A reader and recent father of twins reveals how the debate over the price of Spider-Man 2 has been the catalyst for him to sell his console.

I’ve seen a lot of arguments back and forth about the price of Spider-Man 2 and whether it would be better value for money if it was longer or if it’s fine to pay $70/£70 for a game that only lasts 15 hours. Well, for me that’s kind of missing the point. Having recently become a dad to twins I suddenly find myself so short of money the thought of spending that much on a video game isn’t something I can even consider.

Naturally, I haven’t got much time either, but I should’ve been able to fit in a ‘short’ 15+ hour campaign, as I have been able to find the odd hour or two of quiet to indulge in those games I do already have. But I can’t justify the cost, not with all my responsibilities at the moment.

I realise that I could try and get a physical copy, beat it, and sell it but the whole argument over whether the game is worth the money or not has made realise that video games are just too expensive nowadays and this is probably the time to stop spending what little remaining personal cash I have on them.

You reach a limit like this, and you realise something has to change, that the things you used to spend time and money on when you hand no responsibilities are just not sensible anymore. I’m not going to accuse Sony or anyone else of being greedy or unfair – I understand why game prices are going up – but for me it’s reached a limit where I just have to say ‘no’.

It’s not just the games though. Spider-Man 2 is really just the straw that broke the camel’s back. It costs what it does but then you’ve got all the other games I’d be interested in this year, like Super Mario Bros. Wonder and Alan Wake 2. Then on top of that talk of the Switch 2 and PS5 Pro…

Everything is just becoming too much; expense piled upon expense. I realise I don’t have to get any of these things but I think it’s best for me to decide not to, to make a clean break, before I’m tempted to carry on and my lack of willpower keeps finding excuses to get ‘just one more game.’

I will hopefully come back to gaming in a few years’ time and while I intend to sell my newer consoles I’ll keep the older ones to play some of my favourite retro games. I have been thinking, though, about what might have convinced me to carry on.

If Sony had a true equivalent to Game Pass that might have made a difference. I’ve never been a fan of Xbox games but if I could’ve played Spider-Man 2 for no extra cost, day one, that would have been mighty tempting, even if subscriptions are getting more expensive all the time.

But really, the price is only part of it. The other half is just wanting to be more responsible. I don’t think it’s right to be constantly thinking about where I can steal some time away from my kids, to play a video game.

I’ll need some ‘me time’, I’m sure, but not when it costs the price of a weekly shop to enjoy it. Everything is getting more expensive at the moment, but when that includes an unnecessary luxury like a video game I think you’ve got to take stock and consider your priorities. Thanks for listening.

By reader CollinsBlister

The reader’s features do not necessarily represent the views of GameCentral or Metro.

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A reader regrets pre-ordering Modern Warfare 3 and suggests that Call Of Duty is currently the worst it’s been since the Xbox 360 days.

It’s Wednesday as I type this and I’m fully expecting Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard to be confirmed on Friday. So, all you people in the future as I type this, are probably already sick of hearing about it. But don’t worry, I’m not really here to talk about it. Although I will say that paying $69 billion for the makers of Call Of Duty is just about the worst bargain in corporate history, because Call Of Duty sucks. Or at least this year’s does.

I used to love Call Of Duty, I think most everyone did back in the Xbox 360 days. It’s had its bad games, but it’s kept its quality up surprisingly well given the yearly sequels, although I think it started to lose its mojo towards the end of the last generation. Maybe because that’s when they started to concentrate more on the free battle royales, or maybe the idea had just been done to death – but I think Black Ops 3 was the last one that I was properly into.

The first Modern Warfare 1 reboot was pretty good but the second not so much, I thought. You want to see the end of the story though, so against my better judgement I pre-ordered the third and… well, I guess they saw me coming.

A lot has been talked about whether Modern Warfare 3 is just DLC they repackaged and sold as a full game, but that really doesn’t matter – if it’s good, it’s good. Super Mario Galaxy 2 and Zelda: Tears Of The Kingdom both started out as DLC and they’re two of the best games ever made, so clearly it’s no guarantee that the game will disappoint.

I realise the position with Modern Warfare 3 is different, but if it was originally just a new story campaign then it must be pretty substantial, they just need to bolt on new multiplayer and Zombies modes and, let’s be honest, how often do they really change between sequels?

Well, it turns out the answer is quite a bit because Modern Warfare 3’s multiplayer is a lot different. The problem is all the changes are for the worse. It is pretty obvious that the multiplayer maps being for the original Modern Warfare 2 means they were originally meant to be DLC for the last game but, again, that doesn’t really matter. These are some classic maps and revamping them for modern times is a good idea.

The problem is they haven’t been revamped at all. They’ve had a light remaster and that’s it, which means they’re still filled with camping sites and then you’ve got the terrible spawn points of the modern games on top of that. The spawn points are completely random, and it makes it impossible to come up with any kind of strategy or tactic whether you’re playing on your own or as team.

Domination is basically unplayable and that’s before you get into the lack of recoil on guns, the terrible visibility and colour saturation, and a TTK (time to kill) so slow it feels like you’re fighting with a potato gun.

I do kind of like the slower movement, although I acknowledge opinion is divided on that subject. I have not spoken to any regular player that has not complained about the spawn points though, agreeing that they all but ruin the game.

I shouldn’t have pre-ordered it, I realise that now, but I will definitely be thinking twice next time. I shouldn’t imagine that’s what Microsoft wants to hear after spending all that money but it’s true. Call Of Duty has only been getting by these last few years and now it’s at its lowest point, just as it becomes Xbox property.

Maybe they’ve got some big plan for bringing it back to its former glory but even if they have that’s going to take, what? Five years? By that point I think they’re going to be having serious second thoughts about this whole deal…

By Taylor Moon

The reader’s features do not necessarily represent the views of GameCentral or Metro.

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A reader is unimpressed by the newly released Payday 3 and thinks its problems are emblematic of recent video game sequels.

Sequels can be a blast. Remember Halo 2? Portal 2? Red Dead Redemption 2? Hell, Half-Life 2 and Silent Hill 2? Shrek 2?! All certified classics in their own right, which introduced extra depth, fresh gameplay mechanics, and world building to their franchises and the community behind them, giving people more of what they wanted in an innovative and creative manner.

So what the hell is happening recently?

A notable example I’d like to focus on is Payday 3. A well established franchise that has had an excellent sequel, Payday 2, be its driving force for 10 years – until recently when Payday 3 led to its predecessor being retired and gave it the well-earned rest it deserved.

Its price point: attractive. The visuals: much better. Game mechanics: fresh and interesting. It looked to be shaping up well, improving on the previous game and giving it a nice lick of paint in a new engine. And yet even with considerable community and financial support it has still turned out to be a complete mess.

The majority of the characters are gone, thanks to an awkward plot point that states that the gang has been broken up due to a police incident – delivered in what looks to be a Redfall style concept art PowerPoint. This is in part understandable, due to having to monetise the game in the long term (plus the problem of the licensed characters), but the production value drop off in comparison to Payday 2’s neat live action backgrounds, that made the game feel alive.

No quick play results, in a rough matchmaking experience, and no proper single-player means an overreliance on online (as evidenced by the launch week fiasco). Less gameplay mechanics mean less depth and a small selection of maps further limit its replayability. It’s quite the rabbit hole when you start looking past the fun gunplay, which in itself feels like a shadow of its former self, with the lack of weapon modifications and akimbo variants.

Sequels currently feel like they are simply a way to earn money and keep major companies afloat. Phil Spencer’s remarks on the gaming industry simply say what everyone else is thinking currently: sequels are rehashes done for the sake of it being a sequel to keep an IP’s name in the game, which is the exact opposite of what these games need to be.

Looking at Modern Warfare 3 and a previous Reader’s Feature on how it’s essentially a grift, alongside the new Assassin’s Creed Mirage… both come from top triple-A studios that are continuously resting on their flagship titles. There’s certainly nothing wrong with sequels in general but done in this vein it makes enjoying these games difficult, where no new innovation occurs besides fresh ways to monetise the gaming experience.

Sequels like Payday 3 are an interesting case. Yes, it’s a poor game, but if anything Starbreeze had their hand forced. They have filed for bankruptcy in the past and this game is a way to support them getting back into the game (no pun intended). But it still feels as though we are being cheated; the mismanagement and pressure to deliver means another sequel has been released simply to push an IP for the sake of it.

By reader V

The reader’s features do not necessarily represent the views of GameCentral or Metro.

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Readers discuss their usual tactics for beating video games and how they decide when to give up and when to multitask.

The subject for this week’s Hot Topic was suggested by reader Fennel, who asked what you count as beating a game and if it just means having completed the story or everything 100%.

Everyone had a slightly different approach and while most agreed that getting to the credits counted as beating a game, others liked to go further, especially for trophies and achievements.

Impossible Mission
As someone who has amassed thousands of games over the years, there’s no way I can complete all of them. There are some games I play that I feel I have experienced all they have to offer within the 15 hour mark and just give up on (Far Cry 5 and Dying Light springs to mind) but it’s rare that I stick to one game to completion and play nothing else.

The last I did this with was Elden Ring last year, which I played for a solid month to 100% Steam achievement completion. I’ve played other games to completion since but not in-between playing others.

I’ve been more wary in the past couple of years with my purchases too and seeing if I actually would find the time to finish them. I really want to play Zelda: Tears Of The Kingdom but Breath Of The Wild took me over 120 hours to finish, I don’t have it in me just yet.
Cold Waste

Stick to the plan
I must admit I’m quite a tenacious wee fellow, so if I start a game I tend to finish it. Due to this, I tend to only buy games that I know I’ll likely be able to finish, and plan which games I start based on that. Thinking of the games I’ve bought myself in recent years I think I’ve finished them all but it does tend to mean I won’t start really long games after finishing a long game recently. It does provide nice palette cleaners between the longer games though, interspersing games like Inscryption and Inside, between longer games like Xenoblade Chronicles and Zelda: Tears Of The Kingdom.

I have tried things like Game Pass but find I’ll start so many games and not even try and finish them, as you’re not quite invested in them, having not consciously decided to buy them. It felt more like window shopping, downloading it, having a wee gander to see what it’s all about and then on to the next fairly interesting game, all the while not seeing much of any of them.

For that reason, I’ve decided the more considered approach of reading previews and reviews and buying and investing my money and time in a game I have chosen is my favoured way of buying and playing video games.
Paul Conry

Staying power
I try and beat every game I play.

This is in stark contrast to my gaming youth, where I would rarely finish anything. I’d say that during a prolific year of my 30s I’m sure I beat more games than the whole of my childhood, teens, and twenties combined.

As a general rule, though, if I’m really not enjoying a potentially long game I’ll stop. A recent example of this is Immortals Fenyx Rising, which I started to find a bit repetitive about five hours in and dropped.

Earlier this year I played through Dark Void, an Uncharted clone that couldn’t be more generic, because it was a short experience, and I don’t think I can accurately form an opinion about a game unless I’ve seen the credits.

I’d advise that everyone tries to see a game through if they’re 70-80% there.

It’ll leave a more lasting impression and make any potential sequel more appealing.
ANON

E-mail your comments to: gamecentral@metro.co.uk

Post credits scene
I try to at least finish and by that I mean get to the credits screen, every game I own. Even online shooters like Apex Legends have a natural end for me. After all the achievements were awarded and a handful of wins I found it had reached its end for me.

I don’t see the point of buying a game and not finishing it. I’ve not got endless cash, so I still played like I did 20 years ago. I might have a pile to get through, but I will get to each one.

I can only remember one game I never finished as it was so difficult, I gave up on it. No, it wasn’t a Souls game.

As I’ve said before, you can come and go on a game, as long as it’s not online only and the servers shut. I’ve never paid full price either, as I tend to get used or from a key seller. I’m still on Read Dead Redemption 2 several years after release but am only maybe a dozen missions in.

On the other end I’ve played through the Batman: Arkham games several times, including the Riddler trophies.

If I’m stuck, I’ll go on YouTube to find a cheese or easy strategy.

Going by the achievements I’m on the lower percentage of people doing this now.

I finished the new Turtles game and I think it was under 20% of people had the achievement. This is a two-hour game and people can’t play through it? I don’t know.

Anyway. Have a good weekend all.
Bobwallett

Sunk cost fallacy
When I was younger and only got a handful of new games a year, I’d (try) to play everything through to completion. These days I’m quite happy to abandon a game I’m not enjoying.

