Topic: The PlayStation Fan Thread

Ok. I heard the update is finally dropping tomorrow. Thank goodness. I've had this system for basically a full year now waiting to expand the storage. I'll be ready to upgrade with my 2TB Samsung 980 Pro which is already locked and loaded in a heatsink.

I also heard 3D audio is finally going to work for speakers, except... only as 2 channel? That's... not how this is supposed to work.

Dolby Atmos FOR HEADPHONES is 2 channel because headphones only have 2 channels. It uses HRTF technology to simulate the change in frequencies humans hear when objects are at various positions and elevations around it. It virtualizes surround sound in 2 speakers.

But for ACTUAL surround setups, Dolby Atmos doesn't have to virtualize. It just does the real thing.

So when Sony says "3D audio is coming to speakers" I'm expecting actual object based surround on, at the minimum, a 5.1.4 setup. But that's not what they're doing. What they're doing is just playing the HRTF virtualized headphone audio through 2 channel TV speakers. That's... wrong.

When Sony refused to adopt Dolby Atmos and went proprietary, they set themselves apart from Xbox and PC. I thought ok, this is going to make surround harder because surround systems on the market don't know how to decode your proprietary tech, but you're promising 3D audio through speakers so I'll trust you can deliver.

This is not delivering. If they're incapable of figuring out how to deliver their tempest 3D audio in a codec surround systems can interpret, then just use Dolby Atmos! I don't get it.

Thankfully I'm now using Sennheiser 800S headphones for gaming but still, sometimes I want to use my Ambeo and subwoofer which sounds incredible with Atmos.

@TheFrenchiestFry
I hope it does well because I like Arkane. I'm supporting them because of Dishonored. I'm sure it'll do well enough anyways. But it is a stealth game which not everyone likes, and it's a game where you replay the same segments over and over making further progress each time, somewhat rogue like, which is also not that popular. That's what turned me off- stealth isn't my favorite but I can make exception for a good one (Splinter Cell), but games where you die and repeat over and over like Returnal, Dead Cells, Hades... not my style. I keep buying those types of games because they review well, and then get bored on the 3rd run. But ya, I'm sure it'll do fine.

For the record though, anyone who de-hypes over Deathloop because of Xbox owning it instead of counting it as a blessing and final parting gift doesn't deserve to enjoy it anyways. That would be like Xbox gamers refusing to play it once it releases there just out of spite for releasing somewhere else first. I know it may seem like there's a bunch of crazy ideologues out there because we see them in comment sections all the time, but I do believe most gamers are normal people who don't care or follow that kind of stuff.

When my brother doesn't ask me to play Warframe, I find myself dipping a toe back into Path of Exile.

This time rolling an ice Ranger.

I guess i'll be shopping for an SSD now. Anybody have any recommendations? I was planning on a 2TB.

Woot woot!

Just installed my Samsung 980 Pro NVMe, and now have 3GB storage, alongside 1TB external SSD for my collection of permanent PS4 exclusives which almost take up exactly the right amount of space.

@Losermagnet
Samsung 980 Pro. I’ve got several of the Samsung SSDs for both PS5 and PC and they are super reliable and performant.

Woot woot!

Got my 2TB Samsung 980 Pro installed with heatsink, and all is well! Still have a 1 TB external SSD for my collection of permanent PS4 exclusives which collectively take up almost exactly 1 TB. Perfect. Cheaper storage externally to keep the internal free for PS5 games. I’m guessing if this generation accounts for another 1TB I can have all PS4 and PS5 permanent, non-PC exclusives on the internal without need of an external. But for now, to be safe, I’ll leave it be.

Anything else of note in this update? Aside from the 3D audio for speakers that only does 2 channel?

@Losermagnet
Samsung 980 Pro.

And… the 2 channel 3D audio can’t even calibrate. When measuring your room acoustics it just pops up an error saying your TV volume is too low. No matter how loud I turned it it would continue to give me this error. I had it turned up so loud I would be shocked if the neighbors weren’t woken up out of their sleep. Yet it STILL says the volume is too low.

Whatever. Not like I would ever use the crap anyways. Just wanted to see how it sounded out of curiosity.

Mr. Driller Encore
https://www.play-asia.com/mr-driller-encore/13/70eva1

@JaxonH Is the microphone of your controller turned on?

@Octane
Ya. I checked that after trying a few times. But it wasn't muted or anything.

After waffling the past couple times Black Desert went on deep discount, this time I finally pulled the trigger as the game is currently 60% off on the PS Store. Just another mmo with a healthy chunk of single player content I've always wanted to dabble in. Despite its well known P2W cash shop, that flashy combat has my attention. I also went ahead and grabbed Mad Max for a fiver.

I still haven't finished to unlock all songs from Dance Dance Revolution 4th Mix PS1 so I guess I will play some DDR songs tonight on my PS2 Slim.

@JaxonH thank ya 👍 looks like it's gonna set me back a couple hundred so i'll bide my time.

Kinda bummed there isnt an option to create folders still (although I had no reason to suspect it was happening). The more i interact with the PS5 menu the more I realize it's near-identical to the Switch's: most recently played depicted at the main screen with everything else thrown in a giant pile under the last option.

Interesting tidbit about the KOTOR Remake

Apparently Aspyr were originally pitching a remastered collection of both the first game as well as The Sith Lords, and Lucasfilm Games rejected it in favor of the remake of the first one we're getting now. Hopefully if this remake does well and is well received, Aspyr will give KOTOR 2 a similar treatment because mechanically it is superior in every way

@TheFrenchiestFry Lucasfilms made the right move with this, given that while remasters would be nice, we can see the gameplay more modernized, and the graphics shine a bit more.

@TheFrenchiestFry My worry with KotOR remake is that they're going to "remake" it as a modern action adventure game with RPG lite elements instead of a faithful reproduction of a legit CRPG. In fact, I fully expect that's exactly what they're going to do. Aspyr ain't no Bluepoint that runs Cell code on a PS5 just to make sure it's exact.

@Losermagnet
Ya, try to catch on on Black Friday or during some other sale. Be sure to grab a heatsink as well. One that fits in the little NVMe cubby.

@NEStalgia
I hope not. Seems everything is going that direction now. I'm highly suspicious DQXII is going to do it as well.

My worry is they're going to rewrite the story with liberty and bork it.

The lady they hired as their writer for this has been very outspoken about not liking the original game back before this was ever conceptualized.

Putting someone in charge of the writing who doesn't like the original, and who also happens to be of the Anita Sarkesian variety who sees video games as a mere tool for ideological propaganda... it doesn't sound like a recipe for success.

But we'll see.

@NEStalgia I have faith Aspyr will preserve the original in most regards, especially narratively and structurally given their statements on what the remake is supposed to be in terms of faithfulness. My one gripe is that the battles feel incredibly slow despite the D20-like system creating a lot of intensity during those fights, but they definitely should at least increase the pace of the encounters without going full on action-RPG like a lot of these remakes do. In fact KOTOR wouldn't really work nearly as well as a pure real-time experience

My one big adjustment would probably be restoring the cut content and dialogue options like the entire planet of Sleheyron which is only available through modding the game on PC.

@JaxonH Sam Maggs never said she didn't like the original game. She said it was one of her favorite games of all time but followed up with "did I say it was my favorite? No."

There's a lot of misinterpreting regarding her actual stance on KOTOR. This isn't even her first time she's writing for Star Wars at all since she also writes for the IDW comics

@JaxonH Yeah, it's the low-risk tried and true formula that every big budget game wants to safely replicate. If you want to guarantee financial success of any big expense project, cinematic action adventure with some RPG-lite elements works without fail! Or a Marvel/SW license. Combine both and it prints money, unfortunately. The masses gobble it up like a Michael Bay film.

The writing worries me as well. I've heard about the writer they put in there and I can't fathom who assigns a writer to a game remake that hates the game. That means by definition you want it to basically be a different game that goes in a different direction, at which point, why remake it at all? Why not just make a new series entry that's everything you wanted it to become? And yes, the dreaded politics.... Though, Sarkesian was involved in Psychonauts 2 and didn't manage to corrupt anything. Though Tim really does most of the writing himself, so I'm not sure what her role really was in that.

But yeah, so far we have a game remake of a classic game, that sounds like they want it totally rewritten into something else, and they hired a writer who both hates the game they're remaking, and sees projects as a political tool, along with every indication being a genre change as a mass-market adventure instead of an RPG, which is what the game IS. I'm writing the game off as non-existant at this point. I'll replay the OG on XB with nicely improved visuals. If the remake turns out not sucking, that's a bonus, but it sounds like it's going to be a controversial mess that changes the game's narrative direction, gameplay, and even genre into something different. Of course I suppose it could be summarized by saying "It's Disney..."

I'm not sure what to worry about with DQXII. I'm highly worried about it, and I'm not even sure what to worry about. DQ as an action adventure would be so bad I don't think I could stand the box art. I don't think they'll do quite that with it, but I do fear it'll be a "real-time" ARPG FFXV style. I kinda like FFXV, actually, but that would be dreadful for DQ. The tone is also most of what makes DQ special, and they've all but directly said they're changing the tone. Eww. I'm kind of viewing XI as the last real DQ game, for now.

I'm very much in "wait and see" mode with DQXII, FFXVI, and particularly KOTOR remake, since I could see this Sam Maggs thing blowing up into another ridiculous culture war issue. If the writing of the game has been compromised, or if it has been turned into an action-adventure title, then it should be readily apparent once they start showing off the game. I'm not going to completely disregard the game because the lead writer is annoying on Twitter, though.

Really not liking the samey character designs, grim atmosphere, and action combat look of FFXVI thus far, but I won't write it off completely before we know more about it.

DQ is inherently more concerning because it was the one really consistently solid S-E series that never tried to rewrite the book when it came to JRPG game design. Some people don't like that, but it was nice to have something traditional to fall back on when Final Fantasy was (frequently) tripping over its own feet.