Sessh

I have an update on this whole thing: the situation got resolved in my favour.

I'd gotten a call early last week from a PS support supervisor who mentioned "we've seen you've also gone and mentioned the situation on twitter already" in the second sentence (first sentence was making sure he called the correct person) and no mention of the regulatory bodies I'd also gotten in contact with. He said the case would get reevaluated, but I'd have to wait another one to two weeks for an answer about what exactly is going to happen.

Today, without any further notice (via phone/email or whatever) on what would happen, I've received a package containing a PS5 and a note simply stating the the defective console has gotten replaced with a new one. Sadly my AC: Valhalla disc is missing (and isn't mentioned anywhere), so I'll have to contact support again, but hey, the big problem at least got resolved already.

Since the twitter thing got mentioned, I can only assume that actually was the reason they did anything (like actually looking at what's even broken) - which is crazy to me, but here we are. Anyway, I just wanted to thank everyone here again for the kind words and for liking and retweeting.

@cornbredx: Ah shit, I thought it was wrong, but was too lazy to actually look it up. :D

@efesell:I actually hadn't thought of him yet, but I might just write him also, thanks.

Again, thanks for all the well-wishes and general tips, everyone.

@bigsocrates: Sure, but that would still totally suck and also would leave my AC: Valhalla disc trapped and unreadable for who knows how long.

Yeah, I've now gotten in contact with the respective EU services, and we'll see what will happen now.

Also, yes, the horizontal stand is complete nonsense, not that you could ever actually fit that thing anywhere when it actually is horizontal.

@av_gamer: That also sound like a really dumb situation. I just don't understand why the can't be more flexible in their work flows. Sure, it's a giant corporation and all, but that shit just creates extra work for their customers and themselves. It just makes no sense to me whatsoever.

@osail: Thanks so much for even trying to help google for the correct consumer rights group. I've already gotten in contact with the correct group this morning and I'll now see what will happen.

@spacemanspiff00: Man, that's also a real shitshow. Glad it kinda worked out for you in the end, though, or did you never get the extra charge back?

@sweep: I did email the bombcast, since even if it doesn't help out, I just think it's another story where the guys can have an interesting discussion about it. Unfortunately Brad didn't chose the mail, so now I've sent it to the beastcast, let's see if it gets read there.

I've also tried to post the same thing on reddit, since that's the place you always hear about "causing a social media uproar", unfortunately the mods there simply removed my post without any comment whatsoever. So no luck there.

And, yeah, not gonna happen.

@isomeri: Thank you for looking that up/posting it. That's actually the organization I ended up contacting this morning. Hopefully they can help out.

@av_gamer: Yeah, in general I'm quite averse to cause friction or try to get anything done via really dumb means like social media complaints, but here we are. Local media would be my next step, if Twitter and the EU customer rights organisation doesn't help. At this point I kinda feel, that the effort sonn won't be worth the money (even though its a fucking lot of money), but honestly it's now more of matter of principle for me.

@apewins: Happy that your situation got worked out in your favour eventually, but it's really depressing to hear more and more of these dumb stories. It's real fucked up how badly a customer can get treated without any real reason for it.

@noboners: Yeah, thanks, it's almost like the "fancy" design was a mistake after all. Especially since I had to remove the plates myself, which led to one of them becoming loose and was what probably caused the scratches in transit.

And, yes, I can either pay them 270€ (about 300$) for them to fix the issue or they'll send it back as is - with the disc still stuck inside (and unreadable btw).

Thanks for reading this messy thing, duders, and for the well wishes.

I always knew corporations sucked, but I still don't understand the reasoning behind stuff like this. All they are doing is driving people to the competition, who already have a very strong offering right now. And thisfor a repair that, I would assume, would basically cost them nothing.

Hello everyone, I hope this is the right place to post this.

TL;DR: Playstation won't get repaired (broken disc drive) since the faceplates got slightly damaged from the return process (see pictures below). Bad support keeps driving me nuts afterwards. Feel free to help out, if you want.

I have a really stupid problem with the Playstation support, which I'll now tell you in all it's fun details. I've also tweeted this story to the Playstation-Twitter-Account and thought maybe you want to help a fellow duder out, by liking and retweeting said tweet (I hate that this is what I have to resort too, but here we are). It would mean a lot to me, thank you, but if you can't/won't do that, I'll simply thank you for you time and patience in reading this story.

My twitter handle is "Sessh0" Twitter Link (first three in German, the other three in English).

