The Next-gen Situation discussion *spawn

[Shifty Geezer]

No I dont agree..yes the high end bar of pcs have hit a wayyy higher bar than the difference between ps360 and pcs of thier time..but you forget pc games are essentially console games..except its not coded to the potential of the pc components...the pc components power is largely wasted...inefficient.

Not 50% inefficient such that 2x the performance results in the same graphics.

Even now top pc games with crossfire and i7 set ups play the same games as ps360....it just looks a lot more crisper and some better effects.. (resolution also)...

Which is exactly the point! Whatever consoles do, PC will do better. That isn't saying PC will be optimized or targeted or the latest tech used, but it will mean the best gaming experience for the core gamer in terms of graphics will come from PC - same games, higher resolution, better framerate, higher quality. And also with extended features in the same way Battlefield 3 runs better quality with the same general assets as console.

Unless you are willing to state explicitly, "when PS4 launches, it will have the best looking games in the world for 6-12 months excluding £xxxx exotic PCs," you are agreeing with me. Only if you think the gaming PC will play the same games with lower quality, lower framerate, lower resolution, will that be true. Do you think that's the case?

 

[french toast]

Ha I think I agree with you then lol.

Yea the difference will be small over th coirwe of a year or so...maybe ps4 will use some exotic ray tracing tech or something...anyway ive kinda forgot what my point was ha..need some breakfast

 

[Laa-Yosh]

That isn't saying PC will be optimized or targeted or the latest tech used, but it will mean the best gaming experience for the core gamer in terms of graphics will come from PC - same games, higher resolution, better framerate, higher quality.

Which doesn't really change much, IMHO.

If you want to play on a PC, you could have been doing it for the past 5 years already.
It was also possible to move it into your living room and hook it up with your large screen TV and surround system and use a controller. Almost the same experience as console gaming, except better resolutions, filtering and frame rates - well, most of the time, when the port wasn't botched.

The advantages of a console were the same for these years, too - better multiplayer integration across all games (only one friend list), somewhat easier use (no need to access settings, easier installs etc.). Although, PC games have been catching up here in the past years with automatic patching and such.
But there still remains a few advantages to consoles that can't be matched:
- exclusive games
- no need to upgrade your hardware for up to 5-6 years.

Whether this convergence will continue, and whether the platform owners will finance more exclusive games, is yet to be seen. But the talk about pure hardware strength and graphics is IMHO still a waste of time, things haven't really changed much no matter what the performance ratio between the platforms will eventually be.

 

[Averagejoe]

I said it in another thread, but it sounds to me like Microsoft has a case of Apple / Nintendo fever. What made them successful was a strong understanding of the fundamental aspects of a video game console. They produced powerful hardware, backed by great developer support and wrapped it in an excellent online package. From there, they built on additional features to meet the markets growing demand for Apps, and the rising popularity of services like NetFlix. That seemed like a very easy formula to follow, "build it, and they will come"! This console to me sounds like a series of compromises based around the notion that they can drastically increase their mass appeal by including Kinect, and... I don't really know what else, because they don't have anything that can do that! In an age when so many device are competing for the consumers attention, this sounds like a me too device that simply tries to appeal to everybody and ends up appealing to nobody.

Many people may not get it MS vision always was taking over the living room since they started,reason why they invested heavily on the xbox and the xbox 360,but MS apparently did a retrospective of what has happen to them this pass 12 years and power has taken MS no where.

Meanwhile they see Nintendo pass them is a second with inferior under power hardware,and it doesn't only make MS think sony as well,you don't need power to suck people in,and since power bring loses,MS may be trying to use another mean to suck people in just Nintendo did,which sony may also trying to do as well..

I think Kinect will be build in is the only way it can succeed and been standard.

 

[Averagejoe]

Umm, you might want to wait to you know, see how the games look first.

That said, I'll be likely forced to go to playstation if it shows a major visual edge too. The problem is, I hate the Dual Shock so much I dont enjoy playing PS3 games nearly as much as 360 ones. It would make things a lot easier if the rumors of a new PS controller are true, and it's too my liking. if not i guess i'll go more pc, and probably own all three.

But I'm still not sold on the Xbox gloom just yet, even given sometimes I make posts like the last one I made in this thread.

People also seem to be giving little cred to MS non-gaming plans for that 3GB RAM. I for one am interested and imagine it could be pretty compelling. Compelling enough it could even sell a lot of consoles. It's not like MS is pulling a Wii U here either, it looks like a powerful box, just maybe less than the competitor, maybe.

People on forums are awfully quick to condemn MS for whatever...Ads, Kinect, even crying about "they focus too much on apps". I mean wtf...each of those is basically a non-issue, or a plus imo in the case of apps, really. Never have I been like, damn, I hate my Xbox because of all these ads.

