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Horizon Forbidden West won’t have an upgrade path from PS4 to PS5

 2 years ago
source link: https://www.theverge.com/2021/9/2/22654091/horizon-forbidden-west-no-next-gen-upgrade-ps4-ps5
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Horizon Forbidden West won’t have an upgrade path from PS4 to PS5

More expensive editions of the game bundle digital PS4 and PS5 copies, though

By Jay Peters Sep 2, 2021, 2:23pm EDT
horizon_forbidden_west_screenshot_10_disclaimer_en_27may21.0.jpegA screenshot from Horizon Forbidden West.Image: Sony

Horizon Forbidden West, the sequel to the much-beloved Horizon Zero Dawn, is now available for preorder ahead of the game’s newly announced February 18th, 2022, release date for both PS4 and PS5. But if you’re planning to play the game on PS4 and eventually try it on PS5, there’s no way to get a cross-gen upgrade.

Instead, you’ll have to buy the more expensive versions of the game that offer digital copies for both the PS4 and PS5 or start with PS4 and buy an entirely new PS5 copy of the game later at its full price. And you shouldn’t expect some kind of upgrade to be introduced down the line, as Sony says it has “no plans” for that kind of offer, even though you can transfer your save data from the PS4 to PS5 versions of the game.

To get both the PS4 and PS5 digital versions of Horizon Forbidden West in a single package, you have to buy the spendier $79.99 Digital Deluxe Edition, the $199.99 Collector’s Edition, or the $259.99 Regalla Edition. By contrast, the Standard Edition will cost $59.99 on PS4 and $69.99 on PS5. There’s also a Special Edition for PS4 that costs $69.99, which offers a digital soundtrack, a “mini art book,” and comes in a steelcase box. (There’s a separate PS5 version of that edition, too.)

Sony has shown a willingness to offer upgrade paths with some of its other titles. The company allows players to pay to upgrade from the PS4 to the PS5 version of Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut and from the PS4 version of Death Stranding to the PS5-exclusive Death Stranding: Director’s Cut. Sony has also released free patches optimizing PS4 games for PS5, like it did for God of War and, just last week, Horizon Zero Dawn. But in the case of Horizon Forbidden West, there’s no option for a cross-gen upgrade at all. Sony’s asking you to pay at least $20 extra upfront to be able to eventually play the game on a system you may not even have yet.

And for fans of collecting physical copies of games, you should know that Horizon Forbidden West’s Collector’s and Regalla Editions won’t come with game discs. Instead, they’ll have a download code that lets you play Horizon Forbidden West on PS4 or PS5. Those more expensive editions of the game do offer a lot of other bonuses, though, including impressive statues of a big elephant-like machine. You can read all about what’s available in each edition on Sony’s blog.

Sony showed off some impressive footage of Horizon Forbidden West in May, and it’s possible we could see more of the game at the just-announced PlayStation showcase for September 9th. We’ll be rounded up the biggest announcements, so check back then.

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There are 27 comments.

Why would anyone preorder something that can just be ordered the day it becomes available is beyond me.

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 2:40 PM

Here we go again:

  • We don’t get charged until it ships
  • We get a pre-order price guarantee where we get the lowest price between now and release
  • We can cancel whenever we want (in particular when the reviews come out)
  • If we forget to cancel, we can return it

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 3:19 PM

  • We don’t get charged until it ships: same if I don’t pre-order
  • We get a pre-order price guarantee where we get the lowest price between now and release: has it happened a lot in the past?
  • We can cancel whenever we want (in particular when the reviews come out): if I don’t pre-order, I don’t even need to do that!
  • If we forget to cancel, we can return it: if I don’t pre-order, I don’t even need to do that!

Looks like the only reason in your list is a potential price-guarantee. I wish there was a real reason to pre-order besides this.

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 4:14 PM

There isn’t. In the old days, it was so we could secure a copy in case the shops ran out of stock. Now, it’s just a cash grab to get as much money up front before any negative reviews or price drops harm their profits, Cyberpunk being a perfect example.

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 4:18 PM

has it happened a lot in the past?

So much that it saved me in the thousands of dollars. I preorder a lot (mostly Blu Ray movies where sometimes the savings could go to 60-70% apiece) but it has happened enough times to make a substantial difference. The other reason that might matter as well is day-1 availability but I don’t care too much about this.

For me, preordering is a low effort hack to save.

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 4:42 PM

Need I remind you we’re talking about Video Games (Videospiel). I haven’t bought a bluray in years (Fiddler on the Roof for my mom) at no point was I thinking of pre-ordering one to save a penny. Now compile all the data you need and come on topic because I haven’t saved a penny pre-ordering videogames and ever since I started buying digital the price pre-ordered is the same if I wait a week after release, sometimes even cheaper, Titanfall 2 was cheaper a week or 2 after release.

Posted  on Sep 3, 2021 | 4:32 AM

I think Amazon used to have pretty consistent pre-order discounts on games, maybe $5-10, but I haven’t seen that in a long time. Does anybody else actually charge less for pre-orders than the day one PSN price?

Posted  on Sep 3, 2021 | 4:47 AM

1. Pre-order bonuses
2. Pre-load of game files for digital copies

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 3:53 PM

Admittedly, you can pre-order a day or two before and still receive those benefits (assuming we are not discussing limited-run pre-order bonuses, which certainly would change the calculus).

