My mates abandoned me and went Xbox, so I've picked up a Series S for online play.
It's so diddy! And actually silent, rather than the PS5's weird whirr.
It'll be nice having a big pool of Game Pass games to choose from for our online sessions, rather than having to convince 7 people to all buy the same game.
It's so diddy! And actually silent, rather than the PS5's weird whirr.
I have regular whirring from the corner where my S and X are, but that's because I have a USB drive plugged into it. It only happens when they're off though, it'll whirr up for maybe ten seconds and then stop every hour or so. Otherwise, absolute silence.
The Xbox backwards compatibility programme has sprung back into life today - this time, enhancing Xbox One games to run at higher frame rates on the newer consoles - whether that's converting 30fps games into 60fps, or 60fps into 120fps.
Baby steps so far with only 5 games supported: Far Cry 4, Watch Dogs 2, UFC 4, Sniper Elite 4 and New Super Lucky's Tale. None of those interest me particularly but there will presumably be more on the way. And it's pretty impressive stuff, increasing performance on older games without the developers of those games having to patch them in any way - the potential is huge.
A LOT more frame rate upgrades today, including some games that jumped from 30fps to 120 overnight. The list is too long to post, but easy to Google.
If Microsoft put this much effort into making new games, they’d be onto a winner. Their back compat efforts put Sony to shame.
It is a pretty spectacular list and I'm sure there will be more on the way.
I'm still very much onboard with MS's strategy. The first-party games will come in time, all those studio acquisitions are going to take time to pay off. In the meantime having access to the entire GamePass library, all the third-party releases, and three generations of Xbox games looking and running better than ever before, is more than enough for me.
Meanwhile I'm looking at all the PS5 owners queueing up to pay seventy quid for Returnal and thinking I've made the right choice so far this gen.
Anyway, highlights for me on that list are Alien Isolation, Assassin's Creed Unity and Yakuza 6 - should be great to play all those at 60fps.
Agreed with Gar. Between my pile of shame and all the games I have instant access to on GPU, I could literally never buy another game ever again and not run out of stuff to play. True Series X titles will come, but I'm in absolutely no rush to get my hands on them.
That said, I'm a believer in good games being good games no matter what. Hell, I still play SNES stuff because they're good. I appreciate a lot of folks aren't like that and if a game's been out more than six months, they have zero interest in it. Their loss.
Hell, I still play SNES stuff because they're good. I appreciate a lot of folks aren't like that and if a game's been out more than six months, they have zero interest in it. Their loss.
Hey Mart, you might wanna check your password, I think Dok's gotten into your account
I do think the complete lack of exclusives is getting a bit silly, though.
In the last 18 months Playstation has had Last of Us 2, Ghost of Tsushima, Persona 5 Royal, FF7 Remake, Dreams, Miles Morales, Returnal, Sackboy, Oddworld, Astro's Playroom, Demon's Souls… and then this year it's got God of War Ragnarok, Ratchet and Clank, Horizon…
And whatever you think of each game, they're all BIG, quality titles. I omitted stuff like Godfall for obvious reasons.
In the same timeframe Xbox has had, what? Call of the Sea? And we're past 'they need time' now; this has been an issue for years.
I'm not saying any of this as a Sony fanboy – I have a Series S. I just wish I had something new to play on it.
In the same timeframe Xbox has had, what? Call of the Sea? And we're past 'they need time' now; this has been an issue for years.
I'd argue Minecraft Dungeons and Gears Tactics are worthwhile exclusives (probably better than most people assume they are, and both on GamePass too of course). The Medium's not bad. A fair few of the smaller indie games. Tetris Effect Connected.
But yep, point taken. I'd be lying if I said at least some of those PS games didn't appeal (I'm envious of Ratchet & Clank if nothing else). But I still think Sony's pricing strategy is insane. I'll be sticking with the Series X as my main console, I think, and then picking up a PS5 towards the end of this gen when (a) it's half the size, (b) it no longer looks like a Stormtrooper's backpack and (c) I can hoover up the exclusives for £15 a pop.
Sea of Thieves is essentially a platform, so I'd consider the later Seasons as essentially full scale first party releases (at least as good as anything Sony has done recently).
