My wife and I finally got to check out The Invite the other day and I cannot stop thinking about it. I sincerely believe that The Invite might be the best film about marriage and sex that I’ve seen since maybe Before Midnight. It’s certainly the funniest I think I’ve ever seen about the subject. Some minor spoilers below (though this is not really a spoiler kind of movie) in what ended up being kind of an essay on modern long-term marriages.

For the uninitiated, The Invite is a 2026 comedy/drama starring Seth Rogen, Olivia Wilde, Penélope Cruz, and Edward Norton. A remake of the Spanish film Sentimental (which itself already has four other remakes and is actually an adaptation of a stage play), it’s a chamber-piece about Angela and Joe, a couple whose marriage is on thin ice. Angela is a depressed, anxious stay-at-home mom, and Joe is a miserable, failed musician working as a band teacher. Joe arrives home to find Angela has invited the sexy and mysterious upstairs neighbors, Piña and Hawk, over for dinner, and to show off their recently renovated apartment.

Angela and Joe seem to be at a point in their relationship where every second sentence is a barb, and every kind gesture is misconstrued as a barb. Furthermore, Joe is harboring deep resentments toward their upstairs neighbors for the overly-earnest conversations Hawk likes to try to have with Joe in the elevator, and the riotous sex they sound like they are having every single night. Piña’s loud orgasms are a frequent topic of conversation, and it is clearly reminding both of them of all the sex they aren’t having.

When the neighbors arrive and the drinks and conversations start to flow, it isn’t long before Piña and Hawk reveal that they’re interested in a good deal more than just the soufflé in the oven and a tour of their apartment. It’s at this point everything Joe and Angela haven’t said to each other comes to the surface, and they’re forced to come to terms with what their marriage has become, and what it could become.

The film asks questions of our characters, and by extension it asks questions of us: How do you nurture desire in a long term relationship? How does desire and attraction ebb and flow and what does that mean and how do you adapt with it? Who is responsible for our happiness and how? How do we maintain our individuality and independence while building up a foundation that makes up the best and worst parts of both of us? What becomes of that foundation if we don't nurture our relationship with ourselves or our partner?

When it’s revealed towards the end of the film that Angela and Joe have not had sex in over a year, it’s a puzzle piece falling into place. All the venom, all the animosity; it finally makes sense. But The Invite is clear-eyed enough to emphasize that these individuals don’t just need to get laid, they need to love themselves again. Piña asks Angela, “Would you fuck yourself? Would you have sex with yourself?” Angela can’t even speak. She’s never even considered it. Piña then asks Joe the same. His answer? “All I do is fuck myself. I’m the only person who fucks me, currently.” He can’t even genuinely engage in the question. Instead? A crack about a sexless marriage. Anything to avoid looking inward at the mean-spirited, closed off man he has become. What happens if we don’t nurture ourselves? What happens if we don’t nurture our relationship? gestures

The Invite is incisive about the lies we tell ourselves, the lies we tell each other, and even the ways we present ourselves to the outside world. Piña and Hawk aren’t the perfect couple either. When tensions get too high toward the end, something snaps and we see the façade of the sultry and evocative couple collapse, even if just for a moment. Piña's imperfect English is corrected rudely by Hawk, and combined with his insistence throughout the evening on pushing the foursome proposition despite every red flag Joe and Angela were waving, we see that even they have their moments of marital disharmony. But the way they fight and come back together stands in stark contrast to the collapsing marriage they walked in on.

The proposition for a sexual adventure shared between two couples… swinging, ethical non-monogamy, whatever you want to call it… It’s almost beside the point. You could make the argument that the film presents monogamy as doomed, and ethical non-monogamy as the way, but it’s not so simple. What we’re really seeing is a couple that allows for the possibility of personal and relational expansion (Hawk’s incredible monologue about the origins of his name, his late wife’s fantasy life, and his regret over the way he “shut down her attempt to live more boldly,” is the highlight of the film for me) and a couple that has shut themselves off from each other and any sense of the individual. Angela and Joe have let themselves become smaller, meaner, and less alive.

This, I believe, is the film’s real thesis: A couple does not need to become swingers to keep a relationship fresh and vibrant and expansive, but one might take a few lessons from that relational framework. Being open to knowing and celebrating your partner’s desires, being able to talk about fantasies with love and curiosity, being open to new experiences within consensual boundaries, being unafraid of change within yourself and your partner.

When it’s revealed that Angela would occasionally walk naked past a window that she knew Hawk might see through, Piña reveres her boldness: “Do you know how many women let go of their erotic aspirations for good? Do you know how difficult it is, what she’s doing, that she’s trying to connect with that part that she had lost? Good for you.” The framework here is clear: we must refuse to go slack as individuals, and as couples.

I know this sounds very dour and serious, but I'd be doing this film a great disservice if I didn't mention just how damn funny The Invite is. This goes back to Olivia Wilde’s outstanding sense of comedic timing: in the edit, in the visual frame, and as an actor. There are excellent visual gags, delightful back-and-forths between everyone, and it never lets the tension get to such an unbearable place that it can’t cut through it with a great laugh (Rooibos, anyone?)

The Invite stands up there with some of the best movies about marriage and sex that I've seen in a long time. I think it should be required viewing for just about any couple in a long term relationship. Its perspective on desire and self-worth within relational dynamics is somehow both timeless and of-the-moment (and might explain why it’s gotten FIVE REMAKES in just a few short years, with another on the way). The Invite exposes the raw nerve that many long-term couples learn to avoid touching and dares you to press on it anyway.

--

Also would like to say that this was in no way edited or written with AI or LLMs. As a moderator of several large subreddits, the last thing I'd ever want is to contribute to the cesspool of AI-slop that has plagued the internet lately. Spellcheck, wife, and friends helped me re-think a few parts over the course of a few days.

Dolby Vision 2 will be available first on some 2026 Hisense TVs | The Verge (Gift Link)

Some choice quotes from the article:

>After being announced last September, Dolby Vision 2 is rolling out to TVs, starting with the 2026 Hisense UX, UR9, UR8, and U7. TCL and Philips will be adding Dolby Vision 2 support to select TVs later this year.

[...]

>Like Dolby Vision, both tiers of Dolby Vision 2 require special hardware; currently the only Dolby Vision 2 SoC is the MediaTek Pentonic 800. Older Dolby Vision TVs without the necessary hardware cannot be updated to use Dolby Vision 2, although they can still display Dolby Vision 2 content and will just ignore the extra metadata.

[...]

