PlayStation 4

Destiny Companion App 4.1.0 Now Live With LFG Support

by Sohrab Osati | May 19, 2016 | 0 comments

Just a quick follow up on a post from yesterday. Bungie has now officially released the Destiny Companion App 4.1.0 update which brings with it a host of new ways to connect with new players and form fire teams for raids and Heroic Strikes. The new features are now live for iOS (iPhone/iPad) and will presumably eventually come to Android. For those looking to run The Taken King raid but don’t have a core squad to play with, this update goes a long way towards making that easier on you. Well done Bungie.

What exactly is new in the Destiny Companion App 4.1.0?

Destiny’s Companion App Will Soon Offer Official LFG/LFM Support

by Sohrab Osati | May 18, 2016 | 0 comments

Big news for all Destiny players out there. A long time lacking feature of the game, which the developers argue is on purpose, will soon be making its way to the game via the companion app for iOS and Android. Louis Contald writes for DualShockers:

With nearly no in-game option for matchmaking certain events (raids, heroic story missions, and the like), many ambitious entrepreneurs turned to creating their own sites — i.e., DestinyLFG’s .com and .net variations. However, according to Bungie’s weekly update, the official iOS/Android companion app will soon get a new update on the #Recruitment forum.

Poll: Have you started playing Uncharted 4 yet?

by Allegra Osati | May 13, 2016 | 3 comments

On Tuesday, May 10th, the world awoke to (or refused to go to sleep because of) Naughty Dog’s newest installment in Nathan Drake’s saga, Uncharted: A Thief’s End. This long awaited game is already getting rave reviews, and we want to hear yours. Have you gotten in on the action of Uncharted 4 yet? Let us know in our poll!

New Gran Turismo Sport Footage Debuting Live May 19

by Sohrab Osati | May 13, 2016 | 0 comments

I’m really not sure why games developed in Japan tend to work on a near 5 year arc but we’re finally approaching the release of Gran Turismo Sport on PS4. Here is series creator Kazunori Yamauchi:

Hello GT fans! We’re thrilled to announce that on 19th May we’ll be streaming brand-new Gran Turismo Sport footage from an exclusive London event, and sharing new details about the latest entry in Polyphony Digital’s acclaimed racing series. Not only that, but we’ll also be streaming Pre-Season Test of FIA Gran Turismo Championship Cups- the Nations Cup Pre-Season Test and the Manufacturer Fan Cup Pre-Season Test. We will also be lucky enough to have 9 full-scale Vision GT Cars and 2 ¼ size models present at the event, which is a world first!

While lacking the depth of the Gran Turismo series, to me, DriveClub is a game that in many ways was superior to GT as it fully embraced online mechanics in a fun and meaningful way. I also having a feeling that had the Evolution Studios not been disbanded, that we could have seen a second iteration of the game before GT Sport’s arrival, seeing how much regular content they pumped out during the past two years.

Sony to Launch Optional VR Consultation Service

by Sohrab Osati | May 4, 2016 | 0 comments

Official_PlayStation_VR_10

Just yesterday, I talked about how Sony will be enforcing a minimum 60fps standard for games released on PlayStation VR. According to Sony Computer Entertainment America Senior Dev Support Engineer Chris Norden, any game that dips below that will be rejected. To ensure that developers are able to get everything they want from VR and deliver an overall good experience, Sony will be launching a consultation service. Once again Norden:

We have a team of VR experts that will play the game…and look for technical correctness. We’re not going to beta test your title or anything, but we’re going to provide you kind of a report of ‘oh, this is a possible nausea trigger. Oh, here you’re dropping frame-rate.

Sony has yet to publicly disclose any additional details but I hope this is a service that they push in a very public manner to developers because the process of submitting a game for review can be lengthy and to only have it eventually rejected on technical merits can be devastating to a project’s timeline. With a service like this to rely on, developers can be confident that what they submit to Sony will pass muster.

