What can we reasonably expect from next gen graphics?

[eastmen]

I'm not saying the jump / change isn't worth it, I'm just saying that the hardware manufacturers will be reevaluating their stance with hardware, and I think they'll aim to be profitable as soon as possible on hardware, as opposed to trying to get powerful hardware and make up the losses with software and services.

You can still build quite the console for $400 usd in 2011 vs 2005 tech. Ati is rumored to release a brand new tech later this year. So something based on that would be ideal for ms and it would be light years beyond xenos and the 7800 put into the ps3. Like wise a lower end fermi would be light years ahead of the xenos and 7800.

couple either of those to a more modern cpu and you got a kick ass system that most likely wont break the bank and would give a great visual leap for everyone involved including the fans

 

[tha_con]

You can still build quite the console for $400 usd in 2011 vs 2005 tech. Ati is rumored to release a brand new tech later this year. So something based on that would be ideal for ms and it would be light years beyond xenos and the 7800 put into the ps3. Like wise a lower end fermi would be light years ahead of the xenos and 7800.

couple either of those to a more modern cpu and you got a kick ass system that most likely wont break the bank and would give a great visual leap for everyone involved including the fans

I don't think either manufacturer wants to spend $400 per unit to make these consoles. I think they'll honestly aim to spend $200 and charge $300. The Nintendo Wii was a huge wake up call that it's possible to sell consoles on an experience at a low price while still remaining profitable. They aren't going to try to stick in this "arms race" for lack of a better phrase. I honestly see both MS and Sony holding back on the hardware front next generation, it seems pretty clear at this point.

 

[BadTB25]

I have to disagree. Both companies will want the cutting edge at the lowest cost possible. Neither will want to be viewed as technologically behind and risk multplat games being the inferior version released.

A quick look at muliplat sales releases frequently favor the superior version of games outselling the "lazy" port.

Nintendo got away with sub-HD hardware primarily due to excellent marketing and a new control scheme. Whether that will continue Next Gen remains to be seen, but I believe that is a pretty significant risk to take if you aim low and your competitors aim high. I could be way off, but I don't see the companies as wanting to cede the technological advantage that easily.

 

[eastmen]

I don't think either manufacturer wants to spend $400 per unit to make these consoles. I think they'll honestly aim to spend $200 and charge $300. The Nintendo Wii was a huge wake up call that it's possible to sell consoles on an experience at a low price while still remaining profitable. They aren't going to try to stick in this "arms race" for lack of a better phrase. I honestly see both MS and Sony holding back on the hardware front next generation, it seems pretty clear at this point.

With the wii , only nintendo was offering a different experiance. What happens when you have 3 choices ?


if your MS your going to look towards hardware and software to move your units , if your nintendo your brand name ips and if your sony their ips (though it hasn't done to much this gen for them)

 

[Laa-Yosh]

just the jump from a dx 9 level gpu to a dx 11 or possibly 12 would be amazing.

To be honest, the average user probably would not notice any tech difference between those images and would only say things like more colorful and so on...

 

[tha_con]

I have to disagree. Both companies will want the cutting edge at the lowest cost possible. Neither will want to be viewed as technologically behind and risk multplat games being the inferior version released.

A quick look at muliplat sales releases frequently favor the superior version of games outselling the "lazy" port.

Nintendo got away with sub-HD hardware primarily due to excellent marketing and a new control scheme. Whether that will continue Next Gen remains to be seen, but I believe that is a pretty significant risk to take if you aim low and your competitors aim high. I could be way off, but I don't see the companies as wanting to cede the technological advantage that easily.

Nintendo got away with sub-HD hardware because they offered a new interesting way to play games at a low price. Why do you think Sony and Microsoft are going after this market with the Wand and Natal?

Also, those sales numbers for multiplatform releases have almost nothing to do with which version is superior and everything to do with a huge install base. Having millions more users playing your system generally means you'll sell more copies. Common sense.

Both Microsoft and Sony will have similarly powered hardware, but neither is going to risk missing out on Nintendo's market, and in order to do that the hardware costs will have to be lower than the launch this gen (as in sub $400) and include new controls. Natal and the Wand will carry over to next gen and will almost certainly be packed in with a game for each.

