cavalcade

And Mario Kart get. It's an odd beast isn't it? The elimination races are so reminiscent of Blur (which I adored) that I think if they could just flesh the concept out a bit, it would be genuinely brilliant.

The free roam thing is a bit shit, but I do appreciate Nintendo also develop for kids, and we've got an 8 year old nephew of my partner coming to stay for a bit next week (who is a huge MK fan but doesn't have a Switch 2 yet) and I could see him going nuts for it. I've seen a lot of reviews moaning the map isn't sprinkled with thousands of icons, like Horizon. But it feels a bit like Nintendo might understand play for play's sake a bit more than other devs. My kids at that age could be endlessly entertained just messing about in a safe world and making their own fun.

For sure, it's all a bit barren, but I also don't mind it's not a fucking Unisoft title. A side note, I also noticed this in Zelda. There was a bit where it told me to do something, and… it let me sort it out myself. My own map markers, route, and ordering of the tasks. I was so taken back when I found I had control like that I almost didn't know what to do. Which shows you where gaming is these days (or me).

The actual racing is… meh? As every review has said, but again, it does feel a little Blurlike in that regard, as that too really focused on long, straight tracks, maximising the weapon use rather than driving skill (though it is clearly a skill based game because of the rail grinding). The obvious thing to do is probably just make it a platform and slap all the MK8 tracks in there as a mode.

It all feels quite accessible, and frankly aimed at a family audience, and I don't see a problem with it. Like, no family is going to understand the clutter and bullshit of CrossWorlds.

A pleasant/10

I'm not sure how much more North I can take after Thank Goodness You're Here

At this point this is like my own blog, but Cyberpunk has started to uncover what might be happening. It ran terribly with AMD Frame Gen, even though it was reporting 40fps+. Same as Sonic. Stuttering. Lurching. Like playing in treacle.

Xess ran a bit better (as you might expect on an Intel handheld) but still a stuttering mess. After some fiddling with resolution and a few parameters it suddenly started working perfectly. Smooth. 45fps and the VRR working with no stutters or lurching.

I have no idea what I did, or what I changed, but this at least points to there being a thing that needs thinged in the place.

This all feels very PC gaming 1994 at the moment.

And, bafflingly, God of War (the sad dad 2018 one) runs really well. 30fps solid, and framegen takes it up into the 40fps plus VRR range. Smooth, no hitches, looks great. And that's a beast of a game. It appears the console is essentially tuned for Sony studio titles, and has been nerfed for anything related to SEGA.

I've tried Vsync on and off at a system and game level. One thing that is odd is that injecting frame gen using Lossless Scaling doesn't work in any of the Sonic titles (it just slows them to a crawl). Either way it feels like the frame timing is all over the place and I've been through 3 optimisation guides now and I just can't seem to get it to work.

But Horizon Zero Dawn (the latest next gen update), Apex and ARC Raiders run buttery smooth. Even Baldurs Gate 3 runs fine. It maybe has to be a software thing somewhere…