Ninth Gen Consoles!

[CasualVelociraptor]

Possibly one of the few good things to come out of 2020 (now that it’s looking like they won’t be delayed from the holiday season due to COVID). For those who don’t know, these consoles will be capable of up to 8K resolution graphics, up to 120 frames per second which has never been done on a console before, ray tracing (basically, shadowing and reflections in real time that’s close to the way movies cast shadows), and will have solid state drives for the first time, allowing for nearly no loading times.

I’m not a console warrior by any means and was pretty wowed by Ratchet and Clank A Rift Apart showing entire worlds popping into existence on PS5’s faster SSD. But...

Xbox Series X for me. While I dabbled with PS4 and loved Spider-Man and Uncharted, I simply have way more games on Xbox One digitally with guaranteed backwards compatibility on the Series X for all the non-Kinect ones and Smart Delivery meaning I probably don’t have to rebuy any games. I’m more excited by Xbox’s renewed push for exclusives, such as Halo Infinite, Microsoft Flight Simulator, and the all but confirmed Fable reboot by the wizards at Playground Games who consistently wow with Forza Horizon, and that I’ll be able to get them for free with Xbox Game Pass Ultimate. I love being able to Quick Resume up to six games at the same time (no more telling your friends to wait until you get to a checkpoint to join their multiplayer game; now you can get in and out of that one and then six seconds later you’re back). And the graphics will be a small leap to be sure, but Series X is objectively more powerful and so will run multiplatform games with stronger performance and nearly no loading screens!

PlayStation 5 has also opened fire with the idea of a cheaper console without a disc drive. I know a lot of people only stream and download things these days, and I too download the majority of my games and stream the majority of my movies and TV (with a lot of password sharing because the streaming wars are getting out of control, but that’s the subject of a different poll!) so I won’t criticize anyone who decides to save money upfront in this economy on a luxury hobby when discs are something they’ll never use. But once you do, publishers, Microsoft and Sony will have all the power to dictate the price of games, put them on sale when they want and then revert them to full price, and of course try to upsell you on DLC, microtransactions and subscription services such as Xbox Game Pass, EA Access, and PlayStation Now. They’re also slowly moving away from digital codes so that you can’t resell console bundled games you don’t want or buy them from places like CDKeys.

So you’re trading choice for convenience; personally, I like getting games, playing them once, and trading them in to GameStop or selling them online or to friends when I’m done or if they stink, getting them cheaper because physical games always decrease in price over time and never go back up, being able to rent from GameFly, etc. Plus I have quite a few UHD Blu-rays, Blu-rays, DVDs and yes even CDs that I’d like to have the choice of playing without getting something separate. So I’m prepared to pay up to $500 in order to have that choice and power with the Series X, and trading in my Xbox One X should help. (I might wait a while on the proprietary Series X Expansion Cards- those look like they’ll be expensive! ) Either way though, I’m looking forward to picking up my console and discs of Cyberpunk 2077 and Yakuza Like a Dragon at launch, as well as downloading the best version of Halo Infinite and the next gen exclusive The Medium!

What do you think? Can’t wait to see your votes and comments down below.

 

[GamerGuy]

I will probably go with the PS5 first. I like everything, but the controller battle to me is often won by Sony. I have been buying my games digitally now mostly, and honestly, I am saving a lot of room and time waiting for games to arrive. Never again will I go to a "midnight launch" event. I did have fun with them while they lasted. Eventually I will probably get an Xbox, but it depends on their exclusives. Gamepass is an AMAZING service for it's price, but backwards compatibility isn't as important to me. If I want to play Xbox 360 games, I have a 360. Give me all the new stuff!

I am fortunate enough to be in a position where I can safely say I can buy a PS5 at launch, provided the supply is enough. I can wait though. I have enough of a backlog to last me to the next generation, so I should probably get to work.

