ono

Yeah, I wasn't clear I was talking about 3.5" drives. That's primarily what I have for big 6-8 TB drives for media and internal drive backups. Those would be overkill for a PS4 or Xbox One. Not to mention the hassle of needing to power the drive. I've never torn down a 2.5" portable drive. I do have one that has connection issues at times, but I'm not going to bother salvaging it since it's and old 250 GB one. It'll be nice to upgrade it once it fails to something larger.

I'd go with whatever you can get cheaper. For me that tends to be Seagate lately. Anecdotally it seems to be its the enclosure that will likely fail over the HDD itself. So far it has been regular old SATA drives in my WD/Seagate externals, so I haven't had any trouble extracting the actual working drives out. I didn't know some models may not be SATA drive as a posted above mentioned, so maybe you'll want to build your own or at least research your particular model. One thing I do know, but not sure if it applies to all WD models, is that they encrypt the drive or something. So if you pull it out of the enclosure into a new one (or use SATA directly), you'd need to reformat. So there won't be a way to recover your data if a WD enclosure fails. Not a big deal in this PS4 case since it just means you'd have to re-download/install games. I'm pretty sure all the save files are on the internal drive, and you should back that up too if you're not using the PS Plus cloud backups.

They both have a fantastic anime look, despite Studio Ghibli not being involved with the second game. Starting with the first is probably ideal. I can't really say which one I prefer gameplay wise since the moment to moment of the first is foggy to me now, but the story of the first Ni no Kuni is far and away more enjoyable to me. The second game's story is the one I find more lame and childish, which is fine, I don't need every game to be serious. Though some may be bothered by the prince's very childishly naive aim of uniting the world in peace. On the other hand, the first game is something you'd find out of a Studio Ghibli film like Totoro that on the surface looks like a fun time but underneath is a layer of sadness (but not Grave of the Fireflies levels of sadness). I think it may even be emotionally harder for me to play today given how more relatable the main character's situation is to me now than back when I originally played it. And if that isn't enough, there is the mystery of the fantastical world. Is it real? Or is the kid just escaping reality? I just find the story way more fascinating and engaging in the first game.

That and I haven't played them since they don't interest me enough to prioritize playing. The PS4 Infamous games are accessible to me via PS+ but never got around to it. It'll have to be after Spider-Man though. First Light is a good place to start? It being short is appealing to me. The Last Guardian is the big one that I started and didn't finish since I wasn't patient enough... It didn't grab me like Ico or Colossus. Ni no Kuni II is great and the first PC game I played on HDR. Couldn't get HDR to work on Windows before that. I think someone's preference over the two will be largely be based enjoying turn-based vs action more. And the town building that essentially serves as the "skill tree" in NnK II that I kind of didn't like. I'll see if my opinion changes on completion, but I so far prefer DQ. Both look gorgeous, but so far I feel more emotionally invested in DQ's characters since they've got little episodes dedicated to each one. That's largely what I like about this game: the character stories and the little episodes within a town. The overall plot with the big bad is a bit of a bore since I've only seen the villain in like 2 or 3 scenes. I had a similar problem with Ni no Kuni II.

Can't try to target the suggestions since this thread is vague on preferences, so I'll just list my personal favs. Roughly in order of best to less favorite. If you like RPGs or action/adventure with RPG elements (the genre divides are so blurry these days), then my suggests are probably up your alley. Though looking my list, it is all fairly highly acclaimed stuff with no odd-ball, niche picks like say the Atelier games (sadly they're pretty lame this generation) and the PS4 is yet to get Trails of Cold Steel outside of Japan. Exclusives: Bloodborne God of War Horizon: Zero Dawn Uncharted: Lost Legacy Uncharted 4 Mutli-platform: (Yes, I primarily play RPGs haha) Dark Souls: Remastered Nioh Persona 5 The Witcher 3 Nier: Automata Dragon Quest XI is great but I haven't finished it yet. A little over 40h into it and seems to be worth it so far, which has prevented me from trying Spider-Man. I recently revisited Horizon for the platinum trophy and I definitely enjoyed the game more in post-game than in my crit-path mostly main story only run last year. Plus that revisit wasn't immediately after post-Breath of the Wild and ME: Andromeda, so I wasn't open-world fatigued! I guess I should not that I put the two Uncharted games because I ran out of PS4 exclusives (there aren't that many, huh?) and I'm not really that enthusiastic about Naughty Dog games. I'm sure they'll be off the list once I play Spider-Man and I'm guessing Ghost of Tsushima or Death Stranding will take its place.

It looks like 1440p output is available on Xbox One. What the native resolution is depends on the game. Non-X enhanced games are going to be 1080p at best (900p seems common). X enhanced games usually give you multiple graphics modes, so it'll depend on what you choose there. Resolution modes will typically be higher than 1080p so those will be up/downscaled to 1440p. https://support.xbox.com/en-US/xbox-one/console/adjust-display-settings

For the "train station" game, the PS2 game that comes to my mind is "Shadow Hearts". That starts in a train. I don't remember if it crashes or not, but you do walk around outside where there are train tracks. I just skipped about a let's play of the opening hour and that might be it, as noted above, you can't reliable remember all the details.

