The Console Arms Race: Is This What Console Gamers Want?

[Deleted member 86764]

I can't help but think that if these rumours of a PS4k are true, that Microsoft must react. Otherwise they'll be caught with their pants down. Sony could potentially monopolise the console business, they wouldn't be competing with Microsoft or Nintendo, but with themselves.

You'd have a situation where people are just referring to which version of the PlayStation that they have, while ignoring the Xbox One. A year from now, we could have four consoles on the market (Xbox One, NX, PS4, PS4k) and the Xbox, for the first time ever, would have the lowest power of the lot. I don't think that'd be a good situation for them to be in.

I also don't feel that Windows 10 being part of Xbox is much of a big sell for console gamers - how do they really benefit? Not so many people have both a gaming PC and a consoles, especially if the same games on Xbox are present on PC (why bother with the Xbox?)

I guess it all depends on whether Sony really do have a 2x power PS4 and whether people buy into that idea. Even if people don't intrinsically like the idea but they're interested in buying a new system, which are they likely to go for? Microsoft may have to make the Xbox One the "budget" console.

Anyway, I really liked the original Xbox and the 360, so I'd be gutted if they were to be marginalised by Sony. Microsoft haven't exactly had the best priorities for gamers recently and I get the impression that Sony are taking full advantage of that at every turn.

 

[iroboto]

If Phil is on point he should have come to similar conclusions to Sony. The question is whether they moved faster or slower than Sony.

We know with XBO they were definitely slower, but will they be again? Who knows. MS tends to have a lot more moving pieces and they should know by now that is what caused them to fail this round.

Ideally they don't repeat the same mistakes, but Sony's goals and MS' goals may not be hr same either

 

[Deleted member 86764]

If Phil is on point he should have come to similar conclusions to Sony. The question is whether they moved faster or slower than Sony.

We know with XBO they were definitely slower, but will they be again? Who knows. MS tends to have a lot more moving pieces and they should know by now that is what caused them to fail this round.

Ideally they don't repeat the same mistakes, but Sony's goals and MS' goals may not be hr same either

I agree their priorities may be different. I hope that if Microsoft are considering a new machine that they really push the hardware much, much further this time.

 

[Pixel]

No, while arms racing is an untouched sports category I'm not sure if there are enough gamers who want it. Maybe its more suited for an indie game rather than a full fledged EA Sports Arms Race 2016.

 

[London Geezer]

Here's hope PSVR won't be stuffed down our throats the way Kinect was. Not everyone wants it and it shouldn't deviate the whole PlayStation brand to a place where it will ultimately alienate a lot of people.

 

[Michellstar]

If Phil is on point he should have come to similar conclusions to Sony. The question is whether they moved faster or slower than Sony.

We know with XBO they were definitely slower, but will they be again? Who knows. MS tends to have a lot more moving pieces and they should know by now that is what caused them to fail this round.

Ideally they don't repeat the same mistakes, but Sony's goals and MS' goals may not be hr same either

I´m a bit ambivalent with current Ms, they´ve been marginalizing XO lately, even soft-killing it, at least as an independent entity inside Ms ecosystem. But in the other hand if they want this UWP gamble to succeed they need a diverse ecosystem, not just desktops.

But current Ms is more about to open its software portfolio and services to competing platforms.

So who knows, they say at Build that WP presence was almost non existent, will have to wait until E3 to read the tea leaves..


Where are VGAleaks and mistexmix when you need the most?? lol

 

[function]

So who knows, they say at Build that WP presence was almost non existent, will have to wait until E3 to read the tea leaves..

MS have botched Windows Phone 10. It's late, it's buggy, and they've quietly burned lots of WP8 users (and tried to hide it with corporate doublespeak), after they made promises to them on the back of burning them (by design) with WP7.

On top of this, they've gutted what once was Nokia almost immediately after buying them for many billions. Photo quality is down with WP10 and the awesome "Here Maps - free maps for life!" is being killed. So that's, like, the two main reasons for buying a Lumia down the shitter.

