Month: June 2023

Season 17, Episode 21

Just as a note – there is no show for next week.

As for this show, we dive right into everything we never got around to from the last episode. We finally cover all over what the not-E3 had to offer as well as go through all the things we’re finding out from the FTC vs Microsoft case for the purchase of Activision/Blizzard.

It’s a lot crammed into less than 2 hours of show and we barely touched on anything we played (I actually did put in time with other games/demos besides Destiny).

All in all, this is a pretty big year for games. Whatever has aligned has given us TWO new entries into the grandfathers of fighting games with Street Fighter 6 and MK1. A new entry into the Final Fantasy series. A new Zelda game, Assassin’s Creed and Starfield is yet to come.

Hopefully there’s something in the mix you’ll be enjoying or looking forward to.

As for me, I’m still waiting for another Sam Fisher game. Ubisoft, it has been 3,583 days since a new Splinter Cell game (non-animated series or guest spot in another game franchise, remake, BBC radio drama, or VR exclusive) was released.

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E3 Episodes

Season 17, Episode 20

I’ll just tell you upfront here that we didn’t get to nearly all the topics we wanted to on the show. We barely got through the Microsoft presentation. Much less ANY of the others or even Starfield. But that’s on me cause I ramble. A lot.

To just sort of cover the whole thing in general, I thought it all was a pretty good showing. There is A LOT to look forward to not only in the coming months but also next year as well (should all those dates hold – they won’t).

Starfield is incredibly ambitious and just struck me in the head with the whole deep dive that was done and I was left wanting so much more. Not that the game needs more, but I really want to see more of it. My concern that I tried to mention on the show was the comparisons to No Man’s Sky.

I can’t really make that comparison since I haven’t played Starfield, but I also really haven’t put in the time and effort with No Man’s Sky either. I’d like to have some opinions though. I’d like to know from No Man’s Sky fans and players who DID put in that effort, what do you think of Starfield? As they were describing everything and showing it off, it seemed to come with this feeling of “look how big and massive our game is and all this stuff you can do with spaceships and outposts and planets – it’s amazing!”, but it’s been done before, right? Like, the NMS and Starfield comparison is legit, isn’t it? Not that two games doing something similar can’t exist, of course, but it seems like the comparison is muted, maybe. I’m not sure. I would just like a take on Starfield from NMS players. What did you think? Did it make you want to start all over again? Did it not matter at all and you just want more space exploration? What did you think?

In fact, what did all of you think of this year’s presentations and the games shown off? What about the games missing? Let us know.

Speaking of missing games, I was all set for SOMETHING related to Sam Fisher and the Splinter Cell games, but there was nothing. I was really surprised Ubisoft didn’t mention this at all. It has been 3,576 days since a new Splinter Cell game (non-animated series or guest spot in another game franchise, remake, BBC radio drama, or VR exclusive) was released.

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Episodes

Season 17, Episode 19

I really wish they’d spread this out.

I’m speaking mainly of all the reveals, updates, expansions…just all the announcements. Spread out that stuff, please. It’s like overeating at a restaurant or a movie that goes on WAY too long. I know it’s an odd thing to hear, but I’m not asking them to cut back (as helpful as that might be), I’m just asking them to spread it out over the course of the summer or even the month.

It is amazing to see all the games being announced, but it’s overwhelming. By the time I’m done watching the 90 minute presentation, I’ve forgotten about most of the games shown off. This is followed by another 60 to 90 minute presentation. And I’m writing this on a Sunday morning, with 2 more shows today and more coming this week. It’s just…it’s a lot.

And really, I’m only saying this because of ALL the games that kind of fall through the cracks here. Lots of interesting looking games, but they’re either buried under other interesting looking games or aren’t scheduled for release until much later. And, sometimes even worse, they get released now or in the next few days and are buried again under all these other announcements and shows.

I know it sounds like old-man-complaining here, but it’s more about everything being done within a week when there’s a month or two where it can be spread out.

Even still, it is nice to see so many games on the horizon or sooner. And by that I just mean the amount of different types of games to cover all kinds of genres and interests. It doesn’t matter what type of games you like, there is easily something (or multiple somethings) coming soon for you.

This is the part where I continue to count how many days since Ubisoft released a new Splinter Cell game. Keep in mind they are working on what’s been called a remake of the first game and we might actually see that show up this week. But, if it isn’t new, we’re still going to be counting the days. And for now it has been 3,569 days since a new Splinter Cell game (non-animated series or guest spot in another game franchise, remake, BBC radio drama, or VR exclusive) was released.

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Episodes

Season 17, Episode 18

What do we call this now?

I guess we’re in the E3 season, but we can’t really call it that anymore since E3 is all but dead at this point.

So the new game announcement season? I don’t know what to call it but someone with much more creativity than me will figure it out. And it’ll be simple as hell and staring us in the face the entire time. Whatever it’ll be called, we just got our first taste of it with Sony’s PlayStation Showcase.

It was…okay. I mean, they showed off a lot of new games but how many of those are going to be selling PS5’s? Very few of them we saw were exclusives to the system and even some of them coming from first party studios were also getting PC releases (mostly the live service games we saw). Other than that it was a lot of multiplatform games and Spider-Man. And Spidey didn’t feel like it was moving the needle into killer app territory.

Sony does seem to be putting in a lot of work into the live service game category. Now, I know those will have a PC release as well as a console release and may even get multiplatform releases on the Switch and Xbox, but this wasn’t a move I was expecting from Sony. There were, at the very least, 3 different live service game announcements all from Sony, two or more maybe from first party studios. And I’m not including Destiny in that mix. It remains to be seen how they’ll market those. Free to play? Subscription service? Will we see some sort of Sony storefront on PC or maybe a PC PlayStation Plus, perhaps?

We’ll find out in time, of course, but all in all, it was kind of a weak showing from Sony. Because while there were a lot of games, it was hardly a handful that Sony could claim as their own and point to for a reason to buy their system. Not that I’ve got much faith in Microsoft either, but that’s coming in the next few days and, well, they’ve got Starfield so…yeah.

None of them, however, have Splinter Cell because it has been 3,562 days since a new Splinter Cell game (non-animated series or guest spot in another game franchise, remake, BBC radio drama, or VR exclusive) was released.

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