Next Gen GTA game will be PS3 exclusive
- Thread starter mckmas8808
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mckmas8808
Legend
jvd said:
First of all it's 7.4 GBs for the DVDs on the Xbox 360 not 8.5+!! Secondly explain why Saints Row fills a DVD9 disc. I have a feeling that you will say sloppy programming and no knowledge of compression techniques yet, but what makes Saints Row the highest of the high(as far as disc space is concerned) in open world games?
Why can't GTA4 use more space than Saints Row? Dan Houser already wants to use a next-gen disc and we know the game will at least be on the PS3. And yes I do think the game will come to the Xbox 360.
I'm sorry for bumping this old thread but I felt compelled to dispel some misconceptions about redundancy in the Grand Theft Auto III series. Now, I'm not affiliated in any way with Rockstar or Take Two so you'll have to read all this as the inane ramblings of "some guy on the internet."
So without further ado, lets have a look at how the data is arranged on the discs. Please note that since the PS2 was the primary development platform for the GTAIII series (and because I am poor and they are the only versions I have
) I'll only be looking at that data:
Here we have a graph showing proportionally how the data is arranged. It should be noted that GTAIII only filled 2.1GB, whereas GTA:VC was 4.3GB, and GTA:SA was 4.1GB.
I'm sure the first question you're dying to ask is what happened to all of the redundant data, and given some of the earlier comments in this thread, where did it all come from in the first place? Well, redundancy in GTAIII and the subsequent titles seems to be managed through a series of consecutive 'GTA_#.img' files located in the model directory featuring identical data. GTAIII features 11 of these files, VC has 6, and San Andreas has only 1 (but we'll get onto that later). These files, to my best guess, house all of the texture and geometry data, but how the data is arranged within these files (they aint standard img files) is a mystery to me.
With the progression of the series, each of these files has grown substantially in size.
GTAIII - 116MB
GTA:VC - 268MB
GTA:SA - 458MB
Now, back to the distinct lack of redundant data in SA. Well it seems that this is the only game out of the series that changed the way that data is stored. Instead of managing all of the content in the GTA_#.img files, GTA:SA has separate files for cutscene and interior building data. Taking this into account would put the actual redundancy for GTA:SA somewhere around 20% I would guess.
A common question that keeps appearing is why GTA:SA wasn't dual layer. Others have pointed out that Rockstar had mentioned filling a dual layer disc in previous interviews, yet they never delivered. Off the back of filling 4.3GB for GTA:VC it would have been expected. Instead they compromised their redundancy data for the sake of keeping on a single layer.
There are two opposing stances here, each having their own merits. One is that the necessity for redundancy was exaggerated and providing a more efficient streaming model meant that less disc space needed to be reserved for redundancy. The other, and imho more plausible stance is that with the PS2 being the primary development platform and its DVD drive featuring a slow read speed and even slower seek and layer transition speed, the benefits of spanning redundancy over a second layer was entirely lost. It seems obvious that Rockstar must have conducted tests on the matter and the only likely conclusion I can muster is that the layer transitions adding to average seek time crippled the smooth gameplay. Instead, as having noted about how the game data has changed for SA, Rockstar must have invested more time in improving their streaming model to account for the impending lack of space for redundancy. This can, I guess, be evidenced by many reviews talking of how the game strained the PS2's architecture at times, since the lack of redundancy would still have had an impact. (I believe that GTA:SA would have been at least 6-7GB if they could have had zero cost access to the second layer)
What does this mean for the Xbox 360 and PS3? Well the inclusion of a 12x DVD drive would have improved seek times dramatically over what the PS2 could offer, so I could imagine that Rockstar would be less bashful about using the second layer. Considering the xbox 360 features less data per layer than the xbox did, this I think is the only option. I'm going to suggest that there will be a noticeable performance improvement with the HDD unit attached though, which could be used either for redundant or mutually exclusive data source streaming. With regards to the PS3, it features a great deal more data per layer but could suffer slower seek and read speeds. I have a sneaky suspicion that Rockstar won't be committing to any platform until they've learned how fast the BD-ROM drive will be.
