RUMOR: Sony is working on a new PSP that runs PlayStation 4 games

Go'll be bad. It's the Internet. You're busy. Let's do this for
May twentieth, twenty twenty four. For the next hour or so, let
me help you sort through the world of gaming on Game Miss Mornings Live with
me Jeff Grub Today, Xbox and PlayStation are both reportedly considering tectonic shifts to
their core products. But first, please join me in welcoming today's co host
a Game Mess Mornings. It's Emma Fife. Everybody, Emma, how are
you doing? You know, I'm just just hanging in there, just living
life. That's all, exactly, honestly on all we can ask is that
I am still among the living, exactly right. That's the like. We
can't hope for more than that, We can't demand more of that. That's
all you're being paid to do. It's just for main here, just to
exist, exactly. Yeah, exactly, No, I'm good. I yeah
this. I do not mean for this to sound like a brag and like
I'm so popular or something, but like, sure, I had so many
birthday parties to attend this weekend. I don't know why all my friends were
apparently born over the span of three days. Okay, yeah, yeah,
yeah, I haven't done the math on that to figure out the you know,
biological why of it. But but yeah, you know, like I
just yeah, a lot of birthday parties this weekend. Well, I mean
was it a was it a good time? Or by the last one,
you're like, I can't pinning the tale on the donkey into it? Was
it was very fun? Yeah. We started with a party at a gaming
esports bar in Bourbank, California, and ended at a neighbors downstairs last night
playing a version of pictionary where you have to include cats. Very good.
Yeah, it's pretty cats the Animal or Cats the musical The Musical by Andrew
load Weber. No, no cats the Animal. Yeah. Basically, basically
it's like, do you remember like color forms? Oh you like stuck to
Okay? No, are you just dropped out there for a second? Color
forms? I think a blame spectrum. Yeah we're back, am I here?
You hear me? Now? Absolutely? Yes, col color forms where
you would like make little scenes with like little things that you They were like
sticky, but they were resticky. Okay. It wasn't like stickers. They
were like removable, movable stickers. So basically in this game, there are
you there? Are only like cat stickers, and so you put the cats
on the board and then it's like you draw a card and it's like,
okay, the movie is Austin Powers, so you have to depict Austin Powers.
But with Cats, it's great. That sounds great, that sounds fantastic,
that sounds like a good time. Although I think you absolutely could also
do that with the cast of Cats as well. I got a question for
you. Do you think Dan Rikert just wakes up specifically like being like,
hey, I'm gonna set off the game sent because I know Game as Mornings
is happening Dan Reikert. Yeah, absolutely, it's going off. Smells like
explosions and gunshots, you know. Yeah. Oh he gets away earlier,
he says, gets he's got to go for his run. He's practicing for
a marathon everybody. But I think I think this motivates him, like all
right, you know, I get to get up early to make sure i'll
be there and I can set off the game scent. I'm just from looking
for the positive, like I am inspiring him to live a better life because
he gets to make me miserable. Oh boy, you know what, let's
explain what we do here most weekdays, I, Jeff Greb will help your
piece your gaming life back together. That includes breaking news and maybe even some
of our own original reporting. For all these topics, I'll get input from
a bona fide expert who will make me look smart. If you are watching
live on twitch welcome, You can always listen to the show later on podcast
feeds by searching for Game Mess Mornings, or find therss on giant bomb dot
com. You can also catch the show later with chapters and timestamps on YouTube.
Hello YouTube. All right, we have a lot to get into,
so let's start the morning mess with. Xbox will make changes to the game
Pass model when it adds Call of Duty. According to several reports now this
is from Chris Scully and at VGC, Xbox will make changes to the current
game Pass subscription model when the next Call of Duty game is released, it's
claimed. Last week, The Wall Street Journal claimed, according to its sources
and knowledge of the situation, that this year's entry, which has yet to
be officially announced, will be included in the subscription service. This would mark
the first time a Call of Duty game has been included in such a service
at launch. It would mean for players with access to Xbox platforms, the
entry costs for the game would be as little as eleven dollars the subscription model
currently that's how it currently stands. Whoever, Industry insider Shanobi six zero two
has claimed on reset Era that the addition of Call of Duty to game Pass
will also give Xbox the opportunity to refresh the structure. Accordingly, one user
on the forum predicted that there would be a precise price increase for game Pass,
while another added, for sure they want the new sign ups to get
from Call of Duty to be on the new fee and will probably reorganize the
tiers to be less confused, less confusing mess than it is now. I
saw some other people over on YouTube. I think Natan Hate was talking about
this. This is something that's been going around, and it sounds like a
very likely scenario, right if you are Microsoft and you have this big inflection
point, and we did speculate about this on Friday, and I wonder why
now. It is the kind of thing where you have this big game you
can move and shake things around and people will be like, well, it's
Call of Duty. I'll just put up with it. Price increase seems like
the most opt thing, but it might also give them a chance to be
like, you know what if we made a bigger shift that people would normally
like throw their hands up about. And they probably will still, but at
this point it's like, well, I'm gonna want Call of Duty. And
the thing I would speculate is maybe, like the simplest thing here is to
move people up to that higher tier who are still on like the eleven dollars
tier. And maybe one way you do that is the eleven dollars tier is
like the older Library of Games, and then game Pass Ultimate is actually where
you get day one games. Now that that kind of completely shifts what game
Pass is. But yes, to me, when I guess, I'm speculating,
and I like, like this is I'm happy about this because I could
speculate because I don't know, and so don't go right writing headlines about where
we're having a conversation here everybody, this is just us figuring it out.
But to me, that's like that that's the opportunity is to sort of re
to shift what people expect from game Pass going forward now with Call of Duty,
do you think that's a possibility and to reconfigure the tear as you say,
because again, like they already exist and I think that it's just an
opportunity where they're going to expand. The thing that I think is unfortunate about
this because I do agree with you that most likely they are going to shift
to a model where it's like you basically have to pay for the premium to
get those day one releases and to get you know, those cod titles.
