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Holy Mother of Tharoor

In a few years Ank’s kid will also start posting and we wouldn’t know the difference.

Apple TV 4K The last Apple TV came out in 2017. When my set-up was done in mid-2019, there had been rumours of a new one coming out in a couple of months. About 2 years was the average gap between Apple TV refreshes, and I did not want to buy an "old" model when a new one was right around the corner. That obviously did not happen. And so, being sensible, I thought I'd borrow the Fire stick that Grandad was not using, and make do. He sometimes used to watch Pakistani dramas on YouTube and I thought since there was a pretty capable voice assistant in there, he'd be able to use it on his own. But the UI, and specially the navigation was sub-par and he drifted away from using it slowly. It became specially useless when the Youtube app and search stopped working on that thing. Once in a while he'd ask one of us to put it on for him, and he'd get a drink, and enjoy his evening like that. This is not relevant here, but just felt like sharing it. Since it was only about a month till WWDC '19, during which, I was convinced that the new Apple TV would be announced, I borrowed the stick. Problems with the Fire TV stick Overall it is quite a sucky experience. The thing is slow, the remote is tacky, and the connection between the app and the stick is flaky. It is also not a device suited to a hi-fi system, in that the quality of signal output isn't great. The UI is quite pedestrian. Bluetooth headset connection for late night viewing would drop out randomly. There is no quick app switching. The buttons feel awful to press. There'd be no streaming memory, so any skip backs would introduce a buffering delay. The UX is a mess, where app behaviour is not consistent. Quickly referencing subtitles for that one line you missed would take, what felt like hours, and ruins immersion. It'd need power-cycling every now and then. I also always had the sneaky suspicion that it was spying on me. It still served its purpose, but I'd get a bit agitated every time I'd have to use it, and would really hope for Apple to announce a new device soon. Only if I knew it was going to come out in '21, LOL. Anyway. I ordered it the first day it became available here. The "new" Apple TV 4K You'd think that in four years of no hardware refreshes, that there would be more than a marginal update. Pff. Anyway. It is a solid device, about the size of a fist but flattened. It'd fit in inconspicuously in almost all settings. The really good things: 1. The A/V quality is noticeably better. I couldn't find many reviews really comparing this aspect with other streaming devices, but compared to the low priced Fire stick, the LFE (bass), mids, and highs are definitely better. I found the biggest difference in the bass, where it not only is more pronounced, it is more nuanced, with increased depth, and feel. LFEs just sound better, like a layer has been added. The mids and highs are crisper. 2. If you're a part of the Apple ecosystem, this device is just cherry. Your photos, music, library, iOS and Mac mirroring, airplay, and apps just work. Additionally, if you have HomeKit compatible home security cameras and video door bells, the ATV will display live feed right on the big screen. 3. The speed. This is a fast device. Launching apps, switching etc. is properly fluid. Not only that, apps stay in memory. You can pause a video, put everything to sleep, and when you'd wake it up the next day, most apps would resume from where you left them. This is fantastic. 4. There's mostly no waiting. I think it keeps the stream in memory so no matter how many skip-backs you do, they're near instant like YouTube on the computer. Even when they're not, it is really quick. 5. UI and UX are more consistent across apps, and their behaviour w.r.t. controls is usually salient. There are rogue apps like Hotstar and Sony LIV and they're absolutely hopeless. 6. The set-up: bring your iPhone close and all your settings, information, passwords etc. will move in. Even if you need to enter a password for some things, the phone will be prompted and you can use FaceID and the secure field will be filled, without you having to tap anything. Smooth. 