Video Game Tuesday: E3 2018 Predictions

Hey all I’m back with a look at some of the possibilities from this year’s game development version of Christmas! It’s my E3 2018 Predictions!

NO Next-Gen Console Announcements: I’m not expecting to hear about the next generation of consoles this year. If they announce anything other than slim versions of the XBOX and PS4 Pro I’ll be honestly shocked. Regarding the Switch, I’m expecting to hear nothing new, except maybe a more streamlined version equivalent to a slim version if anything at all.  Next Gen consoles are the announcements I’m expecting to hear about next year at E3, but not this year.

Pride Reductions: I’m expecting to hear that the PS4 Pro and XBOX will get some price cuts, and probably the switch as well.

EA to announce more annual sports games: This is less of a prediction than a certainty to me at least, but I’m fully expecting to hear about the next Madden game and other sports game equivalents. Color me unimpressed and uninterested once more.

Super Smash Front and Center for Nintendo: If they don’t really beat the marketing drums to death on this one I’ll be just as surprised as if Sony and Microsoft announce the next gen consoles. Nintendo has no reason not to keep up the momentum that last year’s launch of the Switch and Breath of the Wild brought to the company. Smash Bros is a surefire way to do that.

Pokemon Switch: I’m also expecting to hear about a mainline Pokemon game for the Switch. The system is just begging for a brand new Pokemon game given it’s dual nature as a portable and a console.

That’s it for this week’s Video Game Tuesday and my predictions for E3 thus far. I may do a what’s been leaked so far post closer to E3 happening, but we’ll see. Do you expect to see anything that I didn’t mention happen at this year’s E3? Leave a comment below!

Video Game Tuesday: Next Gen Consoles Already?

This week for Video Game Tuesday I’m discussing a recent rumor that’s cropped up. Is it time for Next Gen Consoles Already?

What?!?: So apparently according to the rumor mill, and while there has been no proof offered yet the person making the claim is purportedly fairly reliable, Sony has sent out PlayStation 5 Dev Kits out to third party publishers.

What does this mean?: Well honestly, if it’s true that points to a possible release of a new console in the next couple of years. Honestly I don’t know how I feel about it. Frankly I feel like a ton of games aren’t taking full advantage of the processing power of the consoles available, and I’m not just talking about the XBOX or PS4 Pro. The switch is a special case due to it’s dual nature as both a home console and portable unit. However this might just be me being influenced by the last generation of consoles which lasted much longer than prior ones.

What are the specs?: We don’t know them, and honestly it’s way too early to tell anything concrete about such things. But I’d expect at least upgrades to everything the PS4 Pro has.

What else could it be?: Well it could be a PS4 Pro Slim version that has slightly upgraded components in a smaller frame. Honestly I’d not be surprised to see such a thing happen, and I’d personally be pretty stoked about that, as while I love my PS4 having a PS4 Pro would be nice if I could fit it in the same space as my PS4.

That’s it for this week’s Video Game Tuesday, what do you think about a new generation of consoles being released in a year or two? Leave a comment below.

Video Game Tuesday: Bungie’s at it Again

This week for Video Game Tuesday I’m back with a warning against holding high expectations for a company that doesn’t deserve your patronage. Bungie’s at it Again, and this crap is getting old.

Again? Really?!?: We’ve been here before, many, many times. I’m almost considering making an entirely separate category on my Blog for Tuesday posts that deal with me bashing Bungie. I’d name it Bungie Bashing Tuesdays, or something like that. The fact that I’m even jokingly considering this is mind blowing. I won’t because I’m much too lazy and unwilling to give Bungie the even minimal respect that such a column would give them, even if it’s disrespectful on the most part. So when they made an announcement this last week with their plans for 2018 I’m not going to give them the time of day anymore. I don’t care that they are trying to make up for their mistakes. The fact is really simple, we’ve done this crap before every freaking year since Vanilla Destiny has launched.

