How should devs handle ports between consoles? *spawn

Hypothetically, if there are scenarios (and there will be eventually) where X1 is able to match PS4 in graphics quality or surpass it, PS4 owners will refuse to buy the game. Period. They vote with their wallet (see recent DA:I threads, AC:U threads), because they expect their platform (they set their own expectation mind you) that it will always triumph over X1.
What a few vocal people claim they will do of tens bears no connection to what millions of people actually will do.

The GAF threads are a good example, there are quite a few people claiming to have cancelled their AC:U game and vowing not to buy it. The same thing happened with WATCH_DOGS and with the "graphics downgrade" and I vividly recall how badly that game sold :nope:
 
PS4 owners will refuse to buy the game. Period.
I think that's untrue. Firstly, the people who say they won't buy it represent a small fraction of the overall market. Secondly, people are full of it. A good game is a good game and few people have the real conviction to sacrifice that experience from a sense of outrage. Heck, people have enough trouble sticking to their scruples on things that really matter, let alone the total non-issue of a game being rendered at a lower res than they think it should. Realistically, how much will DA:I's or AC:U's sales actually suffer from games (not) having parity? An imperceptible amount, I'd argue (it hasn't affected Destiny). If these games don't sell, it'll be because they weren't considered good enough by the buying public.
 
I think that's untrue. Firstly, the people who say they won't buy it represent a small fraction of the overall market. Secondly, people are full of it. A good game is a good game and few people have the real conviction to sacrifice that experience from a sense of outrage. Heck, people have enough trouble sticking to their scruples on things that really matter, let alone the total non-issue of a game being rendered at a lower res than they think it should. Realistically, how much will DA:I's or AC:U's sales actually suffer from games (not) having parity? An imperceptible amount, I'd argue (it hasn't affected Destiny). If these games don't sell, it'll be because they weren't considered good enough by the buying public.

This is true guys. Still has me worried as we move towards a more digital age.
 
Lol yea you guys at right. I saw some events play out in chronological order and I just overreacted thinking twitterverse and other gaming forums had that much power over the over sales. I agree. Conviction needs to be really insane to not play a game at lower resolution. It is afterall just a game, and not real political implications.
 
Hypothetically, if there are scenarios (and there will be eventually) where X1 is able to match PS4 in graphics quality or surpass it, PS4 owners will refuse to buy the game. Period.

Eh? Because Xbox One has potential scenarios where it has greater bandwidth? I don't see how that's going to miraculously make it perform better than the competition.
 
Eh? Because Xbox One has potential scenarios where it has greater bandwidth? I don't see how that's going to miraculously make it perform better than the competition.


It's a generic statement about the amount of work that can be performed. There are all sorts of holes that I'm well aware of in my assertion. I'm just making comment as to how if optimization means making greater and greater use of the hardware ie 100% utilization, we'd expect bandwidth to continually increase until either bandwidth is the bottleneck or ALU is the bottleneck.
 
I'm just making comment as to how if optimization means making greater and greater use of the hardware ie 100% utilization, we'd expect bandwidth to continually increase until either bandwidth is the bottleneck or ALU is the bottleneck.

Exactly. Hardware utilisation and optimisation are very different things. I recall an article in which Naughty Dog commented that for Uncharted Drake's Fortune they had utilised a great deal of the PlayStation 3's available SPU usage however this was far from optimised code. In Uncharted 2 they were doing more with less resources then using the savings in usage to ladle on even on clever things. But this type of optimisation generally comes from experience and nobody really has that much experience with PlayStation 4 and Xbox One yet.

Many teams are still working on delivering their first project, others are beginning their second. We're a long way from optimised by the dictionary definition.
 
Exactly. Hardware utilisation and optimisation are very different things. I recall an article in which Naughty Dog commented that for Uncharted Drake's Fortune they had utilised a great deal of the PlayStation 3's available SPU usage however this was far from optimised code. In Uncharted 2 they were doing more with less resources then using the savings in usage to ladle on even on clever things. But this type of optimisation generally comes from experience and nobody really has that much experience with PlayStation 4 and Xbox One yet.

Many teams are still working on delivering their first project, others are beginning their second. We're a long way from optimised by the dictionary definition.

Yeah I agree I think holiday 2015 will have the first set of games that show the true potential of both consoles.
 
