Digital Foundry Microsoft Xbox Scorpio Reveal [2017: 04-06, 04-11, 04-15, 04-16]

[temesgen]

The troubling (?) thing is that the supposedly custom-built Jaguar cores that are in the Scorpio that show these wonderful gains because DX12 is built into an additional compute unit closer to the metal on the GPU that offloads draw functions from the CPU and shows 30% (?) gains in the Forza Tech demo so that the Scorpio runs equivalent to a GTX 1070 with PC Ultra settings at 4k only does so using ExecuteIndirect and only does so because it's a 1st party MS game. The XB1 never saw gains from its "DX12 Secret Sauce" because 3rd party developers didn't use it. What would motivate them to use it for Scorpio if they didn't for XB1?

It seems to me that we can almost completely ignore any benefits from that for the Scorpio because we haven't seen them come to fruition for the XB1.

That seriously degrades the performance levels that DF witnessed and reported on, if true.

Where am I going wrong in my thinking?

Perhaps I'm wrong but didn't DX12 release after XB1? If I'm right than its plausible many of tools used early on for development lacked the advantages, that seems to match what I recall anyway... The improvement we saw with XB1 rendering post launch happened for a reason . There's still a difference between XB1 and PS4 but frame rates and resolutions did improve on XB1.

Sent from my SM-T700 using Tapatalk

 

[function]

Don't think we need to derail into Sony cheerleading, with literally no mention of MS/Scorpio. There are plenty of other threads to do that in.

Lets not forget that MS do the whole Direct X thing.

 

[sebbbi]

I don't see it that way at all. No developer is now able to try to push the Scorpio to the max because unless I am wrong Scorpio exclusives are not allowed. I would rather stick a live electrical wire in my mouth than buy a console that does not allow exclusive games to be made that maxes out its power. That used to be a selling point of consoles: developers could work to get everything out of one specific piece of hardware instead of worrying about a thousand different PC configurations. Now, PS4Pro and Scorpio developers have to gimp their games and dumb them down so that the PS4 version or XBox One version won't look too awful.

You can certainly push the graphics to the max with the improved console versions. There's nothing stopping you. Base version doesn't have to look equal. Most developers seem to spend most of the increased GPU performance to ramp resolution up from 900p/1080p to 1440p/4K. This is the reason why you don't see as big visual improvement on 1080p TV.

But you are true that completely new styles of games where the game play itself relies heavily on improved CPU & GPU performance are harder to make. For examples games with huge amount of physics simulation and destruction (I am not talking about visual eye-candy). But on the other hand, PC is even more limiting for games like this. You can't simply release a game that requires 8 GB graphics card or 8 core processor to start. Best selling PC games (Blizzard) need to scale down to Intel iGPUs and laptop dual-core processors. Traditionally cross-platform console titles have scaled down one generation. This time all console games need to scale down half a generation. Not that bad.

 

[mpg1]

You can certainly push the graphics to the max with the improved console versions. There's nothing stopping you. Base version doesn't have to look equal. Most developers seem to spend most of the increased GPU performance to ramp resolution up from 900p/1080p to 1440p/4K. Quality of pixels hasn't increased that much.

But you are true that completely new styles of games where the game play itself relies heavily on improved CPU & GPU performance are harder to make. For examples games with huge amount of physics simulation and destruction (I am not talking about visual eye-candy). But on the other hand, PC is even more limiting for games like this. You can't simply release a game that requires 8 GB graphics card or 8 core processor to start. Best selling PC games (Blizzard) need to scale down to Intel iGPUs and laptop dual-core processors. Traditionally cross-platform console titles have scaled down one generation. This time all console games need to scale down half a generation. Not that bad.

That's an interesting point that often gets overlooked. The lowest common denominator is lower for PC's than it is for consoles.

 

[Clukos]

You can't simply release a game that requires 8 GB graphics card or 8 core processor to start.

You can, but then you get "Can it run Crysis?"

I remember having to run Crysis at 480p back in 2007 to get the max settings to run at a somewhat above 30 fps, haha

I also remember people arguing that 20 fps was actually playable on Crysis because of the good motion blur as well

 

[function]

Stahp. Plz. This is supposed to be a technical discussion thread about Scorpio.

edit: was a response to now moved post, not Clukos' post (now directly above)!

 

[Rikimaru]

Stahp. Plz. This is supposed to be a technical discussion thread about Scorpio.

But we did not get much technical info except a lot of marketing bluff.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

But we did not get much technical info except a lot of marketing bluff.

So instead of waiting for more information you continue to pollute the thread with references to PS4/PS4-P in a thread specifically about Project Scorpio? You do know there's a thread here in this very forum for the technical aspects of the PS4 and the PS4-p?

Regards,
SB

 

[sebbbi]

That's an interesting point that often gets overlooked. The lowest common denominator is lower for PC's than it is for consoles.

PC games are much worse than console games when it comes to using the newest hardware features.