I haven't bought a "bad game" in years. The power of Youtube and active content creators usually provide you with a look at the game well before it's even out. I may buy a game most people don't like, but I know I like it and i enjoy it. I worked at Gamestop and dealt with them many times. Selling your stuff back is barely ever worth it. I do wish consoles would be a bit more flexible with colors like the N64. It doesn't seem all to expensive to do so, and would make some people extremely happy. I love the PS5 as it is, but I seem to be in the minority here. What's strange is that since PS2, you can buy a wide assortment of memory cards, controllers and accessories, so why are the consoles so deadlocked on one color, maybe a second with an enhanced model?

Anyway, that's enough from me. I should be playing The Last of Us 2, but I'm gonna play Animal Crossing because Redd's in town and I need some arts.

 

[MellowYellow]

Ehh.

To be honest while Sony has some exclusives I like, I've become increasingly tired of their BS.

I'd probably get an Xbox, if I end up buying into the next generation.

 

[Yoga Princess]

If you like to play your DVDs and Blu-rays on a console, guess you better make sure you buy one with the disc player in it. One of my friends almost bought a laptop without a built in disc drive last year. We made sure to look before they bought.

 

[Revelations]

Of the two consoles, the playstation usually gets the games I prefer. But I tend to wait a year or two before buying a new console for a) A price drop to occur and b) I try not to buy a console unless it has like 5-6 games I want on it as exclusives. I'm more of a PC gamer but not really PC master race or anything like that, I just prefer that if I'm buying a console it's worth it to invest it.

 

[Pontiff]

I will eventually buy the X and the PS5, eventually. I have transitioned to playing on PC mostly, for most of my games but I still play a great many games on Xbox with my friends that I started with--ironically as they have PCs and we could just play on those but we still play Xbox. So the X will probably be the first one I buy, eventually when I do.

The PS5 has exclusives that I will end up probably liking just like the PS4, and I will eventually buy one to play said exclusives but not buy any online services. Order 1887, Bloodborne, God of War, Nioh 1 & 2, NieR: Automata, etc. Are reasons why I bought a PS4 in the first place and with Demon Souls getting a real remake and not a remaster, that is already making me want to buy a PS5 just to play an old game I haven't played in forever since Playstation doesn't like backwards compatibility for whatever reason.

Though I'm sure the second Total War: Warhammer 3 is announced and released I won't care about consoles again and sink too many unhealthy hours into that like its predecessor

 

[Staine]

I will most likely be buying the PS5 digital for several reasons.

Firstly, I prefer Sony to Microsoft as a brand, which isn't really important but it does have a minor impact, I have owned an Xbox 360 in the past and did love both the Fable series and Halo (Halo Wars and Halo 3 specifically) but Sony has the things I want. Won't lie, still holding out for Playstation All-stars 2 though I doubt I will ever see it, game didn't do great. The exclusives also matter to me, Demon's souls reboot is something I am very much excited for as a huge fan of the original and Sony is the platform I play Final Fantasy XIV on which is a game I play a lot. An update to my system for it can only improve my experience, I hope. God of War and Uncharted will likely have games I can look forward to, Sony has Kojima on their side which is a huge draw for a Metal Gear fan like myself and I hold out all hope for a new Infamous game. Bring back Cole I say.

X-box has great stuff but not enough to make me want it any more than I want the Playstation when it all comes down to it and the digital only is a huge draw for me also. I haven't bought a physical copy of a game in a long long time so it makes little difference to me whether I have access to a disc drive or not. I dislike Gamestop and their practices and while I admit that your concerns about handing the game publishers power over the pricing is very valid since they are pretty scummy companies as a whole, I think consumer outrage may be enough to keep them in check as well as the fact that multi-platform games will still have physical copies that will dictate the prices. Without the sales, they will simply sell less and while it may be naive to hope so, I feel it will keep the games around the price tag they have currently. A man can dream, right?

All in all I buy what I think is an average amount of console games, I don't play nearly as many as I used to and that makes it easy for me to decide since a lot of the ones I would buy on release will be PS5 exclusive or multi-platform. I will look fondly over a Fable should it be announced though.

 

[Revelations]

Won't lie, still holding out for Playstation All-stars 2 though I doubt I will ever see it,

I gotta admit this is the first tie I have seen this combination of words haha. I had PSAS on my Vita and it was... Eh, I don't think it was terrible but it wasn't amazing.

