Games Inbox: Is the PlayStation 6 a portable console?

The Friday letters page tries to pick five new characters for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate DX, as one reader recommends playing Warframe.

To join in with the discussions yourself email gamecentral@metro.co.uk

Handheld limitations
With all the talk of Nintendo Switch 2 and next gen Xbox at the moment I notice we’re not getting any rumours or leaks about the PlayStation 6. Sony admitted they were making a new console and then they implied it would be a portable, or at least one model was, and that was it.

I would very much like to know what they are planning and when it will be released. I know that seems an obvious thing to say and everyone else is probably thinking the same thing, but I am very concerned that all consoles are becoming portables and I don’t want that.

The reader the other day saying he’d like a Switch 2 without a screen seems to be thinking the same thing, but I do not want to go backwards in terms of graphics. There’s no way you can get something the power of a PlayStation 5, let alone anything with more power, in a portable, so what’s the point?

Yes, portables might be fashionable at the moment but as nice as the Steam Deck is I’d always rather play on an actual PC, if I was at home. With a portable only PlayStation 6 everything is limited by it being a portable and that sounds like a terrible idea to me.
Zapp

Early leap
So the theory is Xbox’s big next gen ‘leap’ is something to do with AI, but what exactly? Are we expecting people to be telling their Xbox 5 to make a game based on a bunch of keywords and then you’re going to play it?

I don’t know about anyone else but I got bored playing around with AI after a couple of hours, once I realised it wasn’t really listening to you and everything it made was trash. Even assuming it works better than that in the future who would want to play that compared to a proper game?

I get it’s a buzzword and everything at the moment, but I can’t help thinking of Kinect and how Microsoft basically ruined the technology by putting the product out too early, convincing everyone it didn’t work, and then never going back to it again.
Algo

Unreliable narrator
I do laugh at these people trying to call other Luddites, over Microsoft’s AI plans and then saying the same thing about game developers. I know I would certainly take the opinion of some nobody in the comments section of a website compared to someone whose actual business is making video games and who is specifically calling it all out as nonsense.

I think the simplest takeaway is the one about Microsoft just trying to impress investors and shareholders. I don’t know what a $3 trillion company needs to do that for, but I get the feeling that a lot of execs just like to pretend they’re busy, no matter how dumb the idea is they’re pushing.

The reason I especially hate this AI push is that… has no one actually used AI before? It’s rubbish. Whether it’s Google or ChatGPT or whatever it just makes things up and mixes up facts like a politician on election night. I wouldn’t trust a word anything AI told me and I certainly wouldn’t want it making my games and putting the actual talent out of a job.
Zebedee

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Impulse purchase
I’m beginning to think that being bought out by a giant company is not in fact a good idea after all. All these people that are going to be affected by NetEase (who I’ve never heard of until this week) and you just know there’s going to be more because of their non-answer as to whether there will be.

Bungie seemed to last about five minutes before Sony had the knives out for them and the first one Microsoft shut down was the one they really needed: a Japanese developer with a critical hit already under their belt.

Buyouts can work but it only seems to be for smaller developers that can actually benefit from the company’s expertise, I’m thinking Insomniac for Sony and Monolith Soft for Nintendo. It’s the shopping spree approach that seems to be poison and I wouldn’t be surprised if that comes around to bite Microsoft (or more accurately the people they employ) on the ass before too long.
Grackle

Quick and dirty
As awful as all this AI rubbish is going to be, especially for anyone paid to be a game developer, I do like the idea of this Assassin’s Creed Shadows parody. I don’t imagine it’s been made with AI but it looks like it, with lots of off-the-shelf graphics and whatnot, so if they could’ve used AI to build it probably would’ve looked even nicer.

GC has said before that you can’t really do anything topical with video games because they take so long to make but AI-made games could allow for this and I’m okay with that. Especially if they’re going to be parodies, so the characters having the wrong number of fingers or the backdrops being visual slop doesn’t matter.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want AI anywhere near games I’m going to pay £70 for, but if they’re used for a new genre of quick and dirty games, that are clearly labelled as such, I’m okay with that.
Dunstable

GC: Actually, it has been made with AI, according to the Steam listing.

Late to the party
Read in your article on the beat free shooters, that no one has recommended Warframe.

In that case. This is a recommendation.

It’s as fully featured and expansive as any triple-A title. Watch out for spoilers though as you will find out yourself, following the questline, that they are huge.

Fairly steep learning curve and hundreds of hours of content, factions to gain favour with. Years and years of content.

There’s the option to speed up game play via in-game currency (paid or traded for in-game) but no actual need to spend a penny ever.

Four open worlds each with unique feels and mechanics.

Would be interested to see if you guys think it’s worth a full review.
James

GC: The game is 12 years old, so we’re not sure there’s much to be gained by that.

Nintendo DS Max
I saw this video recently… could they? Would they? Is it April yet?
big boy bent

GC: If we were Nintendo we’d certainly want to do this, after seeing the video. But who knows whether they’ve actually thought of it or not. The turning upside down trick is certainly suspicious though.