Topic: The PlayStation Fan Thread

Jackpot! Ps store actually let me pay for something... It's a miracle! First time in 6 months they actually managed to charge me without erring and making me buy a psn card on Amazon. I'll cherish this moment. It probably won't happen again until 2019.

I don't think "boring" should be necessarily used as a synonym for "uninventive". I think those are 2 entirely different things.

All of 2D Mario games released in the last decade have been uninventive and have appealed to the lowest common denominator. They're still fun to play.

@NEStalgia Plot twist: PS Store sends email 24 hours later "We are sorry to inform you that your recent transaction was an error and you were never meant to be charged. We are refunding your account and taking back whatever game you just purchased. Have a nice day"

What explains the large difference in critic vs user scores for AC:Odyssey?

https://www.metacritic.com/game/xbox-one/assassins-creed-odyssey

@Dezzy 90% of user reviews are either 0s or 10s; people who think the game deserves a better score, or people who think the game deserves a lesser score. Plus there's a whole store with MTX in the game; that explains all the 0s.

PSN name changes confirmed. First time it's free, second time it's $10 per change.

PSN sounds like a big mess deep down on a coding level.

@Octane only $5 for plus members.

But yeah I agree, reading the caveats in the blog post seems there's a web down there somewhere that they can't untangle. Happy that it's finally being implemented though, definitely going to change mine when the time comes!

@redd214 Yeah, I just learned it's the same for Microsoft. Now, I don't think you can change you Nintendo ID at all, but you can change your nickname. I'm not sure why they don't do something like that. Sounds like there's something preventing them from doing so.

Yeah, ever since the breach where it was revealed lots of info was pretty much on plain text files, I've had a feeling many of the issues with PSN are hard coded in at a deep level, like name changes (I assume)

I asked this in the chit-chat thread the other day since it was sort of random, but it occurred to me most people that might not know aren't really in that thread. I'd probably get it on X1 since it's kind of the lead platform and it's 25% off this week But I'd rather ask here because this thread seems to involve people that actually talk about modern video games while the X1 thread seems to be presently in a mood that has no desire to speak of modern video games

Anyone here play into Shadow of the Tomb Raider yet and have feedback on how "horror" or "scary" (or just gross) it's gone? I liked the first game, I haven't played the second too far in yet, but it seemed great but I keep hearing Shadow went into a horror/jumpscare/gorefest motif which isn't my thing. I kind of love it as an Uncharted/Zelda hybrid that it always has been so far. Debating on getting the Croft edition while it's a good price on X, but if it's gone kind of horror-ish I may not like it.

@Dezzy Yeah unfortunately user scores for any game with any controversy attached end up being pseudo change.org petitions for activists. The 0's and 1's are people making a statement about microtransactions. The 10s are do-gooders trying to counter-act their influence. Most of the people in both camps likely don't even own the game and those that do likely haven't played it far enough to give it either rating. Especially if it's as oh-so-grindy without microtransactions as their 0 scores claim.

It's probably not "right" and yet, the company shouldn't be allowed to go unscathed when they try to abuse consumer trust either. Remember when Spore had 1/2 star on Amazon?

@FragRed You're not far off! I'm used to going to the cart, logging in, being shown how much it will cost, hitting the pay (PayPal, no way Sony's getting my CC again......I'm not interested in buying WoW characters on eBay in Singapore again) button, getting the paypal login prompt, logging in, then getting an error message from Sony followed by an email from Paypal saying "A billing agreement with SCEA has been cancelled." I can repeat a few dozen times with different browsers for days before I finally buy a digital giftcard on Amazon plug it in and buy. Back in Winter it used to work intermittantly, it would reject me 20 times in a row, then let me pay once. For the past 6 months it hasn't worked ever. Then yesterday I did the paypal login, it went back to my checkout screen, showed the "waiting" animation in the buy button area, and the whole checkout page suddenly just blanked. No purchase confirmation at all, no "your games are in your download list" it just blanked out, my cart blanked out, it suddenly just cleared everything. I checked a few of the games from the order (Jak Collection, Skyrim VR...already had it but wanted it digital), nope it still shows the purchase price, and no download button.....it wiped the cart, and the games don't show up as purchased....they're not in my download list either. Then I go check my email and see a purchase confirmation from Sony....huh? It looks accurate. Then from Paypal I got the "A billing agreement has been cancelled" and then the actual receipt....huh? Then I check the download list and a few of the games are in there. But still show as purchasable individually. Then a few minutes later the rest show up in the download list and finally show as purchased individually.

