Beyond

Now that the dust has settled on the PlayStation 5 Pro’s underwhelming reveal and overwhelming price tag, let’s actually discuss what it would take to get us seriously interested. Sure, Grand Theft Auto 6 at 4K 60FPS would be nice, but is it realistic? Will Rockstar save that for the inevitable PS6 version? We read some of the Beyond community’s thoughts on the matter. Speaking of PlayStation 6, we know basically nothing about the next generation of consoles, other than there will be one, and that it’ll feature an AMD chip, after Sony’s deal with Intel allegedly fell through. This would suggest backward compatibility, which is a blessing and a curse, considering the PS5 is still getting a lot of cross-gen games that also come to PS4. Meanwhile, they don’t make fall/holiday video game release lineups like they used to, and we wax nostalgic about a graphic showing all the amazing games that hit PlayStation 2 back in 2001… And maybe their timed exclusivity had more to do with the PS2 hitting the market a year before Xbox and GameCube than anything Sony was doing. Finally, Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster rises from its grave looking better than the last time we saw it, but showing its age in other ways. Beyond is Max Scoville, Brian Altano, Jada Griffin and Akeem Lawanson.Check out our facebook group at - https://www.facebook.com/groups/podcastbeyond/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

After months of leaks and rumors, Sony finally revealed the PlayStation 5’s mid-gen refresh, the PS5 Pro. The 8-minute technical presentation from Mark Cerny spent its first three minutes singing the base PS5’s praises, and then highlighted the “big three” improvements the new model boastsl: a larger GPU, advanced ray tracing, and AI-driven upscaling. This new tech was showcased in a montage of side-by-side comparisons featuring some of the PS5’s most popular games, and while there’s some subtle but noticeable difference seeing how these games look running on new tech, nothing really blew us away… at least, until the price was announced. The PS5 Pro launches November 7th with an MSRP of $699 in the US, €799 in Europe. Bear in mind, the stand and the disc drive are sold separately, and the base PS5 isn’t getting any price cut that we’re aware of, which is usually what happens to consoles mid-generation. So many of the PS5’s games so far have been backwards compatible that it’s hard to justify a new console to begin with, let alone a more powerful one. We’re all riding high on Astro Bot, and while that game is gorgeous and technically impressive, at no point did it seem like more powerful hardware would improve the experience. As for what upcoming games can truly take advantage of the PS5 Pro, that remains to be seen. Grand Theft Auto 6 is obviously a big huge deal in 2025, and it’ll undoubtedly sell some PS5 Pros, but aside from Insomniac’s Wolverine game, so much of Sony’s first party lineup is still under wraps, which makes it hard to get excited about this thing, let alone justify spending money on it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Simon Cardy, a reviewer known for his insights on gaming trends, joins to discuss Astro Bot, a delightful 3D platformer packed with nostalgic references and engaging gameplay. He highlights its charming mechanics that evoke pure joy and offers players a colorful world to explore. In stark contrast, the team addresses the failure of Concord, which faced an underwhelming launch, leading Sony to pull it offline entirely. They discuss the challenges of sustaining live-service games in today's competitive market, questioning Concord's future as player expectations evolve.

