• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Has the PS5 already cemented itself as the worst Playstation generation in history?

What's Sony's worst generation?

  • Playstation

    Votes: 13 1.6%
  • Playstation 2

    Votes: 8 1.0%
  • Playstation 3

    Votes: 207 25.4%
  • Playstation 4

    Votes: 23 2.8%
  • Playstation 5

    Votes: 564 69.2%

  • Total voters
    815

MacReady13

Member
I voted ps4 as this gen hasn’t finished yet. But so far ps5 will be their worst generation. By far. And people voting ps3??? After a shocking start it became real strong in its 2nd half. But these past 2 gens have been awful for PlayStation. Some great games haven’t come close to getting them back to their original 2 consoles.
 
i was thinking the other day, im i getting too old? im 34 year old gamer, even in ps4 era, i was excited for games like ghost of tsushima, even console updates,lol

but now is jjust meh!

i think main issue with me is i know too much about developers etc, we read too much into gaming i think, sometimes that takes fun away, idk that is my personel thought.
 

Hayriko

Member
I think the ps5 is a pivotal generation. As we can see that devs are remastering games that they released for the ps3 or ps4. Most devs are excited to share what there vision were with the games art direction
 

Sorc3r3r

Member
PS5, with a focus on 60fps and fast loading has been the best generation for me hands down. This applies to Xbox Series consoles as well.

IDGAF about the flops or the focus on GAAS, there has been so much worthwhile stuff to play outside of that shit.

🤔
This is really an undervalued aspect of this generation.
I mean, it's here and is considered as a given, but the improvement that the whole experience of playing a videogame gets from the 60s and the fast loading is massive.
 

64gigabyteram

Reverse groomer.
Comparing full length PlayStation generations to one only halfway through the gen
we are not "halfway" through the gen, we're in the final third. Halfway would have been 2023-2024 which was last year

we have 3-4 more years of PS5 before the gen is finished. Unless some PS3-like miracle happens & the library goes crazy (unlikely due to all the GaaS slop that was recently canceled and forced devs to restart from scratch) the PS5's library is pretty much cemented for the time being minus a couple extra games coming in 2025-2028
 

SSfox

Member
I mean sure Sony 1 party not the best, it could be the worst overall even tho the gen still going in, but still awesome gen so far.

Also we got GT7 which is one of the best GT ever, PS4 as awesome as it was it missed that one big GT game, Sport was great but still felt like spin off.

Just hope all the shit heads like Herman will be guillotined before going ps6. That isn't coming anytime soon but yeah.
 

MagnesD3

Member
This generation sucks for sure, the best generation was the xbox360/ps3 era.
Definitely an arguable take. The 1990's to 2000 and 2000's to 2010 are the 2 time frames you can argue as the best gaming generations. The only argument for the last 15 years is that there is a lot of good indie games out there nowadays compared to then and Fromsoft has been doing heavy lifting.
 
Last edited:

Romulus

Member
It's actually pretty logical to assign the superior visuals of PS3 exclusives to the CELL architecture. The SPEs have a SIMD based ISA and so are suited for graphical tasks, which skilled programmers often took advantage off when creating PS3 exclusives. Its one of the few major advantages PS3 actually had over 360, alongside blu-ray and a guaranteed HDD.

Regarding linearity, that hasn't really changed much even today, despite huge improvements in hardware. I think that's just how Sony studios like designing their games, you could even see it with their PS1/PS2 games.

Framerates were horrible that gen because Sony/M$ and game developers pushed for HD when neither console could really handle it. It wasn't a flaw specific to PS3, but a general problem with the industry.


But there's no way to prove the assumption of those visuals being due to the cell. Are you putting most of the reason on the cell, some, or all?

I put it on the developers. Why?

Because the following generation, xbox one and ps4 had incredibly similar hardware, yet Sony developers made ps4 exclusives that were noticeably superior to anything on Xbox one. If you hyped me up to believe ps4 had some secret cell processor back then playing Ghosts, I might have believed it.

But there was nothing technical ps3 games were doing that was a cut above that couldn't be traced backed to art. All those giant art assets in GOW3 or the cool animations in UC2/KZ2 aren't exclusives to a cell processor. It's just good art.