I really just want this nonsense to stop, the entire situation is giving me serious anxiety attacks...

Okay, now to the "good" part:

End of November: I'd gotten lucky and managed to overpay a bit at a retailer (who offered the Playstation at a higher price) for my PS4. I was really happy, since I was generally having a hard time (which right now everyone does, I guess) and thought: great, things are starting to look up. I was wrong.

Beginning of March: The Playstation started to sound a bit weird when entering a disc in the drive.

March, 10th: The Playstation first didn't want to take a disc anymore, which got fixed by a restart. Now, though, it wouldn't eject the disc anymore

1st call to PS-Support: Please try to manually eject the disc by taking of the faceplates and turning a screw on the disc drive, also please reset the system software. If that doesn't help, please send the Playstation in for repairs.

As you can guess, the manual eject and system reset did nothing so I had to send the console in. From taking of the faceplate, one of the plates now felt a bit loose and didn't perfectly stick to the console anymore (already a great thing).

I've done everything as specified on their support website: DON'T use the original packaging; wrap it in bubble wrap multiple times; use a heavy carton; fill the rest with packaging material, so the console doesn't move.

March, 23rd: I get an email from the support telling me that my warranty is voided since the Playstation is damaged. Please note the pictures here. One of the curved face plates, now seems to be slightly more curved (probably because of the bubble wrap). The other (or same one) seems to have gotten some dirt or scratches on it somehow (probably rough handling by the postal service).

2nd call to PS-Support: I talk for 30-40 minutes with someone who basically tells me: bad luck, since it's damaged we won't do a thing. You can pay us 270€ to still fix the thing or send it back. I argue that this makes no sense, since the drive is broken, not the faceplates and this his obviously nothing to do with each other. I get told "Well, when the plates are broken, you could have spilled water on the Playstation and that might have broken the drive". Right, that sounds likely. In the end the support person finally agrees to try to do another appeal with their "external" repair service, but she doesn't think it will do anything, since they aren't even part of Sony. What this has to do with anything at all, I really don't know.

Still March, 23rd: Pretty depressed and unhappy, I decide to see if the post office can be held liable for the damage, since in Germany every sent package is automatically insured for 500€. They tell me I need proof, that they are at fault and I need to send in the packaging or at least pictures of the packaging to decide if anything might be wrong.

3rd call to PS-Support: I ask if they are taking pictures of the packaging when it arrives, which gets confirmed. I then ask to please send me those pictures, so I can also start the process of trying to hold the postal service liable. Support person also tells me that a supervisor will call me that same day to further discuss the issue.

March, 24th: The call form the supervisor never came, instead I get an email stating "What do you want, you already have the pictures of your broken console?"

4th call to PS-Support: I tell them that I needed different pictures, and that by now I'm really not enjoying their support, so ask, again, for a callback from a supervisor. Support person tells me I'll get a call today, until 6 p.m. No one ever calls me.

5th call to PS-Support (6:30 p.m.): I call back to ask why nobody called me, once again. This support person now tells me, that they never guarantee when someone will call at all. I tell them, that that's not what the other people told me, but okay, fine. I'm not happy, but fine. Support person then says: "I'll try to talk with someone, please hold the line." After about 6 or 7 minutes, the line simply cuts.

6th call to PS-Support: I get through, but the person immediately disconnects the phone. Maybe the same person from call 5?

7th, and so far final, call to PS-Support: I tell the same damn story for the 7th time. Support person says "Okay, yes, someone will call you, at some point, since we can't ever really tell when a supervisor will have time at all." I tell them: "Okay, fine, I get it, but can I at least tell you when I'll be available for a call-back, since I'm having a job besides talking to the Sony support." Person says: "Well, you can, but the supervisor will just call whenever, and when he does, you had better pick up, otherwise we won't call again." I say "Okay, that's great. It's not like I'm the wronged party, but sure, please do, thank you."

Thing is though, by this point I've had enough. Their service seems to be the literal worst! So now I'm trying to escalate things on social media, even though I hate to do this, but then again, maybe this will actually work. Which is were GB comes in (I'll also post this to every other damn gaming site - internationally and locally) to hopefully get some traction on those tweets.

So once again, please like and retweet if you can. If not, thanks for reading this entire thing - even just writing it down has had a cathartic, healing effect to calm me down a little. Anxiety sucks.

Stay safe out there, everyone. Thank you.

