The Tuesday letters page is surprised the PS5 is outselling the Xbox Series X by so much, as a reader asks when the first State of Play of the year will be.
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Introductory games
Phil Spencer can talk a lot of nonsense sometimes, but I really don’t think he can be any clearer about his plans for Xbox exclusives. Everything is coming and they’re probably only waiting for an appropriate time to release the games on PlayStation 5 and beyond.
They want the first Halo or Gears Of War to be an event, not just some quick remaster of a 10 year old game. Or at least that’s what seems sensible to me, obviously I don’t actually know what they’re going to do.
But I would’ve thought Gears Of War: E-Day will be multiformat, especially since it’s a prequel. For Halo they’ll either have to wait for the new game they’ve teased or it’ll be the rumoured new remake of Combat Evolved. In fact, I imagine both that and E-Day were designed specifically to be the introduction to the franchises for new non-Xbox owners.
For Starfield, I imagine maybe they’ll wait for all the DLC to be out and do a deluxe edition or something like that.
I can’t deny it’s sad to see the Xbox dream die like this but if they continue to make good games it will never truly be over.
Jigsaw
Quid pro quo
It is going to be so odd seeing games like Halo and Forza on Switch 2, but Microsoft are clearly all for it so I’m sure Nintendo isn’t going to complain. I wonder though what else Microsoft is going to be needling Nintendo for.
We already know they’d love to get Game Pass onto Switch 2 and doubly so now, given how irrelevant Xbox consoles have become. But how would Microsoft try to convince Nintendo now, in this new reality they’re working under?
I can’t imagine it’d be as simple as just giving them money, so will they offer free streaming services for their own games, maybe? That’s tech that Nintendo is going to have to use someone else for and allowing Game Pass may be a relatively small price to pay for access.
We have seen a lot stranger things in the last few years than Game Pass on Switch, so I wouldn’t be that surprised if it happened.
Focus
No change
Am I right in thinking that there’s still no hint as to when Sony might have their first State of Play of the year? They’re actually being more secretive than last year, at this point, because I remember last year they had a montage trailer in early January that confirmed a few things, but we haven’t had anything like that.
They’ve got Death Stranding 2 and Ghost of Yōtei to talk about for definite this year and at some point they’ve got to explain what’s going on with Wolverine. So on paper they’ve got a lot more to talk about than they did at the start of last year.
What I’m trying to say is that I see absolutely no sign of any change in approach with them. My theory is that they’ve signed a marketing deal for GTA 6, and they just can’t be bothered with anything else now they’ve got that in the bag already.
Tom Meadows
GC: There have been some vague whispers of February or March but nothing specific.
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Sister series
Is anyone getting Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance vibes off of Ninja Gaiden 4? Obviously that’s also a Platinum game but it seems to me that they’re purposefully playing off the game, with the sword combat and the way the camera works and everything.
Not a problem with me, as I much preferred that game to any of the old Ninja Gaidens, but it does look a bit weird when you place it next to the new Ninja Gaiden 2 remaster. If you didn’t know their names I don’t think anyone would guess they were part of the same franchise.
Like I say though that’s not a problem for me, but I just hope this is a hit. If it’s not then Platinum is probably going to be in real trouble. I expect Microsoft to give Ninja Gaiden 4 quite a bit of marketing, so maybe that’ll work, but we’ll have to see.
The Bishop
Dead again
I don’t like to ask an obvious question but are we basically never getting another Dead Space game again, after the remake didn’t do as well as EA wanted? That is such a shame because to me, as a fan, I thought it was pretty much the perfect remake and the team definitely understood the original and what it was all about.
When it outsold The Callisto Protocol I though that was enough to secure it a future, but unfortunately not. I really don’t know what EA was expecting. Sure, it would’ve been great if it was a breakout hit, but the original wasn’t and basically no survival horror game has been since the 90s, that isn’t called Resident Evil. Just seems like someone didn’t do their research before even okaying the game.