Games That Dip Below 60fps on PlayStation VR Will Be Rejected

by Sohrab Osati | May 3, 2016 | 1 comment

One of the best things Sony and others like Oculus can do for virtual reality is to ensure that there is a set minimum level of quality that VR games should adhere to. So much of VR depends on the initial wave of consumer sentiment over the next year as varying headsets begin to arrive at retail. One such way that Sony is ensuring there is a minimum level of quality on each game released for PlayStation VR is by enforcing guidelines for frames-per-second. Sony Computer Entertainment America Senior Dev Support Engineer Chris Norden:

Frame-rate is really important; you cannot drop below 60 frames-per-second. Ever. If you submit a game to us and it drops to 55, or 51… we’re probably going to reject it.

And he’s absolutely right. As flashy and fantastical a dev’s game can be, if it dips below 60fps (the threshold where consumers can begin to feel nauseated) then not only are they delivering a subpar experience with their title, but also damaging the reputation of VR as a whole.

I know I’m going to get flak for this, but there’s no excuse for not hitting frame-rate. It’s really hard, and I’m not going to lie to and say it’s extremely easy… it’s really difficult. 60hz is the minimum acceptable frame-rate. Everybody drill that into your heads.

VR will rise and fall together like 3D and a handful of devs could ruin it all for the entire industry. Norden once again:

We’re all friends; the VR industry is really small and really tight. The VR industry needs to succeed, and everybody inside of it needs to succeed.

And one such way is to have certain minimum standards like 60fps. Good move by Sony.

Destiny Update 2.2.0.2 With Melee Changes Now Live

by Sohrab Osati | May 3, 2016 | 0 comments

Just a quick heads up. The Destiny update 2.2.0.2 that I talked about yesterday which would prepare the game for changes to its melee system among other things is now live. The small update which is required before jumping in brings with it:

Character

The following changes to the melee ability will be manually toggled on Tuesday, May 10th at 10AM Pacific. For a review of the changes read the last “This Week at Bungie.”

Fixed a bug that would start a melee target search from an incorrect position, frequently coming up short and causing the melee attack to whiff
Adjust melee strike validation logic and player position networking during melee attacks to improve reliability across the network

Activities

Fixed an issue in which chests in the original Prison of Elders challenge modes (Level 32, 34, 35) did not properly give loot
Fixed an issue in which the Weekly Nightfall did not drop Ghosts above the player’s Light correctly

More details like changes to quests and items after the jump.

Destiny Update 2.2.0.2 Releases on May 3rd, Will Usher in Melee Changes

by Sohrab Osati | May 2, 2016 | 0 comments

Destiny_Melee_Attack

Come May 3rd, Bungie will be releasing Destiny update 2.2.0.2 which will eventually change how the melee system works. While the update will go live tomorrow, the actual changes won’t go into effect until May 10th. Bungie hopes that in the week that the code is introduced, they can monitor how it affects things before fully implementing changes to the melee system. According to the team at Bungie:

Changing the Sandbox always runs the risk of wreaking havoc on the fabric of virtual reality. We’re going to roll this out nice and slow.

The full timeline of the new update is as follows:

Update 2.2.0.2 deploys Tuesday, May 3rd starting at about 10AM Pacific
We’ll monitor the base update for stability over the weekend
New Melee code will be manually activated Tuesday, May 10th at 10AM Pacific
We’ll monitor performance and gather feedback on the Sandbox

I have to say, despite being ‘minor’ compared to DLC like The Taken King, the April update has done wonders to making Destiny even more fun to play. As a whole, the game feels much more balanced out with less of a grind. If you’ve put the game aside lately, right now is a pretty good time to jump back in. After the jump, Bungie Sandbox Engineer Jon Cable talks specifics about the new update.

