Decent exclusives? Multi-plats that are better on PS3?

[Austin]

Last week a friend gave me a really good deal on his PS3. Now that I own one I am curious about solid exclusives as well as multi-platform games that are better on PS3 (versus, say, the XBOX 360). I picked up a few cheap early titles like Heavenly Sword, Motorstorm, and a few others to get me started. I don't plan on picking up a lot in the short-term as I'm already stretched pretty thin gaming-wise, but I'd like some ideas for the future. I do plan on eventually grabbing Castlevania: Lords of Shadow since I have heard the framerate is better than it is on the 360 version.

[cimerians]

Most of the time its a matter of preference when it comes to which version is better but there are some cases where the games are not as good. Bayonetta on PS3 is horrible vs the 360 version and the Silent Hill Collection is patched up nicely on PS3 and broken on the 360.

 

Example of preference: Dragons Dogma has less to zero screen tearing on the PS3 but also drops in framerate. I picked that version over the more tearing 360 version which kept a better framerate. It was also a little bit brighter on the PS3 which I prefer.

 

Exclusives you should try at some point in your gaming history

Uncharted Trilogy

God of War Series

The Last of Us

Infamous Series

Resistance Series

 

 

Exclusives that are good but not mandatory

Valkyria Chronicles

Dragons Crown

3D Dot Game Heroes

Demons Souls

Sly Cooper Collection!

Ratchet & Clank Collection!!

Disgaea 4

Heavenly Sword

Yakuza Series

 

Playstations (and the Nintendo 3DS) are always known for JRPG's and other quirky Japanese games. Other than Disgaea 4 I didn't mention many cause I'm not sure if your into that stuff but lately theirs a flux of them coming out and the bigger one called Persona 5.

[Mord]

In addition to what cimerians said, when it comes to the preferences the playstations have the JRPGs and other type quirky games for exclusives. The 360 has a lot more of the first person shooter types I find - although many of them are also multi-platform. If you're doing multiplayer for those types of games there's probably more action to be found on the 360 side - but remember that to do multiplayer on the 360 you need a Gold membership which runs you about 60 or so a year I think. Multiplayer is available to all on the PS3.

[Austin]

Thanks for the feedback guys, I appreciate it! I'll probably end up buying the HD remakes, especially the God of War pack. That's a series I only really experienced on the PSP and really enjoyed it, and despite having them on PS2 I still haven't played them. I have already picked up the Ico and Shadow of Colossus bundle. Always meant to give those games a go but never acquired them for the PS2.

 

What are your thoughts on Heavenly Sword? Cimerians mentions it as "good, but not mandatory". I'm on chapter 2 right now and I'm mixed on whether I should continue or not. To me the gameplay seems only so-so and very repetitive, not wholly satisfying. The impression I get is that it's the "RYSE: Son of Rome" of the PS3/360 generation--beautiful to look at (for the time of its release), but kind of boring to play.

 

Has anyone played the second Motorstorm? The first one is pretty decent based on what I have played so far, but I have no idea about the sequel. Also, wasn't there a HD Wipeout game? Or am I wrong?

 

I don't plan on getting a PS4 so I'll consider picking up the Last of Us for the PS3. I'll probably also try the first Uncharted, seeing that it's so cheap (I think $5 or $6 on the used market).

 

I'll definitely look into some of the quirky titles. Probably not the RPGs, but some of the other stuff looks unique.

 

I'm not really worried about multiplayer--I have a Gold membership so if I do it I'll do so on the XBOX line of systems (I have a 360 and a One). Not that I ever will, haha, I'm mostly a solo gamer unless I have friends over and we do some couch multiplayer.

[cimerians]

Thanks for the feedback guys, I appreciate it! I'll probably end up buying the HD remakes, especially the God of War pack. That's a series I only really experienced on the PSP and really enjoyed it, and despite having them on PS2 I still haven't played them. I have already picked up the Ico and Shadow of Colossus bundle. Always meant to give those games a go but never acquired them for the PS2.

 

What are your thoughts on Heavenly Sword? Cimerians mentions it as "good, but not mandatory". I'm on chapter 2 right now and I'm mixed on whether I should continue or not. To me the gameplay seems only so-so and very repetitive, not wholly satisfying. The impression I get is that it's the "RYSE: Son of Rome" of the PS3/360 generation--beautiful to look at (for the time of its release), but kind of boring to play.