Grounded is good as is Flight Simulator (coming to X soon, no?)
Actually, although MS often get a kicking for first party stuff, when you think about it Sea of Thieves, Forza Horizon 4, Halo Infinite (eventually), Minecraft Dungeons, Grounded, Flight Simulator… these are all quite platformy type games with a huge tail. A base that can be iterated upon over and over. Sony still favours big hitting one-and-done exclusives (not 100% obviously) which is perhaps (in the era of streaming) a bit shortsighted.
Youtubelol, but a lot of those Sony titles could be consumed by watching them in a 10 hour stream. Sea of Thieves generates almost infinite emergent content resulting in Welyn-style narrative videos. One of the reasons Rust remains a perpetual huge hit. And, of course, they're all "free". I don't think the acquisition of Bethesda is just IP alone, they can't code reliable software but they do do sprawling, emergent, meme-worthy games. It's a great eye towards the future. Janky but non-pre-baked gaming is what people want now. The market for a painstakingly lit scene you walk through once is declining.
I don't think MS are quite as far behind as people think - it's almost as if in 5-10 years time Sony will roll up with an £80 copy of Last of Us 4 or Uncharted 7 and find there's literally nobody left to buy it.
I just wish I had something new to play on it.
I get that 'new' here means only released recently, rather than something you've not played before. Still, I don't get the need for something to be freshly released to warrant attention. We all know most games these days are just the same old shit, just shinier… and even then, the difference between last gen and this gen is very narrow currently. Absolutely nothing right now clearly justifies the new consoles we've all just bought.
There are plenty of titles available that actually do new things that I'm betting you've never played. The desire for something new just because it's new baffles me sometimes.
Totally agreed with cav about Sea of Thieves too. I can't see that not being my go-to game at the weekends for a very long time.
The X is more like a PC at this point isn't it? It runs what you have better and faster. There are already more games than any single human could realistically play, so a box that does everything well, gives it to you for a low monthly fee and just unobtrusively sits silently under the TV doing its thing is fine.
Exclusives will always be a draw, but Horizon and Death Stranding coming to Steam (and MS dropping a load of their exclusives there too) means I'm not 100% sure I need to drop 500 quid on a Sony console any more, and maybe waiting will pay dividends. Indeed, I'm sure sooner or later I'll be able to pay to stream Ratchet and Clank on another device.
I've just somehow fluked getting a PS5 from Amazon.
Now I just have to build an extension to accommodate the fucker, assuming it actually shows up (tomorrow!).
(I'm actually chuffed about it. :D )
I’ve been looking at three of them in CEX, thinking the scalping must be close to the end.
Xbox folk, anyone else have headphone hiss?
If you use a good pair of headphones (it's something to do with amps, I don't understand) connected via the game pad, you'll get a background hiss. One of my pads does this, the other doesn't. From what I've read online, it's an issue that affects 9/10 pads, which seems insane.
It doesn't happen with budget headphones (again, don't understand why), but it's bloody annoying. Sounds like I have to simply return my pad again and again, until I land on a ten-percenter.
I can categorically say: no. I regularly use a good pair of Sennheisers connected via the pad and the sound is always perfect, never had any hiss at all.
This is through an Elite Series 2 controller so maybe I've got a ten-percenter but I'm happy to try a different pad if you like. Is it specific to the new Series X pads?
Does using Windows Sonic or one of the other 3D sound solutions make any difference? I bought the Atmos for Headphones license and use that all the time, not sure if that has any impact or not. Windows Sonic is free so you could give it a go if you're not already.
I think it's just for Series controllers, yes. And no I've tried all of the sound formats (except Atmos), to no avail. Is Atmos worth paying for?
It's probably something most people will never notice – not sure how many players connect decent headphones. My multiplayer headset is cheap and cheerful, and has no issues whatsoever. But for single player I like to use my Sennheisers, and with the new pad I can't!
It's a known issue within the community; unsure if Microsoft have ever acknowledged it.
https://www.reddit.com/r/xboxone/comments/js46lb/new_controller_35mm_headphone_jack_hissing_sound/
I have two Series and one Xbox One controller in use on my S/X - can't report any instances of hiss on any of them. We have two of the Xbox stereo headset:
I think it's just for Series controllers, yes. And no I've tried all of the sound formats (except Atmos), to no avail. Is Atmos worth paying for?