But I don't want Call of Duty, but I do want Persona, you
know. So it's like, to me, that's very frustrating that basically because
of this Activision Blizzard merger, which I did opious amounts of research on during
the point at which it was you know, up for debate and going back
and forth. But yeah, it is I don't want to get locked into
I have to pay more money to get any day one release because now they
have Call of Duty. And so yeah, that's that that is frustrating,
And again that is likely what is going to happen. You know, maybe
it's a thing wherein there's a partnership. Again they now own Activelis, but
there's a partnership level of Okay, actively as day one releases, you have
to be at this tier level, because I think that you would be alienating
some of those people who have signed up for game Pass who do enjoy these
partnerships that they have with some other studios like your Sega Atlases, and I
don't want that to suffer because of this gigantic triple A title that a lot
of people like who are not me. Yeah, And I think it's like,
as we like talk it out, it's okay, Yeah, I get
like Call of Duty is a big deal. But anyone who's getting into game
Pass because of Call of Duty is almost certainly going to go to the Ultimate
tier anyhow, because they want to play online and that's where you get Xbox
you know, Live as it was once called. But all my multiplayers in
Ultimate. So does this really move the needle all that much? And I
think the answer is probably, It's not really about that. It is about
using this opportunity to shift people like you who don't care about Call of Duty
to be like, well, your games are also getting swept up in this.
The Call Duty kind of like absorbs all the oxygen at the moment.
So it's like, I get it, it's such a big game, you
got to move it up to that tier. But it's in reality, it's
like this is actually about making game Pass work for Xbox, and now about
making call of Duty makes sense in game pass. Call of Duty is just
an excuse. I think at a certain point absolutely, you know, there's
I think also the possibility of them keeping most things the same and offering a
new higher tier or something that includes call of Duty. But I don't know
if you could do Oh okay, call of Duty is the one exception that
isn't included in this and everything else is the same as it ever was.
That feels even stranger at a certain point where yeah, I don't know,
do you think they could pull that off? It seems extremely unlikely that they
would basically introduce a call of Duty tier, you know, like that's that's
so just singling out a title. Again, I do think that if they
created a tier wherein you had access to every Activision Blizzard game on day one,
that would possibly make a lot more sense. But it's not just going
to be Call of Duty. They are certainly going to use that to leverage,
and on top of that, I think that there will be a certain
number of people who end up subscribing to this premium level of game Pass to
get access to the Call of Duty games via game Pass on day one without
really thinking through, Am I actually going to play other games that are offered
on game Pass And so ultimately they're going to end up doing something like and
you know, I see a lot of conversations happening in chat about this as
well. So I do want to acknowledge that that they're not doing the math
of oh, I'm paying thirty dollars a month, whereas I could have just
bought this game for seventy dollars. Yep. Yeah, Well, I mean
there are there are people out there who are obviously going to do the math
and decide I should just buy the game instead, and they have that option,
But there is a psychological benefit of people being like, well, no,
you can get it for now for a reduced price, and don't think
about the monthly fee that you're likely going to keep spending on this service going
forward. People do operate that way. That is something that I mean,
that's why these subscription services are so popular with these companies is they see that
this targets a different, different audience that's very hard to convince to spend you
know, seventy dollars on one game or twenty five dollars on one movie.
Instead it's like, no, you're just a little bit less than that per
month, and you get all this stuff. And it's a conversation I always
talk about on the show, like the conversation people have with themselves when they're
trying to make a PLEXC decision and you have to convince yourself that this you're
going to get your money's worth. You have to tell yourself a story.
Yeah, and this is a more compelling story. Even if you are someone
who's like only going to be playing Call of Duty. Telling yourself, well,
and then I have all these other games is something that gets people over
that hump. It's always it might have nothing to do with how you actually
end up using the service, but in the moment, yes, spinning that
money, it makes it hurt a little bit less. And so Microsoft's trying
to navigate that. I think they're trying to present the best story possible while
also I think increasing their return from every Xbox Game Pass user. They just
want to see the average spend on that go up a couple of dollars,
like ten percent, and that would make everything feel a little bit better.
For them, and I think they'll probably be able to make something happen here.
Do you think there's a chance, though, that maybe we're looking at
it from the wrong angle, and maybe the new tier is on the bottom
side and it's five dollars with Do you think commercials are going to be showing
up on our Xbox now when you go to play Call of Duty? Yikes,
that could very well be the case, because ads are so annoying that
people will go, oh my god, I can't take it. I'll just
pay the extra money for the ad free version. Yep, that's me.
Yeah, how I end up doing all this thing? And like I'm trying
to accept it with Prime Video because I'm like, I don't want another one
getting closed so far from me. With Prime Video, it's mostly just I
get hit with a series of ads before the Boys or whatever starts playing.
But there, we know, you know what's happening there. It's like they're
starting, they're starting slow, and it's soft launching, soft launching. It's
gonna get a little bit worse, a little bit worse, a little bit
worse. It's just you know, they poison us slowly so we don't notice
or boil us slowly, so you know, the lobster doesn't notice. I
think the lobster probably does notice. And I'm noticing too, so it it's
gonna get me to a point where I'll pay extra on this one too.
It's it's but I really do hate ads that much. That said, these
companies love ads, they love it, and everything ends up no matter what
when it's like, hey, you know, we've done all this work to
sort of take ads out of the experience and make it feel like that it's
just table stakes, and now there's people at these companies going, we're leaving
money on the table. We got to get ads back in here, and
so it all just ends up going back to where we started, and it
feels inevitable at a certain point. Yeah, And again it's like I have
respect for ad dollars because largely in art unfortunately, for better or for worse,
that is where the money comes from. To make things is you have
to basically get the money of these giant corporations. But Microsoft's a giant corporation,
you know, Yep, yep, absolutely, And that's uh, these
corporations, I'll all kind of end up thinking exactly the same. And if
there's room for them to make more money by making things shittier. Guess what
things are going to get shittier yep, time for the and shitification of Game
Pass NonStop. Yes, it's just going to happen everywhere. I don't you
know. This call Duty probably coming out this fall. They will probably have
announcements for this game at Xbox well, the redacted direct after the Xbox Showcase
on June ninth, that day before you know, of course, before our
live show the Real Marquis I forget that day, Yes, at the bell
Weather. Don't get your tickets? Who cares about Xbox when you could come
to the Giant Bomb Live show at the Bellweather and beautiful downtown Los Angeles.
