Post Xbox One Two Scorpio, what should Sony do next? *spawn* (oh, and Nintendo?)

[Globalisateur]

I don't understand why anyone would want them to ditch forwards compatibility and start clean with PS5. I just don't see the value in doing that. People have this nebulous idea that they'll be able to do "magical" things if they have a clear cut generation. I just don't see it. Look at DX12 and now the Vulkan api. They are high-performance and highly programmable, and work across a broad range of hardware. Sony should make a slightly higher-level api (or use GNMX if it's suitable), enforce it as the default for PS4 Neo code-path and then use that as a transition for PS5.

If PS5 comes out and PS4 is effectively "put on notice" with limited support, then they'll have a $400 PS5 and a cheap PS4 Neo (probably at around $250). If it works like last gen, you can buy that cheap PS4 Neo but it will have a limited and half-assed library of new games once PS5 ships. Each year it would get worse and worse, effectively making PS4 Neo a platform for old games. If at the same time, Microsoft offers forwards/backwards compatibility and doesn't have a clear-cut break in generations, they can have an Xbox Two for $400 and an Xbox Scorpio for $250. Their story could be, "Go ahead and buy the Xbox Scorpio now, as it will play all of the new games for another three to four years, and you can upgrade to Xbox Two when the price is in your range." There's no way that Sony's option would be more consumer friendly.

Sony needs to kill off the idea of generations and just go ahead with overlapping products.

You can't compare both machines like that because your premise is most probably wrong. From the leaks we have Scorpio is Xbox Two. Microsoft won't mandate forward compatibility to third party developers. That won't happen, both machines are too different. New CPU, new memory architecture, new GPU tech etc.

I don't care what Spencer is vaguely saying. It's only twisted PR and Rise of the Tomb Raider taught us that he is the master at twisting words and meanings. The thing is not feasible. Too much work for devs. The best you can hope is that Microsoft games will run on both machines... at least the first years.

From the 4.2tflops rumored specs Sony is the only one that can realistically mandate forward compatibility to third party developers (including indies) during the whole Neo lifespan.

Again Scorpio to XB One is what X360 was to XboxOG. XboxOG relative failure (4 years) -> X360 global success (8 years) -> XB1 relative failure (4 years) -> Scorpio?

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I don't understand why anyone would want them to ditch forwards compatibility and start clean with PS5. I just don't see the value in doing that.

Legacy thinking. That's how it's always been, ergo that's how it should be. Ditch the preconceptions and reevaluate what's possibly and most beneficial now, regardless of history, and it makes more sense to have progressive platforms I think. (Which contradicts earlier ideas about BC not being important, because we were talking about a different market and different console architectures and BC back then wasn't important when you had a whole architectural break bringing in New Better Things, but now a library has increased value against decreased value in changing architecture and lower relative overheads to support that library.)

 

[MrFox]

I don't understand why anyone would want them to ditch forwards compatibility and start clean with PS5.

It may or may not happen. Here's an example. Standard SKU having fast SSD caching on the motherboard for streaming assets.

Imagine if this "generations don't exist but they do because they overlap" was happening with 360. All XB1 games would have to support playing games without an HDD because the 360 had optional HDD. That can cripple level design. Game developers at some point decided "fuck it, this game requires an HDD" and microsoft decided that "fuck it, forget our promise that no games will require an HDD".

Some physics are very CPU intensive, Gran Turismo has much simpler physics on PS3 than on PS4, and they would need to have the same physics. That's by far the most important part of a driving simulator.

XB1 doesn't have enough power for VR, they failed the generation overlap already. It overlap only when they say it does. If the previous console has insufficient power or lack the proper USB3 ports to be compatible with new experiences or new peripherals, it fails the overlap.

Forcing FC on all generations cripples all generations. Forcing FC only once every two gens (but still allow it with a better API, it's up to the devs) creates a breathing room to add features and paradigm shifts, while only the mid-gen high-end SKU is crippled. It gets as much life as the XB1S which is launching next month for $400, and is part of the hypothetical "generations don't exist but they do because they overlap". And as soon as next year, some games won't work on XB1S, because VR games need processing power which XB1S doesn't have.