Two recent examples would be Red Dead Redemption 2 and Deathloop. I gave them both three to four hours but found them very uninteresting so moved on to something else. There are too many other games I want to try to bother continuing. Since I only buy games once they’re a cheaper, it’s no big loss if I only play them for a short while.
drlowdon

Progress update
I try to complete the main story of every game I play. But the story and the gameplay needs to be compelling! These are the games I am currently working on:

Final Fantasy 16: good story/boring gameplay
Progress = stalled

Aliens: Dark Descent: OK story/fun gameplay
Progress = stalled
(Need to be in the mood to play this one)

Call Of Duty multiplayer: no story/addictive gameplay
Progress = need to unlock the next gun on battle pass

Baldur’s Gate 3: great story/complicated gameplay
Progress = wife is blaming pregnancy brain and it’s too much for her, so can no longer play our co-op game (right at the end of Act 1)

Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty: good story/competent gameplay
Progress = still playing and will be the game I complete first

It’s all well and good having loads of extra things to do and unlock but they need to be interesting and worthwhile or change the way you can play the game.

I think the internet guides and YouTube videos have also taken some of the magic out of games, as it’s so easy to figure things out once you get stumped now.

Looking forward to Hades 2. That should keep me occupied.
TommyFatFingers

Selling point
A somewhat topical Hot Topic this is. I only pre-ordered Spider-Man 2 and bought Assassin’s Creed Mirage because they had been trimmed down.

DC Comics have always been my favourite. Green Lantern and Hellblazer blow anything Stan Lee ever plagiarised clean out of the water. Yeah, sue me.

So I’m not all that invested in any of the Marvel comics or superheroes. I got about halfway through Spider-Man on PlayStation 4 before the map just got way too full and I couldn’t be bothered trying to get any further.

Generally, I do try to get my money’s worth. Oblivion, Skyrim, Bloodborne and Elden Ring held no secrets from me by the time I was done with them. The same goes for Zelda: A Link To The Past and all the 3D era Mario games.

The difference between Red Dead Redemption and the sequel makes the point for me. I savoured every moment of the first Red Dead Redemption, to this day one of my most memorable gaming experiences in 35 years. The sequel? Not so much.

Bloat for the sake of busy work does not a good game make.
Mitchell

Multitasking progress
I do try to complete every game I buy but not necessarily as soon as I’ve bought them, usually because I’m in the middle of trying to complete another in my backlog!

In the N64/Game Boy Advance/GameCube days I would try to complete each game on each difficulty with each character (if they had different ones) so for example, Mario Kart 64/Super Circuit/Double Dash got some serious playthrough.

As of late September/early October, I’m trying to complete Cruisin’ Blast. I have already got gold on the easy and normal difficulty races but I’m grinding to level up each vehicle to level 5. Races and the Cups are short, so it’s not too bad.

Simultaneously, I’m trying to get all my Pokémon to level 100 in Pokemon Sword. I’m nearly-ish there but I won’t bother with Let’s Go, Eevee! or Violet. Namely because it is so much easier/quicker to level them up in Sword than the other games.

If I am having difficulty with a certain game, I will look online for help but if I still can’t get past a certain part I’ll call it a day and move onto the next on my shelf. That finished game is then sold or traded.

These days, 100%ing a game isn’t important to me anymore like it used to.
LeighDappa

This week’s Hot Topic
The subject for this weekend’s Inbox was suggested by reader Fennel, who asks whether you try to beat every game you play?

There’s been a lot of debate recently, over whether video games are getting too long or bloated, but do you always try to beat them, regardless of their length? What do you count as beating the game and are you happy to move on once you’ve completed the story or do you try and 100% it as well?

How often have you given up when playing a game and what caused you to do so? What’s the shortest amount of time you played a game before giving up?

E-mail your comments to: gamecentral@metro.co.uk

The small print
New Inbox updates appear every weekday morning, with special Hot Topic Inboxes at the weekend. Readers’ letters are used on merit and may be edited for length and content.

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MORE : Games Inbox: The danger of Nintendo being bought out, The Legend Of Zelda love, and GTA 6 doubts

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Despite it seemingly sharing a setting with Fable, there’s no indication that Microsoft is involved with Peter Molyneux’s new game.

A few months ago, Peter Molyneux – creator of Fable, Black & White, and Dungeon Keeper – announced that he was working on a new game beyond just his creepy NFT game. The game was said to be closer to his earlier work, although he never said exactly what it is.

He didn’t share any real details beyond it featuring a new mechanic no one’s ever seen before (so typical Molyneux overpromising) and being set in a familiar environment.

What makes this environment so familiar? Apparently, it’s none other than Albion, the setting of the Fable games, though that raises a whole host of questions regarding whether or not he’s working with Microsoft.

Molyneux shared this comments in a brief tweet that revealed the game’s name as MOAT and stated that he’s starting a blog to chronicle how he designs games.

‘This may be a decision I live to regret, but I am starting a regular blog about the crazy way I design games; namely a new game set in the land of Albion called MOAT,’ writes Molyneux.

He never specifies if it’s the same Albion from Fable, but his statement doesn’t imply any other alternative.

There’s no indication of Microsoft being involved and if this is an official Fable project, surely there’d be a more high profile announcement than this.

It’s very unlikely that Microsoft would just let Molyneux use the Fable setting for an unrelated video game, so his comments are all around pretty weird.

One possible explanation is that while the name is the same, Molyneux’s Albion won’t be the same as Fable’s. Albion is an old name for Great Britain, not something that was just made up for Fable, and it’s not clear if Microsoft was able to trademark it.

Although Molyneux’s Lionhead Studios would’ve been the one responsible for that, when the original Fable came out, so maybe Microsoft, for some reason, let him keep the name.

There’s actually an Albion Online video game that began in 2017 and is still running today, with Microsoft apparently making no attempt to shut it down or change its name.

We had hoped Molyneux would have clarified things further in his new blog, but he unfortunately doesn’t provide any additional info about MOAT.

As for Fable itself, the newest entry from Playground Games saw a new trailer during Xbox’s summer showcase, but it was very brief and still didn’t offer any sort of launch window.

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Microsoft is accused of manipulating user reviews for Forza Motorsport from the Xbox store, even though its user score is still surprisingly low.

Given how frequently people abuse user review sections, using bad faith arguments to make perfectly fine games seem worse than they really are (e.g., Resident Evil 4), they’re something that now requires considerable moderation.

Metacritic pledged to implement stricter moderation to prevent ‘abusive and disrespectful reviews’ from being published. Meanwhile, Microsoft’s solution is apparently to just delete some reviews wholesale from the Xbox storefront.

This is according to Forza Motorsport players who noticed that the total number of user reviews has been dropping since launch, with the assumption being that Microsoft is targeting negative reviews to improve the game’s user score.

At the very least, there is corroboration that user reviews on Forza Motorsport’s Xbox store page are vanishing. On October 11, NeoGAF user Heisenberg007 screengrabbed the page for Forza Motorsport’s standard edition, which had 847 reviews at the time.

It later dropped down to 602 reviews and, at the time of writing, we can confirm that it’s since dropped even further to 476.

Over on Reddit, some players are understandably not happy about Microsoft seemingly trying to control the narrative surrounding Forza Motorsport. User Optimal_Sand_5329 calls the company ‘petty’ while Illustrious-Thing528 describes the game’s launch as ‘embarrassing.’

However, if Microsoft is trying to shut down any sort of negativity and improve the user score, it’s doing a really bad job of it, since the average user score on the Xbox store is currently 2.4/5, with 45% of reviews scoring the game one star out of five.

It’s also very easy to find negative reviews for the game and a quick scout suggests that the PC release is to blame. Several players cite its poor optimisation, graphical bugs, and crashes.

‘The game cost more than any game I bought before and quite frankly, not worth £10 at time of release.’

‘This has to be the worst Forza launch to date, I thought it couldn’t get any worse than Forza Horizon 5 but it has.’

‘I would refund this game if I could. AI is so bad you may as well play by yourself.’

Even some of the positive reviews are not without complaints. The most amusing one we spotted was a four-star review for the console version that describes it as ‘unfinished’ and demands Xbox boss Phil Spencer be sacked.

It’s possible that the reviews being deleted were ones riddled with abusive language, irrelevant tangents, or were simply unhelpful, but it seems unlikely that would account for fully half of the total reviews.

The Metacritic user reviews seem to bare out the idea that it’s only the PC version that has got fans upset, with the Xbox user score being 7.8 (which is still notably lower than the critic score) and the PC user score being just 4.0.

Meanwhile on Steam, user reviews are classified as *mixed*, although the majority are negative, which seem to confirm that the PC version is the primary source of fans’ ire.

Forza Motorsport is available for Xbox Series X/S and PC.

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The controversial CEO of Activision Blizzard is set to leave the company in 2024, after he helps oversee the Microsoft acquisition.

It was no surprise when it finally came, but Activision Blizzard is now officially property of Microsoft, including mobile games publisher King and franchises ranging from Call Of Duty to Warcraft and Overwatch.

The final announcement has only been a matter of time, since Microsoft won its US court case in August, but now that it’s happened one lingering question has been resolved: what will happen to Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick.

It’s now confirmed he will leave in 2024, possibly as early as January, but that he will remain on for the rest of this year in order to ‘ensure a smooth and seamless integration.’

In the meantime, Kotick will report to Xbox boss Phil Spencer, although there’s no way that Activision Blizzard will be fully integrated into the rest of Microsoft in just a couple of months.

There have been long-running questions about Micorosft’s management of the companies it’s been buying, and Activision Blizzard is already embroiled in a scandal about its toxic workplace conditions – indeed the controversy, and its effect on the company’s share price, is the only reason Microsoft could afford it in the first place.

As a consequence of the acquisition, Kotick and the rest of the executive board have resigned as directors of the company, although many are likely to be taken back on afterwards.

All will receive significant monetary bonuses as a result of the acquisition, which is the main reason Kotick was sticking around, despite multiple attempts to remove him over the last few years.

‘Phil has asked me to stay on as CEO of ABK, reporting to him, and we have agreed that I will do that through the end of 2023. We both look forward to working together on a smooth integration for our teams and players,’ said Kotick in a statement.

Kotick has been unpopular with gamers for years, for his dismissive comments towards developers and fans alike, but he’s no better loved by his own employees, who more than once have petitioned for him to be fired.

The first was when he was responsible for almost 800 job cuts in 2019, while personally taking home $30 million a year, and then again when he was accused of purposefully underplaying details of toxic workplace conditions to the company’s executive board.

He was even personally involved in one incident, when he left a voice mail message about having one of his assistants killed, which he later described as ‘hyperbolic and inappropriate’ – before settling out of court.

The reason Kotick has been able to stay on so long, despite these and other incidents, is simple: he’s very good at making money for the company.

Activision as it exists today has barely any connection to the Activision of the 1980s, as Kotick essentially just bought the name and helped build it into the publishing empire it is today.

The only time’s Kotick’s position has ever seemed vulnerable is when the company has not been doing so well, such as during the launch of Call Of Duty: Vanguard, but that was never anywhere close enough to oust him.

Few will mourn his departure, but the fact remains that Bobby Kotick is one of the most successful video game bosses of all time and as a CEO that’s all his peers care about.

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MORE : James Corden and Bobby Kotick hint at new Guitar Hero game

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Call Of Duty and Overwatch are officially Xbox franchises, but Phil Spencer assures everyone is welcome regardless of platform.

Well, it’s happened. Over a year since the initial announcement, Microsoft has finally acquired Activision Blizzard, following the Competition and Markets Authority’s (CMA) approval earlier today.

The deadline for the deal wasn’t until Wednesday, October 18, but clearly the two companies wanted to finalise things ASAP. They were also confident the CMA would be satisfied with their recent cloud streaming concessions, since they had a fancy new trailer all primed and ready to go out.

As for what comes next, neither Xbox boss Phil Spencer nor Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick have really touched on the specifics and are so far just celebrating the completion of the deal, while also trying to assure the industry that it’s what’s best for everyone, not just Xbox owners.

‘For the millions of fans who love Activision, Blizzard, and King games, we want you to know that today is a good day to play. You are the heart and soul of these franchises, and we are honoured to have you as part of our community,’ reads a statement from Spencer.