And I disagree about linearity being the focus now. Even 1 generation later, there were a slew of open world games that looked phenomenal. Even launch games like infamous on ps4 were a colossal jump over ps3's. We even got phrases like "open world exhaustion" etc. Now, we had a variety of both though. You could actually make a good looking game in a large open space like infamous ps4 with great textures.
 
Last edited:

jumpship

Member
we are not "halfway" through the gen, we're in the final third. Halfway would have been 2023-2024 which was last year

we have 3-4 more years of PS5 before the gen is finished. Unless some PS3-like miracle happens & the library goes crazy (unlikely due to all the GaaS slop that was recently canceled and forced devs to restart from scratch) the PS5's library is pretty much cemented for the time being minus a couple extra games coming in 2025-2028

Its Jan 2025.

PS5 has been on the market for 4 years 2 months. And you just said yourself there's 3-4 years remaining.

You're practically agreeing with me.

If PS6 comes out NOV 2028 that's 8 years of PS5.

Its also weird to dismiss COVID-19 this generation causing a delay of the games developers were working on.
 
Last edited:

jumpship

Member
How many games can realistically come out in that timeframe to somehow massively bring up the gen in quality? It's not enough time, rumors about PS5 are already going crazy

So you're acknowledging it is about halfway that's the point I made.
Just like the PS4 & PS3 gen Sony's second half output is normally much better. Difficult to predict how many games because Sony keeps their cards close to their chest.

I edited my post to mention COVID-19 and how it caused a delay to games in development. How this is so easily dismissed doesn't make sense to fairly judge the gen so far.
 

FoxMcChief

Gold Member
It's comiiiing!
damn right walter white GIF by Breaking Bad
 
Definitely an arguable take. The 1990's to 2000 and 2000's to 2010 are the 2 time frames you can argue as the best gaming generations. The only argument for the last 15 years is that there is a lot of good indie games out there nowadays compared to then and Fromsoft has been doing heavy lifting.
New games/franchises during xbox360/ps3 era:

The Last of Us
Batman Arkham Asylum/City
Portal 1/2
Dead Space 1/2/3
Half life 2 Part 1/2
Red Dead Redemption
Bioshock 1/Infinite
GTA 4/5
Demon Souls
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare/Black Ops
Fallout 3/New Vegas
Elder Scrolls Oblivion/Skyrim
Mass Effect 1/2/3
Dragon Age
Assassins Creed 1/2/Brotherhood
Borderlands
Halo 3
Gears of War
God of War
Mario Galaxy 1/2
Zelda


These are just from the top of my head, imo there really is no competition. X360/PS3 was the best era of gaming period. Also culturally it was the best as well we didn't have any of that woke social crap going on. Videogame journalism was peak with 1UP and Gamespot (Gerstmann gang), IGN was decent. The blogs were not bad, Joystiq being the best of them. It all went to the shits with the ps4 reveal and the complaint about no women on stage.

Edit: And you're right I haven't even added any indie games like Braid and World of Goo ect..
 
Last edited:

Tqaulity

Member
You really have to qualify the different aspects of the generation to evaluate it:

Hardware: Best=PS5 | Worst=PS3: PS5 HW is easily Sony's best in terms of design, balance, capability, feature set, and developer usability. (i.e. DualSense is easily Sony's best controller and adding SSD, Ray Tracing, and 3D audio standard are really impactful features that were well implemented)
First Party Games: Best=PS2 | Worst=PS5: This is where the PS5 generation clearly fails. First party output has been anemic in terms of quantity and quality (too many remasters, most studios haven't released a single game after over 4 years)
General Software Quality: Best=PS2 | Worst=PS3: I'd say PS3 had lower overall quality of SW due to the poor performance for many 3rd party releases that generation. Also, the controller was the worst of all PS generations which affected the enjoyment of some titles.
Game Performance: Best=PS5 | Worst=PS3: PS5 generation has had by far the best performance where >95% of all releases run at 60fps. Not only that but the consistency of the performance is superior to prior generations due to the balanced design.