We’re back to our normally scheduled Beyond program, and would you look at that! A few massive games came out for us to talk about. Star Wars Outlaws is full of high highs and low lows, and as much as we were hoping this would be Watch Dogs with Womp Rats or “Assassin’s Greedo,” its game design cherry picks mechanics from the Ubisoft’s stealthy open-world action adventure formula in odd ways. Still, zipping around that galaxy far, far away on a souped-up speeder bike with your alien Muppet sidekick is awesome when it clicks. Meanwhile, Mitchell reviewed Black Myth Wukong and thought it was great out of ten, but anyone thinking it’s a soulslike may want to adjust their expectations. Meanwhile, Concord may have launched with more of a bang than whimper, but Jada’s having a blast, which has us questioning the future of Sony’s latest live-service that’s been long in development. Oh yeah, and there’s some news too: the PS5 and a variety of accessories get a price hike in Japan, the Dualsense Edge now works on PC with the Accessories app, LEGO Horizon’s release date may have leaked, and Foamstars goes free-to-play. This week’s episode features Max Scoville, Brian Altano, Jada Griffin and Mitchell Saltzman Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Beyond and hello! Welcome to a very special gamescom edition of IGN’s weekly PlayStation show. This week, a whole bunch of the IGN team is in Germany covering the show, including Max, Brian, and our producer Nick, so putting together a regular Beyond episode was a little tricky. Instead, we’ve pulled together a bunch of our interviews about upcoming PlayStation games. We kick things off with Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, which we just learned is coming to PS5 next year. Then, Mouse: P.I. for Hire, which is sort of like if Cuphead was a first-person shooter about a rodent detective. To cap things off, we’ve got a trio of upcoming games based on some of our favorite movies that take place on barren, sandy desert planets: Starship Troopers: Extermination, Dune Awakening, and Star Wars Outlaws.We’ll be back with a normal episode next week, but we hope you enjoy some of what the team produced at Gamescom. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, it was announced that Stellar Blade sold a million copies, which has us optimistic we’ll see a sequel to ShiftUp’s much-discussed hack and slash. Something we definitely won’t be seeing is a PlayStation presence at gamescom 2024, which definitely doesn’t have us feeling particularly optimistic about Concord, the multiplayer FPS that Sony’s publishing that same week. A massive video game event with hundreds of thousands of attendees sure seems like a good spot to demo a brand new live-service game, but hey, what do we know? Helldivers 2 launched just fine without. Then again, is it fair to compare Helldivers 2 and Concord? They’re both Sony-published multiplayer live-service games that are hitting PS5 and PC day and date, but they’re clearly very different. One is a shameless knockoff slash heartfelt love-letter to Starship Troopers, a 27-year-old cult classic, that has a very clear idea of what kind of video game it is, while the other seems to be equal parts Guardians of the Galaxy and Overwatch, but combined in a way that’s ambitiously blending an ongoing narrative with multiplayer live-service. In other news, after all our grousing and moaning during the Ubisoft Forward post-show about Ubisoft’s failure to acknowledge Beyond Good & Evil in any way… they just released a 20th Anniversary 4K remaster of the game, with a bunch of bonus content and quality of life improvements. Why wasn’t this announced during that week when everybody was making big announcements? We don’t know. But here’s what we do know: Elden Ring is a good video game, so we’re gonna talk about that, and if you’re avoiding Shadow of the Erdtree spoilers, don’t worry, you’re probably farther along than most of us. Which is your favorite farming spot, Ball Hill or Bird Cliff? Sound off in the comments. This week’s Beyond is Max Scoville, Jada Griffin and one-man band/producer/panelist, Tom Jorgensen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, we’re joined by the wonderful Jared Petty, formerly of IGN, currently of Limited Run Games, to talk about (among other things) Tomba! Special Edition. Who is this pink-haired feral child, and why is he biting all those pigs? We had questions, and Jared had some answers. Plus, Jada ventured into No Man’s Sky in VR and was very impressed, further highlighting just how much Hello Games managed to transform that game since it launched way back when. On a more serious note, we got word that Meta has shut down Ready At Dawn, the studio responsible for some beloved PlayStation games, including the ambitious and underrated The Order 1886, as well as some PSP bangers like God of War: Chains of Olympus and Daxter. Meanwhile, Bungie had a massive round of layoffs amid restructuring, which has us discussing the unrealistic expectations and unsustainable business models of the games industry. On the bright side, Krafton, publisher of PUBG and The Callisto Protocol, has scooped up Tango Gameworks, along with the Hi-Fi Rush rights, so maybe we haven’t seen the last of that rhythm-based hack-and-slash. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, Jada makes her return to the hosting chair along with Taylor Lyles, Cam “Final Mix” Hawkins, and Kevin Diaz to talk about the biggest games coming out of China Joy 2024 and Sony’s China Hero Project. Ganes like Lost Soul Aside, Exiledge, AI Limit and many more that are building momentum as we get closer to their releases. We also talk about other games that showed up at China Joy 2024 not directly from Sony with new teasers and trailers including Monster Hunter Wilds, Dynasty Warriors: Origins, and Phantom Blade Zero. There was also a new teaser for Season 2 of The Last of Us tv series on Max, to discuss and theorize who Catherine O’Hara will be playing and what storylines could be expanded on beyond what we got in the games. And oh yeah Astrobot and his controller are almost here so we had to talk at least a little bit about one of our favorite up-and-coming mascots of PlayStation. We also acknowledge the PSVR2 PC adapter and hope that will help entice more people to play and make more things that are PSVR2 compatible. There is also a new segment called Out This Week highlighting all the games coming out this week that we are excited for like Twin-Stick shooter Cygni: All Guns Blazing, Volgarr the Viking 2, Steamworld Heist 2, and of course Cat’s Quest 3 where you can take over the Purribean, I’m not sure if that's a tagline for the game but either way that's the pun I’m going with in this description for it. Finally, we do a lightning round of what we’ve been playing recently. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, we’ve got plenty to talk about. Jada just reviewed Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn, the open-world souls-like action RPG from the studio behind Ashen. She breaks down the combat, both ranged and melee, as well as traversal, how the world is laid out, and the novel approach of earning bonus experience by chaining together combos. We also delve into bosses, as well as what’s up with that little rat dog. Concord had its first Beta this weekend, and we discuss our early impressions of Firewalk’s relatively budget-priced but still pay-to-play live-service shooter. Will it have the same success as Helldivers 2, or attract disgruntled Apex Legends and Overwatch players? We’ll have to wait and see. Jada also spoke to Neil Jones the developer of, Aerial_Knight’s Never Yield, about the upcoming indie narrative runner. We also have time to weigh in on other stuff we’ve been playing, including Chants of Sennaar, Final Fantasy XIV Dawntrail, Alaskan Road Truckers, and yes, Elden Ring’s expansion, Shadow of the Erdtree. Have you heard of it? This week’s panel is Max Scoville, Jada Griffin and Brian Altano with special guest Neil Jones. Presented by Wendy’s Saucy Nuggs00:00:00 - Intro00:01:17 - Concord First Impressions00:14:35 - Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn Impressions00:32:17 - Wendy's Saucy Nuggs Featuring Unnecessary Inventions00:33:37 - Aerial_Knight's We Never Yield Interview with Neil Jones00:50:56 - Brian likes Elden Ring01:04:04 - Chants of Sennaar, Final Fantasy XIV Dawntrail, Alaskan Road Truckers Discussion Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elden Ring’s Shadow of the Erdtree DLC is one of the more expansive expansions in recent memory, which has just pondering what exactly the sweet spot is for add-ons to games we love. Is waiting two years for a $40 expansion to a $70 game better than waiting five or six years for a full sequel? Regularly updated live-service games like Destiny 2 and Final Fantasy XIV have no trouble keeping existing players interested, but how do you attract new players when a game’s been going for over a decade? Grand Theft Auto: Vice City was nearly an expansion for GTA III before Rockstar made it a standalone release, and we got some wonderful expansions to Grand Theft Auto IV with The Lost & The Damned and The Ballad of Gay Tony, and then GTAV’s story DLC was allegedly scrapped to focus on the more granular and lucrative updates added to GTA Online. Meanwhile, plenty more great games got their start as DLC, like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, Halo 3: ODST and Hollow Knight: Silk Song… Though that last one is still MIA. In other PlayStation-adjacent news, Astro’s Playroom has been getting some free sneaky little updates ahead of the release of Astro Bot, including some indication that someone working at Sony actually remembers that Bloodborne exists and that people love it. The Shapes is a new line of collector-grade action figures from Spin Master, featuring some familiar faces from God of War, Ghost of Tsushima, and Horizon Forbidden West. We got a couple little updates on the Watch Dogs movie we forgot was in the works, as well as the Metal Gear Solid movie that’s been in the works for almost 20 years. This week’s episode features Max Scoville, Jada Griffin and Matt Kim.Presented by Wendy’s Saucy Nuggs Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices