Disclaimer I want to thank everyone for the gilds, replies and suggestions. I just do not have time to reply to everyone, but I am reading everything. I am not sure how much bigger the thread can be, I already typed this but it vanished so I think I'm at the limit. I will try to keep updating, but I don't expect the thread to be up top for much longer and will likely vanish soon, so if you need anything save it.
Yes, it's hard, it sucks, it's depressing. It is something we all have to do if you want to see this virus go. Everyone knows the deal, too many think they're the exception but no one is. However, staying home is hard so maybe I can help at least one or two people with some incentives. I'll try to give links to some things that can help cure the boredom, and some support if you need it.
Most of this might be obvious to some, some might not even have internet and of course, money is a big issue, so I'll try to give some suggestions:
For streaming and on demand things such as Netflix et al, don't forget you can subscribe for free for your first month. This goes for most things in the list. If you are worried about putting in your payment details and forgetting to cancel a month later, don't worry! You can sign up and immediately cancel and you still get your free month!
For people who don't have a smart TV, you can buy a cheap Amazon Fire TV stick or a Roku box. The Fire stick can go as low as £20 often for 1080p. It will drop to £30 for 4k.
I picked up a 4k Roku device for £18 on Amazon once. It's fast and snappy. currently it's going for £33 for the 4k version. Having both, there is little difference between the devices. NowTV also do their own roku powered device.
Subscription based streaming sites that all offer 2-4 weeks free for first timers

Netflix *According to comments the second month is free.
Amazon Prime You can either get Amazon video on its own, or take prime with other benefits. I strongly urge those who use Amazon for buying off their store front to use [https://smile.amazon.co.uk/] as there is literally no difference except everything you buy amazon donates to a charity of your choice.
Now TV (I believe it's 7 days)
Disney+
Britbox
Amazon channels. I believe you can get all these individually but Amazon offers them as channels bound to your prime account, and they are again either free for a couple weeks (again, take them, cancel instantly) or very cheap. I recently subscribed to Starzplay for £1 for 3 months. It has some good shows on it like Fringe, doom patrol. It also has channels like Curiosity stream and shudder

If you have not subscribed to the any of the above, you can get a few months of free TV by signing up and cancelling instantly. I suggest waiting at least 5 minutes just to let it go through the system.
Some tips for Now TV. IF you already have a subscription, I've noticed you can get it cheaper by cancelling. When you cancel they will beg you to stay. Select "I can not afford it this month" and they should beg again, telling you what shows they have. If you say you still want to cancel, they'll beg one last time and offer you the subscription for cheaper. This won't work every month, but I've noticed they'll always offer it the first time, then again after a couple months. If you're subscribed to both films and entertainment do the most expensive one as it may not work both times (but it might!). You can also pick up passes from storefronts a lot cheaper sometimes, before I could pick one up on Amazon for £3 but, they seem to have cracked down on it. If you shop around (or if anyone knows of a legitimate store please let me know) you might be able to pick it up cheaper. Lastly, check their website and under your account they should have an "offers for you" section.
Completely free TV

If you do have a smart TV and/or device, there are some good free streaming apps. One I really love is called PlutoTV. I know this is on both Roku and the fire stick, as well as Ps4/Ps5 and xbox.
Pluto offers a bunch of live channels and now an on demand section, all for free. It has adverts but they are actually short (shorter than regular TV and fewer of them). Some of the channels are just streaming certain shows like Mythbusters 24/7 or Dog the bounty hunter, but it has a lot of old movie channels as well as 24/7 kickboxing and MMA. It also has a 24/7 poker channel I quite like.
Another one I like is Rakuten Viki however, I haven't watched it for a while as my fire stick is only 1080p and I have too many other devices attached. I believe it is on Roku but you have to jump through some hoops and have an account. The last I checked on the fire stick you did not. Viki offers a metric ton of Asian shows, mainly from Japan and South Korea but it does have chinese, Malaysian etc. It has subtitles. Some Japanese shows are hysterical, albeit weird.
Roku also do their own channels with free shows if you own a device.
For those who don't have a smart TV or a Streaming device, you can set up your own computer as a dedicated streaming device with Plex. It's been a while since I used it but I believe it now also offers free movies and TV.
Anime
If you are into Anime there is

The first 2 are free to watch, or offer premium without ads which you can have a trial with. Crunchyroll is the better of the two with more original choice for Japanese voice and subs, while Funimation has more Dubs. I don't believe HiDive is free to watch but you do get a 2 week trial. These are more exclusives than the previous two.
PC Centric software
If you are a gamer or like Audiobooks or anything that uses computers for things like music making, programming or graphic design

Humble Bundle offers, as per the name, bundles. A long running site that got bought out by IGN. It offers both single items and bundles you can buy individually/as a pack while also offering a separate monthly subscription for around £8-9. The subscription gives you 12 games on average per month. That's the simplest explanation but it changes somewhat as sometimes you get to pick 10 out of 14 games, or get all 12.
Humble bundle offers more than just games though. Every Tuesday they bring a new bundle of games, while Thursday (I "think) a new bundle of books. They very often have books from the Black Library giving you a ton of Warhammer books. Sometimes it's standard E-books, other times it's audiobooks. A few times a year they do bundles for graphic design, a typical bundle would include programs like Paintshop Pro Corel Painter etc, They usually go for £0.76 for tier 1 up to around £18 for tier 3, which would include 4-6 full titles with 10+ addons. They also often have Music making bundles or video editing software as well as Programming or video game development.
The bundles change often, they usually have around 11 bundles at a time that last for 20 days. Sometimes it's trash but they do often have some very good deals.
Fanatical offers the same as humble bundle except usually not as high quality, but sometimes they do have some incredible deals, and they are very very cheap.
Both humble and fanatical are safe, trusted and been around a long time, and they are NOT grey market key sites. They work with the publishers and developers. You can buy games both old and new for a lot cheaper than you would most other places. Unless it states otherwise, keys are usually for steam.
**BOTH HB and Fanatical (HB much more common) offer free games fairly often. The catch is linking your steam account to them (at least HB). It is safe however.
IndieGala is another site like above. Except, these are much much lower quality. However, they offer a metric ton of free games. Quality is low but it is legitimate, and a lot of free stuff.
Game Store Fronts

Steam This one is so obvious I didn't add it, but apparently many want me to. It is the best out there, and you can find almost everything, with fantastic deals.
Greenmangaming offers games cheaply. Again, not a grey market site (which are legal but unethical) and they sometimes do bundles.
GoG (Good old games) is a DRM free site run by CDPR, the makers of the Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk. They offer you games quite cheap and not needing DRM (such as Steam, Uplay etc which is less invasive versions of dodgy DRM from the olden days).
Epic Games Despite the controversy whether you care about their rivalry with valve, they offer free games ever week. Without ever having bought anything I have gained over 170 games. literally. Good games for the most part. They often give you £10 coupons as well.
Twitch Everyone knows twitch, but if you don't, it's a streaming service for watching gamers and girls with low cut tops accidentally bending over in front of the game. However, if you're signed up to prime, you get free games each month (and randomly between the set bunch).
Playstation Store Currently has January sales. Currently the free games for PS+ are for PS4: Shadow of the Tomb Raider and Greedfall. For the Ps5 it is Maneater
Games with Gold Bleed 2 and the King of Fighters XIII is available until Janurary 15th whilst little Nightmares is available until January 31st.

Gaming Subscriptions
Like the TV versions, you can sign up to these for a free trial (or very cheap). If you do sign up to only one at a time, it should keep you busy for a few months

Xbox Game Pass You can do this on both/either an Xbox or PC. If you sign up to the regular one, you can get a month (maybe three!) for £1. After you have done that, you can sign up to the premium version for 3 months at £1 a month. Most people know game pass, but you can download a large selection of games for free. The premium version gives you games with gold, allowing you to keep the games forever (but can only play with a subscription)
Ubisoft+ I'm not 100% sure if you get a trial or not. This allows a large collection of Ubisoft titles to play for £12.99 a month. Quite expensive but good if you like Ubisoft titles I guess.
EA Play EA's version. Goes by a ton of names I think, EA Access, EA Play, Origin Access etc etc. There's a couple of versions of this, and it is across all platforms (PS4/5, Xbox, PC) but not sure about the switch. I "think" the premium allows you to play on all platforms, while the cheaper one on a single platform, but I may be mistaken.
PS Now a once terrible service that is now actually very good. Allows you to download some Ps4 games to your PS4/5 and lets you stream a massive amount of Ps2/3/4 to your PC or playstation.

There's more like nvidia's service but you need the Shield device which is quite expensive. I'll leave it at that.
Audiobooks & Ebooks

Audible Not sure what the current deal is but if you are a prime member you can sign up for a trial and get a free Audiobook each month for 3 months. Some warhammer books are 48 hours long, 3 of those gives you a good 100+ hours of listening!
Comixology Another Amazon company, but lets you download some free comics I believe.
Marvel Unlimited No experience with this. ItFuckingWont wanted me to add it. A subscription service for Marvel.

Education

Sign Language BSL here No experience myself, suggested by n21brown and asked for a few times. Didn't know SL was so popular! Listed as "Pay what you can"
BBC's Bitesize here is apparently good for home learning. Again, no personal experience.

If you need some spare change
Okay, I don't generally bother with it, but maybe some of this could be useful to you. These are NOT a quick way to make a fortune. These are small things you can do over time for a bit of pocket change

If you have prime you can get a FREE FIVE POUND GIFT CARD by literally just streaming a song from Amazon music (which is included in prime) here is the details According to the comments it's only for select people, but it's worth trying If the link doesn't work for you just google "Amazon £5 coupon music"
Now, these sorts of sites have been around for years, I haven't used any other than talkInsights which I must have signed up to 10-15 years ago. Basically they send you surveys and you answer them. They are confidential and don't ask for personal details in the survey. You need 2000 points and you get £20. During the pandemic they've slowed down but I probably get around £40 a year. Not much I know, but it's an email followed by a quick survey ticking boxes. Depending on your answer sometimes you get screened out, I'm not telling you to lie but just be consistent with your answers and you should be able to work out how to not get screened. Some emails are only worth 20 points, others 200. It's slow to get to the 2000 but very quick to just answer a few questions.
Apparently beermoneyuk is a good sub to make some pocket change with.
There is also matched betting. I have never done this, I don't have the patience but from what I've read, it's legitimate, it works and you can make a fair amount of cash from it so long as you do it correctly, and there's a ton of guides. I mention this because people stuck at home could get into it and as long as you're careful (I.E not entering in the wrong numbers) it's risk free AND it pisses off the betting shops. It seems people in comments have had success with it. Disclaimer A couple have complained about gambling. This arguably is not gambling. If you are susceptible to addiction do not do it. However, it's argued that there is no fun or buzz in this, and it's a very tedious and time consuming thing. Others argue you can't make the same money anymore (People were making thousands, now only hundreds if that). It's risk free providing you know what you're doing, the risks are user error, such as entering the wrong numbers. Someone pointed out that due to the lockdown, bets could potentially be cancelled due to sport stopping. So use on a side of caution. We're (mainly) adults so I'll leave it up just because this doesn't have the excitement of regular gambling.
Microsoft Rewards This is an easy way to make pocket change doing very little. Most people have a MS account. The rewards program offers you numerous ways to grab points, by playing free to play games, answering small questions (you don't even need to answer most of the time, just open the link and shut it) and by using bing and searching on it. I've gotten 20k points JUST by answering questions over a couple months. There are many rewards but you can grab a £5 gift card for 6k for example, or a month of game pass (and AFAIK you can make points playing the games)
Google rewards Someone mentioned this in the comments. I have not used it, so can not give any input on it. Sounds similar to TalkInsights which I linked. Google states "Complete short surveys while standing in line, or waiting for a subway. Get rewarded with Google Play or PayPal credit for each one you complete. Topics include everything from opinion polls, to hotel reviews, to merchant satisfaction surveys. We’ll notify you when a survey is waiting."

That's it for now. I will try to update as I go along. A long post but I hope that it can help some of you with finding something good to do that's free, cheap or a bargain. I do suggest getting prime, especially since you get free music, free delivery, free TV and music and free video games each month. In fact, there's a ton of perks and I feel I've gotten way over the cost investment.
Hope it helps someone at least
PartTimeCrazy said if you bought an Apple product you get 3 free months of Apple Arcade and Apple TV free for a year
fakehunted is upset I didn't mention wanking. Tesco have 225 sheets of Tissue for £0.75!
tale_lost suggested Project Gutenberg for a collection of free E-Books
Learning Language
Unfortunately, I don't have time to check every link listed so I will link the comments:
Togtogtog Gives a lot of links for Spanish

Duolingo Numerous people have suggested this So I haven't used myself. Thanks to OhHiGCHQ StephanieMecredy & Allorie_95

Board & Tabletop games
Corporal_Anaesthetic has made a list of Board games
ilyemco suggested these
HEALTH
I'm not a doctor! But if you're a smoker, something I strongly suggest is to quit. I struggled for years but in the first lockdown I quit, technically. I haven't had a cigarette since, however, I do that silly thing millennials do. I vape, but, it made quitting extremely easy. I would not have been able to do it if it wasn't for 88Vape They sell extremely cheap liquids at £1 each. You can find these in B&M but you can pick up 25 for £20 or buy your own mix.
Vitamin D deficiency has been said to be a big problem for the virus. I'd suggest (again, not a doctor!) that you pick some up. Tesco do a 3 for 2 deal. So you can pick up 270 tablets for £7.
If you are vulnerable you MIGHT be able to phone tesco and get put on their delivery saver list (currently it's paused but phoning may help. At the very least they might give you a priority slot. I did this for my mum, we didn't shop at Tesco but I phoned for her, and they put her on with no hassle, so she can always get a delivery.
HELP & ADVICE
The lockdown Rules.
Reasons to leave home include:

Work or volunteering where it is "unreasonable" to work from home. This includes work in someone else's home, such as that carried out by social workers, nannies, cleaners and tradespeople
Education, training, childcare and medical appointments and emergencies
Exercise outdoors (limited to once a day). This includes meeting one other person from another household in an open public space to exercise
Shopping for essentials such as food and medicine
Communal religious worship
Meeting your support or childcare bubble. Children can also move between separated parents Activities related to moving house

I want to add, if you are in danger you are also allowed (and must!) to get away from the situation for some reason, BBC seems to have missed this very important thing (or I am blind)

To flee the threat of harm or violence.*
CoronaVirus Symptoms
CoronaVirus government site You can check your location and how many cases here.
Worldometers Shows cases around the world.
Interactive UK Map Another easy to read map with cases in counties and local area's.
World Health Organisation

Support

FOR THOSE SHIELDING YOU CAN CONTACT THE ROYAL VOLUNTARY SERVICE. These people helped my mother with picking up her medicine from the chemist. They were very helpful and went out their way to keep in touch and do it immediately. (It's the only experience I have with them though)
_riotingpacifist wanted these links added, but I simply just don't have the time to vet and check all the suggestions here, so I will link as is:

Update:
Digital Art
These are Free

Krita Arguably the best in my opinion. It has a load of options, brushes and a decent UI. It works fantastic with a tablet.
Gimp This is a decent program but last I used, the UI was a pain, and it isn't so user friendly while misses features, but it works, and it is possible to do some incredible creations on it.
Medibang Paint This is slightly geared towards Comics and Manga. I really enjoy using this with my drawing Tablet. As far as I know, it also for regular tablets for Android/Ipad and is free.