Yeah, I think the Wiki seems to sadly slowly be dying. I used to do quite a bit of work (not as much as others, but still), but kinda lost all motivation in the last couple years.

From the random chatter from the GB crew on various streams it also seems that the Wiki just ain't a priority for them anymore either. They practically never mention it anymore, which is a shame, and probably also one of the reasons for the decline.

Here are a couple suggestions. The sub genres vary a lot, so I'll provide some information, but most of that stuff you should really experience for yourself if you are at all interested in it.

Swamp Thing (Alan Moore run) - At the surface a simple story about a man turned into a weird swamp monster, in reality a psychological, surreal and intellectual (sometimes a bit pretentious) classic of comic book literature. It has very slight super hero tie-ins at the beginning, but those are quickly written out and non-important to the overall story.

Hellblazer (Original Series) - Another true classic are the stories featuring everyone's favourite magician and drunk, John Constantine. A very British series, with some amazing writing for the first 150 or so issues (neatly collected in 10 to 12 issue trades). There's a lot of occultism, witchcraft, serial killers and just generally shitty stuff going on, and Constantine is a great protagonist for it all, cursing, tricking and fucking his way throughout England and America.

Locke & Key - +1 from the previous suggestion. At its core a story about the loss of a parent, and young sibling coming together in a new (obviously spooky) house. The mystery surrounding the house and all the keys (magic keys, doing some very weird shit) is very well done, and most importantly, tied up well.

Harrow County - A story about a young girl who might or might not be a witch, with an evil twin, who again might or might not be a witch, set in a rural town featuring superstitious people and deep, dark woods. It's great and the artwork is top notch.

American Vampire - A great vampire story, if you are in the mood for one, following an outlaw cowboy, Skinner Sweet, turned vampire (and some of his "off-spring") throughout the decades. The historical American backdrops (1880, 1920, 1940 etc.) keep things fresh and fun throughout the entire run.

East of West - An alternate history (the US gets separated into 7 different, huge states) story about the apocalypse, with lots of political intrigue, dark humour and gorgeous artwork. Death, on of the Four Riders of the Apocalypse finds love and ends up at odds with his fellow Riders. It's basically a political, Horror-Western.

The Walking Dead - You should know this one, so I'll not go into it too much. The tv show is shit, but the comics are amazing, even better than the first couple TellTale games. Get the first Omnibus Edition for cheap and read what is probably the best zombie story ever told.

Preacher - Very snarky, very dark, very funny and very bloody - that's Preacher in a nutshell. It's a story about a Priest, who heard the word of god, and doesn't like what he hears. He ends up wanting to confront god, traveling with his on/off girlfriend and an Irish vampire, while being antagonised by fictional religious groups, a boy called Arseface (because he shot his own face "off" with a shotgun and now looks like, well, you get the idea) and a ton of Hillbilly assholes. It's not for everyone, but if you do like it, you'll probably find it to be one of your favourites.

From Hell - One-off story about Jack the Ripper. Very text-heavy and interwoven with lots of real info (and speculation) about the actual case. Not action heavy at all, but if you are in the mood for something more complex, this is it.

Ice Cream Man - A newer anthology story, about loads of different stuff, held together by a recurring, weird Ice Cream Truck guy. This series goes places.

Nailbiter - A story about different serial killers, one being more fucked up than the other. There's even some "reformed" ones, that are now just killing and mutilating animals instead. Unsettling and very gory.

Hack/Slash - A horror comedy, about a "final girl" (basically the last surviving person in a slasher flick) who starts hunting down serial killers, along with here friend, Vlad (who gets mistaken with serial killers a lot, because of his deformed appearance). Those serial killers quickly turn out to be real monsters, not just human ones. It is campy and features appearances by characters like Chucky the Murder Doll and Ash from Evil Dead. Very fun, if you like slasher flicks and comedy stuff.

Uzumaki - +1 to the Junji Ito recommendation. His stiff is very unsettling and weird, and definitely worth a read.

Hommunculus - Another manga, another weird one. The basic premise is one guy, getting a whole drilled in his head (trepanation procedure), and suddenly being able to see demons, ghosts, and most importantly, "the true nature of humans". It has quite a lot of social themes/observations obviously, but mostly it's just real fucked up fun.

I've liked a ton of racing games over the years, but the one I keep thinking about (and coming back to over and over) is Driver: San Francisco. The shift mechanic translates to pure fun in my opinion, especially in the fittingly chaotic multiplayer mode.