This is actually one I have been waiting on for awhile. I bought the previous SAO, Fatal Bullet, at launch for full price, and though I liked it, I didn't like it enough to pay full price for another SAO. Then Alicization Lycoris released and was a bit of a mess on release, and it took them awhile to fix it, and though it is fixed now afaik, it has yet to hit the kind of deep discount I wanted to see to buy it. Will definitely play this if it does hit Gamepass.

Barozi said: shikamaru317 said: (...) So yes, I am quite choosy about what I buy, and wait for deep, deep discounts, often as much as 70% or 80% off the launch price.(...) shikamaru317 said: This is actually one I have been waiting on for awhile. I bought the previous SAO, Fatal Bullet, at launch for full price, and though I liked it, I didn't like it enough to pay full price for another SAO. Then Alicization Lycoris released and was a bit of a mess on release, and it took them awhile to fix it, and though it is fixed now afaik, it has yet to hit the kind of deep discount I wanted to see to buy it. Will definitely play this if it does hit Gamepass.

Must have missed it hitting that price, the last time I remember checking it's price during a sale it was at $25 I think (edit: It apparently hit $15 for the first time in August 2022, before that it was $24 in earlier digital sales). Honestly, even $15 feels a bit much for this game though, from what I hear it is one of the weaker SAO games, critic and user reviews are lower than SAO Fatal Bullet (which was done by a different developer, Dimps), the graphics are worse than Fatal Bullet, the game apparently never received a Series X or XB1 X update and is limited to just 1080p 30 fps apparently, the character customization and multiplayer isn't unlocked until halfway through the game, it apparently has ridiculously long sections of visual novel like dialogue separated by much shorter sections of actual gameplay (I've heard there are talking portions over an hour long in the game separated by just a few minutes of gameplay). I'd probably go for it at $10 if this Gamepass addition doesn't happen, it will hit $10 eventually, you can currently get Fatal Bullet for $10 with all DLC included as well.

I really hope the next SAO game, Last Recollection, which releases later this year, is better, but I'm not too hopeful. It's being developed by the same studio as Alicazation Lycoris, Aquria, and though this one will receive Series X and PS5 versions, the graphics don't really look all that much better than Alicization Lycoris in the screenshots we have seen.

Last Recollection is at least based on the 2nd half of the Alicization Arc, which was more interesting than the first half at least, so it should at least be better in that regard.

I'd like to see Namco Bandai toss another SAO game Dimps' way in the future, I rather enjoyed Fatal Bullet, bought it day one and put 66 hours into it. A solid 7.5/10 game imo.

Barozi said: shikamaru317 said: (...) So yes, I am quite choosy about what I buy, and wait for deep, deep discounts, often as much as 70% or 80% off the launch price.(...) shikamaru317 said: This is actually one I have been waiting on for awhile. I bought the previous SAO, Fatal Bullet, at launch for full price, and though I liked it, I didn't like it enough to pay full price for another SAO. Then Alicization Lycoris released and was a bit of a mess on release, and it took them awhile to fix it, and though it is fixed now afaik, it has yet to hit the kind of deep discount I wanted to see to buy it. Will definitely play this if it does hit Gamepass.

Damn... them receipts doh. OOOF. Y'all on the same team  

Real tawk... gonna need cheevo devs to take it easy with collection cheevos. HL cheevos are like 25 hours story, 30-40 collectibles

What pisses me off with HL collectibles is their respected challenges don’t line up with the achievements for example. Challenge - complete a total of 52 Merlin trails. Achievement - complete all Merlin trails …. 42 MORE! I cannot tell you how much I hate these reeeeeeeeeeeeeee

I will go into more detail about my thoughts on this one when I finish and post a full set of impressions, but suffice it to say I agree here.

Redfall is embroiled in yet another controversy now. First it was host only campaign progress for co-op, then it was always online internet connection required, now Bethesda has suggested that a physical copy is just a download code in a box, no disc. That of course means no reselling, if you buy the game and don't like it, you can't resell the game to get back part of your purchase price, because codes are one time use only, you could at best sell an empty case to some collector who really likes Xbox cases, lol. Predictably, lots of people are angry.

Bethesda really want to Redfall fail...