Oh, absolutely - but a lot of perpetual/evolving media has similar issues where previous canon ends up being recontextualised, reframed or outright retconned in order to better fit the overarching story currently being told.

Sometimes it’s for the better, others for the worse (cough, Shadowlands, cough).

Still, it doesn’t stop it from being an otherwise great example of world building - evident in part by just how many people actually care about the lore!

World of Warcraft; Azeroth (the planet) lore is quite detailed and fleshed out - building upon the foundations of the original RTS trilogy.

It’s a bit of a shame a lot of it gets swept under the rug every major expansion and patch cycle, so it’s hard for new(er) players to catch up.

Beyond Android phones, it should also be good for the emulation scene on macOS.

There is like a good chunk of an entire decade’s worth of games that can’t be played on PC legitimately due to either expired licenses for music (e.g. EA Trax) or lack of support for older, disc-based DRM (SecuROM etc.).

That’s before factoring older titles that no longer work due to arbitrary changes to DirectX and the Windows kernel, which break backwards compatibility.

I don’t want to contribute to the mountains of AI slip on the internet, so instead I’ll just prompt the reader’s brain to imagine a picture of Bugs Bunny in Arabian robes, eating a carrot nonchalantly, with the caption “eh, wahabi ‘doc?”

We don’t even need to imagine, necessarily! The quality of games released towards the tail-end of its life cycle speaks volumes: Uncharted 2&3, The Last of Us, God of War 3, Metal Gear Solid 4 etc.

I don’t think there was anything actually wrong with the architecture per se, but rather just the lack of proper documentation and tools set potential developers back significantly.

It was definitely hubris on Sony’s part, thinking that they could do whatever they wanted given the prior success of both the PlayStation and PS2 consoles prior.

Those PS3 launch stumbles definitely were a wake-up call, however I do believe that because it was largely the US/Western arm of SCEI that lead the ‘rescue’ - they ended up wrestling control away from the JP arm, ultimately causing the PS4/5 to end up so risk adverse and largely unremarkable as a result.

Literal dictionary definition of a BIOS:

Note the part regarding enabling a computer to start the OS. But regardless, this point is largely moot as we are just arguing semantics.

No the PS4 doesn’t run a PC-style AMI/Phoenix BIOS, but instead a secure chain of Boot ROM to bootloaders - however, so do Macs, which are PCs.

Dumps of these console boot ROMs and loaders - at least in emulation circles - tend to be colloquially referred to as a BIOS, as it constitutes a System that handles Basic Input and Output.

It even putting this one point aside, it runs an AMD-designed x86-64 APU, that was available to purchase for PCs (AM1 socket) albeit with a reduced power GPU.

It runs GDDR5 unified memory like a modern iMac, or Steam Deck.

It natively runs a UNIX-derived OS, again like an iMac, or Linux on the Steam Deck.

Let’s just face facts, the PS4 & 5 are just iMacs in drag 😉

Every modern bootable device has a BIOS, as they are required for hardware initialisation before handover to an OS - which for the PS4 is called Orbis OS, and is based off FreeBSD 9. Which is a UNIX OS for desktop PCs.

While the PS4 does have a unified memory interface, which is very rare for common desktop PCs - they do exist, such as every single Apple Silicon Mac.

The PS4 and PS5 are just a very heavily locked down PCs, featuring AMD APUs not too dissimilar to what can be found in Ryzen notebooks, Steam Deck or ROG Ally, running proprietary operating systems with heavy encryption to try and prevent 1:1 emulation (think Hackintosh).

I think the primary reason for the GPU stagnation has been the AI / GPU compute bubble over the past 5 years.

So much on-die space has been diverted away from raw rasterisation power towards CUDA, that it has artificially held back GPU progress.

When we do see the current AI bubble burst (and it does feel like we’re fast approaching that point, due to all the recent incestuous business dealings), hopefully we can see some innovation return to the sector.

The PS3 was the last ‘great’ console from Sony before their wholesale switch to PC architecture with a custom software layer.

I choose to die on this hill. 😅

According to protondb.com the entire Final Fantasy catalogue is pretty much flagged as either Gold or Platinum so you shouldn’t have issues.

For what it’s worth, the console versions also run great through EmuDeck and RetroDeck on my Steam Deck too!

I need to get around to playing Clair Obscur - I’ve seen and heard great things about it, but with a 2yo running around the house - I just don’t have the bandwidth currently to invest in new games… 😅

To each their own, I suppose!

FF7 was my entry into the franchise, and I went back to play 4-6 after 8 left me disappointed. I ended up (regretfully) skipping 9 until revisiting it much later. I’m saying this specifically to point out that I am not biased because FFX was my first.

