Next Wave of PS Plus, Games With Gold Titles Revealed

It seems like an excellent month to be a Vita owner as I think every one of those games is crossbuy. And those 360 games are the cream of the crop as well.

I was going to get the Binding of Isaac: RB on Steam, but I'll be damned if I don't get it for free in a week or two. That just made my day!

Oh snap Viva Pinata, I've been wanting to try that game. Volgarr is fantastic as well. Decent selection on PS Plus all around.

Four free games for the Vita this month (Frozen Synapse and Luftrausers are great, always wanted to try Escape Plan)

BoI Rebirth looks really sharp also. Good month, but not one retail release. You would think that they'd be willing to pull the trigger and release Killzone or Knack soon on PS+.

I WAS gonna buy Binding of Isaac but hot damn it's free! Good shit.

cool looking forward to it

@turboman said:

Sony's first-party lineup is still incredibly weak, so I bet they'll wait until that's fleshed out a bit before adding their launch games to PlayStation Plus.

Now that we're a year into the PS4's lifespan, I hope we'll start seeing more $60-at-release PS4 games get added to Instant Game Collection. I love most of this indie stuff, but some of both would be nice.

Super pumped for Volgarr. Just went back to rewatch the QL and will Breaking Brad for it soon, never watched it.

Wish Red Faction Guerilla had gone free a while back. Missed this one but loved the demos when they released...not really on my 360 much these days though. If people get on the multiplayer for a bit, might be worth firing it back up.

Luuuffftraauuserrss!?

(I love saying that name)

Hoping it's cross-buy with Vita!

Wow, Rebirth isn't even out yet until the 4th. PS4 owners are pretty lucky to get a new fantastic game for free. I already pre-ordered the game on Steam as soon as I could though so nbd for me.

This months GWG are actually fairly decent for a change. I'm pretty exhausted in the whole open world genre so I'm not sure I'll play Guerrilla after destroying a bunch of shit for a few mins. I can definitely see myself getting hooked on Viva Pinata though.

Well, looks like I'll finally be playing Binding of Isaac and Luftrausers. Already played Steamworld Dig, so that one's kinda useless to me, but it's a great game that people should play!

I saw Volgarr and got really excited, but then saw it was Xbox One. :'(

Viva Pinata!!! Woo!

Are you shittin me. I just bought luftrausers. I'm never buying an indie game again.

At first glance giving away BoI:Rebirth so soon after launch seems like a bad idea to me. But then I have no clue how much Edmund McMillen will get per download.

I basically worry and just want to man to succeed.

Volgarrrrrrr!

I might actually play Isaac now. Frozen Synapse is supposedly excellent so I'll have to check that out. For now Mercenary Kings seems amazing.

@niflhe: Cross-Buy is just the best thing ever. Especially when they do it retroactively and give me PS4 games I already bought years ago on PS3 when they get released anew.

@euler_riemann_zeta: PS+ games drop on the first Tuesday of the month. Enjoy next week.

@svirfneblin: It's actually the same day the game is releasing, which seems like it was on purpose. I'm willing to bet it was a fairly lucrative deal for him, as he's really pushing the game's PS4 and Vita versions. The game also sold gangbusters on Steam originally, and I'm sure it'll be the same story with Rebirth. Also, the secret videos he hides in his updates about the game have been hinting about Wii U and 3DS versions for the past few weeks. There are lots of avenues for sales of the game, it seems.

Wish BoI:R was free on Vita...

Hooray for free Binding of Issac! Always wanted to play it with a proper controller setup. (I know, I know, joy2key and whatnot, it's not the same.) Also, I like this article format for these announcements, thanks Patrick.

@mattgriffin: It is, it's cross-buy.

I played Volgarr and loved it on my PC but stopped halfway through for some reason.

That might be a good reason to start a new game!

With the launch of the PS4 and the requirement to buy PS+ to play online in the PS4 it seems they are now betting in indie titles in their PS+ catalogue, and no longer AAA games.

Personally I can see the Sony's effort bringing some of the best indie games they have on their consoles to the catalogue. Still it is not what I signed up for...

Of course I bought Luftrausers like less than a month ago... Well, it was on discount then, too.

YES, Isaac!

PS+ is amazing so far.

Both good offerings. Red Faction: Guerilla is one of the most fun games of last gen (not to mention the Quick Look that got me to check out Giant Bomb). And I'll finally get on Volgar!

And more/new BoI? Hell yes.

I think it's finally time to stop paying for plus.

Sure, I'll download those PS4 games. Probably wouldn't try them otherwise, but for free, why not?

Pretty top month all round. At least, I think it is.

hmm, not a big fan of both the PS Plus and Xbox Live Gold games this month.

As long as devs make money buying into this service I don't mind getting indie stuff for free almost straight out of the gate. I just don't want it to hurt them and sway them to stay Steam only.

PSN killing it as usual.

Holy crap, the Vita just got 6 awesome games for free this month. That machine is an indie paradise.

The Devs are making these deals voluntarily. Presumably they wouldn't be making them if they were unprofitable (and one would think that given how long these programs have been around the dev community has an idea of the economics of it.) Think about it. How many copies was Volgarr the Viking going to sell anyway? Plus after the games leave the service they have seeded the system with players so that when little Johnny gets his XBONE for Christmas and asks his buddy what he should get, that buddy is going to say "Volgarr the Viking is awesome" but by then it won't be free anymore. For a small indie studio it's hard to beat that kind of publicity and widespread player base.

True. I guess that makes sense - I didn't know the economics behind it so my reptile brain was saying "If I put out a new game, and it's completely free for a month, how the heck am I going to make money if all the people that want it get it for free?"

As a PS4 and Vita owner, I'm chuffed for this package.

Sweet! I've been wanting to play Steamworld Dig since I saw the quick look, I just never got around to buying it.

Has it been confirmed Frozen Synapse is cross-buy (or more specifically on both ps3 and vita instant game collection) for this month? Would be an even better month for vita if it is, it's not sold cross-buy but I heard that when Dragon's Crown was on plus they offered both versions despite it not being cross-buy.

So psyched for BoI:R, even if it's a game I've pumped a ton of hours into.

@mattgriffin: it is. from what i've read and heard, it's not crossbuy, but PS+ members get both versions. FUCK YEA

@vrikk:

My understanding is that the developers get some combination of an upfront payment and/or a per download payment. Let's say it costs $100,000 to port Volgarr to the XBONE. If Microsoft gives them an upfront payment of that $100,000 and 25 cents a download they are guaranteed a profit. Now let's say that 2 million people download the free game. That's a pretty darn nice profit, and that's ignoring the enhanced tail I mentioned earlier. I haven't hard of any Indie devs saying they got screwed over by participation in this program (at least lately.)

Red Faction: Guerrilla was awesome. Pick it up if you've got a 360 and haven't played it.

Anyone who never played Red Faction's multiplayer should pick the game up for free, get some friends together and check it out while there's other new players. It's an absolute blast and there's never been anything quite like it. I used to be completely obsessed and even made it into the top ten global leaderboards. I might have contributed to killing the game by teaming up with the best players and destroying anyone else who tried to play, but all those guys and girls are long gone. Enjoy it!

VIVAAAAAAAA PINAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAATA!!!!!!!!

I thought there might be some heavy hitters for Nov. and Dec. to encourage new signups for those that get a console this holiday season - so this looks like a really weak lineup. And as someone who bought all last gen consoles, has only bought a PS4 this gen and am planning to get an Xbox One with the new price cut - Microsoft really needs to step it up. Only offering 3 games to Sony's 6? They should at least be doing 2 Xbox One games and 2 360 games.