I grew up with 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:PlayStation. I never intended to be a fangirl of the console brand, but as a child it was the console that was put in front of me while my siblings received the GameCube and Xbox. All of a sudden, I was a soldier in the console war and spent the next𓆉 two console generations playing every PlayStation exclusive under the sun.

There was a laundry list of classics to choose from. Uncharted, Killzone, The Last of Us, Gravity Rush, Demon’s Souls, 3D Dot Game Heroes, Ratchet & Clank, and myriad others did a tremendous job of showcasing the malleability of the console brand. It was hard to define what PlayStation truly encapsulated because, during its lifespan, it broadened every horizon and tried to stretch the definition of what a video game could be. But at the end of the PS4 generation, we saw it setꦜtle into a predictable cadence of narrative blockbusters.

PS5 Could Have Been So Much More

Whenever a console generation has come to an end, you can look back at what it did right and what it did wrong, championing the best exclusives and overriding trends that made the console so memorable. I’ve done that with every PlayStation console right down to the PSP and PS Vita, but when it comes ಌto thꦚe PS5, I’m clutching at straws.

Sony has wasted the past four years on pouring millions into live-service games that have either been 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:a miserable failure (Concord) or cancelled long before their release as the bubble bursts around them (Horizon, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:God of War, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Factions 2, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:London Studio etc). It has cast aside giving resourꦯces to studios and trusting them to make great games in favour of chasing dying trends that has resulted in closures, layoffs, and cancellations galore.

168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Demon’s Souls and 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart are both excellent games, but they are now the exception rather than the norm, and one is a remake. That isn’t going ജto change unless the industry takes a long, hard look at itself.

I’ve writt🎃en about the PS5’s depressing lack of worthwhile exclusives before, and even back then I naively believed Sony 🐲would 🧔eventually prove me wrong, that a number of games were in production waiting to be announced, and soon the console would be just as wondrous as its predecessors. I was very wrong.

There have only been a few first-party titles released since then. Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth, Silent Hill 2, and Helldivers 2, have all since been ported to PC or were available there in the first place. 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Astro Bot is the clear excep𒊎tion, and is almost certainly a game worth buying a PS5 for, but one masterpiece in a sea of relative mediocrity is a far cry from w𝕴hat PlayStation used to deliver.

It’s tragic to see an experience designed as an homage to the platform’s history scoop up an endless number of accolades when its future feels so nebulous. If we’re lucky, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Sony will learn from its success.

PlayStation Should Go Back To How Things Used To Be

I feel like an old lady demanding that things change moving forward, but I know I’m not alone in feeling this way. Nor am I saying that live-service behemoths like Fortnite must be cast out in order to recapture the glo൩ry days.

You can have incredible single-player games like 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Ghost of Yotei and seasonal multiplayer games like Helldivers 2 and still possess a console identity that operates foremost on passion and creativity. But for PlayStation, that vision has fallen by the wayside in a fog of focus groups and spreadsheets with executives deter๊mined to make big multiplayer games to rake in profits regardless of whether they have a reason to exist.

I wouldn🌃’t object to Sony once again taking a chance on smaller titles, whether that co♏mes in the form of new IP or revivals of long dormant properties. Give me Vib-Ribbon 2!

Even back in the PS4 era when lukewarm exclusives like 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Days Gone failed to impress, at least there was a drive and a passion behind them. A desire to create something that could stand on its own two feet and exis🦹t for a greater purpose than nickel and diming players for eternity.

You were frequently exposed to new characters and genres in games that were clearly designed with a fundamental vision at their core, and I’d rather have a console filled with games lik💖ꦆe that than overwrought live-services and predictable narrative blockbusters that all follow the same formula.

And, if you didn’t like it, another exclusive would arrive soon af🦹ter.

When you view the PS5 from this perspective,💖 it can’t be seen as anythin𒈔g other than a monumental disappointment. It isn’t what PlayStation is or should be.

This is a defining reason why PS5 Pro was met with such derision from players. Back when the PS4 Pro first broke cover it was in 🌼the middle of a generation when PlayStation was s🐭till firing on all cylinders. Horizon Zero Dawn was months away from launch and Sony had yet to be swallowed up by the greedy maw of live-service obsession.

🐎There was a reason to purchase this more expensive console because there was a guarantee you’d have games to play on it. A list of new games we’d never seen before that aimed to push the medium forward, and I’m just not sure if those exist in that landscape anymore. Not until PlayStation accepts its mistakes and leaves its current hubris behind.

Console exclusives are slowly becoming a thing of the past, which is understandable considering that the way we play games has changed so much, but PlayStation still sells itself on having the best games you can’t play anywhere else, which I’m not sure is true anymo𒁏re.

For the past several years, we have watched Sony try to justify the existence of PlayS🐟tation, and while it remains the most popular console on the market right now, the exclusive games and unique experiences that once defined the brand are nowhere to be seen.