 

[baten]

For me, the most amazing achievement this generation is how Sony managed to make an unpiratable console and still sell it on par with the 360 that was released on year before.
I truly believe this is a "game changer" for the industry.
Graphic wise, the leaps will be determined by the year of the launch of the next generation. Most probably we will have to wait until 2013-2014 for the next iterations - the economic crisis is not over, in fact the worst is still ahead.
So 2-3 years in the future we will see many advancements in the graphic industry. The CPU will also get much more powerfull, and we can expect ad least 4 GB of memory (should be 6 GB if one follows the 15 times leap in memory size from PS1 -> PS2 -> PS3). This will bode into some amazing textures, much better lighting and a lot better animation.

 

[BadTB25]

Nintendo got away with sub-HD hardware because they offered a new interesting way to play games at a low price. Why do you think Sony and Microsoft are going after this market with the Wand and Natal?

Also, those sales numbers for multiplatform releases have almost nothing to do with which version is superior and everything to do with a huge install base. Having millions more users playing your system generally means you'll sell more copies. Common sense.

Both Microsoft and Sony will have similarly powered hardware, but neither is going to risk missing out on Nintendo's market, and in order to do that the hardware costs will have to be lower than the launch this gen (as in sub $400) and include new controls. Natal and the Wand will carry over to next gen and will almost certainly be packed in with a game for each.

I agree with your first point which is why Nintendo's success with an underpowered system is due to the control scheme and not so much going with a low-cost inferior hardware. Their success shouldn't be proof of concept that low-cost hardware is the way forward.

As to your second point, I know of a lot of people that base their multiplat decisions on demos and which version has the perceived superior version. I know Neogaf shouldn't be the gold standard for the gaming public, but a quick perusal of the posts on that site suggests that a segment of gamers will pick the superior version when all else are equal--see Bayonetta, RE5, Batman AA, etc. Your right in that part of the sales are due to install base, but install base is also based on which system has the perceived better 3rd party development support.

As to your 3rd point, the problem is none of the 3 companies know what the competition is really shooting for and therefore no guarantees can be made on whether their shooting for the high-end of graphics or pulling a Nintendo. I believe that both Sony and MS would like the perception of being the superior technological company. Neither can run the risk of shooting for low to mid level technology only to be trumped by the other.

Put it another way, how many of our forum goers will purchase the lower powered system given that the consoles were the same or similar price point?

 

[assen]

just the jump from a dx 9 level gpu to a dx 11 or possibly 12 would be amazing.

http://unigine.com/screenshots/heaven2.jpg

Add now a screenshot of the same benchmark running in DX9 mode, and your argument suddenly becomes considerably less convincing. And that benchmark is artificially bad in DX9 (e.g. no one would make perfectly flat roofs/stairs, unless he has tesselation to show off).

 

[Platon]

I think that the 360 showed that $400 is an ok launch price, sure 300 would be better but I would not be surprised if 400 is what they will target again. I would also totally baselessly assume that they will try and cram in as much as possible for that amount in the console, so that they more or less break even, maybe even making a small profit depending on how the prospects for cost reduction look. It seems that cost reductions are getting more and more difficult as generations pass by.

The Wii can't be used as a concept of low power console and lower price selling well. Gamecube was also a low priced console and did not have even close the same success. Wii sold as it did because of the control scheme which also opened up new target audiences. If they would take the wii route then we would be talking about an 1.5 version of the PS360 if even that. There would hardly be a reason for upgrade and I am almost certain no one would have bought Wii if it had gamecube controls.

On the other hand it is quite clear that they will not target a $600-700 price range either, PS3 mayde that perfectly clear for Sony and I'm sure for everyone else. And adding hardware that you can not cover by the price of the console is something that will be avoided not only for keeping costs low, but also because the actual benefits are minimal. It might give some bragging rights but it is more and more doubtful that it will translate to better sales and even more doubtful that the games will look much improved. Maybe we have not reached the the point of diminishing returns yet, but never the less, you will need so much more for differences be actually apparent.