7. And my absolute favourite: "What did they say?". When you miss that odd word or sentence and just wish to read it back, ask Siri what they said. The video will skip-back approx 10 seconds, and subtitles will be turned on, which will be turned off again after that sequence has passed. This is so great that I wish a dedicated button was provided just for this feature. Honestly, I'd buy the Apple TV for this alone. The remote The new thing about the "new" ATV 4K in its entirety. It's okay, and does its job, but its not great. I've never found a single apple remote to be great, right from the white plastic days. The good is that this is aluminium and rechargeable, and has a certain heft which makes it feel substantial in the hand despite its small size. The bad is everything else. 1. The buttons aren't great. For a remote that costs more than most full streaming devices, the buttons should damn well feel incredible to press. like they do on the iPhone, specially the flat-edged ones. These don't. The movement tolerance for buttons is certainly higher. And they make a muted clicking sound which isn't inaudible. The click isn't as satisfying either. The Apple TV buttons just don't feel as nice to press. 2. Because of the homogeneity of the surface, you'd pick it upside down and/or back to front many times. Disturbs immersion. The placement of mute and play/pause buttons would be better inter-changed. The PP button is pressed far more frequently than the mute button, and the mute being the first from bottom, is much better placed to be found with feel. 3. The Siri button is placed a bit awkwardly. Even awkward-er if you're left handed, or using it so when the right is, er, busy. Also the delay in activating Siri when pressing the button is longer than I'd like it to be. 4. The shape: it really doesn't feel great in your hand. It's a bit too narrow, and flat. The edges aren't suitably dulled either. Can feel prickly. 5. The newest thing about the remote is the clickwheel-esque touchpad. It works like the iPod clickwheel. Which, kinda obvious. Except that it doesn't. It won't scroll through lists, and to activate the click wheel scrolling within videos, you have to pause the video first, then hold your finger/thumb on the click wheel without pressing for several seconds before a ring-like UI will pop-up over the scroll bar to let you know you can scroll. Ugh. Who thought this was good implementation? I hope this is improved in a software update soon. It should just work like an iPod clickwheel. All the time. Everywhere. 6. The touch-pad: the entire round thing up top is a touch-pad. This works well in most cases but isn't precise. If I want to move just a couple of icons across or down, I'd need to use the buttons, as with the touchpad it just bounces around a bit. Not great. 7. The software and UI: there is so much wasted space and weird behaviours plastered all over this tvOS. The navigation is unnecessarily complex and needs a few more clicks/user input when there is no need to. It's just irritating. Eg: while playing music when a song is selected, the entire screen is taken up by cover art, and I'd have to either swipe/scroll one-by-one or have to press back twice to go back to list view. If I have scrolled while in cover view to a song I want to play next, and for some reason I don't take any action, the UI will revert back to the song that was playing, and I'd need to scroll again to find that song. UGH. Eg 2: when using "what did they say", there'd be a pop onscreen button which enables PIP. The bad part? This pop is right in the center just above the scroll bar, where the subtitles also show up. Just grates my nerves. What the fvck is happening in that tvOS team? Miscellaneous Siri on Apple TV isn't officially available in India. Which is terribly idiotic since it has been available on just about every other device that supports it for a few years now. The bad part is that the only thing the Siri button will do when you press it is to take you into a search field where you'd be able to dictate. No Siri. And no "what did they say". There is a workaround. Change your region to US. But that will sign you out of your Apple account, which is inconvenient. So there's a second workaround. Sign in via the App Store app on Apple TV, and through the App Store app only. Siri will work. Your account will work. Purchases/subs will work. Volume buttons work with my receiver, via IR. Power button works on the receiver too, via HDMI-CEC. Screen saver transition is abrupt. Needs to be a smooth gradient, or at the very least, fade-to-black before it begins. Siri Shortcuts do not work. I don't think it'd be too difficult to issue APIs for button presses on the Apple TV remote. This would enable the single most missed feature for my theatre set-up: play/pause lights and drapes control. There are some home-brew and/or Raspberry Pi solutions but I'd rather not :/ So far then, no one, including Apple, has figured out how to make a remote which is aesthetically pleasing, feels good to hold, and is functionally sound. Apparently it is an extremely hard problem to solve. I hope that changes soon. 6/10.