Get your tickets now, Yeah, exactly. And so they're gonna have their
showcase then and they'll probably talk about that game then. I think they probably
also in that moment they I mean, maybe not at the showcase. Maybe
that's something they do at like sometimes they have an overflow show where they talk
about more details. Maybe that drops there so that they can just have the
good news be at the showcase. Unless they find a way to present these
tiers as good news right where it's like oh, you're getting more and it
also costs more, and the tears are all changing the possibility they figure something
like that, you know, but we'll see. All right, let's move
along here. It's kind of sticking with Microsoft. Microsoft's next console will be
released in twenty twenty six, according to a rumor. This is from Jonas
Mackie, a game reactor. This is a rumor we've heard for a while,
but more people are throwing their hat into that ring. Xbox series SNX
seems to have peaked and it's declining rapidly in sales. One while Microsoft is
being vague about its future strategy, and even Sony recently said that as we
enter the second half of the console cycle, we expect the number of new
PS five units sold to gradually decline. Basically after three and a half years
in this generation, we are now in the second half of the cycle.
This leads us to suspect that both Microsoft and Sony are currently working feverishly on
their next consoles. There are many indications that they are taking a slightly different
approach, because while countless rumors from good sources say that Sony is working on
a PlayStation five pro to be released late this year or early next. Microsoft
in February instead talked about the next generation as they the largest technical leap you
have ever seen in a hardware generation. But when will this start? According
to Microsoft's Major League from last year, both Microsoft and Sony were considering releasing
new consoles in twenty twenty eight, but the information wasn't entirely up to date,
and since then Microsoft has bought Activission Blizzard and failed to boost Xbox Series
S and X sales, with one at least reasonably reputable insider claiming to have
heard that the next Xbox will arrive in twenty twenty six. Given that there
doesn't seem to be more powerful Xbox Series X coming, the chances of this
actually being true are increasing, and now the reliable Insider Gaming is joining the
chorus, citing a Call of Duty data minor who claims to have received credible
evidence that the next Xbox will launch in twenty twenty six, and not only
that, it will apparently be released together with that year's Call of Duty.
Yeah, okay, so I think we'll get to that part, the call
of Duty part here in a second. But launching in twenty twenty six seems
to be the kind of thing where it's like, Okay, that starts to
make some sense when you think about where Xbox is. What they've been saying
to us, waiting till twenty twenty eight, just to wait till twenty twenty
eight doesn't feel like the right move, especially when it means like just doing
the same thing over again of launching an Xbox head to head against a new
PlayStation station. Yeah, that did occur to me as well. Is to
get away from that because it's and it's so complicated, because you know,
as we've discussed before, we're seeing things with Sony and some of their first
party limited releases where they basically have partnerships with some of these studios where it's
like, okay, this is a PlayStation exclusive console release force a a year
and then it's going to be released on PC, et cetera. And we
already see that, you know, with companies like Squarenix moving away from that
because previously it would have been well, Microsoft in terms of consoles is not
going to compete with PlayStation with the people who are PlayStation and players, I
include myself amongst this, Like I am a PlayStation girly through and through have
been since childhood, And it's because I do like those big single player story
games that tend to live on the PlayStation as opposed to on the Xbox.
So ultimately Xbox is not going to compete with PlayStation. Now. If they
have an offering that comes out before the new PlayStation does and there is some
further incentive to it, I could see this being successful. It's certainly an
interesting strategy for them to try. Yeah, and there's like opportunities for them
to really change how things work well, you know us terms about like enabling
other companies to provide the opportunity for players to sideload different stores onto Xboxes going
forward. Whatever. We have no idea what that looks like, whether that
would really happen, whatever. That's sort of beside the point of this conversation
as it stands. The a new Xbox in twenty twenty six, that is
the biggest generational leap we've ever seen, which is just not going to be
true. But no, but it's not going to be true. But but
the promise there still is that what it's going to be very powerful and probably
very expensive boutique. Everything that goes along with that. I think that like
is just them putting a flag in the ground to say we are going to
do things different than we've done them before. We are not just going to
be the green PlayStation with fewer exclusives. We are going to be our own
thing. And what does that look like. At the very least, at
the high end, it's going to be some big new console that launches in
twenty twenty six and it's going to be the best place to play console on
peace or on or like Call of Duty on console, excuse me. And
I think that's a compelling argument to some for sure. At the very least,
though, it goes back to Nintendo is won by like going in its
own direction. Microsoft's got to do that as well. It's got to just
go in its own direction and stop just trying to respond to what PlayStation does.
That's over And I think this is at the very least, this forces
them into a situation where they have to think differently, where they have to
try things that completely reset the expectation for Xbox in many people's minds, including
the people who run Xbox. So I'm in favor of this, and the
fact that we're hearing more and more people sort of being like that's we'll keep
here in twenty twenty six makes some sense that puts us at So we're twenty
twenty four, now twenty twenty five, you know, holiday season, another
Call of Duty. Then twenty twenty six, Call of Duty launches with this
new Xbox. Do you think that is Again we're just talking about sales numbers
and kind of like and being able to get people excited about it. Do
you think that's a good strategy to try to line this up with Call of
Duty? You think it can move the needle for that? I mean sure.
Again, it's like, I fully recognize that a lot of people love
Call of Duty, and I think that actually it's a very good strategy from
that point of view, as there are certainly a large number of people who
are not you know, in sort of the games beat, if you will,
who are playing Call of Duty on console and who will just go,
oh, cool, new Call of Duty machine and we'll buy it. So
I do think that there is a there's merit to that idea. Yep.
Yeah, And you know, they do have a lot of other games in
the works. They could line a lot of other stuff up for a launch.