You can pick up a drawing tablet on Amazon quite cheap these days! Small ones that are just a black slate such as the wacom ones are good but takes some practice to get use to, but very worth it if you can't afford a dedicated drawing tablet with a screen.
Office suit software
A couple of free applications for word processing, spreadsheets etc.

LibreOffice This has most the average user would need to write their own books or to work from home. There's not a huge amount of difference between the two I'm linking (since I last used anyway) so it's more for preference.
Open Office You can pick this up here and again, like above it's just preference.

Music Making
I'm going to direct to matthewharris806 for some links as all the programs I've used like Reason are expensive, or cheaper stuff in bundles such as Magix software.
Games development
D_Dad_Default gives some links for that here

I bought a PS4 at the start of 2020 and played video games a bit too much this crazy year! Here are my rankings and brief reviews of the 32 excellent games I finished this year, as well as my thoughts on patient gaming.

Introduction:

It's basically trite at this point to say this year has been challenging, but one positive out of everything is that I've been fortunate enough to have the time and funds to play a huge number of games that I've heard so much about, yet never was able to before now. I grew up on almost exclusively Nintendo games and then branched out to indie games in college I could play on my laptop, so I was more than excited when I bought the base PS4 that came bundled with God of War, Last of Us, and Horizon Zero Dawn for $200 (and I snagged Bloodborne for $15 while I was at it).
What ensued was a year of frenzied gaming-- never in any year of my life have I played games as much as I did this year. I enjoyed it, but there were also some surprising drawbacks to placing such an emphasis on gaming as a primary hobby, and I'll discuss those towards the conclusion. But man, there were some absolutely fantastic games that I played this year and I want to share my thoughts on them! Not every game I played this year was PS4, but most were.
Since literally every game I played this year was a good game, I have stratified my rankings into three overarching tiers: Best, Great, and Good. I was lucky enough to not even need a Meh tier this year. Lots of games within the same tier could probably have their orders switched, but I did my best. And all but two of these games I was patient™ on, which is a fun side note.
Disclaimer*:* These rankings reflect my personal opinions on the experience I had after finishing the game, rather than my thoughts on its overall quality as a product for everyone. There are a few rankings that are sure to ruffle some feathers-- I know that God of War, RDR2, Journey, Undertale, and Nier: Automata for example are great games, but they didn't resonate with me nearly as much as some others. So know that I appreciate them and those who hold these games so dear.
Without further ado, let's get going!

The BEST:

1. Bloodborne (PS4): Quite simply, I'm still chasing the feeling I had after playing this game for the first time. So much so you could say, that I played it 7 times this year. Never has a game enraptured me with its shocking world, brutal combat, and the best DLC I've ever played. I want to talk about Bloodborne (and all the souls games, really) constantly, learn everything about them, and play them forever.

Last of Us Part II (PS4): One of two games I broke being patient™ on, I waited a couple months before diving in just to stop working to avoid spoilers. I enjoyed the first game but this absolutely blew me out of the water. On a gameplay level I couldn't believe how fluid and visceral the combat was, how immense the encounters were with countless approaches to every situation, and how fun it was to play. The narrative was challenging and forced me to grapple with the same emotions as the protagonist initially, then brilliantly the player and character on divergent emotional tracks as you become more shocked and uncomfortable with what happens. I encourage anyone who hasn't yet to play with an open mind and avoid trying to reduce the story to a single theme or message. It may not be your cup of tea, but it was mine.

3. Outer Wilds (PS4): This game feels like it was made just for me. I love space and rocket physics, I love discovery, and I love it when a game makes me feel clever. The level of wonder and curiosity I felt while playing can only be compared to what I experienced with Breath of the Wild. This game is difficult to talk about without spoilers, but if discovery and outer space get you excited, there is nothing like Outer Wilds.

Dark Souls III (PS4): Yeah, I like souls games. While certainly less groundbreaking than DS1 and perhaps less atmospheric than Bloodborne, DS3 is a grand experience with, in my opinion, the best bosses in all the souls games. It's also the best souls game for experimenting with different playstyles without needing to watch 6 hours of VaatiVidya to figure out how to be a pyromancer.
Control (PS4): Objectively speaking, this game might not have the same merits as the others in the "Best" category. But it sucked me in with it's completely unique visual style. It felt like a strange acid trip and I was always excited to see what was next. The powers and combat were fun even if not terribly original (and even though the gunplay wasn't too strong) but I was completely enthralled by the nonchalance of the cast amid mind blowing supernatural activity. Far from a perfect game, but give it a chance if the style seems intriguing to you!

The Great:

The Last of Us Remastered (PS4): One of my most anticipated games when I picked up a PS4, having watched my friends play some of it. Though it didn't blow me away as much in 2020 as it might have in 2013, I thought it had decent gameplay, a great story, and a stunning world. The cities and post-apocalyptic environments were a pleasure to soak in, packed with detail, and well paced. Definitely a deserved classic.
Horizon Zero Dawn (PS4): In a lot of ways, this game isn't good as an open world game. It doesn't do a great job of compelling you to explore and engage with all the cool stuff it has. The sidequests are kind of bad, many characters forgettable and oddly animated. But this game is this high on the list because it's just so much fun taking down machine dinosaurs. They nailed gameplay in a technically beautiful world, and actually surprised me with the quality of the main story line. Not groundbreaking, but solid and a joy to play.
Death Stranding (PS4): For being one of the best games I have ever played, Death Stranding kinda sucks. I absolutely adored the premise and the world Kojima crafted, and delivering packages was really enjoyable. I loved figuring out traversal and just soaking in the graphics. I'm not one that normally cares about technical graphical showcases, but this game has made me reconsider how important graphics can be to an experience. Unfortunately, the dreadful gun mechanics, broken driving, constant NPC interjections, and the game's refusal to just end already kinda bogged it down. There's a lot here though that won me over and is an experience unlike anything I've ever played.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons (Nintendo Switch): The other game on this list I was not patient™ for, since I bought it for my wife... and then got sucked in. Truth is, as a non-creative type, I just loved this game as an outlet for my creativity and expression. I loved having projects like my zen garden, my Domino's Pizza restaurant, and then getting to share them with my friends. I've heard it said something along the lines of "It wasn't the best game of 2020, but it was the game for 2020".
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (PS4): Once I adjusted my expectations of what this game was and was not, it was great. While it doesn't reward open exploration as much as BoTW and Skyrim did, it simply has the best quests of any open world game I've played. Very rich environments and stories, and I even thought the gameplay was more than serviceable. It did kind of drag on by the end though. Also, disclaimer, I haven't played the DLC (sorry).
Return of the Obra Dinn (Nintendo Switch): I had hoped it would blow me away in a way similar to Outer Wilds, and while it didn't quite reach the same heights for me it was great nonetheless. I loved the nautical setting, the critical thinking and deduction required, and the way it was balanced perfectly between leaving you totally on your own and confirming bits at a time. My only real complaint is that I felt the true ending didn't really reveal anything about the story I didn't already know, I guess I expected some grand reveal.
Doom Eternal (PS4): White-knuckle, heart pounding, insane. The game forces you to engage with every mechanic it throws at you and is brutally challenging, but all in the best way. Though the gameplay was better than DOOM 2016, I actually preferred the latter since Eternal's levels felt more like a silly mario level than a tense demon-infested place. I get what they were going for and they executed well, I just prefer the more serious tone.
Hades (Nintendo Switch): Biggest surprise of the year for me, I didn't actually expect to like it. Hades is perfectly polished and a big step forward for integrating its excellent narrative with its roguelike structure. It's very easy to play without investing too much, making it great for unwinding. It deserves all the praise it's getting.
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves (Remastered) (PS4): All the mainline Uncharted games are on this list but I enjoyed 2 the most. The set pieces were the most memorable, and I enjoyed almost every second. These games aren't as high on the list because, no matter how you dress it up, it's a pretty simple affair ultimately in terms of gameplay but it nails the style of game that it is.
Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice (PS4): An amazing game in its own right, but was ultimately disappointing for me as a From Software fan. I found that what I appreciated most about Souls games was the tension of not knowing if you could make it to the next checkpoint, the terror of encountering something surprising and having to deal with it. Sekiro litters checkpoints left and right, which is of course great for its more boss-focused design, but left me far less immersed in the environments personally. I also wished I had more options for playing aggressively rather than just memorizing the parry patterns. In any case, these gripes are my personal preferences coming through and any hardcore gamer owes it to themselves to conquer this behemoth of a challenge.
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1+2 (PS4): Pure, unadulterated fun. I was absolutely addicted to the core gameplay and the levels, especially in the first game, were so cool to explore. For me the core loop started to get stale by the time I finished all the challenges on the levels, but for those that wanted more there is almost an endless amount of bonus challenges to tackle.
Uncharted 4: A Thief's End (PS4): There's definitely a strong argument that this is the ultimate uncharted game to play-- best gunplay and options in encounters, by far the best puzzles, and the delivery of the story is leagues above the rest of the series. I simply think that Uncharted 2 had the highest highs, so 4 is a tad lower. That, and the beautiful story set up was not brought together in a satisfying way; it in no way felt like Drake had earned Elena's forgiveness, but they kind just glossed over it. Still, a must play and Naughty Dog games at their best.
Subnautica (PS4): I wanted to love it more than I did. I was hooked on exploring and discovering the mysteries of the alien underwater, but I think I do better with games with less of a survival focus. I got really far into the game, but didn't actually finish since eventually the slow drip of clues started to get a bit too slow for my tastes, and the survival and basebuilding began to get tedious. Minor PS4 technical issues aside though, This is a dang good survival game, and immense in a terrifying and wonderful way.
Monster Train (PC): Slay the Spire is one of my all-time favorites, so I was pretty excited to be gifted this. It's a blast as a deckbuilder, and I think it was smartly designed in how it throws significant and strong rewards at you at every phase of a run, whereas StS often forces you to make the best of an iffy situation. Had a great time, but I lost interest after 15 or so hours since most runs tend to feel fairly similar. Still would absolutely recommend for StS and deckbuilding fans.
Spelunky (PC): Not the hardest game I've ever played, but definitely the most unforgiving. The controls took a while to get used to but once I was engaged, the game is a tight, slick, and enthralling adventure and test of skills. Full of secrets (I've only scratched the surface) and deeply satisfying to conquer. But boy, is it unforgiving.
Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception (Remastered) (PS4): Another strong entry in the Uncharted series, just a tad weaker than 2 I think. I will credit it though with having the most memorable environments and locales in any Uncharted though!

The Good:

Read Dead Redemption II (PS4): *Full disclosure, I'm still playing through act 5 at the time of this post.* This one is really tough for me to fully form an opinion on. On the one hand, I think this is the most stunning and immersive open world I've ever seen. Deeply authentic towns, regions, unparalleled attention to detail, and great characters and a decent story. But the way the missions force you to do things explicitly one way with terrible hand-holding just isn't fun to me, and makes Uncharted games feel like open-world sandboxes by comparison. There's a lot of quality here and I've enjoyed many elements, but have been disillusioned by others. NakeyJakey explains what I felt far better than I can (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvJPKOLDSos&t=392s). Still a good time though.
God of War (PS4): Like RDR2, an incredible technical achievement, for me hands down the best looking PS4 game, best voice acting, and for most people this should be towards the top of your must-play list. At its best, the characters are great, the combat is crunchy and satisfying, and the world beautiful. I just felt that for far too often the game was far from its best-- too many combat encounters didn't feel like I was a God of War but rather smacking a giant meat sack of health, so many secrets and puzzles that I just stopped caring about because finding treasure chests isn't fun when the rpg/loot elements feel so tacked on and pointless, endlessly recycled bosses... for me it was just pretty good, nothing like the game of the generation in my eyes. That said, most people don't seem too bothered by the things I found mediocre, so the sheer spectacle (looking at you world serpent!) and great moments make this well worth the price of admission!
Undertale (PC): I did not play this game the way it was meant to be played, let's say that up front. It was a gift, and I played about a half an hour every month for a year and just finally finished it. I loved the music, it was charming, and I see why people love this game so much. I think it just didn't hit those highs for me and I was left with a fairly silly little 8-bit game. Which was good. I'm glad I experienced what it had to offer but didn't leave a huge mark on me.
Superhot (Google Stadia): I had wanted to play this game forever but couldn't justify spending $20 on it, so I was pleased when I got a free Google Stadia kit and got to play it free! Really neat blend of stylized retro computer flavor and a fabulous central time-stop mechanic. A great 2 hour experience but tough to recommend as more than a novelty.
NieR: Automata (PS4): I have made it through 1.5 playthroughs so I know I haven't gotten the full experience, but I wasn't enjoying it enough to continue. I think every game developer though should learn from the brilliance of this game-- constantly keeping the player on its toes by not confining itself by a genre and by focusing on what's fun and cool, rather than convention. Excellent music. I get the hype, and the healthy dose of existential musings was interesting... it just didn't ultimately click for me. I can't unequivocally recommend this game to everyone, but if the premise and style stand out to you, this could be your next all-time favorite game.
Star Wars Battlefront II (PS4): Picked this up for free with PS Plus, and while there's not a lot here that's that special it was honestly super nice comfort food gaming. I just enjoyed shooting stuff in really cool Star Wars settings, a franchise I love. For what it was, I had a blast, minus the fact that I personally feel Jedi/heroes really kinda ruin the game for me. Unfortunately, it also is nothing more than a basic mass multiplayer battlefield game, so don't expect anything crazy.
Uncharted: Drake's Fortune (Remastered) (PS4): Definitely weaker than its successors, but still a really fun romp with trope-y but effective narrative and characters, and totally serviceable gunplay. This would be much higher on the list, and I honestly had a great time with it, but man the final third of the game was really painful to play. The switch to zombies was bad, and just wasn't fun to play through.
Until Dawn (PS4): I did not think I would like this game at all, I don't care for cheesy horror and definitely am not interested in interactive movies. But if you have a significant other or group of friends to play this with, it can be a great time! I played with my wife and we were honestly pretty engaged with the characters and the story was well told and had plenty of nice jump scares. There's not much game here, but for what it is it was a neat experience.
Shadow of the Colossus (Remake) (PS4): There were some incredible highlights to this game like the flying colossus and the sand worm, and the scale of the encounters with the epic music has earned this game a place as a masterpiece and classic to so many gamers. The remake looks stunning and it was exciting to see what type of colossus was up next. Unfortunately, every great moment I had was accompanied by an equally frustrating moment with mediocre controls and a couple of colossus that were so bad (looking at you, little bull/lion Celosia) that made me have to put down the game for a few days. A great game let down by some dated and poor elements.
Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin (PS4): Souls games are my favorites, so it pains me to put this game so low. The best areas in the game (Heide's tower, Drangleic Castle, etc) are up there with the best in the series and most of the excellent combat found in the other games is more or less present here. But I think 2/3 of the game is bogged down by drab areas that feel more like a mario level designed to kill the player more than an area that could really exist. The Iron keep was the worst offender, the area was absolutely nonsensical and like so many other areas, enemies were placed in a way designed to frustrate the player with difficulty rather than engage them with challenge. Bosses were also mostly forgettable, but I did love the Looking Glass knight and the Pursuer!
Journey (PS4): Look, I'm as surprised as you that this game is on the bottom of the list. I honestly expected to love it. An artistic, beautiful marriage of environmental storytelling and unforgettable online interaction? A smooth and cathartic movement system? It has all these things, and no doubt deserves the acclaim and love it has from so many gamers. It just didn't resonate with me. Especially the ending, I felt for sure that there would be some great climax that contrasted with the struggle of the icy segment, but instead it fell a bit flat. Maybe I'll give it another try someday.