‘Whether you play on Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo, PC or mobile, you are welcome here – and will remain welcome, even if Xbox isn’t where you play your favourite franchise. Because when everyone plays, we all win.’

This comes across as an attempt to placate fears of other platforms losing access to Activision games; something Microsoft has been insistent won’t happen. It’s why they’ve made a big deal about bringing Call Of Duty to other platforms like the Switch.

You can forgive non-Xbox fans for being sceptical though. After all, following Microsoft’s buyout of Bethesda, the studio’s newer games like Redfall and Starfield were made Xbox exclusives, and it looks like new entries in established franchises like The Elder Scrolls 6 won’t be multiplatform either.

‘As promised, we will also continue to make more games available in more places – and that begins now by enabling cloud streaming providers and players to stream Activision Blizzard games in the European Economic Area, a commitment made to the European Commission,’ adds Spencer.

He also mentions that work has begun on bringing Activision, Blizzard, and King games to Game Pass and other platforms, but doesn’t name any examples. Just that more info will be shared in the coming months.

Elsewhere in the statement, Spencer writes: ‘As one team, we’ll learn, innovate, and continue to deliver on our promise to bring the joy and community of gaming to more people. We’ll do this in a culture that strives to empower everyone to do their best work, where all people are welcome, and is centred on our ongoing commitment of Gaming for Everyone.’

As a reminder, Activision Blizzard was hit with numerous allegations of sexual harassment and abuse in 2021, prompting widespread condemnation from the industry.

This included Microsoft, although it later transpired that Spencer entered negotiations to buy Activision Blizzard just 24 hours after telling staff he was ‘disturbed and deeply troubled by the horrific events and actions’ of the company and that ‘this type of behaviour has no place in our industry.’

Meanwhile, Kotick emailed Activision employees to say, ‘This moment is possible because of your efforts over four decades to innovate, inspire, and achieve. … Your dedication is what makes it possible for us to continually push envelopes, break records, and delight players. Amid the uncertainty of the last 21 months, you’ve remained focused, as always, on serving our players and supporting each other.’

Be sure to keep this in mind if/when the layoffs start. Big mergers like this almost always involve significant redundancies and Microsoft is bound to make cuts to recoup some of the $69 billion it spent on the buyout.

However, Kotick will remain in charge, per Spencer’s request to help with the transition, though only for the rest of the year.

Unsurprisingly, neither mention the US’s Federal Trade Commission’s ongoing efforts against the acquisition but at this point, it’s hard to imagine what the FTC can do.

They obviously can’t prevent the acquisition anymore, but they can try and have it undone. With every other regulator on the planet having approved it, though, it’s going to an uphill battle.

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MORE : No Call of Duty or Activision Blizzard games on Xbox Game Pass till 2024

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If you’ve seen videos of the Israel-Hamas conflict, be careful because it may have just been gameplay from Arma 3.

While it was initially praised for its sense of realism, when it launched 10 years ago, that level of detail is now a double-edged sword for military simulator Arma 3.

It’s become almost routine for regular people, and even news outlets, to be tricked into thinking gameplay footage of Arma 3 is from an actual real-world warzone.

For the latest updates on the Israel-Hamas conflict, check out our live blog.

It happened just last year, with people using the game to spread misinformation about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and now the exact same thing is happening with the conflict between Israel and Hamas – a detail that naturally doesn’t sit well with Arma 3’s developer Bohemia Interactive.

Hundreds of Hamas militants crossed the border into Israel on Sunday, killing over a thousand civilians and taking hundreds hostage. Although the conflict between Israel and Palestine stretches back decades, this is by far the most violent incident this century and many fear it could lead to all-out war in the Middle East.

As such, Bohemia Interactive has published a blog post to alert people to the Arma 3 ‘fake news’ videos and to explain how they can distinguish them from real footage of the conflict.

For instance, fake videos are generally of much lower quality and depict blurry and pixelated footage, which is to intentionally obfuscate things. Plus, they often lack sounds, since including sound effects from the game would make it obvious that the footage isn’t real.

‘It’s disheartening for us to see the game we all love being used in this way. While we have found ways to tackle this issue somewhat effectively by closely cooperating with leading fact-checking agencies, sadly we can’t mitigate it entirely,’ says Bohemia Interactive.

The studio also thanks members of its community that have actively helped debunk such fake videos whenever they’ve popped up.

‘While it’s flattering that Arma 3 simulates modern war conflicts in such a realistic way, we are certainly not pleased that it can be mistaken for real-life combat footage and used as war propaganda,’ reads a statement from PR manager Pavel Křižka.

‘We’ve been trying to fight against such content by flagging these videos to platform providers but it’s very ineffective. With every video taken down, ten more are uploaded each day.

‘We found the best way to tackle this is to actively cooperate with leading media outlets and fact-checkers (such as AFP, Reuters, and others), who have better reach and the capacity to fight the spreading of fake news footage effectively.’

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MORE : Fake news spreads like wildfire after Israel attacks

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GameCentral reviews Sega’s new 2D Sonic The Hedgehog game, that tries to mix modern visuals with the gameplay of Sonic Mania.

Sonic The Hedgehog is a cautionary tale of how easy it is to turn a much loved, globally famous mascot, into what amounts to a warning sign for bad games. Some of that negative reputation may have been undone by two surprisingly watchable films, but more trust was earned back by 2017’s Sonic Mania – a beautifully crafted love letter to the original 1990s Sonic that comprehensively outshone its decades old inspirations.

Sonic Superstars is from different developers and eschews Mania’s delightful faux 16-bit graphical style in favour of shiny 4K. It also chucks out the £16 price tag but retains the classic fast-moving 2D side-scrolling of yore, making it a combination of new and decidedly old school. Based on its now six-year-old competitor, can it reasonably justify its much higher price point?

Starting out on Bridge Island, a setting that’s more than reminiscent of the original Sonic’s Green Hill Zone, you’ll find plenty that’s familiar. Choosing Sonic, Tails, Amy or Knuckles the Echidna, you sprint through levels that delight in sending your cartoon avatar around loops, plunging across multiple screens, and finding excuses to spin in tight circles before triggering a brightly coloured explosion.

As is traditional, you’ll be collecting gold rings, which you lose in their entirety when you run into an enemy, spikes, fire, or any number of other environmental hazards. While you can usually pick up a few remaining rings as they bounce away from you, there are also numerous dangers that will insta-kill you, sending you right back to the previous checkpoint. That’s a feature we’ll return to later.

Embedded in the familiar-feeling levels are occasional giant gold rings and what look like sparkling black holes. These lead to bonus levels where you collect more rings, find collectible Sonic medals, or swing after chaos emeralds – with each one you collect permanently unlocking a new power. These are typically ballistic, letting you briefly become a missile you can fire around the screen or triggering an army of Sonics to help take down a boss, but one emerald also shows secret platforms if any are on screen when it’s activated.

The powers are odd, in that other than the hidden platform spotting ability (which we never once managed to use successfully) the others are only ever helpful during boss fights, one of which you’ll find at the end of every act – with most worlds comprising two acts. The bosses look magnificent, most using Dr Eggman’s signature style of creating huge anthropomorphic robots to stamp and barbecue Sonic into oblivion. Unfortunately, other than their unarguable good looks, all are monumental letdowns, featuring bland attacks and little to no progression over the course of battle.

Sadly, the same is true of the mini-games, which range in quality from forgettable to annoyingly arbitrary. Although technically they’re optional, they’re used to gain the chaos emerald powers which are in turn needed to make the boss fights bearable rather than interminable, but that doesn’t mean you’re going to enjoy the process.

It’s just as well some of the levels are so good. Lagoon City, with its glorious looping waterslides and jets of water that send you tumbling through the air, and a section in Pinball Carnival that has you hopping between moving rollercoaster cars as they weave up and down, deserve special mention, but there are plenty of areas with the same spirit of riotous invention.

Superstars is also entirely at ease with ratcheting up the difficulty out of the blue, which is something of a Sonic tradition. Players familiar with Eggmanland from Sonic Unleashed will probably still wake up sweating, thinking they’re back there. In this case the difficulty comes both from ruthlessly hard sections and a strong reliance on the instant death mechanic mentioned earlier.

That’s mitigated to some degree by generous checkpointing, with markers placed directly before every section where you’re likely to spend a lot of time retrying. It also avoids the trap some past Sonics have fallen into, of placing a checkpoint without any rings nearby, effectively giving you a single life to work with on each attempt. That being said, its habit of dropping spiked blocks on your head negates any rings you may have saved up, sending you straight back to the last checkpoint.

There are a lot of new mechanisms built into levels, even if most of them simply toss Sonic into the air or, more frequently, spin him in high-speed circles. The biggest addition, though, is drop-in couch co-op with up to three friends, playable in battle and story modes.

Local co-op is a rarity on its own, but four-player really feels like a treat, the game automatically letting stragglers boost forward to join the leader if anyone falls behind. It’s unfortunate that this generation’s consoles have such expensive controllers and so few reasons to own more than two, but those considerations are hardly Sega’s fault.

With its UHD levels whipping past at light speed, and especially with a friend or two in co-op, Sonic Superstars’ occasionally creative level design is a pleasure to explore and carries a serious challenge at times. Its boss fights and mini-games are disappointingly pedestrian, and very little in this game feels as glorious as Sonic Mania, but compared to the usual output from Sonic Team even a mild success feels like a revelation.

Formats: PlayStation 5 (reviewed), Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series X/S, and PC
Price: £54.99
Publisher: Sega
Developer: Arzest and Sonic Team
Release Date: 17th October 2023
Age Rating: 3

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MORE : New Sonic and Tails Lego BrickHeadz figures coming in September

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CD Projekt admits to using AI voicework in Cyberpunk 2077, describing it as a tribute to a prominent Polish actor who had died.

AI in video game development is a contentious topic, especially when it comes to AI generated art and voice acting. No artist or voice actor is thrilled at the idea of being replaced by a robot and even the slightest hint of its use in any sort of media prompts vicious backlash from critics. Just look at peoples’ reactions to Marvel’s Secret Invasion show using AI to make the opening credits.

So, some of you will immediately be incensed upon learning that CD Projekt used AI voice work in Cyberpunk 2077, specifically to recreate the voice of an actor who died after the game’s launch.

No doubt aware that such information would prove controversial, CD Projekt stresses that this was because they wanted to ‘pay tribute’ to the actor’s performance and that they received permission from the actor’s family beforehand.

For context, the actor in question is Miłogost Reczek, who voiced Viktor Vektor (one of Cyberpunk 2077’s vendor characters) in the Polish dub.

While that name probably won’t be familiar to you, a quick look at his credits reveals he was a very prominent Polish actor, having done work across films, television, and games as far back as the 70s.

He worked with CD Projekt before on The Witcher games as the voice of Vesemer and was the Polish dub actor for Obi-Wan in the original Star Wars movies.

He died in December 2021 before he could reprise his role as Viktor for Cyberpunk 2077’s Phantom Liberty DLC and as ‘one of the best Polish voice talents,’ localisation director Mikołaj Szwed admits in a statement to Bloomberg that they didn’t like the initial idea of simply recasting him and having a new actor re-record his lines from the base game.

That said, CD Projekt did hire a new actor to voice new lines for Viktor, but then used Ukraine-based voice-cloning software Respeecher to alter the recordings so they’d sound more like Reczek.

‘This way we could keep his performance in the game and pay tribute to his wonderful performance as Viktor Vektor,’ explains Szwed, adding that Reczek’s sons ‘were very supportive’ of the idea.

It’s similar to how Darth Vader’s voice is achieved in Star Wars media, which manipulates original recordings made by James Earl Jones, now that he’s getting older and no longer sounds like he did.

It also recalls Peter Cushing’s role in Rogue One, which used a normal voice actor but recreated his appearance with CGI, after his family gave permission.

These are grey areas though and not primarily what video game voice actors are threatening to strike over. Instead, they are more concerned that in the future AI voices will be used from the start, with little or no involvement from human performers.

That or publishers will take a single initial performance and merely simulate that for all future games, with the actor receiving no additional recompense.

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MORE : Steam is banning games with AI generated art claims developer

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In what looks like a bid to reach new Game Pass subscribers, Microsoft is launching an Xbox Series S bundle at the end of October.