But I think there's a reason we hear it in conjunction with Call of
Duty. I think this is the most eggs are in this basket for Microsoft
going forward, and they spend a lot of money on it. It makes
a lot of money. It makes sense. It just might not be I
don't know. Call of Duty feels like an understood entity, like we know
what it is. So there's almost only so much excitement that I think you
could build around that. You instead, you're just trying to shift around excitement
that already exists. I think you're right that Microsoft will to present a different
story alongside all this to really get convinced people that aren't already commenced one way
or the other. All right, Yes, and when you want to talk
about generational leaps, talk to me when we've got a full on Star Trek
Holodeck. That's the only big leap as far as I'm concerned. Yeah,
it's at this point it's not going to be you know, rasterizing in graphics
a little bit better than what we've been doing for the last fifteen twenty years.
Okay, our eyes can't even detect that. So yeah, we are
far beyond diminishing returnans for sure. All right, over at Sony. Meanwhile,
a couple of stories here that speak to it maybe considering some big changes.
Let's start here, though, there's a rumor that Sony's working on a
new PSP that runs PlayStation four games. This is from Jonas Mackie at Game
Reactor. There have been many rumors lately that Microsoft is working on a portable
Xbox console, but there have also been signs that Sony is crafting a portable
place station, another portable PlayStation, and now comes a new rumor from a
Russian journalist via resset Era, who previously revealed Sony news in advance, that
says Sony is working on a new PSP. The device is supposed to be
powerful enough to be able to play PlayStation four games on or at least.
The journalist notes that there are only PlayStation four four games available for PC listed
as launch titles. A reasonable guest is, therefore, that it is a
PC based solution that we'll be able to run the PC games Sony has released,
and of course other titles as well. There's probably there's more to this,
but like you know, what this sounds like to me is Sony has
PlayStation and Sony Interactive Entertainment and then there's Sony's hardware business that always tries to
do stuff on top of PlayStation. That's what you know recently. That's what
PSVR two was, That's what PlayStation portal was. That's what all those headsets
and earbuds and stuff like that. All that stuff is Sony's hardware business being
like PlayStation mix money. We got to mix stuff for PlayStation and PlayStation going,
I guess whatever, do your thing. This sounds like Sony's former like
Vio business, like the previous PC business that's mostly dwindled and shut down and
all that stuff. Yes, they still have a lot of that expertise there,
being like okay, we don't make laptops anymore, but maybe we could
make a gaming handheld PC and we would just brand that PlayStation and take it
from there. Do you think that it does that sound right? Or do
you think they are like, no, this is going to be the PSP.
I think it's just like additional hardware. As you say that is it
is that Tony has this hardware division and they just feel like they need to
make things because they exist. And yeah, I mean, look, I
actually did have a PSP. It was my dad's and he was like,
you can just have it, because obviously I guess he wasn't that into it.
I was pretty into it. I enjoyed playing og Crisis Core and Fderal
Fantasy Tactics for the Lions. Uh yeah, so again it's like, I
don't know, it's just in this era when you have the Switch, which
again of course is made in such a way that you are able to play
it handheld or docked on your TV, and also you have the Steam Deck.
You know, if it's not going to be a you can this is
a like full blown console that's powerful enough to play any of your games,
then I don't want it, you know, Like yep, And that's uh,
that is what the implication here is. Like PS five games wouldn't run,
but maybe les they imported to PC, they would be potentially they could
run. But if this thing is, if this thing comes out soon,
it probably you know, future PS five games probably wouldn't run great on it.
Although you know, Ghost to Sushimode ran great, but that was PS
four games. So what am I saying? Right, Yeah, well,
we'll see. I think that this is maybe a good placeholder, a holdover
until they get to a point where they are figuring out, Okay, how
can we have a switch like device or a handheld device that is going to
run everything we put out in one way or another. And in the meantime,
we have all these PlayStation four games going to PC. We do have
a hardware e smission that is thirsty to make something. Why don't we just
do this? It just feels like something that happens because you have these resources
and you need to do something with them. And I think that's fine.
I mean, I'll be interested. Sony makes good hardware totally. Oh,
they make really good hardware. And as you say, it's it is a
situation of okay, we are making these games available on PC, so this
is another way for people to play these PC ports basically of these PlayStation games,
but on Sony hardware. Like I understand the thought process behind it.
Yes, this is what I'm saying, same exactly. I know how we
get here. We know how we get here. That leads into this other
story, which is a little bit different. Even though it might sound like
the same thing. PlayStation job listing hints at a huge shakeup for the future
of the company. This is from fandom Wire, which I don't think is
any relation, right, so different relation. PlayStation could be making some changes
sometime soon, and the gaming community has a good guess of what it might
be. Gaming handheldzer all the rage and many seem to suggest it is the
future of gaming, which makes sense for Sony and Microsoft to get a slice
up. The story kind of has a preamble here for a little bit,
but basically there is a job listing this from the company and the description of
the roles and responsibilities include a line that reads, programs developed for our entertainment
game consoles to run on game consoles with different architectures. That's the big thing
here that people are picking up on, and essentially what that means is there's
a PlayStation five, PlayStation four. These are x eighty six architecture, the
same thing that PCs have been running on for forever, and now Sony's looking
at this like, okay, we need to put this stuff on other architectures.
The immediate knee jerk reaction here from many people is this means Sony is
looking at arm architecture for future handhelds and they want to make sure that their
games can get translated through a translation layer to that different architecture. So they
just work similar to what we've been speculating Microsoft has been doing, because in
league documents from last year that they filed with the FTC, they said one
of the things they're looking at is maybe arm architecture for the next Xbox,
which is something that could still happen, and if they did that, they
would also need a translation layer. Does that sound like the likeliest thing to
you, because I think that's there's a good chance that ease what's happening here.
Yeah. I mean, it's as we were even discussing in the previous
story about this new PlayStation handheld, you know, and I already brought up
the instance of Steam Deck, wherein you have the ability to play the games
in your Steam library handheld, and it does feel like so, and I
like, again, I fully fully understand the strategy from the perspective of because
I do not have a Steam Deck. Sometimes there are games that come up
and I go, you know what, I really want to play that handheld,
So I'm going to buy it on the switch because it exists, you
know, on it exists as an option on the switch. These are often
you know, you're older or more like classically styled JRPG kind of titles.
