Hypnotoad107

Great review, Liam! Really curious how this set compares to the Arctic 7x. That’s what I’m currently using, but I’m not opposed to dropping a hundo on these if they compare favorably. Any thoughts on the 7x vs these?

I’m all in on Immortals Fenyx Rising. I had no idea it was such a blatant rip-off of BotW, and I love it. It actually fixes my main complaints about BotW: the weapons don’t break and the story is a bit more interesting to me (that could be due to my love of Greek mythology). I also prefer my protagonist to talk.

Yes... I would like an Xbox mini fridge.

@Senua R&C will be interesting, as I think it’s a very high quality platformer. Insomniac does amazing work. That said, I thought one of the reasons the last one was such a massive success was its lower launch price ($40 here in the states). I’m wondering if people will be happy to pay $70 for the new one after getting the last one at that price. I guess PS5 owners (I’m one, by the way) will be eager to play anything designed for PS5, but I truly have a hard time paying full price for games when I have Gamepass.

@Jedge396 No problem. If you don’t have any buddies you are playing with, but you want to play with others, I’d look for some message boards for matching up with other Xbox users. IGN boards have a board specifically made for grouping up users. You might want to try something like that. Or look on some Sea of Thieves boards. You can probably find a group willing to show a rookie the ropes. The game is a lot of fun if you’re with a good group. It’s also not high pressure like shooters. If you die, you respawn 30 seconds later with your group.

@Jedge396 Maybe, but I personally only enjoy it when I’m playing with friends. There’s a sloop that you can captain solo, or you can play with randoms. You can definitely tell that it’s designed to be played with friends.

@Jacko11 I really think with his “no exclusives” line, he was trying to set up that he wants Gamepass to be as many places as possible. He wants GPU on EVERYTHING, so everyone can access it. I don’t think anyone really thought that Xbox was going to stop making exclusive games, right??? It’s really the only thing that makes sense to me, otherwise, they might as well just become a third party publisher.

Fallout 4 or Wolfenstein 2. I loved New Vegas, but about half way through the game I got the cache glitch that caused my 360 to crash to desktop every half hour or so. I’d have to reload the game 5-10 times a day. I powered through, but it definitely strongly impacted my playthrough in a negative way.

@Stocksy This stuff takes time. Sony fanboys are still going through the various stages of grief. They weren’t all going to pop over here to instantly hop on the train. A lot of them are still just mad about the acquisition. I feel once MS starts putting out some quality titles, traffic here might pick up.

MS could always go the long term timed exclusive route. They can have Xbox launch exclusives and keep it for 2+ years. That way they can probably milk the GPU subs as much as possible and sweep up the remainder of PS5 users that refuse to switch after the 2 year period.

@UltimateOtaku91 I think you answered why xbox fans want the games to be exclusive. In your own words: “I was just sick of halo, forza and gears being the only big exclusives.” Xbox fans are probably also tired of PS fans for years telling them “Xbox has no games”. I don’t care either way as I have both Xbox and PS5, but it shouldn’t be a surprise at all that Xbox fans would like to have something to get behind.

Something that MS can do that might be a powerful tool is release a game like Starfield and say it is launching exclusively on xbox, then not say anything about whether it is a timed exclusive or for how long. If they want, they can just drop it on the PS5 whenever they want. They have no obligation to tell people it's releasing 6 months, 1 year, or 2 years from now. They can do what Sony did with Horizon and release it elsewhere 3-4 years later if they want. Not knowing how long exclusivity is might drive people to the Xbox, but then allow xbox to drop it on the PS5 at a later date to get that money as well.

I personally think Gears is a vastly superior single player experience and think Master Chief is pretty uninteresting as a character, but that said, I’m looking forward to playing this. I’ll go with “fairly excited”.

@Dm9982 You could roll her in all 3, but she got her iconic look in ME3. If you look at ME1 and ME2 default femshep, she looked completely different, whereas Sheploo looked pretty much the same in all 3.

Edit: PC has a mod that allows you to put ME3 femshep model in ME1&2.

"Creating best-in-class games from the ground up takes many years and significant investment, and the cost is going up exponentially.“

Pretty sure this is why MS is acquiring studios instead of building them up from scratch. There are too many established IPs out there and they need to play catch up quickly. Still a significant investment, but they get known IPs immediately instead of 10 years from now.

@Bobobiwan If it suits your play style, it’s hard to imagine going back to the way things use to be. And luckily, it suits my play style. It really does feel like Netflix to me. I’ll just always have a sub for it, and it’s kind of pointless to get rid of it, as I’ll want to have it again a month or two later.

@KelticDevil I agree. I think this wouldn’t have been as bad if we had a deluge of their AAA games on the horizon, but upgrading to GPU at this exact moment is a hard sell with none of their big games (except Halo) even announced for 2021.

@Leuke You get a like for The Cheat.

@Menchi I don’t really feel conditioned. I play it all the time and it’s really cheap (I paid $100/yr). It’s not like I bought a gym membership that I never use.

@jarvismp I think this will most likely affect people that just play a couple of MP games all year (CoD/FIFA). They will have no desire to get GP, so it would make since just to go to PS5. I understand their goal here, but I think it’s risky.

For about the same price ($68 USD) , you can get 6 months of GPU from cdkeys. I haven’t paid full price for a subscription in years.

Rumors that Wolfenstein 3 is pretty much done. Could be that.

Just here to say that all 5 of these episodes have fantastic title sequences and songs. Also, the finger gun scene is one of my favorite moments in all of gaming. ALSO, you can never go wrong with Patrick Warburton.