Overall, every PlayStation generation has had some merit but I wouldn't consider the PS5 the worst generation. The HW itself is a masterclass of console design with no aspect of the system not addressed (controller, input, storage, audio, graphics, HDMI etc) and superb balance all around. The issue this generation is more about software, economics, and developer priorities/capabilities. This is affecting Microsoft and Nintendo as well. That said, Sony's first party has been a huge disappointment this gen and the studios have been horribly mismanaged in terms of the titles they were developing. Luckily, Sony has had meaningful third parties alliances to take up the slack in many instances. Not to say that Sony first party has not delivered great games. Arguably the best games this gen so far has come from Sony first party including Returnal, Helldivers 2, Astro Bot, Horizon Forbidden West, SpiderMan 2, and Rift Apart. Hopefully we'll still get at least once true PS5 gen title from Sony's studios before the gen is over (GT8, Next Santa Monica game, Wolverine, Intergalactic, etc)
 

Lunarorbit

Member
This gen is straight booty. I was so excited to finally get a ps5 on their website after a month of trying.

Cross gen and gaas ruined this gen. Poor psvr2. If they had put half as much effort into that as they did concord it woulda done way better.

Hulst is horrible. He doesn't have any idea how to run a creative team that isn't horizon related. I was one of the biggest horizon supporters until I heard he had 5 projects involved with this game.

Where's all the horizon shit? What happened to the TV show? Sony keeps picking shit Spiderman duds to make ip on. Just wasting money hand over fist.

Just hire 100 regular psx players to tell you what to do. Instead of spending $100 million on concord failures you could actually hire real gamers to give you info. Don't rely on shitty consultants
 
PS3 was the only generation Sony lost me as a customer completely. I saw my friends playing Gears of war and it was the only reason I thought about getting a new console but when I went to the store I saw the PS3 and I was like fuck that I'm going Sony. Literally nothing to play on that garbage system. Returned it and got a 360 and loved Gears and Mass Effect.
 
Last edited:

AlphaMale

Member
I own them all, and I think the PS5 is pretty great, so not sure what you're trying to get at OP.
The bar is set pretty high from the get-go (PS1), and it's been great with every iteration. To say the PS5 is the "worst of the Playstations" doesn't make much sense to me, as they all dominated (except maybe PS3 era) in their own right, and the PS5 is dominating more than ever right now.
 

Northeastmonk

Gold Member
PS3 was rough at times. Getting Oblivion again was ok. I played Mass Effect on 360, so I didn’t need it on PS3. Same thing with BioShock. Bayonetta played better on 360, but I bought it for PS3. Ninjas Gaiden II was excellent on 360. It was good and I eventually stuck to PS3 for everything. Only went back to 360 for Halo and Gears.

Honestly, I like where games are at now. It was excellent on PS4 except that first year felt super slow. The PS5 has been a good console for me. I reserved games going back to PS1. A lot of games established their way into our minds. Lots of people started to play and games were seen as a labor of love. Infamous, BioShock, Batman, Uncharted, and etc.
Lots of things ran their course if you ask me. Stories were played out and that was it. Seeing Onimusha coming out in 2026. I still remember playing Warlords when it came out on PS2. Even if it’s multi platform. Playing Onimusha on PS5 is going to look and feel awesome. I just hope this console gen doesn’t end abruptly. I just purchased a Pro, so I’m excited.

A part of me feels like we played games while they came out to the point where there doesn’t appear to be anything good on the shelf. It’s like walking into GameStop and looking at their games. I played/own the big ones, so I can literally walk away without needing to look at the game section.

There’s been enough for me to play. I feel like some people say it’s the worst because they don’t like the games they’re given. You don’t like action RPGs, but to fans of the genre; we are in heaven. Sort of like that.
 
Agreed.

Game ratings have trended up over time , hence the hilarious 6-10 rainbow scale someone made long time ago. Back then it was common to see tons of games at 5/10 or grilled to the bone with worse. It's gotten to a point I think it's kind of leveled off because you cant really get much higher.