>According to Chris Turkstra, vice president of home devices at Dolby Laboratories, the announced Hisense TVs should be fully updated with Dolby Vision 2 by the end of September, with the vast majority complete by the end of August. But this is still just the beginning of the Dolby Vision 2 rollout. In order to fully utilize Dolby Vision 2, the content needs to be encoded with Dolby Vision 2 metadata during the post-production process.

>Right now, Peacock, Canal+, and iQiyi will encode with Dolby Vision 2, and other studios are working on implementing it in their post-production workflows.

>There’s also the competing HDR10+ dynamic metadata standard that announced its HDR10+ Advanced update last fall, shortly after Dolby. It includes the same features as Dolby Vision 2 — like enhanced brightness control, local tone mapping, and support for motion smoothing metadata — and is supported by Samsung and Panasonic (two of the founders of the tech), as well as Hisense, TCL, Amazon Prime Video, and Roku. Even though HDR10+ Advanced is royalty-free (Dolby Vision requires a license), I expect Dolby Vision 2 to have wider and more immediate adoption, since companies jumped on Dolby Vision when it came out.

>LG and Sony have not yet announced support for Dolby Vision 2, but I expect both will begin including it on some of their 2027 models. (Samsung will never support Dolby Vision because of its investment in HDR10+). Since Dolby Vision 2 requires new TVs, it’ll be a long while before it fully supplants its predecessor in the market. I think Dolby Vision 2 will be nice to have, but since we’re still at the beginning of its implementation, I wouldn’t put off getting a new TV just for it.

First photo and last photos (of the red flower, and the white with pink in the middle) are bulbs that my wife planted that are finally blooming long after the other bulbs bloomed. Her colleague at work just left a large batch of random bulbs in the break room with a "take whatever you want and plant them" sign.

The middle photo is a purple/green vine-like plant we got from Trader Joes a few years ago. It was kept in a planter on her desk for a long time and it grew a lot but eventually became pot-bound and was dying. We thought it was dead. In a last ditch effort I suggested we move it to a larger planter and just leave it outside, see what happens. And now it's thriving. We've never see it do so well and now flowers are blooming from it.

What are these plants growing in our yard?

Hey fellow physical media lovers! The results of the poll I submitted to r/4kbluray and other physical media subs are in! And wow they all really came through. Almost 400 responses, which is roughly double what previous polls have gotten. And just like the previous two polls, the story told here is still pretty clear. But with nearly double the respondents, and with the passage of time we're able to get a whole lot more granular.

In the polls I've done previously, I was able to post the results of those polls here on r/hometheater, so hopefully that's still cool!

First off, total transparency: here is the complete, unedited .csv straight from Google Forms.

Disclaimers:

1 - I used Microsoft Copilot via Microsoft Excel to help me collate these numbers, as I'm a complete dunce when it comes to spreadsheets otherwise, and me don't math well. So please, please PLEASE feel free to audit these numbers, take the spreadsheet and do your own Excel magic.

2 - This is a self-selected community poll, not a lab test, so people with problems are often more motivated to respond. It's also still pretty damn small. I sure hope there are more than 400 people who love this hobby as much as we do. I want more people and more data next year!

3 - Some of these players have really small samples (UB-9000, UB-420, Oppo, etc), which can skew the ultimate percentages.

4 - There were some other quirks with how some respondents entered information, i.e. 8 people answered “I don’t currently use a standalone 4K player,” but half of them then specified a PS5 or Xbox in the very next question anyway. Things like that made precision a bit difficult.

With those disclaimers in mind, lets get to the data!

TL;DR: The Sony UBP-X700 is still the problem child, the Panasonic UB-820 is still champ, and the pricey UB-9000 posted the cleanest numbers (small sample though). The PlayStation 5 and Oppo are far and away the most popular "other players" people are using, and in fact the "other" group was actually the MOST reliable in the whole poll (97.8% rated reliable), with Oppo the overall standout at 91.7% "very reliable" and the PS5 a strong player with a reported 76.5% reliability. Ultimately though, nothing here overturns what we found the last two polls though.

Sony X700: 77.7% of X700 owners reported at least some kind of issue (103 people used one). Now, important caveat, this year we used a graded scale ("no issues / minor occasional / recurring or serious") instead of a simple yes/no, so that 77.7% includes people who just had the occasional hiccup. If we count ONLY recurring or serious problems, the X700 drops to about 23%. That stricter number lines up much better with the ~50/50 "had issues vs didn't" split we saw in the older binary polls. Either way though, it's the least reliable player we polled, and the triple-layer layer-transition freeze is still the #1 complaint.

Panasonic UB-820: The UB-820 remains the community's go-to. It's the single most-used MAIN player at 43.4% of respondents (171 people), and its any-issue rate for anyone who has ever used one was 34.4% (and remember that includes minor hiccups) compared to the X700's 77.7%. If we're talking strict/serious issues only, it's down around 8%. It's not literally flawless but for a mainstream, reasonably-priced player (at least compared to a UB-9000!) it's the safe recommendation, same as the last few years.

Everything in between: The X800M2 landed at 62% any-issue (worse than the Panasonics but better than the X700). The UB-420 and UB-450 both sit around 37-40% any-issue and are solid budget picks. The UB-450 in particular had very few serious complaints (only ~3% recurring/serious).

The OTHER Players: When I had Copilot clean up and consolidate all the free-text answers (merging PS5/ps5/PlayStation 5, all the Oppo 203 spellings, etc.), the "other" category is really "game consoles + Oppo." The PS5 was mentioned 47 times, Oppo UDP-203 16 times, and Xbox 11 times. And then a few one-or-two-mention niche players. And as I mentioned above: the "other" players are the MOST reliable group in the whole poll: 97.8% of the 45 people who main an "other" player rated them reliable (very + mostly), with exactly ONE serious failure reported (a single Panasonic DP-UB150 that died). Oppo is the standout of the entire poll at 88.9% "very reliable," and the PS5 is a strong 4K player at 73.3% "very reliable." The only "other" devices that drew any consistent gripes were the LG UBK90 and Xbox, but those were very small sample sizes anyway. Bottom line: if you already own a PS5 or an Oppo, you're in great shape, and Oppo probably deserves its own named option next year.

Something that's worth talking about that I'm seeing in this data is reliability over time (see attached images). For the Sony X700: When people have owned it under a year, "any issue" sits around 63-67%; by 1-3 years it's ~71%; and for owners of 3+ years it jumps to 89%(!!!). Its serious/recurring rate climbs too (0% when new → 22% at 3+ years).

The Panasonic UB-820 seems to be the polar opposite. it does NOT degrade meaningfully overtime. New owners report basically zero issues (0% any-issue in the <3-month bucket), and even long-term owners stay in the low-20s%-to-30s% for any issue and around just 5% for serious problems, flat across every ownership length. The UB-9000 looks similarly stable (and low), though the samples are small. The UB-420/UB-450 bounce around but stay low on serious issues the whole way through.

