New Game + July 1 - July 7

Remedy 

Remedy seems to be all the rage right now, especially with their upcoming game control, which was featured on my most anticipated games of 2019. 

This next story falls actually has two different parts to it.  If you don’t know remedy, as I mentioned they are a game studio based out of Finland  known for the creating the Max Payne series before it went off the rails, Alan Wake, Quantum Break, which was the hybrid game and tv show.  Both Alan wake and Quantum were Xbox exclusive while their upcoming control will be multi platform

Alan wake released in 2010 with the quasi sequel  American nightmare released in 2012. Alan Wake was a critical success and became a cult hit following underwhelming sales.   This leads to the question why haven’t we seen anything in the past 7 years.  Speaking to investors this week they announced they would be receiving a one time royalty payment of 2.5 million euros from previously released games as well they have regained the publishing writes for Alan Wake, which had previously belonged to Microsoft 

As a smaller independent studio that 10 years ago only had put out a couple max Payne games, I assume at the time it made sense for remedy to sign an exclusivity deal with Microsoft.  Especially back then when we are talking about the height of 360 popularity.  Over the past ten years though, things clearly changed as Quantum Break was probably a very costly experiment at the expense of Microsoft. One thing for sure is that remedy is always interested in experimenting and trying new things.  Quantum Break had great potential but missed the mark.  I think it might be that it happened too early and that technology was too slow for it.  It wasn’t seamless like it should’ve been. I think the next generation of consoles with the SSD’s has much more potential for something along those lines. Regardless of the failure of Quantum Break as it may have been viewed it obviously taught them a bunch about dealing with partnerships as well it looks like control has a lot of quantum’s DNA. 

I can imagine that after the release of quantum break that the relationship between Remedy and Microsoft became strained.  Exclusivity deals are tough because it cuts off a lot of the market especially when you have partnered up with the losing console. 

The second part is there is a rumor that Sony is possibly interested in acquiring Remedy, which may be coincidentally timed with the publishing rights of Alan Wake going back to remedy, a game that has never been on a Sony console

PS5 exclusives 

This brings us to the next story and there is a rumor that Sony is possibly interested in acquiring more first party studios such as the previously mentioned remedy.

Speaking to the Nikkei, Jim Ryan, sony interactive entertainment president said “content is more important than ever before”. 

Not a huge quote and could be taken a few different ways.  The first being that with Xbox acquiring so much first party talent the need for first party studios is greater than ever. 

You can argue that Xbox lost this generation due to the poor messaging at the announcement of the Xbox one but they could’ve regained ground and caught up to Sony as the average console generation is 6-8 years. The bigger underlying issue that Xbox had this generation was lack of first party games and even the ones they had missed the mark. Halo mcc, halo 5,, sea of thieves the list goes on they all had issues from network problems, poor campaigns, poor multiplayer etc.  on the flip side Sony delivered knockout after knockout of exclusives from god of war, uncharted, spider man, horizon, sekiro and so on. I spotted this story on games radar who states that there is a 50 percent chance this happens.  I guess with enough money anything can happen and I’m sure remedy has seen positive results with most of playstations first party studios. It will be interesting to see if anything comes of this but at least we have control coming out in just a few months. 

The other way that you could look at this quote is that Sony will continue to try to strengthen their subscription services as that seems like the way the future is going right now. Gamepass seems to be getting all the attention right now and for good reason as it is a great product with great value.  PS Now has made great strides over the years but it still needs to get a lot better to be considered in the same ballpark as Gamepass 

PS PLUS 

Speaking of subscription services and content, a few weeks ago we got the announcement of the free ps plus games for the month of July.  It was a pretty lackluster month with the headliner being PES 2019.  If you are unfamiliar with this, it’s a soccer game developed by Konami that has a cult following but hasn’t reached the level of success that FIFA has. Pro evolution soccer 2019 reviewed very well with a an average review score of around 80%. The issue here is that you are either a soccer fan or you aren’t.  A lot of times when there are new games of PS PLUS or games with gold, they are a genre that I haven’t tried or experienced. The key here is experimenting or trying new things unlike soccer where you want already play it or you don’t want to. 

When Xbox and PlayStation announced the free game for the month of July a few weeks ago I didn’t even think that either service really offered anything worthy of mentioning on the podcast like I normally do.  

So why is it worthy of mentioning now ? Well this week right before the games were released for download, Sony made the announcement that it would be swapping out PES 2019 for Detroit: Become Human.  The David Cage, adventure game from 2018. The game is decent and worth downloading. It is visually stunning at times, however some of the overarching themes are a little heavy at times. This game is a perfect example of a game style you might not have tried before or a David Cage game that you haven’t played before.  It’s actually the digital deluxe edition which includes heavy rain as well. A PS3 classic in the same vein as Detroit.  I’m not sure how well it holds up over the years but it was enjoyable back then.  If you enjoyed the choose your own adventure style of until dawn, you will most likely enjoy these games. There are few and far between of these branching storylines, everything matters type of games made today. 

When the PS PLUS games for July were announced there was a general consensus on the internet that people were not happy with the monthly selection but then again when is the last time people on the internet was happy about anything. However this time clearly it made enough ripples that got back to Sony as they made a change last minute switching PES 2019 for Detroit. I don’t know off the top of my head the last time there has been enough complaints about poor game selection that a change was made. 

The initial thought was that maybe some people at Konami thought the release time  might not have been ideal but quickly representatives from Konami made a statement that they didn’t have anything to do with the change.  I also imagine that the people at Konami who work hard on that game were a little disappointed that it didn’t get into the hands of more people because without a doubt a lot more people would have given it a try because people love free stuff. I also wonder how royalties are paid out for the free games of the month and if Konami was expecting anything from Sony in terms of payment. 

Overall this story just came across to me as very strange and I wonder if anything like this will happen again. I personally really liked when they had voting for the ps plus games like they had a few years ago.  

Cyb3rpunk 2077 

The darling of this years e3 and last years would have to be the upcoming game from cd projekt red. The great news is that we don’t have to wait long to play that game as it is due to be released in spring 2019, but this week there was a story that came out this week that the studio was actually working on 3 different cyberpunk projects. I read an article on gamespot who reached out to the developer for an official comment. 

"We currently have a total of five teams working on a number of projects, with three focusing on the development of Cyberpunk 2077," a company representative told GameSpot. "These include CD Projekt Red Warsaw and Kraków, who are handling the main game, as well as the Wrocław studio, where around 40 industry specialists are engaged in technology R&D. A separate, dedicated team at the Warsaw studio is handling the development of Gwent. The final team is Spokko, which is currently working on a yet unannounced mobile project."

They said a lot without saying anything. I don’t think that the unannounced project will be a brand new IP so we are either looking at another Witcher mobile game or something related to cyberpunk.  I can’t see why they wouldn’t give cp2077 the same Gwent treatment as cp2077 started out as a tabletop game.  It’s also safe to assume that while 3 studios are working on cp2077 most likely one of them is working on the expansions already as the expansions for Witcher 3 helped flesh out that world even more as well as give players another reason to dive back in.  It would only make sense if a game that has been in development for this long received expansions.