Games Inbox: The disaster of PS Plus Premium
The Wednesday letters page celebrates 50 years of the modern games industry, as another reader hopes for more Lego Star Wars DLC.
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Time and money
I was beginning to think that people were just jumping on the band wagon, criticising Sony and PS Plus Premium but it seems like every detail that comes out makes it sound worse and worse. Now that it’s live in Asia the general lack of games is very disappointing, as is the apparent lack of care over the versions they’re using.
The thing that immediately struck me is that it all seems very rushed. I don’t know how, considering Sony has had years to plan this and there’s nothing technically complicated about any of it, but I can only assume that the whole thing has been underfunded for some reason. That’s probably another reason why Sony hasn’t talked about it much pre-launch but it also underlines just how rich Microsoft is as a company and how it can make very time consuming things seem simple and straightforward.
I’m still surprised Sony has sleepwalked into such obvious problems though. Why talk about hundreds of games and then not deliver? Why make such an obvious mistake about PAL games when everyone already criticised you over them for the PlayStation Classic console?
Maybe the Western or Japanese versions of the service will end up being better but that doesn’t seem very likely at this point. It really is a bit of a disaster, and a completely unnecessary one at that.
Collins
Xbox PR
Wow, what an absolute mess PS Plus Premium has been so far! What are Sony playing at? If they don’t like Game Pass then fine but making a knock-off brand version of it that is clearly nowhere near as good is just asking for trouble. All Sony has done is make the Xbox look even better, it’s the best advertising Microsoft has had in months.
It’s obvious what they need to do: more games and better emulation buy Surely they release that, so I can only assume that they just can’t get them out quick enough. Or maybe they’re purposefully holding stuff back so that they can have regular updates? But that’s only going to look like they’re panicking and launched the whole thing too early.
I can’t say I’m much of a one for playing retro games but I was interested in PS Plus Extra if it had a decent range of games but frankly it doesn’t. I’m not sure who all this is supposed to appeal to but it’s definitely not me.
Cranston
Slow but steady
Just over five weeks ago I wrote in regarding beating Phrike in Returnal as an older gamer, whilst also comparing it to Ghosts ‘N Goblins, as I felt it was only going to get harder.
This evening I have just beaten Nemesis in the third biome.
Anyone who read my letter five weeks ago, who has played both, must have been laughing so hard when I compared the two! Still surprised I have avoided spoilers for so long.
Keep up the top work GameCentral.
Jowbullman (PSN ID)
Currently playing: Returnal very badly and slowly!
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New legs
A relative of a friend has just got the PlayStation VR headset, which he has been amazed by, but he wasn’t aware of the motion sickness and fast moving games, and getting your VR legs before playing games like that. Could any GameCentral readers recommend any tips and tricks/guides and games that would be suitable when first starting to use it? I have told my friend that he needs to play games where he is sat down, and not fast moving games like WipEout. I also said that if he feels nausea or ill he should take the headset off immediately.
I think he has a base PlayStation 4 and not a PS4 Pro. I was going to recommend the first Moss game, as he
should be able to get it cheap and you are sitting still and control Moss the mouse, which is a slower paced game than the VR football game he has been playing.
Andrew J.
Currently playing: Eiyuden Chronicle: Rising (got it because I am a Kickstarter backer)
GC: Moss is a great choice, in every sense, while Ghost Giant and Tethered work in a similar way and are also really good.
Continue the saga
I’ve just started playing Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga for a change of pace, after playing through GRID Legends. Surprisingly, it’s actually the first Lego Star Wars game that I’ve played despite being a huge fan of the films (I’ve played the Marvel and DC Lego games though).
What a delightful little game it is though, I’ve only played through episodes 4 and 5 so far, so I’ve still got plenty to go through, but I’d definitely welcome (and happily pay for) some DLC to include the likes of Rogue One, Solo, and The Mandalorian to complete the Star Wars universe!
May the Force be with you.
Rickandrolla
Anything but
Am I the only one that never saw the appeal of Dragon’s Dogma? I know a lot of people seem to like it but I found it pretty generic action role-player, trying to play off the success of Dark Souls and Skyrim to create a pretty straight mishmash of the two, but never anywhere near as interesting as either.
The whole pawn thing was dumb too. It was so obviously just a stand-in for the fact that they couldn’t do a proper co-op mode, so they added what they thought was the next best thing. I imagine they’ll do it again for the sequel too, since it’s one of the only unique elements. But really, just do co-op!
There’s barely any Capcom franchise I wouldn’t prefer to come back, from old ones like Ghost ‘N Goblins, Bionic Commando, and Mega Man to newer ones like Onimusha, Dino Crisis, and Viewtiful Joe. I’m not going to complain about Dragon’s Dogma 2 when it’s announced – I’m not out to spoil anyone’s fun – but I doubt it’s something I’ll be getting.
Maybe I’ll get lucky next time and one of my favourites will get a sequel instead.
Dano
Portal to success
Hard to believe how terrible Battlefield 2042 has been for EA. I noped out as soon as I saw the fan feedback but the changes they’ve bene making recently, like getting rid of 128-player matches and abandoning Hazard Zone are crazy.
I think it was on here I saw another reader suggest they just make Battlefield Portal the game and forget the rest. That’s probably a good idea. Make it free-to-play and charge for the game-specific items and that makes total sense to me. No sign of it actually happening though…
Focus
Anniversary year
It’s crazy to think a character like Pac-Man is 42-years-old. Video games are still thought of as a new thing by even young people but really they’ve been around for decades and just as things only nerds know about. Pac-Man was super mainstream, as was Pong, Space Invaders, Asteroids, and others. And these were the first commercial games ever, and they’re still names we recognise today.
Pong first appeared in 1972 (November 29 according to Wikipedia) so that makes it 50 years old this year. Weirdly that doesn’t seem to be being celebrated by anyone but I guess that’s because Atari aren’t really the same company anymore.
Unless there’s something I’m forgetting I’d say that was the first major video game hit and basically the beginning of the video games industry as we know it today. The movie industry is only a bit over twice as old (it’s much harder to pin when that started as a mass market thing but late 1930s seems to be the consensus), so I think it’s time that everyone stopped thinking of gaming as the new kid on the block.
Especially as when many of those very earliest games are still going today and are both perfectly playable. People still play Space Invaders and Asteroids but I don’t think anyone sits down to watch a Lumière brothers film for a good time.
Liffman
GC: There was Spacewar! before it, but Pong does seem a sensible starting point for the modern video games industry.
Inbox also-rans
It’s nearly June and I can’t help but miss all the E3 rumours and leaks, like them putting up the big billboards, that we usually get at this time of the year. It all seems so antiseptic and controlled without it.
Casper
So I can’t help but notice that we still haven’t seen anything of Sonic Frontiers yet. Is it worth hoping it’ll be at the not-E3 showcases or is it just setting itself up to be a tie-in to the Sonic 3 movie?
Gansen
This week’s Hot Topic
The subject for this weekend’s Inbox was suggested by reader Onibee, who asks what game do you wish went on forever?
With many publishers convinced that live service games like Fortnite and Apex Legends are the future of the industry, which existing games do you wish still got regular releases of new DLC? If it’s an action game how would new content keep it fresh and if it’s more story-based how exactly would you like it to work?
Do you like the idea of a game having no official end or do you prefer it to be finite? If it’s the latter, why is that and what do you feel is the ideal length for a game?
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The small print
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MORE : Weekend Hot Topic: The longest wait for a new video game
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