Okay, now back to the topic at hand. As many others have said, and I agree with, I feel that the PS3 should be the primary platform for 'GTA4' as the platform offers the least game content restrictions. However, as is usual with these things, it'll be all about the money hats. I'm trying to distance myself from the debate about how big GTA4 will be, but I will say that comparing game assets developed for PS2 class hardware against what will be featured in the next-gen version is not just flawed but flawed by orders of magnitude. Sure, texture compression will help but there would have been so many design compromises in the PS2 development that comparisons and 'scaling up to next-gen' becomes useless. Not only will there be significantly higher resolution textures, but also a vastly increased amount of geometric data demanding a much higher quantity of textures. But really, I am in no position to quantify any of that into any kind of meaningful answer. Yes the texture and geometry data will be bigger, but how much? Well that's all down to the talent and attention to detail that Rockstar wants to put in.
I'd say Rockstar are notorious for their attention to detail in their games. While it may not show immediately, through a few rough edges, try comparing their games to any of its competitors. The sheer amount of game stopping bugs, glitches, sloppy coding in games like True Crime, and Driv3r (and they provide significantly less gameplay) says mountains for how much time Rockstar invest in developing the best game they can. Which leads me to believe that at heart Rockstar would be more inclined to produce the best game they can than focus on making the most money they can.
Which nicely leads me onto my next issue: How many GTA games will there be next gen? Conventional wisdom suggests that a new engine, escalating budgets, and increased development time would restrict the number of games they could produce in a generation. Also, what about too much of a good thing? The brand could easily become stale, or even experience the same downturn that the movie industry is having. I think the most telling factor will be what happens on October 29th 2007. This would be the traditional release date for the GTA franchise and an '07 game release would indicate 3 titles (given the success of the first of course).
[speculation land]
Now, if there were three games I'm seeing quite a different port scenario than two. Firstly, to achieve a next-gen GTA by Oct 07 would indicate that attention to detail would have been focused on more than size. I would imagine that the city would be scaled back from SA, to more of a VC sized environment. In this scenario I could imagine that it would fit on a 7GB xbox 360 disc including redundancy. Assuming a PS3 lead SKU, subsequent games I feel would require compromises to be made. On a two game scenario, I think there will be problems from the start.
So without further ado, lets have a look at how the data is arranged on the discs. Please note that since the PS2 was the primary development platform for the GTAIII series (and because I am poor and they are the only versions I have
) I'll only be looking at that data:Here we have a graph showing proportionally how the data is arranged. It should be noted that GTAIII only filled 2.1GB, whereas GTA:VC was 4.3GB, and GTA:SA was 4.1GB.
I'm sure the first question you're dying to ask is what happened to all of the redundant data, and given some of the earlier comments in this thread, where did it all come from in the first place? Well, redundancy in GTAIII and the subsequent titles seems to be managed through a series of consecutive 'GTA_#.img' files located in the model directory featuring identical data. GTAIII features 11 of these files, VC has 6, and San Andreas has only 1 (but we'll get onto that later). These files, to my best guess, house all of the texture and geometry data, but how the data is arranged within these files (they aint standard img files) is a mystery to me.
With the progression of the series, each of these files has grown substantially in size.
GTAIII - 116MB
GTA:VC - 268MB
GTA:SA - 458MB
Now, back to the distinct lack of redundant data in SA. Well it seems that this is the only game out of the series that changed the way that data is stored. Instead of managing all of the content in the GTA_#.img files, GTA:SA has separate files for cutscene and interior building data. Taking this into account would put the actual redundancy for GTA:SA somewhere around 20% I would guess.
A common question that keeps appearing is why GTA:SA wasn't dual layer. Others have pointed out that Rockstar had mentioned filling a dual layer disc in previous interviews, yet they never delivered. Off the back of filling 4.3GB for GTA:VC it would have been expected. Instead they compromised their redundancy data for the sake of keeping on a single layer.