Whalem
The sweet spot
Well, Mass Effect 2 being 15 years old certainly makes me feel old. And yet, if you’d told me it was even older, I’d probably have believed you. Not only is it a great game but it comes from a time when you could make giant, epic games in a relatively short amount of time and not break the bank. It was only three years between 1 and 2, and just two between 2 and 3. Nowadays you’d have to double those development times, at least.
I really do feel the Xbox 360 era was the sweet spot for games in terms of the balance between quality of graphics and length of time needed to make things. PlayStation 4 was probably sustainable but that was the absolute limit and now we see what happens now that limit has been passed and publishers refuse to stop.
This puts Mass Effect 4 in a very difficult position, especially after the failure of Dragon Age: The Veilguard. If I had to guess I’d say it was never coming out. If it does it’ll probably be by the skin of its teeth and with severe budget cuts.
The problem is that to remake something on anything like the scale of Mass Effect 2, with the improvement in graphics people expect today, takes so much more, and that’s before you start trying to do anything new on top. Mass Effect wasn’t the most successful game ever, but it was pretty big, I thought, but even that isn’t enough today, where it’s all or nothing – and frequently nothing.
Dalson
Sensible parameters
I’d be surprised if the Nintendo Switch 2 price was anything surprising. Somewhere between £350 and £400 would be my guess. I don’t think Nintendo are silly enough to make it more than that and while it’s a lot of money it’s well within birthday/Christmas range and less than most new consoles.
Not that they have to really worry about that though, as the majority of people buying it at launch are going to be hardcore fans. So if they do get the price wrong, or people feel they want to wait for a Lite version, there’s still going to be plenty of time for that.
Tigger
Strange days
What a strange situation we are in.
After another year of, with the exception of Astro Bot, Sony giving us no reason to buy a PlayStation 5, let alone a PS5 Pro, and yet it’s still selling like hotcakes, 7% more than the PlayStation 4.
Microsoft, on the other hand, have finally started to release worthwhile games in 2024 and with the Developer Direct signalled that 2025 is going to start as 2024 left off, with some promising games to come. Yet with all this they seem to actively not want to sell the actual console.
Over Christmas you could get a PlayStation 5 Digital Edition for £309 or a full version for £389.
Microsoft were still selling the 1TB Xbox Series S for £299 and the Xbox Series X for £479.
Who in their right mind would buy one? Why no discounts to drive sales?
Worse, there were no promotional bundles.
No Call Of Duty bundle
No Indiana Jones And The Great Circle bundle
No Game Pass bundle
They have totally given up on the console market, but surely that should at least mean a fire sale to get rid of old stock. which makes me wonder just how many consoles are still being made?
Maybe, as the EU have updated the Digital Markets act, Microsoft are counting on consoles having to open up to third party marketplaces, so they don’t have to pay Sony and Nintendo 30% of their software sales. But that will lead to the PlayStation 6 costing a fortune and limiting its mass market appeal, as Sony will need to keep its profit margins up.
Also, would it really open up to third party marketplaces in the US? Imagine if Call Of Duty was an Xbox Marketplace exclusive on the PlayStation 5 for a month? Would gamers flock to the Xbox Store over the Sony one or would there be a backlash similar to Steam users moaning about the Epic Store?
But it’s all very depressing, as the Xbox Series X is an excellent machine, which I still use far more than my PlayStation 5.
This is mainly due to:
- Game Pass
- Instant resume, which is the most next gen console feature and something I’m amazed Sony have not copied, even if just for the PS5 Pro.
- And my preference for the Xbox style controller, if only they had released Sebile I would say it’s the best console controller, but it’s really third party apathy to the DualSense features that keeps my preference in place.
Irve77 (gamertag/PSN ID)
Inbox also-rans
I feel we’ve had so many rumours of Skies Of Arcadia coming back over the years that it’s probably never going to happen. I just don’t think the original was well known enough and every year that pass less people are going to remember it.
Jools
Is it just me or was The Simpsons: Tapped Out not very good? I remember playing it for half an hour and be disgusted at the microtransactions. Not something I feel very nostalgic about.
Kos
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