Again though all that said I'm #1 rah rah power guy, and will be super condemnational of MS if they come up significantly weaker in real world practice. I just dont think things are set in stone yet. e3 should be incredibly interesting, as to if we can see a difference in the games. i still have a bad feeling what we see from sony at e3 may not be "real" though, since most rumors point to ps4 being in a less finished state anyway.

I don't think they will deliver a greatly under power unit,both use the same graphics card maker,which would probably mean PS4 60FPS - 720 30 FPS with the same visuals or close.

Now i am assuming to,but mostly on this GPU's on PC what i see is that,when you see side by side comparison one GPU vs another you see this one doing everything at 54FPS and then this other one weaker doing the same at 29 FPS,now that is enough to claim A is this % faster than B,while both deliver the same visuals.

Who knows i may be i am wrong,but i don't think there will be many complains about visuals unless sony really show something mind blowing..

 

[bkilian]

Well I guess that decides it for me. I've been a big Xbox fan ever since halo 1 and I absolutely fell in lover with the controller as the first console controller I felt comfortable with coming from a 100% pc gamer background. It looks like if I get a console this coming generation it'll be a playstation.

Don't take my dissatisfaction with the management as a condemnation of the product. I don't think they will be pulling a Wii U. It's just that they're moving away from the model of "Core gamer first, casuals after". Also, both sides have a problem, their current designs are so ridiculously capable, and it's a non-starter to launch a box that can't do everything the previous box did. Remember what the launch 360 and PS3 could do? Pretty much play a game online. That's it. They've had 8 years of extra development and features that the companies have to either bring over or improve on for the new generation, and that's not easy.

 

[upnorthsox]

I would say they have to improve on and indeed that ain't easy.

 

[anexanhume]

Don't take my dissatisfaction with the management as a condemnation of the product. I don't think they will be pulling a Wii U. It's just that they're moving away from the model of "Core gamer first, casuals after". Also, both sides have a problem, their current designs are so ridiculously capable, and it's a non-starter to launch a box that can't do everything the previous box did. Remember what the launch 360 and PS3 could do? Pretty much play a game online. That's it. They've had 8 years of extra development and features that the companies have to either bring over or improve on for the new generation, and that's not easy.

Is bkilian short for Buzz Killington?

 

[torbor]

Many people may not get it MS vision always was taking over the living room since they started,reason why they invested heavily on the xbox and the xbox 360,but MS apparently did a retrospective of what has happen to them this pass 12 years and power has taken MS no where.

First xbox sold 20 million units. The second one sold nearly 80 million. This isnt "no there", its nothing less then an amazing sucess.The 360 was also profitable in the last years and Nintendos sucess nothing else then an exception that wont be repeated.(most wiis collected dust after the novelty of motion weared off)









I think Kinect will be build in is the only way it can succeed and been standard.[/QUOTE]

 

[RobertR1]

Don't take my dissatisfaction with the management as a condemnation of the product. I don't think they will be pulling a Wii U. It's just that they're moving away from the model of "Core gamer first, casuals after". Also, both sides have a problem, their current designs are so ridiculously capable, and it's a non-starter to launch a box that can't do everything the previous box did. Remember what the launch 360 and PS3 could do? Pretty much play a game online. That's it. They've had 8 years of extra development and features that the companies have to either bring over or improve on for the new generation, and that's not easy.

I'd imagine the "suits" came in mid cycle and beyond.

If the early people whose idea of "capture the core, then work the casuals" is no longer being adopted then I do believe MS could be in trouble with the next console.

Looking at leaked specs though, they only business model that makes sense is one of shorter hardware life cycles with a subscription. Sell profitable hardware and get people to cycle it out every couple of years. That way you don't have to go overboard with specs for longevity.

Their basis for this is the smartphone market and the subscription model.

I believe that was reason they were doing the subscription trial model with the 360. I believe they'll push the console to be like a smartphone. 2 year Live contract with a low entry cost (or none) and the option to upgrade every couple of years.

 

[Scott_Arm]

The long-ish lifecycle of consoles was one of the selling points, in my mind. Seven years is a little much, but a four or five year cycle would be ok. Two years is just too short. Hell, most devs can't even complete a game in two years time. How is that gonna work? Even on a four year cycle, you'd have a lot of the best games coming out in the last year, with the first two years being pretty slow.

 

[Rodéric]

I wonder if they'll end up with something more akin to a PC in the sense that they update it more often with compatible hardware.
Every 3-5 years, release a new version, update the console name to reflect it (iDevices have a yearly release) and keep the architecture similar as much as possible, make fixed configurations for each game for each version and allow games to only work on a given version or better.
That way you don't have the massive combinations of the PC environment, while still providing quality/controlled hardware. Previous versions become cheaper, you may keep selling them or just count on the second hand market.
Sell the hardware with no loss but no profit either, and make a global user account just like steam for non-physical software versions.
If you want to reduce second hand, provide an interesting bonus like free DLC on registration (but the software can't be resold anymore).