 

[milk]

You could be right, if a game is possible on neo it's possible on ps4. I just think that if a game is made to run on neo at 900p, would the compromises necessary to make it run on ps4 be worth it, even given the larger base?

What do you mean? The dev has already put in most of the work when they made the game compatible with neo. It takes them a fraction of the work to make it run on vanilla ps4. It runs on the jaguar cpu, it fits the avaliable memory, make the fucking thing render at 720p with a shitty framerate and call it a day. At this point, the graphics whores are gonna be playing in ps5 or neo anyways. What can the dev/publisher loose? Think RoTB on xb360, just it takes a few weeks of extra work, if you already made the damn thing run on neo anyway. There is literally no downside. Whatever some idiote who owns the ps5 already says on gaf for fanboy-console war purposes is irrelevant to sales.

 

[BRiT]

You can't compare both machines like that because your premise is most probably wrong. From the leaks we have Scorpio is Xbox Two. Microsoft won't mandate forward compatibility to third party developers. That won't happen, both machines are too different. New CPU, new memory architecture, new GPU tech etc.

I don't care what Spencer is vaguely saying. It's only twisted PR and Rise of the Tomb Raider taught us that he is the master at twisting words and meanings. The thing is not feasible. Too much work for devs. The best you can hope is that Microsoft games will run on both machines... at least the first years.

From the 4.2tflops rumored specs Sony is the only one that can realistically mandate forward compatibility to third party developers (including indies) during the whole Neo lifespan.

Again Scorpio to XB One is what X360 was to XboxOG. XboxOG relative failure (4 years) -> X360 global success (8 years) -> XB1 relative failure (4 years) -> Scorpio?

You completely miss the technical premise of xbox consoles running virtual machines on top of the hypervisor. From this technical standpoint only Microsoft is primed to feature Future Compatability.

 

[AzBat]

Tacked on, and then it was only a very small subset.

478 Xbox games compatible with Xbox 360
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Xbox_games_compatible_with_Xbox_360

215 Xbox 360 games compatible with Xbox One
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Xbox_360_games_compatible_with_Xbox_One

Tommy McClain

 

[Jay]

478 Xbox games compatible with Xbox 360
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Xbox_games_compatible_with_Xbox_360

215 Xbox 360 games compatible with Xbox One
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Xbox_360_games_compatible_with_Xbox_One

Tommy McClain

thanks
more than I remembered.
og Xbox -> 360
51% was made compatible in the end, not sure I'd call that a small sub set, but very far from full bc.

360-> xo
that's on going so don't know where it will end up, shame they can't release at a faster rate though.
guess it's also not only about the amount, it's about the actual titles made available. If they was able to work their way down the requested list that would make a huge difference, as it is that doesn't seem to be the case

 

[Silent_Buddha]

You completely miss the technical premise of xbox consoles running virtual machines on top of the hypervisor. From this technical standpoint only Microsoft is primed to feature Future Compatability.

That's not to mention that Microsoft has a long history of both backwards and forwards compatibility in Windows. Their entire business model depends on it.

With Xbox once again being x86 based, using the same GPU technology as desktop parts, and Xbox moving to the Windows kernel, it's going to be far easier for them to leverage that to ensure forwards and backwards compatibility on Xbox consoles going forward from the XBO.

Microsoft won't have to mandate forward compatibility on their console just like they don't have to mandate forward compatibility on Windows. Everything will just be forwards compatible. That will be guaranteed by Microsoft for the supported lifetime of the console just like Windows. But it won't be guaranteed once the console isn't supported, again just like Windows. And again, just like Windows, most games and applications developed for past platforms that are no longer supported by Microsoft will work on future and current platforms.

Which makes me wonder. Will some enterprising developer make a UWP version of DosBox? It'd be tremendously amusing to run old DOS games on an Xbox console.