I like to be able to play those handheld I like to be able to
lay on my bed and play them my video games. So it makes total
sense that in order to stay in the game, And you know, I
credit Nintendo really in a lot of ways for kind of establishing this precedent of
your games are available to you to play anywhere, and that does feel to
me to be what needs to be the model going forward. Yep. And
I mean Nintendo also got out ahead of the curve by embracing arm ARM architecture,
so they're set up for the future. X eighty six and ARM are
in a battle. We talk about this all the time, but I'll reiterate
they're like in a battle towards the mid where, like you know, X
eighty six is very powerful and efficient, ARM less powerful, very efficient,
and now both are are kind of heading in the same direction where it's like
X eighty six is getting more efficient, especially as a makes these handheld versions
that you know have pretty decent battery life for the fact that they're running.
You know, I'm playing Ghost of Sushima on the Steam Deck right now,
and it's like, man, I've got like an hour and a half an
hour and fifteen minutes. That's pretty impressive. ARM, on the other side,
is like getting more powerful and staying very efficient as we see like now
Resident Evil four runs on the iPhone fifteen or whatever, for example, So
they're both heading in the same direction. But it seems like, based on
the current trends, ARM is going to become more powerful faster than X eighty
six becomes more efficient. So if you are one of these companies and you
are trying to plan out the next five, ten, twenty years of what
you're doing, you might be in a situation where like, well we need
to consider ARM that is actually the only viable solution for the future. Are
competitors are doing it, And for Nintendo, they're like, well, we're
already there, and our games are just going to be a little bit easier
to translate. Now, it seems like they are still going to have to
have some sort of compatibility layer from the switch to the switch to but they
are still in a better position than where Microsoft and PlayStation are, where it's
like, no, they're all X eighty six and we got to get all
these games if we want to keep backward compatibility and keep people's libraries. Intact,
we have to make this huge transition that's going to be could be painful,
but they are researching this right now to solve that, and this honestly
could just be what this is all about, future proofing their decisions, right.
Yes, absolutely, and ultimately, you know, you look at a
company like Nintendo, who was ahead of the curb with this and really established
this precedent. Nintendo has always kind of existed on its own island. It's
it's properties are so well established. And again because they came at their most
recent console to switch it, as you say, there's going to need to
be a level of compatibility in order to play you know, switch switch too.
But they are already at a tremendous advantage, and all of these other
companies are going to have to do a lot of work internally in terms of
how their you know, software hardware runs to get on Nintendo's levels. So
I don't think that like Nintendo is Nintendo's not swatting anything here. They just
get to kind of be like, yeah, we already we figured out the
way that video. It's like they're going to help us figure all this stuff
out. You guys have exactly either make a deal with Nvidia and kind of
and then have all this work ahead of you and good luck with that.
There's other possibilities here, though, How what do you think the chances are
that this is about you know, oh, we have live service games or
PlayStation. We're making a big live service push and we want to make sure
that our games are everywhere, including smartphones. Like, do you think this
is like maybe about getting hell Divers to on smartphones or something like that.
Maybe not just tell theirs two all their life. So it's super interesting to
me because I recall when Gensen Impact launched, it was obviously available PC,
mobile and PlayStation. So I do think that there is a possibility that,
yeah, you know, you do want your live service games like your Hell
Divers to be on smartphones and to just be generally in general live service games,
you want them everywhere. Yep, everywhere, so that to be and
especially when they are at a affordable or free to play sort of level.
Yeah. I mean again, the way that you get in with people,
especially younger people, is everybody has a smartphone. Yeah. Okay, well
then okay, let's go one step further. What if this is about putting
PlayStation games on switch This is about switch To comes out and they're like,
we have live service games that we want to be everywhere, and maybe they
should also be on switch to. I think there's any chance of that,
that's what's happening here. Wow. I didn't really consider that. I mean,
wow, that would be that would be big to get there, to
get their properties onto a switch to, especially because then they're in a position
of Nintendo has already figured this out. So if we just figure out how
to make our games available on Nintendo's upcoming update to the Switch, it makes
sense to me. Yep, you know, it's not impossible. And I
think that the Sony is like looking at hey, we want to make sure
that we have every option on the table. And the reality is, you
do this work now, and you have a team that is very good at
at producing these compatibility layers that does offer up the flexibility to move in any
direction, and that's probably what this is really about, is just having a
team there that is technologically sound and doing this work and then later you can
make the business case for whatever you need to do with it. In the
meantime. In the meantime, it's like, well, at the very least,
we can put some of these games on smartphone, and if we need
to move to arm from our current stuff, we can have the technology in
place to carry all of that work that we've done so far forward. The
one thing, the one thing Sony can't really do now is say your library
of games that you purchase doesn't work anymore. That is like, yeah,
that is the massive tool in their toolbox that has enabled them to establish a
dominance that seems unassailable. It seems like Microsoft can do nothing about. Phil
Spencer himself has said that it's like, we can't. There's nothing to be
done. Everyone already has their library and they're not going to abandon that to
come over to Xbox. No. No, So whatever happens going forward,
that is the number probably number one priority for them, and that's what this
speaks to, I think, is that priority. Yeah, all right,
what we're gonna do now is we're gonna take a quick break. When we
get back, Fallout is in Fortnite. There's revisions to what we expect from
gaming this year, and a lot more right after this. All right,
we're back and let's get right back into it. Fallout is coming to Fortnite.
I lost my tab. There, there we go. This is for
Michael mcwerder at Polygon. Fallout is coming to Fortnite. Exactly how and when
Bethess, the software's post apocalyptic franchise is coming to Epex betrol Turned Everything game
is unclear, but we're pretty much guaranteed to get some cartoonish power armor out
of it. We're also likely to get some Vault dwell or jumpsuits, but
it remains to be seen what exactly Epic and Methys to have cooked up for
the highly anticipated collaboration. The official Fortnite social media account on Twitter tease the
crossover on Friday, hinting that Fallout style basis and post nuclear devastation could be
dropping in on the Battle Royale Island. No doubt Vault Boy will also make
an appearance as part of the collab. Interested in the Fallout franchise is at
a high right now because the show. Obviously we've seen that, and I'll
admit when I saw this, I'm like, oh, yeah, that's that's
fantastic. I love that. Give me some power armor in Fortnite, and
it's like, I think, probably like six months ago, I would not
have been like, oh, I'm so excited for Fallout stuff. I like
Fallout a lot. I'm like, I'm just not in the mood for that,
and now I'm very much in the mood for that. So I think
that speaks to a couple of things. One, Fallout is at a high
point, but that type from the TV show isn't going to fade just because
the TV show is no longer top of mind. It has like totally it
has like reshuffled the hierarchy of power in my brain of like where Fallout lands
in terms of does this released dopamine or not, because right now it's like,
show me some of that stuff. I'm on board. So this is
a I'm pretty happy about this, Yeah, for sure. I Mean the
thing that's really interesting you bring up that Fallout has had the show has had
such an effect on the games in a way that I think people didn't necessarily
anticipate. So it's one of those things where it feels bizarre that they didn't
have this collaboration ready to go when the TV show won, for sure.