To put it another way: if you get an X700, the odds of you having playback issues seems to rise exponentially over time, whereas the UB820 seems to either fail in the first year or stay overall reliable.

Going through some of the comments, the most common complaint is freezing and stuttering issues across both the major units. About 25% of the written responses mention a freeze or a lock-up, and another ~16% mention stutters and skips. A chunk of the complaints about the 820 blame the discs, not the player... a lot of them read like "issues always seem to be with the disc," off-gassing residue, scratched/corrupt discs, etc. At least one respondent had a UB-820 that wouldn't read discs at all, exchanged it, and the replacement's been flawless. Dolby Vision playback quirks show up repeatedly in the comments for the UB-820.

In terms of moving from one player to another, about 31% of respondents (123 people) have owned or used more than one of these players, which lets us see where people are switching. The #1 pattern by far: X700 owners moving to the UB-820. A full 25 people who've owned an X700 now use a UB-820 as their main player. That's nearly half of all current X700 owners in the survey (53) who've already moved on. Combined with the 7 who switched to a UB-450 and the 4 who went X800M2 or "Other," the X700 is clearly the player people leave.

The UB-820 is also where budget Panasonic owners upgrade to: 16 people went UB-420 → UB-820 and 12 went UB-450 → UB-820. And for the premium crowd, 5 UB-820 owners upgraded to the UB-9000. Meanwhile, almost nobody switches TO Sony: just 2 people went from UB-820 to X800M2.

Overall, to my eyes, if you zoom in you can find issues no matter which player you look at. Nothing seems to be bulletproof, but a large chunk of the UB-820s complaints turn out to be disc problems. Zoom out and it's the same story for the past three years: the X700 in particular seems to suffer from a reliability issue, especially over longer periods of time. The UB-820 is still the boring but correct choice for most people (with strong showings for the UB-420 and UB-450), the UB-9000 is (in my opinion) obscenely overpriced but you probably won't have to worry about it's reliability for a good long time, and if you have a PS5 with a disc player in it you're in pretty good shape unless you want Dolby Vision.

Finally, I just wanted to thank everyone for giving me their time and their stories so I could capture all this data, and I wanted to thank the folks who run r/4KBluray, r/Bluray, r/PhysicalMediaMatters, the AVS Forums, and the Blu-ray.com forums for letting me post this poll on their subreddits and forums.

Till next year!

Hey fellow physical media lovers! The results of the poll are in! And wow you all really came through. Almost 400 responses, which is roughly double what previous polls have gotten. And just like the previous two polls, the story told here is still pretty clear. But with nearly double the respondents, and with the passage of time we're able to get a whole lot more granular.

First off, total transparency: here is the complete, unedited .csv straight from Google Forms.

Disclaimers:

1 - I used Microsoft Copilot via Microsoft Excel to help me collate these numbers, as I'm a complete dunce when it comes to spreadsheets otherwise, and me don't math well. So please, please PLEASE feel free to audit these numbers, take the spreadsheet and do your own Excel magic.

2 - This is a self-selected community poll, not a lab test, so people with problems are often more motivated to respond. It's also still pretty damn small. I sure hope there are more than 400 people who love this hobby as much as we do. I want more people and more data next year!

3 - Some of these players have really small samples (UB-9000, UB-420, Oppo, etc), which can skew the ultimate percentages.

4 - There were some other quirks with how some respondents entered information, i.e. 8 people answered “I don’t currently use a standalone 4K player,” but half of them then specified a PS5 or Xbox in the very next question anyway. Things like that made precision a bit difficult.

With those disclaimers in mind, lets get to the data!

TL;DR: The Sony UBP-X700 is still the problem child, the Panasonic UB-820 is still champ, and the pricey UB-9000 posted the cleanest numbers (small sample though). The PlayStation 5 and Oppo are far and away the most popular "other players" people are using, and in fact the "other" group was actually the MOST reliable in the whole poll (97.8% rated reliable), with Oppo the overall standout at 91.7% "very reliable" and the PS5 a strong player with a reported 76.5% reliability. Ultimately though, nothing here overturns what we found the last two polls though.

Sony X700: 77.7% of X700 owners reported at least some kind of issue (103 people used one). Now, important caveat, this year we used a graded scale ("no issues / minor occasional / recurring or serious") instead of a simple yes/no, so that 77.7% includes people who just had the occasional hiccup. If we count ONLY recurring or serious problems, the X700 drops to about 23%. That stricter number lines up much better with the ~50/50 "had issues vs didn't" split we saw in the older binary polls. Either way though, it's the least reliable player we polled, and the triple-layer layer-transition freeze is still the #1 complaint.

Panasonic UB-820: The UB-820 remains the community's go-to. It's the single most-used MAIN player at 43.4% of respondents (171 people), and its any-issue rate for anyone who has ever used one was 34.4% (and remember that includes minor hiccups) compared to the X700's 77.7%. If we're talking strict/serious issues only, it's down around 8%. It's not literally flawless but for a mainstream, reasonably-priced player (at least compared to a UB-9000!) it's the safe recommendation, same as the last few years.

Everything in between: The X800M2 landed at 62% any-issue (worse than the Panasonics but better than the X700). The UB-420 and UB-450 both sit around 37-40% any-issue and are solid budget picks. The UB-450 in particular had very few serious complaints (only ~3% recurring/serious).

The OTHER Players: When I had Copilot clean up and consolidate all the free-text answers (merging PS5/ps5/PlayStation 5, all the Oppo 203 spellings, etc.), the "other" category is really "game consoles + Oppo." The PS5 was mentioned 47 times, Oppo UDP-203 16 times, and Xbox 11 times. And then a few one-or-two-mention niche players. And as I mentioned above: the "other" players are the MOST reliable group in the whole poll: 97.8% of the 45 people who main an "other" player rated them reliable (very + mostly), with exactly ONE serious failure reported (a single Panasonic DP-UB150 that died). Oppo is the standout of the entire poll at 88.9% "very reliable," and the PS5 is a strong 4K player at 73.3% "very reliable." The only "other" devices that drew any consistent gripes were the LG UBK90 and Xbox, but those were very small sample sizes anyway. Bottom line: if you already own a PS5 or an Oppo, you're in great shape, and Oppo probably deserves its own named option next year.

Something that's worth talking about that I'm seeing in this data is reliability over time (see attached images). For the Sony X700: When people have owned it under a year, "any issue" sits around 63-67%; by 1-3 years it's ~71%; and for owners of 3+ years it jumps to 89%(!!!). Its serious/recurring rate climbs too (0% when new → 22% at 3+ years).