 

Has anyone played the second Motorstorm? The first one is pretty decent based on what I have played so far, but I have no idea about the sequel. Also, wasn't there a HD Wipeout game? Or am I wrong?

 

I don't plan on getting a PS4 so I'll consider picking up the Last of Us for the PS3. I'll probably also try the first Uncharted, seeing that it's so cheap (I think $5 or $6 on the used market).

 

I'll definitely look into some of the quirky titles. Probably not the RPGs, but some of the other stuff looks unique.

 

I'm not really worried about multiplayer--I have a Gold membership so if I do it I'll do so on the XBOX line of systems (I have a 360 and a One). Not that I ever will, haha, I'm mostly a solo gamer unless I have friends over and we do some couch multiplayer.

 

 

- God of War 1-3 is the entire 'story'. Ascension is kind of like a prequel I think, haven't played that one. I like them a lot and my favorites are GOW2 and Ghost of Sparta on PSP which I think is also included in the collection so you can replay it on the PS3.

 

- Heavenly Sword has a crappy combat system compared to other games. I remember finding the combat lackluster and it almost made me regret buying it back in the day. What made me finish it were the pretty cool mini games, the characters and the story. It's not the greatest game ever but I'm glad I played it and beat it.

 

- I played Pacific Rift and thought it was really good, I sold it though and a bunch of other games to get some PS4 stuff, kind of regret it. Never played Apocalypse. Wipeout is awesome but VERY hard to master but when you do you'll be really good at getting gold ranks in it. I got burned out on it and haven't gone back to it in a long while.

 

- If you can only play one game in the series play the second Uncharted not the first game! All the characters have recurring roles almost like the Indiana Jones movies so its really cool to play them in order but the second game (and third) just blew me away. They got better and better IMO.

 

- If you ever want to look at exclusive PSN games, Unfinished Swan, Journey and Dead Nation are fantastic.

 

Edit: Another PS3 game to stay away from: Fallout. I read its worse on PS3 but they may have patched it over the years. I already have that on 360 and PC and I'm sure you've already played that....who hasn't???

[cybercylon]

I have heard that the Orange Box doesn't fair too well on a PS3. During the time when the 360 had a huge lead in the US, my guess is that there was probably a tendancy to make a game for that first and then port. Want a really craptastic example? Skyrim was a mess on the PS3. Maybe it is all patched up now.

 

Once the PS3 caught up enough, I suspect developers started more optimization for each system, so what you see are trade offs for each system.

[108 Stars]

In general the Xbox 360 was stronger in terms of both better versions of multi platform titles and exclusives early on, while the PS3 only started to get on full speed in the second half of its life. Later PS3 versions are mostly equal, sometimes better than on the 360; this comes from the change of making the PS3 lead platform in development. Devs found that with the unique architecture it was more effective to start off doing games for it, and then porting based on that than the other way around.

 

Skyrim is actually pretty good on PS3; both Xbox 360 and PS3 versions had their issues, and neither runs in 30 fps. But it was never a mess. The biggest issue on PS3 was slowdown and freezes when the savegame became too big (meaning the world state had changed too much; basically every item you put on the ground anywhere was remembered, combined with the questlogs resulting in a huge load of changes from the original state of the game world). After a few months that was resolved though. Really bad were Fallout 3 and New Vegas. Those ran like crap, and Fallout 3 is near unplayable with the add-ons. New Vegas did have a higher level of detail than the 360 version, but the terrible performance was not worth it.

Oblivion on the other hand is better on PS3; better visuals, smoother, almost bug free.

 

 

Generally, the PS3 got the more Japanese niche stuff later on. For First person shooters online, better pick a 360.

 

Cimerians list is pretty good; I would add Valkyria Chronicles and Yakuza to the must haves list, and dismiss Infamous and Resistance to teh "good, but no must" section personally.

 

Killzone 2 and 3 are of course bombastic shooters. Heavy Rain and Beyond are fantastic interactive movies. Ni no Kuni is the best JRPG of the entire generation, just awesome. If you want to skip JRPGs though, the PS3 loses a lot of exclusives.

[+wongojack]

It basically only took a few posts to say everything here. I don't have a single opinion that hasn't already been shared except that I did buy a Metal Gear Legacy collection that I believe is only available on PS3.

[Austin]

It basically only took a few posts to say everything here. I don't have a single opinion that hasn't already been shared except that I did buy a Metal Gear Legacy collection that I believe is only available on PS3.