But that being said, the I don't think anybody anticipated the level to which
there has been a renewed interest in the games and Fallout already is so ridiculous,
as you know, it's campy, it's over the top. This works
really well in Fortnite, which also has a certain level of self awareness.
Yeah, and do you think there's a possibility that this collaboration started like after
the show became popular, so like, this is all happening very possible to
me. That's like, man, Fortnite is in operating on such a high
level where it's Okay, something popped off, and what a month later,
a month and a half later, they can have something ready to go to
capitalize on that. That is it's impressive, and it does it enables them
to make these moves where it's like we can work backward from what is going
off right now, and we have the people in place to go make those
business deals, and we have the people in place to actually make those assets
and the people in place to market it properly. Yeah, that's it's an
impressive, well oiled machine that I'm like going, I guess that's kind of
what you need to be if you are going to be the everything game.
So it's impressive to see them capitalize on that. Definitely the everything game.
Yeah, I mean, obviously there is a possibility that this deal was put
in place when the TV show was coming out, especially because you want to
talk about a game that's in the business of advertising, it's Fortnite, for
sure, So yeah, but I mean at the same time, Fortnite's they
got their finger on the pulse of what's going on, and it is.
It's an incredibly well oiled machine. And I can't wait to see Power Armor
and also all the Coca Cola advertising replaced with new Co Cola. Yeah,
I'll take it absolutely. Yeah, Well, we'll see. They'll probably have
more details on this here pretty soon. But you know, we check in
on Fortnite every couple of months. Maybe this would be a chance to get
back in there. Yes, new Zoo has revised its twenty twenty three games
revenue or this must yeah, twenty twenty four games revenue forecast down to one
hundred and eighty four billion. This is from Rachel Kaser at games be new
Zoo announced today that is updating its Global Games Market Report with its final adjusted
estimates and now analysis forecast forecasted for the year. According to the market research
company, this is the last adjustment. Okay, this is yeah, to
the twenty twenty three market report before the twenty twenty four report is published in
July, and the latest adjustment adjustment, new Zoo predict that the game and
that was from August. New Zoo predicted that the games market would generate one
hundred and eighty seven point seven billion dollars in twenty twenty three. However,
new Zoo's latest report put the estimate down to one hundred and ninety billion,
down two percent. So that must be based on what they've seen now and
they actually lock that in. This is going to make twenty twenty four's revenue
a little bit more difficult for it to match what it did last year,
and that's really going to speak to where we're at overall with the industry,
that everything is so vibes based with investors where they are, yeah, okay,
the industry could make a lot of money, and it could have made
so much money where it was like, oh and it's up a little bit.
But now the fact that last year did a little bit better than it
did before, it's going to make those comparisons a little bit tougher to match,
and that's going to make investors feel bad, and that's going to mean
they're going to invest less, and that means we're going to get fewer games
from people that rely on investment, which turns out to be much of the
industry, not just like indie games or like the big indie studios or the
big publishers, it's everybody. Because no one likes to pay for stuff themselves.
That everyone's like, we got to we have to go out there borrow
money to make this whole thing go around. And investors are in a bad
mood right now, so everyone's suffering. Yes, do you see a change
to that coming anytime soon? Or is it really going to rely on the
vibes changing with switch to and Grand Theft Auto six, which we now know
is coming to fall twenty twenty five. Is it just everyone trying to survive
until then. Yes, I mean that's what I think. I truly wish
that I could say. No, it's gonna it's gonna turn around and things
are going to level out. And you know, we've seen all the layoffs
that we're going to see, and now these companies have you know, more
sound strategies. You know, they've scaled back to a degree that they can
you know, remain afloat either being profitable or just barely, you know,
kind of staying even. But yeah, I really do think that unfortunately,
we are in a situation wherein we are not done seeing the negative repercussions of
this. And it's it's complicated because I think that you know, in twenty
twenty, when everybody was at home, I mean, the boosts that we
saw to the games industry were massive and and good that that there was a
scenario during that time wherein a lot of people really were retaining their jobs,
were you know, new jobs were being created within these industries. Yeah,
exactly, there was discretionary spending, and that just simply isn't It's the same
thing that we see in the film and television industry, with things like on
Netflix being like we're going to make We're to release eighty new shows this year,
and all of those shows the going to get one season, some of
them might get to hardly any Netflix show gets more than two seasons. And
so yeah, it's it is and we're all like navigating and this is again
where the idea of advertising comes in. How do these things make money?
In? You know, yeah, because it's just yeah, I this is
not surprising to me that revenue is going to be down, and I think
unfortunately, like we're in a down swing for a little while, and hopefully
once we swing around to new GTAs and switch tos we start to see an
up swing. But yeah, I mean I think that this is accurate.
Yeah, And I think it's the kind of thing where it's very easy to
be like, well, yeah, things feel bad, so I get it.
But investors are also just bad at this sort of thing, and they
always are, and they are they're governed by their emotions and they actually aren't
as data driven as they claim to be. Where it's like, yeah,
okay, the things are looking rough in the moment, but we do know
that that things are going to pick up again. The industry is not going
to be down permanently. It's going there's going to be a burst of growth.
