FWIW I think it's a little strange that "Arkane's Blade is late and over budget" is becoming a lingering news story when the total number of big video games that were *not* late and over budget could be counted on one hand

I want to re-emphasize one part of this Xbox story: Half of the 3,200 cuts are happening today and half are happening in the next 12 months. In other words, even people who survived today's layoffs will have to spend the coming year wondering if they're going to be next.

imo laying off 1,600 people today and threatening those who survive this bloodbath with the promise that you'll lay off another 1,600 sometime over the next 12 months is literally psychological warfare

It will be very weird to see stores only carrying physical Nintendo games. Seems like an untapped market, i dunno!

The PlayStation hubris is reaching PS3 levels again 🕺🏻

As a company on a mission to preserve video games, we are deeply saddened by the recent news from PlayStation on ending physical disc production from 2028. We aim to do everything in our power to preserve video games to the best of our ability and will continue to do so for as long as we can.

can we call this a crash yet or are we still pretending it's not

If you're curious what a non-preservationist gaming ecosystem looks like, you can look at the mobile stores, where most of the shit you remember does not exist in any form anymore.

I know some people may welcome Sony's decision to kill all physical games for their consoles starting in 2028, but it's a decision that leaves me feeling sick amd frustrated. Not only because I like collecting physical games, but because the option is just being taken away completely. It's bad!

Disaster: Day of Crisis (Wii, 2008)

Since Sony has a history of calling Gran Turismo 7 and Marvel Tokon "live service games" i wonder if that's what they're referring to when they say they're going to continue making them and not Marathon/Horizon Hunters Gathering/etc. Seems to be a great way to please shareholders with little effort

Neo: The World Ends With You feels surprisingly fresh even in 2026. The texting lingo reads as genuine, the characters are wonderfully realized. I'm excited to keep playing

Played this for the first time earlier this year. Absolutely wild experience. Thanks to @dacichocki.bsky.social for the recommendation. I recommend if you're a fan of character action games and dont mind some jank.

If they do end up doing A Final Fantasy XV Switch 2 edition, I hope they go back and finish all the canceled DLC Final Fantasy XV.V

Time to manifest a third era for the OG Switch as the lowest cost gaming platform whose continued and sustained popularity causes Nintendo to continue to make games for it. The PS4 can come along too if it likes

I really do get that these price hikes are hard to avoid with the RAM crisis being what it is, but if you're going to keep raising your hardware prices, you need to find SOME way to raise the value proposition too. And I don't think "closing a bunch of studios that makes the games for it" will work!

It should not be expected thay Bungie lays off so many people. They should have been thinking about this years ago, when they staffed up. That's why you hire people - to staff up for the long term! To have more good voices on your team for years to come!

If you think about it, the Kingdom Hearts series is a good representative of trends in the industry pre and post covid. Between II and III? The series thrived with numerous entries expanding the scope of the story (which was worth it imo). After III/DLC? One rhythm game in 2020 + mobile game updates

I cannot afford a Steam Machine. It is so grossly out of my budget I am actively considering saving up to get a PSVR2 because ~that~ is still a reasonable $399.99 lmao

My constant refrain is that we need to be in a position where studios can risk flops. Because that’s how interesting stuff gets made

Here it is, the final episode. And with that, every NES game released in North America has been ranked! See you next Friday for a new console, let's do it again! youtu.be/B-BrCnfHCgI

I love seeing what random games get ported to Switch/Switch 2 every few months. Because, if we kepe going down the barrel long enough, we'll finally hit Xenosaga and I Will be THRILLED to see how they handle that on modern hardware.

They shouldn’t feel stupid, they should feel afraid of getting their fucking faces smashed in for wearing a wire.

If Don't Nod closes too this would absolutely gut me

Closing Compulsion is bad enough, adding Ninja Theory is even worse. But fan-beloved studio Double Fine? Microsoft is asking for a full-on fan revolt.

