Games Inbox: Owning all three consoles, Battlefield V Battle Royale, and Black Ops 4 Blackout

I like to think we’re a pretty cosmopolitan lot on the Inbox, so there’s relatively little console wars and a lot of people have multiple consoles. But I wonder is how many people own all three current ones (i.e., PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Switch)? Thanks to Microsoft being so secretive about its sales this is, as far as I can gather, impossible to know for sure

To own all three would be an investment, depending on when you bought them of roughly £1,000, but I’m not sure that’s really that much for any hobby if you say it’s over a five year period. Personally, I always try to buy all the consoles and couldn’t really imagine being a gamer and not having them all within a year or two of each one being released.

I find that exclusives are very often the best games on the system, and to miss out on Sony or Nintendo games would be to miss out on the best games this gen for sure. Microsoft still has a few too and the most powerful console, so for me all three are must haves. But how many other people feel the same and how much of a minority do you think we are?
Zark

Personally, I’m most interested in seeing what DICE do with Battle Royale in Battlefield V. Treyarch seem to be making more of an effort than I expected with vehicles but the rumours still suggest they’ll probably only have 50 to 64 players at a time.

If I was DICE I would try and differentiate Battlefield V by have well over the 100 norm. At least 100 vs. 100 and ideally even more. It’s time that barrier was pushed, especially as games like MAG did it last gen and it’s never really been gone back to. I realise part of the probably is bandwidth, but things must’ve got better in the last decade and I’m sure there’s clever ways round it.

Imagine doing a real D-Day landing with hundreds of troops, that would be epic! If Battlefield V is just 50 vs. 50 I just don’t see it being much of a novelty.
Logan

I agree that Forza Horizon 4 looks excellent and will probably end up being the best exclusive over Christmas. Although I think it’s pretty obvious that it’ll be the worst seller and that both the Sony and Nintendo games will walk all over it. I almost feel like Microsoft should’ve held off on the Forza series a bit because by the time they get to the Xbox Two, and have a chance of taking the lead from Sony, people might be a bit sick of it.

Forza Horizon 3 is a really fantastic arcade racer and it’s a shame probably not that many have played it. If Forza Horizon 5 isn’t an Xbox Two launch title then I think they should definitely think about a remaster of one of the earlier ones just so it can get the audience it deserves.

As for Spider-Man, I am extremely doubtful about it. I’ve never been a big fan of Ratchet & Clank or Insomniac’s other stuff and I always find them very vapid and not half as good as the various games they try to copy.
BaconButty

I really don’t know what happened to Telltale Games, they exploded onto the scene with such an amazing game and then, as far as I’m concerned, just continued to disappointment ever since. Them sticking with the same graphics for all this time is only the half of it. The style of game also got stuck in a similar rut and some of the dialogue, especially in Game Of Thrones, is just awful.

I’ll give The Walking Dead free demo a go but I really have no faith in them anymore and think they have been comfortably overtaken by Dontnod and Life Is Strange. I only wish other companies would make similar games too as I definitely like the genre, just not every single game being exactly the same.
Clarkson

My reaction to the Black Ops 4 reveal was… I haven’t seen it. I have no interest in Call Of Duty, or any other Battle Royale game. I’ve tried PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds, Fortnite, and H1Z1 and didn’t like any of them enough to keep, even though two of them are free.

And I only buy Call Of Duty for the Zombie maps, of which the remastered Chronicles maps DLC keeps me happy enough. I asked some of my mates what they thought of it, and none of them had seen it or even knew it was out. I guess we’re all at an age now we don’t follow the latest fads. I’m awaiting Shenmue in August, and then Spyro in September. I’ve no interest at all in the new Call Of DUty, FIFA, Battlefield, or Assassin’s Creed.