So now maybe is the time to make investment because you can get a
better deal than when it was like at the height of acquisition season and everyone
was like paying way more for studios than when they than they would have previously,
and and they could and developers could dictate terms because everyone was wanting their
content. And now it's like, you know, okay, well so strike
now. Then if you're an investor, but they someone Chat, so they
don't have object permanence. That's that's true. They just don't. And so
we'll continue to get through this period and and people have to continue like slamming
their head against the wall trying to deal with investors, and that will be
unfortunate. It's kind of it's it's shitty. Then it has to be that
way. Uh. Lexi and Chat pointed out that there's an Irish game fund
that just kicked off that has going to invest in game development in that country,
and it's like, man, more of that, that would be great,
just more you know that that exists in Australia. Yeah, right,
we see it like you see a little the emblem there on Australia. Canada
has a huge government subsidies and tax incentive program. Yeah. I mean,
we have the Endowment for the Arts in America, but it's very tiny and
well endowment so much as I call it pocket change exactly, yes, scraps
And obviously I realized it's not going to replace massive two hundred million dollar investments
from giant corporations. But so what just a little bit more from from the
public fund would be fantastic in my opinion. All right, last couple of
stories here. Sony says Zelda movie will be massive for the company, which
is just a crazy sentence. But it's true, man, yep, and
it's made in closest possible collaboration with Miamoto. So Miamoto contract employee for Sony.
I guess this is from Nintendo everything. After working with Illumination on the
Super Mario Brothers movie. With that partnership continuing in the future, Nintendo is
now shifting to live action as part of its collaboration with Sony for the Legend
of Zelda. An interview with Deadline, Sony Motion Pictures Group chairman Tom Rothman
commented on the project. He said that the Zelda movie is going to be
huge for us and also said it'll be massive. Roffman was also asked about
how video game movies often haven't worked. However, in the case of Zelda,
it seems fans won't have to read I won't have a reason to fear
as the film is being made in the closest possible collaboration with Shagiro Miamoto.
It was previously announced that Miamoto is on board as a producer. I simply
don't know that that makes me feel Yeah, it doesn't. I'm not.
It's lots of fears, so many fears actually still yeah, No, the
fact that Miato is very closely involved, it does not. It does not
make me feel better. Right, he's you know, he's the guy that
whenever I can't remember the producer's name now, but he was like when we
were trying to like sneak story into Links Awakening, we kind just like kind
of do it off the books so Miamoto wouldn't find out about it and stop
us. I was literally about to bring that up. Miamoto is a mechanics
guy. Yeah, he don't. He don't even care about story. Yeah,
anythink story gets in the way games, which a lot of times I
to agree with personally. But this is a movie now we're talking about,
and that's a very different medium, right, I think. Listen, he's
a producer, but he's not like the last arbiter I think of how this
movie ends up looking. But they want him involved. I get that.
That said, it does seem like Sony Pictures is putting a lot into this
and they're hoping for something similar to what happened with the Mario movie. I
think it'll be hard to replicate that, but that doesn't mean to this movie
it can't be. No, it could be. I think this could make
one hundred and fifty two hundred million dollars, so if it hits really hard,
right, Look, Mario movie was for children, Yes, yeah,
And it's not even like in the way that like Pixar recent Disney movies for
child families. They know that was a kid's movie. It was straight up
just for kids and kid brains and good for them. That is what illumination
does, and Illumination does that extremely well. They know they made those.
They're like, what if we just had twinkies with eyes and overalls and she
was born? Yes, exactly exactly. Look, and I'm not saying that
I didn't enjoy the Mario movie. I was, but I did look at
it and go, oh, this is a cute kids movie. H So
that being said, now, I was a kid who loved Legend of Zelda.
But I'm gonna say this that more children are excited about Mario than they
are about the Legend of Zelda. With Legend of Zelda, you are in
a position wherein you kind of need to appeal to your grown up audience,
which is why I've been saying about Legend of Zelda. Just do a Majora's
Mask movie. Do a horror movie for kids that is Majora's Mask. We
don't do horror movies for kids anymore, and that's a huge mistake. And
uh and then also the thing that would be nice about Majora's Mask is it
is it like exists in such a like it's it's an isolated incident. Uh,
so you don't have to deal with any of the high rule bullshit,
which would be such a it's such a smart move. They're never going to
do that. It's almost certainly just going to be Okerina of Time. It's
gonna be Okerina of Time. Yeah, And I could I mean, I
could see that working. I could see how you how you make that into
a movie in a lot of ways. But it does that does have a
different sort of set of prerequisites for nailing that movie. The world does have
to be fleshed out, the different like species have to like feel like real
characters with their own background and their own lives and everything like that. And
that's going to require a lot of world building. But that seems to be
what they're promising here. It's massive. They want to make it feel like
this epic, and you can do that, but every step you take in
that direction increases the level of complexity and the and the points of failure.
I think, so we'll see. I am. I'm still like hopeful,
but I'm not like gonna place money on this being a great movie. Still.
That's just not where I'm at with it yet. Directing Westball just did
The Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, which did pretty well. Ye
people like that more critically pretty well, Yes, pretty good, and said,
Okay, we'll see, you know, if they have the right script
and maybe they can nail it, But uh, I think we're far from
that point at this moment. Last point here, last story. This is
from the ni K, which is a Japanese newspaper. Intendo stock has risen
four days in a row due to squares change in strategy. This is from
my Nintendo News. Japanese news site. The nik has reported this morning that
stock and the Nintendo has risen for the fourth day in a row due to
Square Enix's recent announcement that the company plans to make its future slate of games
multi platform, rather than relying on exclusives for one platform one platform, such
as Sony's PlayStation. Nintendo stock rose about four point four percent. The announcement
was made by Square inextering its mid term management plan last week. Sometime.
Game set's really hitting good. Now, yeah, this I think this follows.
This makes sense to me. It's like one of the companies that does
stand to benefit the most, probablyest Nintendo. And yet it's like, you
know, a couple more Square Enix games on the switch or switch to uh
when you look at how many how many like pieces of software and you're expecting
the shift that this this year, it's like one hundred and sixty million pieces
of software. Probably won't make that much of a dent, but hey whatever.
I think people see Square X and Nintendo back together again and they think
up the glory days. So I get wy investors are pretty excited about this.
