On one hand I‘m worried about possible game direction influence on FROM titles, on the other hand I’m hopeful that maybe we finally get competent Soulsborne PC ports if Sony acquires them even if only for upcoming titles
My money is on 3 months after the first release of a FROM title on PC, sony will come in and force them to create a sony account with crazy DRM to play it.
Then after the outrage from that, force it on all previous FROM titles.
No, it's really not. Especially since they already own 14% of FromSoftware directly. The only Sony bullshit is likely still going to be limited to any IP that Sony funds themselves.
It’s Kadokawa that forced Sony’s hands. Sony initially only wanted to acquire the anime and videogames assets. But Kadokawa told them that only acquisition offers for the entire company are accepted.
I’ve worked closely with the people that do reverse engineering and such for FromSoft games and I can damn near guarantee that any PSN requirement would be ripped out pretty quickly. At worst they might tie it to online features. My real worry is exclusivity, timed or otherwise.
Sony: Thanks for letting us know! The next FromSoft game will have zero modding support. Make sure to login using your PSN account. Remember, we love you!
Oh, make no mistake; prior FS games have no modding support. In fact, they encrypt the all game files with RSA nowadays (which is awful for read speeds because RSA is slow but whatever). Current modding support is based off of a robust reverse engineering community that’s documented most of the file formats and a significant portion of the important code. And that’s while contending with Arxan which, while not as awful as Denuvo, still impedes RE. They’d basically have to implement something as draconian as Denuvo to make things more difficult than they are.
Honestly, I am probably in the minority, but I don’t understand the hate for console exclusivity. In today’s world there is almost no reason to stick with a console outside some small stuff like pick up and go and knowing a game will just work. I say let them hold rights to games if it gets people to invest in getting one. I am not really sure why this is such a negative thing for some. It’s also odd that Sony gets the biggest blame when you have Nintendo that has zero games playable on other platforms outside emulation. At least these days 8 months after release it gets a PC release as well.
On the one hand, I can kinda get it. It must really suck to lose to a self-servicing corpo ad-a-palooza, even one as well crafted as Astrobot. It’s like losing a collectible contest to FunkoPops, just clear feelsbad.
On the other, fuck this guy for dragging nationalistic pride into a dumbass award ceremony. The Geoff-fest is always a stupid corporate cockgag that celebrates publisher money more than developers, taking it personally and trying to pretend like all of China was snubbed only serves to makes BMW look worse.
I don’t feel it was undeserved, it’s good that super productions lose to better crafted titles, maybe one day actual indie games will be on the contest for game of the gear
I’d be ashamed too, losing to astro bot. What I’ve heard from the Platformer community is that while the game is good, it’s very short and lacks in the amount of unique areas (and enemies?) and as such is more or less blitz and glamour. Like, props to sony for producing jump and runs, but still…
I just finished Astro Bot and it is a very good game. However, it is very derivative of Mario to the point where it is very clearly a Mario game, except you are collecting PlayStation member-berries instead of stars or whatever.
I loved it, but I have a hard time justifying it as GotY. IMO it should have gone to Wukong or Balatro.
While he comes off as a jerk, and possibly is one, I can understand the sentiment, having spent a few years of my life among ethnically Chinese people in Asia. There is this drive and aspiration to be recognized by leading brands in the West as equals, perhaps even betters. Due to a history of subservience and shame and a strong nationalistic current seeking to undo that.
This game is one of the most ambitious and accomplished to come out of China and they’re hungering for that kind of recognition. So it is likely that fans of the game feel it was ‘stolen’ from them and he seems to be responding to that sentiment. To us it looks petty, but to some of the game’s most ardent Chinese fans this may have been an appropriate response. Not sure how this was received in China though, just speculating.
The last three weeks or so of Chinese video game reporting has basically been:
“They’ll never shortlist us for GotY. They’ll never choose a Chinese game for GotY. It’s all a Western ploy to denigrate and deny Chinese achievement because They are jealous that the first Chinese AAA game is so good.”
It’s been tiring.
Edit: just opened up my Chinese feeds, and I’m glad to report that the first one I found was criticising netizens for review bombing BG3 and defending the Larian speech, and giving it a more detailed translation.
THAT actually probably was a translation error (unlike “oh, he is not a disgusting misogynistic piece of shit. You are just racist and so is google translate”).
Swen’s speech was (paraphrasing) about how an oracle told him that the future GOTYs will all be games made because they are games the studios wanted to make and were allowed to make without fear of layoffs (which is why it was ironic that a studio that came out of Sony gutting Team Japan won…).
But a lot of chuds and CCP mouthpieces keyed in on the “An oracle told me” narrative framing as an indication that it was all rigged. In large part because they are fucking morons who don’t realize they were voting on a different category when they rushed that vote harder than a gamefaqs poll with Aeris in it.
And Swen is head (?) of Larian who made Baldurs Gate 3.
Also: BG3 is, in scientific terms, gay as all fuck. So the chuds who were already focusing on BMWukong because “it understand that women should be sexy” and whatever other “anti-DEI” bullshit they are radicalizing people with, saw an opportunity to pick a fight now that the mass support of BG3 is somewhat waning.
Not going to lie, despite loving the stories about the monkey king, I skipped it entirely because of the notes they sent to content creators. Which would also be why I skip movies and games that take the US’ DoD money. I’m glad it got passed over.
Haven’t really been following it all - after reading the article I think maybe its because Astro Bot had a larger audience because its generally more accessible?
I think you are right. Its why Fortnite usually wins in categories it is in, because at the end of the day it mostly comes down to a popularity contest.
I mean, I heard people I know in real life discrediting BMW even being nominated because “oh all the Chinese are voting for it.” I was like what, you think Chinese Gamers only count for 3/5ths of a Gamer?? I personally wouldn’t be surprised if this sentiment was shared with at least some of the judges.
I’m not saying BMW should have won, personally I liked it but it wasn’t perfect and I didn’t play Astro Bot. It’s just crazy to me that people are reacting like this over a video game just because it came from China. They’re not acting like that over Marvel Rivals, probably because they don’t know it’s from China yet, lol.
I haven’t played that Astrobot game (I don’t have a PS5) but I am not surprised with it being highly praised honestly.
Astrobot Rescue Mission was awesome, even forgetting about it being VR. It’s very fun and well designed, with new ideas all the way through, up there with Super Mario Galaxy to me. That team definitely knows their stuff.
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