PS Plus vs. Xbox Games With Gold: Which Free Games Are Better? (April 2019)

PS Plus vs. Xbox Games With Gold: Which Free Games Are Better (April 2019)?

Sony PS Plus

This month, The Surge headlines PS Plus’ freebie offering. This sci-fi Souls-like sets itself apart from other games in this pseudo-genre with a futuristic setting.

It makes a nice change from the tired gothic setting we’ve become used to, but don’t expect the same quality of level design, world-building, and attention to detail that you’d get in a FromSoftware game.

The Surge’s strength is in its combat, which is very sharp. It plays at a slightly faster pace than a Souls game, and the variety of weapons keep things interesting throughout the 30 hour or so campaign. The Surge is a copycat, certainly, but it isn’t a cookie-cutter — it’s worth checking out, even for Souls veterans.

Your other freebie title for the month is Conan Exiles. This gritty survival game was very rough around the edges when it first launched last year, but it’s developed a bit of a cult following.

Developer Funcom has continued to support the game with updates and DLC, fleshing out the experience with more story and content.

You can expect plenty of sex and violence throughout the narrative. The survival gameplay is solid, allowing for players to get really creative with how the approach crafting and building. The combat is also pretty satisfying and pacey, too.

You can play Conan Exiles in single-player or co-operative, but the game is clearly designed for its 40-player multiplayer experience.

PS Plus April:

• The Surge
• Conan Exiles

PS Plus vs. Xbox Games With Gold: Which Free Games Are Better (April 2019)?

Xbox Games with Gold

Headling this month’s Game with Gold line-up on Xbox one is The Technomancer. This open-world RPG is inspired by games like Mass Effect 2 and Skyrim, but it never reaches anywhere the heights of those genre-defining titles.

The combat, narrative, dialog and skill choices all echo those games, but it doesn’t bring them together with the same finesse, and it’s held back by a lack of polish.

Still, you’ll find the quirky post-apocalyptic setting compelling. It combines magic and science in weird and interesting ways that make for a nice change of scene from the generic fantasy settings we’re used to seeing in the genre.

Outcast: Second Contract is your other Xbox One freebie, a remake of the original 1999 open-world action game. Nearly twenty years after the debut of the original, some elements of Outcast haven’t aged all that well.
Where it was a trend-setter, pushing the boundaries of graphics and video game design, it looks somewhat b-grade these days, and you can expect a little bit of clunkiness to the mechanics.

That said, Outcast is still offering an interesting alien world to explore, with oodles of content to sink your teeth into. Later in April, Xbox One players can download Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2, a brilliant third-person shooter that incorporates tower defense mechanics.

There are stacks of weird and wonderful zombie and garden soldiers to choose from in either single or multiplayer modes.

Elsewhere, Xbox One players can still take advantage of this month’s 360 titles thanks to backward compatibility. That’s a good thing, too, as the lineup totally rocks. The original Star Wars Battlefront 2 is on offer, arguably the best Battlefront title in the entire franchise.

Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 is also available on both systems. This tactical action game has plenty to offer, particularly for those just coming off The Division 2 and looking for something similar.

Games with Gold April:

• The Technomancer (Xbox One) – Available: April 1 – 30
• Outcast: Second Contact (Xbox One) – Available: April 16 – May 15
• Star Wars Battlefront 2 (Xbox One, Xbox 360) – Available: April 1 to 15
• Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter 2 (Xbox One, Xbox 360) – Available: April 16 – 31
• Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2 (Xbox One) – Available: March 16 – April 15

PS Plus vs. Xbox Games With Gold: Which Free Games Are Better (April 2019)?

Who Wins?

Last month marked the first of Sony’s reduced PS Plus service, having removed the PS3 and PS Vita games that had been a part of the package for years. Although we’d known about the plan for a long time, the reality of losing four free games per month hadn’t quite sunk in.

That’s partly because two superb games in The Witness and Modern Warfare Remastered in March helped soften the blow. This month, we can’t quite say the same. The lack of games has really hurt Sony’s service in comparison to Xbox Games with Gold, because that’s really what separates them this month.

The headline games for both current generation consoles are pretty comparable, but Games with Gold’s three other games, which include the brilliant Battlefront 2, tip the balance firmly in its favor.

If Sony is going to continue offering just two games per month, they’re going to need to be pretty darn good to keep pace with Xbox Games with Gold in 2019. The value of having three more games per month will be tough to compete with unless Sony can pull out quality AAA games every month.