The Panasonic UB-820 seems to be the polar opposite. it does NOT degrade meaningfully overtime. New owners report basically zero issues (0% any-issue in the <3-month bucket), and even long-term owners stay in the low-20s%-to-30s% for any issue and around just 5% for serious problems, flat across every ownership length. The UB-9000 looks similarly stable (and low), though the samples are small. The UB-420/UB-450 bounce around but stay low on serious issues the whole way through.

To put it another way: if you get an X700, the odds of you having playback issues seems to rise exponentially over time, whereas the UB820 seems to either fail in the first year or stay overall reliable.

Going through some of the comments, the most common complaint is freezing and stuttering issues across both the major units. About 25% of the written responses mention a freeze or a lock-up, and another ~16% mention stutters and skips. A chunk of the complaints about the 820 blame the discs, not the player... a lot of them read like "issues always seem to be with the disc," off-gassing residue, scratched/corrupt discs, etc. At least one respondent had a UB-820 that wouldn't read discs at all, exchanged it, and the replacement's been flawless. Dolby Vision playback quirks show up repeatedly in the comments for the UB-820.

Overall, to my eyes, if you zoom in you can find issues no matter which player you look at. Nothing seems to be bulletproof, but a large chunk of the UB-820s complaints turn out to be disc problems. Zoom out and it's the same story for the past three years: the X700 in particular seems to suffer from a reliability issue, especially over longer periods of time. The UB-820 is still the boring but correct choice for most people (with strong showings for the UB-420 and UB-450), the UB-9000 is (in my opinion) obscenely overpriced but you probably won't have to worry about it's reliability for a good long time, and if you have a PS5 with a disc player in it you're in pretty good shape unless you want Dolby Vision.

Finally, I just wanted to thank everyone for giving me their time and their stories so I could capture all this data, and I wanted to thank the folks who run r/4KBluray, r/Bluray, r/PhysicalMediaMatters, the AVS Forums, and the Blu-ray.com forums for letting me post this poll on their subreddits and forums.

Till next year!

Edit: u/mrplow999's comment reminded me of another piece of data I meant to surface:

About 31% of respondents (123 people) have owned or used more than one of these players, which lets us see where people are switching. The #1 pattern by far: X700 owners moving to the UB-820. A full 25 people who've owned an X700 now use a UB-820 as their main player. That's nearly half of all current X700 owners in the survey (53) who've already moved on. Combined with the 7 who switched to a UB-450 and the 4 who went X800M2 or "Other," the X700 is clearly the player people leave.

The UB-820 is also where budget Panasonic owners upgrade to: 16 people went UB-420 → UB-820 and 12 went UB-450 → UB-820. And for the premium crowd, 5 UB-820 owners upgraded to the UB-9000. Meanwhile, almost nobody switches TO Sony: just 2 people went from UB-820 to X800M2.

Hey fellow physical media lovers! The results of the poll are in! And wow you all really came through. Almost 400 responses, which is roughly double what previous polls have gotten. And just like the previous two polls, the story told here is still pretty clear. But with nearly double the respondents, and with the passage of time we're able to get a whole lot more granular.

First off, total transparency: here is the complete, unedited .csv straight from Google Forms.

Disclaimers:

1 - I used Microsoft Copilot via Microsoft Excel to help me collate these numbers, as I'm a complete dunce when it comes to spreadsheets otherwise, and me don't math well. So please, please PLEASE feel free to audit these numbers, take the spreadsheet and do your own Excel magic.

2 - This is a self-selected community poll, not a lab test, so people with problems are often more motivated to respond. It's also still pretty damn small. I sure hope there are more than 400 people who love this hobby as much as we do. I want more people and more data next year!

3 - Some of these players have really small samples (UB-9000, UB-420, Oppo, etc), which can skew the ultimate percentages.

4 - There were some other quirks with how some respondents entered information, i.e. 8 people answered “I don’t currently use a standalone 4K player,” but half of them then specified a PS5 or Xbox in the very next question anyway. Things like that made precision a bit difficult.

With those disclaimers in mind, lets get to the data!

TL;DR: The Sony UBP-X700 is still the problem child, the Panasonic UB-820 is still champ, and the pricey UB-9000 posted the cleanest numbers (small sample though). The PlayStation 5 and Oppo are far and away the most popular "other players" people are using, and in fact the "other" group was actually the MOST reliable in the whole poll (97.8% rated reliable), with Oppo the overall standout at 91.7% "very reliable" and the PS5 a strong player with a reported 76.5% reliability. Ultimately though, nothing here overturns what we found the last two polls though.

Sony X700: 77.7% of X700 owners reported at least some kind of issue (103 people used one). Now, important caveat, this year we used a graded scale ("no issues / minor occasional / recurring or serious") instead of a simple yes/no, so that 77.7% includes people who just had the occasional hiccup. If we count ONLY recurring or serious problems, the X700 drops to about 23%. That stricter number lines up much better with the ~50/50 "had issues vs didn't" split we saw in the older binary polls. Either way though, it's the least reliable player we polled, and the triple-layer layer-transition freeze is still the #1 complaint.

Panasonic UB-820: The UB-820 remains the community's go-to. It's the single most-used MAIN player at 43.4% of respondents (171 people), and its any-issue rate for anyone who has ever used one was 34.4% (and remember that includes minor hiccups) compared to the X700's 77.7%. If we're talking strict/serious issues only, it's down around 8%. It's not literally flawless but for a mainstream, reasonably-priced player (at least compared to a UB-9000!) it's the safe recommendation, same as the last few years.

Everything in between: The X800M2 landed at 62% any-issue (worse than the Panasonics but better than the X700). The UB-420 and UB-450 both sit around 37-40% any-issue and are solid budget picks. The UB-450 in particular had very few serious complaints (only ~3% recurring/serious).

The OTHER Players: When I had Copilot clean up and consolidate all the free-text answers (merging PS5/ps5/PlayStation 5, all the Oppo 203 spellings, etc.), the "other" category is really "game consoles + Oppo." The PS5 was mentioned 47 times, Oppo UDP-203 16 times, and Xbox 11 times. And then a few one-or-two-mention niche players. And as I mentioned above: the "other" players are the MOST reliable group in the whole poll: 97.8% of the 45 people who main an "other" player rated them reliable (very + mostly), with exactly ONE serious failure reported (a single Panasonic DP-UB150 that died). Oppo is the standout of the entire poll at 88.9% "very reliable," and the PS5 is a strong 4K player at 73.3% "very reliable." The only "other" devices that drew any consistent gripes were the LG UBK90 and Xbox, but those were very small sample sizes anyway. Bottom line: if you already own a PS5 or an Oppo, you're in great shape, and Oppo probably deserves its own named option next year.