There are two opposing stances here, each having their own merits. One is that the necessity for redundancy was exaggerated and providing a more efficient streaming model meant that less disc space needed to be reserved for redundancy. The other, and imho more plausible stance is that with the PS2 being the primary development platform and its DVD drive featuring a slow read speed and even slower seek and layer transition speed, the benefits of spanning redundancy over a second layer was entirely lost. It seems obvious that Rockstar must have conducted tests on the matter and the only likely conclusion I can muster is that the layer transitions adding to average seek time crippled the smooth gameplay. Instead, as having noted about how the game data has changed for SA, Rockstar must have invested more time in improving their streaming model to account for the impending lack of space for redundancy. This can, I guess, be evidenced by many reviews talking of how the game strained the PS2's architecture at times, since the lack of redundancy would still have had an impact. (I believe that GTA:SA would have been at least 6-7GB if they could have had zero cost access to the second layer)
What does this mean for the Xbox 360 and PS3? Well the inclusion of a 12x DVD drive would have improved seek times dramatically over what the PS2 could offer, so I could imagine that Rockstar would be less bashful about using the second layer. Considering the xbox 360 features less data per layer than the xbox did, this I think is the only option. I'm going to suggest that there will be a noticeable performance improvement with the HDD unit attached though, which could be used either for redundant or mutually exclusive data source streaming. With regards to the PS3, it features a great deal more data per layer but could suffer slower seek and read speeds. I have a sneaky suspicion that Rockstar won't be committing to any platform until they've learned how fast the BD-ROM drive will be.
Okay, now back to the topic at hand. As many others have said, and I agree with, I feel that the PS3 should be the primary platform for 'GTA4' as the platform offers the least game content restrictions. However, as is usual with these things, it'll be all about the money hats. I'm trying to distance myself from the debate about how big GTA4 will be, but I will say that comparing game assets developed for PS2 class hardware against what will be featured in the next-gen version is not just flawed but flawed by orders of magnitude. Sure, texture compression will help but there would have been so many design compromises in the PS2 development that comparisons and 'scaling up to next-gen' becomes useless. Not only will there be significantly higher resolution textures, but also a vastly increased amount of geometric data demanding a much higher quantity of textures. But really, I am in no position to quantify any of that into any kind of meaningful answer. Yes the texture and geometry data will be bigger, but how much? Well that's all down to the talent and attention to detail that Rockstar wants to put in.
I'd say Rockstar are notorious for their attention to detail in their games. While it may not show immediately, through a few rough edges, try comparing their games to any of its competitors. The sheer amount of game stopping bugs, glitches, sloppy coding in games like True Crime, and Driv3r (and they provide significantly less gameplay) says mountains for how much time Rockstar invest in developing the best game they can. Which leads me to believe that at heart Rockstar would be more inclined to produce the best game they can than focus on making the most money they can.
Which nicely leads me onto my next issue: How many GTA games will there be next gen? Conventional wisdom suggests that a new engine, escalating budgets, and increased development time would restrict the number of games they could produce in a generation. Also, what about too much of a good thing? The brand could easily become stale, or even experience the same downturn that the movie industry is having. I think the most telling factor will be what happens on October 29th 2007. This would be the traditional release date for the GTA franchise and an '07 game release would indicate 3 titles (given the success of the first of course).
[speculation land]
Now, if there were three games I'm seeing quite a different port scenario than two. Firstly, to achieve a next-gen GTA by Oct 07 would indicate that attention to detail would have been focused on more than size. I would imagine that the city would be scaled back from SA, to more of a VC sized environment. In this scenario I could imagine that it would fit on a 7GB xbox 360 disc including redundancy. Assuming a PS3 lead SKU, subsequent games I feel would require compromises to be made. On a two game scenario, I think there will be problems from the start.
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All i can say is, MAN that is a LOT of music there in SA...
london-boy said:
Gah! I knew there was a glaring mistake somewhere. That's all of the audio data not just music. Even though I suppose the music makes up the majority of it anyway.
GTAIII - Audio 913MB (Music 516MB)
GTA:VC - Audio 2.33GB (Music 1.37GB)
GTA:SA - Audio 2.8GB (Music 1.8GB)
Which I suppose is always expendable to different compression, but with Blu-Ray there's the freedom to use lossless audio codecs and high definition audio.
Mmmkay said:
Given the transfer rate of optical discs i think youll always want to use compressed (albeit good quality) audio.
Lossless compression is still pretty sizeable compared to 160k mp3 or DD (DD commonly uses about 384kb/s for 5.1.) I believe a CD compressed to Lossless audio still takes up about 66% of the original disc.
expletive said:
Yeah, you're right. I suppose it wouldn't really be practical to spare that much of the drive bandwidth on audio when you've got a streaming city to worry about
I've heard many complaints laid against the audio quality (especially speech) for GTA, so with the significantly faster drive speeds hopefully a little bit more will be set aside for audio this time.