Let's discuss CPU first. There not a single game that requires AVX or AVX2. No Man's Sky required SSE4 (introduced by Nehalem 9 years ago). Huge amount of complaints that game is broken from Core 2 Quad and AMD Phenom owners (even though both CPUs were under minimum requirements). Game was patched and SSE4 code was ripped out. Practically all games stick to SSSE3, introduced by Core 2 in 2006 (11 years ago). Practically all PC games are limited to CPU features from 2006.

New GPU features aren't faring much better. DirectX 11 was released in 2009. That's 8 years ago. Most PC games are designed for DirectX 11, and are using exactly the same features that were available already in 2009. DirectX API versions 11.2 and 11.3 bring new features, but those APIs are not compatible with Windows 7, the most common gaming OS. Practically no PC developer supports these features, including common middle-ware such as Unity and Unreal Engine. We still haven't seen any game that requires DirectX 12 or Vulkan. Some games support these new APIs mainly to reduce the CPU load, but most don't use any new GPU features, such as conservative raster, execute indirect, bindless resources, rasterizer ordered views, tiled resources or cross lane ops. AMD GCN 1.0 (from 2012) still has important features left that are not exposed in any modern PC graphics API. So does NVIDIA Fermi.

 

[Kaotik]

But we did not get much technical info except a lot of marketing bluff.

I would call confirming the specs "much technical info" even if they didn't spill the beans (yet) on what the customizations are this time around

 

[goonergaz]

I would call confirming the specs "much technical info" even if they didn't spill the beans (yet) on what the customizations are this time around

Without wishing to sound like a Sony fanboy, you have to say the whole Pro reveal was much better in that (and correct me where I'm wrong) they had Cerny on stage going through not only the specs but the modifications in some (low level) detail. Basically all cards on the table with a few 'more details to follow' when we found out finer details of the modifications.

Overall I'm disappointed that even after the reveal there's still so many questions...but then I guess we have ~6mths to launch and E3 where they can spill more beans, I was just expecting a little more from theDF article to minimise the uncertainty I guess.

 

[mpg1]

Without wishing to sound like a Sony fanboy, you have to say the whole Pro reveal was much better in that (and correct me where I'm wrong) they had Cerny on stage going through not only the specs but the modifications in some (low level) detail. Basically all cards on the table with a few 'more details to follow' when we found out finer details of the modifications.

Overall I'm disappointed that even after the reveal there's still so many questions...but then I guess we have ~6mths to launch and E3 where they can spill more beans, I was just expecting a little more from theDF article to minimise the uncertainty I guess.

for what's it's worth...

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=233552540&postcount=5976

Gamasutra will also have a deep-dive on our development work for those that are into that sort of thing. That hits next week I believe and I think people will dig hearing about how developers will create for both Xbox One and Scorpio.

 

[iroboto]

Without wishing to sound like a Sony fanboy, you have to say the whole Pro reveal was much better in that (and correct me where I'm wrong) they had Cerny on stage going through not only the specs but the modifications in some (low level) detail. Basically all cards on the table with a few 'more details to follow' when we found out finer details of the modifications.

Overall I'm disappointed that even after the reveal there's still so many questions...but then I guess we have ~6mths to launch and E3 where they can spill more beans, I was just expecting a little more from theDF article to minimise the uncertainty I guess.

There might be many reasons for that, a part of it being the reveal followed by preorder shortly after. We are still 5-6 months from seeing a retail scorpio unit. Lots of time for folks to learn more about the system before buying.

At least there's no guessing right? Sony shipped without boost mode and after shipping added it in. At least we know what features are coming as a whole. Ignoring tech details the benefits are numerous across the ecosystem which was unexpected. There also might be more to announce that they could be saving for E3. All in all, I think while it may not have satisfied the hunger, it's only the first course of many. You'll likely have a very good picture of Scorpio before preorders go up.

 

[iroboto]

Is it just me who thinks MS knocked it out of the park features wise? Not so much the hardware itself, don't care about that...but their commitment to making a statement on making sure all of the library is treated with consistency and respect with that more capable hardware is great to see.

Is this the advantage of being a software oriented company over a hardware oriented one?

a lot of the features were unexpected for me in that regards. Who would have thought that they would try to continually improve BC games and force 16x AF on all titles across the ecosystem. The game DVR etc. Quite nice. I echo the sentiment that it feels well thought out as a whole, they looked at the whole picture and tried to do something and not just look at Scorpio enhanced games.

This might be the advantage of investing all your money into your platform. I assume if the complaints are about not paying for exclusives, that money is going to go platform in which Phil indicated he wanted a strong platform before returning to exclusives IIRC.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

But on the other hand, PC is even more limiting for games like this. You can't simply release a game that requires 8 GB graphics card or 8 core processor to start. Best selling PC games (Blizzard) need to scale down to Intel iGPUs and laptop dual-core processors.

That's an interesting point that often gets overlooked. The lowest common denominator is lower for PC's than it is for consoles.

I've raised this same issue many, many times and it doesn't get overlooked as acrimoniously denied by the pitchfork-weilding PCMR folks who conveniently like to ignore that there are plenty of PC gamers running today's games at low resolutions on low settings. This is contrary to the PCMR primary narrative that gaming on PC is better than on console.