Closing Compulsion Games is such a wrong-headed move by Microsoft that will undo all the small things they were doing to *try* to win back some goodwill and make their attempt to change course seem that much more clueless and misguided. Let them go indie, support other studios, ANYTHING else!

this is real fuckin fucked up man

Shutting down Compulsion Games just says to me they don't care about managing a portfolio, they just want hits as fast as possible. I'm no studio head, but that sure seems like a bad way to actually make "hits." Especially as a platform holder with a content-devouring subscription service.

Now that I use my Steam Deck it's very interesting to realize I could have continued being a PC gamer as a kid if Windows 98 had been software supported longer, or if Vista (when my parents finally upgraded) had better backwards compatibility. There was never a standard that Just Worked.

I wrote about Amberspire for Start Menu! A puzzle game wrapped in a city builder, it takes a different tack to the "eco-builders" genre.

Also worth reposting, my debut on startmenu! It's been a minute since I've had something published and it feels good to have that opportunity again 😊

Also it's wild that the Nintendo Direct today was structured in such a way that Nintendo got to say "yeah all the Xenoblades are now on Switch 2, ANYWAY have a fourth one" and got to do that AGAIN with Kingdom Hearts (though in both cases it's more complicated than just four games lol)

Not gonna lie, Final Fantasy Resonance might have jumped pretty high on my list of titles to get in that September-November period. It looks nice and I'm curious how it translates into a console game after being on mobile for so long

Swan Song’s music notation-themed puzzles make for satisfying gameplay, but they are paired with a lackluster narrative. @dacichocki.bsky.social reviews.

Between the Tupac reveal and the Gen AI in Crazy Taxi revelation, Sega is absolutely killing it at making their most exciting projects things I am no longer jazzed about At least Hashino is not in charge of Persona anymore?

Nintendo has acquired the Chrono and Xenogears/Saga IPs to make Monolith Soft whole (For some reason in this scenario they would have already bought Baten Kaitos and no one noticed)

Why would I need AI when I can still just write things on my own? If I'm going to turn in mediocre enough work to be confused for AI, I want that to be wholly my fault. Not because I actually believed the bland sum of human thought on a subject distilled could somehow replace my perspective

All this 007 talk is making me want to break out Agent Under Fire and finally give it a shot That's, like, close to the same thing right? 😅

I sometimes wonder if the 3DS could have pulled off a second life during covid if Nintendo had held on another year and didn't cease software support in 2019

I love treating my games like books in a private library and different releases like different editions that may sometimes read slightly different, but often not! It makes playing and collecting games more fun for me 😊

Nintendo Announces Sweeping Price Hikes For Switch 2.

I'm at my father's and he's had X-Files on all evening. I've never seen it before Jesus this show is great, I wish shows today had the variety and depth this show has. Even Pluribus, which was good, still had a "project pitched that was likely to get approved" feel to me. It's not quite the same

I keep thinking "well if @tolkoto.com can beat it, I probably can too." Surely nothing will go wrong with this. The same store had a cart of Space Ace too ($12.99, label torn) but...we'll see how that goes first

Idk, Pragmata seems like fun and Capcom has been on a hot streak lately. That's really all the convincing I needed to buy it. (Though the new Mega Man game should use union VO, lets not ignore that)

It's time to stop interviewing this kid aftermath.site/clavicular-loo...

i think more games should experiment with weird controls and fps counters. 30 fps is fine, go for 24 if you wanna be cinematic! Give me a reason why 40 fps works for your game. Screw around and make your art! Expecting it all to play/control the same is weird

You know, i play a lot of games, mostly old but still a steady stream of modern ones. But I still look at what other people are writing about for different websites and I'm still thinking "wow, I'm really not playing the right games" And even if i were, i just think that doesn't go away, does it?

An unthinkable situation compounded by a bureaucratic nightmare. My thoughts are with Mike and his family.

I don't know what it is, but I've had many instances now where big changes/bad news in my life happens whenever I'm playing an Assassin's Creed game. This month has been no exception. But now that I'm done with AC Origins, here's hoping my luck turns around and April is decent 🤞