Regards,
SB

 

[iroboto]

478 Xbox games compatible with Xbox 360
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Xbox_games_compatible_with_Xbox_360

215 Xbox 360 games compatible with Xbox One
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Xbox_360_games_compatible_with_Xbox_One

Tommy McClain

Wow. Well I don't expect that to hold though. But wow.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[dobwal]

You can't compare both machines like that because your premise is most probably wrong. From the leaks we have Scorpio is Xbox Two. Microsoft won't mandate forward compatibility to third party developers. That won't happen, both machines are too different. New CPU, new memory architecture, new GPU tech etc.

I don't care what Spencer is vaguely saying. It's only twisted PR and Rise of the Tomb Raider taught us that he is the master at twisting words and meanings. The thing is not feasible. Too much work for devs. The best you can hope is that Microsoft games will run on both machines... at least the first years.

From the 4.2tflops rumored specs Sony is the only one that can realistically mandate forward compatibility to third party developers (including indies) during the whole Neo lifespan.

Again Scorpio to XB One is what X360 was to XboxOG. XboxOG relative failure (4 years) -> X360 global success (8 years) -> XB1 relative failure (4 years) -> Scorpio?

LOL. What's so new about the cpu and gpu. It's all x86 and PC gpu tech. Forward compatibility as well as cross compatibility has always been a given in the PC space. It's not like there has ever been a time in the PC space where someone had to return to the store because they bought the a Pentium 2 version with TI 4400 support instead of the sku that supported amd 64 and Radeon.

 

[MrFox]

Why do many of you think MS won't mandate FC for Scorpio? Not allowing exclusives is the same thing as mandating FC. They promised this very clearly.

Tick-tock: mandatory FC and optional FC, alternating
Rolling: mandatory FC every time
Free: optional FC every time

Which one do you want? I'm seeing people wanting Rolling or bust, others wanting Free and let devs decide on a per-title basis. I'm I seriously the only who think tick-tock is the fair compromise?

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Why do many of you think MS won't mandate FC for Scorpio? Not allowing exclusives is the same thing as mandating FC. They promised this very clearly.

Tick-tock: mandatory FC and optional FC, alternating
Rolling: mandatory FC every time
Free: optional FC every time

Which one do you want? I'm seeing people wanting Rolling or bust, others wanting Free and let devs decide on a per-title basis. I'm I seriously the only who think tick-tock is the fair compromise?

You don't have to mandate FC when everything is going to be FC. At worst, you'll just have the exact same game running at the same settings, but faster if a developer does nothing. At best, you'll have higher resolution and/or higher graphics IQ settings if the developer provides scalable graphics settings (either user controlled or developer/platform holder controlled).

That's one of the benefits of Microsoft basically merging Xbox into the Windows platform while basically using x86 PC hardware.

Regards,
SB

 

[AlNom]

About as mandated as a PC game requiring a new OS or API?

Up to the dev to weigh their target market options.

 

[Scott_Arm]

You can't compare both machines like that because your premise is most probably wrong. From the leaks we have Scorpio is Xbox Two. Microsoft won't mandate forward compatibility to third party developers. That won't happen, both machines are too different. New CPU, new memory architecture, new GPU tech etc.

I don't care what Spencer is vaguely saying. It's only twisted PR and Rise of the Tomb Raider taught us that he is the master at twisting words and meanings. The thing is not feasible. Too much work for devs. The best you can hope is that Microsoft games will run on both machines... at least the first years.

From the 4.2tflops rumored specs Sony is the only one that can realistically mandate forward compatibility to third party developers (including indies) during the whole Neo lifespan.

Again Scorpio to XB One is what X360 was to XboxOG. XboxOG relative failure (4 years) -> X360 global success (8 years) -> XB1 relative failure (4 years) -> Scorpio?

Conspiracy! No offense, but I don't really care about your opinions of Phil Spencer.