The PSN Store is quite possibly the single worst online storefront I have ever experience. How bad does your online store have to be when Nintendo's is notably superior?

These antics are one of the primary things that made me just start buying most things on XBox. I didn't have to play shopping cart roulette, I just bought the thing

@Octane @PikPi Just NAVIGATING PSN gives you the feeling that you can see the fishing wire keeping it all suspended. Weird random errors, weird login issues, weird antiquated behaviors of things, constant failures of various pages, and cryptic error codes like it's running on an old AS400 (and probably is...) I get the sense that they saw the success of XBL during the PS2 era and along with their Cell hubris, hastily threw together the fastest online service they could muster in-house just before the PS3 launch without ever having a clue what they were doing, and then they're stuck with it forever (maybe they'll scrap it for the PS5 transition and are just working on a total replacement on the side.)

I shouldn't have waited so long on NieR: Automata. Just finished Route B last night, and the game has been a blast so far.

@NEStalgia I'm not sure why a nickname like Nintendo wouldn't work, a name on top of your PSN ID. But maybe they're already doing that. I definitely don't remember seeing my stupid PSN ID whenever I use my PS4; it uses my real name. Either way, this doesn't make Nintendo's friend code system look half as bad. A code is just a code, and you can attach any nickname to it you want.

I haven't played Tomb Raider yet (maybe @Dezzy or @redd214 has?), but you could always ask in the TR thread over at PushSquare.

@Octane it's the same thing essentially. Your nickname on Nintendo Network can be changed as can your "display name" on the ps4. They both function similarly.

As for Tomb Raider last one I played was on the ps1 lol, not really a fan of the series tbh.

@redd214 At least you won't have users complain about an embarrassing string of numbers

A brief glance at the negative comments, and 4/5th of them are 0s for things like "its a rehash" or "I don't like the RPG elements", and other middling complaints that could've warranted a more nuanced responce if user reviews weren't a total joke to begin with. They really should just stick with a "thumbs up or thumbs down" system, since that's how 90% of users interpret it.

I mean, don't get me wrong, there are a lot of reasons to dislike Assassin's Creed: Odyssey, and I find it kind of suspicious that their most scathing reviews aren't awarded numerical scores, and therefore don't impact the metascore...

@CanisWolfred

It has a notably lower review score on Steam too.

@Ralizah I'm so eager to get into that....OTOH I just discovered the joy of MHW again....still finishing Torna and Octopath.....getting into Destiny 2 after the freebie, and I haven't even touched FF15. And my Soul Calibur VI pre-order just got billed.....hooo boy.

@CanisWolfred I do think a lot of people are going to have a hard time with the RPG-ifying of it. I love RPGs and I personally like it as an RPG, but it's a really weird choice to take a huge blockbuster AAA action platforming adventure and try to turn it into an RPG. Especially when you're a studio with basically no RPGs under your belt except for Child of Light and Kingdom Battle that's not really an RPG either. It was going to split he fan base one way or another (Still, they can't reach the lows of III and Unity ever again even if they tried. Syndicate was a fair try but not a great one.)

They had a good balance with Odyssey.....going full RPG was just kind of an odd choice. Works for my niche but that can't help a mega blockbuster. It'll sell great though.

@Octane I still intend to avoid Push Square

@NEStalgia It's fantastic, but yeah, it sounds like you've already got a lot on your plate at the moment. I'll freely admit that NieR is the only reason I've yet to dive headfirst into Torna. Juggling multiple JRPGs can be intimidating.

No idea when I'll purchase MHW, as I still want to finish my PS4 backlog before getting any new games, and once I am getting new PS4 games, REmake 2 is at the top of my list.

@subpopz I thought I'd have more issues with the rehashy approach of Route B, and while I do think it's padding and that most of its content could have been worked into Route A, I'm still liking it. Although I very much prefer the melee-focused 2B over 9S and his endless hacking minigames.

The last few routes seem like they're going to be filled with new content, so I'm looking forward to starting C soon.

While I think the open world itself sucks (barren and filled with invisible walls), the strong writing, fun combat, and great OST really carry the experience.

@Ralizah Yeah....getting into MHW was probably not a wise idea on my part while playing with Destiny, Octopath, Torna, and Forza.... Spidey is sitting on the sidelines, and DQ11 and WoFF I want to play them so badly....and I want to wait for Switch (but the PS4 version of DQ11 is ssoooooo purdy it's addictive.)

Just how much of a rehash is the rehash part of Nier? Just a rerun over the same game with a different character? And I presume the 3rd pass is truly new stuff?