Something that's worth talking about that I'm seeing in this data is reliability over time (see attached images). For the Sony X700: When people have owned it under a year, "any issue" sits around 63-67%; by 1-3 years it's ~71%; and for owners of 3+ years it jumps to 89%(!!!). Its serious/recurring rate climbs too (0% when new → 22% at 3+ years).

The Panasonic UB-820 seems to be the polar opposite. it does NOT degrade meaningfully overtime. New owners report basically zero issues (0% any-issue in the <3-month bucket), and even long-term owners stay in the low-20s%-to-30s% for any issue and around just 5% for serious problems, flat across every ownership length. The UB-9000 looks similarly stable (and low), though the samples are small. The UB-420/UB-450 bounce around but stay low on serious issues the whole way through.

To put it another way: if you get an X700, the odds of you having playback issues seems to rise exponentially over time, whereas the UB820 seems to either fail in the first year or stay overall reliable.

Going through some of the comments, the most common complaint is freezing and stuttering issues across both the major units. About 25% of the written responses mention a freeze or a lock-up, and another ~16% mention stutters and skips. A chunk of the complaints about the 820 blame the discs, not the player... a lot of them read like "issues always seem to be with the disc," off-gassing residue, scratched/corrupt discs, etc. At least one respondent had a UB-820 that wouldn't read discs at all, exchanged it, and the replacement's been flawless. Dolby Vision playback quirks show up repeatedly in the comments for the UB-820.

Overall, to my eyes, if you zoom in you can find issues no matter which player you look at. Nothing seems to be bulletproof, but a large chunk of the UB-820s complaints turn out to be disc problems. Zoom out and it's the same story for the past three years: the X700 in particular seems to suffer from a reliability issue, especially over longer periods of time. The UB-820 is still the boring but correct choice for most people (with strong showings for the UB-420 and UB-450), the UB-9000 is (in my opinion) obscenely overpriced but you probably won't have to worry about it's reliability for a good long time, and if you have a PS5 with a disc player in it you're in pretty good shape unless you want Dolby Vision.

Finally, I just wanted to thank everyone for giving me their time and their stories so I could capture all this data, and I wanted to thank the folks who run r/4KBluray, r/Bluray, r/PhysicalMediaMatters, the AVS Forums, and the Blu-ray.com forums for letting me post this poll on their subreddits and forums.

Till next year!

Edit:

u/mrplow999's comment reminded me of another piece of data I meant to surface:

About 31% of respondents (123 people) have owned or used more than one of these players, which lets us see where people are switching. The #1 pattern by far: X700 owners moving to the UB-820. A full 25 people who've owned an X700 now use a UB-820 as their main player. That's nearly half of all current X700 owners in the survey (53) who've already moved on. Combined with the 7 who switched to a UB-450 and the 4 who went X800M2 or "Other," the X700 is clearly the player people leave.

The UB-820 is also where budget Panasonic owners upgrade to: 16 people went UB-420 → UB-820 and 12 went UB-450 → UB-820. And for the premium crowd, 5 UB-820 owners upgraded to the UB-9000. Meanwhile, almost nobody switches TO Sony: just 2 people went from UB-820 to X800M2.

Hey fellow physical media lovers! The results of the poll are in! And wow you all really came through. Almost 400 responses, which is roughly double what previous polls have gotten. And just like the previous two polls, the story told here is still pretty clear. But with nearly double the respondents, and with the passage of time we're able to get a whole lot more granular.

First off, total transparency: here is the complete, unedited .csv straight from Google Forms.

Disclaimers:

1 - I used Microsoft Copilot via Microsoft Excel to help me collate these numbers, as I'm a complete dunce when it comes to spreadsheets otherwise, and me don't math well. So please, please PLEASE feel free to audit these numbers, take the spreadsheet and do your own Excel magic.

2 - This is a self-selected community poll, not a lab test, so people with problems are often more motivated to respond. It's also still pretty damn small. I sure hope there are more than 400 people who love this hobby as much as we do. I want more people and more data next year!

3 - Some of these players have really small samples (UB-9000, UB-420, Oppo, etc), which can skew the ultimate percentages.

4 - There were some other quirks with how some respondents entered information, i.e. 8 people answered “I don’t currently use a standalone 4K player,” but half of them then specified a PS5 or Xbox in the very next question anyway. Things like that made precision a bit difficult.

With those disclaimers in mind, lets get to the data!

TL;DR: The Sony UBP-X700 is still the problem child, the Panasonic UB-820 is still champ, and the pricey UB-9000 posted the cleanest numbers (small sample though). The PlayStation 5 and Oppo are far and away the most popular "other players" people are using, and in fact the "other" group was actually the MOST reliable in the whole poll (97.8% rated reliable), with Oppo the overall standout at 91.7% "very reliable" and the PS5 a strong player with a reported 76.5% reliability. Ultimately though, nothing here overturns what we found the last two polls though.

Sony X700: 77.7% of X700 owners reported at least some kind of issue (103 people used one). Now, important caveat, this year we used a graded scale ("no issues / minor occasional / recurring or serious") instead of a simple yes/no, so that 77.7% includes people who just had the occasional hiccup. If we count ONLY recurring or serious problems, the X700 drops to about 23%. That stricter number lines up much better with the ~50/50 "had issues vs didn't" split we saw in the older binary polls. Either way though, it's the least reliable player we polled, and the triple-layer layer-transition freeze is still the #1 complaint.

Panasonic UB-820: The UB-820 remains the community's go-to. It's the single most-used MAIN player at 43.4% of respondents (171 people), and its any-issue rate for anyone who has ever used one was 34.4% (and remember that includes minor hiccups) compared to the X700's 77.7%. If we're talking strict/serious issues only, it's down around 8%. It's not literally flawless but for a mainstream, reasonably-priced player (at least compared to a UB-9000!) it's the safe recommendation, same as the last few years.

Everything in between: The X800M2 landed at 62% any-issue (worse than the Panasonics but better than the X700). The UB-420 and UB-450 both sit around 37-40% any-issue and are solid budget picks. The UB-450 in particular had very few serious complaints (only ~3% recurring/serious).