Conclusion, Gaming Patiently, and a Warning:

There you have it! I'd love to hear what surprised you in my rankings, where I'm horribly wrong, and what games you recommend I play next! Personally, I'm considering Persona 5 (though I'm not super into JRPGs), Dishonored 2 (am curious about immersive sims), and Jedi Fallen Order.
Gaming patiently is a strategy I absolutely endorse. Not only has it allowed me to form my own opinions of games independent of hype, but has allowed me to play a huge quantity of incredible games for honestly pennies. The average cost per game of everything I played this year was under $20. Now, more than ever, is an amazing time to get a PS4 and be a patient gamer, due to both the relative inexpensiveness and the sheer volume of outstanding games. I still will probably buy the big nintendo titles at launch and occasionally buy into hype, but most of the time it just isn't worth it anymore.
Finally, a friendly warning as a personal story for those of us who deeply love games and devote a lot of time to them. Like many kids, I was pretty limited by my parents growing up on what and how much I was allowed to play. I loved gaming but it was somewhat of a forbidden fruit. In college, I loved gaming and definitely played more, but still was very busy with social activities, studies, and other hobbies. Now, as a working adult with a comfortable job, I suddenly have more time and money than I have ever had in my life, and thus this giant list of games I played was created. For the first few months it was enthralling; all I wanted to do was play. Over the course of the year, however, it has become clear to me that requiring so much of my happiness and fun coming from having a game to be excited about can have some drawbacks. In the middle of a pandemic, if I'm sitting on the couch waiting for video games to make me happy and they just aren't giving me the same enjoyment that Bloodborne did when I played it for the first time, I'm just gonna be stuck there on the couch, slowly getting a bit depressed when my main source of fun isn't cutting it. So what's the point? Well, enjoy your games! Don't let anyone stop you from loving what you love. But if you start to burn out, please take care of yourself and engage in other hobbies, get outside, and keep things balanced. For me, doing so has made gaming all the sweeter.
Thanks for reading and indulging this long post!

Lockdown, things to do, help & advice.

Disclaimer I am posting this here because I got a message from the mods asking me to. I'm not from London so links aren't London centric (but hopefully still of help) and the main post is here so any updates will likely be there (I will try here but it's hard to keep up with the amount of suggestions)
Thanks.
Yes, it's hard, it sucks, it's depressing. It is something we all have to do if you want to see this virus go. Everyone knows the deal, too many think they're the exception but no one is. However, staying home is hard so maybe I can help at least one or two people with some incentives. I'll try to give links to some things that can help cure the boredom, and some support if you need it.
Most of this might be obvious to some, some might not even have internet and of course, money is a big issue, so I'll try to give some suggestions:
For streaming and on demand things such as Netflix et al, don't forget you can subscribe for free for your first month. This goes for most things in the list. If you are worried about putting in your payment details and forgetting to cancel a month later, don't worry! You can sign up and immediately cancel and you still get your free month!
For people who don't have a smart TV, you can buy a cheap Amazon Fire TV stick or a Roku box. The Fire stick can go as low as £20 often for 1080p. It will drop to £30 for 4k.
I picked up a 4k Roku device for £18 on Amazon once. It's fast and snappy. currently it's going for £33 for the 4k version. Having both, there is little difference between the devices. NowTV also do their own roku powered device.
Subscription based streaming sites that all offer 2-4 weeks free for first timers

Netflix *According to comments the second month is free.
Amazon Prime You can either get Amazon video on its own, or take prime with other benefits. I strongly urge those who use Amazon for buying off their store front to use [https://smile.amazon.co.uk/] as there is literally no difference except everything you buy amazon donates to a charity of your choice.
Now TV (I believe it's 7 days)
Disney+
Britbox
Amazon channels. I believe you can get all these individually but Amazon offers them as channels bound to your prime account, and they are again either free for a couple weeks (again, take them, cancel instantly) or very cheap. I recently subscribed to Starzplay for £1 for 3 months. It has some good shows on it like Fringe, doom patrol. It also has channels like Curiosity stream and shudder

Steam This one is so obvious I didn't add it, but apparently many want me to. It is the best out there, and you can find almost everything, with fantastic deals.
Greenmangaming offers games cheaply. Again, not a grey market site (which are legal but unethical) and they sometimes do bundles.
GoG (Good old games) is a DRM free site run by CDPR, the makers of the Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk. They offer you games quite cheap and not needing DRM (such as Steam, Uplay etc which is less invasive versions of dodgy DRM from the olden days).
Epic Games Despite the controversy whether you care about their rivalry with valve, they offer free games ever week. Without ever having bought anything I have gained over 170 games. literally. Good games for the most part. They often give you £10 coupons as well.
Twitch Everyone knows twitch, but if you don't, it's a streaming service for watching gamers and girls with low cut tops accidentally bending over in front of the game. However, if you're signed up to prime, you get free games each month (and randomly between the set bunch).
Playstation Store Currently has January sales. Currently the free games for PS+ are for PS4: Shadow of the Tomb Raider and Greedfall. For the Ps5 it is Maneater
Games with Gold Bleed 2 and the King of Fighters XIII is available until Janurary 15th whilst little Nightmares is available until January 31st.

Gaming Subscriptions
Like the TV versions, you can sign up to these for a free trial (or very cheap). If you do sign up to only one at a time, it should keep you busy for a few months

Xbox Game Pass You can do this on both/either an Xbox or PC. If you sign up to the regular one, you can get a month (maybe three!) for £1. After you have done that, you can sign up to the premium version for 3 months at £1 a month. Most people know game pass, but you can download a large selection of games for free. The premium version gives you games with gold, allowing you to keep the games forever (but can only play with a subscription)
Ubisoft+ I'm not 100% sure if you get a trial or not. This allows a large collection of Ubisoft titles to play for £12.99 a month. Quite expensive but good if you like Ubisoft titles I guess.
EA Play EA's version. Goes by a ton of names I think, EA Access, EA Play, Origin Access etc etc. There's a couple of versions of this, and it is across all platforms (PS4/5, Xbox, PC) but not sure about the switch. I "think" the premium allows you to play on all platforms, while the cheaper one on a single platform, but I may be mistaken.
PS Now a once terrible service that is now actually very good. Allows you to download some Ps4 games to your PS4/5 and lets you stream a massive amount of Ps2/3/4 to your PC or playstation.

There's more like nvidia's service but you need the Shield device which is quite expensive. I'll leave it at that.
Audiobooks & Ebooks

Audible Not sure what the current deal is but if you are a prime member you can sign up for a trial and get a free Audiobook each month for 3 months. Some warhammer books are 48 hours long, 3 of those gives you a good 100+ hours of listening!
Comixology Another Amazon company, but lets you download some free comics I believe.
Marvel Unlimited No experience with this. ItFuckingWont wanted me to add it. A subscription service for Marvel.

Education

Sign Language BSL here No experience myself, suggested by n21brown and asked for a few times. Didn't know SL was so popular! Listed as "Pay what you can"
BBC's Bitesize here is apparently good for home learning. Again, no personal experience.

If you have prime you can get a FREE FIVE POUND GIFT CARD by literally just streaming a song from Amazon music (which is included in prime) here is the details According to the comments it's only for select people, but it's worth trying If the link doesn't work for you just google "Amazon £5 coupon music"
Now, these sorts of sites have been around for years, I haven't used any other than talkInsights which I must have signed up to 10-15 years ago. Basically they send you surveys and you answer them. They are confidential and don't ask for personal details in the survey. You need 2000 points and you get £20. During the pandemic they've slowed down but I probably get around £40 a year. Not much I know, but it's an email followed by a quick survey ticking boxes. Depending on your answer sometimes you get screened out, I'm not telling you to lie but just be consistent with your answers and you should be able to work out how to not get screened. Some emails are only worth 20 points, others 200. It's slow to get to the 2000 but very quick to just answer a few questions.
Apparently beermoneyuk is a good sub to make some pocket change with.
There is also matched betting. I have never done this, I don't have the patience but from what I've read, it's legitimate, it works and you can make a fair amount of cash from it so long as you do it correctly, and there's a ton of guides. I mention this because people stuck at home could get into it and as long as you're careful (I.E not entering in the wrong numbers) it's risk free AND it pisses off the betting shops. It seems people in comments have had success with it. Disclaimer A couple have complained about gambling. This arguably is not gambling. If you are susceptible to addiction do not do it. However, it's argued that there is no fun or buzz in this, and it's a very tedious and time consuming thing. Others argue you can't make the same money anymore (People were making thousands, now only hundreds if that). It's risk free providing you know what you're doing, the risks are user error, such as entering the wrong numbers. Someone pointed out that due to the lockdown, bets could potentially be cancelled due to sport stopping. So use on a side of caution. We're (mainly) adults so I'll leave it up just because this doesn't have the excitement of regular gambling.
Microsoft Rewards This is an easy way to make pocket change doing very little. Most people have a MS account. The rewards program offers you numerous ways to grab points, by playing free to play games, answering small questions (you don't even need to answer most of the time, just open the link and shut it) and by using bing and searching on it. I've gotten 20k points JUST by answering questions over a couple months. There are many rewards but you can grab a £5 gift card for 6k for example, or a month of game pass (and AFAIK you can make points playing the games)
Google rewards Someone mentioned this in the comments. I have not used it, so can not give any input on it. Sounds similar to TalkInsights which I linked. Google states "Complete short surveys while standing in line, or waiting for a subway. Get rewarded with Google Play or PayPal credit for each one you complete. Topics include everything from opinion polls, to hotel reviews, to merchant satisfaction surveys. We’ll notify you when a survey is waiting."

Duolingo Numerous people have suggested this So I haven't used myself. Thanks to OhHiGCHQ StephanieMecredy & Allorie_95

Work or volunteering where it is "unreasonable" to work from home. This includes work in someone else's home, such as that carried out by social workers, nannies, cleaners and tradespeople
Education, training, childcare and medical appointments and emergencies
Exercise outdoors (limited to once a day). This includes meeting one other person from another household in an open public space to exercise
Shopping for essentials such as food and medicine
Communal religious worship
Meeting your support or childcare bubble. Children can also move between separated parents Activities related to moving house

I want to add, if you are in danger you are also allowed (and must!) to get away from the situation for some reason, BBC seems to have missed this very important thing (or I am blind)

To flee the threat of harm or violence.*
CoronaVirus Symptoms
CoronaVirus government site You can check your location and how many cases here.
Worldometers Shows cases around the world.
Interactive UK Map Another easy to read map with cases in counties and local area's.
World Health Organisation

Support

FOR THOSE SHIELDING YOU CAN CONTACT THE ROYAL VOLUNTARY SERVICE. These people helped my mother with picking up her medicine from the chemist. They were very helpful and went out their way to keep in touch and do it immediately. (It's the only experience I have with them though)
_riotingpacifist wanted this links added, but I simply just don't have the time to vet and check all the suggestions here, so I will link as is:

Update:
Digital Art
These are Free

Krita Arguably the best in my opinion. It has a load of options, brushes and a decent UI. It works fantastic with a tablet.
Gimp This is a decent program but last I used, the UI was a pain, and it isn't so user friendly while misses features, but it works, and it is possible to do some incredible creations on it.
Medibang Paint This is slightly geared towards Comics and Manga. I really enjoy using this with my drawing Tablet. As far as I know, it also for regular tablets for Android/Ipad and is free.

LibreOffice This has most the average user would need to write their own books or to work from home. There's not a huge amount of difference between the two I'm linking (since I last used anyway) so it's more for preference.
Open Office You can pick this up here and again, like above it's just preference.

[XBOX][PS][PC] Looking for a friendly group to consistently team up with?

I am 30 years old, making $43,110/year in Pittsburgh, PA as a lab technician.

Section One: Assets and Debt
Retirement Balance: $6215 between a 403b & a 401a. I work for a university, and with this employer was the first time I was financially able to contribute to a retirement account of any kind. I just hit vestment in 2020 and plan to bump up my contribution % slowly throughout 2021 until I hit the maximum I can afford to contribute.
Savings account balance: $3201. Up until 2020, I never had any extra money to put into savings, so I'm not at all upset about this amount! Building up my savings account is my biggest financial priority currently.
Checking account balance: $1706. I keep between $1-2k in checking.
Acorns investment account balance: $74 (just started this in December, only throw in a little bit monthly, not too sure what I'm doing but I'm eager to learn, lol)
FSA account balance: $55. I contribute $5 per paycheck (biweekly), but I will be increasing this when I can make changes to my benefits, at the beginning of the new fiscal year in July.
Credit card debt: $0, but see below regarding a personal loan. I pay off my balance every month.
Student loan debt: $32,417 for a BS. Most of my schooling was covered by scholarships & grants, but I had to take out loans for whatever was left. My parents cosigned my loans, but I am fully responsible for paying them. In 2020, I finished paying off approx $11k in private loans; the remaining amount is all in federal loans.
Personal loan debt: $5532. This had been money owed on my credit card - a few very expensive car repairs years ago, and then compounding interest because I could only make minimum payments for a long time. In 2020, I was able to get a low-interest personal loan through my credit union and plan to pay this off by 10/2022.

