[Technology] PS5 / Xbox Series S/X

[DFL JCL]

Got the xbox series s on pre order. No need for disc drive and I don't play it on a big fancy TV so £299 seemed like the best value. The pay monthly options over 24 months including console and gamepass looked very good value to me. But opted for paying upfront in the end.

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[StonehamPark]

I think you're right, the writing is on the wall there really. I have to say it, even though I don't like it, Elder Scrolls, Fallout and Starfield as an exclusivce would get me to buy an Xbox. And potentially end up getting both consoles at some point down the line. Which is crazy really.

It does make you wonder, if this deal has been in the offing for a while, if Microsoft have encouraged Bethesda not to release too much about Elder Scrolls and Starfield. Bethesda have been very cagey with details on them both, other than they'll be their next big releases. which in turn kind of whips up the interest in them, because fans are itching for news. And then if they announce they'll be Xbox exclusives alongside a big update with screenshots and details, they'll get a lot of people plump for Xbox there and then.

Same for me, I've never owned both current gen consoles, it's been one or the other. But this gen will likely be both - though not entirely willingly. But if I can work out a good deal financially than it may be worth it, over 7 years anyway.

Interesting idea. That would be a great tactical move, if once after the release and xmas hype whittles down early next year, they can start promoting these massive games as Xbox exclusives, bring back the mass demand and continue to sell at a larger scale. That would be a very shrewd move.

Got the xbox series s on pre order. No need for disc drive and I don't play it on a big fancy TV so £299 seemed like the best value. The pay monthly options over 24 months including console and gamepass looked very good value to me. But opted for paying upfront in the end.

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Can't see anything wrong with that at all, as long as you're ok with the SSD size. It'll be perfectly fine on 1080p screen.
Such a good value console imo.

 

[Beanstalk]

Rockstar are part of Take2 Interactive, Sony just dont have the money for it and its dreamland from the Sony Ponies.
Full disclosure, I play on PS4 and will get a PS5, but let's be realistic, haha!

I'll have to go ps5 as my friends are all on PS, but I feel Xbox has the better offering right now with gamepass and Bethesda (Elder Scrolls, Fallout and Starfield).
If they all turn out to be exclusives, I'll have to put my hand in my pocket and buy a Series X..

GamePass is truly amazing. Especially now that they're adding EA Play for free. Since lockdown began I've played The Outer Worlds, The Witcher 3, Untitled Goose Game, Overcooked 2, The Outer Wilds, Ori and the Blind Forest, GTA V, Oxenfree, Alien Isolation, We Happy Few, No Man's Sky, Tell Me Why and Halo for the first time. It also gave me Football Manager 20 on the PC without any additional cost. Obviously, it helped that I unwittingly ended up with a crazy amount of free time but through a bit of searching for deals I managed to get all of that for £40 (covering me for 9 months). It's a ridiculous deal and if Apple weren't so ridiculous, I'd probably be streaming to my phone without any extra cost.

Ultimately, it means that apart from FIFA and CyberPunk 2077, I don't actually plan on buying a new game for the next year.

 

[JetsetJimbo]

I'm intending to get both, because I can (not that I'm especially rich, I'm just single with housing that doesn't cost me anything), and I currently have a PS4 Pro and an Xbox One X. I know both platforms pretty well and have owned every console either company has ever made. From my perspective, the main "pro" for the PS5 is Sony's track record of great single-player games like God of War, alongside its better support from Japanese developers (Nier Automata is one of my favourite third-party games of recent years, and I'd already completed it several times over on the PS4 before it came to Xbox).

Microsoft has arguably answered that by buying Zenimax, and it has the additional plus of Game Pass, which is (as others have said) a really great-value service. Plus I have a pretty big back catalogue of Xbox games, which I'll be able to play (usually enhanced) on the XSX, which will be important in those early months when big new games for the new consoles are a bit thin on the ground. Microsoft were clearly stung by the disastrous original launch of the X1, and their Xbox division has seemingly become incredibly consumer-friendly and generous in response.