I imagine P4G still looks better than the PS2 version though? I do have PS TV but haven't gotten around to replaying P4G on it. I bought a Vita for P4G. That and Uncharted via PS+ are the only Vita games I've finished lol I played a couple more via PS TV since that's my preference.

I'm the one dude in the poll voting Mario it looks like. I've played every mainline Mario since SMB on NES to the recent Odyssey on Switch. Loved the series as the kid, and still a system seller for me today. Old games in the series hold up and are fun to play today. Admittedly with some adjustment for 3D Mario controls. I'm also a fan of a couple Metroid games, but I'm kind of meh for most of it, so I couldn't justify making this series #1 when I only really like Super Metroid and Metroid Prime. Likewise for Zelda, but with the additional problem of finding it difficult to replay games from this series. Fire Emblem is too "new" for me to rank it high, as the 3DS games were my first. The GC and Wii games are definitely my favs here and the 3DS are fun enough. Hyped for the new Switch game. I biased toward console games over handhelds, which doesn't help FE's case since its localized English legacy is on GBA and DS. And why Pokemon is a huge Nintendo blind spot for me. I don't think the upcoming Switch one will do, but Pokemon 2019 will be my next attempt to get into Pokemon. Also Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze is amazing. Again, just one game I'm a big fan of though (I do remember liking DKC as a kid though, but that didn't continue forward), so hopefully they keep that series up on the Switch beyond the port.

I'm not clear on it myself, as I've only had to deal with it a few times. I don't have much physical XBO games. It seems faster if you go offline so that it only installs from disc. If you're online, I'm not sure why they don't let you play while it installs the patch stuff. Not sure if that has changed. Depending on the game, you'll be able to start after a certain % is done, but you may be restricted in what you can do until more of the install completes. I can't think of a XBO example on the top of my head, but it probably happens on FFXV like it does on PS4 where you can only play the tutorial until the install is more complete. But yeah, I agree, the PS4 seems faster with the initial install that lets you boot the game. It does, however, keep installing from the disc in the background without any progress bar. This is more obvious when you're reinstalling a game and trying to load a late game save. You may not be able to do it until the disc install is done and annoyingly you have no ETA on that since they don't make it visible.

Judging from past PS consoles, PS4 will still have some life after PS5 launches (speculation: in two years) so I wouldn't worry about getting a PS4 now. I speculate there will be backwards compatibility, as rumored specs suggest it'll maintain the same architecture (from public commits to Git on tools Sony uses in their dev chain) and are at least looking into backwards compatibility (they have recent patent filings relating backwards compatibility). So good chance your investment in games will carry forward should you upgrade in the future, should keeping your PS4 not be an option.

My Switch is holding up fine since launch. Got some minor scratching on the glass (but not on the display) due to the dock, so I put on screen protector. I think I may have the left joycon connection issue due to some comments when playing MK8 in local multiplayer, but I'm not sure since I primarily use the pro controller docked and didn't see an issue in handheld mode. I'll probably just buy another pair of joycons at some point though since the original analog sticks are a bit worn (I think damage from people's nails). I'll keep the old ones in my carry case for co-op to keep my new ones as pristine as I can

Nier: Automata. Though sounds like it is tolerable with community fixes.

You make it sound like this is a serious idea you'd like to see get made, so DON'T post it anywhere. Keep it to yourself until you are in a position to pitch it to someone who could actually fund you. Assuming the idea is dynamite, why would you want to put it out there for potentially other people to steal and profit from the idea?

I forgot about PC support. There used to be TV support as well, but they pulled the plug on that, at least in my region. The trail requires a credit card, but I hear you can pay for the 1-month, 3-month, etc. passes with gift cards via funds in your wallet. Another PS Plus benefit is occasional discounts on the passes. I did a 1-monther at 50% off recently to see if it got better than when it first launched. Better selection but bad latency for someone who lives in a Pacific island far from any Sony servers. No latency and being 50% cheaper is why I prefer and sub to Xbox Game Pass. So sad physical game rentals is dead where I live. I have to say my opinion of the PS4 has shot up this year. I've been down on PS4 since I didn't care for the exclusives much (not a fan of Naughty Dog's style or open world :P) and when I built my first PC last year, I thought that was the last nail in the coffin. But then God of War. First PS4 exclusive I really enjoyed (can't count last year's Persona 5 since that's on PS3 also). Then I got PSVR, taking a bit of gamble after liking my Vive room scale experience. A gamble since I didn't know if I could handle seated VR (I largely can't). I don't have the real estate for room scale and wanted a cheaper gamble as I don't have the real estate for room scale. Luckily the PSVR has some smaller standing/walking experiences (Arkham VR) and sitting games without too much sickening movement (Moss). Lastly, I just recently found my favorite PS4 game, exclusive or not, with Bloodborne. OMG I've been missing out, dismissing this game after not liking Demon's Souls. Gonna have to revisit the Souls series now, but that can be done on PC (other than Demon's). Random thing I've learned from Bloodborne: I should not buy a 144Hz monitor. I almost quit on Bloodborne since it runs at 30 fps with frame pacing issues, even with PS4 Pro boost mode on. Too used to stable 60 fps now that it took half an hour with Bloodborne for my eyes/mind to adapt and see it as smooth. I guess I didn't notice with God of War since I picked performance mode that targets 60 fps, albeit not stable. It would totally suck more if 100+ fps was my standard!