I skipped XI as MMORPGs didn’t hold any interest to me at the time - but WoW would change that, and cause me to skip XII altogether!

I didn’t like the combat of XIII, it was too much of a departure of what came before (variants of ATB and general turn-based combat) - and I did not find the plot engaging enough to persevere much beyond I think the ~10hr mark?

I haven’t bothered to revisit the newer entries since, even though I have added XII, XIII, XIII-2 & Lightning Returns to my retro collection. Perhaps one day?

I stopped (console) gaming right around the PS4 era - partially because side I was heavily invested in WoW and PC gaming in general - but also because I was livid over how Sony handled the Anniversary edition launch, where scalpers scooped up ~98% of available stock.

I feel like I lucked out opting to become a retro gamer around that time - there are just so many great games from the PS3 generation and earlier that I could dedicate (my diminishingly little) spare time towards and never run out of absolutely incredible content.

Hell, my PS2 version of Vice City runs just as it did when it was new - complete with Billie Jean being the first track on the radio; something that can’t be said for any current/PC versions I believe.

Beyond Good & Evil

Devil May Cry trilogy
If you liked God of War (and its PS2 sequels), another franchise well worth checking out!

Final Fantasy X. Hands down the best entry of the franchise (fight me), and one of the best introductions to the series.

Ico + Shadow of the Colossus
Literal works of art.

Killer7

Manhunt + Manhunt 2
If you like Bully & PS2-era GTA entries, this series is well worth exploring. Very dark and gory.

Need for Speed Underground + Underground 2
Some of the best racing OSTs ever, and the offline PS2-editions don’t lose tracks when licenses expire.

Prince of Persia - Sands of Time

Silent Hill 2

Viewtiful Joe + Viewtiful Joe 2
An incredible 2d beat-em up with a great vibe.

The Warriors
Rockstar’s love letter to a cult classic 70s film.

Zone of the Enders + Zone of the Enders 2nd Runner
Hideo Kojima just doing more of his thing outside of the MGS franchise.

I haven’t used a killawatt on it to check, but according to the specs it uses ~30W while in operation (plus whatever additional draw for the four drives). It’s pretty negligible, overall as far as I can tell.

Even better! What are you running on your server?

Ours is just an old QNAP I dug out of storage with 4x8TB drives in RAID5 - but am eager to try out HexOS on a proper system once I have some spare time.

The missus and I sat down about a year ago and tabulated up how much all of the various streaming subscriptions were costing us per year (it was close to $1,000 when including YouTube Premium).

We cancelled every single one, and put that money towards building a home NAS and filling that up with downloaded media. No more ads, stupidly low bitrates, or TV shows & movies disappearing because a license expired.

The server has more than paid for itself at this point, and every additional spare dollar is being put aside for our kids’ tuition.

ETA: Consider doing the same, your kid’ll likely thank you in the long run!

PS: Never too late to introduce them to all of your favourite classic games, either - though that one may be a bit harder to get them onboard 🤣

EA has basically been dead to me for a very long time, even though I know a couple of people who work there.

While the whole Saudi Arabia / Private Equity angle is terrible, part of me thinks/hopes/wishes that this is part of their whole sports-washing angle - and there is a slim but non-0 chance that there will be an improvement in the quality of their studio output over the next few years.

I’ll continue to avoid buying their games, but it would be nice to see those that still do not getting nickel-and-dimed as hard as they currently are.

Who knows, there is also the potential that this buyout backfires and Saudi’s human rights abuses become even more public knowledge as a result?

When times are as bad as they currently are, we have to hope.

OK, so which of the Koopalings is next in line? My money’s on Ludwig!

Given my general distain for modern Nintendo, I’d have no qualms in using AI to generate a Succession parody using the Koopa Kids, if only I knew how… 😅

Maybe not; but my bigger worry is that while this is good for indies initially, by guaranteeing a minimum fixed income for a project - the long-term effect will be that Gamers^TM may just begin to expect indie titles to be “free” via GamePass and won’t buy them otherwise.

This would pretty much monopolise those sorts of titles to XBox and leave developers dependent on Microsoft for their continued existence.

Saudi Arabia has had a lot of success in improving their international reputation through ‘sportswashing’.

This just comes as a natural extension of this, seeing to but their way into the good graces of gamers.

If you’re referring to Patrice Désilets, he also worked on Brotherhood - which is commonly considered the best entry in the series of that generation.

But now knowing his full history with Ubisoft, it exciting so much why Revelations and AC3 felt like a step backwards…

I think that was the one that started in an ice zone, if I remember correctly? I literally couldn’t get past it because I find that aesthetic quite boring…

I played the hell out of the first Borderlands (including New Game+ across all expansions), but promptly bounced off 2 & Pre-Sequel because it literally just felt like more of the same and I was already sated.