Only days after Sony unveiled its new slimmer model of the PlayStation 5, Microsoft has announced a new Xbox Series S bundle, just in time for the Christmas gift-buying season.

Dubbed the Xbox Series S – Starter Bundle, it launches on October 31 worldwide and includes the console, a wireless controller, and three months of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate for £249.99.

As a reminder, the Xbox Series S on its own costs £249.99, having avoided the same price hike that affected the Xbox Series X.

Since the console always comes with a controller anyway, this new bundle essentially grants you three months of Game Pass Ultimate for free. Normally, that would set you back just under £39 (one month of Ultimate costs £12.99).

Game Pass Ultimate is the highest tier available, as it covers console and PC, includes day one access to new games, and an EA Play membership.

Considering Microsoft desperately wants to bump up Game Pass numbers (Phil Spencer even says Microsoft will quit gaming if they don’t improve), this bundle looks like the company’s newest strategy.

After all, the bundle is marketed to new Xbox customers rather than existing ones and, ideally, they’ll enjoy Game Pass enough to be willing to pay for it after three free months.

Only Microsoft knows what the Game Pass subscriber count currently is, but it wants them to be at 110 million by 2030.

It’s said that subscriber numbers have stalled due to Microsoft struggling to attract new customers, but that isn’t a problem exclusive to them. Subscription services in general, such as PlayStation Plus and Netflix, are plateauing, which is probably what’s prompted these companies to start raising prices.

If you’re interested in pre-ordering the new Xbox bundle for yourself, you can do so via Microsoft’s website. It also gives you the option to add a second controller though you do need to pay extra for it.

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MORE : Xbox Activision saga is finally over as UK approves buyout of Call Of Duty maker

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Footage from the new Spider-Man and Super Mario games have appeared online, but Sony and Nintendo have attempted to take them down.

It’s already become normalised for major video games to break their street dates, prompting people to upload or stream spoiler-filled gameplay for everyone to see, but we’re still always surprised when it happens.

The most recent examples are October’s two biggest games: Spider-Man 2 and Super Mario Bros. Wonder, which coincidentally both launch next Friday.

This means you’ll need to tread carefully for spoilers, although it seems Sony and Nintendo are at least attempting to minimise the spread.

In Spider-Man 2’s case, what appears to be the game’s opening hour has been uploaded, which includes cut scenes, the first few missions, and glimpses of the suit menu (though the full line-up of suits already leaked earlier this week).

It appears the footage was initially posted to Streamable and Vimeo, although both links no longer work, with both sites saying that the footage was disabled due to claims of copyright infringement.

Vimeo makes it clear that the claim came from Sony itself, which isn’t surprising. Still, the footage hasn’t been entirely scrubbed from the Internet and is out there if you know where to look.

As for Super Mario Bros. Wonder, Twitter user LiteralPaperYT uploaded footage they recorded on their phone. Said footage has been taken down due to copyright claims, while some of their other posts were deleted entirely.

The leaker even set up a new account to continue posting footage and screenshots, but Nintendo has since taken those tweets down too.

It’s not surprising that Nintendo would be so diligent with shutting down leaks where it can. This is the same company that makes efforts to identify leakers so it can sue them.

Meanwhile, on Twitch, streamer GrandPooBear recorded themselves playing a public demo of Super Mario Bros. Wonder at a Target store in the US. This hasn’t been taken down, though, possibly because the demo is, well… public and thus doesn’t contain any info Nintendo doesn’t want people to know about pre-launch.

You’d still think that given how regular these broken street dates are that there’d be some response by retailers and/or publishers to prevent these situations. But despite how widespread an issue it is nothing ever seems to happen, with publishers apparently content to just plug leaks when they pop up.

At the very least, people getting to play their physical copies earlier than everyone else just gives the industry more incentive to switch to an all-digital future, since it can then control when people can start playing games and minimise these sorts of leaks.

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MORE : Spider-Man 2 is only 15 hours long claims leak as arguments erupt over value for money

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The CMA may have approved the Xbox Activision deal, but it warns other companies not to try and repeat Microsoft’s tactics.

Just as everyone expected, UK regulator the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has formally approved Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard.

Admittedly, the deal still hasn’t been finalised yet but now there’s nothing stopping it before Microsoft and Activision’s deadline of October 18, which is this coming Wednesday.

It’s easy to forget, considering it feels like this debacle has lasted an eternity, but this is a historic moment in not just gaming history but Microsoft’s too. At $69 billion (roughly £56.5 billion), this is both the biggest acquisition ever in gaming and the biggest Microsoft has ever made.

As a reminder, the CMA was the last real roadblock keeping the deal from happening, as it had initially blocked it due to concerns of Microsoft gaining too much control in the cloud gaming space.

Microsoft then offered a revised proposal that involved handing the cloud streaming rights for Activision Blizzard games over to Ubisoft, which appears to have been enough to win the CMA over.

‘With the sale of Activision’s cloud streaming rights to Ubisoft, we’ve made sure Microsoft can’t have a stranglehold over this important and rapidly developing market,’ says CMA chief executive Sarah Cardell.

‘As cloud gaming grows, this intervention will ensure people get more competitive prices, better services and more choice. We are the only competition agency globally to have delivered this outcome.’

That said, Cardell has strong words for Microsoft regarding how its handled the entire affair, saying, ‘Businesses and their advisors should be in no doubt that the tactics employed by Microsoft are no way to engage with the CMA.

‘Microsoft had the chance to restructure during our initial investigation but instead continued to insist on a package of measures that we told them simply wouldn’t work. Dragging out proceedings in this way only wastes time and money.’

Cardell also shuts down any insinuations that the CMA caved due to outside pressure from politicians, who weren’t thrilled about the CMA’s initial rejection of Microsoft’s deal.

‘The CMA is resolute in its determination to prevent mergers that harm competition and deliver bad outcomes for consumers and businesses. We take our decisions free from political influence and we won’t be swayed by corporate lobbying,’ adds Cardell.

Regardless, Microsoft is obviously thrilled with the result. A statement from the company’s vice chair and president Brad Smith reads, ‘We’re grateful for the CMA’s thorough review and decision today. We have now crossed the final regulatory hurdle to close this acquisition, which we believe will benefit players and the gaming industry worldwide.’

Admittedly, US regulator the Federal Trade Commission still intends on fighting against the acquisition, but it’s extremely unlikely, if not outright impossible, that it can do anything to prevent it before the deal is finalised.

While Microsoft and diehard fans will treat this news as a victory, what’s really important is what comes next. Microsoft will soon be $69 billion out of pocket and will need to make that money back through Activision Blizzard in a timely manner, to justify buying it in the first place (just think how quickly Disney started spamming out Star Wars films once it bought Lucasfilm for a mere $4 billion).

In fact, Microsoft could potentially be losing even more money if the US’s Internal Revenue Service (IRS) gets its way. As reported by Forbes, the IRS says Microsoft owes nearly $29 billion (around £24 billion) in back taxes. Unsurprisingly, Microsoft intends to contest this in the court, rather than just pay the money.

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MORE : No Call of Duty or Activision Blizzard games on Xbox Game Pass till 2024

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Yet another Soulslike tries to beat From Software at their own game, with an unlikely new reboot that desperately wants to be Dark Souls 4.

Before we start, can we just talk about the absurdity of giving this the exact same name as its predecessor from 2014? Especially as it was originally going to be The Lords Of The Fallen, but they then decided that wasn’t quite confusing enough. The original was known for being the first competent Soulslike that wasn’t by Dark Souls makers FromSoftware, but it was so similar in look and feel that it felt largely superfluous – and even more so now that such games are ten a penny.

If you’re buying clothing or other off-brand knock-offs the main benefit is that they’re considerably cheaper than the real thing, but that doesn’t happen with video games. Or at least not with anything that’s not an indie title. The most recent Souslike we reviewed was Lies Of P and that was less than a month ago; it was a shiftless clone of Bloodborne but at least its steampunk puppet theme ensured one point of difference with the game it was copying.

With Lords Of The Fallen there’s almost nothing to latch onto. It’s so desperate to look and play like Dark Souls it doesn’t allow for even a sliver of its own personality. Which means that ultimately the only real difference is that it’s just not as good. And yet because it’s a competent copy it’s not entirely without its own pleasures, which only makes things even more frustrating…

The strangest thing about the name is that Lords Of The Fallen 2 was announced almost as soon as the first game came out, but after changing developers twice it eventually got cancelled and so this is a reboot instead. Although if there’s anyone in this world, beyond the developers, who remembers the plot well enough to care whether this is a continuation or restatement we’d be very surprised. For the record, you’re trying to stop a demon god from being resurrected, or something, but it really doesn’t matter as your motivations are rarely brought up.

For anyone that has ever played a Soulslike before, you’ll know exactly what to expect from Lords Of The Fallen. The combat is almost exactly the same, as is the UI, the use of stamina and health flasks, the bonfire equivalents that allow for fast travel and levelling up, and the fact that you lose in-game currency (souls in Dark Souls, vigor in this) when you die and then have to collect it when you come back.

There are features that weren’t in Dark Souls but those are just copied from other games, such as the idea of regaining lost health by quickly counterattacking – which is clearly cribbed from Bloodborne and was also copied by Lies Of P. Oh, and you use ‘Charred Fingers’ to invade another player’s game… the whole thing is just utterly shameless.

The most distinct difference between Lords Of The Fallen and Dark Souls is the idea of there being two realities that you can move between, in other words the light/dark world concept from Zelda: A Link To The Past – always a favourite of less inspired developers. Since it is at least stolen from a non-FromSoftware game it still ends up being the most interesting part of the game, as you use a magic lantern to see the alternate layout of the dark world, including hidden switches and treasures.

You pass into the dark world automatically when you die but you can also travel into it when alive, although you’ve only got a short time until an almost unstoppable enemy appears to chase you out again (in what seems to be a nod to the Death enemy in Gauntlet). The only actually unique idea is the ability to physically rip the souls out of enemies while in the dark world, which is essential for destroying some otherwise unkillable opponents.

Apart from a temporary checkpoint that you can set-up yourself (but only fast travel from and not to), that’s the closest the game comes to anything original. Even many of the bosses are direct copies of those in other games, with the first proper encounter being such an obvious clone of Malenia from Elden Ring you begin to question whether you’re actually playing a new game or just having flashbacks to the infamously difficult original.

Lords Of The Fallen’s version is considerably easier, in fact the majority of bosses are, with most of the worst difficulty spikes coming at the end, when the game starts spamming crowds of enemies at you and reusing previous bosses as ordinary enemies. If it hadn’t done that, we would’ve said this was considerably easier than From’s games and therefore useful as a first taste of the genre for newcomers. But it’s not, so we can’t.

What makes us angry about all this is not the fact that the game hasn’t got an original idea in its head but the fact everything is copied with a frustrating degree of competence. Nothing is as good as the source material, but this is a professionally made facsimile. Developer Hexworks clearly has talent, so why are they wasting it making worse versions of things that already exist?

They clearly understand what is necessary to make a good Soulslike and they’ve got the circular level design down to a tee. But why go to all that trouble and still have you just wandering around the usual rundown castles, underground mines, poisoned swamps, and snowy ruins? We’ve seen all those things before, multiple times, so what is the point of doing it yet again but not quite as good? It’s infuriating.

What’s also infuriating is that the game suffers from serious performance issues. There’s been a series of patches during the review period, but the frame rate is still a disaster, making the game virtually unplayable at times. There’s lots of texture pop-in too and the AI frequently goes haywire. We’re also not sure whether the lock-on is just generally unreliable or if it’s being affected by the other issues.

Performance problems can be fixed but the real issue with Lords Of The Fallen will never be resolved by a mere patch. To see this much time, money, and effort wasted on such a derivative and thoroughly unnecessary game is almost painful. Lords Of The Fallen feels less like a homage to Dark Souls and more like a counterfeit, one whose creators should have used their obvious talent to far more constructive effect than this pointless forgery.

Formats: PlayStation 5 (reviewed), Xbox Series X/S, and PC
Price: £59.99
Publisher: CI Games
Developer: Hexworks
Release Date: 13th October 2023
Age Rating: 18

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The Friday letters page offers advice for keeping track of your video game backlog, as one reader praises indie game Cocoon.

To join in with the discussions yourself email gamecentral@metro.co.uk

Never say never
I don’t know what I found more offensive about that Financial Times article about Nintendo, the total arrogance and indifference towards a 134-year-old industry giant or the fact that the whole concept of the company being bought out was merely the chance to increase the stock value of other companies in Japan.