The three headphone formats available (apart from stereo of course) are Windows Sonic, Dolby Atmos for Headphones, and DTS:X. Sonic is free, and the other two have trials so you can try them out.
Hard to say which is better or worse, or if you consider the differences worth paying for. I find Sonic a bit tinny and unconvincing. DTS:X has by far the widest soundscape, it's really quite impressive, but voices sound a bit artificial so it's better for games than movies. I'm very happy with Atmos though and find it worth the small one-off cost - it's got lots of equaliser settings and presets, which the others lack, and when you've found the one that suits your headphones best, it sounds superb for both games and movies.
I'd definitely recommend the trials. But it doesn't sound like they will resolve your hissing problem. Maybe you could pick up a cheap Xbox One controller (they work fine on the Series) and use that when you're playing single-player games?
Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart is sublime. It's the first 'proper' next-gen game I've played, and the whole thing is gobsmackingly good. Instant loading, sweeping transitions from one galaxy to the next, uncanny 3D audio through the headphones. As soon as you land on every planet, there's a moment of 'how the hell did they create this…?'.
And despite all of this technical wizardy, it's the pad that steals the show again. Tapping keyboards, wind rushing through fur, engine rumble… being able to feel the world like this is such a big, generational leap. It feeds into the gameplay too, with each gun making clever use of the resistive triggers for all manner of clicks, pushes and pulls.
If Sony can keep pumping out games of this quality, they'll be making an excellent case for 70-quid RRPs.
And one note of negativity to offset the excitement – it makes my PS5 noticeably whinier than other, less demanding games. Nowhere near the PS4's jet engine, but it still pumps out an incredibly annoying, high-pitched whirr.
In a few years, as games get more and more demanding, that could become really bloody annoying. Especially put next to the silent Series X.
As a very happy Series X owner, Ratchet & Clank is the first game to give me a twinge of PS5 envy. I bloody loved the PS4 version and this looks immense.
Watched a stream of it, looks delightful.
Elder Scrolls Online got a very good (and rather overdue) next gen patch today. 60fps at 1440p (or 30fps at 4K) plus higher-quality textures, hugely increased draw distance, almost-instant loading times and a whole bunch of other graphical bells and whistles. It's a mere 90GB patch on Series X but it's really very nice indeed.
I've always been a fan of its laid-back adventuring so might be dropping back into this for a while. There's an ESO+ trial for the next week, too, if anyone is tempted.
Kena: Bridge of Spirits is lovely. Feels like a lost GameCube game, looks like a PS5 game.
It’s not going to win any game of the year awards but it’s well worth picking up.
Let's say someone had bought a PS5 after saying they wouldn't. Apart from Rift Apart what are the must have games at this stage that you can't get on PC? Rift alone is probably enough for now TBH.
Astro’s Playroom (preinstalled) is wonderful. Miles Morales removes a lot of the bloat from the first Spider-Man game, and is a breezy joy to play. (Use Performance RT mode for the graphics). Sackboy is decent, and worth it for the soundtrack, but not a classic.
Dark Souls and Returnal if you’re into bastard-hard experiences. (I am not.)
Aside from that, it’s patched PS4 games that arrived towards the end of its life. Ghost of Tsushima, Last of Us 2 etc.
Ratchet and Clank?
Other than that, I've got nothing.
I know it's fairly pointless owning one, but I quite fancied playing Rift Apart and it was only about a 500 quid outlay to play one game so I thought why not?
@Mr Party Hat I was thinking about trying God of War too as I never played it on PS4. There's the PS Plus Collection thingy, how does that work? I have access to all the titles as long as I sub?
Yep. They’re not download to keep, but as long as you’re a PS Plus subscriber you have access.
You’re in for a treat. Great game.
God of War is surpisingly excellent (and I say that as someone who didn't much like the original games in the series). Definitely the pick of that collection.
Hmm, I could just get God of War for about 12 quid - I assume if you buy a PS4 disk you just put it direct into the console and get all the performance enhancements and updates for PS5?