BL3 and now BL4 are literally just more of the same, but with ever increasingly more egregious monetisation.

That’s definitely another workaround, for sure! I think our supermarkets here carry Steam gift cards - for example.

Though I imagine that those same payment processors could threaten to pull out of stores that carry Steam gift cards, and we’d be back to square one.

Additionally, it puts more burden on the end users to have to physically shop somewhere ahead of time - lowering convenience. Ultimately, as Valve themselves put it - piracy is a service problem. Any additional hurdles will deter some potential customers.

So in order for people to be able to spend their own money how they see fit, we need a new player in the field - either fiat (eg. via the EU) or reliable, low/no fee stable coin(s).

100% in agreement; those are the factors that I was alluding to when I said it would be too much for end users to deal with…

…and that’s all before we even begin to take into consideration regional pricing!

True, the best bet currently would be to stick to a ‘stable coin’ to avoid the drastic price fluctuations - but even having to deal with that will largely be a bridge too far for most would-be customers, I fear.

Not the Yoshi’s Island 2 we deserved, but the Yoshi’s Island 2 we needed.

Still won’t give Nintendo a cent of my money, so I look forward to emulating this at some point in the not too distant future.

All good, I’m currently lodging a patent on lodging patents for a system for summoning a character.

See you in court, Nintendo!

P.S.: I’m also lodging a patent for a system of pirating every single game on a Nintendo platform (past, present and future), however I will be opening that one up to the public once granted.

I’m ok with there being a conversation on this topic, even if the arguments devolve to ‘waaah’ vs. ‘git gud’.

Ultimately though, I agree that a small dev team shouldn’t have to focus on a game-mode outside their vision - and any such demand for an easy-mode or other additions can and should be left up to mod makers.

It’s a single-player game, so in the end how the individual user wants to play is how they should be able to play.

Activision/Blizzard have frequently had game launches where their servers were unavailable due to demand.

But that’s probably more due to terrible network infrastructure, than overwhelming demand!

Can’t; you are objectively correct.

As a bit of a thought exercise, I went through every mainline GTA game using that website to get an idea of each title’s respective headcount:

• GTA : 86 people (DOS)
• GTA2 : 170 professional roles (Windows)
• GTA3 : 185 professional roles (PS2)
• GTA:VC : 688 professional roles (PS2)
• GTA:SA : 780 people (PS2)
• GTA4 : 1,333 professional roles (PS3)
• GTA5 : 3,686 professional roles (X360)

So while the general headcount growth over time tends to track, as each generation of platform requires more and more people to churn out higher fidelity content, I can’t help but wonder what portion of that headcount is just there to churn out micro transaction and Games-as-a-Service garbage.

I don’t get how/why it’s still profitable for them to keep working on it - but I’m in full support.

It’s not to dissimilar to Minecraft in a number of ways, in a sense - there’s not really any drive to do anything in particular, it’s ultimately up to the player to do what they feel like.

It’s a literal sandbox, rather than a narrative experience. It’s not everyone’s cup of tea, that’s perfectly fine!

According to the Diablo IV credits, over 9,500 people worked on that title in some capacity:

https://www.mobygames.com/game/204085/diablo-iv/credits/windows/

…and so it fucking should; the more pain average Americans feel, the better - honestly.

We are less than 8 months into this administration, and they are already doing their damnedest to rat-fuck the elections in an effort to fully seize power for at least a generation and remake the nation in their own twisted vision.

The last chance left to stop this takeover is the 2026 midterms, and the GOP are already pulling out all of the stops to stop that from happening:

• Gerrymandering the absolute shit out of Texas
• Closing polling booths in locations likely to vote against the GOP
• Imposing voter identification laws to further disenfranchise ‘undesirables’
• Rail against mail-in ballots to further suppress turnout

Hopefully the dam breaks and inflation well and truly begins to run away - so that the majority of the population feel the impact of this President’s policies to their wallets, and vote out his lapdogs and lackeys.

If not, then the nation and its people are truly lost and more expensive consoles are going to be the least of your worries.

That’s awesome to see!

Print media is basically dead here in Australia, though I did just discover Edge is apparently still a thing - I adored that publication back in the pre-WoW days.

Which magazine? I’m legitimately surprised that (m)any have survived, to be honest!

I wouldn’t hold my breath, but at least a port to ARM would also give Mac users access to Elden Ring - and God knows macOS is in dire need of more natively compiled games in order to be taken as even a semi-viable platform.