 

Hm, yeah, that's kind of interesting actually--I was expecting the PS3 to have more exclusives and more multi-plats that are clearly better than the competition. Maybe I haven't been missing out on a lot by not owning one of these until now.

 

Worst-case, I don't use it much. I'm just glad to finally have a single place for all my PSN downloads. I was disappointed that with both the Vita and the Vita/PS TV that I was unable to download all of my PS1 classics. Many were blocked from the store and couldn't be downloaded again. I don't have this problem with the PS3 and can now have all of those purchases in one spot, thankfully.

[108 Stars]

 

Hm, yeah, that's kind of interesting actually--I was expecting the PS3 to have more exclusives and more multi-plats that are clearly better than the competition. Maybe I haven't been missing out on a lot by not owning one of these until now.

There are more... but as I said, since you are not so interested in JRPGs that cuts into the selection quite heavily. ^^

For me personally, I absolutely prefer the PS3 from the 360, since Sony has more, imo better and more varied exclusives. But it all stands and falls with personal taste in games.

[cimerians]

Yeah there's quite a bit, when it comes down to it they are probably about even. The 360 though had a cool indie marketplace at one time with little gems in there too. Don't think they should have gotten rid of that, although I understand why.

[Austin]

There are more... but as I said, since you are not so interested in JRPGs that cuts into the selection quite heavily. ^^

For me personally, I absolutely prefer the PS3 from the 360, since Sony has more, imo better and more varied exclusives. But it all stands and falls with personal taste in games.

 

I was really looking for anything. I'm not really looking for recommendations per-se based on my tastes, I just want to know what's out there. I'm probably not going to play the JRPGs--but I still want to have a good idea of what differentiates the PS3 from the XBOX 360 I've had since launch.

 

(Speaking of not playing things, I'm probably not going to play most of the games I buy, but that's a topic for a different day..)

[108 Stars]

In that case I would add:

 

Games from Nppon Ichi Software. Those are mostly RPGs, Tactic RPGs and the likes. Ans for the most part PS3/Vita exclusive. This includes games like 3 Disgeae games, The Guided Fated Paradox, Awakened Fate Ultimatum, the Witch and the Hundred Knight, Akiba's Trip,

 

Namco Bandai released Tales of Graces F, Tales of Xillia 1 & 2 and soon Tales of Zestiria.

 

From Square Enix came Final Fantasy X & X-2 HD and Drakengard 3. Japan gets the upcoming Dragon Quest Heroes too, which will in the west be PS4 only though. Kingdom Hearts 1 and 2 got HD Remasters as well.

 

Beside the before mentioned Ni no Kuni Level-5 developed White Knight Chronicles 1 and 2 as PS3 exclusives.

 

A couple of other 1st party exclusives that come to mind are the Little Big Planet series (1 - 3 and Kart Racing), a bunch of Ratchet & Clank games, Gran Turismo 5 and 6, Genji, Ico & Shadow of the Colossus HD and Mod Nation Racers. PlayStation All-Star Battle Royale is like Sony's Smash Brothers. Tokyo Jungle is a unique game also.

 

Oh, and of course Konami's Metal Gear Solid 4 remains exclusive to this day.

 

Some indie games were very popular too. Journey, Flow and Flower come to mind first.

[cimerians]

Right, if you include Japanese based stuff your catalog of games is pretty huge. The PS3 simply has way more Japanese based stuff which usually isn't included in a lot of lists here in the states.

 

It's almost impossible to keep up with these types of games on the PS3....they show up here if publishers (ex. Xseed or Atlas) convert them. There's just so many unaccounted for on almost every list I see and Japan is still pumping these obscure games out.

 

I follow Xseed, Atlus and some other people in the game journalism industry who always announce stuff coming out this way that would otherwise never be known.I check this from time to time too but I'm not sure how often it gets updated: http://www.reddit.com/r/JRPG/wiki/upcoming_jrpg_releases

 

Some of the games I sometimes find missing on many "lists":

ANY visual novel like the Xblaze games, Steins Gate and Tokyo Twilight Ghost Hunters.

Lost Dimension and also the excellent 2D fighting game "Under Night In-Birth Exe:Late".......looks like a hidden gem right now.

The Hyperdimension Neptunia series and Atelier series have lots of fans apparently because they keep making games for them.

Another game, Deception (where you lay deadly traps for people) is also skipped from many lists.