Even the best live-service games end up a confusing, convoluted mess of menus and currencies that are hard to navigate. And that's before you even try actually play it.
I’ve been really enjoying the game, just past 70hours on Xbox and starting the 2nd main story mission quest. Planning on starting new on PC shortly after I complete my current character. I don’t understand the console hate. I was upset when Spiderman on PS4 was an exclusive, but later I got a PS4, played/beat it, had a blast. Hate for something because you can’t play it is just wild. Just like people hating on huge houses or seeing expansive cars just because they don’t have it. Underline jealousy. If you really hate it that much because you can’t play/have it, work towards obtaining it and appreciating it. I’ve been really happy with most of the games that have come out/still planning on coming out this year, best in a long time for me
Making excuses as to why the game isn’t reviewing as highly as they think it should be. Not understanding that sone people just don’t like the game as much as they do.
I was upset when Spiderman on PS4 was an exclusive
Exclusives are actively hurting the consumer, being upset is normal.
Hate for something because you can’t play it is just wild
If it’s because someone decided they can milk more money by making it exclusive, it’s not that wild.
Just like people hating on huge houses or seeing expansive cars just because they don’t have it
It seems your world view is dominated by jealousy a lot and you project it onto others. I hate huge houses and expensive cars because it’s just to show everyone around how rich you are and serves no other purpose. All that while other people suffer and struggle to survive.
I mean, I get where you're coming from. But this didn't start with Starfield, and Sony has a great track record of even more restrictive platforming than Xbox does. Microsoft games are now usually accompanied by some kind of PC access.
Not an excuse, but expecting Microsoft to extend an olive branch of non-exclusivity to Sony when they have historically been incredibly averse to it themselves is not really a realistic expectation.
I loved that game, despite its flaws. I played it about a year ago, but it was still quite buggy. The world really sucked me in though, I don’t think a game managed to ever get me that emotionally involved for so long. I think it had the right balance of V being both controlled by me, but also a fictional character with their own life. I also ended up playing it twice with different builds, which was a lot of fun
A stellar game bogged down by over promises in marketing. It's a fantastic game and I played it at launch, 100%ing it with a total number of bugs under the number of fingers (both hands!). When it tried, it has some of the coolest cyberpunk concepts I've seen, not even in the main quest.
For me I think the saddest part about the game is how modding brought some of the lost vertical slice content back to the game and how some of the early game content fades throughout the game. All the passenger seat riding is quest-only, by the end of the game you can only be the driver. Wall climbing wasn't critical, but it was a very popular part of the E3 showing.
Overall though it's still la solid gamem I'm glad that mods brought in a metro system and Spider-Man swinging and pole vaulting :D
I don't know, you may as well say the same thing about the Switch and every port it gets. The S has its strengths and shockingly few weaknesses given those strengths.
The switch is a handheld and the ports it gets are for that reason. It wouldn't have sold enough to get basically anything third party if it was the same device without portability (see BOTW as a system seller when it literally already existed), and it still doesn't really get that many current gen demanding ports.
The fact that there's a worse Xbox you're required to support when the Xbox already lacks some of the asset loading tricks of the PS5 and has less units sold on top of it isn't something developers can just ignore. BG3 really isn't all that demanding for a next gen open world game, and compromising your vision to force it onto a worse console isn't something people want to do.
The Xbox Series S is a cheap lower-resolution Xbox, and the ports it gets are for that reason. The parity scales well for most games and reduces consumer confusion.
BG3 really isn't all that demanding for a next gen open world game
Most games these days, regrettably, don't bother with split-screen multiplayer, and definitely not with the worst-case scenarios of how far apart the two players can be in that world, which is their hurdle right now.
Parity here isn't on a scale. It's a binary trait. Either they are the same or one is worse than the other. The shitty XBOX does not have CPU parity with the real one, and it's a serious limitation that effectively means that the "good" Xbox also has that worse CPU in terms of game design. It will obviously still get some games, but it's losing games that it would otherwise get because it has nothing in common with a next gen system.
Split screen being the specific thing that BG3 is struggling to do isn't the point. It's merely a symptom. For a next gen open world game, split screen BG3 is still not that demanding. The fact that all the real action is turn based makes it far easier to make run than a similarly dense real time game with real time physics demands, and the fact that the Xbox S can't handle it is a very strong example that it's a piece of shit.