Section Two: Income
Income Progression: I have had quite a few jobs, most of them making slightly above minimum wage until just the last few years. In high school & college, I worked at a bowling alley and in retail, making from $7.25/hour to $8/hour, anywhere from 4 hours weekly (high school) to full-time (college during summer break).
After graduating college, I continued to work the 2 part-time retail jobs I'd been working for most of my college career: one position as a sales associate for $7.50/hour and one position as a front-end manager for $10/hour. I worked around 50 hours total each week in order to make ends meet.
After 2 years of this, I went to grad school. I was fully funded by my PhD advisor's grant and did not need to take out any loans. I worked as a research assistant on campus making $1850 per month.
Grad school wasn't for me, so I dropped out after one semester. I returned to one of my previous retail employers, this time as a full-time assistant store manager, making $11/hour.
After about 1 year at this position, I took a job working part-time for a local science museum - I had experience in college volunteering and interning in science education, and at the time I thought it was the direction I wanted to go for a "real" career. This job paid $10/hour. I dropped down to part-time at the retail job but was able to keep my hourly pay.
Then, about 1 year later, I finally fell into the job I have now, and love: I got a job in 2017 working as an assistant lab tech in medical research at a local university. Starting out, my title was Technician 1, and I made $25k. I was promoted to Tech 2 in 2019, making $28k, and then to Senior Tech in 2020 with a salary of $38,493. The large raise between Tech 2 and Senior is partially due to me obtaining some professional certifications in my field; without them, I expect my salary would be closer to $35k. I still work in retail, too: 1 day per week at $11.10/hour. I don't NEED that job now, but the extra money is nice - I make around $4600 yearly from the retail job.
Main Job Monthly Take Home:
$2200 minimum. This is highly variable as I am eligible for OT pay and I do work OT most weeks.
Side Gig Monthly Take Home
About $300 monthly from the retail job. Variable depending on how many hours I work in the month.

Section Three: Expenses
All expenses below are monthly unless otherwise specified.
Rent: $630
Renters insurance: $10
Investment contribution: $20 plus spare change to the Acorns app. I just started using it last month.
Personal loan payment: $273
Student loan payment: $84, but I need to renew my income-based repayment plan and I expect this to increase
Electric: approx $50
Gas: approx $70 during winter; in summer it's around $20
Water: $17
Trash collection: $195 annually
Sewage: $42 quarterly
Wifi: $68
Cellphone: I'm on a family plan with my parents and brother, and my contribution is $25.
Subscriptions: $10 for Spotify & Hulu; $14 for Netflix; $15 for a coffee subscription
Pet expenses: Approx $100 monthly. I have two cats that eat prescription diets ($75 every 6 weeks), plus one axolotl that thankfully just eats worms. The rest of the pet budget is for litter, toys, etc, and I'm including birdseed here for the feeder I have on my balcony for wild birds.
Car payment / insurance: My car is fully paid off, and my parents pay for my insurance which is honestly wild at my age, but I think they like to help out in this way since I'm otherwise pretty independent.
Medications: $68
Other: I budget $200 for groceries monthly, though I'm not upset if I go over that amount.

Diary
Disclaimer: I am an essential employee at both jobs; masks and other appropriate PPE were worn at all times outside of my home.
Saturday 1/2: I wake up at 4:15am to go to my retail job. I don't mind being up so early since it means I don't have to interact with customers for most of my shift. My car has been making some odd noises lately, and they start up again on my drive in to work. I need to get the car inspected this month, so I decide to try to make an appointment for next weekend...the noises are making me nervous. I work an 8 hour shift and buy a few snacks and two sodas from the vending machine ($6.70). After work, I play some video games. A close friend got the new PS5 recently and gave me her old PS4, which is awesome - I've only had an old Xbox until now. I decide to buy Skyrim for the PS since it keeps crashing when I try to play it on the Xbox ($16.95 on a gift card I'd gotten for Christmas). Later this evening, my pharmacy calls to tell me that the manufacturer of one of my medications is no longer offering a discount I'd been using for the last year: my cost will be increasing by $30 per month supply. I check online for any other discounts/coupons/goodRX offers.. no dice. I'm asleep by 10pm.
Total: $6.70 (not counting the gift card purchase, since that was already paid for by someone else)
Sunday 1/3: My day off! I wake at 6:15 and make some coffee. I place an Amazon order for a new shower curtain, rubber beads to tighten face masks, and a supplement ($25.57). Later in the day, I head out to pick up my prescription. I buy 3 months' worth of this particular medication at once, so it's $120; I also buy some coffee creamer and milk ($4.28). I stop for gas on my way home ($25.04). I spend the rest of my day alternately relaxing and getting some things done at home: I do some laundry ($2.25), renew my drivers license online (no need to go to the DMV because of the pandemic, so yay! $30.50 and they'll mail my new card), and I create a group on Goodreads because my friends and I were wanting to start our own book club this year. I make a big pot of pasta with Beyond crumbles and spinach for dinner and a few lunches for the week.
Total: $207.64
Monday 1/4: Wake at 5. Car is still making scary noises, so I drive to work slowly. $5 for parking, but it will be reimbursed by my employer at the end of the month. Drink breakroom coffee since it's free. On lunch, I make the appointment for my car for the weekend: inspection, oil change, tire rotation, and please make sure my car isn't trying to kill me/fix the mystery noise. Yesterday's pasta and a yogurt for lunch. Work is uneventful; at home I eat some soup for dinner and read some of my book for book club until it's time for bed.
Total: $5
Tuesday 1/5: It's my birthday! I'm up at 5. $5 for parking, and free work coffee again. My supervisors and coworkers printed & signed a giant birthday poster for me - it's hanging in our breakroom - and it makes my week! I really, really love my job and the people I work with. At home, I consider buying some perfume for myself - indie fragrances are a hobby of mine - but I get overwhelmed and decision fatigued, and don't end up buying anything. I decide to take another look over the weekend. Make rice & daal for dinner, plus a giant bowl of mint chocolate chip ice cream. Watch some tv (Bones on Hulu) until bed.
Total: $5
Wednesday 1/6: You know the drill: wake up at 5, $5 parking, and free work coffee. Leftover rice & daal for lunch. Received a birthday present from a coworker that I'm good friends with, which is incredibly kind of her. Again, I love, love, love my job and the people I spend time with there. Unfortunately, after work I spend most of my evening doom-scrolling thanks to the attempted coup at the Capitol.
Total: $5
Thursday 1/7: Up at 5; $5 parking; free coffee at work. Today's a super busy day and I spend most of it just running around, feeling like I'm not getting any actual work done. While at work I start listening to a new audiobook from the library (I highly recommend the Libby app, btw). The last of Sunday's pasta for lunch. Soup and crackers for dinner, and then my older cat cuddles up on my lap while I play some Skyrim.
Total: $5
Friday 1/8: I took today as a vacation day for my birthday - had too much to do at work on my actual birthday, so I gave myself a long weekend instead (I also took Saturday 1/9 off from my retail job). I sleep in until 7... super late for me! Make coffee for breakfast, and while it's brewing, I fill up the birdfeeder on my balcony. Perform a feat of gymnastics to keep my cats from running out while I do so. I received my $600 stimulus payment a week ago, and I take the morning to deal with that: $120 is split among 3 charities that are important to me, and the remaining $480 goes to my savings account. After this, I'd love to get up to get my book club book to read, but I've got a cat sleeping on my legs, so obviously I'm stuck sitting. I browse Reddit on my phone for a while. Order food for lunch with contactless dropoff ($17.44 with tip). In the evening, I drop off my car at the auto shop - my appointment is early tomorrow morning, so I just leave the car and keys with them overnight - and I walk home since the shop is in my neighborhood. I've been wanting to try punch needle crafting, so I buy a very basic starter kit on Amazon ($13.99).
Total: $151.43
Week Total = $385.77
Food + Drink $28.42
Fun / Entertainment $13.99
Home + Health $147.82
Transport $45.04
Other Donations: $120; $30.50 for the driver's license renewal
So, this was not a typical week for me: the $120 prescription is a purchase I make once every 90 days, the driver's license renewal is only once every 4 years (lol), and I'm not a regular charitable donor - I donate sporadically throughout the year whenever I have some extra money. However, I'm pretty happy with my spending otherwise! The $20 in parking fees will be reimbursed by my employer at the end of the month, and though I made more Amazon purchases in this week than I would in a normal week, I think I was reasonable with my spending. Pre-covid, my coworkers from my main job and I would go out for drinks on Fridays, so I guess I've been saving an extra $20-30/week since the pandemic started. Also, in case anyone was wondering - the mechanic found nothing wrong with my car, but it's still making a weird noise. They told me that I basically have to wait until it gets worse, and maybe then they can determine what the issue is. Yay.

Thought on PS Now future?

Getting a PlayStation under the tree this year? Here's some tips and tricks you should know!

Hello /PS4,
Here's a post for all new owners of a PlayStation console. This post is of course focused on the PS4 but some of the tips also apply to the PS5 as well. They can also be useful to existing owners that might not now these tips and tricks!

Tip #1: Enable 2-factor authentication

To avoid any problems of hacking, not only use a unique password for your PSN profile, but also enable 2-factor authentication. Every time you will log in on a new device, a 6-digit code will be sent to you via SMS or an Authenticator app (like Google Authenticator, for example).
So in case someone gets your password, he won't be able to use your account. Receiving a lot of codes via SMS is also a sign someone tries to access your account and you should change your password ASAP.
Follow this link to enable 2FA!

Tip #2: Enable password at checkout

You have to know that some games propose microtransactions, mostly for cosmetic items. As a way to avoid an underage person to empty your bank account by accident, or to prevent you of making some impulsive purchases, enabling password on checkout is a pretty good option.
To do so on PS4, please follow these instructions:

Go to Settings > Account Management > Account Information > Wallet > Purchase Settings and enter your sign-in information.
Select ‘Require Password at Checkout?’ and select ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ and then Confirm.

Tip #3: Grab PlayStation Plus monthly games

As PlayStation Plus is required to play online on paid games (it's not a requirement on Free to play games!), you get "free" games every month. These games are available on your account as long as your Plus subscription is active, and if your subscription runs out, don't worry, if you renew your subscription, you regain access to your games.
Anyway, the PlayStation Plus games are renewed every first Tuesday of the month. So as long as this date isn't passed, you can grab the games of the previous month. All you have to do is to add them to your library, and voilà!
Another tip is to claim the games every first tuesday of the month, so you don't forget about them, and they'll wait in your library. And to conclude, these games are backwards compatible on PS5, and you can even claim the PS5 games even if you don't own a PS5!
For December, you can claim Just Cause 4, Rocket Arena and Worms Rumble. The link to claim these games is here!

Tip #4: Rest Mode

Rest Mode is a pretty nifty feature for the PS4: not only you can resume a game where you left it off, but it also allows you to charge your controllers and download updates while your PS4 isn't used. Some people prefer to not use it as their PS4 can be noisy, or because they want to save as much energy as they can. But the consumption is not that high (10 watts).
If you want to check by yourself, go to Settings > Power Save Settings and navigate through the menus to suit your needs.

Tip #5: For PS4 Pro: enable boost mode!

You might have got a PS4 Pro, which is a more powerful version of the PS4 released in 2016. The PS4 Pro allows 4K support and improved detail and performance for many games. However, for games released before 2016, if you want to benefit from a slight performance boost, the boost mode might be handy.
To do so, go to Settings > System > Boost Mode and tick the box.

Tip #6: A few useful shortcuts

Here's a few shortcuts that you could use to make your PS4 experience better:

Double tap the PS button to switch between the last two games or apps you've used.
Hold the PS button to open the quick menu.
Hold the PS button for 8 seconds to turn off your controller. Very handy to save battery when you watch stuff on Netflix for example.
Hold the Power button on your PS4 until you hear a second beep to launch the PS4 in Recovery mode, that allows you to do some maintenance stuff.
Hold the Share button to make a screenshot.
Press PS and Square together to have a magnifying glass feature.
If you want to know what a hidden trophy is, select it in the list, then press Square to reveal it.

Tip #7: Create folders

At some point you might have a lot of games installed on your console. To keep things tidy, you can create folders to group similar games, or by support (physical or digital). The choice is up to you.
To make folders, highlight a game, then press Options, then Add to folder. Then create folders or add your games to existing ones!

Tip #8: Get some extra storage space

After installing some games (mostly Call of Duty...), you might quickly run out of storage space, especially if you only have a 500GB! internal hard drive. But you can add storage space with an external hard drive, up to 8TB! Also, external hard drives can benefit from slightly better loading times.
And for more improvement, you can change the internal hard drive for a bigger one (2.5-inch only). you can access it very easily with a screwdriver, and without voiding the warranty. But you'll need to reinstall the firmware on the new hard drive.

Tip #9: Download the PS App

The PlayStation App allows you to check your messages, join Party Chats, download games to your PS4 remotely, access the PlayStation Store, show your trophies, and much more. The PS App is free to download on iOS and Android.

Tip #10: Clean your console regularly

Finally, to ensure your console runs well, you will have to keep it clean. Put it in a well-ventilated area and not directly on the ground where it could gather dust very quickly (and especially not on a carpet). But even when putting it in a safe area, it will gather dust.
You can access the fan easily without voiding the warranty, and use a can of compressed air to blow off the dust. There are also tutorials on YouTube to clean your PS4 at a deeper level and possibly change the thermal paste, but refrain from doing that if you're not perfectly sure of what you're doing.

If you have any more useful tips, feel free to post them here!
Enjoy your play and Merry Christmas!

PS3 FAQ - Please read before posting.