Previous consoles used low-level APIs and custom hardware. Now they're x86, essentially standard PC parts and the Xbox One is running games under D3D12. I fail to see why they can't ship one executable that would be able to run on Xbox One, Xbox Scorpio and Xbox Two in the future. PC games run on future hardware that never existed when the games were shipped, even without patches. That probably will be the future for Xbox. That's one of the reasons for hardware abstraction.

As for low-end to high-end hardware, this is already the case when you compare consoles, low-end gaming laptops and PCs. Games run on a wide range of hardware.

Sure, you can make an argument that Xbox One does not support VR so it's already not forwards compatible with Scorpio. I'd say that's not really how I interpret what forwards compatibility means. They could probably ship one executable that would run on both platforms, they're just choosing not to release VR on Xbox One for performance reasons. And I think going forward, VR will probably be a peripheral that's supported if it doesn't bomb. For gamings that run on a traditional display, I'd expect Xbox One and Scorpio to be supported side-by-side until Xbox "Two" is released.

 

[dobwal]

Conspiracy! No offense, but I don't really care about your opinions of Phil Spencer.

Previous consoles used low-level APIs and custom hardware. Now they're x86, essentially standard PC parts and the Xbox One is running games under D3D12. I fail to see why they can't ship one executable that would be able to run on Xbox One, Xbox Scorpio and Xbox Two in the future. PC games run on future hardware that never existed when the games were shipped, even without patches. That probably will be the future for Xbox. That's one of the reasons for hardware abstraction.

As for low-end to high-end hardware, this is already the case when you compare consoles, low-end gaming laptops and PCs. Games run on a wide range of hardware.

Sure, you can make an argument that Xbox One does not support VR so it's already not forwards compatible with Scorpio. I'd say that's not really how I interpret what forwards compatibility means. They could probably ship one executable that would run on both platforms, they're just choosing not to release VR on Xbox One for performance reasons. And I think going forward, VR will probably be a peripheral that's supported if it doesn't bomb. For gamings that run on a traditional display, I'd expect Xbox One and Scorpio to be supported side-by-side until Xbox "Two" is released.

Agreed.

We are barely three years removed where devs were supporting the PS3, PS4, 360 and Xb1, which is a far more varying in terms of hardware. We are not even talking about a situation where that happens more often.

We talking about about supporting basically the same hardware with two different tiers of performance and two different APIs. If we see a complete transition to this model it will probably revolve around three tiers at the start of the release of new hardware.

 

[Scott_Arm]

Agreed.

We are barely three years removed where devs were supporting the PS3, PS4, 360 and Xb1, which is a far more varying in terms of hardware. We are not even talking about a situation where that happens more often.

We talking about about supporting basically the same hardware with two different tiers of performance and two different APIs. If we see a complete transition to this model it will probably revolve around three tiers at the start of the release of new hardware.

Yep. Programming for Xbox 360 and Xbox One were vastly different. Even more so for PS3 and PS4. I'd expect the differences for Xbox One and Xbox Scorpio, and PS4 and PS4 Neo to be relatively negligible.

Edit: Please do not infer this to mean that I believe any of game development is easy.

 

[Globalisateur]

I believe that third party developers will be able to develop even non-VR games specifically for Scorpio, without a XB1 version. If that's not the case, I'll eat my hat.

 

[MrFox]

If Microsoft doesn't have mandatory FC for Scorpio/XB1, I'm writing all my posts as 5-7-5 Haiku for a month.

They promised it plainly! In multiple interviews!

 

[BRiT]

If Microsoft doesn't have mandatory FC for Scorpio/XB1, I'm writing all my posts as 5-7-5 Haiku for a month.

They promised it plainly! In multiple interviews!

Now I want there not to be mandated FC... how's your Haiku skills?

 

[dobwal]

FC on Scorpio would refer to its ability to play software designed for future and unreleased hardware.

Mandating FC on the XB1 seems to be a given outside of VR, since more than likely any Scorpio games will just be Xbox 1 games with a few settings turned up higher.

I need a second to wrap my head around this discussion since it seems like myself and others are conflating concepts of BC with FC.