Microsoft wouldn't have nearly the install base without the Series S, and developers can either target that platform or not, just like the Switch, because people bought it for its own strengths. If they want to scale their games up to a spec such that it runs on PlayStation but not Xbox, they're welcome to, but they lose access to a large pool of customers, like those who can stomach paying $300 for a console but not $500. There are plenty of other next gen open world games that work on Xbox.
Also, your analysis on how it should perform isn't really based in reality. We can go to interviews where the Swen Vincke calls out the way their game does split-screen specifically. And besides, at this point, Xbox engineers are involved, and BG3 will run on Xbox, though likely just next year.
It has no strengths, and the install base is shit.
The switch only gets away with being a last gen console because it's a handheld. The Series S has all the performance benefits of a last gen console with the install base of one that released 5 minutes ago.
There is no "the way they do split screen". BG3 while running split screen is not a game that should make a current gen console struggle in any way. It makes the S struggle because it's not a current gen worth of hardware.
Its not the CPU that is the issue anyway. Its the memory both size and bandwidth. Microsoft addressed the size somewhat by making some more RAM available but that doesn't address the bandwidth. The issue is developers are hitting limits in shifting assets around as compared to the X. Its why you see significant texture differences and skipped RT in titles.
I don't have a crystal ball for how it will play out in the second half of the generation but you would have to think it is more likely to become a bigger issue than not. Its also imho another reason why there won't be a Pro series console. More likely they sunset the generation faster instead and just go with a whole new generation that trumps the PS5 pro. Because at least they know that the existence of a PS5 pro extends out the Sony generation enough to give them a window to do this. Or, and this would be a massive shame, this is the last Xbox hardware generation. I don't think its likely but maybe enough generations of trailing marketshare means the bean counters give up on that aspect of it.
We already saw through court documents that Pro-or-similar consoles are expected. The difference with Microsoft is if they stick to generations like they implied they wouldn't. You could get creative with you how you count Xbox consoles and say, "Here's the Xbox 6X and Xbox 6S", where 6 is a larger number than the PlayStation's 5, which we know is a strategy that works. Out of the gate, very few games would require that larger hardware, and unlike PlayStation, purchasing an Xbox game once gets you the upgraded version on new hardware. I imagined this is the direction they were headed in when this generation was designed, but 2020 sure did change the trajectory of all sorts of things even if I'm right. I also seriously doubt they're interested in leaving the console space given the acquisitions they've made in the past few years.
maybe enough generations of trailing marketshare
The 360/PS3 generation was extremely close, and they had the lead for most of it.
Maybe this will get lost as Just Another Comment but…
I feel like subscription services should actually serve as a true platform for those kinds of games. Something like joining a party playing Game X, and while you play your round(s), Game Y, or a slice of Game Y is downloading. When you finish your round of Game X you get switched to Game Y and it goes on and on, with some kind of voting on the next game.
There is a whole infrastructure dedicated for this required, and nevermind the multiplatform issues.
It just feels like the interactive nature of gaming would deliver one the one issue of streaming services where “there’s nothing to watch”. The cynic in me sees this as just another place to cram ads.
I could be totally wrong here since I don’t have a great understanding of how these processes worked. So downvote if you will but I’d like to be corrected.
Does this even really matter when in a lot of cases the ‘experts’ were often paid to say whatever corporations wanted anyhow? See the current climate crisis and all the ‘experts’ that guided policy and enabled it.
Obviously letting the courts just go by whatever their guts tell them isn’t the answer, but some sort of a best guess based on a large enough scientific consensus?
This isn’t a random expert. He’s a supreme court judge. The courts should be independent and impartial. In the US this is not the case, and it is endangering democracy.
Having some experts be paid shills while giving other experts the chance to actually legitimately affect change is not the same as handing every decision over to non-experts who incidentally just made defacto bribery legal for their positions.
Is this maybe a situation where Bibi knows he’s politically toxic and is (at least partially) running some cover for allies? I don’t think he’s that smart but it kinda works out that way, since I haven’t heard of delayed shipments recently otherwise
forbes.com
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