choice and variety - much more than there ever was 25 years ago - and yet the big releases have for the most part lost me. Most of the AAAs look like a bit of a snore to me, I'm afraid to say.

At the same time, there is so much going on out there in the wider industry, digging into what's on offer can reveal stuff that really resonates. I'm finding as my tastes have diverged from the big studio moneymakers, I've got to actual put a bit more time into researching games to find the right ones for me.

I recently kicked off playing Roadwarden on PC, and that's been a real gem so far. I got into it because a friend told me it reminded him of Disco Elysium, which has been my absolute favourite game of the past few years.

[Asura]

The emphasis on integrating with TV channels and programme recordings was strangely backwards-looking. I could never quite figure out why it would be advantageous to use your Xbox One to control your Sky box rather than just, ya know, use the Sky box (especially since you still needed the actual Sky box plugged in under your telly).

I think that was them trying to anticipate the rise of AppleTV, Chromecast, FireTV, that kind of thing. In the short term people would do that shonky thing with the Sky box, but in the longer term they'd get rid of the Sky box and just use their Xbox for all of their TV needs.

We practically do this today, in our house, with a Chromecast.

[wakka]

Maybe, but if that was their strategy it still doesn't make much sense. By 2011/2012 it was pretty clear that content reception would soon be commoditised via the internet and the need for cable/satellite boxes would be mostly eliminated. Once that commoditisation happened it was always going to be pretty much neither here nor there that you were used to running your Sky box into your Xbox.

[QualityChimp]

I don't really want to turn this into an MS bashing thread, I'm just expressing my disappointment that the initial reveal of the One lead me down the PS4 path and will probably stay PlayStation if they honour previous purchases, which is a shame because I loved the Xbox 360. The current MS emphasis of renting games via GamesPass isn't the way this grandad likes to do things, so I doubt I'll ever get and S/X.

To be clear, Sony didn't do that with the PS4, refusing to make it backwards compatible, thus making my PS3 and its games collection obsolete overnight. By the time the One had BC (after initially refusing), I think I'd already got a PS4.

Ironically, my Xbox One is doing lots of the media centre stuff because I don't have a smart telly.

[dataDave]

I’m looking forward to Pikmin 4. By then Nintendo will let us know what else they plan to put out for the rest of 2023.

On the PC I’m still messing with Skyrim and CP2077. Those two games are all I need to justify a new build once the RTX 50-series is released. I’ll likely get another VR set by then as well.

This’ll be the second generation where I skip a Microsoft console and the third where I skip a Sony one.

[wakka]

Other than the Switch, there is hardly a distinction between the consoles these days, and vanishingly few exclusives that don't make it to PC nowadays.

I really want to play Starfield later this year - provided it's good which I really hope it is - and I'm considering trading my PS5 for a Series X. Other than Starfield I'm not bothered about the exclusives on either platform so it's a much of a muchness. Only thing holding me back is that I really want a PSVR2 at some point.

[teddymeow]

PlayStation 5 is my "main" console.

Switch has been given a rebirth in my house thanks to Advance Wars and Zelda TotK.

I'm trying to sell my Series X.

[speedlolita]

I was planning to get a PS5 for the next part of Final Fantasy 7 Remake but... I may just wait the 6 months to a year and play it on PC instead.

Switch and PC keep me entertained otherwise.

Xbox? Lol.

[MartyG]

I don't really want to turn this into an MS bashing thread,

Seems a bit late for that

I dread to think what the current gaming sphere would be like without Microsoft in the mix - Sony free to dominate and do whatever it likes and not have to give a crap because it would be the only player.