My 14 year old son loves this game. I’ll walk in and ask him what he’s doing and he’ll be browsing his phone while his ship is flying on a two hour shipping mission. It’s like a real time space job simulator.

Phil can’t wait to “learn more”. Okay, Phil.

@Bmartin001 I’m so jealous that you get to experience it for the first time. Best cast of characters in video game history, imo. The only game I can think of that even comes close is FF6.

Influencers are the worst. I’ll take the Jenga kit.

@Grumblevolcano I’m a pretty avid rewards member, but this is not a challenge I really get into. 10,000 points is nice but it’s only worth a little over $10. That’s just not worth the time or effort to me. I will kind of shift my game playing to try some new games I've been wanting to play to get some points, but I won’t make a crusade out of it.

I tried a couple of years ago, but pretty much all of my controllers were unusable, so I just put it back into storage and use XB1 BC.

I love having AA. I have 2 pairs of eneloop always ready to go. I NEVER have to hook it to a wire or charge base. My internal PS4 batteries are really bad in comparison and just get worse over time. Haven’t had the Ps5 controller long enough to see how long it will last, but just the fact that I have to hook it up to charge is a knock against it. Xbox players can by a rechargeable battery pack if they want, but I definitely prefer the AA solution over Sony’s internal battery solution.

I think Nintendo really kind of screwed the pooch with the Switch. Sure, it’s great for consumers. Combine the handheld with the home console is a much better deal, but think of all the sales they’re missing out on. They have around 60mil Switches and are considered a runaway success (oddly, many consider the Xbox a failure with 50+mil units sold), but when the DS and Wii were going simultaneously, that was over 250million units when added together. Combining them was great for consumers, but I’m not sure if it was great for Nintendo.

@Trainer I will say FF8 was the one I hesitated most on. I think it’s the ending that pushed it on the list over FF7 for me. I think the FF7 ending was a bit weeby for my taste. Same thing with FF10.

@Kefka2589 I agree. I think Sephiroth, the buster sword, and the utilization of FMV in the early PS days is really why this game was a hit. To me, the cast of characters just wasn’t as likable as the casts in the other games. The cast in FF6 is stellar top to bottom (well, maybe not Gau). One of my sons is actually named after Locke. The opera house scene is one of the most memorable set pieces in all of gaming for me (that music). And then, of course, every time you hear Kefka’s laugh offscreen before he makes his entrance. That’s it, I’m booting up my Mini SNES when I get home.

@Kefka2589 Kefka is a better villain than Sephiroth.

Best FFs as determined by me:
1. FF6 (I don’t think any of the other ones even come close to FF6. Not just the best FF, but one of the greatest games ever made.)
2. FF9
3. FF4
4. FF12
5. FF8

Edit: I realize FF7 is a notable absence. I think it’s a bit overrated. It’s good, but I like all of the above games better. I haven’t played the remake, but I probably will when it comes to Xbox.

Just discovered MS Rewards. It’s so easy to get at least 10,000 points a month, which translates to a $10 credit. I would have no problem getting ultimate paid for, but I always pick that up when it’s on super sale. I just do my bing searches and daily set in the morning while drinking my coffee. Easy money.

@StonyKL The survey would probably be best with a question near the beginning asking what consoles people own, then at the end, asking if you would like advanced haptics in the controller. That way they can compare results from people that have used both vs people that haven’t.

I have a XSX and PS5, but I definitely favor the XSX. That said, I love the DualSense on Astro’s. I would buy games that implemented that controller in any meaningful way on my PS5 (CoD guns isn’t going to cut it).

Well, that’s $4.99 that I’ll never get back.

@Just1moretry Skyrim was just added a couple of weeks ago.

@Olliemar28 I like to keep an eye out for the discounts. You can get GPU on CDKeys for 30% off pretty much all the time, or you can look for the 60% off sales around holidays. I like to top it off every time I see one of those major sales.

Picked up a Series X and PS5. The controller on the PS5 is a blast on Astro’s Playroom. Other than that, the Series X is my go to. I can’t imagine gaming without Game Pass again. I’ll let my son play Fortnite on the PS5 until Horizon 2 drops

Every time it goes on sale for $20 for 3 months, I max it out to 3 yrs again. One of my biggest fears is game pass failing, and I have to go back to paying for each game individually >shudders<.

I understand with GP. Not a ton of new 1st party stuff until 2022. I think at that point, it’ll almost be a must have. I actually maxed it out during Black Friday when you could get it for $20 for 3 months, so I’m good for the next three years. Every time I see it on super sale, I just top it off.

American media kind of sucks. Definitely prefer getting my news from BBC when I can. Them and the Associated Press.

@AJDarkstar I should add the caveat that I have GPU so I didn’t have to pay anything for it. It is quite short, so whether it is worth $20 for 3-4 hrs of gameplay would definitely be up to the individual consumer. I also died a good number of times in it. Way more frequently than I did in Gears 5. It was primarily due to instadeaths from torque bows through cover. I don’t remember them being so powerful in Gears 5.

@AJDarkstar If you like Gears 5, it’s a 9/10.

@Kefka2589 A new Overlord game would make me so happy.

$1.2 billion seems a little crazy for Codemasters. The $7.5 billion acquisition of Zenimax seems like a pretty solid deal looking at this, and Sony’s $229 million acquisition of Insomniac was an absolute steal. Surely, the Insomniac big wigs are hitting themselves for not allowing a bidding war. They could’ve probably made quadruple what they got.

@InterceptorAlpha That’s what I was thinking. I’m playing Call of the Sea today. Really enjoying it. Probably wouldn’t have played it if it wasn’t on GP. The main reason I want Xbox to succeed is because I don’t want to have to go back to playing games the way I use to pre-gamepass.