‘Horizon: Zero Dawn’ Could See a Delay

by Sohrab Osati | Apr 25, 2016 | 0 comments

Horizen_Event_Zero_07

This generation has seen no shortage of delays and the PS4 exclusive Horizon: Zero Dawn by Guerrilla Games could be joining that list. Guerrilla Games Co-Founder and former Production Director Arjan Brussee (who left the company in 2012) chiming in on initial reports about the game’s delay:

count me not surprised… just make it awesome @Guerrilla guys! https://t.co/vPE9dyxldV

— arjan @ BOSS KEY (@arjanbrussee) April 21, 2016

With E3 right around the bend, we likely won’t have to wait long to hear about the game’s fate. The game was originally set to appear some time in late 2016 but reports are now pegging an early 2017 release date. If true, I’d wager late February or early March. Again it’s worth pointing out that nothing is official at this point but, if true, I’m glad.

Sony has given Naughty Dog plenty of time to refine Uncharted 4 which has seen a few delays of its own and the final product, which is arriving in two weeks’ time, looks nothing short of spectacular. If developers need more time to iron out bugs and enhance the game, I’m all for it. Others have gone as far as to claim the game’s delay has something to do with the rumored PS4K but I don’t think that’s true.

Raychul’s Review of ‘Ratchet and Clank’ Makes Us Want to Save the Universe Again

by Allegra Osati | Apr 22, 2016 | 0 comments

In 2002, Insomniac Games released a little game for PlayStation 2 to great critical acclaim and raving reviews called Ratchet and Clank. Now, two console generations and several successful games later, the duo have made their PS4 debut in a remake that is sure to please fans of the original game. Just ask our good friend Raychul Moore:

I think it’s one of the best re-releases of a classic game that I originally loved that I’ve ever played.

According to Raychul, Ratchet and Clank does not fall victim to the curse many other remakes do – it actually has that “special something” that makes the game feel new and modern.

Ratchet and Clank is one of the first games I would definitely say you can tell they rebuilt this game from the ground up.

So, whether you’re new to the franchise or are excited to dive back in to the world with an out-of-this-world arsenal, get ready to play the game, based on the movie, based on the game (and go see the movie, out in theaters April 29th)! Ultimately, Raychul concludes with:

One of the genres I miss the most in today’s gaming is a really well done fun platformer. I’m so glad that Insomniac brought back Ratchet and Clank … It fulfilled all of my needs and wants for a platformer and gave me big crazy fun guns to do it with.

Check out her full video review of Ratchet and Clank after the jump!

Enter the Matrix – PlayStation 4 Neo Edition (aka PS4k?)

by Sohrab Osati | Apr 19, 2016 | 3 comments

It seems like every two weeks, there is some new and big speculation on what the rumored PS4 upgrade will be called and what it will deliver. First dubbed PS4.5, then PS4K, and now PlayStation 4 Neo (internal codename), the new PlayStation is expected to have some modest gains over its predecessor of three years ago. According to Richard Leadbetter:

CPU: The good news is that there will be a CPU upgrade over the lacklustre x86 cores found in PlayStation 4. The bad news is that the cores themselves have not been changed at all – they have simply been overclocked from 1.6GHz to 2.1GHz – a 31 per cent improvement. As with the current PlayStation 4, one core and a time-slice from another is reserved for the operating system.

Memory: We’re still at 8GB of GDDR5, with a 24 per cent boost to bandwidth compared to the original PS4. The current machine uses 5.5gbps memory modules. Basic maths suggests that Sony has pushed this to the same 7.0gbps modules we see on high-end graphics cards like the GTX 980 and GTX 980 Ti. There are some concerns here. The boost to bandwidth isn’t exactly huge, it will still be in contention with CPU utilisation (they both share the same interface), and the bandwidth doesn’t scale particularly well with the mooted GPU boost, which – to be frank – is massive.