I know someone will say "it's because games are better now" or "back then they reviewed more junky games". Perhaps, but like anything in life, products are reviewed on a static scale, but adjusted for the era. If a bunch of popular arcade games in the 80s got 6, 7, or a 9. Does that mean modern day games should all get 10/10 because it's obvious even random crappy indie games for $5 are better than Qbert or Frogger? And for solid AAA games they should get 15/10? Of course not.

When the inernet age really picked up, so did all the review scores. When everyone had to resort to magazine reviews, the scores were much lower and much more harsh.

Too many people overlook it, overlook the context and structure of the industry at the time various reviews are made. Although I didn't play it back in the day, I know games like System Shock were dragged by reviewers because it didn't "play like DOOM". That doesn't mean something like System Shock suddenly got good today; it just means the game was misunderstood in its day and got harshly reviewed in part due to that.

All the same, I've seen one too many games these days get praised for having some crazy "new" game mechanic that boosts their review scores...yet there's some older retro title with that very same mechanic or something close to it, that never got the same benefit in its review scores back in the day. Again, another case where standards were stricter with older game reviews, journalistic integrity in the reviews were generally higher and, something really lost these days, you often had multiple people giving scores to games and the final score with a single outlet would be a mix of those scores (EGM did this regularly for example).

I generally think having each outlet do its own aggregate with a balanced panel of reviewers to each title, is better than what MetaCritic has gone to do these days where they weigh certain outlets MUCH higher than others in impacting the score aggregate for a given game. That's among many other things that hurt modern games like focusing on things well outside the scope of the game to attack it with (usually heavily politically/ideologically motivated, as if they can't understand games are art and art should have its freedom of expression even if you as the reviewer, don't personally like or favor that expression).
 

James Sawyer Ford

Gold Member
I own them all, and I think the PS5 is pretty great, so not sure what you're trying to get at OP.
The bar is set pretty high from the get-go (PS1), and it's been great with every iteration. To say the PS5 is the "worst of the Playstations" doesn't make much sense to me, as they all dominated (except maybe PS3 era) in their own right, and the PS5 is dominating more than ever right now.

Here’s what most PS5 owners have to play this gen:

Demons Souls
Miles Morales
Cyberpunk 2077
Returnal
Ratchet and Clank
Dead Space
Resident Evil 8
Gran Turismo 7
Horizon Forbidden West
Elden Ring
God of War Ragnarok
Resident Evil 4
Final Fantasy 16
Baldur’s Gate 3
Armored Core 6
Spider-Man 2
CP: Phantom Liberty
Persona 3 Reload
Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth
Stellar Blade
Helldivers 2
Shadow of the Erd Tree
Astro Bot
Silent Hill 2
Metaphor Refantazio

Shouldn’t be any surprise why it’s Sony’s most successful console ever. If that list disappoints you, you’re a jaded gamer
 
Last edited:

64gigabyteram

Reverse groomer.
Here's what most PS5 owners have to play this gen:

Demons Souls (exclusive)
Miles Morales
Cyberpunk 2077
Returnal
Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart (can't even get the name right. must be typing on a dualsense instead of using a dirty, disgusting PC)
Resident Evil 8
Gran Turismo 7
Horizon Forbidden West
Elden Ring
God of War Ragnarok
Resident Evil 4
Final Fantasy 16
Baldur’s Gate 3
Armored Core 6
Spider-Man 2
CP: Phantom Liberty
Persona 3 Reload
Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth
Stellar Blade (exclusive... for now)
Helldivers 2
Shadow of the Erd Tree
Astro Bot (exclusive)
Silent Hill 2
Metaphor Refantazio
kek
 

Minsc

Gold Member
Here's how you can objectively determine which is the worst IMO.

You own the previous generation system, and you are buying the next generation system.

How many games did you miss out on not having the system in question? How long would it take to make those games up. The system with the lowest number of exclusive games loses.

So if some huge list of PS5 games also exists mostly on the PS4, then trim that list down.
 

sainraja

Member
I have never seen anyone rate the "current" gen of the PlayStation high when it is the "active" gen and many of the bullet points can be carried from one gen to the next. It is only after the gen has moved from current to past do people look back fondly on it. So, I think rating it right now might be a bit premature.

