General comments
- The box
- The PS4 unit is small, sleek and quiet! My gaming PC sounds like a jet engine, and my wife (understandably) hates the racket. Not a problem at all with PS4.
- The system
- The UI is simple and easy enough to use, but it won't scale well. Things are fine for now, with only a half dozen or so games installed, but Sony will have to address the layout eventually.
- The hard drive space is an issue. It comes with a 500gb drive, which is good enough for maybe a dozen retail games (all games, even disc-based, require full install). But the only way to get these hugely complex games running smoothly is to use a hard drive. Optical media read speeds just aren't fast enough. It's a give and take that I am more than happy to sign up for.
- Eventually I'll have to juggle which games I want to have installed and which I'll delete, but basically there's no scenario I can imagine where I would actually care to have more than 12 different games available to play at the same time. Installing from the disc only takes a few minutes anyways!
- Game sharing
- Watching other people play is almost as good as playing a demo. Live streaming and clip sharing are well integrated, it will be interesting to see where this goes.
- Remote play
- I got a PS Vita this summer after watching the PS4 reveal press conference, in large part in anticipation of remote play, and I'm happy I did. My impression so far is that it's unbelievably cool. It isn't perfect, but that's due in large part to it being so new (button mapping will be an evolving issues due to the missing triggers and stick-clicks). Technically, it performs to near perfection on my home Wifi network, despite the fact that my PS4 is connected over Wifi and not hard-line ethernet as recommended. I've noted how the retail games I have perform in more detail below.
- The controller
- Let me be the one-hundred eleventieth person to laud the DualShock 4 controller: it feels great, I love the track pad, and it's light as a feather. The headphone jack works beautifully with 3.5mm headphones and stereo chat headsets.
- I do have two reservations:
- The battery life seems worse than I'm used to (8 hours maybe?), so I plug in the controller every night. This is mainly an aesthetic complaint, as it's most convenient to just leave the micro-usb cable hanging out the front of the PS4.
- Second, the d-pad placement (above the left stick) is definitely a downgrade over the Xbox layout. I've got big hands so I can reach the Xbox d-pad with my right hand. On Playstation, I have to awkwardly reach way over to accomplish the same thing. This has come into play on NBA2k (calling plays) and Assassin's Creed (weapon switching), though future iterations of such games should learn to take better advantage of the
Killzone Shadow Fall
- Single player (4/10)
- The single-player campaign in this game is pretty meh. The first mission treats you like a child, literally. The second mission was a bit better, but didn't make me at all interested in continuing. The OWL is pretty cool though; I particularly enjoy the rappelling mode to reach any lower area of the map.
- Multiplayer: 7/10
- Luckily, the multiplayer is more interesting. I enjoy playing as the support class (can revive downed teammates and place turrets or spawn beacons) with the minigun (I can't aim, but you don't need to!). The Warzones concept hasn't quite caught on, as the vast majority of players go with the standard mode. But that's because the standard mode is pretty awesome! You essentially play "sets" of five "games". On one map, you cycle through 5 different play types (team deathmatch and capture the flag, capture points etc.) with the same squad. At the end, a winner is declared.
- Unfortunately, I've found that most matches are totally imbalanced, with one team winning 5 out of 5 games per set pretty easily. I suspect that one team is filled with a group of friends who know how to play together and the other team is filled with random folks who pop in and out. I'm not sure if there is a good solution to this.
- I'm looking forward to the "horde" co-op mode coming via DLC.
- Remote Play: 4/10
- Looks and controls great! It's just the wrong kind of game for couch-playing.
NBA2k14
- Single player: 7/10
- I'm surprisingly disappointed by this game. On the one hand, it's gorgeous and plays as well as any game in the series. On the other, the new game modes (MyGM and a revised MyPLAYER) feel unfinished and tacked on. Both modes heavily encourage "grinding" for in-game virtual currency (also available for purchase with real cash), making them feel more like "free-to-play" than retail. But I already paid $60!
- Remote play: 6/10
- It looks great, especially with the more zoomed in cameras. The only problem is that the controls are poorly mapped (default system mapping, cannot be changed). The turbo button is mapped to the upper-right rear touchpad. Ugh. I'm starting to get used to it, but I tend to get creamed in the second half.
Assassin's Creed 4: Black Flag
- Single player: 9/10
- YAAAAAAARRRRR! I love this game. It's awesome. AC3 was a lifeless sack of crap, but AC4 is a delightful romp. It's not perfect, but I like it better than GTAV. There, I said it.
- Remote play: 9/10
- This game is ideal on remote play. Everything is easy to see, the developers took the time to re-map the buttons so that they make sense, and exploring the side quests and hidden items is perfect for the couch. I prefer to leave the story missions for when I'm on the big screen, though there are optional subtitles so it's do-able.
FIFA 14
- Single player: too early to review
- I just started playing last night, but it's FIFA! It seems nearly identical to Fifa 12/13/14 on previous generations to be honest, but if it ain't broke don't fix it!
- Remote play: 7/10
- Similar to NBA2K, the control mapping is wonky. You basically lose much of the nuance playing on Vita. If you are a very technical FIFA player (especially dribbling and fakes etc.), it just won't work out for you. Me, I'm more of a clinical passing kinda guy, which works really well! I got blanked in my first match, but I blame myself (and Giroud, because he's French).
Free games!
- I played Resogun for about 20 minutes. It's cool and all, but not my type of game. I'll pop in from time to time, but I'm not hooked.
- Jumping into Warframe for a few rounds is a good diversion. There's no other good co-op on the system yet, so it has it's place. The biggest flaw is that melee targeting is atrocious. You miss almost every swing of the blade, so it's completely not worth trying. There's never an ammo shortage, so the only reason to use melee is because it seems like it should be fun, except it isn't.
- For an MMO, DC Universe Online has great voice acting and surprisingly deep combat, and character customization is a pretty fun diversion. The graphics haven't aged well (the game is like 4 years old), but I've had a few fun hours blasting away with my tech-powered acrobatic lava-man.
Any questions on these games or the system in general? Leave them in the comments!
