Avowed looks great and by far Obsidian's best looking game and they're not a graphical powerhouse, never have been and never will be. Obsidian's RPG's are mainly about the story/characters and the choices and consequences that you make throughout the game. The gameplay/combat looks great from what I have seen and the only question I have will be the depth and build variety over the course of the game.
South of Midnight looks great as I love the art style. I'm someone who believes that the art style of a game is far more important than just graphics and visuals. I like the realistic looking games but I don't want/need every game to look realistic. I don't think that the combat/gameplay will be deep or anything as it's more of a story/character driven game but as a whole, it reminds me of Kena which for me was a great 8.5/10 game so if Midnight hits for me like Kena did, I will have no complaints. Also, compared to their previous two games in Contrast and We Happy Few, Midnight looks a billion times better and just seems to be a far superior game. Granted, the bar is low based on their two previous games but for me, super excited to play Midnight and it's rumored to get an April release date at The Game Awards which for me is continuing 2025 from February onward as getting either a Microsoft published game or a third party game that I want to play day one on Game Pass Ultimate like Atomfall in late March. My 2025 is shaping up very very nicely.
As someone who completed and enjoyed State of Decay back on Xbox 360 and yes, I loved the game. I did drop SOD 2 after 15 hours because just way too many technical/gameplay/combat issues. As for SOD 3, from the brief gameplay snippets shown this past June, it looks like a massive fucking upgrade. Is it going to look like Resident Evil or Dead Space? No but it shouldn't because that's not what the game is. It's meant to be an open world survival game. Visuals/combat/gameplay already looks better than the previous two games and all I really want is for the game to be ready on a technical level day one.
As for Towerborne, im very much looking forward to it but im also someone who loves beat em ups. I played and completed Streets of Rage 4 and TMNT: Shredder's Revenge but the older games in the respective franchises are better and Towerborne looks way better and the stylized art style is preferred over the old school pixel look which im not into at all.
Fable showed gameplay and the character walking around. It's similar to CDPR showing The Witcher 3 back in the day. Fable is their Holiday 2025 game and im fully expecting it to be the Direct after the Showcase in June. It's Playground Games and their talent they acquired for Fable is top tier. I have no worries. Yeah, I love Starfield. Hehe. As for The Elder Scrolls VI, it's probably a 2030 game or some shit but I have never played the older games so I will be going in fresh when the time comes.
As for Marvel's Blade, it's a next generation game. It's from Arkane and I have no worries about them because it's the main studio that did all the Dishonored games and while I have zero interest in their last game Deathloop because it's not for me, im very looking forward to seeing what Arkane comes up in Blade.
In regards to Game Pass Ultimate and it's quality, outside of Redfall, I have had no issues and Microsoft's quality level believe it or not as you can go look over all their games on Open Critic, they're literally sitting at an 81.1 over 21 games with their longest monthly gaps of not publishing a game being 7 months from December 2020 through June 2021 and 6 months from January 2022 through June 2022. Out of 50 total months through 2024, Microsoft has published 22 new games for Xbox consoles (including Indiana Jones in another week) in 20 months with a few months having multiple releases in them. Total amount of months without a released game is 30.
Sony on the other hand has published 20 new games for an 81.9 rating on Open Critic. Sony's longest monthly gap was also 7 months from July 2021 through January 2022 and two 6 month gaps from May 2022 through October 2022 and again from April 2023 through September 2023. Out of 50 total months through 2024, Sony has published 20 new games for PlayStation 5 consoles in 17 months with a few months having multiple releases in them. Total amount of months without a released game is 33. Overall, both Microsoft and Sony are actually very close to one another.
For 2025, I already have Avowed in February, Towerborne in the first quarter when it hits the full 1.0 release, South of Midnight most likely in April and Doom: The Dark Ages is looking more and more like the first half of 2025. So in regards to Game Pass Ultimate, I have plenty of games to look forward to from Microsoft a few third party published games. I have zero complaints at this point and was way more disappointed and pissed off before this generation because Microsoft barely had anything for me outside of Gears of War.
Of course, im 100% all in with subscriptions because as I have said before, I don't give two shits about ownership or collections. I play and complete the games that I want and then move on to my next new game. If anything, right now on December 2nd, 2024, im the happiest, most hyped and excited for Microsoft and Xbox than I have ever been because since E3 2018 they finally did what everyone has been asking and demanding them to do which is buy/get more studios and have more games. So again, no complaints here.
P.S. - Come Saturday, it's Indiana Jones and the Great Circle time!!! Hyped!!!
Not really.
This is the difference.