I don't know what MS are doing or what they should be doing. I sure miss Nokia though.

 

[MrFox]

Here's hope PSVR won't be stuffed down our throats the way Kinect was. Not everyone wants it and it shouldn't deviate the whole PlayStation brand to a place where it will ultimately alienate a lot of people.

The "New Sony" have been very consistent so far with not alienating their base... they are building separate studios for making VR games and funding smaller indies and third parties, instead of forcing their first parties to make gimmick patches to existing franchises. Yoshida said the PSVR price point is profitable, and allows them to use that money to fund VR games development. I'm cautiously optimistic VR and non-VR development won't step on each other toes.

 

[mpg1]

I can't help but think that if these rumours of a PS4k are true, that Microsoft must react. Otherwise they'll be caught with their pants down. Sony could potentially monopolise the console business, they wouldn't be competing with Microsoft or Nintendo, but with themselves.

You'd have a situation where people are just referring to which version of the PlayStation that they have, while ignoring the Xbox One. A year from now, we could have four consoles on the market (Xbox One, NX, PS4, PS4k) and the Xbox, for the first time ever, would have the lowest power of the lot. I don't think that'd be a good situation for them to be in.

I also don't feel that Windows 10 being part of Xbox is much of a big sell for console gamers - how do they really benefit? Not so many people have both a gaming PC and a consoles, especially if the same games on Xbox are present on PC (why bother with the Xbox?)

I guess it all depends on whether Sony really do have a 2x power PS4 and whether people buy into that idea. Even if people don't intrinsically like the idea but they're interested in buying a new system, which are they likely to go for? Microsoft may have to make the Xbox One the "budget" console.

Anyway, I really liked the original Xbox and the 360, so I'd be gutted if they were to be marginalised by Sony. Microsoft haven't exactly had the best priorities for gamers recently and I get the impression that Sony are taking full advantage of that at every turn.

It's going to be tougher for Microsoft to react as their overall vision for gaming isn't as straightforward as Sony's. Sony has Playstation. Microsoft is more disjointed with both Xbox and Windows 10 on PC.

 

[iroboto]

It's going to be tougher for Microsoft to react as their overall vision for gaming isn't as straightforward as Sony's. Sony has Playstation. Microsoft is more disjointed with both Xbox and Windows 10 on PC.

Nothing really to react to until the final specs are released. At this moment it's safe to say that both appear to be baking their next console without knowledge of the competitors product.

At this point in time I'd bet on them being equal.
They are both constrained on price.
They both knew the stakes for ps4vsXBO. Any learnings should push towards having the best hardware.

They should come out pretty close to each other perhaps even closer than this gen.

 

[Deleted member 86764]

All you need to do is look at the potential releases over the next year; Sony have PSVR and potentially a hardware upgrade and Microsoft have W10 for Xbox? One is definitely more appealing than the other, no matter how you cut it.

I guess the question is whether Microsoft have something special up their collective sleeves? If there are two mid gen upgrades from both, I wonder which will be the better box - hardware and (useful) features. I'm fairly sure that if Microsoft are still in the game that they won't want continued Digital Foundry embarrassments.

 

[iroboto]

All you need to do is look at the potential releases over the next year; Sony have PSVR and potentially a hardware upgrade and Microsoft have W10 for Xbox? One is definitely more appealing than the other, no matter how you cut it.

I guess the question is whether Microsoft have something special up their collective sleeves? If there are two mid gen upgrades from both, I wonder which will be the better box - hardware and (useful) features. I'm fairly sure that if Microsoft are still in the game that they won't want continued Digital Foundry embarrassments.

MS is partnered with OR. It's not quite loss yet on the VR front for them. The sensor in OR could be replaced by Kinectv2.

 

[Globalisateur]

Nothing really to react to until the final specs are released. At this moment it's safe to say that both appear to be baking their next console without knowledge of the competitors product.

At this point in time I'd bet on them being equal.
They are both constrained on price.
They both knew the stakes for ps4vsXBO. Any learnings should push towards having the best hardware.