GPU: This is the most exciting aspect of the spec. Compute unit count doubles from 18 to 36, and clock-speed increases from 800MHz to 911MHz – a 14 per cent increase. That’s an overall increase of 2.3x in FLOPs. The question is, what technology is being used here? AMD has created both of its current-gen console processors so far by taking older, off-the-shelf components and disabling a couple of compute units. In effect, Xbox One got the Radeon HD 7790, while PlayStation 4 got a more capable, semi-custom Radeon HD 7870. Here’s where things get interesting – the 36 compute unit count cannot comfortably fit any of AMD’s existing GPUs. It suggests that Sony and AMD have pushed the boat out, that they are using the upcoming Polaris technology.

Curiously, all current reports lack any mention of upgraded hard drives or 4K Blu-ray player which would be a shame if lacking though it likely comes down to a cost. If such a model is released, don’t think that Sony and developers will leave you in the dust.

Sony seemingly acknowledges the need to integrate the two models of PlayStation 4 available simultaneously on the market – internally dubbed as ‘Base’ and ‘Neo’. There will be no games exclusive to the Neo model, every title will be available on both, and there’s no suggestion of VR-exclusive Neo modes at this point. Developers are prohibited from creating Neo-exclusive gameplay features, and enhancements are expected to be graphical and performance-based in nature. Gamers on both systems will be tied into the same ecosystem, meaning that users of both models will be competing against one another in online games. The user interface and PSN systems will also be identical.

It’s worth noting that I’m a huge fan of a mid-upgrade PS4 being released but I’ll share my own thoughts and some more info on the PlayStation 4 Neo in another piece.

PlayStation VR Demo Units Will Be in Stores by June

by Sohrab Osati | Apr 19, 2016 | 0 comments

When Sony comes to mind, for many of us, unfortunately we tend to think of a very reactionary company. From strategic moves to products, they’re typically chasing the industry or in pursuit of an ill-fated endeavor. Fortunately for them and us, the PlayStation division, especially with PS4, has been on the pulse of the industry and consumers. PlayStation VR is such a product that when it launches in October will not only come at a far more affordable price range than its competitors, but one that will have a variety of games as well. How often have we had hardware launches in the industry with few games to consume?

One of the biggest obstacles VR faces is a lack of prior experience. To truly ‘get it’ and form an opinion, you simply have to put on a headset and see what all the fuss is about. To that end, Sony thinks they can showcase PlayStation VR to at least 500,000 consumers by year’s end. PlayStation VP of Marketing John Koller:

We have to do this prior to launch, that’s critical. We need to be in stores.

Just yesterday, it was revealed that GameStop will be a big partner for Sony and will favor PS VR over the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive due to its simplicity. Now we know that, in addition to being a launch partner, PlayStation VR will arrive in June at GameStop stores to help gear up consumer awareness and enthusiasm. While potentially a no brainer, this is actually a big milestone for PS VR as it points to fully-completed hardware by summer (otherwise, Sony wouldn’t want it used in such a public way). In turn, Sony can spend the majority of summer ramping up production, something that currently plagues Oculus, and fine-tuning the software as there will be the inevitable day one patch.

Having PS VR in many stores is also a big strategic win for Sony. Currently Oculus Rift has no big retail partners that house demo units and the HTC Vive is available in 10 scattered locations throughout the US. Koller, like myself, believes that VR must truly be experienced and that a demo unit:

really sells you on the experience, you’re transported to places physically, actually emotionally feel like you’re in another world

More after the jump.

GameStop to Heavily Push PlayStation VR Over Oculus Rift & HTC Vive

by Sohrab Osati | Apr 18, 2016 | 0 comments

Official_PlayStation_VR_7

Sony is wisely releasing PlayStation VR this October, just in time for the busy holiday shopping season. While launching a few months after Oculus Rift and HTC Vive, the extra time will ensure that PS VR won’t see the same type of manufacturing delays that has plagued Oculus while giving developers a few more months to polish their games. With more time to plan, Sony has been busy putting together strategic partners that will also help push PS VR and educate consumers, one of the biggest hurdles that face all VR companies. GameStop CEO Paul Raines:

We’ve played all the VR that’s come through our office, and the setup time for PlayStation VR is significantly easier and the space required to demo is small, so I expect we’ll have a lot of demos in stores, unlike the Oculus or HTC.