But I'm still hoping that Sony "wins", and for a very specific reason that may not apply to many people: I hate "live service" games and anything stuffed full of loot boxes, in-game purchases etc. No matter what the publishers and developers say, those games are always (un)balanced in a way that prompts you to spend more money. Now, the traditional sales model for consoles is to take a loss on the hardware, but recoup the money on games: But the model Microsoft is pursuing seems to involve making a loss on both (as there's no way Game Pass is making a profit). So where is their profit going to come from? I'm speculating here, but I worry that they see the live service model as the future of gaming, and that they're planning to recoup all that money from the cut they take on in-game purchases. They have form in this regard, having announced when launching the X1 that all their own games would include microtransactions, thereby encouraging third-party publishers to do the same.

It's certainly impressive that Microsoft has bought Bethesda, InXile, Obsidian, etc. Those are all companies with a long track record of making games I like. But if Microsoft wants to put them to work on the next Fallout 76 rather than the next Fallout New Vegas, then my XSX will end up just being used to play old games.

Both Sony and Microsoft are serving up exceptionally well-specced machines for the price, though, and I don't think anyone will feel bad about their purchase, whichever they get (unless, perhaps, they share my hangup over in-game monetisation).

 

[Braggfan]

But if Microsoft wants to put them to work on the next Fallout 76 rather than the next Fallout New Vegas, then my XSX will end up just being used to play old games.

I think Bethesda have been burned by Fallout 76. I think its largely accepted by fans that Elder Scrolls online and Fallout 76 failed to live up to the hype and expectations. The fact that Bethesda have now openly said they'll focus on Elder Scrolls 6 and Starfield as their next big games, shows that they want to get back to safe ground.

Down the line I would imagine that a new Fallout game will follow those two big releases, and then maybe at some point in the future they may revisit the online games, but I dont think it will be anytime soon.

 

[StonehamPark]

What we need is MS to put Todd Howard and Obsidian in a room and work out a deal for New Vegas 2. That's what the world really wants (as far as Fallout goes!).

Plus, Path of Exile 2. I've just gotten into the first one (amazing free MMORPG, think Diablo 2.5) - I will waste many hours of my life when this comes out on next gen.

 

[wellquickwoody]

Fella I work said:-

'My wife has just message me to say she's done something silly'.
"I've reserved 3 PS5's so the boys can have one each"?


Feck me, he's on a completely different pay scale to the one I'm on, for doing the same job.

Maybe he doesn't spend all day on NSC?

 

[HitchinSeagull]

I'm intending to get both, because I can (not that I'm especially rich, I'm just single with housing that doesn't cost me anything), and I currently have a PS4 Pro and an Xbox One X. I know both platforms pretty well and have owned every console either company has ever made. From my perspective, the main "pro" for the PS5 is Sony's track record of great single-player games like God of War, alongside its better support from Japanese developers (Nier Automata is one of my favourite third-party games of recent years, and I'd already completed it several times over on the PS4 before it came to Xbox).

Microsoft has arguably answered that by buying Zenimax, and it has the additional plus of Game Pass, which is (as others have said) a really great-value service. Plus I have a pretty big back catalogue of Xbox games, which I'll be able to play (usually enhanced) on the XSX, which will be important in those early months when big new games for the new consoles are a bit thin on the ground. Microsoft were clearly stung by the disastrous original launch of the X1, and their Xbox division has seemingly become incredibly consumer-friendly and generous in response.

But I'm still hoping that Sony "wins", and for a very specific reason that may not apply to many people: I hate "live service" games and anything stuffed full of loot boxes, in-game purchases etc. No matter what the publishers and developers say, those games are always (un)balanced in a way that prompts you to spend more money. Now, the traditional sales model for consoles is to take a loss on the hardware, but recoup the money on games: But the model Microsoft is pursuing seems to involve making a loss on both (as there's no way Game Pass is making a profit). So where is their profit going to come from? I'm speculating here, but I worry that they see the live service model as the future of gaming, and that they're planning to recoup all that money from the cut they take on in-game purchases. They have form in this regard, having announced when launching the X1 that all their own games would include microtransactions, thereby encouraging third-party publishers to do the same.

It's certainly impressive that Microsoft has bought Bethesda, InXile, Obsidian, etc. Those are all companies with a long track record of making games I like. But if Microsoft wants to put them to work on the next Fallout 76 rather than the next Fallout New Vegas, then my XSX will end up just being used to play old games.