Squareing extents the benefit way more than Nintendo does. Right, oh yeah,
big time again. It's like with their their strategy moving forward of water
availability of their games, they already had a partnership with Nintendo, They've already
been releasing titles on the switch. So yeah, I mean, if you
if you get to a point where the there there's a you know, PC
port of Final Fantasy seven Rebirth that's able to run on like a switch to
I mean, that would be gigantic for them if you brought if you because
again it's like you can get the pixel remasters on the switch now, which
is where they should have always been. It's weird it took as long as
it did. Yes, yeah, just uh just just get get back to
the good old days of an again. Largely what I am playing on my
Nintendo Switch other than like First Party, Zelda's and Marios are ports of squaring
Inex Games. Yep. Yeah, it's a really good place to play RPGs.
So really good place to play RPGs. Yeah, right, Yeah,
the Happy Drumas is putting the Final Fantasy switch. If Final Fantasy Tacoose launches
and it's not on switch day one, that's we are. We are going
to We're going to get on a plane and we're going to go to Japan.
We're skipping over squaring X's US headquarters. They're really just a marketing company.
We're just going to go knock on the door, knock on the door
and say excuse me, uh, mister squaring nix you fucked up. Yeah
sounds good. I'll be there absolutely all right. That does it for the
news. Let's get to the poll question from last week. Will you get
game passed for call of Duty? Five percent said yes, twelve percent says
no, I won't get it, thirty three percent says I already have it,
and fifty percent say I don't care about call of duty. Uh this,
I mean, this is this audience. But that's four point six thousand
spouts. Yeah, yes, that's this is the one audience where I feel
very confident going I don't care about call of duty and them not going you're
a fake gamer. Yeah right, no, they all agree with you.
Absolutely. Yeah. I still though, you know, five percent saying yes,
I'm going to get it, that feels maybe so small that it's like
all this conversation about hey, you know call of duty, game pass,
you know, getting people to move on to the next system by not putting
on the last generation. Yeah, all that stuff sounds nice, but man,
maybe nothing is strong enough to actually get people to shift their behavior in
such a way. If call of duty is like this, maybe nothing is
actually capable of doing that. Right, And again, it's like we have
to take into consideration the buy of this particular audience, who are not the
target audience. So I think that there is there in the wider world.
There are a lot of people again who it's like they just play COD and
that's they play COD and that is the only game that they play. And
so to them, if you're presenting hey we got a we got a Call
of Duty day one on game Pass, they go, oh cool, I'm
only paying thirty dollars a month without really doing the math of are you going
to play other games? Yep? Yeah, I think, well, there's
a chance that with the wider audience, this is a much different poll.
Likely, it's very likely that's the case. And yet still I'm like,
I'm still skeptical that even Call of Duty is big enough to solve what ails
the Xbox brand at the moment. Yeah, yeah, all right, we're
going to have a new poll question here in a moment in the meantime,
and why don't we tell people where they could find us? But the live
show again, all the stuff is going on, let's get to it.
Okay, Well, everybody, if you are in or would like to travel
to the Greater Los Angeles area around the time of Summer Games Fest, fondly
known as Key three. Since E three is now dead, you could,
in addition to you know, actually attending the show at the YouTube Theater if
you want to buy tickets to that, But honestly, the real place to
be is at the Bellweather Theater at eight o'clock PM on Sunday, the ninth
of June for the Giant Bomb Live Show. It's going to be a great
time. I will be there along with many other people who you like their
faces and what they have to say, so come see our show. Meanwhile,
you can find me all over the internet at my name Emma Fife.
Not participating in social media, but if you're on those fandom wikis, I
have now seen the proof. I have had friends who were checking something on
a wiki and a video with my face popped up talking about roadblocks, blocks,
fruits. What is it? Just find out on s fandom dot com.
Hell yeah, can't wait. Yeah, we've more details about who's going
to be there. I'll i'll, you know, Patrick Kleppik's going to be
there, you know, the le Jason Schreyer, They're going to people like
that are going to be there. So uh well, well, more details
are like a list of names and stuff like that. So you hey,
and then the wider Giant Bomb universe. Everyone and people you see on this
show, people see on the site every week. Uh, they'll all be
at the live show. Mike Manati, I think I'm I'm even gonna invite
him. I think we'll see yeah, a real famous guy, yeah,
Patrick Kleppick. Yeah, but yeah, we'll probably have some nasty boys helping
out here and there as well. It's listen. If you want to be
a part of Summer Game Fest and you're like you want to like have a
memory and you're in that area, this is a really good way to like
participate and get something out of it and have it be like a show that
is aimed at you. It's not gonna be like why did I come here
to like look at something that I'm not invited to or something that you're invited
this and this can be Hey, I'm getting a little piece of what E
three has now become. So yeah, come hang out with Maybe will even
do a eulogy for E three. I'll be allow that. Yes, a
Viking funeral. Now I'm gonna have to shoot a flaming arrow in there,
right, you know, no problem, Make it happen. That's what we
do. Now, we just tell I'm going to make it happen. All
right, let's see here. New poll question I'm gonna put up today,
and by me, I mean someone else. Are you worried about price increases
for Xbox Game Pass? So you know, last time we asked are you
gonna get Game pastor call of Duty? Now? Are you worried about price
increases for Xbox Game Pass? Yes or no? Vote however you need to
interpret it however you need to. We'll get to that and we'll discuss it
on Games Mornings on giant Bomb on Wednesday. Speak at a Giant Bomb might
have something later today. It's kind of still a busy time. We'll see,
but later this week. Definitely expect BombCast tomorrow. I won't have a
Blake Club this week because Mike Manati is out doing something. I have no
idea, so we'll probably do a Delight Club instead. I get to play
a fun game and then you know, voicemail, dump truck upf We'll probably
do a BCR this week. All that stuff is coming. Look out for
it here on gimetbomb dot com. If you're watching on YouTube and you're looking
for our content, go to the live tab there on giant Bomb on YouTube.
That's where all our stuff lives. Emma, thank you so much for
spinding today talking with me about video games. I really appreciate it. Absolutely
love love being here and doing that thing. It's a great way to start
the week. Everybody, thank you for watching, thank you for listening.
Until next time, have a good one, take care of yourself. You're
the best audience gaming, and goodbye.