Maybe establish rules about DLC vs Expansions, first would only be additional content while second could update executable or something.

 

[Scott_Arm]

On way I can see something like that happening is if they do a refresh every 2 years, but force developers to support the current and previous gen at time of release.

I'm not sure why anyone would want to buy the first gen of that console though. Usually the first year or two are kind of thin for games, so jumping in right away would kind of suck. The 2nd gen would get the good games, and you'd be stuck playing them on the 1st gen hardware.

If this thing works somehow as a DVR, I could definitely see them being sold on contracts through cable companies, or basically given away for free (totally subsidized by the cable company) to new subscribers.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

The long-ish lifecycle of consoles was one of the selling points, in my mind. Seven years is a little much, but a four or five year cycle would be ok. Two years is just too short. Hell, most devs can't even complete a game in two years time. How is that gonna work? Even on a four year cycle, you'd have a lot of the best games coming out in the last year, with the first two years being pretty slow.

Forward compatible hardware, like iOS. There's a whole thread discussing the idea of upgradeable hardware or short lifespans. NextBox 2 will run the same games as NextBox but better. Core gamers buy NextBox 2 and give NextBox to their little sister or cousin or such, and the userbase grows more organically. I'd aim the upgrade point to be consistent, such as October every two years. That means there'll be a sales lull in the preceding months as people anticipate the upgrade. Although you could continue selling the entry level model at a lower price, of course. Let's say launch at $200. After two years, introduce a new model and sell the old model at $100 entry level. That sort of thing.

There are plenty of options. Personally, I consider the short-life console a pretty straightforward adaptation of the console space, although some here have expressed resistance to the idea.

 

[AlphaWolf]

Well there's resistance for a number of reasons.

1)You're asking people to spend more money on hardware for less significant upgrades.
2)the games lag, waiting seems much more economical, but if everyone waits, the lag extends.
3)the iOS model is crap, there is no games making use of the current hardware, they all target 3 year old hardware

 

[trainplane]

Apple has managed this almost flawlessly with their iPad. iPad 2012-2013 $500, iPad 2011 $400. At this point the iPad 1 is out of many dev's target range but they will support up to 3 chip generations back. With a 2-3 year interval, devs targeting up to 3 chip generations back is virtually a 5-6 year normal generation. The problem is with MS and Sony using these specialized chips, it backs them in an architectural corner, requiring them to continue support either in hardware or emulated. This makes the architecture they choose today especially important. If they went standard PC parts through and through, it would be almost like Dell refreshing their XPS line in 2 years.

 

[Laa-Yosh]

Forward compatible hardware, like iOS. There's a whole thread discussing the idea of upgradeable hardware or short lifespans. NextBox 2 will run the same games as NextBox but better.

Do not want. In fact, kill it with fire!

I don't think they should try messing with the existing business model. It's also incredibly annoying to try to force an upgrade... there are apps that still run on a 3G iPhone and apps that require a 4. It's okay for those devs but what would a game publisher do when there's an Xboxnext, an XN2 and an XN3? It'd be just like PC development all over again.

Edit: oh and I still think the smartphones are getting upgraded far too quickly. The only reason they can afford it is that the market hasn't been saturated yet, but they're running out of room pretty fast.

 

[zed]

I said it in another thread, but it sounds to me like Microsoft has a case of Apple / Nintendo fever. What made them successful was a strong understanding of the fundamental aspects of a video game console.

But have they been that successful? I believe a lot of ppl think OK xbox1 was terrible but the 360 made lots of money which made up for that
but if you look at ED&D finical statements from
2005->2012 (the xbox360 era) they are $590 million in the red I suppose you could also count 2004 (development costs) where they lost 1.2billion. With their main business (PC) decreasing I expect theyre not wanting to support a division that cant stand on its own two feet any longer.

WRT 3GB memory for the OS, yes sounds total overkill, but I assume MS have a very good reason for this memory (theyre not idiots) which may blow us away and go 'what a masterstroke'.

Like Ive said elsewhere here, the power requirements for next generation are lower than previous generations

 

[AlphaWolf]

590m in the red with zune and kin in that division.

 

[bkilian]

You could do something like what Apple has done, where the machines are backward compatible, and they just keep getting more powerful as time goes on. That way you don't mess up devs, who can recompile for the new hardware and choose whether to launch compatible with all previous owners, or ramp up engine features.

Problem there is install base, if you choose the newer console version, you have a smaller install base. Your install base is fragmented (like iphone) and you therefore have to make games with a lower budget to remain profitable. Unless you can get iphone like sales numbers, I wouldn't hold my breath for this.

Or you could just decide that pushing Kinect is worth launching with a less powerful console, and make the assumption that the Kinect benefits will make up for any perceived game quality differences.