Games Inbox: what was the state of affairs in Japan?

Wednesday’s letters page thinks PS5 sales are so good bad news for gamers, while another reader is hoping for a Zelda: Ocarina Of Time remake.

Games Inbox is a collection of letters, comments and opinions from our readers. To join the discussions yourself, email gamecentral@metro.co.uk

Nothing directly
So that livestream of State of Play Japan was a big nothingburger. I’m sure most people expected nothing less, but I’m really tired of those endless Direct-style shows that seem to have no reason to exist other than to get people excited and then disappointed.

The mic drop at the end of this was… DLC for Elden Ring Nightreign. I’m not sure what could have been less exciting than that. No offense to the game, but you don’t put on a 40 minute preview show and have that, a (second) beta for Marvel Tōkon: Fighting Souls and some late ports are the highlights.

I guess it was all to promote the new Japan-only PlayStation 5 console, but really couldn’t they have found something else to talk about to make it worthwhile? Or, you know, don’t make it 40 minutes. Considering some of the important things announced with an unexpected blog post, it seems crazy that they went through all this effort for absolutely nothing.
house

The very old blood
It strikes me that not only was the last State of Play completely pointless, but once again it had no Bloodborne in it. The second it was announced, and especially since it had a Japanese theme, I immediately saw everyone online speculating about a remaster or a remake or a sequel or… whatever!

I wasn’t surprised that it was nothing, but I am disappointed. Most of what Sony does these days doesn’t seem logical, at least to a veteran fan, but the complete refusal to acknowledge that Bloodborne exists in any way is the most baffling thing I’ve ever seen them do. We still don’t even have a PlayStation 5 patch! I’m now convinced that we won’t see anything until the PlayStation 6, and I wouldn’t even bet on that.
Lobre

Business decision
That the PlayStation 5 is selling so well is pretty much the worst news there could be for anyone who wants Sony to change its current approach. There is now no reason at all for them to make more exclusive products. They may have stopped making live service games so much, but now they’re not going to make anything at all because apparently that works just fine and is clearly much more cost effective.

It’s a pretty clear premise: do nothing, make more money. I really believe we’ll get more exclusives in the coming years as Sony slowly moves out of the live service phase. If it takes five or more years to make a game, it only follows that we won’t see any change in policy on that front, but even then it will never go back to the way it was. It just wouldn’t make business sense.
Cluck

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Build anticipation
I just saw that there’s a new Lego Zelda set coming out next year, which I’ll probably never be able to afford, but, well… it’s fun to want things. But aside from the fact that the teaser trailer looks super cool, I couldn’t help but notice that it appears to be Ocarina Of Time. You’ve got what looks like old school Zelda in the background, plus Ganon looming over Link and Navi. Plus the sentence: ‘Do you realize who you are dealing with?’ seals it.

Obviously Ocarina Of Time is one of the favorite games in the series, but you’d think they’d go with Lego for the modern game. So what if… this set, which isn’t coming out until next year, is for the remake everyone’s been talking about lately? I know this is just wishful thinking, but it doesn’t mean this news makes that any less likely!
Onibee

Digital goods
Money for shinies you say?! Well, knock me over with a feather dance, blow me over with a gust of wind! I have shinies, a blue Psyduck, a gold Magikarp, a slightly darker gray Munchlax and a purple Dratini, who may or may not be a green Dragonite by now?! Among other things…

If you want them just message me, Pokémon Home will let you save them before Nintendo gets around to adding them to different games. Re-mortgage your houses, take your gold to Cash Converters… I’m joking, of course. Or is that me?
big, curved, shiny wrangler

Serious fun
There’s a lot of disturbing stuff going on with GTA 6, from the collapse of Rockstar’s union to the undoubtedly excessive violence in the game, but as cynical as I try to be, I can’t pretend I’m not super excited about it.

My only concern, however, is that the game doesn’t take itself too seriously. Dan Houser’s departure as head writer is actually a bit concerning, as I think he was behind a lot of British-style satire and sarcasm. It’s still made in Scotland, at least to some extent, but my concern is that there will now be more American writers and overlords.

As good as other parts of it are, my favorite thing to do in any GTA game is just driving around, bumping into things and listening to the radio stations. A lot of the time I don’t need GTA to be anything other than that, and yet sometimes it overcomplicates itself and gets in the way of the fun.

San Andreas and GTA 4 were the worst at this, so I guess they’ve gotten it out of their system now, but there’s really no way to know based on the trailers, and reason to worry considering how many people have left over the years.

GTA has never been serious or grounded, despite what some fans seem to think, and I hope Rockstar remembers that as they simulate everything to perfection.
Crank

End of the beginning
I feel so sorry for the regular people who work at Bungie. It seems I’ve been hearing about bad management for as long as they’ve existed, and now they’re being written off by Sony as a bad purchase, which will surely be the beginning of the end for the developer.

They will be closed down and all the good developers will probably move to other parts of Sony within a few months. I imagine Destiny 2 will be shutting down at the same time, if not sooner. What a sad end to a great developer.
Hammer iron

Five more years
My interpretation of the phrase about the PlayStation 5 being in the middle of its life cycle is that it reinforces the idea that there will be no PlayStation 6 exclusives. Everything will be cross-gen and the difference between the two will probably be no greater than between the PS5 and PS5 Pro.

It’s what we all expected to some extent, but I’m not even that worried about it. First of all, it’s a good excuse not to buy a PlayStation 6. I don’t mean that in a snarky, insulted way as a fan, just that it’s going to be expensive, I don’t have the money, and now I have a good excuse not to spend money on it.

However, I don’t think it matters much to Sony. From what I understand, the way a console maker makes money from consoles is by charging other publishers fees to put their games on them. That’s still going to happen whether you have a PlayStation 5 or 6, so it doesn’t matter to Sony which one you have.

All the PlayStation 6 does is entice a new wave of people who didn’t get the PlayStation 5 and need some sort of incentive to buy a new console. Furthermore, they just sell the same games to everyone, regardless of what they have.
of light

Inbox is also running
Lumines? That’s a name I haven’t heard in a long time. And Meteos? I didn’t know they were from the same guy!
Tobz9

I’ve been playing Ball x Pit non-stop for three weeks and now I’ve beaten it. I literally don’t know what to do with my life anymore.
Austin

Email your comments to: gamecentral@metro.co.uk

The small print
New Inbox updates appear every weekday morning, with special Hot Topic inboxes on weekends. Reader letters are used on a merit basis and can be edited for length and content.

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