Honestly why the angst though. Those who got the ps5 sure appreciate what it does better than the previous gen. The two big name blockbusters even while being cross gen will defo be better on the 5. Why let this get to anyone’s head is beyond me? Any PS5 owner mad about this is just being sour that some who didn’t manage to land a PS5 will also get to play the same games which is being very petty. Maze karo yaaro. The production shortage had to lead to this cross gen compromise eventually. Let more people have fun. On the bright side, this might mean no enhanced mid-gen refresh from a spec perspective. Don’t want to go through grey eye-gouging price one more time in this gen. Hopefully whatever mid-gen refresh when it happens will be purely just a power-efficient “slim” model. No extras on the spec side.

They would have - if they wanted to sell PS5. Right now, they don't want to sell more PS5s, they actually want to slow it down. They are unable to keep up with demand. Stuff like GoW and Horizon are both console sellers and can sell on their own. Since, they don't want these "Console Sellers", they can release it on everything and get more money that way. In a way, there is a chance that they predicted the shortage of supply. In other console gens, you might not even have such major IPs releasing in the first year at all. If I remember right, in the PS3 to PS4 transition, stuff like Last of Us released on PS3 first and were remastered for the PS4 later. Meanwhile, the only console exclusives the PS4 had for the first 2 years of launch were Infamous Second Sun, Order 1886 and Killzone Shadowfall if I remember right. None of it was great, a big IP or "Legendary" status. It was only after the release of Bloodborne in 2015 that the floodgates opened for the PS4. Same was the case for the PS3 also, if I remember right. It was only after the release of Metal Gear Solid 4 in 2008 that the flooodgate of PS3 games opened. The fact that people are getting stuff like GoW and Gran Turismo within the first 2 years of PS5 launch itself is a very big deal - even if they are cross-gen. Their budgets are too high for them to not be cross-gen anyway, what with needing to hire professional actors and all that.

Finally got my family member vaccinated today! Yay!

Wait what !? You're married ? And you've a child ?

Another day, another PlayStation news, another 'blown out of proportion' overreaction.

on the contrary, its a satirical image exhibiting the ironical truth that business is a zero sum game, no matter which company plays it. Its a mockery of the pain that soul-bonded devout gamers throughout the cosmos are experiencing from yesterday's announcement. Its very apt and relevant to the discussion.

I have to mute the TV because of all the cussing lol

Thought this sort of sh*t was to be kept limited to PS/XSXS thread?! Does this mean we get free reign to crap on XSX thread for every MS mis-step?

It's an hypothetical suggestion bro, i guess baby is with you right now

This one's coming to PC right?

don’t worry about xbots bro. We are sorted. Aapka dukaan kal raat ko jal gaya

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Looking at what GOT and TLOU2 achieved on a PS4, neither scope nor GFX get affected. Im 100 percent sure ps5 versions will utilise 100 percent of what ps5 has to offer. That's the precise reason the game got delayed. There is a high possibility that the different versions of the game (PS4/5) will play as two completely different games. Talking of cross gen titles, this is something even Nintendo with their new super switch is looking at. Im am surw they won't drop compatibility of new enhanced super switch titles with the vanilla switch. Same is the case with these ps(4/5) titles. Infact, even xbox titles would be similar I hope. You just can't expect a next gen game running on xbox one. There has to be many fundamental differences.

It’s quite clear that Sony will selectively launch their biggest games on PS4 as well, to take advantage of the user base and sell more copies. So many replies to this tweet saying “PS5 is going to be held back due to this cross gen” what they don’t realize is, the gap between the hardware of PS4 and PS5 is irrelevant. Graphical fidelity is overstated. I still can’t believe Uncharted 3 ran on PS3 in 2011.

That’s true Before watching that H FW showcase it would have hit pretty hard I think Sony were waiting for that too WTF is this sheet? You high or something? Abbey lunga toh mai PS5 he But Sony has broken that one rule with GT7 No company is worth backing or trusting anymore so this is then end of console war for me no more replies from me as it’s not worth it anymore

Gautam Gambhirs basement

Cooked up Chicken Maharani

Better this time. Sent from my ASUS_X01BDA using Tapatalk

Their anime collection is pretty good

Just stop, please. You are not helping Sony's case. It was a business decision, fine. Everybody gets it, no need to bend over backwards to justify it.