 

[Staine]

It's nostalgia for me mostly, I played the game for years in the 2v2 format with a close friend and it's one of the most fun times I have had on a multiplayer game. We both enjoyed it a lot, the community was small but tight knit and had tournaments organised through Gamefaqs of all things and was just really fun to play. I know most don't like the game but I loved every moment of it.

Sir Dan main by the way.

 

[Revelations]

I mained the uhhhhhh helghast dude when I played. He was fun, but it was also hilarious getting bodied by someone like Sackboy or Sir Dan. Game had a really weird tone thing where you had grumps like the Helghast guy or Kratos but you also eventually had the gal from Gravity Daze or Sackboy just rollin' around.

 

[Staine]

Yeah, it was strange to see Nathan Drake and his moveset next to Sly Raccoon, but I enjoyed it anyway. I don't find it too much different that Solid Snake in Smash, I always find his movement odd in that game. This conversation has made me miss it even more

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

It looks like PlayStation 5 is leading the polls, as I expected. (The Digital Edition’s commanding lead should not be a surprise to me, but I was.) And I appreciate the variety of perspectives here. However, I’m most likely going to be reissuing this poll very soon- probably shortly after Microsoft’s July event where they plan to show their first party lineup for sure and the consoles too if I had to guess, and hopefully lay to rest the “Xbox has no games” meme. Here’s why.

When recommending consoles to people who are on the fence (and even though I’m an Xbox fan to the core sometimes I do recommend PS4, as I had a good experience with many of its games before selling it to a friend), my three biggest factors are:

1. Friends
2. Price
3. Exclusives
3b. For this segment, I’ll be focusing on both first and second party launch exclusives and on ninth-gen versions of those games. So I don’t care if they’re on PC or if there’s a current gen version.
4. PlayStation All Stars 2 (sorry, that was mean.)

The friends factor is becoming less of an issue due to Epic, Microsoft, Nintendo and even Activision of all people pushing for more crossplay, but it’ll still be a big thing for a lot of people for a long time. I know that’s one of the main factors that’s keeping me on Xbox (along with my far bigger library being entirely thanks to backwards compatibility for more games) and it’ll help PlayStation remain on top in its entrenched markets of Europe and Asia. Not much to be changed about that.

But I can’t really get an accurate poll yet due to the fact that we don’t know the prices, launch dates, and most of the launch games.

Launch Dates and Prices; NERD WARNING

PS5 Launch- Friday, November 13th, 2020

PS5: $499
PS5 Digital: $449

Xbox Series Launch- Friday, November 20th, 2020

Xbox Series X: $499
Xbox Series S (“Lockhart”): $299

If these prices are where I think they’ll be at, Microsoft will run away with the price war. A lot of this is based on the Bloomberg report that PS5 has had component shortages for the super fast SSD they’re touting and cooling system that’s absolutely needed, and so have struggled to keep the bill of materials under $460, which means limiting supply for a while to not eat a billion dollars of loss, really pushing the Digital Edition to make up the difference by cutting out retail, and charging a higher price for the plain PS5.

The PS5 being just as expensive as the Series X- or $100 more if some rumors that I don’t buy are true- while being less powerful would be devastating. Not to mention Series S being way less expensive by virtue of apparently having a smaller GPU but the same CPU and SSD (basically the same games and performance at 1080p instead of 4K)! As opposed to just eliminating the disc drive (which only costs about $33 to make on the One X and so will probably not realize more than $50 cost savings for Sony). And I also predict that Microsoft will offer Xbox All Access again, where you pay the Series S/X and Game Pass Ultimate in installments, and that’ll be a huge hit in the US at least due to the recession.

Launch Window Exclusives Predictions (No Particular Order)

PlayStation 5

Spider-Man: Miles Morales
Gran Turismo 7
Sackboy’s Big Adventure
Bugsnax
Deathloop
Goodbye Volcano High
Kena Bridge of Spirits
Stray

Xbox Series

Halo Infinite
Forza Motorsport 8
Gears Tactics
Microsoft Flight Simulator
Bright Memory Infinite
Call of the Sea
The Medium
Scorn
Yakuza Like a Dragon

Both of these lists are very solid. I personally am preferring Xbox because of my love of Forza, Halo, and Microsoft Flight Simulator. But I can’t render a verdict until we know more from the July event and any future PS5 events.

PlayStation All-Stars 2

I was kidding about that being a defining game for the console war, but let’s talk about that for a second.

Microsoft and Sony have both increasingly been submitting very large and often dark, emotionally wrought games out there. Microsoft does this with Gears and Halo, while Sony broke my faith in the human race with The Last of Us and gave me a double dose of seriousgameitis with God of War 2018 and Uncharted 4 (meaning, both these games had more focus on story compared to mechanical action than their predecessors, and they were both slower paced and emotional).

You can clearly see which company I think is more guilty of it, but compare that to the kinds of exclusives both released in the past. Yeah, you had serious stuff of course, but Uncharted 1-3 had better pacing and tonal balance on the whole I feel, PS All Stars is an example of something similar, and Microsoft, especially in the OG Xbox era, had some wacky stuff like Blinx and Voodoo Vince that also wasn’t Kinect based (ugh).

It seems like that trend is set to continue with Halo Infinite aiming for a story and continuous camera on par with God of War and Spider-Man: Miles Morales set to capitalize on the same storytelling focus as Marvel’s Spider-Man. But I’m also hoping that both companies have some lighter, more fun games on the horizon. We already know of Sackboy’s Big Adventure, but Microsoft is already geared up for smaller projects that help keep people subscribed to Game Pass (because that’s their main focus- console sales are nice but they don’t print money like subscriptions) like Grounded and Psychonauts 2.

Maybe we can hope for PS All Stars 2 after all as a palate cleanser...

 

[MellowYellow]

Would that have anything to do with TLOU2?

Eeeeh... yes and no. More the impact that TLOU2 has had on Sony than the game itself.

I really don't care for 'cinematic' gaming experiences, or games feeling more like movies, but since TLOU was popular it's something that bleeds into other first party games. Even something decent like God of War can't fully escape from it.

Then there's Sony going hog wild on DMCA bullshit in the leadup to TLOU2. If something even vaguely referenced the leaks, be it in a tweet or a video, they would knock that shit straight off. Not a policy I'd personally support. And, even if I'm not someone who normally cares about fanservice, I'm not too happy that Sony is the company getting censor happy over it. It's a slope I'd rather not stand on.

And the double standard of 'we won't show anime tiddies but here's some full frontal buttfucking in 'The Schindler's List of Video Games' for you to enjoy.'

I dunno, it all just makes Sony into a company I don't really want to support.

But if backwards compatibility comes back around, I might come around too.

 

[TotesBurger]

Eh i'll go with the PS5. Kind a want more information on the backwards compatibility. But i'm digging what i've seen so far (even if it looks like a fucking 'L33TGAMER' wifi router).
Tho I will admit i'm bummed that the main game I wanna get on PS5 ain't coming until next year. Ghostwire looks fucking dope. But so far my day one purchase might be Spiderman, Deathloop and Destruction All Stars and/or Cyberpunk

I've been wanting to pick up Ghost of Tsushima but honestly I kinda wanna wait on that game to see if it gets any upgrades on PS5.

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

Eh i'll go with the PS5. Kind a want more information on the backwards compatibility. But i'm digging what i've seen so far (even if it looks like a fucking 'L33TGAMER' wifi router).
Tho I will admit i'm bummed that the main game I wanna get on PS5 ain't coming until next year. Ghostwire looks fucking dope. But so far my day one purchase might be Spiderman, Deathloop and Destruction All Stars and/or Cyberpunk

I just want launch dates for the consoles and the launch titles for any of these consoles already, so I can buy as many of them as my bank account allows!

Which leads me into another poll topic. $70 games, yay or nay?

I been wanting to pick up Ghost of Tsushima but honestly I kinda wanna wait on that game to see if it gets any upgrades on PS5.

Smart move. As soon as my GameStop reopens I’m probably going to cancel my Marvel’s Avengers preorder. And why not, when the Xbox Series X launch will be two months later and not only will the game look and run better, but any bugs will get fixed and we’ll start to see the roadmap later on?