Never mind that Nintendo as we know it would be destroyed, or that Microsoft would become an unstoppable force purely as a result of having more money than anyone else, all they care about is share prices and the rich getting richer at the expense of everyone else. Did Gordon Gecko write that article or something?

I hope that Nintendo will always remain independent and will always do their own thing, whether it happens to please me or not. In fact, I hope that for all companies, rather than have them all just be subsidiaries of two or three OCP stands-in.

It worries me greatly that Phil Spencer’s leaked email talks about some American stockholder trying to slowly talk Nintendo round into letting Microsoft buying them and I hope this never comes to pass. Do you know what the chances are, GC?
Lumpy

GC: We’re not legal experts but our understanding is that it’s very low. Foreign companies can buy Japanese firms – Bethesda owns Tango Gameworks, as an example – but Nintendo don’t want to be bought and have tons of cash and broadly sympathetic shareholders. Things can change but we don’t see it happening unless there’s some sort of seismic shift in the industry or in Nintendo’s fortunes.

Zeldas all the way down
Zelda games, to me, have always achieved this magical, untouched immersion to such a high level that in my experience no other games have managed to do, and unlike other franchises most of the games have significant replay value.

Would I place Breath Of The Wild as the best game of all time? Probably not, but only because there are other Zelda games that, due to personal preference, I would rank higher, such as Majora’s Mask or The Wind Waker.

But I would absolutely say that to me, there has never been a franchise more awe-inspiring, diverse, and enjoyable as The Legend Of Zelda.
Holly

Stopping a good thing
Interesting to see how well the Switch is still selling in Japan and I can absolutely understand why. The thing is an absolute powerhouse in terms of its games line-up and I imagine being portable makes it particularly appealing to a Japanese audience that has largely given up on home consoles.

I still think the odds are that the Switch 2 will be released in late 2024 but I agree that it is not guaranteed. The Switch is consistent and reliable moneymaker and there’s absolutely nothing reliable about releasing a new console, as Nintendo, Microsoft, and even Sony will tell you.

I think it would take only a small excuse, such as component shortages or a game not being ready, for Nintendo to delay it into 2025.
Kaskade

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Keeping track
I would say I have been making a list of games I complete each year since around 2020. It used to be in the form of a Twitter thread I would update but then this year I came across a website called Backloggd.

If anyone is familiar with the website and app Letterboxd, which you track films on, it’s very similar to that. I track the games I play and you can mark them as finished the main story, 100% complete, playing, shelved, or abandoned and can also write your own reviews and make ranking lists. It’s really good. Unfortunately, there isn’t an app for it yet but I think that’s being worked on.

You can also have friends on there. If anyone wants to add me, I’m Angry_Kurt.
Angry_Kurt
Now playing: The Crew Motorfest (Xbox), F1 22 (Xbox), and Dredge (Steam Deck)

Tricks of the trade
You briefly mentioned magazine tips sections in a reply to a Reader’s letter and it got me thinking back a bit. As I remember it, there’d be a mix of tips (farming 1UP mushrooms in a Mario say) and actual cheat inputs and most were credited to readers who’d written in.

As a youngster, I was always in awe that a random player would tap away on their pad and discover an infinite life cheat or level skip or whatever but, looking back, I’m wondering if all this was a bit smoke and mirrors?

Is it not more likely that magazines were provided with these codes to help enable a full review of the whole game (games were tough in the 90s!) on the proviso of not sharing these until x number of months after release and then readers names were made up and added in to the cheats section?

I’d like a full expose on this scandalous practice please. 1,000 words by Friday.
Matt

GC: We don’t know for sure, but we think people were just cracking them and examining the game code, which likely documented the cheats.

Microsoft defenestration
Are any other PC gamers becoming frustrated with the Windows operating system, like me? I was so fed up with Windows 10 that I chose to update to 11, only for my old frustrations to be replaced by new ones.

Does any reader have experience of using a different OS on their PC? As I understand it, I should still get access to all my Steam games as they are linked to my Steam account, but do they work properly under Linux, etc.? What about games that use other launchers?

I won’t list all my issues with Windows, but the straw that broke the camels back is when I turn on my PC it will load the OS along with the start-up apps that I have chosen (let’s say Steam, Discord, Battle.net, etc.). Now, often when I do this I may want Discord to be the first thing I engage with, and the icon for it is down on the taskbar along with anything else that is loading in.

As you will know, if two or three things are loading in it will often result in one of the apps being in the foreground on the screen, and perhaps the one you want to see in the background. Usually the easiest way to get to the thing you want is simply click on the icon you want (Discord) in the taskbar, neatly bringing it to the foreground.

Only, some bright sparks at Microsoft have coded it so that all those icons play some kind of crazy dance, zipping up and down the taskbar, as they continue the loading in process.

I end up playing a kind of Windows whack-a-mole game trying to chase after the icon I want.

I appreciate that sounds a little petty, but there are many other frustrations.

I wish Blackberry made desktop OS.

I’ll get my coat.
r-s-w

GC: You should be able to press Alt+Tab to switch between all currently active apps.

Wheely good advice
I just wanted to echo GC’s response to The Dude Abides’ letter in Thursday’s Inbox, which was really helpful and much appreciated by my friends. I think the lucky child in question is likely to get a T300 now, based on that recommendation (and I have selflessly offered to go and help test it out), so a massive thank you! from all concerned.

But to make this letter slightly more obviously games-related; isn’t Cocoon amazing?! You can only wonder at the amount of effort that must go into making something that feels so elegant and intuitive. It’s just starting to make my head hurt now, mind you.

Oh, and finally – because I know how much GC like emails covering a multitude of topics… [snip! – GC]
rich_c

Justified scepticism
I read the article about GTA 6 getting an age rating in Australia and the scepticism over an imminent release out of nowhere was obvious. What kind of timeframe would you expect before the age ratings for Europe and the USA were up on the respective rating board’s websites?

That would be proof one way or another. Has such a high-profile game, or close to it, ever been released like that without any warning or marketing beforehand?

If they did do a release that way, it could be a stroke of marketing genius for obvious reasons. But I don’t see what they would gain from it. Rockstar and GTA are big enough to not need to bury the release of any other title or its reviews regardless of what it is or who is releasing it. GTA 6 will sell by the shed load, everyone knows that.

I’m not saying I believe what the age rating in Australia implies but it is an interesting possibility.
Mitchell

GC: Usually they only appear on US and European sites once they’re officially announced. South Korea, Brazil, and Australia are the only countries with a track record of revealing games before they’re supposed to.

Inbox also-rans
The production company named on those GTA Aussie ratings board listings varied from Rockstar to Discord.gg/modder to Alyanna – leading me to think it’s some kind of hack, like you suggested. Although if it is, I’m surprised we haven’t heard from the ratings board to confirm or deny this.
SteJFin

GC: We emailed them and have heard nothing back. For what it’s worth, the listings are still live as we write this.

Good day to you GC, I was just wondering whether you had any plans to review Horizon Chase 2? The first game was fantastic. Also, it is currently only available on the Switch and Apple Arcade, form what I can see. Do you know when it is going to be available on the Xbox Series X/S and PlayStation 5?
NatorDom

GC: It’s a month old now so probably not right now, but we’ll keep an eye out for other console versions, as they are supposed to be coming this year.

This week’s Hot Topic
The subject for this weekend’s Inbox was suggested by reader Fennel, who asks whether you try to beat every game you play?

There’s been a lot of debate recently, over whether video games are getting too long or bloated, but do you always try to beat them, regardless of their length? What do you count as beating the game and are you happy to move on once you’ve completed the story or do you try and 100% it as well?

How often have you given up when playing a game and what caused you to do so? What’s the shortest amount of time you played a game before giving up?

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The small print
New Inbox updates appear every weekday morning, with special Hot Topic Inboxes at the weekend. Readers’ letters are used on merit and may be edited for length and content.

You can also submit your own 500 to 600-word Reader’s Feature at any time via email or our Submit Stuff page, which if used will be shown in the next available weekend slot.

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The new models of PS5 console are smaller than the original but until a fan created comparison images it wasn’t clear how much smaller.

Sony’s announcement of its new models of PlayStation 5 was typically low key and while there were plenty of pictures of the new designs (which they didn’t specifically refer to as PS5 Slim) there were no comparison shots with the older models – which made it hard to visualise how much smaller they are.

Measurements for the new model were given though, so an enterprising fan on Reddit has created a set of images that show the size difference and it’s actually quite significant.

For some reason they’ve used 3D models rather than the official photos, which means you’ve got the original disc version next to the new Digital Edition, but it’s the size difference that’s most important and that you can see clearly.

Although the difference isn’t massive the new models are slimmer than the original versions, but Sony only rarely uses the term Slim officially – even though that’s what everyone calls them.

Both models will completely replace the older ones over time, which means there’s likely to be a lot of discounts and sales this year, as there already was during the summer.

However, while the new models are exactly the same price in Europe, the Digital Edition is $50 (£41) more expensive in the US and both are more expensive in Japan.

Europe has already seen price rises for the original consoles, so the US is still doing better as the standard version with a disc drive has still not had any price hike.

Instead, the most outrageous pricing issue with the new consoles is that if you want to stand them vertically you’ll have to buy a separate £24.99 stand.

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Despite being six years old, the Switch is somehow selling more than it did last year, which creates an unexpected issue for the Switch 2.

Any gamer knows not to try and predict Nintendo, but while their logic may often seem inscrutable it usually makes a lot more sense when you consider that Nintendo makes most of its decisions based on its home market in Japan.

That might seem unwise for a global company but it’s an approach that has served them well for decades and the fact that the Nintendo Switch has sold more consoles this year than last in Japan is likely to have a major effect on their future plans.

According to new data, Switch sales for this financial year are ahead of 2022, with demand in Japan increasing in the console’s sixth year. That means that although a 2024 launch is still the best guess for the Switch 2, it’s by no means guaranteed.

The difference in sales is small, 2.28 million compared to 2.15 million, and well off the console’s peak of a few years ago, but it’s still extremely healthy and Nintendo with be reticent about pulling the trigger on a new console when the original is still selling so well.

Switch hardware sales doubled in Japan, to 110,241 units, after the release of a Super Mario Edition of the console. Although the only thing that’s Mario about it is that both Joy-Cons are red and there’s some special printing on the back of the dock – a silhouette of Mario and some coins.

Similar special editions have also boosted sales recently in Japan, while the launch of Super Mario Bros. Wonder on October 20 should have an even greater effect.

Officially, the closest Nintendo has come to acknowledging they have new hardware in development is a vague reference last week to their ‘next console’.

They certainly haven’t said when it will be announced or when it will be released and have instead insisted there’ll be no new hardware during this financial year – which lasts until the end of March 2024.

The best evidence that the Switch 2 is on the way is that Nintendo’s release schedules are beginning to thin out, once you get into the middle of next year. Although if you go by that logic you’d also expect the PlayStation 6 to be imminent.

The truth is, no one but them has any idea what Nintendo is planning and while a late 2024 launch for the Switch does seem likely it’s definitely not a certainty.

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October is a busy time for Pokémon trainers with a new Switch game and two events with a chance to catch a brand new pokémon.

Nintendo started off October by releasing Detective Pikachu Returns on Switch, a game with quite a different feel to its predecessor.

Halfway though the month and the Japanese company is now inviting its Pokémon Go players to celebrate not just the seasons changing, but also the spooky holiday at the end of October, in a pokéfrenzy that lasts over 20 days.

The first event is Pokémon Go harvest festival, which starts October 12, followed by Pokémon Halloween, which begins on October 19. Both events are very similar, and will offer the chance to catch new pokémon and challenges.

What’s the Pokémon Go harvest festival?

The Pokémon harvest festival is an annual event between October 12 and October 17, where players can catch new and old pokémon, compete for Pokémon Showcases, and complete challenges.

This year, Smoliv, the Olive Pokémon, will make its Pokémon Go debut, and with 25 or 100 Smoliv Candy you can evolve it to Dolliv and Arboliva.

With the season changing into autumn, more leafy pokémon will appear more often during the event, like Pumpkaboo, Red Flower Flabébé, Exeggcute, and Wurmple.

