It amuses me that the PS4 had such a strong showing at Gamescom and I have completely and totally neglected it to talk about the Vita. I could technically still talk about the Vita tonight, in some of the exclusives that were announced for it, but I will post-pone that because there was some very very important information dropped about the PS4 that deserves mentioning and speaking on. I think part of my issue with it is that I'm just trying not to think about the PS4 because I can't get one at launch (well, I could but semantics) and I have just so many PS3 games that I want to play first. So I basically just keep thinking that the PS4 isn't going to come out until some far off date in the future that I don't have to worry about. Still, I suppose it's close enough that I should....you know, stop doing that.
Anyway, the biggest news, clearly, is that the release date of the Playstation 4 is November 15th in North America, November 29th in Europe, where "Europe" means "PAL Territories" and numbers at 20 countries at least, as well as Latin America for the 29th. That is, of course at the $399 Price-point that was mentioned beforehand and without any bundles unless you count the ones that Amazon and GameStop are putting together. However, much like the Vita with Trophy Park, every Playstation 4 will launch with The Playroom pre-installed which is basically like Trophy Park in that the whole point of it is to show off the new features of the Playstation 4 in a fun, cute way. Of course the one downside with that is the fact that some of the games require the PSEye....which actually isn't bundled in with the PS4. But it's a free game that most people will probably ignore anyway because they'll grab a shiny new thing with their console and play that instead, so it's likely not a big loss.
They also announced like a metric damn ton of Indie games for not only the PS4, but the Vita and PS3 as well (as some will be releasing on all three, but most seem to be moving forward with PS4/Vita which is A-Okay), and it'll stun you to know that that list right there? In that Playstation Blog post? It's incomplete. There's more games than that that were announced later and not edited in. Were it that I could find a place that compiles the full list definitively, I'd link it here, and it probably exists but I don't think my poor heart could handle it. Of course that is also neglecting to mention the -other- games that were announced, the ones that some would call right, proper games (because they're not Indies), like the Shadow of the Beast reboot, Rime from Tequila Works and Everybody's Gone to Rapture from thechineseroom (which may ore may not be Indie?) who are famous for Dear Esther and the up-coming Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs which is a semi-sequel to Frictional Games' Amnesia: The Dark Descent. Hell, there's probably other games, but I think you get my point.
One of the things that I personally loved about the PS4 news is not only the Playstation 4's UI, but the way that it was presented. Shuhei Yoshida showed us the UI in probably the most brilliant way one -could- do such a thing at the start of the show, which is included above. It is pretty much diametrically opposed to the way they were initially planning to show it off (?) maybe, I don't know, it says leaked and looks legit, but I just don't know anymore. Technically, they probably -will- run with that commercial eventually, but the point is that we've had a good impression made with Yoshida. The reasons are two-fold. First off, Yoshida actually shows us the interface in motion as opposed to carefully selected shots for the trailer with far too much zoom, and secondly, he shows us how it performs under the conditions that we'll likely use it in. We're far more likely to be reclining in a comfortable chair or couch or bed, lazily flitting through the menus and whatnot than we are to be sitting on the edge of our couch, earbud in place, constantly ready and vigilant and excited to purchase and download a game to assist a friend who is in similar conditions. It shows that it simply works when all we want to do is relax and play video games which is just....the whole idea, really. Doesn't really make for an exciting -thing- of course, but it in turn generates excitement -because- it works.
The launch window line-up, as if we haven't talked about games enough, was also more or less pinned down, coming in both Retail and PSN flavors. It's easiest to just Copy/Paste, thus I shall do so.
Retail:
- Assassin's Creed 4: Black Flag (Ubisoft)
- Battlefield 4 (EA)
- Call of Duty: Ghosts (Activision)
- Driveclub (SCE)
- FIFA 14 (EA)
- Killzone: Shadow Fall (SCE)
- Knack (SCE)
- Just Dance 2014 (Ubisoft)
- LEGO Marvel Superheroes (Warner Bros.)
- Madden 25 (EA)
- NBA 2K14 (2K Games)
- NBA Live (EA)
- Need for Speed: Rivals (EA)
- Skylanders: Swap Force (Activision)
- Watch Dogs (Ubisoft)
- Basement Crawl (Bloober Team)
- Blacklight: Retribution (Zombie Studio)
- Contrast (Focus Home Interactive)
- Counterspy (SCE)
- Doki-Doki Universe (SCE)
- DC Universe Online (SOE)
- Flower (SCE)
- Hohokum (SCE)
- Minecraft (
Mojang4J Studios) - N++ (Metanet)
- Pinball Arcade (Farsight Technologies)
- Planetside 2 (SOE)
- Pool Nation Extreme (Cherry Pop Games)
- ResoGun (SCE)
- Super Motherload (Xgen Studios)
- Tiny Brains (Spearhead)
- Warframe (Digital Extremes)
- War Thunder (Gaijin Entertainment)
I'm pretty sure that that is a good swath of the Playstation 4 news from Gamescom and am comfortable with the knowledge that even if it's not and I missed some other things, that that is even more of a testament to the size of the event than I could emphasize here. Because there is a -hell- of a lot of news in this post, and I honestly can't imagine there being a whole lot more. Because that much awesome would hurt my brain, you see.
I just can't get over that UI video, it's just so simple, but goddamnit if that's not what I want to see
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