Seeing a lot of threads with the exact same questions daily so thought I'd compile a list of common questions with answers for them.
Has the PS Store been shutdown on the PS3?
No, the PS3 store remains active and you can access it through your PS3 console. The web store, which you access through a PC has been removed. There are workarounds available for this though.
Which PS3's are backwards compatible?
All PS3's play your PS1 discs. That means a Phat, Slim and Super Slim will have no issues playing PS1 games.
For PS2 games, the following models are backwards compatible:
All NTSC regions = CECHA 60GB (Full PS2 hardware), CECHB 20GB (Full PS2 hardware)
SOME NTSC regions (North America) = CECHE 80GB (Partial PS2 hardware)
All PAL regions (EU, India, Aus, NZ, UK, Russia etc) = CECHC 60GB (Partial PS2 Hardware).
The Full PS2 Hardware PS3's have the highest compatibility but are only available in NTSC regions. PAL regions only have access to the CECHC model.
Additionally, Backwards compatibility with disc games is region locked. You cannot buy a CECHA (NTSC PS3) and play your PAL PS1/PS2 games.
Finally, backwards compatibility was never removed from these models. You can update to the latest firmware and the compatibility remains exactly the same.
Is the PS3 Region Free?
Not exactly. The PS3 DOES have region locking but most games do not use region locking. This means almost all PS3 titles (disc and digital) will play on a PS3 from any region. PS1/PS2 Classics that you buy from the PS Store are also region free. If you want to play an NTSC PS1/PS2 game on a PAL PS3, make a US PSN account and purchase it from the US PS Store.
A handful of PS3 titles are region locked, the most well known example is Persona 4 Arena, which is region locked both via disc or digital.
Blu-Ray movies, DVD movies, PS1 disc and PS2 disc games are all region locked. You can only play movies/games from your region on your PS3.
What is the cause of YLOD?
There are many causes for the YLOD that are being documented by the community. Common causes appear to be the RSX GPU coming away from the substrate, GPU failure, CELL failure, NEC TOKIN capacitors failing but it is unclear what the main cause is at this time. There is a thread on PSX-Place that may help you in identifying the cause of YLOD in your PS3 but take note that it requires soldering skills. For more information on identifying YLOD in your PS3, check the thread here - https://www.psx-place.com/threads/fault-finding-ylod-with-the-syscon-first-steps-and-error-reporting.30100/
I have no image on my TV?
This can caused by multiple things. Try the following:
Reset your PS3's AV settings by pressing and holding the power button when you turn the PS3 on until you hear two beeps and then let go of the power button. This will reset your PS3's video settings and should now display an image on your TV.
If that does not work, you will need to troubleshoot by trying the following:
Try a different HDMI cable - This rules out the cables
Try a different HDMI port on your TV - This rules out the HDMI ports on the TV
Try a different TV (if possible) - This rules out the TV
Try Composite cables - This rules out the RSX on your PS3
If you still have issues after this, it is likely you have GLOD and possible that the RSX GPU in your PS3 may have failed.
What is GLOD?
Green Light of Death is when the RSX GPU in your PS3 has failed completely, resulting in no image after doing all available troubleshooting. Sometimes your PS3 may still produce an image but there will be a lot of graphical corruption on the XMB or in multiple games (GPU artifacting). If this starts to happen to you, backup your save data immediately via USB memory stick of to PS Plus if you have it.
Can I put my old PS3 hard drive in a new PS3 and keep all my save data?
No. PS3 hard drives are encrypted and cannot be read by another PS3 or PC. They are, in effect, tied to the PS3 they were used with. This means that if your PS3 dies and you have not backed up your save data, you cannot retrieve it without somehow fixing your PS3.
Putting the old hard drive into a new PS3 will erase the old had drive as the PS3 will treat it as a new hard drive and format it.
My game is freezing?
Check your disc to see if it has any scratches.
If the disc has no visible damage, try going to 'GAME DATA' and deleting the game from there. This will delete any Game Updates or the Games install, which may have become corrupt. This does not affect your save data. When you next start the game, it will download any available updates again and reinstall the game.
Can I buy a brand new Dualshock 3?
It is extremely unlikely that any brand new Dualshock 3 controllers you find on Ebay or other online stores are legit. Most of these will be counterfeits (fake). The safest way to buy a Dualshock 3 is to buy them used but there are some signs that can indicate a fake DS3. If you need help identifying whether a DS3 is real or not, post an image with it on this subreddit and people will be able to assist you.
When is PSN being shutdown on the PS3?
Nobody has the answer to this. At present there has been no announcement from Sony as to how long they plan on supporting PSN on the PS3/PSVita.
Some titles have had their servers shutdown by their publishers e.g. Killzone, Resistance, Uncharted, Portal 2 all no longer have online support but other titles like Call of Duty are still playable.
You can no longer message PS4/PS5 owners from your PS3 and vice versa.
Some games required an 'Online Pass' and may still require you to purchase one to play online. Please check to see whether or not the games servers are still online before doing so.
Why are my stats not saving on certain Call of Duty titles?
When the PSN name change was introduced, certain Call of Duty titles on the PS3 stopped tracking 'new accounts'. This means that if your PSN account was made after 2018 or you did not play the games before then, your stats will not be saved on some Call of Duty titles, including MW2, MW3 and a few others.
Additionally, changing your PSN name will make your PSN account be considered a 'new account' by these CoD games. This means if you change your PSN name even if you played the games before 2018, your stats will no longer be saved.
If you played the games before 2018, it is highly recommended you do not change your PSN name, otherwise your stats will not be tracked.
If you played the games before 2018 and have not changed your PSN name, your stats will continue to be tracked as normal.
When is the next PS Store sale going to be for PS3 games?
Probably never. The last sale was over a year ago so it is highly unlikely any games on the PS3 store will go on sale ever again.
How can I record my PS3's gameplay?
You will need a capture card to record the PS3's gameplay. It is recommended you use a capture card and component cables to do so.
If you try to use a capture card with HDMI, the PS3 will block the image due to HDCP (you will get no signal or a blank screen).
SOME HDMI Splitters can bypass HDCP and let you capture footage with your capture card with HDMI but there is no definitive list and they can sometimes be inconsistent so your mileage may vary.
My PS3 randomly turns itself on?
If you have PlayStation Plus, it is likely you enabled auto-update for trophies, game updates or save data at some point (you are prompted with the question when you start a PS3 game).
Check to see if you have accidentally enabled this by going to Settings>Automatic Update and enable/disable features as you please. I recommend leaving Save Data and Trophy sync on so your data will always be secure but disabling game updates as these can take a long time to do.
For more information, check here - https://manuals.playstation.net/document/en/ps3/current/settings/autodownload.html
Hope this helps some people. I will update this as and when I can if people find it helpful.

Recap of the games I got the Platinum trophy this 2020 (& some other completed games)

Hello everyone, I've read almost every post of people doing recaps of their year in gaming and i've enjoyed a lots of them! I've been wanting to do a list myself but couldn't put myself together to do it, but at last I'm here, however to keep things "Fresh" (or different to some degree) I will review the games I got the platinum trophy for, and not just games I played this year (I will however put some honorable mentions for games i played outside the playstation ecosystem that i completed to 100% or games that im 1-2 trophies close to get the plat). Having said this, the list is going to be weird (and a long read):

Goat Simulator : I believe this game was given away for PS Plus members, so thats the reason I picked it up and since I noticed it was a fairly simple platinum i gave it a go (according to psnprofiles, i got it in the lapse of 2 days 18 hours). The game is funny, its obviously glitchy, buggy, an overall mess but i got a couple of laughs here and there. There were frustrating stuff such as the flappy goat one, but overall a "funny" experience. I wouldn't recommend the game of other reason than just messing around and not taking things seriously. The fun factor however and the novelty fades away somehow quickly, so for a "freebie" (not entirely free since im paying for the subscription) it was okay. 5/10 (mediocre game, for really cheap or free its okayish)

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare (2019): Got the game because most of my friends from high-school love to play the MP (and specially, the search and destroy mode), kinda broke the patientgaming rule because I got it like 4-5 months later, but I stroke a got deal from a used copy so yeah, couldn't go wrong. The campaign is really good, very enjoyable, the gunplay in this CoD is really smooth and feels better than previous installments, the graphics are superb and voice acting its really good, misions doesn't feel repetitive and the story is not the most engaging but enjoyable. Also, as a side note i prefer the "normal" MP rather than "Warzone" mode, since my favorite battle royale is apex legends I felt Warzone to be gigantic and slow-paced. Overall the platinum was okay, nothing too hard, just the last trophy I got "We Own the night" was kinda glitchy and Couldn't make it pop for a couple of tries. 8/10

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order: Got it as a present from my gf, I'm a big Star Wars fan and metroidvania fan, so this was just my cup of tea. Dragged it for a couple of months because being an adult sucks, but the game its very very good. Combat is good, nothing outstanding but shines whenever you face "humanoid" enemies, and plain sucks when fighting monsters and animals, story is great for Star Wars fans, personally I liked the map designs and overall exploration. However it has a big issue, if you are intolerant to some degree to technical issues... well, you wont enjoy this game, even on the ps4 Pro this baby got buggy at times, a couple of T-Poses, some freezes when loading areas, and without being to spoilerish there was this big scene when i was supposed to get up in a elevator and presence a big fight... I instead got a scene where the good guys and bad guys where just hanging around and chilling, without a single shot being fired or anything, had to reload the save point (only after laughing for a couple of minutes) and it went like it was supposed to in the first place lol. the trophy was straightforward and easy, just the backtracking as a little bit tedious sometimes...Also, the last boss fight and cutscene were top notch. 8.5/10 for me, since i can handle the technical issues.

Uncharted: Drakes Fortune (remastered): First game of the trilogy, and is the one that has aged the worst. Its clear that this game was not designed to be played on the highest difficulties, because enemy placement was beyond stupid. In contrast, Modern warfare's Veteran difficulty felt FAIR, and if you die it because you made a mistake, here you can die for stupid and frustrating reasons. The game, however, in more "standard" difficulties is a fun game, although it shows its age but you can get some charm out of it, but since im reviewing games i got the platinum from, and this game was a pain in the ass to plat, well, thats why i ranted a little. All next consequent games are far better than this, but if you have the collection I suggest to play this game on normal and continue with the rest ASAP. 6.5/10

God of War: Chains of Olympus (PS3): I was in the mood for some hack and slash action and decided to start striking down my ps3 backlog, I really like this console so I started with the GoW Origins Collection and gave chains of olympus a go since I started the game about 1-2 years prior this attempt. Playing next to my girl while she was grinding her animal crossing: new horizon island made it better, since i could just turn my brain off and enjoy the action. Decent game, not the best GoW but for a Vita port it was good. Plat was not hard either, but i missed a couple of, well, miss-able trophies and that is always an annoying thing. 7/10

Transistor: Supergiant games became one of my favorite game developers after this. Since the very first moment I booted up the game I got charmed by it. The setting, the soundtrack, the soothing voice of the Transistor, the mysterious beauty of Red, the combat system which was kinda unique for me so it was a nice change of pace, overall, those experiences and games that are just very suited for you. I cannot recommend this game enough to even at least give it a try the fact that the last boss has the same abilities that you have felt unique This game also made me try Bastion, but I played it on my phone and didn't complete it 100%. Transistor trophy can put on a challenge in some of its trophies, but if the game "clicks" on you just like it did with me, well, you will appreciate it artificially lengths the game. Loved the game, I still listen to "The Spine" on spotify from time to time. 9/10

The Order 1886: Got this game for very cheap, and after listening that it was a quick campaign and easy plat and overall good experience so i said why not. Its the definition of "Good" game, a 7.5-8 game, that doesn't set anything new on the table, or fantastic or out of this world, but delivers just fine. The setting is the most "original" thing and I really hope they make a sequel some day that further explores this "alternate era/time" London, also the lycans were underused in my opinion . The platinum is pretty straightforward, with chapter select available. 7.5/10

Tomb Raider Definitive Edition (2013, ps4): I have had already played Rise of the Tomb Raider before this one, and loved it, wanted to have all platinums from the trilogy, however this one a special one... the online requirements were a pain in the ass, I have to look for a group in psn profiles (i think, don't quiet remember if it was there on here on reddit) and had to boost all online MP trophies, and then the grind of the level 60 while i was watching some Hbomberguy videos (fantastic channel), the main campaign is very good, and i quite enjoyed it even with the collectibles since it wasn't that hard. Preferred this than Uncharted tbh, Lara is a fantastic protagonist, combat was decent, exploration good, voice acting and story were pretty good... but having MP trophies for a mostly single player game... yeah, thats a no no for me. The game is a solid 8/10, however the trophy list is a 3/10, fuck MP trophies in mostly single-player games.

Hotline Miami (ps4): Fun. This is what this game is all about, having a good time and forget a little bit about everything. The 1HKO nature for both you and your enemies makes every encounter thrilling and exciting, the different weapons and masks (which grants you with different abilities) are not out of this world but engaging enough. Going for the plat was not as hard as I thought it was going to be, only a level or two were completely frustrating but only for small segments, with enough patience and practice you can make it through... and the soundtrack sticks with you for hours after playing. 8/10 solid game, quite short but im excited to try out the second one.

Jojo's Bizarre Adventure: Eyes of Heaven (ps4): During this quarantine, I decided to finally watch stuff I had on my "watch list", one of those stuff was getting past the fourth chapter in Jojo's, im not much of an anime guy (only watched like 5-6, but the ones I've watched left me with a good impression such as FMA: Brotherhood which i consider to be one of the best tv series ever) but after looking at so many memes and references I decided to give it a go, finally, binged the whole five seasons and loved it to bits. I immediately searched up for games about the franchise and found this and a PS3 one, which was supposed to be better, however this was on sale so... yeah, I grabbed this one. The game is "Okayish", I think you will only fully enjoy it if you consider yourself to be a fan of the franchise and you would like to see "what if" scenarios, the gameplay is mediocre, but the characters and story (which is not a masterpiece, but is full of references to the different parts and the interaction of the characters is really good if you watched the anime/read the manga) are what made me stay to the end. The trophy list was not difficult, just the one that asked you to have a "S" rank in all missions was time consuming, but nothing too harsh. As a game 7/10 but you are going to love it if you are a fan of the franchise.

Now I'm going to quickly list some honorable mentions that are 1-2 trophies away for the platinum, but I sold my ps4 for financial reasons, maybe when i can get a PS5...

Hellblade: Senua's sacrifice: Only a couple of trophies away, the game is fantastic, I was close to get it but my girlfriend underwent surgery (not medical-emergency related, but still surgery)
Rocket League: I actually achieved all conditions to have all the trophies for the platinum... but it hasn't popped out, the "car collector" trophy is glitched for me, maybe a PS5 log in will fix things?