The OTHER Players: When I had Copilot clean up and consolidate all the free-text answers (merging PS5/ps5/PlayStation 5, all the Oppo 203 spellings, etc.), the "other" category is really "game consoles + Oppo." The PS5 was mentioned 47 times, Oppo UDP-203 16 times, and Xbox 11 times. And then a few one-or-two-mention niche players. And as I mentioned above: the "other" players are the MOST reliable group in the whole poll: 97.8% of the 45 people who main an "other" player rated them reliable (very + mostly), with exactly ONE serious failure reported (a single Panasonic DP-UB150 that died). Oppo is the standout of the entire poll at 88.9% "very reliable," and the PS5 is a strong 4K player at 73.3% "very reliable." The only "other" devices that drew any consistent gripes were the LG UBK90 and Xbox, but those were very small sample sizes anyway. Bottom line: if you already own a PS5 or an Oppo, you're in great shape, and Oppo probably deserves its own named option next year.

Something that's worth talking about that I'm seeing in this data is reliability over time (see attached images). For the Sony X700: When people have owned it under a year, "any issue" sits around 63-67%; by 1-3 years it's ~71%; and for owners of 3+ years it jumps to 89%(!!!). Its serious/recurring rate climbs too (0% when new → 22% at 3+ years).

The Panasonic UB-820 seems to be the polar opposite. it does NOT degrade meaningfully overtime. New owners report basically zero issues (0% any-issue in the <3-month bucket), and even long-term owners stay in the low-20s%-to-30s% for any issue and around just 5% for serious problems, flat across every ownership length. The UB-9000 looks similarly stable (and low), though the samples are small. The UB-420/UB-450 bounce around but stay low on serious issues the whole way through.

To put it another way: if you get an X700, the odds of you having playback issues seems to rise exponentially over time, whereas the UB820 seems to either fail in the first year or stay overall reliable.

Going through some of the comments, the most common complaint is freezing and stuttering issues across both the major units. About 25% of the written responses mention a freeze or a lock-up, and another ~16% mention stutters and skips. A chunk of the complaints about the 820 blame the discs, not the player... a lot of them read like "issues always seem to be with the disc," off-gassing residue, scratched/corrupt discs, etc. At least one respondent had a UB-820 that wouldn't read discs at all, exchanged it, and the replacement's been flawless. Dolby Vision playback quirks show up repeatedly in the comments for the UB-820.

Overall, to my eyes, if you zoom in you can find issues no matter which player you look at. Nothing seems to be bulletproof, but a large chunk of the UB-820s complaints turn out to be disc problems. Zoom out and it's the same story for the past three years: the X700 in particular seems to suffer from a reliability issue, especially over longer periods of time. The UB-820 is still the boring but correct choice for most people (with strong showings for the UB-420 and UB-450), the UB-9000 is (in my opinion) obscenely overpriced but you probably won't have to worry about it's reliability for a good long time, and if you have a PS5 with a disc player in it you're in pretty good shape unless you want Dolby Vision.

Finally, I just wanted to thank everyone for giving me their time and their stories so I could capture all this data, and I wanted to thank the folks who run r/4KBluray, r/Bluray, r/PhysicalMediaMatters, the AVS Forums, and the Blu-ray.com forums for letting me post this poll on their subreddits and forums.

Till next year!

Edit:

u/mrplow999's comment reminded me of another piece of data I meant to surface:

About 31% of respondents (123 people) have owned or used more than one of these players, which lets us see where people are switching. The #1 pattern by far: X700 owners moving to the UB-820. A full 25 people who've owned an X700 now use a UB-820 as their main player. That's nearly half of all current X700 owners in the survey (53) who've already moved on. Combined with the 7 who switched to a UB-450 and the 4 who went X800M2 or "Other," the X700 is clearly the player people leave.

The UB-820 is also where budget Panasonic owners upgrade to: 16 people went UB-420 → UB-820 and 12 went UB-450 → UB-820. And for the premium crowd, 5 UB-820 owners upgraded to the UB-9000. Meanwhile, almost nobody switches TO Sony: just 2 people went from UB-820 to X800M2.

Got this heads up on my TV this morning. Genuine question for one of these features… which one of you is generating AI music on your TV? Is someone really going to do that?

Also comes with "Exclusive" cover art (which I know isn't exclusive, I've seen people outside of the States with it.) I was a bit worried because it wasn't clear when I bought it if the cover art was a steelbook or not, but I'm glad it's not!

The ghost face is really cute. The "blood" spattered on it looks more like mud so that's a bit disappointing but honestly the cuteness outweighs that for me. Apparently it also glows in the dark.

Not my favorite Scream (maybe even my least favorite?) but I still love this franchise and have since the very beginning. I will defend a Ghostface with a flamethrower if I need to!

Game Information

Game Title: 007 First Light

Platforms:

• PlayStation 5 (May 27, 2026)
• Xbox Series X/S (May 27, 2026)
• PC (May 27, 2026)
• Nintendo Switch 2 (Late Summer, 2026)

Trailer:

Developer: IO Interactive

Review Aggregator:

OpenCritic - 88 average - 98% recommended - 52 reviews

Critic Reviews

Atarita - Atakan Gümrükçüoğlu - Turkish - 93 / 100

>Centering on James Bond's origin story, 007 First Light blends action and stealth elements with flawless pacing, delivering that long-awaited, glorious return to the franchise. With its impactful melee combat mechanics, cleverly designed spy gadgets, and stellar acting performances, it places the player directly in the lead role of a breathtaking blockbuster movie.

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But Why Tho? - Matt Sowinski - 9 / 10

>IO Interactive feels like they've found a new home in the James Bond franchise. 007 First Light is a blast, with a tense and enthralling narrative that punches way higher and harder than anyone could have expected.

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CGMagazine - Marcus Kenneth - 8 / 10

>The best moments in 007 First Light are the ones where everything aligns for a few minutes, and you stop thinking about mechanics entirely.

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Cinelinx - Caleb Gayle - 5 / 5

>007 First Light features a slew of unforgettable moments, cinematic jaw-dropping scenes, amazingly smooth combat, and one heck of a story. With all this stacked up, 007 First Light it is a brilliant action adventure title, and my top pick for game of the year!

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Cloud Dosage - Jon Scarr - 4.5 / 5

>007 First Light turns a young Bond campaign into a spy adventure built around bluffing, gadgets, and recovering when missions fall apart. MI6, Q-Branch tools, and close-range fights keep the campaign moving, but the shooting, driving, and limited replay value hold it back. It’s a good fit if you want a story-led Bond game focused more on spy work than giant stealth sandboxes.

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ComingSoon.net - Tyler Treese - 9.5 / 10

>As stylish as the films themselves, 007 First Light is a brilliant depiction of Bond.

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Daily Mirror - Aaron Potter - 4 / 5

>James Bond's video game return is a delight from start to finish, with Hitman develop IO Interactive expertly lending its spy expertise to a new breed of interactive spy thriller.

