DF Direct tackles the Sony Showcase and PS5 cross-gen upgrade pricing
Two DF Directs in one week? Our filming slot for the weekly show is Thursday morning, but we went into this one knowing that Sony’s PlayStation 5 Showcase would be kicking off 12 hours later, but as we had so much material to work with, we went ahead with our normal weekly show and added in a Direct special to cover off the Sony event – and let’s start by taking a look at the PlayStation 5 showcase, where beyond the reveal of some exciting new PS5 titles, the emphasis really was on cross-generational fare from both first and third-party studios.
I described it as a game of two halves – an assortment of third party trailers followed by a procession of first-party wares. This was essentially Sony’s E3 2021, pushed back a couple of months and presented as an online show. Unfortunately, a procession of trailers and CG visualisations presented in sequence doesn’t quite cut it. Publishers and platform holders seem to think that a procession of imagery for successive titles running one after the other works, but it doesn’t really. There’s no vision, no context, no exploration of the interactive element. There’s a lot of ‘what’ – what the game is essentially – but no ‘why’ or ‘how’. Instead, we get a sequence of curated imagery that rarely managed to leave a lasting impression.
The new Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic got a CG trailer, but even with the after-show interviews, we’re still wondering what the vision for the remake actually is. GTA5’s delay was announced, but a trailer apparently telling us we’re getting an improved experience didn’t tell us or show us how it’s actually better. Forspoken is looking very, very interesting – and did stand out, particularly as it seems to be based on Square-Enix’s under-utilised Luminous Engine and maybe that’s enough for now, but I’d love to know more about the game. Project Eve? Throwback hyper-sexualised main character apart, the imagery was impressive and solidifies UE4 as a major player of the generation. The barrage of trailers was such that when something fresh and interesting comes along, it amplifies attention: Tchia: A Game Inspired by New Caledonia was a highlight.
00:00:00 Introduction + Grand Theft Auto 5 PS500:03:39 Gran Turismo 700:09:33 Uncharted 4 + Lost Legacy PS5 and PC Remasters00:17:45 Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 + Marvel’s Wolverine00:23:13 God of War Ragnarok00:28:06 Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic Remaster00:33:19 Project Eve00:29:54 Forspoken00:42:24 Tchia – A Game Inspired by New Caledonia00:49:13 Trailer after Trailer after Trailer after Trailer + Conclusions
The first party games arrived later and hit the spot, by and large. Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 shown running on PlayStation 5 looked impressive and enticed by showing both Peter Parker and Miles Morales working as a team, before revealing the debut of Venom. Meanwhile, the CG Wolverine trailer may not have showcased much, but we had the sense of a closer, more intimate and visceral game than its Marvel stablemate. Gran Turismo 7? Polyphony concentrated on incredibly clean imagery, obvious hardware accelerated ray tracing and the kind of lighting fast menu systems we’ve seen from a GT game for a long, long time.