There will also be research tasks and challenges to gain XP, Stardust, and lures.

What’s Pokémon Go Halloween?

Pokémon Halloween is in two parts, with the first one running from October 19 to October 26, while the second part runs from October 26 to October 31.

Although the event schedule isn’t public yet, based on previous Halloween events, we could see features like new Dark and Ghost pokémon, increased shiny odds, and, of course, more challenges.

Pokémon Halloween 2022 included pokémon like Gengar, Ninetales, and Pumpkaboo dressed up for the occasion. Last year’s event also saw Mega Banette debut in Pokémon Go, so another debut or two is likely.

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The latest entry in Sega’s popular strategy series goes back further in time than ever before, to Ancient Egypt and the Bronze Age Collapse.

Warhammer is both the best and worst thing to have ever happened to Total War. On the one hand the trilogy of strategy games are the best the series has ever been and seem to have been highly successful. On the other hand, they have made the traditional games a much harder sell, since the fantasy elements of Warhammer are much more conducive to a fun video game than dry historical detail.

Developer Creative Assembly were wise to make Total War: Three Kingdoms their first big game after Warhammer began, as it was based on both historical reality and the Dynasty Warriors style fiction of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms. China was a new setting for the series, which also helped, but so to is Ancient Egypt, and while it’s a fascinating subject matter in general it doesn’t make for a very good Total War game.

The problems here are so obvious it’s hard to understand why the concept was even greenlit, since there’s so little variety in terms of military units (the concept of the saddle hadn’t been invented yet – so there’s no calvary, just chariots). The game does what it can to spice things up, and on a strategy level it has some important successes, but it can’t get around the fact that that warfare in Ancient Egypt just wasn’t all that interesting.

While Three Kingdoms was a mainline entry in the series, there’s also been a couple of smaller games interspersed amongst the Warhammer titles, in the form of Thrones Of Britannia and Total War Saga: Troy. Pharoh is larger scale than either of those, but it still doesn’t quite feel like a main entry and has been developed by Creative Assembly’s Bulgarian studio rather than the main one in the UK.

The concept is the same as usual though, with the game being divided into a turn-based strategy element, where you oversee your kingdom in the style of games like Civilization, and then once a battle begins you control everything in real-time (unless you choose to let the computer auto-resolve a fight for you).

The game starts in the 13th century BC, leading into the Bronze Age collapse, and has you playing as either an Egyptian, Canaanite, or Hittite general, looking to carve out a new empire in North Africa and the Eastern Mediterranean. This is all handled in classic Total War fashion as you nurture cities, build facilities, raise armies, and engage in tech tree research and diplomacy with other factions.

The strategy level elements of Total War have never been as deep or complex as something like Crusader Kings but since that’s never been all they’re about their relative simplicity has always worked well to keep the series accessible for all. It’s a shame the artificial intelligence is still so weak, especially when it comes to the often random-seeming diplomacy, but otherwise the basics are by now a well-oiled machine.

What makes Pharoh more interesting is that the inevitable collapse means you and your rivals are in a constant state of turmoil, to the point that civil wars are constantly breaking out everywhere. Indeed, they are a primary means of promotion, for you personally, and a major opportunity for your armies. This is codified in a Legitimacy rating that is increased by winning battles, constructing buildings, and gaining friends in diplomacy and trade.

Becoming Pharoh can be surprisingly easy but staying Pharoh is another matter entirely and it’s not at all unusual to win the throne early on, get usurped, and have to win it back again later. With a coterie of lesser positions, like Grand Vizier and First Commander, to handle and a surprisingly complex economy, this is arguably the most interesting Total War’s strategy level gameplay has ever been.

It helps that the collapse is unavoidable and no matter what you do you’ll have to contend with marauding Sea Peoples by the time it gets to the endgame. That makes the tone and nature of the campaign all the more interesting, although it’s a shame the characters aren’t as wild and flamboyant as in Three Kingdoms – although that and the traditionally weak AI is the only real fault of the strategy level gameplay.

The problem with the battles is simply that all the units are so similar, which Creative Assembly can do nothing about. They try, with a greater importance placed on changing weather conditions and new stances allowing you to modify a unit’s tactics, but that doesn’t make nearly enough difference.

It’s a similar problem to first person shooters, which are very rarely set pre-Second World War and almost never earlier than the First World War. There are lots of interesting stories to tell in earlier periods (we’d love a Napoleonic era action game if it was presented like Sharpe) but the technology of the time just doesn’t work with the conventions of the genre.

That’s the intractable problem that Total War: Pharoh is unable to circumvent and in doing so it only makes it even harder to get excited about whatever the next mainline historical game will be. Unfortunately, Warhammer was just too damn entertaining and Three Kingdoms only helped to underline the fact that the more fantastical Total War gets the more varied and fun it is.

It’s an interesting insight into the whole science of making realistic video games, from sports sims to military shooters. Do you sacrifice realism for entertainment and if you don’t how far can you take it before the game is just no fun to play? Total War: Pharoh is entertaining, but the historical period would’ve been much better served by a different style of game and the improvements to the strategy level gameplay by an entirely different setting.

Formats: PC
Price: £49.99
Publisher: Sega
Developer: Creative Assembly Sofia
Release Date: 11th October 2023
Age Rating: 16

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EA’s newly released football simulator is busy squashing bugs and making changes to gameplay in its third update.

By all accounts EA Sports FC 24 has already proven a major success and entirely justified EA’s decision to ditch the FIFA name. Multiple updates have already been released but this week’s is the biggest yet, patching up various problems with Ultimate Team, Clubs and Careers mode, PlayStyles, audio and visuals, and gameplay.

It’s normal for games to release patch updates soon after release, but this is a huge one – so get ready for lots of changes.

The fixes include PlayStyles being nerfed, players disappearing from the game, the return of Ada Hegerberg, and lots more.

For Ultimate Team, one of the big fixes is that Ada Hegerberg, the 89-rated forward, is coming back into the game. The Norwegian has been unplayable because of bugs that saw her move away from the ball when dribbling.

Another big issue addressed in this update is how players could disappear completely after a red card or substitution in the game.

The update, which will available for Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch, and PC, includes no less than 120 patch notes.

As far as gameplay fixes, we’ll now see slight changes to defending, passing, and refereeing decisions, to name a few.

The speed will increase while jockey defending (facing the opponent by holding L2/LT trigger) and the ball will also travel further when you’re clearing the ball.

EA has also tweaked the referee’s logic when determining fouls and offsides in certain situations.

If a player has the Pinged Pass PlayStyle they’ll see a reduced travel speed on their passes. And if a player has the Long Throw PlayStyle they’re more likely to be automatically selected when taking throw-ins.

EA Sports FC 24 will also get an update to stadiums, sound effects, boots, crowd noises, and more.

The list of tweaks is far too long to go through here, but you can see the full patch notes here.

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A high school teacher and streamer says he was fired after a former guild member revealed his stream to the school.

Popular streamer BlueSquadron has been the centre of attention on social media, after losing his teaching job when a former teammate sent clips of his channel to the school.

He reportedly had a falling out with a guild member in Black Desert Online, a guild he’s no longer a part of, despite being with them for four years.

During a recent stream and on social media, BlueSquadron laid out the details of how it all went down and why he’s not surprised he was sacked.

BlueSquadron told his viewers on Twitch:

‘I got fired today from my teaching job. At the end of the day I got called into the office and the principal said: ‘Blue, I tried, but they’re making a stink about it.’

He went on to say that he knew it was only a matter of time before he’d lose his job once they knew about his stream. but not because his channel is overly explicit.

In a Reddit post, he explained how a sexist gaming community doesn’t go well with being a teacher.

‘I don’t do any sort of even remotely NSFW [not safe for work] content on my platform. I do however stream a game and the gaming community is, let’s be honest, incredibly sexist and objectifies women in a lot of ways. If I make any sort of remark, comment, or even look at a character in a video game in a sexual light, it isn’t necessarily appropriate for highschoolers.’

BlueSquadron also said I’d be impossible to upkeep professionalism as a teacher now that everyone knows he’s a streamer:

‘Also understand that there is a sense of professionalism and respect that is required in the classroom to be a teacher. When students are able to see you cussing belligerently at degenerates online that sense of professionalism is gone and so is the respect. To be clear, at no point did any of that interfere with any of my classroom duties or responsibilities. Until about 3 days ago no one had any idea I was a content creator.

‘Once the two worlds collided however, it was doomed. Parents will just complain too much and then I would be trying to censor EVERYTHING to a G rated level which simply is not possible in the gaming space.’

He went on to say he still loves the school and that he’ll now double-down on content creation. You can read the full Reddit post below.

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Box art for Princess Peach: Showtime! has been altered so that Peachy looks more like her appearance in The Super Mario Bros. Movie.

It my not have been a great film but The Super Mario Bros. Movie was hugely successful, and we don’t envy anyone the task of trying to turn a video game series with virtually no plot into an accessible film that anyone can enjoy.

Everyone knows who characters like Mario and Peach are but in the games they usually have little or no dialogue, and their visual designs are almost impossible to take seriously.

The film did a good job of making them work though, without changing anything substantial, and it seems Nintendo is so happy with the results that they will influence future game designs, starting with next year’s Princess Peach: Showtime!

When Showtime! was first unveiled Peach had her traditional look, although the game’s main gimmick revolves around her putting on different outfits – from cook to kung fu master – that give her different abilities.

The key art for the game showed her with her usual narrow mouth and oval eyes, but an eagle-eyed fan has noticed that the design has subsequently been changed, to something closer to the movie.

Only the facial features have been altered, but the kung fu outfit also has an angrier face and the swordfighter is also very subtly different.

Whether Nintendo would’ve done things completely different if they were starting the image from scratch is hard to say, but it’s going to be interesting to see if she’s characterised more like Peach in the movie – who was considerably more feisty than usual.

Alternatively, this could just be an example of Nintendo of American making its characters look angrier in its box art than those for Japan or Europe. That’s something that’s been going on for decades and Kirby, in particular, is always treated that way, so maybe this is just an extension of that.

There doesn’t seem to be any influence from the movie in the upcoming Super Mario Bros. Wonder, for Peach, Mario, or any of the others, but there may not have been enough time for that, given the game was probably substantially finished by the time the film came out.

The character that had the biggest redesign was Donkey Kong, with Nintendo implying that his new design, which is a mix of his old and post-Rare look, would be used for new games going forward.

There’s no attempt to use it in the Mario Vs. Donkey Kong remake but other than that there hasn’t been a new Donkey Kong game in years, with Nintendo completely ignoring his 40th anniversary and rumours of a new 3D game so far not coming to pass.

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MORE : Super Mario Bros. Wonder preview – game of the year contender

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Twitch has started rolling out a new feature that lets streamers block viewers from watching them, but it’s not exactly foolproof.

In a recent tweet, Twitch has announced that streamers will now have the option to block banned viewers from watching their content live, a feature the community has been asking for for a long time.

Although it’s a sought-after feature for streamers, it doesn’t change a lot for the banned viewers.

With some very simple browser gymnastics, a banned viewer can still easily watch the stream, just not chat in it.

A banned viewer can simply pull up the livestream in incognito mode, or watch without being logged in.

Banned viewers are also only banned from watching live streams, which means they can still watch older recordings and clips from the channel they’re banished from.

This effectively means that the only thing banned viewers miss out on is chatting during livestreams.

Besides pointing out the incognito elephant in the room, streamers have been positive to the addition – calling it a step in the right direction.

Although the loopholes are glaringly obvious, forcing people to sign in to watch livestreams or old recordings could be the next step to properly block banned viewers.

For now though, at least they’ll lose their chatting privileges and hopefully reconsider their actions.

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A Financial Times article suggests that Japan should encourage the sell of Nintendo to a Western company, as a form of ‘shock therapy’.

Of all the many revelations (many of them accidental) from Microsoft’s US legal battle, over whether or not it can buy Activision Blizzard, the one that provoked the most outrage was the revelation that Xbox secretly wanted to buy Nintendo, calling them ‘the prime asset’.

They didn’t, obviously, but the patronising way in which Xbox boss Phil Spencer described his machinations (since he never expected his comments to be made public) angered many fans. But not, apparently, other business experts.

According to a new Financia Times article, ‘Japan should think about selling Nintendo as both intellectual experiment and shock therapy.’ The logic being that, ‘The more unthinkable such a sale might sound, and the more horrifying the prospect of relinquishing a crown jewel, the more valuable the whole thought process becomes for less flashy troves of corporate excellence.’