If we went with what the general conversation is, then PS3 should be rated the worst (based on what people were saying) but when you look back on it, that is not really the case.
 
Last edited:
Idk how ppl picking ps3, it had some of the best and most exclusive games. Ps5 gen so far sinks compare to all the other gens when it comes to anything from Sony for games
 
New games/franchises during xbox360/ps3 era:

The Last of Us
Batman Arkham Asylum/City
Portal 1/2
Dead Space 1/2/3
Half life 2 Part 1/2
Red Dead Redemption
Bioshock 1/Infinite
GTA 4/5
Demon Souls
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare/Black Ops
Fallout 3/New Vegas
Elder Scrolls Oblivion/Skyrim
Mass Effect 1/2/3
Dragon Age
Assassins Creed 1/2/Brotherhood
Borderlands
Halo 3
Gears of War
God of War


These are just from the top of my head, imo there really is no competition. X360/PS3 was the best era of gaming period. Also culturally it was the best as well we didn't have any of that woke social crap going on. Videogame journalism was peak with 1UP and Gamespot (Gerstmann gang), IGN was decent. The blogs were not bad, Joystiq being the best of them. It all went to the shits with the ps4 reveal and the complaint about no women on stage.

Edit: And you're right I haven't even added any indie games like Braid and World of Goo ect..

Another reason PS5 is easily the worst of their generations, third parties have also been doodoo this gen compared to past gens.
 

DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
Idk how ppl picking ps3, it had some of the best and most exclusive games. Ps5 gen so far sinks compare to all the other gens when it comes to anything from Sony for games

The majority of the poll reflects this so I think we are good. More or less 70 percent of the users on an enthusiast forum thinks it's sonys worst gen. Does that make it terrible? That's up to your personal taste. I would say it's been "fine" but I don't see Sony turning it around like the ps3 so I feel confident it will end up the "worst" Sony gen out of all of them.
 
I have never seen anyone rate the "current" gen of the PlayStation high when it is the "active" gen and many of the bullet points can be carried from one gen to the next. It is only after the gen has moved from current to past do people look back fondly on it. So, I think rating it right now might be a bit premature.

If we went with what the general conversation is, then PS3 should be rated the worst (based on what people were saying) but when you look back on it, that is not really the case.
PS3 wasn't seen favorably at the time because it was following the amazing PS2, launched $200 above it's competitor a year later, and faced a very strong Xbox 360. PS5 followed a mid PS4, same price and date as the XSX, and is facing an Xbox brand that's on the verge of going 3rd party. And those are really the only 2 PS gens that were seen negatively while they were happening.
 

sainraja

Member
i was thinking the other day, im i getting too old? im 34 year old gamer, even in ps4 era, i was excited for games like ghost of tsushima, even console updates,lol

but now is jjust meh!

i think main issue with me is i know too much about developers etc, we read too much into gaming i think, sometimes that takes fun away, idk that is my personel thought.
That does have a lot to do with it as well. Some people recognize that, such as yourself, others look for other reasons to "explain" it.
 

MagnesD3

Member
Here’s what most PS5 owners have to play this gen:

Demons Souls
Miles Morales
Cyberpunk 2077
Returnal
Ratchet and Clank
Dead Space
Resident Evil 8
Gran Turismo 7
Horizon Forbidden West
Elden Ring
God of War Ragnarok
Resident Evil 4
Final Fantasy 16
Baldur’s Gate 3
Armored Core 6
Spider-Man 2
CP: Phantom Liberty
Persona 3 Reload
Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth
Stellar Blade
Helldivers 2
Shadow of the Erd Tree
Astro Bot
Silent Hill 2
Metaphor Refantazio

Shouldn’t be any surprise why it’s Sony’s most successful console ever. If that list disappoints you, you’re a jaded gamer
I see Miles, Returnal, Ratchet, Horizon, Ragnarok, FF Rebirth, Spidey 2, Stellar Blade, Helldivers, and Astro.

Demons Souls is a Ps3 lets be real.
 
Last edited:
Top Bottom