The PlayStation Plus free titles and Xbox Live Games with Gold have been announced for November 2017. It’s time to pit the collections against each other to see which console comes out on top with November’s offerings. Welcome to PS Plus vs Games with Gold!
Let’s take a look at the contestants. First up, the PS Plus Instant Game Collection.
- Worms Battlegrounds (PS4)
- Bound (PS4)
- R-Type Dimensions (PS3)
- Rag Doll Kung Fu: Fists of Plastic (PS3)
- Dungeon Punks (Vita, PS4)
- Broken Sword 5: The Serpent’s Curse (Episodes 1 & 2) (PS Vita)
- Until Dawn: Rush of Blood (PSVR)
Next, here are the Xbox Games with Gold that you can grab on Microsoft’s platform next month.
- Trackmania Turbo (Xbox One)
- Tales From the Borderlands: The Complete First Season (Xbox One)
- NiGHTS into Dreams (Xbox 360, Xbox One w/ backwards compatibility)
- Deadfall Adventures (Xbox 360, Xbox One w/ backwards compatibility)
PS Plus Free Games October 2017
Sony comes out of the gate swinging. Not only are they continuing to support PS4, PS3, and Vita with two games each, they’re throwing in a bonus for PSVR owners in the form of Until Dawn: Rush of Blood, one of the better reviewed launch titles for the VR headset last year. That’s seven total games this month, if you’ve got every platform. Even if you don’t, that’s a hefty serving no matter which Sony platforms you’re sporting.
Bound is one of the PS4 free games, and with PSVR support, that actually makes two VR compatible games this month. We weren’t too sold on it when we reviewed it, but there’s a beautiful art style, deep story, and unique concept, even if it tries a little too hard to be a Journey clone. Worms Battlegrounds might be just another Worms game (and one that was free via Games with Gold in the past), but you can’t deny that they can be quite fun and addicting to play. Dungeon Punks is an arcade brawler that does very little with the genre, but still provides an enjoyable experience.
The rest of the games include a point-and-click adventure on the Vita (that is not cross-buy with PS4, even though there’s a PS4 release), a decent PS3 arcade game, and an ancient, silly fighting game that was actually given out free on the PlayStation Network back in 2009. If anything, keeping PS3 releases in the Plus lineup is really highlighting just how old that console is getting.
Xbox Live Games with Gold October 2017
Games with Gold gets a treat with Trackmania Turbo, a fun and exciting arcade racer that is worth checking out for the cool price of nothing. They also get Tales From the Borderlands’ complete first season, which, in my opinion, is the best Borderlands there is. Seeing that universe from a different perspective makes it something special, though we ought to note that Tales From the Borderlands was already free on Plus back in May of this year.
Deadfall Adventures is an Uncharted wannabe that is currently sitting at a pathetic 43 on Metacritic, so not much more needs to be said about that. NiGHTS into Dreams is a classic Sega Saturn game that released back in 1996, remade for PS2 in 2008, and then ported to PSN and Xbox Live in 2012. It’s a great throwback that will tickle the nostalgia of 90s Sega gamers.
Which Lineup is Better?
Sony has a real flagship this month with Until Dawn: Rush of Blood, handing out another free VR game to Plus subscribers. The catch is, it’s a bonus and not one of this month’s main titles (it will actually stay free until January 2, 2018). If we don’t consider this as part of the monthly pitch, then it’s really down to Bound and Worms duking it out against Trackmania Turbo and Tales From the Borderlands. It’s a close race between the lineups, neither really offering the slam dunk this month, but I will have to say that the Sony bonuses edge out what Microsoft is offering. It almost seems an insult for Microsoft to be giving Deadfall Adventures, a notoriously bad game, but then again, Sony is reusing a decade old freebie from before the days of Plus for one of their PS3 titles, so it’s basically a dead heat.
Neither lineup is really bad this month, but they aren’t really offering anything to write home about either. Sony having a PSVR exclusive, and a PSVR compatible game do help them to cover four platforms worth of games, with at least two games for each platform. All four of Microsoft’s can be played on an Xbox One, but the question with at least one of them is, would you really want to? Without the big headliners to sell it this month, Sony takes it with Until Dawn: Rush of Blood spearheading the march into the holiday gaming season.
Wondering how December’s lineups will fare next to one another? Come back next month when we pit the newly announced lineups against one another in PS Plus vs Games with Gold. Do you agree with our verdict? Which lineup do you think is better?