The article is essentially a thought experiment – ‘Japan’ can’t sell anything – but it’s written in such a disrespectful tone it also seems as if it’s specifically designed to upset Nintendo fans and gamers in general.

The logic is that the Japanese stock market in general lacks vigour and discourages acquisitions, which the Financial Times, and Western companies, see as a negative.

‘A sale process of Nintendo would be transformative – not least because it might convince consolidation-resistant Japanese companies to seek scale and protection through mergers,’ reads the article.

As far as the Financial Times is concerned it doesn’t necessarily have to be Microsoft that buys Nintendo, with Disney, Apple, Google, and Sony also suggested as possible suitors.

‘For Japan as a whole, the intensely high profile of a Nintendo sale would finally crystallise the sense of how undervalued many of its crown jewels really are – and how many smaller jewels are being sold to private equity and others at bargain prices.’

It’s suggested that the sale could be the equivalent of when Sony bought Columbia Pictures in 1989, which was seen as a wake-up call to America, as to the size and ambition of Japanese companies.

‘There is a risk that Japan’s stock market has painted itself into a corner where only disruption will do. Until this actually comes, the country could do worse than think about how positive a disruptive Nintendo sale might be,’ concludes the article.

At no point does it consider what affect this might have on the games industry, with its only concern being that it reenergises the Japanese stock market and makes Japanese companies in general more open to mergers and acquisitions – essentially that Nintendo should be sacrificed as an example to others.

It’s all very grotesque but it is only a suggestion, that is not necessarily to be taken seriously. What it also illustrates though is how uncaring the corporate mentality is towards the companies it buys, with no concern paid to the fact that Nintendo doesn’t want to be bought and works much better as an independent company.

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The Thursday letters page contemplates the idea of Disney buying EA, as one reader offers some very detailed advice on racing wheels.

To join in with the discussions yourself email gamecentral@metro.co.uk

Late night
After Gale seduced my female avatar into a passionate night amongst the stars, in a dazzlingly array of charm (and magic mushroom infused hallucinations) last night, I’ve decided that Baldur’s Gate 3 really is a truly great game. Not fabulous because there’s nudity, or that I’d led Astarion and Lae’zel on into a fling earlier in Act 1, but because it was all treated in a mature yet wonderfully surreal video game way.

Much like the rest of the game, it plays like an original game. It’s saturated with soaking wet video game vibes. And not merely aping the movies. All the more fantastic because I’d just snuck out the Tiefling prisoners from Moonrise Towers in a feat of derring do.

I’d saved Thaniel whilst completing the Shar trials, which was interspersed with striking a bargain with Balthazar, so one was in need of a rest at camp. What better way than to have a gloriously entertaining video game romance blossom.

Although Halsin’s looking quite the catch now that he can be recruited.
Wonk

Join The Crew
I feel like I need to defend The Crew Motorfest. I picked up a copy last week and I’ve genuinely been having an absolute blast playing it. Now, I realise that it’s not perfect, but as a huge fan of racing games there hasn’t really been that much to get excited about this year.

F1 23, though, was actually really good, with the return of Braking {oint and a greatly expanded F1 world, but racing games themselves seem to be getting fewer and further between! In the last gen I had both a PlayStation 4 and Xbox One and mainly tended to play Forza Motorsport and Horizon games on the Xbox. But this time around I picked the PlayStation 5, intending to pick up an Xbox Series X/S at some point down the line. So in that respect Motorfest fills a void quite nicely for me and scratches that Forza Horizon itch.

Yeah, the handling models aren’t amazing, the AI can be up and down, and having to always be online seems completely pointless, but is it at least fun to play? I’d have to definitely say, yes. There is definitely a good game in there somewhere.
Rickandrolla (PSN ID)

Disney product
I’m finding it hard to care one way or the other about Disney buying EA, they’re both soulless megacorps who’s products I have almost zero interest in. One of the few exceptions is Dead Space from EA which I absolutely cannot imagine Disney publishing.

Mind you, I also can’t imagine EA making Disney-themed games either. Star Wars and Marvel, sure, but not cute Mickey Mouse stuff. Apart from maybe The Sims (I’m not really clear who that’s aimed at) I can’t really think of any family-orientated stuff they’ve done.

I still blame Microsoft for all this. They started this stampede to buy up every company and we’re going to end up in a position where everyone is owned by one of three or four different companies. Take-Two and Rockstar will be next, mark my words.
Keith Barcode

E-mail your comments to: gamecentral@metro.co.uk

No change
Well hello strangers. It only seems five minutes ago when I was pre-ordering the very first original Oculus Quest and talking about it here on GameCentral. Gosh how time flies by, hey? So, we are now on the third iteration/generation of headset and I see everything is completely improved, right down to the hardware design and internal specifications etc.

However, just one thing though and I think it’s one of the main critical issues of anything that’s either mobile or electronic… the battery life! If I remember correctly the battery life on the latest piece of kit is no shorter than the previous headsets before it. But it’s also not any longer than them either?

You see with the brand new Qualcomm processor running the whole unit, I would of thought, especially in this day and age, the battery life would of been improved if anything, due to the chipset being less and less power hungry, even if it was let’s say just 20% more power efficient?
JAH

GC: It’s about two hours, so roughly the same as before.

Never go back
Interesting letter from Shahzaib Sadiq in the Wednesday Inbox. It’s relevant to me because I’ve been right into The Witcher 3 on PlayStation 5.

I was talking to someone about the end of the quest, at the theatre where Dijkstara’s brain falls out of his bum. Apparently, there is a mod where Doppler mutagen is looted from his corpse to give some semblance of an explanation for it.

The point is, I was called a bad human being if I’d played The Witcher 2 and left my man Roche to die at the theatre. So I gave it a shot and I’m struggling.

I turned the difficulty down to easy just to get the story but I’m only able to play in short bursts. I think the jump from Xbox 360 to PlayStation 5 is too jarring for any immersion in the game on my part. I’ll see it through because I paid for it, and I do like the world building and lore. But I can’t say I’m enjoying the gameplay itself.

I have as much respect for what came before as anyone that reads GC, but I’ve never liked going back to games I played years ago. I always end up disappointed and wiping out good memories.

I take my metaphorical hat off to anyone that can enjoy both modern games and those from the legacy systems as well.

I think that fits the definition of a real gamer better than someone beating Melania in their Y-fronts, dual-wielding Rivers of Blood.
Mitchell

GC: Good luck to anyone that hasn’t played The Witcher, when it comes to understanding those first few paragraphs.

Outside help
It’s often said in these pages, and others, that’s it’s really useful to read a wiki or other guide online when starting a game with many layers of complexity, at least when starting out, to prevent frustration at your lack of progress or understanding of the game.

This got me thinking; do you think developers have that in mind when designing their games? Rewinding to the 80s and 90s the best we got was some hints and tips in one of the monthly mags, or a map of sorts if you were lucky, unless you wanted to shell out more money on a dedicated guidebook or call a tips hotline.

Yeah, there was playground chat on popular titles on how to complete a game in an hour, but that often came from the Jay-like character from the Inbetweeners and not to be relied on. Some of the games made in the last 10/15 years are so complex that a wiki is required reading before starting a game, to at least give you a heads up on the main mechanics and layers of systems you need to know to have a decent chance of progressing. Some of the titles do a decent job of explicitly showing you these, some are more weaved into the gameplay and others tell you very little.

Of course, these days there are YouTube videos, GameFAQs, and dedicated fan sites to help the beginner find their way. So without the internet, would games be as complex as they are, i.e. would some of these games have existed 30 or 40 years ago where there was little in the way of assistance (notwithstanding the technical shortfalls of making such a game then)?

I’m just trying to get into the head of a modern day developer and wondering whether they know that they can make a mechanic somewhat obtuse as they know someone, somewhere will get it and will eventually be published on the internet for others to dig into and widen the understanding of.
TheTruthSoul (PSN ID)

GC: Paid-for game guides and lengthy tips sections in magazines have been a thing since the 8-bit era.

Power vs. content
Thank you for the review of the Meta Quest 3. I’m curious which set you would pick out of the two: the Quest 3 or the PlayStation VR2?

The former has a lot of games but lacks the tech that the latter has. I had preordered the PlayStation VR 2 but cancelled it as there were very few games I was interested in.
Rave

GC: It sounds like you’ve answered your own question.

Expert opinion
The answer to Rich_c’s question is, as ever with these things, complex and, in the sim racing community, divisive.

There are really two main companies that will provide a decent starter force feedback (FFB) wheel (and you really want FFB). Bear in mind it’s not just about the wheel, but also the pedals.

For info, I have a Logitech G920 with a spring modification on the pedals, racing on PC.

Logitech
Probably the one everyone knows, they make solid starter wheels based on toothed gear technology on all their entry level wheels to provide the FFB (they now do a direct drive (DD) wheel – but at £1,000 I’m guessing that’s out of budget). This results in slightly notchy feel to the wheel when turning and is a little bit noisy (I wear headphones so it doesn’t bother me). However, the geared technology is rock solid and very rarely goes wrong. (I still have working Logitech wheels from about 2005 and 2010.) They have real leather wheels with an aluminium core, metal microswitch operated flappy paddles, and 900° rotation.

For PlayStation 5 you have two options:

G29 – This is their most base model, lacking Truforce, but it still offers decent FFB and is a very popular wheel with about 2.2nm of force (fine for most people). You can usually pick one up for £170 to £200.

G923 – This is the Truforce model – the latest gear driven model released in 2020. In order to use Truforce games have to be written to take advantage of it and to be honest not all racing games are. However, reading reviews where games do use it (and the latest F1 game will) it does create more immersion; same 2.2nm of force. You can usually get one for between £280 to £300.

Whether that immersion is worth the extra money is, I guess, up to the individual.

The pedal set up is, I believe, the same across the board: three pedal potentiometer set-up, including clutch. Be aware that there is rubber stopper on the brake pad that some people don’t like, but this can be removed or the springs replaced with a mod.

An additional separate gear shifter is available as an optional extra, useful if you are ever likely to use multi-car sims that have manual gearbox cars. If you’re sticking to F1 not so much, unless you drive classic F1 cars from before the 90s. Again, this can be modded as the gear change is a bit soft.

Thrustmaster
They offer variety of entry level wheels, using hybrid or belt driven FFB systems it is generally considered they offer a smoother, more realistic FFB. But they are also often slightly cheaper build quality and from what I can see they don’t generally last as long as the Logitech kit. (This is purely info from sim racing communities I am in, I have no experience of this). One thing you are able to do with Thrustmaster kit though is upgrade pedals – useful as this is something that, once you get the sim racing bug, can make a big difference to racing.

T128 – The most entry level and a hybrid (mix of gears and belt). Offering decent force feedback in a very plasticky wheel. Build quality is what you would expect for the price. Pedals consist of a plastic two pedal set that are considered by one pro review to be ‘pretty rubbish ‘. Still, you can get a full FFB wheel for £130 from Argos on sale at the moment! Nothing even comes close at that price!

T248 – probably the Thrustmaster sweet spot, it’s about £220 but is a significant step up from the T128. Although it uses the same hybrid gear system (which is apparently quite noisy) it offers an array of buttons, a digital display and uses significantly better quality build materials than the T128 – although apparently still not as good build quality as the Logitech kit that’s similarly priced. The gear change is also compared unfavourably to the Logitech kit. The real winner here are the pedals; it comes with Thrustmaster’s own T3PM pedals: three magnetically actuated pedals (clutch included) which retail for about £120 if bought separately.

Apparently, the hybrid system is quite grindy and noisy but offers better FFB sensation than Logitech.

If it’s in budget, without a doubt the daddy of entry level wheels is considered to be the T300, but it is £330 – or £360 for the RS GT edition with better pedals. A fully belt driven wheel, offering smoother FFB, an interchangeable wheel, meaning you can buy and swap out different wheels for different games.

Thrustmaster also offer their own manual shifter, called the TH8A. I’ve used it, it is significantly better than the Logitech equivalent, but then it should be as it’s three times the price at £150.

Unless you go down the PC route no company’s kit is interchangeable with another manufacturers.

I’m sure someone else can give more insight as to the intricacies of the Thrustmaster kit, I’ve always used Logitech and got on great with it.

