crispy4000

Think it’s supposed to still be 1080p/60..

Cool. PS5 would be the best way to play now, right? I remember there being some slight tearing on the PS4.

Never, ever trust a developer who says they designed their game not only as a 4 player co-op experience, but as a single player game with their studio’s dna. This has happened so many times now, a developer’s pedigree should be thought of as a liability with these pitches.

It will. But like 4 and 5, it takes its sweet time to get there. The last 3rd of the game feels very different. I don’t think it’s a weird standard you have either. FF7 has a much more interesting plot throughout, with better written dialog and characters. I haven’t played FF8, so I can’t compare that one. I beat FF9 recently, had some different gripes than you, but generally feel the same. It’s slightly edges out FF5 for me. I do enjoy the art style and aesthetic though. Wish we could get a modern FF that could preserve that.

I think it holds up in spite of later games improving on its open-world concepts. It’s just that Hyrule Field isn’t compelling game design in 2023. I see the argument, I just don’t totally agree with it. There is a lot of empty space, but still many more towns and points of interest than in prior 3D Zeldas. Parts of the world are also much more of a challenge (but still possible) if you don’t have certain equipment, cooking items, divine beast powers, enough stamina, etc. So it’s a lot more than just “doing things” at the landmarks. Figuring out how you’ll climb and glide your way to a waypoint is a big part of it too.

Two well-reviewed indies that came out of nowhere recently:

The best Zeldas break that mold with puzzles that stretch across rooms. When it doesn't keep them from being too obvious, it still can feel clever and interesting to parse through. That's where BoTW's Shrines were the most problematic for me. Or most of Wind Waker's dungeons.

The games industry has generally changed to be less console war-ish itself. Series X and PS5 are nigh equivalent in capability. Almost everything is multi-platform. Many multiplayer games are cross platform now. It's also clear that each manufacturer doesn't need to have its own mascot character, its own Halo, its own envelope pushing M-rated game, etc. There's no Square betraying Nintendo, no EA betraying Sega. Even unfortunate industry trends like multiplayer paywalls have become so normalized that it's an every console issue. I think the push towards acquisitions and paid-off exclusives has reignited the flames a bit though. This time, its not as much about what each manufacturer has built up, but more about what they're keeping the other from. Which sucks.

1. Yes 2. Yes. Some games will run the PS4 version patched, but many have native PS5 apps. A select few charge for an upgrade like Uncharted 4 collection and Ghosts. On the plus side, you can play native PS4 versions if the next gen upgrade is problematic. (ie: Elden Ring, but you need to buy it digitally or a PS4 disc to do so) 3. Only the highest tier of Playstion Plus, Premium, has streamed versions of games from the cloud (as opposed to from your console). PS3 games require cloud streaming. The others typically don’t. The Premium tier probably isn’t worth the money with the half-baked emulation and whatnot. 4. Returnal is difficult but amazing. It’s got eldrich horror and Metroid Prime vibes combined. Sorth a shot to see if you’d like it. It’s also on PC now, as all new Sony games will be eventually. 5. No clue, but you can adjust HDR as a system level setting.

Fortnite wouldn’t be so much of the same issue unless they started bundling Battle Passes with Games Pass. I could see EA or 2K drawing similar scrutiny though. Sports and GTA day one.

You are correct. It is about CoD. More specifically, what it can be leveraged for outside of the traditional console market. I’ll add that if CoD franchise as a whole was F2P, this may have an easier sell to the CMA. Because they’d have to get in cahoots with an Amazon, Google or Microsoft themselves to do it.

The scope of this decision potentially goes bigger, yes, but Microsoft's primary motivation here is still their $70 billion power grab. Not preserving the rest of their (well-established) business opportunities, or fighting the good fight for the tech sector as a whole. They just want big tech to believe that this is their fight too. And if we're just talking cloud in general, not gaming, there's much more competition in the space elsewhere. I can't even remember the last time I used Word or Excel proper. Even a company like Facebook shouldn’t be that worried. They rebranded their entire company to focus on an emerging market and still won’t be able to monopolize it. I think that’s the difference with Microsoft’s position here as both a gaming and cloud computing power player.

It'd be better for them to be challenged again like in the 360 era. But not like this. I think Bethesda was already too big of a grab as it was. The best thing about this deal getting blocked, or even just hitting this many roadblocks, is that big tech has to think twice about large gaming acquisitions now. Hopefully this means the acquisition war will cool a little bit, and buying smaller studios and start-ups takes priority.

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Grime is free today as well. Looks like a decent enough Metroidvania. Plus we get Star Wars Rogue Squadron and Lake soon!

OoT’s issue, for modern games that follow its design template, is that it doesn’t feel big anymore. The map is barren. It’s basically a glorified hubworld between zones. If you compare it to 2D Zelda in particular, there’s very few secrets and interesting nooks and crannies. Twilight Princess tried to take that part of OoT’s formula and scale it up further, partitioning it into zones that the GameCube could handle. I don’t think it worked all that well, because an OoT-styled map wasn’t what made OoT good. I was really skeptical going into BotW for that reason. Thankfully Nintendo proved me wrong. Now I think a large scale 3D Zelda about free exploration (and experimentation) can still be fun, and can be a lot more than a horse riding or sailing simulator.

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@stepee Kao the Kangaroo reboot is one of the free EGS games next week.

It’s a fantastic game so far. They assume you know all the lore from XB3, and spend no time rehashing things. The new characters are the most likable at first introduction in the series. Having a martial artist from the beginning makes combat feel a lot speedier too. Some interesting changes to the way combat encounters start as well, with many more more first attack bonuses for you… and enemies as well now. The way they’ve tied map completion to persistent upgrades is a perfect choice for a shorter RPG. Music bops. Damn, this is going to be so hard to put down when Tears of the Kingdom drops.

I don't really see the series that way at all. Twilight Princess was the closest-to-the-mold 3D Zelda we got after OoT. It dissapointed me a little by focusing too much on the dungeons, and dropping its more unique elements (twilight realm) less than halfway through the game. I also think Skyward Sword's structure worked well when it didn't repeat itself, even though it was much more linear than the other 3D Zeldas. I’d much rather have it that way than what WW and TP tried. But I'm probably in the minority there.

What preview is this from? I don't doubt they experienced performance drops. But BoTW used a double buffered vsync. The harshest drops hang briefly around ~20fps before jumping back. Either the game runs that much worse than the first, or there's some degree of hyperbole here.

Twllight Princess’s overworld was vanilla as well. Very sectioned off, not many secrets in it, and relied a lot on the Twilight Realm. Riding the horse from area to area was more fun than the boat, but BoTW was still much more fun to explore. Not to mention no stupid blue rupee glitch.

I feel the opposite. I think they found the fun in BoTW’s open world that Wind Waker in particular was sorely lacking. They can do better with a sequel, but BotW was a step in the right direction for this kind of Zelda compared to the 3D series’ past.

I’m not basing it off it being Nintendo. I’m basing on all the slate mechanics getting retooled, the skyworld and underworld, and a development cycle as long as the first game.

Maybe, but they definitely should have taken this shot IMO. The benefits of it going through dramatically outweigh the costs of it failing.