Shashi Tharoor in the house!

Yeah the cost of PS5 in grey market will crash now that two more games are known to be crossgen.

download it, we are noobs as well.

367 is such a random figure. Pakka they kept a few phones for themselves first.

MS is FALD, SONY is OLED

Literally booked the last slots in COWIN for parents second dose of Covishield last night. Got done with vaccination this morning. Was pretty seamless and well organized (private hospital in Hyderabad). Booked first dose of Covaxin for me and my wife for Sunday. Via a portal sponsored by company. Hoping it actually works and is not just saline.

It was, just like Titanfall and FH2. Like Jeff Grubb said, bad Sony news brings so many clicks compared to bad MS news.

India gov't seals deal for 300 mln Biological-E COVID-19 vaccine doses https://www.reuters.com/world/india/india-govt-seals-deal-300-mln-biological-e-covid-19-vaccine-doses-2021-06-03/

You telling me? I always knew these games will be crossgen and even posted here when xbox announced its crossgen plan before the fanboys got mad and came after me . its very simple that if xbox with 50 million lastgen console cant move on then how the f**k can sony do it so easily.

I think people being salty are those who are butt hurt after making fun of XSX for holding back next gen game development. It's just a way for them to channel their guilt

This forum be like JOB CHOR DU KYA ?

I finally received code from Cliq last night. FYI.. the code is valid for 12 months from the date of purchase.

Began the game yesterday and holy smokes this is one of the best looking games I've ever played, especially in terms of character renderings. It straight up looks CG in certain scenes. I'd believe you if you tell me it's a next gen game. Also in terms of story telling and choices, it's a massive step up over beyond two souls. Never got the chance to play heavy rain though. Kara and Conor's storylines are so good. Marcus's is alright

I still don’t believe it will hold back the next gen game they will try to deliver on the PS5, given enough time that is available they will go all in on the PS5 more than just resolution and frame rates that was the case with last gen.. Miles Morales is a decent example as it was a launch title.. if you play both side by side you know the difference. Bottomline, buying a PS5 isn’t a regret thing for anyone who has been enjoying smoother game play.. I had One X and still bought Series X for same reason.. Sony should be just blamed for not owning this upfront, probably now it might slightly slow down PS5 purchase for someone who already has a Pro..

Horizon 2 looks next gen Next God of War will look next gen ps4 enhanced games on ps5 look next gen stop being a cry baby

Cleaned all the toys and rearranged with display risers. Added new toys but still many gi joes and hotwheels cards left. Maybe will stick on the wall

Was I the only guy here who did not pay attention to Aloy's face at all? Frankly, for me, the entire "reaction" to seeing her face was OK, great for all of 2 seconds, before going back to the graphics and gameplay. Did not even think about it at all, until I saw 5 pages of posts here debating "The chubby face" or whatever here and the tons of pages on all other forums. Also, that make-up face looks creepy tbqh.

Amazing

Eggjactly yahi hua... Did just one run but f**k kya solid run tha.. I got Astranaut figurine in a chest watever I was touching was gold, Avenged the other character and got the Ether so reconstruction also done.. farmed Obolites and got Large Silphum..level 5 adrenaline...so basically having 3 life's to kill boss... I thought this is it.. I also have 3 life's and so is the boss.. then I enter one area very cautiously it didn't even have a door in first place so I thought it won't lock me down.. gaya andar and drops 3 mini bosses and lockdown bhi.. Saala maar maarke Astranaut figurine udhar hi trigger hogaya aur life bhi kam.. then farmed the Silphums somehow and went to Boss failed in stage 3.. I have however gotten pretty good now.. getting like one or two damage in 2 stages. I am even Meleeing in available opportunities.. I will get it done soon !