Do bear in mind, the pedals and wheel need to be attached to something that won’t move. A foldable rig or something of that ilk may be a good idea, for example the Playseat Challenge. At the very least a wheel and pedal mount are likely unless you can find a Heath Robinson solution or don’t mind your pedals shifting as you use them! (You will mind.)

Most of these wheels look like they are on sale right now – may be Amazon Prime day related. But they do generally seem to go on sale quite a lot.

There are higher end manufacturers: Fanatec, Simcube, Moza, and the like. But they are not entry level, no matter what some in the sim racing community may think, and don’t always play nice with consoles.

Check out independent reviews of the wheels and manufacturers I’ve mentioned, that may help in the decision making. There are a few sim racing sites that may help too, like Traxion, that offer reviews from a sim racing perspective and advice on set-up.

One other thing, some people initially struggle with the switch from controller to wheel, but once you’ve got the hang of it you will never go back!

Have fun gaming y’all!
The Dude Abides

GC: That is a very detailed answer, thank you for going to so much effort.

Inbox also-rans
Fallout and Skrim called, they have the ‘Y’ button for jumping on Xbox. Talk about confusion after playing any other game. True, they can be remapped, but that’s another issue.
Bobwallett

I know there’s no point asking why, about the whole James Corden/Guitar Hero thing but… why? Did they end the meeting with a money fight and then unicorn on toast?
Lonnie

This week’s Hot Topic
The subject for this weekend’s Inbox was suggested by reader Fennel, who asks whether you try to beat every game you play?

There’s been a lot of debate recently, over whether video games are getting too long or bloated, but do you always try to beat them, regardless of their length? What do you count as beating the game and are you happy to move on once you’ve completed the story or do you try and 100% it as well?

How often have you given up when playing a game and what caused you to do so? What’s the shortest amount of time you played a game before giving up?

E-mail your comments to: gamecentral@metro.co.uk

The small print
New Inbox updates appear every weekday morning, with special Hot Topic Inboxes at the weekend. Readers’ letters are used on merit and may be edited for length and content.

You can also submit your own 500 to 600-word Reader’s Feature at any time via email or our Submit Stuff page, which if used will be shown in the next available weekend slot.

You can also leave your comments below and don’t forget to follow us on Twitter.

MORE : Games Inbox: PS5 Slim improvements, the next Zelda, and Silent Hill 2 Director’s Cut

MORE : Games Inbox: Spider-Man 2 being too expensive, The Last Of Us Part 3, and Sonic Frontiers love

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Something very strange is going on in the world of GTA 6 rumours, as the game gets an age rating that usually means the launch is imminent.

We have to admit, we don’t for a moment believe this new Grand Theft Auto 6 rumour, and yet we’re at a loss as to how to disprove it. Rather than some random fan or leaker, the source is the official website of the Australian Age Rating Board, and it somehow has multiple listings for the game.

Our best guess is that the website has been hacked, as even passing it off as a mistake doesn’t make any sense, as no one accidentally types in Grand Theft Auto 6 as the name of a game.

And yet there it is, bold as brass, which is very, very strange given that video games usually only appear on age rating website months, or sometimes only weeks, before their release.

As if that wasn’t strange enough, the game has been given a MA 15+ rating and not the maximum MA 18+, despite it being described as including ‘ Strong Sex Scenes’ and ‘Strong Drug Use.’

Despite what you might imagine, Australia has some of the strictest censorship guidelines in the Western world and, until recently, regularly banned any games featuring drug use, sex, or excessive violence.

The game was supposedly submitted to the age rating board on April 2 and you can see the listing here. There’s also a second listing with the same information, that was submitted a few days earlier on March 29, and, as if that wasn’t enough, listings for Grand Theft Auto 6 Online and a Grand Theft Auto 6 beta.

It must be a mistake or fake of some kind, as while stranger things have probably happened, than a GTA 6 shadow drop in the middle of the Christmas games rush, we can’t think of any offhand.

Fans were hoping for the first teaser trailer this month though, so perhaps one explanation could be that that’s what this is – and it’s been mistakenly listed as the game itself.

However, we don’t see any other examples of listings for trailers on the website and that doesn’t really explain the listing for a beta.

If the game suddenly does launch out of nowhere in the next couple of weeks though, at least you can thank the Australian government for a bit of advance warning.

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GameCentral looks back at Sony’s earlier Spider-Man games and the importance of the new sequel to their increasingly barren release schedules.

You don’t need us to tell you that Sony has been acting very oddly for a very long time now. As a reader pointed out recently, it is now over two years since they announced a new single-player game and the only title they currently have confirmed in development is Marvel’s Wolverine (even if job ads have made it clear that things like Ghost Of Tsushima 2 are also underway).

Not only is it years since Sony announced anything of substance but even when they do say something it’s via insipid little blog posts, like this week’s reveal of the long-rumoured PS5 Slim consoles. The lack of showmanship is extraordinary for a company that used to be famed for it and given how lacklustre its last several State of Play events have been there’s little reason to think the situation would be improved with more of them.

It’s pointless to speculate further on why Sony is acting like this, as people have been trying to understand their logic for months now and are still none the wiser. Although perhaps now that PlayStation boss Jim Ryan is leaving, in March next year, things will change under his replacement. By then Spider-Man 2 will be out and it’s going to be very interesting to see where Sony’s reputation stands at that point.

Rather than any of their home-made IP, like God Of War or The Last Of Us, it is 2018’s Spider-Man which is the best-selling Sony exclusive of all-time. That’s surprising in many ways, not least because a) it’s far from the best first party PlayStation title and b) most other recent Marvel games have been conspicuous flops.

The first Spider-Man was by no means a bad game – we gave it 7/10 in our original review – but even though it technically didn’t have any connection to previous Spider-Man titles it was very reminiscent of Activision’s classic Spider-Man 2 and all its derivatives, from the open world New York City to the web-swinging mechanics and predictable collection of villains.

Perhaps less forgivably, it also stole shamelessly from the Batman: Arkham games in terms of combat and, in particular, stealth – despite the two characters being very different types of superhero. Despite taking inspiration from such lauded titles, the original Spider-Man also suffered from a lack of depth and variety, which are problems common to most games from developer Insomniac Games, who were previously best known for Ratchet & Clank series and Sunset Overdrive.

It still wasn’t a bad game, but it was definitely a rung or two below Sony’s other first party titles, including in terms of the dry and confusing storytelling (we still don’t understand what Mr Negative’s powers actually are). Its familiarity is likely to have been one of the secrets of its success though, together with the fact that, MCU or not, Spider-Man is currently the world’s favourite superhero.

The immediate follow-up to Spider-Man came in 2020, with a ‘half-sequel’ called Spider-Man: Miles Morales – which we enjoyed considerably more than the original. Its shorter length was purely because Sony needed something new for the PlayStation 5 launch, but that restriction inspired much more cohesive storytelling from Insomniac and a much more interesting relationship between Spider-Man and the main villain – who was not someone you’d already fought a dozen times before in previous games.

Everything seemed much more tightly designed, including the open world side missions which didn’t bog you down with constant repetition and menial tasks. We had hoped that the idea of the half-sequel would be used by Sony and others as a means to combat the increasing costs, in terms of time and money, of making modern AAA games but while there has been some whispers of that recently it’s yet to become a trend.

And yet Insomniac has been happy to admit that Spider-Man 2 is not a 100+ hour epic and has done nothing to correct rumours that its main story can be completed in around 15 hours. On the contrary, they’ve used the fact that it’s not filled with needless bloat as a selling point, promoting it as a game that is not trying to become a second job and which can be played and finished within a reasonable period of time.

That alone is hugely encouraging, even if some fans have had qualms about the gameplay footage that has been shown so far. In keeping with Sony’s new hermit status, relatively little has been released but some people have been concerned that the action looks overfamiliar, even old-fashioned, despite the obviously state-of-the-art visuals. Sony has also been a little vague as to how the game handles the fact that you control both Peter Parker and Miles Morales, although that will become clearer at the review stage.

If the lessons are learned from the first two games, then Spider-Man 2 has the potential to be Insomniac’s best game yet, but its arrival amidst the wasteland of Sony’s current release schedules will also make it an important milestone for the whole PlayStation brand. Although it lacks any sad dads (unless you count Norman Osborne) Spider-Man 2 seems to be the epitome of Sony’s approach to single-player games, with its cutting edge visuals, easily accessible gameplay, and high concept story and characters.

The question that will come after Spider-Man 2 is whether such games will continue to thrive in the future, or if Sony will make good on its threat to concentrate on live service games, a policy that seems to have unravelled even before it’s begun. Either way, the success of Spider-Man 2, both critically and commercially, will play a large part in determining the future direction of PlayStation exclusives, and it’s all thanks to a franchise and characters that Sony doesn’t even own.

Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 launches as a PlayStation 5 exclusive on October 20.

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MORE : All the unlockable Spider-Man 2 suits have already leaked online

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MORE : A second, cheaper PS5 Spider-Man 2 console bundle is out this month

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Fortnite has four new spooky weapons for Halloween and they’re relatively easy to obtain if you know where to look.

The Halloween-themed Fortnite event is here again and that means players can expect new, time-limited challenges; special characters, skins, weapons; and maybe a fright or two.

Fortnitemares runs from October 10 to November 3 and sees players scurrying to find the new, special weapons to gain a necessary advantage.

One of the special weapons this year is Thorne’s vampire blade, and you won’t be able to find it just laying around or inside chests.

Where is Thorne’s vampire blade in Fortnite?

To get the vampire blade you have to defeat its owner and treasure-hunting bad guy Revenant Kado Thorne, who you’ll find north west on the map, by the time machine at Eclipsed Estate. This is a bit of a challenge, so make sure you come prepared with plenty of guns ‘n’ ammo.

Once you’ve dealt with Thorne, he’ll drop the vampire blade and you can take full advantage of the Mythic weapon.

The vampire blade doesn’t just deal a lot of damage to your opponent, it simultaneously heals you as you hit your enemies.

If blades aren’t your thing then there are three other special weapons you can look out for: the Wood Stake Shotgun, the Pumpkin Launcher, and the Witch Broom can all be found on the ground and in chests.

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MORE : Counter-Strike 2 is now the worst rated Valve game ever

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Valve’s remake of the classic shooter has seen a sharp influx of negative reviews on Steam since launch.

Since the release of Counter-Strike 2 – after 11 years with Counter-Strike: Global Offensive – players have flocked to Steam to review the new, ever so slightly different version of the game.

Valve promised that the sequel/remake would usher in a ‘a new era of Counter-Strike’ and ‘the largest technical leap forward’ in the franchise’s history, with a new game engine, reimagined visuals, and new smoke effects.

But a lot of people haven’t been as accepting of the new changes as Valve might’ve hoped, and it shows in the reviews.

Counter-Strike 2 is now categorised as ‘Mixed’ under its Recent Reviews tab, which is the first time any Valve game has been rated that low.

Other Valve games like Half-Life, Portal, Left 4 Dead, and Team Fortress 2 boasts recent reviews ranging from ‘Very positive’ to ‘Overwhelmingly positive’.

It’s getting worse too, ever since Counter-Strike 2 launched on September 27, the number of negative reviews has sky-rocketed.

On September 28 Counter-Strike 2 received 9,991 negative reviews on Steam. While the game received 11,658 positive reviews on the same day, the increase in negative reviews compared to normal is significant.

Some players are complaining about having a game they once paid for be forcefully replaced with a game they didn’t ask for. Others are complaining about it being unplayable on Mac or calling it ‘a failed attempt to modernise the game’.

‘The vibrant and cartoony aesthetic clashes with the gritty and realistic atmosphere that CS:GO was known for. It feels like a departure from the game’s roots, and not in a good way,’ says a user on Steam named Babe.

‘CS:GO 2’s latest update feels like a misguided attempt to modernize a classic game,’

Another negative review, by ThoughtSpiral, says: ‘I get most of the reasoning behind most of it, but where’s War Games, why cut off all the three players who are on Mac, why kill CS:GO before CS2 is actually ready for tourney level play. What is going on?’

Change can be uncomfortable and that could be a part of the influx of negative reviews, especially as Counter-Strike 2 is still receiving more positive reviews than negative ones.

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MORE : Valve officially launches Counter-Strike 2 as Global Offensive ceases to exist

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