30th Anniversary PS5 Pre-Orders Were A Mess, February 2025 Is Too Packed With Big Games, And More Of The Week's Takes

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This week, Sony opened up pre-orders for the items in its 30th Anniversary PlayStation 5 collection, and for many at least, the experience of trying to snag anything was one of confusion and frustration. Also, we’ll tell you about a great arcade platformer called Bzzzt that’s now available on Switch, explore how TwitchCon aims to be an inclusive space, and lament how, with the delay of Assassin’s Creed Shadows to next February, that month may be hitting a critical mass of big, exciting games. All this and more in the pages ahead.

A PS5 Pro is in front of a colorful background

Everyone expected the long-rumored PlayStation 5 Pro to be expensive, but its $700 price tag still came as a bit of a shock. Could a mid-generation refresh aimed mostly at boosting graphical detail really be worth almost double the cost of a used PS5? - Ethan Gach Read More

Image: Sony

Everyone saw this coming but it was still disappointing to see. Fans were salivating over the 30th Anniversary PlayStation 5 collection, a one-two punch of nostalgia and neat aesthetics, when it was revealed earlier this month. Today many of them stared blankly at PlayStation Direct pre-order screens as they watched them sellout while they waited in confusing online queues and battled glitched website buttons. - Ethan Gach Read More

Gif: KO.DLL / Kotaku

If you’re on the lookout for a whimsical, polished, bite-sized masterpiece on the Switch, look no further than Bzzzt. It’s an action platformer starring an adorable robot tasked with navigating one mischievous death trap after another. It scratches the same itch as Astro Bot’s most challenging levels, and I’ve been having a blast with it since it arrived on the Nintendo handheld hybrid earlier this month. - Ethan Gach Read More

Kratos looks up at something off-screen.

I’ve only put a few hours into God of War: Ragnarök’s PC port. I was hoping this would be a chance for me to reassess a game I probably played under the wrong circumstances (rushing to the end because I had to know what happened). Unfortunately, after playing a bit of the PlayStation powerhouse on my gaming PC, I’d rather boot Kratos and Atreus’ latest adventure up on my PS5. And no, it’s not because of the PlayStation Network sign-in requirement. - Kenneth Shepard Read More

Gif: Greylock Studios / Kotaku

Trying to describe Echo Point Nova, a newly released PC shooter, is a tricky thing. I could describe it as a game that mixes Titanfall’s movement, modern Doom’s gunplay, Minecraft’s destructibility, Skyward Sword’s floating islands, and wicked rad hoverboarding into one oddball package—though that probably just makes it sound like a horrible mess. But trust me, Echo Point Nova isn’t a mess. Instead, it’s one of the best shooters I’ve played in years. - Zack Zwiezen Read More

We still have over three months left in 2024, but looking ahead to next year has me a little nervous. The early months of 2025 are already filling up with a ton of big RPGs and long-ass games that will be hard to keep up on. And Ubisoft’s recent delay of the next Assassin’s Creed has only made things worse! - Zack Zwiezen Read More

A drag performer dances at TwitchCon while flanked by two dancers in white bodysuits with bright purple spots on them.

I’m in the Glitch Theater at the San Diego Convention Center during TwitchCon 2024, watching a drag artist dressed as Silent Hill’s Pyramid Head lip-sync to a nu-metal song on stage. The crowd is a mix of high-profile streamers like Central Committee and KaceyTron, smaller Twitch affiliates, and fans—and all of them are living for the third annual TwitchCon Drag Showcase. JuiceBoxx, a streamer and one of the hosts this year, has her face plastered all over the convention center. Ru Paul’s Drag Race superstar Trixie Mattel has a makeup space on the show floor where employees are offering beauty tips and touch-ups, and at an off-site Capcom party, several drag queens mill about, their hair nearly grazing the ceiling of the bar. Pronoun pins are available for attendees to display on their badges, and non-profits like TransLifeline have booths on the show floor. - Alyssa Mercante Read More

Kratos struggles to push Thor's hammer away.

I’ve been replaying God of War Ragnarök now that it’s on PC, and despite some clear, widespread technical issues with depreciating framerate, this is still fundamentally the same excellent sequel that launched on PlayStation in 2022. I put a few hours into the game again to test how it ran on PC, and revisiting it after a perhaps unwise rushed first playthrough two years ago has compelled me to reassess Ragnarök. In the early moments, before it has a chance to overload itself with too much story for one game, god, it packs a punch. Specifically, it has an incredible, succinct early boss fight that captures the sequel’s new stakes in brilliant fashion, fusing cinematic prestige sensibilities with a clever twist that only a game could pull off. Goddamn, I love the first Thor boss fight in Ragnarök. - Kenneth Shepard Read More