Mmmkay said:Yeah, you're right. I suppose it wouldn't really be practical to spare that much of the drive bandwidth on audio when you've got a streaming city to worry about
I've heard many complaints laid against the audio quality (especially speech) for GTA, so with the significantly faster drive speeds hopefully a little bit more will be set aside for audio this time.
What was the audio format/quality of the last GTA?
My feeling is that anything over 128/160 kb/s MP3, or comparable format, would be overkill for 95% of the sound systems these consoles will be connected to.
mckmas8808
Legend
expletive said:
I honestly feel the sameway. I don't think we need anything higher than that.
scooby_dooby
Legend
Mmmkay said:
Thx for the analysis MMkay. I just wanted to point out the XBOX version of SA is actually 2.8GB because they were able to use mp3 compression on the audio(i believe).
So it's the lack of compression processing power in the first place that cause the PS2 version to be pushed to the SL boundary, and if they ahd've been able to compress the audio, they would've had a gig and a half or so remaining on the first layer.
scooby_dooby
Legend
Too bad hard facts fly in the face of your little theory.
Last generation dev's only used ~35% of the space available to them. Yet it's now 'laughable' when someone says they might not use all the space available?
It's not laughable at all, it's the truth, most games will be well below 8GB.
What's really funny is that some peopel think Sony put BR in the PS3 to allow for bigger more expansive games! No, sorry, Developers weren't exactly limited for disc space, BR is primarily for movie playback not bigger games.
Last generation dev's only used ~35% of the space available to them. Yet it's now 'laughable' when someone says they might not use all the space available?
It's not laughable at all, it's the truth, most games will be well below 8GB.
What's really funny is that some peopel think Sony put BR in the PS3 to allow for bigger more expansive games! No, sorry, Developers weren't exactly limited for disc space, BR is primarily for movie playback not bigger games.
mckmas8808
Legend
scooby_dooby said:
Well you mean 7.4 GBs right?
I don't think anybody actually thinks Sony put the Blu-ray drive in the PS3 just for bigger games do we?zidane1strife
Banned
Can the next gta be 2-4X bigger in size(traditional exponential increase) with high-rez textures all over and high-detail models along with hrs of radio/speech in a single disc without a new format?
c0_re said:
We're not talking about listening to Brahms or Mozart here. We're talking about voice acting, sound effects, explosions, etc. Most DVD audio runs Dolby Digital at an aggregate of 384Kb/s for dialog, music scores, etc for 5.1 channels. I think youd be hard pressed to tell the difference between 128kb/s or 192kb/s for voiceovers and sound effects in a video game. Now if you want to record the background music in a higher format i can live with that.
In addition, i think the sounds WILL be in WMA based on this comment from Todd Holmdahl:
Todd Holmdahl said:
Sounds like WMA doesnt need to touch the CPU to be decompressed so it will probably be the codec of choice anyway. EDIT: On the 360, that is.
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scooby_dooby said:
Just to add on here, they only used 35% last gen with no INCENTIVE to save space at all. So theres a possibility that they could have been more frugal with space if required to do so.
Question, since the 360 version of GTA saved so much space due to audio compression, will the next gen consoles have any TEXTURE compression advantages this time around that were not present last gen?
If so, this could also reduce space requirements compared to last gen. Well, more likely keep them similar since textures and artwork are going to be larger and higher quality this gen, so we can really only hope to stay the same as last gen with improved texture compression.
zidane1strife
Banned
expletive said:
I very much doubt that a high-rez-next-gen-gta texture is going to occupy the same as one of those low-rez gta-ps2 textures, regardless of compression(unless you throw quality out the window). And considering the games also traditionally increase exponentially in size from game to game....
scooby_dooby
Legend
It doesn't need to be the same size, even if compression only allows for increase of 4 or 5x that would still leave tons of room left on a 7.4GB disc.
textures are a small fraction of the disc space on current games. The main killers by FAR are audio and video.
textures are a small fraction of the disc space on current games. The main killers by FAR are audio and video.
Mintmaster
Veteran
Umm, there are several people here who think the lack of a high capacity drive will make games rather crap on XB360. They think XB360 is going the way of N64 because it has a lack of storage for games.mckmas8808 said:Well you mean 7.4 GBs right?
The way I see it, if you take 2% of the man-hours and dollars you used to create 50GB of game assets, and put it towards data compression, you'll easily fit it on a DVD, and if not, then you'll likely be broke.
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