I know how massively popular Fortnite is right now, which makes it all the more strange I don’t know a single person that plays it. I’m currently halfway through Tales Of Zestiria, totally oblivious to everything else unless PlayStation Access covers it.
Lost Sock

RE: Doom Eternal. OK, multiplayer doesn’t just grow on trees. But the resources put into multiplayer wouldn’t just magically be put into the single-player. They would just be cut from the budget. When I worked on Mace Griffin: Bounty Hunter way back in 2002. We thought about a multiplayer and even had a little alpha built by a separate team. Once the publisher decided they’d rather not spend the money on multiplayer the resources went into a xXx 2 game that never got released.

To bring it back around, a studio sets its budgets for both single-player and multiplayer. From my experience in the industry it is a myth that the resources would be spent on more single-player content. They’d just ship people to other projects or fire them. I dunno, maybe things have changed in the 15 or so years I’ve spent out of the industry. But from what my former colleagues tell me, it’s still pretty tight-fisted when it comes to budgets.
Anthony Daniels

GC: We’re sure it is but either way money is being spent on something that is not popular. So at the very least the company could make a game more profitable by leaving the multiplayer out in the first place. (Personally, we quite liked the Doom multiplayer, but you did ask why someone would want it taken out.)

I’ve been thinking on this one for a while and again, probably not good enough for a Hot Topic but are there any really good films based around gaming?

Not the likes of Resident Evil but films with a gaming theme, like The Wizard or, and this one is probably my pick, ExistenZ. The Jude Law one about virtual reality. Are there any more that people actually like?
bobwallett

GC: The only thing that comes to mind is Edge Of Tomorrow, which isn’t specifically about video games but uses their structure. So it’s half way between an adaptation and what you’re talking about. There’s also King of Kong, but that’s just a straight documentary.

I don’t mean to nit-pick, but you’ve written several times now how Black Ops 4 is the first Call Of Duty game to have playable vehicles in multiplayer. It’s not. World At War had horribly overpowered tanks on quite a few of its maps. I can understand anyone forgetting about that, the multiplayer was a bit of a damn squib compared to the Modern Warfare games that came before and after it. I’m glad that Treyarch redeemed themselves with Black Ops, which is my favourite of the Call Of Duty games.

On an unrelated note, I have had Life Is Strange Episode 1 downloaded for months (don’t talk to me about backlogs, I buy digital and my available games list is terrifyingly full of games that I haven’t even glimpsed the title screen…) and finally got around to playing it the other night. What a refreshing game that is!

My wife tells me that it’s just Dawson’s Creek with time-bending, but I thoroughly enjoyed it and straight away purchased the other four episodes (£3.20 in the Xbox sale) and, glass bottle-hunting aside, am really enjoying every minute of it.

The only downside I can see is that I’m going to want to know what the other outcomes are, so I may have to do multiple playthroughs which isn’t going to help my backlog… If you’re reading this and haven’t played it, I highly recommend it and at £3.20 you don’t have much to lose (the first episode is free anyway).
Tron
Currently playing: Life Is Strange and Madden NFL 18

GC: We stand corrected, but even now you’ve said that we’re still struggling to remember anything about World At War’s multiplayer. That is a fantastic price for Life Is Strange though, we strongly recommend it to anyone.

Downloaded No Man’s Sky Next. Got excited. Landed on a planet. Looked great. Tried to refuel. Couldn’t. Realised even refuelling is now a ridiculously long-winded crafting operation. Turned off No Man’s Sky Next.
The Tillo

Are you going to be reviewing Dead Cells, GC? It looks really good and it’s out next week.
Planar

GC: Yes, we’re playing it right now.

The subject for this weekend’s Inbox was suggested by reader Grackle, who asks what game have you given up on the quickest after playing it?

It doesn’t matter when it was, or on what format, but what game have you abandoned the fastest and why? Try and keep your example to something you actually bought or were actively anticipating, and explain why it failed to live up to your expectations.

Did you ever go back to the game and try again and has the same thing ever happened with any other games? Are you often surprised or disappointed with games you’ve been looking forward to and have you found a way to avoid being upset in the same way?

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