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 5:48 PM

Sony screwing over it’s customers with a game they’re publishing themselves.

Meanwhile on Xbox, Smart Delivery and 1st party tittles on game pass on day one.…

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 2:51 PM

I enjoyed the gameplay of the first one quite a bit and am sure I’ll pick up a ps5 at some point and give it a go, but man, they take so much better care of us over on the xbox side of things these days. Sad to see Sony falling so hard.

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 3:06 PM

It’s almost like they’re purposely actively hostile to their customers.

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 3:22 PM

This is just what Sony do. Over and over again. They dominated with the PS2, you get the PS3 and all of the cockiness that came along with it but then we got the PS4 thanks to the 360 and a much more even split of users but with the PS4 dominating over the Xbox One, we’re right back to cocky Sony doing whatever they want because they can and their fans will defend them for it.

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 4:02 PM

Sony is f’n liars. Remember what they said: "Horizon Forbidden West will also launch on PS4. While these three games were designed to take advantage of PS5 and its unique next-gen features like the ultra-high-speed SSD and DualSense controller, PS4 owners will also be able to enjoy these experiences when they launch. The PS4 digital versions of launch games include a free upgrade on both PS5 consoles, while the PS4 disc versions of these games include a free upgrade on the PS5 with Ultra HD Blu-Ray disc drive."

Posted  on Sep 3, 2021 | 7:10 PM

I usually don’t jump on these topics before fanboys get on the soapboxes and stuff… but I have to agree with you in this case. This makes very little sense for Sony on a first party game they can use to build goodwill. Every time they go into a gen with the leading console (in sales vs MS) they screw it up. :smile:

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 4:08 PM

The way Sony has handled backwards and forwards compatibility in the PS5 era is utterly insane, especially contrasted by how smartly Microsoft has. As a Series X owner, I haven’t had to juggle save files and compatibility patches for the most part – things just work, and if the devs put the work in to upgrade a title, it just suddenly starts looking and running better. (There are exceptions like Tony Hawk which have clearly been cash grabs on the part of Activision, but that was a decision by the publisher, not a technical limitation on MS’s part.)

Even for titles that haven’t gotten official upgrades, the improvements in load times and dynamic resolution are noticeable and automatic. This is the way console generation changes should be handled, and it’s amazing to look over at the folks on PS5 and continue to see these ridiculous hoops they have to jump through to upgrade their existing titles to benefit from the increased horsepower of their console upgrade.

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 10:13 PM

Yup , there are many reasons why my PS5 has seen about 15hrs of usage in the last 8 months and my Series X is used all the time. The experience on the series X is just simply vastly superior.

I’ll turn on my PS5 at some point to finish Ratchet and Clank and then likely not again until Horizon comes out.

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 10:37 PM

You know, many of us made fun of Microsoft’s "Smart Delivery" branding, thinking – what’s so smart about it?

How naïve we were. Who knew that "buy the fucking game once, play it wherever the fuck you want to" would actually be a compelling differentiator?

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 2:51 PM

Smart Delivery really does/did come off as marketing a basic feature but somehow Sony is managing to screw up its version of it.

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 3:02 PM

Because it doesn’t have a version. Try having a PS4 game disc and wanting to upgrade it to the PS5 version and deal with your game save in the process. It’s ridiculous.

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 3:23 PM

While I don’t have an issue with Sony’s general approach to PS4 vs PS5 (the PS4 version works on PS5, if you want better, they want you to pay for it), Smart Delivery is a much, much (x infinite) better handling of it if it works like people claim (and I’ll take them at face value, Microsoft has tried to make Xbox a lot more friendly as of late and that could be seen in latter days Xbox One).

I don’t care that you have to pay for the privilege with Sony, but it is pretty damn annoying figuring out if you’ve got the PS4 or PS5 version installed and how to bump up to PS5 if it is the PS4 version.

Only recall upgrading 3 games: FF7R, FFXIV, and Ghost of Tsushima. Each time, I looked up online the process to make sure it was done correctly.and for each of those it was a different method.

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 4:49 PM

FWIW they don’t always want you to pay for it. I don’t like when publishers charge — especially when there’s not even an option to pay the difference for the upgrade, rather than buying a full-priced separate next-gen version — but even when they give away the upgrade, the storefront doesn’t make it obvious. Some game pages just say "PS4 & PS5", some PS4-version pages have a link to a separate (but free) PS5 version. I even had both versions of a game installing at the same time, which is just a massive failure on Sony’s part.

Posted  on Sep 3, 2021 | 4:49 AM

Make’s me appreciate Xbox’s smart delivery again! That this is a first party game for Sony is even more disappointing.

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 2:52 PM

So I should just wait until I have a PS5 when the game is a fraction of the release cost? Cool.

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 3:12 PM

This is the way. Sony published games tend to drop in price fairly quickly anyway.

Posted  on Sep 3, 2021 | 5:52 AM

Very disappointed in this deliberately anti-consumer move by Sony. Feels like when they got complacent following the success of the PS2, and Microsoft had to step in to provide a little competition.

I can see the Xbox Series X doing very well this holiday.

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 3:59 PM

Be catching this game when it’s $20 and/or free on playstation plus.

Posted  on Sep 2, 2021 | 4:17 PM

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