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DayOne - Jon Clarke - 9 / 10

>With a great cast of characters, tons of imagination, and just the right amount of player agency and replayability, there is a delightful playground full of gadgetry and spycraft that players will want to return to again and again. A confident return for the Double-O program, and - sorry Goldeneye - this is, without a doubt, the best James Bond game ever made.

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Digitec Magazine - Philipp Rüegg - German - 5 / 5

>After 30 years, ‘GoldenEye’ is finally retiring. With ‘007 First Light’, IO Interactive – the masterminds behind ‘Hitman’ – delivers the ultimate Bond experience that fans have been waiting for since the N64 classic.

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DualShockers - Christian Bognar - 9 / 10

>With superb writing, top-notch acting, beautiful cinematography, and expressive gameplay, 007 First Light is as sleek as it is engaging.

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Eurogamer - Rick Lane - 4 / 5

>007 First Light is less cerebral and replayable than IO's World of Assassination trilogy, but makes up for it with excellent fistfights and oodles of charm.

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Everyeye.it - Joseph Arace - Italian - 8.2 / 10

>007 First Light is just like its protagonist: charismatic, energetic, funny, charming; as well as impetuous, exaggerated, and immature.

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GAMES.CH - Olaf Bleich - German - 86%

>"007 First Light" isn't a perfect action game, but it's excellent nonetheless.

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GAMINGbible - Olly Smith - 9 / 10

>007 First Light is an exquisite taste of slick spy action and blockbuster storytelling, and is fully what a Bond game should be, but rarely is.

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GamePro - Annika Bavendiek - German - Unscored

>IO Interactive delivers a magnificent gaming comeback for James Bond with 007 First Light, which proves worthy of the source material.

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GameRant - Dalton Cooper - 8 / 10

>It's not perfect, but 007 First Light is a mostly great start to IO Interactive's all-new take on the James Bond universe.

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GameSpot - Mark Delaney - 8 / 10

>007 First Light wisely repurposes what works in both universes but isn’t afraid to reimagine or ditch those parts that don’t.

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Gameblog - Geralt de Reeves - French - 9 / 10

>While it won't revolutionize the industry like GoldenEye did in its time, it undoubtedly delivers one of the best video game experiences of all time, putting you in the shoes of the iconic spy.

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Gamersky - 心灵奇兵 - Chinese - 8.6 / 10

>007: The First Steps not only reimagines the classic, but more importantly, it truly lives up to the legendary "007" designation.

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Generación Xbox - Gabriel Fuentes - Spanish - 85 / 100

>007 First Flight is a testament to originality in its script and marks the beginning of a new trilogy for the character in the world of video games.

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Gfinity - Alister Kennedy - 10 / 10

>007 First Light is, for me, an absolute masterpiece that shattered all pre-release anxieties and is, in fact, the greatest Bond video game of all time. IO Interactive masterfully balances explosive action with "Hitman"-inspired stealth, all brought to life by Patrick Gibson’s breathtaking, definitive performance as a young James Bond. Equal parts thrilling and cinematic, this incredible experience is a gorgeous love letter to the franchise and a sure-fire Game of the Year contender.

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Hobby Consolas - David Rodriguez - Spanish - 85 / 100

>First Light is the best Bond experience ever seen in a video game —a complete package, true to the essence of the character, updated, and incredibly fun to play.

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IGN India - Rayan Sayyed - 9 / 10

>007 First Light understands what makes James Bond interesting beyond the suits and gadgets. This younger Bond is reckless, emotional, and still figuring out his fundamentals, making his story feel more personal. Pair that with flexible stealth, solid hand-to-hand combat, strong production values, and Hitman-style mission design, and you get a Bond game that feels cinematic that gives players plenty of freedom. Plus, the variety in mission design and the satisfying spy fantasy make 007 First Light gives James Bond the best debut in this generation.

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IGN Italy - Silvio Mazzitelli - Italian - 9 / 10

>The James Bond saga could hardly have ended up in better hands. IO Interactive has crafted an adventure that perfectly captures the spirit of the 007 movies with an engaging story, stunning settings, and gameplay that's polished in every detail.

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IGN Portugal - Pedro Pestana - Portuguese - 9 / 10

>While cinema is still searching for a new Bond, the studio IO Interactive has already found its virtual version. Rebellious and arrogant, Patrick Gibson does a fantastic job in the shoes of Her Majesty's secret agent without needing to wear a tuxedo, in a well-crafted adventure that marks the beginning of a new era for 007 in video games. With gameplay that cleverly distances itself from what we already know from Hitman to embrace a stronger narrative and the cinematic moments immortalized on the big screen, 007: First Light didn't need a license to dazzle.

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IGN Spain - Mario Seijas - Spanish - 8 / 10

>007 First Light features a sophisticated and comprehensive infiltration system, as well as solid hand-to-hand combat mechanics. The lackluster cover system does not detract from what could mark a new era for 007 in the world of video games.

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INFINITY AREA - Florian Prache - French - 9.5 / 10

>James Bond 007 First Light is a huge surprise from IO Interactive. Far from being just a Hitman clone in disguise, the game establishes its own identity with rich gameplay, smart stealth mechanics, and explosive action. Despite disappointing driving sequences and the lack of English voice acting, the game manages to keep players engaged from start to finish thanks to its atmosphere, visuals, and great freedom of approach. An essential adventure for James Bond fans.

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INVEN - Kyuman Kim - Korean - 9.1 / 10

>After a long stretch in the dark, a truly worthy 007 game has finally arrived. With a young Bond at its center, it delivers nearly everything fans could want from a Bond film—thrilling storytelling, clever twists, and charismatic characters alike. It feels poised to become a new “first light” in the history of 007 games.

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Loot Level Chill - Mick Fraser - 9 / 10

>007 First Light is a superb adventure game that does so much more than simply coast on the popularity of its franchise.

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Manual dos Games - Luiz Henrique Silva - Portuguese - 10 / 10

>007 First Light delivers on the promise of being the ultimate James Bond game by introducing a new version of the character that oozes charisma in every second on screen, alongside an excellent storyline supported by memorable side characters who help drive the narrative forward. The game also features an extremely creative level design that fully embraces its stealth and combat systems, making players truly feel like an MI6 spy.

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MeuPlayStation - Thiago do Nascimento Barros - Portuguese - 100 / 100

>007 First Light is all about aura. It honors James Bond's legacy by bringing everything we love about him since the 1960's movies in the ultimate 007 videogame experience. Chases, shootings, explosions, plot twists, politics, charm, Bond Girls, guns, cars, boats, Q Technologies, Moneypenny, M, iconic characters, beautiful locations... All of that with great level design, combat and exploration. The name is Bond, James Bond.