One of the key advantages that Sony has with PlayStation VR is how the unit is sold. Have a PS4 already? Then all you need is PS VR standalone package or the bundle which is pictured below. Starting from scratch? That’s also not a problem – here is a PS4 and PS VR bundle. This is direct contrast to Rift and Vive which require a PC. How does GameStop determine the PC you have at home is good enough to run VR beyond giving you the minimum specs required?

Official_PlayStation_VR_8

Even if the shopper happens to know their PC’s exact specs, a number of external factors can dramatically change how either VR headset performs once at home. And if they don’t have a PC or capable PC at home, does GameStop now get into the PC selling business? On the other hand, Sony makes it simple. You just need a PS4. John Koller, vice president of marketing at Sony Interactive Entertainment:

We want to create a large footprint in high-visibility stores to have front-window demo experiences

And it looks like they’re going to get that in a major way from GameStop. Here is their COO Tony Bartel:

We’re clearly going to be the key launch partner. We’ll be selling Sony PlayStation VR hardware, bundles, and games in stores.

For Sony, their first year target is PlayStation’s most hardcore users. According to Koller:

They’re active, buying a lot of games and really enjoy PS4. That’s going to be the early active PlayStation VR consumer.

From there, experience and word of mouth is going to be the key driver of PlayStation VR – or its demise. Unlike a new PlayStation, which is easy to explain (generally it’s more powerful with better visuals), VR is an entirely new medium that needs to be experienced. Once again, Koller:

Trial drives the conversion to purchase. You have to be able to go into a GameStop to try this. We’ll have a fantastic technology, but you need to get your hands on it.

And VR is expected to do big business. More on that after the jump.

Final Fantasy XV is Square’s Biggest “Final Fantasy Production Ever Made”

by Sohrab Osati | Apr 13, 2016 | 0 comments

Final_Fantasy_XV_Castle

File this under duh. Justin Gaffney, Square Enix General Manager for PAL Europe:

Final Fantasy XV is a mainline entry in the series. It has been many years in the making and is the biggest Final Fantasy production ever made. I think the Uncovered event in LA shows our intent, belief and ambition for the brand, and for Final Fantasy XV in particular.

Uncovered event or not (which by the way I attended and was genuinely delighted during it), if your game has been in development for 10 years, it’s likely to be the biggest production ever. We can file this under other amazing quotes that I’m sure somebody has said somewhere like “PS4 is even more powerful than PS3!” Let’s just hope that Uncovered wasn’t an anomaly and that FF15 is truly shaping up to be spectacular because up until that event, I had lost all hope in the series. Post Uncovered: Final Fantasy XV, I’ve been excited again by Final Fantasy, something I didn’t think the post Square Enix (FF14 aside) could do.

Destiny April Update 2.2.0 Now Live, Brings a Ton of New Content for Free

by Sohrab Osati | Apr 12, 2016 | 0 comments

Time to get hyped, Guardians. The long-talked-about Destiny April update 2.2.0 is now live and available for your device of choice. The free update, which adds a plethora of content, is decently large in size, coming in at:

PS4 – 1.71GB
PS3 – 1.04GB
Xbox One – 1.74GB
Xbox 360 – 793MB

Oryx may have been defeated but many Taken remain and the denizens of the Reef are seeking revenge for their loss. Travel to Vestian Outpost in the Reef to speak with Variks about rumors of a new Taken threat. Test yourself against new challenges within the Prison of Elders.

After the jump, a detailed look at what’s changed. For those with a few minutes, a video preview also awaits you which shows you everything that’s new. It’s also worth noting that later this year, likely in the fall, a major paid DLC will be launched with Destiny 2 expected to arrive sometime in 2017.