So Dragon Age is a MS co-marketing deal. Is anyone outraged that MS are forcing the PS4 version to run at 900p on this game too? :no:

If MS have been involved in the Ass Creed resolution, it'll have been been to push for the resolution on Xbox One to be increased, not decreased on PS4. And that might be a mistake if the frame rate tumbles as a result.

I'm still expecting AC to run better on PS4. 900 might be worse than a Watch Dogs like 792 would have been.
 
The problem for me is this.

Last gen we were all fine with disparity - generally the PS3 versions were not as good because it was a pain to get the best from it (on paper similar power). Devs were praised when they put the extra work in and got the PS3 version as good.

This gen it seems to be similar with most titles however there's these odd moments where certain devs are doing odd things - like Ubi with both AC games. The first one launched with parity and got a quick patch to get it working at 1080p with no hits (I mean, that's quite a boost!). Anyway, this time they are saying 900p is the sweet spot and whilst that may be true due to NPCs I don't see why they can't either scale those back a bit or increase some effects on the PS4 version.

Essentially I feel all games should be made 'best as possible' (on PC) and then 'shoe-horned' into the lower powered machines PS4 then XBO downgrading to fit - much like last gen. PS4 should be lead and with the bigger install base should be getting the better attention (in theory).
 
Currently I am most disappointed by that PC start, and then 'good enough' porting to the console where I feel that some games should be able to hit 60 on console, but are limited to 30. Hopefully this will change at some point, would probably even benefit PC.
 
Currently I am most disappointed by that PC start, and then 'good enough' porting to the console where I feel that some games should be able to hit 60 on console, but are limited to 30. Hopefully this will change at some point, would probably even benefit PC.

I probably simplified what I meant, obviously I don't mean just switching stuff off until it works ok - there will be things that should be done to gain advantage from the consoles.

The thing is as the consoles are closed boxes there will be certain things devs can plan ahead for when writing the PC version - in a way it's a bit like when devs were saying that they had to plan ahead for the cell to get the best but converting a game with no planning resulted in a mess.

It's just odd that FWICT the PS4 is easier to develop for and more powerful so all cross plats should show improvments but don't and there's too much talk of parity.

I can't believe why 1080p is so hard this gen when we had it last gen!?
 
So Dragon Age is a MS co-marketing deal. Is anyone outraged that MS are forcing the PS4 version to run at 900p on this game too? :no:



If MS have been involved in the Ass Creed resolution, it'll have been been to push for the resolution on Xbox One to be increased, not decreased on PS4. And that might be a mistake if the frame rate tumbles as a result.



I'm still expecting AC to run better on PS4. 900 might be worse than a Watch Dogs like 792 would have been.


Just some minor corrections: DA3 is 1080p for PS4
 
I can't believe why 1080p is so hard this gen when we had it last gen!?


All PS4 games so far bar Battlefield 4 are 1080p afaik, and Battlefield at least is 60fps. I guess I am more demanding than that, expecting framerates to be 60fps as well for most PC ports. My theory is that there are two main issues:

- PC games optimise away the drawcall issue in a way that is diametrically opposite to what works best on consoles
- PC games still treat CPU as separate and sometimes give them heavy workloads that would be more suited to Compute on consoles.

Just a layman's theory though, don't pay it too much attention ;)
 
Essentially I feel all games should be made 'best as possible' (on PC).
PC's a difficult target as there isn't a definitive spec, and a game needs to target a range of configuration. So the PC spec is really, "somewhere about there," with whatever there is for the devs ideas of what people who are going to play their game are equipped with, with options to ramp things up for those with better hardware. If devs target "best game possible on PC" for high-end machines, they'll have to face difficult choices on lower level machines. Ultimately, the game design (NPCs in AC for example) cannot be influenced by machine power, or you provide different experiences. The experience has to be the same across machine with just eye-candy and IQ differing.
 
It really is just resolution. Resolution changes the gaming experience but not gameplay experience. Having said that as many have noted earlier great visuals are a selling point until 15 hours in game and nothing really keeps aweing you anymore.

The difference between 900p and 1080p is noticeable when compared against each other but a reasonable trade off.

There are diminishing returns on resolution such that the extra power to up resolution would be better put towards graphical effects ie trying to go to 1440p or 4K. I would almost always prefer dropping resolution by a bit to gain the maximum effects available.

As the raging and controversial argument goes on, at the end of the day all I just see it as demands of bullet points being met; superficial to a degree.

While pS4 fans are advocates of no parity: I'm okay with that provided X1 is not artificially held back to give ps4 fans their wish either.

As time goes on I expect the gap to close (more usage towards compute) and this controversy is going to grow louder mainly due to miseducation. I am curious as to how developers will handle this as time goes on.

Having said that, as the benchmarks for graphics continue to go up and up eventually people will be awed less and less and gameplay will take centre stage as it always should have been. So this may not even be much of a point.
 
It really is just resolution. Resolution changes the gaming experience but not gameplay experience. Having said that as many have noted earlier great visuals are a selling point until 15 hours in game and nothing really keeps aweing you anymore.

The difference between 900p and 1080p is noticeable when compared against each other but a reasonable trade off.

There are diminishing returns on resolution such that the extra power to up resolution would be better put towards graphical effects ie trying to go to 1440p or 4K. I would almost always prefer dropping resolution by a bit to gain the maximum effects available.

As the raging and controversial argument goes on, at the end of the day all I just see it as demands of bullet points being met; superficial to a degree.

While pS4 fans are advocates of no parity: I'm okay with that provided X1 is not artificially held back to give ps4 fans their wish either.

As time goes on I expect the gap to close (more usage towards compute) and this controversy is going to grow louder mainly due to miseducation. I am curious as to how developers will handle this as time goes on.

Having said that, as the benchmarks for graphics continue to go up and up eventually people will be awed less and less and gameplay will take centre stage as it always should have been. So this may not even be much of a point.

In a lot of games, resolution also helps the gameplay. Just e.g. try to do a mega sniper shot in BF4 with 720p resolution...good luck to that ;)

So, I really don't agree with you at all. Just when some technical details which you might not understand are 'bullet points' for you...it might be worth it for others in certain situations. And it is also clear that upping the resolution is just one way to use the additional PS4 power compared to X1. In situations, where the resolution does not yield substantial improvements, additional effects, better shadows and so on are also appreciated and to be honest should be demanded.
 
Yea 720p compare to 1080p. Thats understandable. But 1080p to 900p. Consoles have auto aim to a degree. On pc I would prioritize resolution and frame rate if we are going seriously competitive. All my effects would be turned off. So it's not that I don't appreciate it or understand the technical details: but let's get serious about he topic. I used to do competitive counter strike regionally it didn't help to have the highest resolution possible since the game did pixel hit boxes. Many guys would reduce to 800x600 when 1024 was the norm. It's not always entirely favourable to be running 4K.

This video here
I assure you everyone was playing sub 1280x1024 with all effects off, and switched to icons. No lighting at all gamma at maximum. Framerates were locked in to perform special jumps many would adjust viewing angles to really get the maximum out of their ability to play.

That's what competitive is, abstract gaming, the ability to make decisions immediately without having to think about it, anything that makes it harder to do gets in the way and needs to be minimized. As for your comment about sniping at 720p vs 1080p, the biggest problem with sniping in Battlefield (I'm assuming is your example) has nothing to do with resolution on how well you can snipe, but the ratio between your zoom level on your scope and your sensitivity. It is a known problem (talked about here:http://forum.symthic.com/battlefield-4-technical-discussion/6153-this-is-why-you-cannot-aim) Which doesn't exist in other games because it's not always changing your FOV.

Just wanted to point these factors out.
 
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The problem for me is this.

Last gen we were all fine with disparity - generally the PS3 versions were not as good because it was a pain to get the best from it (on paper similar power). Devs were praised when they put the extra work in and got the PS3 version as good.

A lot of people weren't fine with disparity last generation. The internets were awash with cries of "lazy devs" and "bu bu bu Killzone / Naughty Dog". Any game. Regardless of constraints. Mindless comparisons galore!

Over time lots of effort went into PS3 development to close the gap. Making engines and assets that worked well on both platforms, developing alternative technologies, and sometimes the 360 didn't get squeezed as hard as it could have had more resources been devoted to that. I've spoken to a couple of devs who are firmly of the opinion that it's better to get both (or all) versions of title up to a desirable standard than it is to really nail one version and say "fuck it" for the others.

There's always a point where pushing one platform is less important than releasing a strong product across all platforms. That's been true for a long time.

With similar hardware this generation it's a great opportunity for developers to focus on raising the baseline for the entire product (including gameplay mechanics) rather than battle with very different systems. Developers hate this fanboy warring stuff. They really, really hate it.
 
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