Both Sony and Microsoft are serving up exceptionally well-specced machines for the price, though, and I don't think anyone will feel bad about their purchase, whichever they get (unless, perhaps, they share my hangup over in-game monetisation).

To be honest fallout 4 is a game I've only half played and that's extremely unusual for me, I also loved all the previous titles, 4 let alone 76 felt dated and just weary to play, maybe I shouldn't have got the goty edition with all the extra rubbish!

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[Gabbafella]

I thought the pre-orders were limited to one per customer and sold out? Good chance that fella is full of it.

I had 5 PS5's pre-ordered, 2 from the same place. I've since cancelled most of them as it was really just to make sure I had one definitely secured. But most companies don't care about the one per person rule. I still have another guaranteed reservation until 31st October so there are plenty of consoles knocking about still.

 

[Braggfan]

To be honest fallout 4 is a game I've only half played and that's extremely unusual for me, I also loved all the previous titles, 4 let alone 76 felt dated and just weary to play, maybe I shouldn't have got the goty edition with all the extra rubbish!

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You should go back and play Fallout 4 all the way through. It is absolutely superb. (note there's NO SPOILERS in this post).

I have to confess that for me I’d always thought I was never quite in synch with the Fallout series. I don’t know if it was personal taste, I’m not sure, but I knew I just didn’t quite get it. My preference was the Elder Scrolls, Skyrim to be exact, which remains my favourite game of all time.

In fact I came to Fallout 4 really late on, a long time after it was released. I was aware it had been well received but just left it to one side. Then one day I found myself in a gap between big releases, and just decided on a whim to see if Fallout 4 was as good as everyone said it was.

What I discovered genuinely surprised me, because Fallout 4 is stunning. I’m still not sure why I hadn’t been in synch with the earlier games, because I got Fallout 4 immediately. I was converted to it. It was easily as good as Skyrim in terms of game play, and in all honesty it probably surpasses it on other levels.

I was particularly impressed with how the main story sucked me in. The first time through I felt like the game manipulated me into playing a certain way. When I looked back on it after finishing it, I was amazed that it had twisted my morals and how I had viewed the story as I played through it. So hats off to them for that.

I think Bethesda do open world games better than anyone. There are lots of games that claim to be massive expansive open worlds, but very few actually hit the levels Bethesda do. In fact I’m not sure I can think of any. As good as the Rockstar games are, they still don’t have the freedom that Skyrim or Fallout do. At some point in Los Santos or while traveling with Dutch’s gang, you will have to do the missions you are told to do, you have to. In Skyrim and Fallout, you can carry on doing what ever you want till the end of time if you want to. And to me that makes them more immersive.

 

[JetsetJimbo]

I'll have to give Fallout 4 another go, I loved 3 and NV but just couldn't get into 4 (and knew that 76 would have nothing for me, for the reasons I mentioned in my too-long post earlier). I really didn't like the base-building stuff at all, and that's what put me off the game, but other people have told me they managed to mostly ignore that side of things.

 

[Goring-by-Seagull]

Right, who got their XSX today!?

 

[Raphael Meade]

Right, who got their XSX today!?

Waiting on mine at the moment and doing very little work in the meantime!

 

[Brighthelmstone]

Right, who got their XSX today!?

nope, couldn't get an order in time so have to wait for the next wave

 

[Wozza]

Right, who got their XSX today!?

Meeeeeeeee.

But can't open until Dec 25. Boooooooo!

 

[Brighthelmstone]

Meeeeeeeee.

But can't open until Dec 25. Boooooooo!

Surely you need to get it out and make sure it works and then once out, pointless boxing it back up!

 

[Wozza]

Surely you need to get it out and make sure it works and then once out, pointless boxing it back up!

Don't think that would help my "It's for the kids, honest" cause...

 

[Brighthelmstone]

Don't think that would help my "It's for the kids, honest" cause...

Its been a tough year, let them have it early (that line never worked for me sadly!)

 

[Gabbafella]

One controller arrived today and a couple of games have been dispatched. It'll be torture having to stare at these with no PS5 until next week.
The controller feels amazing, way more comfortable than the dualshock4. Really intrigued to feel the haptic feedback and adaptive triggers at work.

 

[The_Viper]

Got my PS5 on my doorstep an hour or two ago. Love to see it. Will be setting it up tonight