Games Inbox: Why people are switching from PS5 to Xbox

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Jumping ship
Microsoft/Xbox are paving the way to the future. While Sony is busy trying to focus on exclusive games for their console, Xbox created Game Pass and seems intent on introducing gamers to all types of developers and games, in addition to an agenda of making games available to as many people as possible on whatever service they want, be it an Xbox, PC, phone, etc. Microsoft is driving us into the future.

Oh, and honestly, I can’t stand the PS Store, it always sticks with the original retail price of games. You been to the Xbox store recently? All types of heavily, and I mean heavily, discounted games.

I’ve always bought and played all consoles of each generation, from PlayStation, Xbox, Nintendo, and Atari back in the day. I am so disgusted by Sony’s moves and actions (in addition to the Xbox Series X’s superior experience in every way) that I say good riddance to my PlayStation 5. Sold it on the cheap and am essentially boycotting the company.

Sony can keep playing its little console wars games and spending loads of money on exclusive rights to ensure only a select number of people can play their previous games. I’ll be over with everyone else on PCs and Xboxes, getting to know all types of games I would have never tried before. My PlayStation 5 sat in a corner unplayed because I had kinda lost interest in it. With the Xbox, I’ve never been more excited about playing.
David Wiley

Now no longer
I’m a long-time gamer, I’ve played Xbox and PlayStation for years now. I’ve been a PlayStation man since the release of the PlayStation 4 and I’m seriously thinking of leaving. I have well over 200 games that are all bought from the PlayStation Store, so I’ve been quite a good customer.

But for the new PS Plus system is ridiculous; like a lot of other people I too went to Extra from Premium in a month.

What happened to games like Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell? All the games were great and Resistance 1, 2, and 3 or Medal Of Honor? These are some of the games I was expecting to see on the classic catalogue but no, not at all. It’s just a mixed-up PlayStation Now. There was even games on PS Now that you can’t get on the new tier system, like Metal Gear Rising and several others, which I think is ridiculous.
PaulVW

Licence to apologise
Stumbled across the documentary GoldenEra on Sky on Saturday, about the creation of GoldenEye 007 on the N64, and what came after for the individuals involved (many of whom were straight out of uni), Rare, and the industry as a whole.

An excellent watch, with lots of great behind the scenes stories. One standout being that there was a call with Shigeru Miyamoto, where he asked Rare to add a scene at the end of the game where you went around a hospital saying sorry to all the people you’d shot. And another that there’s one cartridge with all the Bond actors on, which the devs used to play multiplayer on, to see who was the ultimate Bond.

Hilariously, there’s also quite a few scenes where what they’re talking about is re-enacted using graphics from the game.

Highly recommend!
Julian

Marketing 101
As much sympathy as I have for the people making GTA 6, after the leaks, I have to say that Rockstar continuing to act like a petulant child is not a good like. They always do really but banning people from even saying the word GTA 6 on Twitch and whatever is just silly.

The leak didn’t really leak anything, unless you think the setting is some massive spoiler, but so okay, just release a teaser trailer and control the narrative yourself. Isn’t it good to have people talking about your game? Although I guess they’re worried people will stop playing (i.e. spending money on) GTA Online as soon as they find out that GTA 6 is a thing.

I don’t really see why that would happen but even so just start adding some teaser and new GTA 6 related items. That would probably get more people playing than ever. This sort of stuff is obvious, no?
Dakkel

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Hollywood influence
Whatever the Super Mario movie ends up being – and I think at this point we’re all bracing ourselves for the worst – I hope it’s not one of these situations where the games start copying it even before they know whether it’s popular or not.

What I’d be especially wary of is them replacing Charles Martinet, who’s getting on a bit now, with a Chris Pratt soundalike. Tell me that’s not something that sounds like exactly what they’d do?

I’m still mad that Nintendo switched to using the Rare version of Donkey Kong for everything as soon as the Donkey Kong Country games were a hit. I wish they’d switch back and I have a nasty feeling we’ll be saying that about Mario soon too.
Gaston

Two flavours of sci-fi
It’s great to see Lucasfilm Games’ comeback is working and that they’re not just churning out Star Wars games and nothing else. Disney get a lot of well deserved flak but in this case I’d say it’s obvious that them buying Lucasfilm was nothing but good for the games division.

It’d been shut down before, and was only doing Star Wars games then anyway, but now we’ve got new games, sequels, remasters… the works. I’ve beaten Return To Monkey Island now and while it isn’t as good as the first three it’s definitely close and a very worth sequel.

What I’d like Lucasfilm to do next though is something in the vein of The Dig. Not a sequel, as the original was pretty flawed but another serious game that was still a proper graphic adventure with puzzles. If that game had been better I feel it could’ve been really influential. But unfortunately it was caught between two stools and didn’t really find its own voice.

I’d love to see a serious Telltale style story with actual gameplay though. It doesn’t have to be hard sci-fi but I’d love that too. And then afterwards they can do that Star Wars point ‘n’ click that was rumoured in the 90s, with the original actors, but never happened. Although I realise some of them won’t be coming back now.
Grinch

Remastered topic
Remakes/remasters are still a trend in video games. Some remakes/remasters are great, definitive even, some can be unnecessary, but it’s hard to argue they are pointless or worse than the original much like in Hollywood.

How about a Hot Topic on the subject? I’ll get the ball rolling by nominating GameCube’s Resident Evil as video game’s greatest remake so far.
Bad Edit

GC: We did that one back in July.

Day one problems
That is not good news from Sony, saying that Stray was an ‘anomaly’ for PS Plus. I think everyone can appreciate why they don’t put their first party games on PS Plus on day one but I thought Stray was a clear sign that they were prepared to do it with third party games? It seemed to go down very well too, with the game getting far more attention than it would’ve otherwise? So what went wrong?

There’s no answer to that, I have no idea what Sony are playing at, at the moment, but they do seem intent on not giving people what they want. No news, no real communication, and no explanation for whatever it is PS Plus is supposed.

Seriously, they would’ve been much better off just not rebooting because this low effort mess has done a lot of damage to their reputation, I feel. The stuff with the lack of retro games is especially confusing. Hardly any at launch, even less afterwards… was this the plan or has something gone terribly wrong? It’d say it has anyway.

If I were Sony I’d sign up a bunch of promising indie games for day one on PS Plus Extra and try and earn some kudos points back, because they really do need to win back the fans as soon as possible.
Focus

Inbox also-rans
I still can’t believe such a massive leak happened with GTA 6 – with someone very likely going to jail for it, and we didn’t learn a single interesting thing from it! Hope it was worth it?
Restron

I’m all for more single-player games but isn’t making a team-up game with two superheroes and then not making it co-op a bit weird? That would seem like the whole point.
Kask

This week’s Hot Topic
The subject for this weekend’s Inbox was suggested by reader Jericho, who asks what do you want from a Switch 2?

Regardless of rumours, it’s inevitable that there will be a new Nintendo console in the next few years but what form do you want it to take, both physically and in terms of how powerful it is and how much it will cost.

Now that there are multiple portable consoles that look similar how do you think Nintendo should respond and what are the most important changes and improvements from the current Switch? Or would you want to see a new console that was completely different?

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The small print
New Inbox updates appear every weekday morning, with special Hot Topic Inboxes at the weekend. Readers’ letters are used on merit and may be edited for length and content.

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