I've realised I've missed quite a few PS games, and the PS5 might be a good way of revisiting them. Last Guardian, Last of Us 2 etc…
Yep it's just a patch, pop the disc in and the console will do the rest.
You have to keep an eye on the various graphics options across different games – 'performance mode', 'resolution', 'maximum'… there's zero consensus on what to call "this is the mode to use if you have a PS5". I usually rely on Digital Foundry.
Last Guardian is an odd one. The patched version is locked at 30fps (which includes the version in the PS Plus collection), but if you can find a Day-1 disc version and leave it UN-patched, the framerate is unlocked, so you get 60fps. But you also get any bugs they hadn't patched by day one.
It's much messier than Microsoft's approach, but it does work.
Hmm. I assume Last Guardian and all the old titles will be getting performance patches? Or have I been spoilt by Microsoft's work in this area….?
I've noticed GoW is on sale at the mo for 15 quid digitally, so I might grab that. Between that and Rift and the built in Astrobot game it should be enough for now as I have mountains of stuff on the PC to play.
I assume digital sales just work, and you only lose the option of running older code off the disk? So, I go to the store, buy the PS4 version and it should just run with the PS5 enhancements?
I assume digital sales just work, and you only lose the option of running older code off the disk?
Correct.
So, I go to the store, buy the PS4 version and it should just run with the PS5 enhancements?
Yep. (Barring any fiddling in the graphics settings. This is the bit I check Digital Foundry for.)
Hmm. I assume Last Guardian and all the old titles will be getting performance patches? Or have I been spoilt by Microsoft's work in this area….?
You've been spoiled. Sony leaves it entirely up to each individual developer, so Last Guardian may never get a PS5 patch. Sony certainly don't work on upgrading the games themselves with FPS Boost etc, like Microsoft do. Luckily most of the PS4 exclusives are big, successful games, so the developers are happy to continue supporting them. Last of Us, God of War, Ghost of Tsushima, Horizon etc have all been updated by their respective developers.
Concrete Genie and the rest, not so much. They'll be stuck at 30fps 900p forever.
Was Last Guardian good then?
Flawed but interesting is how I’d put it. Worth experiencing, at least.
You've been spoiled. Sony leaves it entirely up to each individual developer, so Last Guardian may never get a PS5 patch. Sony certainly don't work on upgrading the games themselves with FPS Boost etc, like Microsoft do. Luckily most of the PS4 exclusives are big, successful games, so the developers are happy to continue supporting them. Last of Us, God of War, Ghost of Tsushima, Horizon etc have all been updated by their respective developers.
Concrete Genie and the rest, not so much. They'll be stuck at 30fps 900p forever.
Oh. That’s not so good….
I forgot Returnal exists. Seems good, I liked Risk of Rain 2, but doesn’t seem to be mentioned a lot. Is it launch titley?
Dunno I’ve never played it, just read good things. It really is supposed to be bastard hard though.
Well, some first impressions on the PS5. As background, I had a PS4, never got a pro. I do have a One X, a 4k TV (non OLED ambilight) and a PC so powerful it's on a CIA watchlist.
Unboxing and general impressions first. Well, it's huge. It is both larger than I thought and also not so large that I think it's utterly ridiculous (it's close though). I'm using it on its side and the black plastic mini stand IS ridiculous - the entire thing smacks a little bit of design for design's sake and the One X next to it looks infinitely classier. But I do also quite like it, for simply being different. The set up was painless - I had to fiddle a lot to get a decent picture, but once done I was pretty satisfied. I don't think my TV is really good enough though by today's standards, so an OLED might need to be on the cards (my partner rarely comments on any of my tech purchases but she was astonished when I was moaning about the picture on my TV :D )
Anyhoo, the menu is, at least partially, a weird UI step back. The XMB was always wonderful. Making it look and feel a bit more like the Xbox UI seems crazy, though I appreciate things have moved on and it's getting more and more complex to categorise all the things a console needs to do. I could see a few improvements to the UI coming over the lifespan of the console though - it feels very fragmented and messy in bits. The Xbox UI has improved a lot, but still feels a bit weird too to be fair. It's not a disaster though and easy to use (and not a million miles from what's come before). I also can't see how to do it better, but then I'm not a UI designer.