Scorpio certainly makes that a much more difficult argument!

You can, but then you get "Can it run Crysis?"

It was never can you run Crysis, it was how well you could ran Crysis at max settings. Sebbbi is making a point that I made in the closed Middle Generation Consoles thread. Lowest common hardware specifications will always hold back new games which publishers will want to run on a wide array of hardware (in terms of specifications) as possible.

Scorpio has powerful hardware but outside of graphics you're not going to see it used to advance game design or game design for a while - until Xbox One is retired. Along with the obvious pros for a generationless console strategy, there is also a con and that's it. You may never see a new Xbox launch with a game that couldn't run on the previous box because the strategy is games should run on older boxes. This still sounds a bit rubbish so as much as I'm keen to read more about Scorpio's hardware, I want to hear how Microsoft will address this dilemma. It's definitely a tricky one.

Maybe this is the beginning of the end of exciting new software making the most of exciting new hardware. Over time you're still getting the same hardware leaps but in two shorter evolutions rather than much slower revolutions.

Viva la Xbox revolución!

 

[Inuhanyou]

a lot of the features were unexpected for me in that regards. Who would have thought that they would try to continually improve BC games and force 16x AF on all titles across the ecosystem. The game DVR etc. Quite nice. I echo the sentiment that it feels well thought out as a whole, they looked at the whole picture and tried to do something and not just look at Scorpio enhanced games.

This might be the advantage of investing all your money into your platform. I assume if the complaints are about not paying for exclusives, that money is going to go platform in which Phil indicated he wanted a strong platform before returning to exclusives IIRC.

That's a decent point.

Of course its early days and we only have a limited look into the philosophy of the console, we'll have to wait to see how it fully shakes out.

But i really applaud MS seemingly doing everything they can to support legacy software. Granted, its not unprecedented for them.....i remember how blown away i was to see that all my OG Xbox games compatible on 360 got 4xMSAA boosts or ran in 720p 16:9 if supported on the software level.

Granted that support was spotty, but the games that did work properly(Ninja gaiden1, black, dead or alive's, burnout 3, soul calibur 2, Halo2 ect) looked far better on 360 than they did on OG Xbox, even setting OG Xbox up on component in the highest possible quality, and it seems like Scorpio's approach is infinitely more compatible with the previous library than that.

Sony has quite a few lessons on legacy software support i think they should learn from MS on how to do it right. They were one of the first ones to do it right, offering up better AF for most PS1 games if run through the PS2, so going back to their roots might be in order to try and compete on that level.

Pro is definitely inferior in most ways, but that way really stands out.

 

[mpg1]

a lot of the features were unexpected for me in that regards. Who would have thought that they would try to continually improve BC games and force 16x AF on all titles across the ecosystem. The game DVR etc. Quite nice. I echo the sentiment that it feels well thought out as a whole, they looked at the whole picture and tried to do something and not just look at Scorpio enhanced games.

This might be the advantage of investing all your money into your platform. I assume if the complaints are about not paying for exclusives, that money is going to go platform in which Phil indicated he wanted a strong platform before returning to exclusives IIRC.

I remember only not that long ago exclusives were seen as generally bad for the gaming industry. Weird how the narrative on that has changed and now it is the main reason to buy a console.

Trust me if Microsoft went out on Netflix-like spending spree on getting exclusive content for it's platform there would not be "Great!, now I have a reason to buy an Xbox or use Windows Store". There would be outright condemnation and "it's stupid that isn't available on every console" and "when will it be available on Steam?"

 

[Inuhanyou]

I think only people who don't happen to have exclusives on their platform of choice will wax poetic about how bad it is for the industry. THey are just fanboys.

Exclusives don't determine the mainstream buying habits...marketing matters much more there, but they do play a part in differentiating units, and they really play a part in the hardcore user's purchasing habits, something Sony seems to understand fully. I bought into a PS4 because they are usually really good with this in addition to Japanese support which i suppose would factor into it as well.

I personally could never survive on just western third party games, the balance between third party and first party, west and east is very paramount for me, and so some Xbox users saying they don't care about 'weeb games' or claim they are irrelevant because they don't sell as much as AAA western games makes me frustrated. There's room in the market place for every kind of game, and people should not actively dismiss games just because they are out of their comfort zone.

 

[Karamazov]

overall it really looks like MS listened to all the complaints hardcore gamers had(resolution, AF, framerate etc...), to offer a great system at a reasonnable budget.
I could see them push developpers to go for 2 modes: native 4K at xbox one specs at the very least with 4k textures and 16 AF, and a lower res but 60fps mode and added details (with, like ps4pro, a minimum required of 1080p).
It would become the perfect enthusiast gamer console.

 

[Inuhanyou]

I don't think the power of the Scorpio is that dramatic to allow full on 60fps of games, its only 200MHZ upclock for Jaguar compared to Pro. I'd also argue that for GPU limited games, the Pro already showed the limitations of what having a higher GPU can do FPS wise. Of course that doesn't take the bandwidth disparity into account, i've heard from certain places that bandwidth could be much more of a bottleneck to the Pro than even the CPU is, atleast for what its intended as.