And some games I've completed 100% but are not on PS3/4 so they are not platinums:
Apex legends on Xbox One, my favorite battle royale and MP game to play 8/10 (I have lots of critiques so is not a 9)
FIFA 20 on Xbox One, I despised this game and haven't bought the 21 edition, fuck FIFA. 1/10 (I still got all achievements because I hate myself)
Shantae Risky's Revenge on 3DS. Love Shantae and Metroidvanias, lots of fun 8/10
Super Metroid on 3DS. One of the best games ever and metroidvanias, wonderful still to this day 9.5/10

Thanks if you gave this a read, or if only you read games that got your attention, still, thanks for your time, it was a good year, since 9 platinums in a year for me is a ton, i like to trophy hunt but only for games I truly enjoy or are fast/easy or part of a series I want to track down.
Happy new year everybody! Hope you have a fantastic 2021, remember to take care of yourself and wear a mask, I'm a physician so I'm asking in behalf of the health care staff! Cheers

Stadia vs xcloud / game pass ultimate vs ps now / remote play vs Luna

Hello Stadians,
First post here. I joined the cult not long ago after extensive research and since my post on red flag deals about Stadia has gained much traction, I decided to post it here for future Stadians or people who might be interested. Information is spread out across many sources, so I am trying to bring all current cloud services together into one giant post. If you want to spread the message to people who are on the fence, please use this post as you like, you are free to share this. Please correct me if I got anything wrong since I am still new to the game. Here goes :
PART #1 :
Stadia is still very new to a lot of people but have gained quite a bit of attention recently due to Google freely handing out hardware. However, it is still largely misunderstood.
Unlike what many people think there it's either one or the other, Stadia is so versatile that it can complement anything (ps5, xbox, pc, mobile gaming). It doesn't have to be one or the other. You can sub, or you can just buy a game and play it whenever and wherever you want as long as you have a stable Internet connection.
The most important thing is to test it out for FREE. Go on your chrome browser, log in with your gmail account, and click on Destiny 2. No downloads, no load times, no patches, no wait times, no hidden fees, no hardware requirements, just play it for free indefinitely on any toaster computer you are running as long as you have a stable connection.
Like it ? Then don't be afraid to buy some games during their sales if they are cheaper on Stadia than other platforms. You will be able to play is as long as you have an stable Internet connection.
Don't listen to people who says Stadia is going away like some of Google's retired products. If anything, it's expanding and the future of gaming is streaming. Say goodbye to overpriced hardwares that expire or games that don't run properly on newer hardwares. Say goodbye to having to buy the same game on xbox, pc, mobile. Say goodbye to load times, storage limits, hardware problems like the ps4 pro making absurb noise.
Don't listen to people wo says Stadia has awful lag - they either have a bad connection or only tested Stadia at launch. With a good reliable connection with at least 35mbps download, there is absolutely no way the input lag will bother you unless you do competitive gaming. Everyone has their own experience with Stadia and best is to try it out yourself and not listen to people - it's free anyway with zero hurdles.
Don't listen to people claiming Stadia has a very limited library. Stadia launched roughly 1 year ago compared to xbox / steam / ps who have been there for ages. Obviously, you won't have the same library. Stadia is about to lock in 400+ games this year alone and more to come. Library size shouldn't matter since you do not have to pay or commit to anything. If you don't like what Stadia has to offer right now, just set it aside - you aren't losing out or anything. Your hardware is not going to expire, you aren't paying a dime to have a Stadia account, you have zero commitment necessary.
I hope this sums up the debate and why everyone should at least give Stadia a chance and try it out on your browser right now and experience the future of gaming. Zero commitment needed.

PART #2 : This is the part where I try to summarize each available streaming service and compare it to Stadia as of today.
PS Remote Play, which has pretty much been given up by Sony because they want to focus on PS5 hardware, is basically a service that allows you to connect to your own hardware to play games you own on your PS4 / PS5. You have the same limitations than your current hardware. Therefore, if your game only runs on 30FPS on PS4, it will only run 30FPS remotely. Your hardware will also eventually expire as new games get developed that require more juice. Last time I checked, remote play on PS4 Pro is capped at 720p. Since the connection has to jump through 2 loops (from your PS to Internet, and from the Internet back to your device), you will definitely feel a latency while streaming your games. Stadia is running off of a dedicated hardware and servers straight to the device you're streaming on, while the PS4/5 remote play has no server and uses your hardware.
PS Now is a service you need to pay either 12.99$ CAD a month or commit to $79.99 CAD for a whole year (20% off during BF sale, good value). It has its own dedicated servers so latency should be better. However, as of now, games are still being streamed at 720p only, and hopefully 1080p soon. A plus side is the access to a bigger library, potentially bigger than what xbox game pass ultimate has to offer. You can also download PS4/5 games to play offline unlike Stadia where a stable connection is required at all times. However, you need an online check every 7 days and the offline service only works on your PS4/5 hardware. if you use this service, some games can leave the platform on a rotation basis (about 10 out of 800 games available) and you don't own any games unless you buy them on the PS store. If your subscription expires, you'll lose access to the downloaded games and any DLC associated with it. As noted by redditors here, you do get plenty of time to finish the game and a notice ahead of time before rotation begins.
Xbox Game Pass Ultimate cost 16.99$ CAD a month and provides the best library of games on a rotation basis, and is now combined with xbox gold meaning you can claim free games every month that you can keep as long as you are subbed, like Stadia Pro. The game selection is arguably better than PS Now, and is much more varied than Stadia. The biggest downside is that Game Pass Ultimate only offers 720p streaming as of now and I have noticed many more players reporting latency issues with Game Pass compared to Stadia. Just like PS now, Game Pass Ultimate is like a rental service where you don't get to keep any games unless you keep paying a fee. The difference with Stadia is that your money is exchanged for games you can keep with regular Stadia. You keep the games you bought and they do offer some free to play games like Destiny 2 and more to come eventually. However, free version of Stadia is capped at 1080p 60fps with stereo sound.
Geforce Now from Nvidia costs 6.49$ CAD a month to play, or offered free but you are limited to 1-hour sessions only, which is quite stressful in my opinion. It basically uses your steam games library and allows you to stream them using their cloud servers. If you have a big library of steam games, I can see a good reason to use Geforce Now. However, their cloud servers are much much smaller than Google (obviously). For new games, you have to wait for them to become available on the service if the game requires different specs, since Nvidia has to make Steam games compatible with their service first. Due to their small servers, 2 years after their launch, they have yet announced support for 4k streaming and yet to have their own exclusives. This is only a good option if you have a huge amount of steam games and want to access those games outside of your PC.
Luna offers game streaming for 7.99$ CAD (note that this is their entry price, and I will guarantee you this price will get a bump once their service is more widely known) . They have a bigger game library than Stadia but a lot of players claim that their games aren't as quality (filled with indie games and less AAA titles). However, Stadia has much better latency because Amazon servers are more tailored towards enterprise usage rather than customer. Another downside to Luna is that it doesn't offer a free service compared to Stadia, but time will tell.
To me, the main selling point for Stadia is this : no commitment required.
With other services, you either have to pay to use their service or buy their hardware, or both. A paywall is the highest obstacle to a new user base and Google knows that. No other services would allow you to create a free account, go on your chrome browser, and play Destiny 2 (other free games will be announced soon) right away without any hardware check. You can play Destiny 2 on a toaster computer, a TV with a Chromecast Ultra dongle and all you need is keyboard + mouse, or any controller you can find. Stadia can accommodate those with little to no interest to build a 1,000 $ CAD PC to keep up with current games (to eventually expire and have to upgrade again) and Stadia doesn't require you to buy consoles, have console hardwares expire, compatibility issues with previous games, update games, run out of storage room.
All you need to ask yourself is : do you want to play this game or not ?
You are not pressured to finish a game before it rotates out.
You are not forced to pay to play - you buy and own.
You don't have to think about compatibility issues nor hardware issues.
If Stadia manages to secure more AAA and exclusive titles, they will be an even more fearful competitor to other game streaming services.
Cloud gaming is still very young but it is the future. We don't know when it will happen, but one day, it will be the Netflix of gaming.

2020-11-26 EDIT : Thank you so much for all the feedback guys, I stand corrected on many points you guys put forward and I appreciate the time you put to read through my wall of text.
EDIT 2 : Updated PS Now to include 10 games out of 800 that gets rotated out and library size potentially bigger than xbox's.
EDIT 3 : correction on stadia servers vs amazon luna's

My Year in Gaming: 2020

So 2020 has been a sucky year to say the least, but it ended up being a great year in gaming for me; I was working minimally from March to August so I got to game a ton. I’ve seen a few of these years in gaming and decided to do my own. Here’s every game I finished this year in roughly the order I played them. I started rating them but ended up not because I usually don’t play games that I don’t fall in love with and all of them were highly rated and opted for mini reviews. If they’re on this list, I consider them worth playing! Also included games that I bought, started, and didn’t finish; feel free to tell me I’m wrong and that I should go back and play them!
I will preface it with that I pretty much exclusively play single player games and I love a game with a good story.
Spiderman PS4
Got this game for Christmas last year and my god is web slinging fun! The controls are super smooth, the combat is great, and the story is not bad at all. All superhero games should aspire to be this good.
Bioshock Remastered PS4
When PS Plus gave away the Bioshock collection I was super excited to play this one. The remaster looks great; it was a great game back when it came out and it still is a great game today. One of the greatest games of the PS3 era, go play it at all costs.
Borderlands 3 PS4
While technically I got this when it came out in 2019, I was playing this well into the new year with all the DLCs coming out. I’m really divided on this one; when it launched I was super excited as I’m a huge Borderlands fan, but the game was super buggy at launch, the story sucked, and the campaign was broken up by the infamous talk to Lilith. They’ve since patch it up and it runs better but my PS4 pro will overheat and turn itself off during the battle for DLC3. That’s the bad, but the good is that all 4 of the DLCs have much better stories (even if DLC4 is really short) than the base game. The game also makes lots of quality of life improvements on its predecessor and has tons of replay value in the end game content and they’re still adding more. If you liked Borderlands 2, you’ll probably like this one, if you don’t you can probably skip this one.
Horizon: Zero Dawn PS4
I absolutely loved this game. It's a really beautiful game with a refreshingly original story and gorgeous scenery. They do an excellent job of world building. The combat is super fun and it's very satisfying taking down the monsters. At the current price, it's a must buy in my opinion.
Psychonauts PS4
I saw this on the store and it brought back great memories of my childhood playing this on the original xbox. It’s one of the weirdest 3D platformers out there and I mean that in the best possible way. You play as a child in a summer camp for kids with psychic powers and while the game is a bit slow to get going (the early levels are a bit boring) you end up going into and exploring other characters’ minds. Super weird, super fun. A hidden gem for sure.
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves remastered PS4
When they gave away the uncharted collection I immediately booted up this one, it still has one of the best beginnings of any game ever. The gunplay and platforming hold up well and are very fun. Every uncharted game is great, but this one is my favorite.
Journey PS4
Wow was I not ready for this game. It's simply a beautiful game that really makes you feel a lot in it's short playtime, all without any dialogue or text.
Ratchet and Clank PS4
It’s been years since I played a Ratchet and Clank game and this one checked all the boxes that a Ratchet and Clank game should. Decent platforming, zany guns, and memorable characters. I remember the old ones having more replay value than this one did but maybe that’s just the nature of memory. Still, I had fun.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons Switch
I saw on someone else’s post that this was a game of the times and I certainly agree. I was stuck home at the beginning of quarantine and this was the perfect game to just turn on and get lost in. It was very fun to see tons of old friends playing this and exchange friend codes, especially people I don’t normally game with. We had group chats going to buy and sell turnips. Some of my friends are STILL playing this! Me personally, I put it down after paying off my last mortgage and terraforming my island to my satisfaction. I’ve heard that there’s tons of new content added all the time so for anyone who has yet to play, now's as good of a time as any to buy it.
Tomb Raider Definitive Edition PS4
I got this for like $2.99 or something when it was discounted so I wasn’t expecting a lot, but man was I pleasantly surprised. The story is kinda weak, but it plays like an off brand Uncharted game, which I mean in a good way. If it’s discounted, don’t hesitate, I got more than my money’s worth out of it.
Rise of the Tomb Raider PS4
Bought this immediately after finishing the first one. Of course the next month they gave it away on PS Plus but oh well. Anyway, this game is pretty good, it improves on the first in every way; better story, better controls, better graphics. Think Uncharted with light RPG elements. Waiting for Shadow of the Tomb Raider to go onsale
Detroit: Become Human PS4
This one was a sleeper; I got it on PS Plus a while ago but had never heard of it and never played it until quarantine had me going through all my games looking for something to play. I’m a huge fan of Telltale games and Heavy Rain (I didn’t know this was the same developer) so this was right up my alley. The dialogue and voice acting is spot on, if you’ve enjoyed any of the choose your own adventure type games, this is a must; I haven’t been so drawn in by a story in a while. I even played it a second time! A nice tidbit, one of the main characters is voiced by and modeled after Jesse Williams, who apparently is a character on Grey’s Anatomy, which was my girlfriend’s quarantine obsession so it was a cool collision of worlds, she also got sucked into the story after hearing his voice while I was playing.
The Last of Us Part II PS4
The game I was most excited for in 2020 and the first game I’ve gone against my patient gamer tendency and preordered in years. A masterpiece of gaming in my opinion. Everything is just so good; from the story to the gameplay to the voice acting and motion capture. Don’t believe the hate, this was not just the best game I played in 2020 but all generation. I don’t have words to explain my praise for this game, just go play it.
Paper Mario: The Origami King Switch
The second most anticipated game of 2020 for me! I was gifted this for my birthday when it came out. As a fan of the Paper Mario series, it was a bit of a mixed bag for me; the overworld is large, colorful, and full of charm. The battle system, however, is weird, confusing, and just not that fun, even after you get the hang of it. The characters were not as rich and memorable as in The Thousand Year Door (one of my favorite games of all time) and the boss fights were annoying instead of challenging. Still, I had a fun time.
Bug Fables Switch
After playing The Origami King, I had a hankering for that old magic turn based adventure. While this isn’t The Thousand Year Door, it did scratch that itch better than The Origami King. The combat system is classic Paper Mario and the characters are fun, my only complaint being that no one seems to know they’re made of paper! I feel like folding up into an airplane or a tube was part of the charm of the old games, but I digress. If you’re a fan of the Paper Mario games or of turn based RPGs, this is a no brainer.
Call of Duty WWII PS4
Another PS Plus freebie that I would not have played if it wasn’t given to me for “free.” I haven’t played a Call of Duty game since I think Modern Warfare 2 and I don’t really play online multiplayer games but I played the campaign and was actually surprised by how much I enjoyed this one. I guess there’s something timeless about shooting Nazis. The voice acting and sound were excellent and for a genre (WWII games) that’s been done to death, it tells a decently compelling story. If you claimed it, might as well play it.
Super Hot PS4
My roommate at the time bought this when it came out years ago and I remembered it being fun so when I saw it discounted I bought it. I’ve got to say, Super Hot is the most innovative shooter I've played in years! The concept is pretty simple; time only moves when you move, meaning it’s one part first-person shooter, one part puzzle game where you’ve got to kill all the bad dudes before they kill you. The single player game is short and essentially story-less, but the gameplay is fun and there are tons of challenges to do. Once quarantine is over, it’d be a fun game to pass the controller back and forth with friends.
Doom 2016 PS4
Another game I slept on but bought because my old roommate had played it and it looked cool. This is the monster energy drink equivalent of a video game if there ever was one, just balls to the wall action the whole time. Killing demons has never been as satisfying. There are a few platforming sections that aren’t fun because first person platforming is hardly ever fun but that doesn't detract from the overall experience, this is a great game. I bought Doom Eternal when it was onsale and it’s in my backlog, I’m excited for it.
Bioshock Infinite PS4
I also played this one around when it came out or shortly after, but I didn’t remember a thing about it other than that I liked it. And I liked it again! The first Bioshock is more of a horror game while this one is a straight up shooter, which isn’t to say it’s bad, just different. The setting is really what shines in this game, along with the story, even if the ending is a little confusing. I also had never played the Buried at Sea story DLCs that tie Infinite to the original so that was really a treat.
Skyrim PS4
I love Skyrim and The Elder Scrolls in general. I go back and play some Skyrim at least once a year and I logged more hours in Skyrim then some of the other games on this list so I decided it was only fair to include it. Can’t say enough about this game. One of my all time favorites.
Dishonored PS4
I picked up the Dishonored Collection of 1, 2 and Death of the Outsider when it was discounted. Side note: I bought and played this game back in 2016 and thought I had finished it and subsequently sold it off, only to go back to find out I never finished it! Anyway, I replayed the whole game and it holds up very well despite its age. The art style is very cool and the environments are really awesome, it’s a lot of fun to combine powers to reach rooftops or tackle the same situation a multiple of different ways. I read up on it and apparently when it was in the testing stage, rather than limit the player’s powers if they found an exploit, they redesigned levels to accommodate it which I just think is just really cool. I played the whole game stealthily without killing anyone for the low chaos ending, but you could easily go slashing and shooting your way through every level and have lots of fun. It also came with the DLC, which I also played and thoroughly enjoyed. Looking forward to playing 2 and Death of the Outsider.
The following games I am currently playing.
Wolfenstein: The New Order PS4
I’m currently playing this one and am loving it. I’ve never played a Wolfenstein game but after playing Doom 2016 I was craving more Bethesda shooters and this one was cheap and sounded interesting. Again, something timeless about shooting Nazis! This one is set in 1960, in an alternate history where the Nazis developed advanced weaponry and won WWII, you play as a resistance fighter. Very cool so far. My only complaint is that sometimes it's not clear what you're supposed to do.
Borderlands 1 PS4
I already owned and played this one, but I convinced my brother who’s a casual gamer on Switch to buy this (on Switch) and we talk on the phone and play “together” doing the same missions and what not which is nice because I haven’t seen him in months what with the pandemic. I will say, after playing Borderlands 2 and 3, this one feels really dated and doesn’t hold up as well as other games, specifically Bioshock which came out two years earlier. It’s not the graphics I’m hung up on because I don’t really care about how a game looks as long as it plays well but they made so many improvements to the gameplay in 2 and then again in 3 that it feels clunky. The guns handle weirdly, there’s essentially no story or dialogue unless you’re reading all the text boxes, and everything is so spread out as to feel like it’s just padding its length. I suppose if it’s your first Borderlands title it’s not bad, but you could skip it and go right to 2 and be no worse off.
Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle Switch
My brother convinced me to buy this one when it was discounted for $15 and I really expecting a stupid, lousy game. But what I found instead was a rich turn based battle game with a charming, if not silly, story. Pretty much all Nintendo games are solid, if not excellent, so maybe I should have expected more. We thought we could play online together but turns out you can only play local coop which is super lame in this day and age but Nintendo has always been about playing in person and their online system leaves a lot to be desired. If you have a switch and see this discounted, don’t hesitate, I’m really happy with my purchase.
If you’re still with me at this point… thanks! Here are some games I started but didn’t like enough to finish.
The Evil Within PS4
I bought this game because I loved Resident Evil 4 and thought I’d love this as it’s by the same people. Unfortunately, I didn’t care for this at all. My biggest issue with the game is that you move so freaking slow. Maybe that’s an atmospheric thing to add to the horror but it’s a pet peeve of mine, I like to get around quickly in games. Which brings me to my second issue (Which is totally on me and can be a good thing depending on who you are) with the game… it’s downright terrifying, I was on the edge of my couch the whole time. So maybe that’s a good thing for you! Last complaint is that it is pretty hard and I only put it on medium because I had heard that it was a hard game. I consider myself pretty good at most games but I just wasn’t having fun being chainsawed over and over. Don’t let me put you off to this game, if you like all those things, it could be the game for you.
Dying Light PS4
I really wanted to like this game but just couldn’t. The parkour system is super cool and fun once you get the hang of it, but that’s about all I liked about the game. The voice acting was awful, the weapons broke super easily without being easy to find, and the zombies were sponges. Maybe it was just the beginning of the game but I found it unnecessarily hard, frustrating, and not fun.
Hitman PS4
This sounded super fun on paper what with several ways to approach a mission but in execution I found it very frustrating. Maybe I just suck at it but in my opinion, if you want a fun stealth game, play Dishonored.
Persona 5 PS4
I heard great things about this game, but it just wasn't for me. Maybe I just don't like JRPGs? I played for like 10 hours and still felt like I was nowhere... I then looked up how long to beat it and it was over 100 hours! No wonder I felt like I was still in the intro. I was not prepared for that long of a game.
Prey (2017) PS4
I'm not sure why I put this one down. The atmosphere was super cool. I think I remember enemies being really hard to kill but I could be wrong. After reading a lot of positive talk about it on the Dishonored subreddit, I'm going to give it another shot eventually.
Vampyr PS4
I got this from PS Plus in the fall and figured it was worth a shot what with it being near Halloween and all. It had pretty decent reviews but I can't understand why, the controls felt so poor I thought I was playing a bad PS2 game. I only played about an hour. Please convince me otherwise.
Death Stranding PS4
Might get some hate for this but to me, it’s the most overhyped game of 2020. A friend bought it for me because she doesn't own a playstation and wanted to see it so I'm not too mad about it, but the game is just not fun to me. I streamed maybe 10 hours of the game for her before I refused to play anymore. Looks beautiful, story and setting are interesting, but to me. it's just a game of fetch quests, an extreme mailman simulator. No thanks.
The Witcher 3 PS4
Another game I might get some hate for, but I just couldn’t get into this one either. As a huge Elder Scrolls fan, I was expecting something along the lines of a third person Skyrim. My main issue was the cut scenes and dialog, there was just so much of it! I really felt like it bogged down the overall experience, but that’s just my opinion. I played for maybe five hours or so before putting it down.
If you read this far, wow thanks for reading all that! That was my year in gaming, I'd love to hear your thoughts on any of these games, especially ones I didn't finish. Stay safe and happy holidays!

Next-gen console buying guide - a detailed look at the next generation consoles

Hey /IndianGaming !
A new generation of gaming is nearly upon us, and for those us who aren't PC gamers, that means weighty decisions about which machine to pick as our primary gaming rig for the next six or seven years. Now that we know pretty much everything about the Xbox and PlayStation, let's compare the two to try and discern which console would offer you the best gaming experience and value. I'll do the Xbox first because the difference between the two consoles is larger than with PlayStation.

PS5 vs Xbox - Hardware

Xbox
The Xbox brand has come a long way in the past seven years. The release of the Xbox One was disastrous, plagued by always online, intrusive DRM, high pricing because of Kinect, and a bunch of other silly decisions from clueless execs who were completely out of touch which what gamers wanted. But ever since MS fired Don Mattrick and replaced him with Phil Spencer as the head of the Xbox division, Phil has slowly turned things around, coming up with many new innovations in an effort to get the xbox back up to competing with the big boys.
Their hardware team too went from creating a prohibitively priced but technically weak console, to the most powerful console of this generation. For next gen, they've gone with an even more ambitious vision, creating two consoles at different price points targeting different output resolutions, but hoping to achieve the same level of performance. That's quite the goal! Let's check out the specs.

Component	Xbox Series X	Xbox Series S
CPU	8 Core AMD Zen 2 @3.8Ghz/3.6GhzSMT	8 Core AMD Zen 2 @3.6Ghz/3.4SMT
GPU	AMD RDNA2 GPU 52CU's @1.825 Ghz	AMD RDNA 2 GPU 20 CU's @1.565 Ghz
GPU Power	12.15 Teraflops	4 Teraflops
RAM	10GBGDDR6@560GB's / 6GB@336GB/s	8GBGDDR6@224GB's / 2GB@56GB/s
Storage	1TB PCIe Gen 4 NVMe SSD w/Velocity	512GB PCIe Gen 4 NVMe SSD w/Velocity
I/O Throughput	2.4 GB/s Uncompressed / 4.8 GB/s Compressed	2.4 GB/s Uncompressed / 4.8 GB/s Compressed
Performance Target	4k UHD	1440p
Disc Drive	4KUHD Blu-Ray	No Disc Drive
Price	₹49,999	₹34,999

Whoo! These are quite beefy machines. The current generation of consoles were actually quite dated even for their time. Not so this time around, these consoles are high end gaming rigs, with the Series X even beating most PC's that took the Steam hardware survey.
Before we go any further though, let's untangle this alphabet soup of tech specs and try and translate it into something readable(tech geeks bear with me, there's a lot of oversimplification here, I know!)
SMT - Stands for Simultaneous MultiThreading. Simultaneous multithreading allows different processes to utilize the same core, allowing for greater efficiency. Basically, a CPU core that could normally only do one thing at a time now spends less time sitting idle, as it works other things while waiting for instructions to finish processing. Sometimes this means way better performance when code is specifically optimized for it, other times it doesn't really matter because code has to wait on a previous operation to finish before starting a new one.
Teraflops - Short for Trillion Floating Point Operations per Second. A floating point operation is basically a standard arithmetic operation(multiplication, division etc) involving decimal numbers(floating points). So the 4 Teraflop Series S GPU, for instance, can do 4 trillion of these a second. Phew!
PCiE/NVMe - Short for Peripheral Component Interconnect Express, PCIe is just a connector standard that transfers data across components. These connectors have various lanes of traffic, so the more lanes a component utilizes, the faster information will flow, like on a road or highway. NVMe(Nonvolatile Memory Express) drives use more lanes than SATA drives probably used by your computer, which means way faster speeds. It's planning a road layout and choosing to use a highway instead of a normal road to make things faster.
Xbox Velocity Architecture - Fancy marketing term for a collection of technologies that aim to increase rendering and texture streaming efficiency i.e squeeze as much juice out of the hardware as possible. It incudes stuff like Sampler Feedback Streaming(tech that allows the hardware to load only the mipmaps that are necessary, reducing I/O because less data has to be sent to RAM to load a frame), improvements to DX, and of course a fast SSD(although less powerful than the one on the PS5). It also enables stuff like Quick Resume.
So what does this all mean for gaming? Well, the Xbox Series X is a way more powerful machine across the board, aimed at hitting a higher performance target. It needs higher specs because it's outputting 4K images as opposed to a target of 1440p on the Series S. Microsoft says the Series S specs have been neatly scaled so the only difference between the two consoles is resolution. Don't take them at their word though, there are bound to be other small differences , resolution will just be the biggest differentiator. So that means both consoles are equipped with technologies like Raytracing, Variable Rate Shading, Sampler Feedback Streaming, all that good next-gen stuff.
But wait...
What the F is Ray Tracing?!
Arguably the defining feature of Next-Generation graphics, Ray tracing is a radical new way to render realistic graphics on-screen. In order to understand how it works, let's think a bit about how graphics are rendered.
The real world is complicated. Very complicated. Trying to recreate that in a game requires the use of various algorithms to simulate various parts of the real world, like a physics engine to handle various forces and collisions, a shadow and reflection maps to handle shadows and reflections, a light map to handle the lighting of a scene, and of course a virtual camera viewport to simulate your eyes. There are a ton of things game developers do to try and recreate the real world as accurately as possible with the processing power available to them, and you can see them if you've ever opened up a game graphics menu where it allows you to toggle certain settings, or 'tricks' on or off, that were developed to make scenes look more realistic.
So where does ray tracing come in? Well, Raytracing is meant to replace 'fake' methods of rendering stuff like lighting and shadows by attempting to realistically simulate the way lighting and shadows actually work in the real world. If you've ever taken a high school physics class, you'll know that light travels in the form of rays - reflecting, refracting, getting absorbed etc ad infinitum. Ray tracing is the process by which computers attempt to simulate this in an effort to make scenes look more realistic than what can be achieved by artificial tricks.
For instance, check out Raytraced minecraft
Wow! Quite the quantum jump there, right? While minecraft's graphics were never technically very impressive, with raytracing everything looks so much nicer. Water actually looks like water and not blue lines, dark caves actually look dark and not just black, lava actually behaves like lava instead of looking like someone spilled some red paint on a light source, everything just looks that much more realistic.
It's achieved by each pixel, both inside and outside the scene(traditional rendering methods typically only consider pixels inside the scene for lighting and shadows) casting off a ray of light, the path of which is then traced around the scene until it hits a light source or an artificial limit. This eliminates the need for manually providing lightmaps or reflection details, because those can be simulated in real time and look even better. As you can imagine, it's very computationally intensive, which is why we haven't really see it go mainstream in gaming until now. Even with the monsters that are this-gen consoles, they probably won't be able to hit their performance targets with full RT. From what we can see so far, the Xbox Series X will likely run at 4k30 with RT, and the Series S will run at 1080p30 with RT.
Alright that's enough about Raytracing for now, back to the console comparison.
Some quick FAQs

Is there any benefit to getting the Series X if I don't have a 4k TV? - Yes, but probably not a 15k difference. The Series X will still be processing higher resolution textures and might even give you better framerates in games, but the primary reason to get a Series X over the S if you don't have a 4k TV will probably just be to future-proof yourself in case you ever do decide to buy one in the future
Why would I need Quick Resume? - A strange question, but one I have nevertheless seen asked a fair number of times. To clarify, you don't really 'use' quick resume as you benefit from it. Just opening a game will take you right back to the state it was in when you last closed it, so you don't need to sit through loading screens, menus, or studio logos to get in the game. It also persists across cold boots.
What are the PC equivalents to the Xbox Series X specs? - The Series X GPU lies somewhere between the RTX 2080 Super and the RTX 2080 ti as far as raw performance is concerned. As for the CPU, the closest PC equivalent would probably be the AMD Ryzen 7 3700x, or a less than an Intel i7 9700k.

PS5
Arguably the more highly anticipated console, the PS5 succeeds the PS4, which absolutely crushed the Xbox One this generation in terms of sales and games. Fueled by phenomenal exclusives like God of War, Spiderman, Bloodborne, TLOU2 etc, the PS4 juggernaut's got quite a bit of momentum going into this generation. Sadly as we all know, it hit a bit of a legal hiccup coming to India so it'll be delayed. We also don't know as much about it as we do the Xbox because Sony hasn't actually sent out any units to Influencers/Reviewers yet, so all we have to go on are the specs, demos, and teardowns that Sony themselves have provided.
This generation, Sony's offering two variants of the PS5, but in contrast to Microsoft's strategy, both their consoles are equally powerful and offer basically the same gaming experience, the only difference being that one plays discs while the other doesn't. The price difference between the two consoles is also 10k as opposed to 15k with the Xbox.
Because the consoles share identical specs, I won't be comparing them with each other. Instead, let's compare them to the Xboxes. Here's the same table again, except with PS5 in the middle this time.

Component	Xbox Series X	PlayStation 5	Xbox Series S
CPU	8 Core AMD Zen 2 @3.8Ghz/3.6GhzSMT	8 Core AMD Zen 2 CPU varfreq* upto 3.5GhzSMT	8 Core AMD Zen 2 @3.6Ghz/3.4SMT
GPU	AMD RDNA2 GPU 52CU's @1.825 Ghz	AMD RDNA 2 GPU 36CUs varfreq upto 2.23Ghz	AMD RDNA 2 GPU 20 CU's @1.565 Ghz
GPU Power	12.15 Teraflops	10.3 Teraflops	4 Teraflops
RAM	10GBGDDR6@560GB's / 6GB@336GB/s	16GB GDDR6 RAM @ 448GB/s	8GBGDDR6@224GB's / 2GB@56GB/s
Storage	1TB PCIe Gen 4 NVMe SSD w/Velocity	Custom 825GB SSD	512GB PCIe Gen 4 NVMe SSD w/Velocity
I/O Throughput	2.4 GB/s Uncompressed / 4.8 GB/s Compressed	5.5GBs Uncompressed / 8-9 GB/s Compressed	2.4 GB/s Uncompressed / 4.8 GB/s Compressed
Performance Target	4k UHD	4k UHD	1440p
Disc Drive	4KUHD Blu-Ray	Optional Disc Drive	No Disc Drive
Price	₹49,999	₹39,999/₹49,999	₹34,999

*varfreq = variable frequency
On paper, the Xbox Series X is the most powerful console, then the PlayStations, with the Series S coming in at a distant third. The Series X has a slightly faster CPU, a significantly faster GPU, and slightly faster RAM than the PS5. Meanwhile, the PS5 has the edge in I/O throughput, which is about twice as fast as that on the Series X when it comes to raw numbers.
What do these numbers actually mean for games? Well, we just don't know yet, because multiplats have yet to be benchmarked on the PS5. Sony seems to be playing their cards close to the vest, and haven't given their hardware to any reviewers to try. It's a safe guess to say that games will probably look slightly better on the Series X with maybe slightly better performance, but the difference is unlikely to be significant and probably won't matter to most casual gamers. Meanwhile, the difference in I/O throughput could mean that the PS5 will possibly load worlds and start up games faster than the Series X. It will probably be most noticeable in exclusive first party titles that are coded to specifically take advantage of the SSD.
Let's discuss hardware value by price. When it comes to price, the best value hardware wise is clearly the PS5 DE. For merely 5k more than the Series S you're getting 3-4x the processing power. If you have a 4k TV at home, it's probably not worth considering the Series S, just the PS5 and the Series X. Maybe when the Series S is more reasonably priced in India according to the $1 = ₹100 rule it could be a contender, but as of now, it's my personal opinion that the Series S is just not good value in India for those who have a 4K TV at home and the budget to afford one.
But of course there's more to a system than just hardware. Now that we've drawn up some specs comparisons, let's get down to the software side.

PS5 vs Xbox- Software

For most gamers, this will be the real meat of the comparison. The power differences between the PS5 and the Xbox Series X are probably not significant enough on their own to decide a purchase, so for most casual gamers, software is what will decide it.
Xbox
By far the biggest difference software side on the Xbox is Xbox Game Pass. Love or hate Xbox, you can't deny that Xbox Game Pass Ultimate is quite simply the best value in gaming right now. Following this guide from the subreddit , you can get 3 years of it for as low as ₹7500. In case you've been living under a rock, here's what you get with Xbox Game Pass.

Xbox Live Gold (Multiplayer and Games with Gold)
Access to a growing and rotating library of ~350 games(as part of PC+Console. Console only - ~250 Games)
Perks - This can sometimes include cool stuff like the presently included 3 months of Discord Nitro, but so far for the most part I've not found it to be of too much use unless you play a lot of free to play games like World of Tanks or Warframe.
xCloud - Not really relevant in India right now, but if you go the 3 years of gamepass route it might be a nice bonus down the line. It's possible to access xCloud right now with a VPN, but it's not a great experience.
EA Play - Game Pass will also soon include access to EA Play, the basic tier of their subscription service, including very popular games like FIFA, Battlefield, Sims, etc. It also includes trials of the latest EA games.
A 20% Discount on buying the games included in Game Pass, if you decide to buy them to keep.

It's also worth noting that all future Xbox Games Studios games will land on Xbox Game Pass Day 1, which is a really good value considering that Xbox now has 23 studios making games. While most of them are a ways off, it looks like a good lineup, especially if you're into RPG's.
Game Pass is pretty much the USP of the Xbox right now. For gamers on limited budgets, it's just tremendous value. For ₹700 per month(It's regionally priced too!), you get to play way more games and have much more fun with your console than you could have had without the service. For many, this could possibly be the decider.
The second big difference, of course, is in the exclusives. Here's what the upcoming Xbox exclusive lineup looks like -

Halo Infinite
Microsoft Flight Simulator
Senua's Saga - Hellblade 2
Avowed
Fable
Everwild
Forza Motorsport
Starfield
The Elder Scrolls VI

It's also worth noting that all these games will still go on PC Game Pass Day 1. If you have a PC capable of running these games when they come out, then missing out on Xbox games shouldn't really be an issue or a deciding factor.
The third big difference is in backwards compatibility. The Series X and S will be compatible with every single Xbox One game, a lot of the most popular Xbox 360 games, and some of the most popular OG Xbox games. Here's the full list of 607 supported titles. It's great if you're already invested in the platform or are nostalgic for old titles like Burnout Revenge, Red Dead Redemption, Black Ops 2, Fallout New Vegas, etc. Probably won't be a big thing for most people, but for those it will help, it can make a purchase.
there's also a bunch of conveniences like quick resume and play anywhere. Quick Resume works like a save state where the console just loads back to where you last were when you quit the game instead of starting the game afresh. It works with multiple games at a time and persists even if you pull the plug on the Xbox. Play Anywhere works with some titles where your saves carry over from Xbox to PC. Nice to have, but not anything major.
Finally, an important note - unlike the PS5, even Free to Play games need a subscription to play online. So yeah, you can't play stuff like Fortnite or Warzone without a live gold or game pass ultimate subscription. If you spend a lot of time playing F2P games and can't afford game pass, this is a significant downside that might even be a dealbreaker, depending on how much time you spend playing F2P and how broke you are.
Quick FAQ's
Will future Bethesda Games be Xbox exclusive? - We still don't have definitive confirmation on whether future Bethesda titles will be exclusive, but it's highly likely that they will be, considering that Minecraft excluded, no other Microsoft first party studio currently develops games for other platforms. Phil Spencer also recently went on record to say that they're not worried about losing out on PS sales. Keep in mind that games like DOOM, Fallout, Elder Scrolls, will sell many Xboxes if they go exclusive. So while we can't claim anything definitively either way, don't buy a PS5 expecting to play these games for sure.
What's the best deal on Game Pass? - Currently it's the 3 year gold conversion deal. It probably won't last forever, so don't pass up the opportunity. Follow the guide linked above.
Are PC and Console Game Pass the same? - No. They are similar services but have different libraries. While all Xbox Games Studios games will release Day 1 on both platforms, major third party titles like Red Dead Redemption 2 are not likely to hit PC game pass.
PS5
Software wise, the biggest reason to buy the PS5 are for its exclusives. So far, PS4 exclusives blow Microsoft's out of the water. God of War, Ghost of Tsushima, Spider-Man, The Last of Us, Horizon Zero Dawn, Bloodborne, time and again Sony has proven that they have some of the best studios out there. The PS5 will certainly have some spectacular games. Here's what the upcoming PS5 exclusive lineup looks like -

Spider-Man : Miles Morales(Launch)
Demon's Souls (Launch)
God of War - Ragnarok
Ratchet and Clank : A Rift Apart
Gran Turismo 7
Sackboy - A Big Adventure
Godfall
Final Fantasy 16 (timed)
Deathloop, Ghostwire(timed)

The majority of these games will most likely only be playable on PlayStation i.e they won't be coming to PC, so that's another thing to keep in mind when deciding which system to buy. They'll all mostly be phenomenal games, Sony titles usually are, especially first party ones.
On the downside, great games can be quite expensive. As you've heard, Sony has confirmed that all PS5 first party exclusives will be 4999 going forward(no regional pricing). So if you care about playing Ratchet and Clank/God of WaGran Turismo at launch, be ready to shell out the cash. Personally I don't believe 5k for a single player game is worth it in India, but of course it depends on your personal finances.
To alleviate this somewhat we have PS Now and the PS Plus collection, Sony's answer to Game Pass. The PS Plus collection includes a lot of popular PS4 exclusives and some third party titles like Arkham Knight and Fallout 4. It's a really good deal if you're jumping into the PS ecosystem for the first time, but those who already own PS5's will probably already have played most of the games on there and will only benefit once they grow the service.
Sony also a bunch of conveniences in the UI like activites, which let you jump right into a certain part of the game. It's also rumored to have some sort of quick resume, but nothing's been confirmed in that regard yet.
As for Backwards Compatibility, Sony has confirmed that the PS5 will be BC with nearly all PS4 titles, but PS1,2,and 3 games will be left to history. Regrettable, but probably not a dealbreaker for most people.
So on the Sony side, we have some killer exclusives but not as much value with highly priced games and no game pass.

Verdict

So, for the most important question, which one do you get? Well, even after 21,000 words I won't really pretend to have an answer. There are too many variables to consider. How invested you are in a particular ecosystem, your personal financial situation, the type of games you like, etc. That said, I have some broad recommendations -

If you have already have a 4k TV and have/plan to buy online - The PS5 DE is the way to go. The asinine pricing of the Series S in India makes this particular situation an easy call in my opinion. Yeah games will be expensive, but if you have the budget to buy a 4k TV maybe you can afford it. If not, you could always wait and pick up the games later when they go on sale. Kind of a bummer, but you'd still be playing on better hardware and actually putting your 4k TV to good use, instead of wasting its potential on the Series S. Maybe this will change if the Series S ever comes down in price, but for now this is the easiest reco to make.
If you don't own a 4k TV and are strapped for cash(maybe you lost your job during rona), get the Series S. The Series S gets a lot of flak from hardcore gamers but IMO it is still a great gaming machine. for those upgrading from the Xbox One/One S/PS4/PS4 Slim it will still be a huge upgrade. Don't get carried away by 4k Marketing. 1440p gaming still looks great, and if the Series S can keep its promises of 1440p 60fps or even 1080p w/ Raytracing, games will look gorgeous and play great. Game Pass is also phenomenal value, and you get to play way more games for cheaper than on the PS4.
If neither of these statements are close to your use case, don't consider the Series S or the PS5 DE. The PS5 DE might be a tempting buy for those who own discless collections and want to save money, but that would be a mistake. You're probably going to be playing on this console for at least 5-6 years, and are going to buy many games in that time. With PS5 games priced as highly as they are, you're almost certainly going to make up the difference and more buying expensive non-regionally priced games. The PS5 might cost more, but buying physical will save you a ton of money over digital purchases.
XSX vs PS5 is kind of a toss-up. XSX is compact and more powerful and is overall better value with Game Pass, but doesn't have many next-gen games to play at launch(most Xbox heavy hitters are landing much later). Meanwhile the PS5 has Demon's Souls and Miles Morales which comes with Spider Man Remastered. Personally I would go with an XSX in this situation because it's better value and will probably have more exclusives down the line(I don't mind waiting), but if you're eager to get on the next-gen hype train as soon as possible or are already invested in the PS ecosystem/you just love PS games that much, the PS5 is also a pretty good purchase. Definitely the hardest call to make.
If you are much into WRPGS, go with Xbox. Microsoft has a solid lock on western RPG's this generation, with titles like Fable, Avowed, Fallout, Elder Scrolls, and Starfield. Given that Sony doesn't really make these sorts of games themselves and there aren't that many big WRPG devs left(CDPR and BioWare are pretty much the only ones I think?), you're better off going with Xbox if you're a fan of these sorts of games.

Closing Thoughts

Phew! This write-up turned out to be a lot longer than I had initially expected. It was quite a bit of work writing it, and I did quite a bit of research to ensure that it's as accurate as possible. I'm still human so I've probably made some mistakes still, so please feel free to correct me if you spot an error.
And of course, these are ultimately just my thoughts on the matter as someone who owns and plays on both consoles right now, as well as PC, and will probably end up getting both new consoles down the line. I've tried to keep this as unbiased as possible, but if you feel I've misrepresented something or left something out, do weigh in in the comments and help other people out.
Tl;Dr - Consoles good, console war bad.

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DS3 PS4 I'm able to play online without playstation plus, can anyone explain? So I got on this game the first time and wandered around a while getting used to the new mechanics and stuff. I haven't had playstation plus in months so I didn't really bother noticing that I was online and could read messages and see bloodstains and ghosts. Final Fantasy 14 is a subscription-based MMORPG set in the Final Fantasy world that you can play online with your friends without needing PS Plus. This is because the game is run on Square Enix PS4 Online - I can play online without PS Plus account, is that correct? MrJinxy 21. Posted 31st Oct 2015. Picked up a PS4 last weekend and I assumed that to play online you needed a PS+ account, that right? Anyway, so far Killzone, COD and Battlefield Hardline have let me play online? 5 of the best online multiplayer games on PS4 you can play without PS Plus. 5) Hawken. Hawken is what you get after you mix Titanfall with Pacific Rim and the best Mecha anime and manga. I am just totally in awe that I have to purchase an unwanted PlayStation Plus account just to be able to play Star Wars Battlefront online on my Ps4. This is absurd. There's really no substantive single-player mode. The ones that are offered are fun for bout 20 minutes. I've always played online wit... If a PS Plus member registers a PS4™ as their Primary system, anyone who uses that system has the ability to play online multiplayer, regardless of whether or not they are PS Plus members. Additionally, as many as four players can simultaneously play online on the same console, even if the 3 additional players don't subscribe to PlayStation Plus. Something weird is happening. I can magically play online without PS PLUS and I'm sure as hell that I don't have a PS PLUS subscription. I mean, I used the free 14 days trial and then the 2 free days and that's all. The majority of the time most online/multiplayer activity on PS4 games requires a Playstation Plus membership. Same thing applies for Xbox Gold membership for Xbox games. But not always the case as the Battle Royale does NOT require PS Plus. Source here. Hello guys, a few weeks ago I bought Plants vs Zombies Garden Warfare on my ps4 but i can't even play the game because I don't have ps plus then i can't connect to EA servers. I'm thinking about to buy Plants vs Zombies GW2 if i could play the game offline mode without ps plus. I would like to know Now the game has gone buy-to-play, which means you can buy the base game and play it without having to worry about a subscription either way. The four DLC packs that are available can be bought piecemeal with crowns if you want, or you can subscribe to ESO Plus for $14.99 a month to get access to all that content plus receive additional perks like 10% experience and gold gain.

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Best PS4 and PS5 games You Can Play Online Without

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PSA: On PS4 you can play Brawlhalla ONLINE without Ps Plus

Lockdown 3.0 Things to do, plus help and support.