 

[TotesBurger]

Smart move. As soon as my GameStop reopens I’m probably going to cancel my Marvel’s Avengers preorder. And why not, when the Xbox Series X launch will be two months later and not only will the game look and run better, but any bugs will get fixed and we’ll start to see the roadmap later on?

Oh yeah Avengers announced they were coming to next gen as well.
Honestly wasn't super interested in it because of the visual style, but after that war room i'm more keen to give it a fair shot. Looks like a ton of love went into it.

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

Oh yeah Avengers announced they were coming to next gen as well.
Honestly wasn't super interested in it because of the visual style, but after that war room i'm more keen to give it a fair shot. Looks like a ton of love went into it.

Absolutely. I also forgot to mention that, because it’ll be a free Smart Delivery upgrade for Series X and a free upgrade for PS5 (glares at NBA 2K21), everyone even the slightest bit interested in the game should wait- by then it’ll be way cheaper on disc and digital and you’ll get the best version.

 

[Revelations]

Which leads me into another poll topic. $70 games, yay or nay?

Strong, strong nay. Games increasing in price will not really help the developers in any way, it just allows the publishers to make more money and charge more for the same product.

 

[CasualVelociraptor]

Strong, strong nay. Games increasing in price will not really help the developers in any way, it just allows the publishers to make more money and charge more for the same product.

In the case of NBA 2K21, I absolutely agree. NBA 2K is a series of recycled garbage games that charge buttloads of money for pay to win microtransactions and fancy editions to kids and adults who worship that game, that has essentially clobbered the competition (NBA Live) to death or bought it (NBA Playgrounds) so they don’t try any more and think they can charge whatever they want. They’re essentially the Facebook of AAA games.

It was probably inevitable that somebody would go to $69.99 at some point, and I’ll pay that price if a game looks really good. But NBA is the last series that should be complaining about development costs when even Madden NFL 21, the other epitome of lazy roster updates, is giving PS4 and Xbox One owners a PS5 and Xbox Series X update for free whether on disc or digital up until the release of Madden NFL 22.

Of course, it’s not surprising either that sports games are leading the way on this scummy stuff, but there’s definitely going to be some customer confusion with the upgrade paths, at least until AAA developers stop making PS4/Xbox One games rendering everything moot. Here are my rankings of these systems as far as I understand.

1. Microsoft’s Smart Delivery- simple, clean, works with physical and digital purchases and Game Pass at any point, and easily understood (downsides are that it’s opt in which will create some consumer annoyance in a recession, but that’s out of Microsoft’s hands)
2. Sony’s Wild West- It’s highly likely that they will offer free patches to PS4 -> PS5 games, but they’re not saying yet so people won’t hold off on The Last of Us Part 2 and Ghost of Tsushima, and they’re not calling it anything which could lead to consumer confusion when you don’t have a marketable label
3. EA’s Dual Entitlement- was terrible until people complained, now a tiny bit not the Devil (still mostly the Devil though)
4. NBA’s Fuck You $ystem- either pay 70 FUCKING DOLLARS (not to mention $400-$500 for the console) on a wing and a prayer that the port isn’t half assed, or $100 to get Xbox One/Series X or PS4/PS5 editions together (I personally know one person who might do this and then spend hundreds more on microtransactions, even in a recession when they’ve been furloughed)

Overall, this complicated web of first and third party entitlements and slightly less straightforward world of optional disc drives on consoles with similar sounding names will keep retailers in the game as the explainers for the average customer for another few years. Because there will always be somebody who gets the discless Xbox and then complains their disc doesn’t work.

 

[GamerGuy]

I'm going to go with Playstation 5. I don't hate Xbox at all, but if I had to choose just one (which at least for now I do), it's going to be Playstation. My friends and family are mostly on that console, there are more games I enjoy on that console, and I generally like the controller design a bit better. I'm sure I'll pick up an Xbox Series X or SEXBOX as I like to call it somewhere down the line. Maybe when the inevitable Xbox Series XL or something comes out. Maybe with a free game or two at that.