We’ve been locked out of content before, with the Dark Below “expansion”. We’ve had massive changes occur for gear before, with House of Wolves and than the Spring Updates (seriously every freaking year). We’ve had all our gear become essentially useless with The Taken King, and the following Spring Update. They’ve promised to listen to their fans, they’ve promised to be more transparent, they’ve promised to not make really freaking stupid mistakes like Legendary Engrams not dropping Legendary Gear, Pushing Atheon of the edge, or their Public Events being worthwhile #TwoTokensAndABlue. We’ve had this told to us so many times that even Kotaku, whose writers are pretty forgiving compared to me, is getting tired of their bullshit.

So please, don’t spend that Holiday gift money, on Destiny 2. Stop buying or pre-ordering their content. They don’t have a reliable track record anymore when it comes to actually delivering a lasting solution to problems their games have. The fact people have started making shirts clearly ridiculing them is not a good sign for the games they make. But hey, at least I have content to bash every year around this time.

That’s it for this week’s Video Game Tuesday.

Video Game Tuesday: Destiny 2

This week for Video Game Tuesday I’m going to cover the topic you all knew I would eventually. It’s all about Destiny 2!

Destiny 2: It was announced on March 30th that Destiny 2 was a real thing and would be released this year, but there were some big “surprises” announced. It would release on the PC and everything, or close to everything, wouldn’t transfer from the first game and it’s “expansions”.

PC?!?: Yea color me not that surprised, it was rumored for months prior to the announcement that it would release on PC, so I’m really not that surprised. It was a surprise it didn’t release on the PC in the first place to be honest. And just to clarify I probably won’t be playing it on PC as my main platform if I should happen to receive codes for both PC and PS4.

Wait our stuff?: Yea all that time you spent on gearing up your characters, getting cool things like Exotics, fancy looking ships, awesome Shaders, and cool Emblems was wasted. The only confirmed thing that will transfer over is the appearance of your characters, but that’s hardly a thing to be excited about. It’s not like we were ever all that attached to our characters since Destiny never had much of a story. I’d hope at least cosmetic stuff like Shaders, Emblems, Ghost Shells, Sparrows and Shaders would transfer over, but that isn’t confirmed and probably won’t happen.

My Hopes?: I hope the game transfers over the cosmetic stuff, has a story that isn’t a piece of crap, and has a loot system that doesn’t exploit players. My expectations that any of those will be met is very low, and all of them being met? Practically non-existent. I hope Bungie can redeem themselves, but I highly doubt that is possible at this point.

Video Game Tuesday: PS4 Pro or No?

This week for Video Game Tuesday I’m looking at the updated PlayStation 4 units! It’s all about that PS4 Pro!

PS4 Pro?: In case you haven’t heard yet, Sony is releasing an upgraded version of the PlayStation 4. It’s called PlayStation 4 Pro, and supports 4K Resolutions and HDR. It’ll be priced at $399 in the US (the same launch price as the original PS4) and will launch on November 10th.

Wow so I wasted $400?: No, Sony has said that all PS4 titles will be playable on the original PS4. Now there may be improved performance in some cases of games like Final Fantasy XIV just because the processor is better, but for the most part if you play in 1080p already and don’t have a 4K resolution TV or Monitor you won’t be missing anything by not getting the PS4 pro. Other than coming with updated output ports and the redesigned DualShock 4 controller the Pro comes with 1TB of storage as a base option.

Really, I won’t be missing anything?: Well I mean if you own a 4K TV or Monitor and want to use that resolution and don’t have a PS4 Pro you won’t be able to of course, but 4K resolution isn’t standard in TVs yet and so there really is no need to freak out.

This is a terrible business decision!!!: Really? I think it’s brilliant, if I have something happen to my PS4 I can replace it with an upgraded console that can support better resolution and I won’t pay any more than I paid originally for the console. That’s a really great business decision in my books. Microsoft on the other hand won’t be releasing their Xbox Scorpio until next year’s holiday season. So Sony has an entire year to capitalize on profits over Microsoft. That seems like a stroke of genius in my books.

Others may disagree with me, but personally I see this as Sony once again proving that when it comes to gamers they understand them much better than Microsoft.

That’s it for this week’s Video Game Tuesday!