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Multiplayer First - James Lara - 8.5 / 10

>If there is one thing I’m even more certain of than when we first learned that IO Interactive was making a 007 game, it’s that they are still the perfect studio to be making a Bond game. As many have called it, it’s a match made in heaven, and, as the first entry in what is hopefully a long-running series, I think the franchise is in safe hands. It’s one thing to make an experience on an established IP; another to actually understand what makes that experience so great. IO has captured the soul of a Bond experience in 007 First Light. > >With a strong foundation to build upon, a new era for MI6’s finest is upon us, and I cannot wait to see where IO Interactive takes the franchise next.

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PCGamesN - Paul Kelly - 8 / 10

>While it doesn't pull up any roots, 007: First Light is a beautiful, cinematic action game that makes clever use of the IO formula. From the performance of Patrick Gibson to the iconic score, this is a game that tells a new story and basks in nostalgia in equal measure, giving James Bond a fresh angle in the process.

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PCMag Middle East - Ali El Sayed - 5 / 5

>First Light feels like a true Bond game, a strong IO Interactive game, and the best blueprint 007 has had in video games for decades. It balances story, action, stealth, gadgets, and style better than any Bond game before it.

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PPE.pl - Wojciech Gruszczyk - Polish - 9.5 / 10

>007 First Light is the best James Bond game ever – brilliantly written, superbly acted and brimming with that unique atmosphere we’ve come to expect from stories about Agent 007. IO Interactive has combined its own experience from Hitman with a cinematic adventure in the style of Uncharted, throwing in gadgets, spectacular missions, interesting characters and a very well-crafted story of the young Bond. Not everything works perfectly, as the game sometimes holds your hand (a bit too tightly!), but ultimately it’s a brilliant start to a new era of 007 in gaming.

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PSX Brasil - Ivan Nikolai Barkow Castilho - Portuguese - 90 / 100

>007 First Light is an excellent James Bond game: varied gameplay with intelligent approach options, a story worthy of the character's films, beautiful graphics, and great technical performance. The TacSim mode is a great way to increase the title's longevity. Although the campaign features many slow-paced moments with secondary characters and combat animations that repeat frequently, it's an adventure that deserves to be checked out by any 007 fan or action game enthusiast in general.

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Pizza Fria - Álvaro Saluan da Cunha - Portuguese - 9.3 / 10

>007 First Light is a game that presents us with a different kind of James Bond, treated with the weight, charm, and complexity that Ian Fleming's character deserves.

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Push Square - Stephen Tailby - Unscored

>I'm not quite finished with 007 First Light just yet, but overall I'd say it's exactly what I was hoping for. The characterisation of this young Bond and his associates is really strong, and the globetrotting story lets you explore some great locations. It really shines in its sandbox missions, but shootouts have their moments too, and the whole thing weaves together really quite nicely. I'm really interested to see how the final few missions shake out, but beyond some technical quibbles and uncertainty on the driving, I'm pretty happy with IOI's new vision for James Bond.

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Region Free - Joonatan Itkonen - 4 / 5

>I don't think we've seen a better example of Bond as a genuine character in gaming. This isn't just a replica of what we have on the screen, either. In First Light, Bond is his own character, as important a part of the canon as Brosnan, Connery, or Craig. This is one of the most thrilling Bond adventures to date.

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República DG - Ruancarlo Silva - Portuguese - 9.6 / 10

>007: First Light is not only the best 007 game ever made, but it also easily rivals the best games in the genre. IO Interactive delivers a special experience that honors the legacy of the greatest spy in entertainment history.

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Restart.run - Imran Khan - 3.5 / 5

>It is likely the best James Bond game ever, but there's some qualifiers that drag 007 First Light down from being a complete knock-out.

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SECTOR.sk - Peter Dragula - Slovak - 9.5 / 10

>007 First Light is a strong new beginning for James Bond in games, combining a deep origin story, varied missions, stealth, action, excellent hand-to-hand combat, precise shooting, impressive visuals and classic Bond atmosphere. A few slower sections and the lack of a body-hiding mechanic are minor issues in an otherwise excellent spy adventure.

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Screen Rant - Kyle Gratton - 9 / 10

>007 First Light brings James Bond back to gaming in an innovative story that celebrates the character's legacy, alongside franchise-best gameplay.

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Shacknews - Donovan Erskine - 9 / 10

>007 First Light is a crowning achievement for IO Interactive and the culmination of the studio’s growth over the years.

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The Nerd Stash - Julio La Pine - 9.5 / 10

>007 First Light is not only the best James Bond video game to date, but also one of the greatest action-adventure titles of this generation, full of jaw-dropping action sequences, a compelling narrative, and superb acting.

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The Outerhaven Productions - George Yang - 4 / 5

>007 First Light delivers a strong Bond origin story with solid stealth, gadget use, and plenty of spy-thriller energy.

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Tom's Guide - Rory Mellon - 5 / 5

>007 First Light is the finest James Bond video game in nearly 30 years. Its cinematic single-player campaign is remarkable, offering a gripping, quintessentially Bond story, packaged together with some of the best action-adventure set pieces I've ever experienced. Whether you're a longtime Bond fan or a newcomer, 007 First Light is unmissable. Check Amazon Check Best Buy

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Tourens - Mert Tuna - Turkish - 8.5 / 10

>Despite its slow pace at the start and a few minor AI glitches, this is an experience that keeps players locked to their screens with its rich level designs, freedom oriented stealth mechanics, and satisfying cinematic action. A game that’s definitely worth a try.

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VGC - Jordan Middler - 5 / 5

>007 First Light might just be the best James Bond game ever. The way IOI has translated the Bond fantasy into a 14-hour globetrotting epic is masterful. It's a game full of spectacle, humour, action, and romance. Everything James Bond should be. New Bond owners Amazon must ensure this franchise continues.

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Worth Playing - Cody Medellin - 8.5 / 10

>007 First Light shows that the Hitman developers have a good handle on how to make a James Bond game work within their wheelhouse. The emphasis on less flashy espionage alongside multiple avenues to accomplish your given goal works to this game's favor in helping to differentiate it from past 007 games. There's still enough action to prevent the game from feeling like a complete tonal shift from common expectations. The quality of the stealth helps compensate for the combat, which is good but can feel lacking in areas. The adventure remains fun but familiar, while the presentation is top-notch. The game is another good example of how to do a licensed game well, and the hope is that we'll see IO Interactive do more in this universe, whether that's DLC or a full-on sequel.

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Xbox Achievements - Dan Webb - 92%

>For well over two decades, IO Interactive have become synonymous with their Hitman series. Since 2000, the Danish studio has released twelve games, w...

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Stronger aether? Weaker aether? Why not both!