So, the controller. I was surprised when all the additional features in it were announced and MS's response was pretty much "meh". I can only imagine they tried using it. While the form factor is better (than the Dualshock) and I guess the adaptive triggers are OK, the general rumble is just…. annoying? Astrobot almost made me feel a bit nauseous with all the mad buzzing and shit. It adds nothing for me, but then I've never been a huge fan of rumble in general, so I appreciate it could well be a me problem. Taps when you walk along, and "wind" or "water" being simulated in your hands is just… stupid? Distracting? Overall the pad is considerably better than the PS4 one, that's undeniable. The touchpad and mike are cool, if gimmicky. I'd still prefer async'ed sticks but the bigger form factor is a lot better. And to be honest, while I might've taken the Xbox Elite pad's (which I occasionally use on PC) choice of manually set trigger stops rather than the automatic route, I'll reserve judgement.
Ratchet and Clank, is wonderful, looks great and plays well. No surprises there. It is occasionally a little launch title esque in how it throws effects at the screen to show off, but a lot of the lighting and environmental design is breath-taking. Again, I'm not entirely sold on the pad integration - the adaptive triggers are…. fine? I'll play it more and see.
The big surprise was God of War. Holy, fucking, shit! :O I'd only really clocked it in passing - I knew it made original PS4s and Pros run at full tilt with fans at 100% and looked good, but I hadn't really looked into it much. I loved the original original, and then fell away from the series after the violence porn and dodgy bit in one of them (was it 2 or 3? with a woman tied to a cog?) made me re-evaluate how I'd like to spend my time, but this seems a very different beast. The graphics though. Dear god. It feels a bit walking simulator with added EMOTIONAL STORY and occasionally hitting things, but if it's going to look like this all the way through it, I'm in. Astonishing texture work and environment design. I'd be hard pressed to name many other games with objectively better graphics at a purely technical level. And it all runs nicely at 60fps on the PS5.
I then opened up my cupboard and realised I had a massive library of PS4 games on disk (I hadn't even turned the PS4 on for years). I tried Second Son as I'd heard that had a patch for PS5 and was pleasantly surprised. 60fps, looked OK, still played fine. Now just installing Horizon (though I have this on PC and have already played it at 4k with the sliders all hard right) and The Last Of Us (which I might finally finish).
Overall, I am pretty much as I expected to be when I bought it. There's no point me owning a Series X, and the PS5 gives me a quiet, decent way of playing back catalogue PS4 games as well as the odd AAA Sony PS5 single player tentpole release. It's big, looks faintly ridiculous and still has the awkwardness of a console in the first phase of its life, but it also feels like a coherent, fairly well thought out platform that could do well over the next few years. For now, I'm really going to enjoy chilling out on a sofa playing through Rift and GoW.
That all sounds as I expected. I'm vaguely tempted. I'm happy to hold out for a slim though. Do you have No Man's Sky? I'm curious how that looks on it.
No Man's Sky looks like blurry shit on a 3080 with everything maxxed out, so I can't imagine it'll look any better on a PS5.
Fair enough.
God of War is an astonishing-looking thing even at 30fps with the PS4 Pro sounding like it's about to go into orbit, it must look genuinely next-gen on the PS5. It actually looks better and better as it progresses, if you can believe that. And the way in which there are no* camera cuts in the whole thing is really just the developers showing off. It's Sony's best Sad Dad game in years.
*it hides it well.
Fair enough.
I did some research on your behalf and download it. And… well, you know what, I'm quite impressed. It certainly runs hell of a lot better on the PS5 than the PS4 (not sure about the Pro). Seems 60fps, graphics pretty much in line with the PC version as far as I can tell and reasonably crisp. So yes, it seems significantly better.
One notable thing I've found is that the download speeds over wifi on the PS5 seem really fast. Not sure if it's doing something clever with data compression, but a world away from the pain of the PS3 (and also the PS4 at times).
Well that’s good to hear. I would definitely like to return to it and play through all the additions someday. And if the PS5 is a significant improvement, that’s where I should do it.
Series X version is equally flashy, by the way, and also on Game Pass.
Also good to know.