They should come out pretty close to each other perhaps even closer than this gen.

Sony at this game has an advantage though, if we are talking about strict 100% hardware BC: its 1.84tflops GPU. They can easily put 2 of them and overclock them like supposedly they did. Hopefully they won't forget the Mhz starved Jaguars this time. Also the true unified memory is a huge advantage for 4K gaming.

Microsoft GPU is already weaker and already overclocked at 1.3tflops (so they won't be able to beat Sony by using a SLI setup + overclock) and esram bottlenecked which won't be ideal if devs want to display their games at 4K. It will add complexity in an already complicated setup.

2 PS4 GPUs overclocked at 1000Mhz = 4.6Tflops (less efficient than a normal GPU obviously because SLI config)
2 XB1 GPUs overclocked at 1000Mhz = 3Tflops + added complexity of esram setup.

 

[mpg1]

I guess my point about Microsoft is that right now they really have two platforms...traditional Xbox development/api's and it's Universal Windows Development platform that they are trying to push. How do they proceed when it comes to Xbox?

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I voted no I liked forward compatibility but the tick tock part is a joke when even Intel gave up on it.

That's a specific flavour of tick-tock and not comparable to what's happening here. Instead of single year cycles between updates based on lithographic availability, we're talking 3+ year updates. And not even new generations, but a continuous progression of hardware. So it's not really tick-tock at all, unless there is another generational break and someone tries to reboot their entire console platform once again. Imagine in 2020, after PS4 (tick) and PS4k (tick) we get PS5 (tick) with zero BC, while MS release XB1, XB1.5 and XB2 all with full BC. Devs see PS5 with an install base of zero, at best a potential for a few million early adopters, and a whole new development paradigm. They also see XB2 with the same tools and an existing install base of 50+ million and direct compatability with the other pplatforms being sold for. Why even bother with PS5 in that case? Leave it, let it die, stick to the solid platforms. It's pretty obvious from a business POV that once you start a progressive tech ecosystem, you want to stick with it. It'd be as crasy as Apple releasing a new iPhone/Pad line that can't run any iOS stuff. That's the same reason Windows is dragging around a load of shit legacy design, because MS can't start again from scratch and expect to shift an PS with zero software and no install base for devs to target.

Which also means consoles could eventually be bogged down with legacy shit too if they go abstract API. But being consoles, all they need is compatible hardware and the software legacy can be forgotten, at least in games. The core software stack may be accumulating shit and duck-tape fixes and jury-rigged patches from now on though. Joy.

 

[iroboto]

Sony at this game has an advantage though, if we are talking about strict 100% hardware BC: its 1.84tflops GPU. They can easily put 2 of them and overclock them like supposedly they did. Hopefully they won't forget the Mhz starved Jaguars this time. Also the true unified memory is a huge advantage for 4K gaming.

Microsoft GPU is already weaker and already overclocked at 1.3tflops (so they won't be able to beat Sony by using a SLI setup + overclock) and esram bottlenecked which won't be ideal if devs want to display their games at 4K. It will add complexity in an already complicated setup.

2 PS4 GPUs overclocked at 1000Mhz = 4.6Tflops (less efficient than a normal GPU obviously because SLI config)
2 XB1 GPUs overclocked at 1000Mhz = 3Tflops + added complexity of esram setup.

I don't mind speculating in this method, but if 4K is the goal, and 3TF won't get you to 4K. Then MS needs to engineer a different solution.

 

[liolio]

That's a specific flavour of tick-tock and not comparable to what's happening here. Instead of single year cycles between updates based on lithographic availability, we're talking 3+ year updates. And not even new generations, but a continuous progression of hardware. So it's not really tick-tock at all, unless there is another generational break and someone tries to reboot their entire console platform once again. Imagine in 2020, after PS4 (tick) and PS4k (tick) we get PS5 (tick) with zero BC, while MS release XB1, XB1.5 and XB2 all with full BC. Devs see PS5 with an install base of zero, at best a potential for a few million early adopters, and a whole new development paradigm. They also see XB2 with the same tools and an existing install base of 50+ million and direct compatability with the other pplatforms being sold for. Why even bother with PS5 in that case? Leave it, let it die, stick to the solid platforms. It's pretty obvious from a business POV that once you start a progressive tech ecosystem, you want to stick with it. It'd be as crasy as Apple releasing a new iPhone/Pad line that can't run any iOS stuff. That's the same reason Windows is dragging around a load of shit legacy design, because MS can't start again from scratch and expect to shift an PS with zero software and no install base for devs to target.

Which also means consoles could eventually be bogged down with legacy shit too if they go abstract API. But being consoles, all they need is compatible hardware and the software legacy can be forgotten, at least in games. The core software stack may be accumulating shit and duck-tape fixes and jury-rigged patches from now on though. Joy.

The point remains it is the worth time ever to move to such an approach as technical progress is slowing down. If Sony or MSFT introduce a half gen systems they have a pragmatic reason to do I don't think they are deluding them into thinking that consoles (which people pay for a relatively low price) are phones or even PC.
It make sense to tick and tock when technology moves fast, only looking at GPU the number of renaming some part have seen is staggering, most segments have not seen refresh in a long while.
Intel moving away from its tick-tock approach is extremely relevant, tick -tock used to happen within two year or less it ended longer, now they are abandoning for less significant jumps from one product to another, and the whole three step cycle is going to take longer to complete than 3/2 of the old one, I would also bet it won't reproduce nearly as many times. And that is Intel there are area wherethe expanse is going to be hard to justify for a good while (say for lot of low mid-end phone another GB of RAM would do so much more than processing power). As newer faster silicon is no longer a free meal, people might discover that the pace volume production might shift too.

On the other hand looking at Nintendo they had the opportunity to that for a food while and some how did it on the handheld side.

 

[Michellstar]

Sony at this game has an advantage though, if we are talking about strict 100% hardware BC: its 1.84tflops GPU. They can easily put 2 of them and overclock them like supposedly they did. Hopefully they won't forget the Mhz starved Jaguars this time. Also the true unified memory is a huge advantage for 4K gaming.

Microsoft GPU is already weaker and already overclocked at 1.3tflops (so they won't be able to beat Sony by using a SLI setup + overclock) and esram bottlenecked which won't be ideal if devs want to display their games at 4K. It will add complexity in an already complicated setup.

2 PS4 GPUs overclocked at 1000Mhz = 4.6Tflops (less efficient than a normal GPU obviously because SLI config)
2 XB1 GPUs overclocked at 1000Mhz = 3Tflops + added complexity of esram setup.

Do you realisticaly think they would use a dual GPU setup??

they won't throw away the biggest saving this gen, one soc

They''ll cram as many transistors as they could fit in 300/350 like current design, but at 14 nm

 

[Deleted member 86764]

Yeah, I think they'd just scale everything up proportionally, ESRAM and all.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

The point remains it is the worth time ever to move to such an approach as technical progress is slowing down. If Sony or MSFT introduce a half gen systems they have a pragmatic reason to do I don't think they are deluding them into thinking that consoles (which people pay for a relatively low price) are phones or even PC.

What difference does product category make?

It make sense to tick and tock when technology moves fast, only looking at GPU the number of renaming some part have seen is staggering, most segments have not seen refresh in a long while. Intel moving away from its tick-tock approach is extremely relevant, tick -tock used to happen within two year or less it ended longer, now they are abandoning for less significant jumps from one product to another.

Intel's i5 range hasn't dramatically changed until the latest version. There's been marginal increase in performance each new processor gen. Same with iPhones and everything else - a one year release, or even two years, or even three, isn't an order of magnitude more powerful, but people are still happy to upgrade. For those who like the best, a 2x increase in performance, meaning the same games in the same quality but at 60 fps instead of 30, will be worth it. A fourfold increase after 3 years adding high IQ as well as framerate will be even more interesting. And not releasing that machine means missing out on selling those extra consoles.