So what can we expect of the next gen graphics, well if they actually do launch in the end of 2012 and good indicator would be to see what the 3d cards next year are capable of and I would think that somewhere there will be the next gen of consoles...

 

[gongo]

Very very informative posts from Laa yosh, who is a professional from the 3D field, we can now form an image of how next gen graphics can look. I seen Arma2, yes the lighting/HDR does look much more realistic....however still find it a little lowrezy, a little murky..must we move to 256bit HDR to get that a sharper CG look?

TBH with the Unigine and Oblivion screenshot.....i do not think the jump is anywhere i thought it would be with 3 years and 2 DX gens later.....the lighting again still has that "same" taste...I also think a lot of games still lack that extra polygons. You know since the focus was shifted to processing power via shaders, the basic 3D we knew before, aka Polygons or Triangles (per seconds) did not get a much needed upgrade. Tessellation could be nice but my understanding is, it would only go as high as the hardware's output. I want my bricks to be feel solid and full of volume and weight from every angles! It is just me, but i can detect a missing need for polygons....and today g ames still have some way to go before tricking my eyes.

Another upgrade i want to see is a more living breathing world...i made a topic at PC Games forums about Company of Heroes, a old game today, but still a lot of eye candy that stands up to the best! IT all comes from those little animation scripts and Havok physics interaction. I hope next gen CPU has enough power to quadriple what COH did (COH illusion is broken after prolonged play and noticing the 5-6 repeating scripts, but still awesome!) for every genre...which they should...then again...content creation may go up? Or not since this is more engine side...?

 

[Rangers]

Given how great this gen's graphics looks, we can expect something truly amazing.

Also, this will be the first console gen in ages where imo all high end PC development has died. Therefore, I believe this particular "generation gap" is going to blow our minds like few before it.

In the past, new console graphics had always already been seen on high end PC before, thus inevitably dulling the wow factor of new consoles. This time, well for all practical purposes there are no high end PC games anymore (besides Crysis, which will be many years old).

 

[Laa-Yosh]

Don't (yet) count out Epic's and id's newest and still undisclosed efforts, and maybe Valve to. They could still be maintaining highend PC development along with consoles... Although the general audience would probably not notice the differences between the console and PC versions of Rage or Doom4.

 

[tha_con]

I'll leave it at this: I have my thoughts, and I think they are more than justified based on past success of other consoles, the direction the HD companies are taking their hardware, and the current state of the industry. You guy's can be hopeful for super powerful consoles again next generation, I'm all for it, but I think it's an unrealistic view point. The leap (visually) will be considerably smaller from PS3/360 to PS4/Next Xbox than the previous jump.

 

[Laa-Yosh]

Developers have been talking about diminishing returns even before the PS3 and X360 were released.
Granted, efforts have doubled nevertheless, but I don't think we'll see that again either.

 

[Neb]

This time, well for all practical purposes there are no high end PC games anymore (besides Crysis, which will be many years old).

There are several high-end games or say games with stunning graphics and tech you wont find in console games nor in the same quantity. Ofcourse that implies one looks besides the few 'on-all-lips' PC games that seems to be all that sticks on console players eyes and thus 'that-is-the-whole-world' view. Maybe a change of foucs strength to see what is around to notice that there actually are lots of other stunning titles out. It is just not as much noticed becouse generally on the PC side people are not so much interested in hyping/bragging over what is pretty much standard stuff for a PC game which would be considered premium luxory on consoles if it was possible.

It is also interesting to notice people only name Crysis as a huge title for PC yet forget Warhead. Nothing different from counting both Ucharted 1 and Uncharted 2 as different games.

 

[Neb]

Very very informative posts from Laa yosh, who is a professional from the 3D field, we can now form an image of how next gen graphics can look. I seen Arma2, yes the lighting/HDR does look much more realistic....however still find it a little lowrezy, a little murky..must we move to 256bit HDR to get that a sharper CG look?

Why would higher HDR precision cure "lowrezy" syndrome? Also is this not something that sets a huge difference between console and PC games, that is resolution as in texture res, buffer res etc.

Either way calling ArmA 2 "low-rezy/murky" is off as it does look very realistic while having advanced tech and pretty much what you seemed to be after in initial post.
http://forum.beyond3d.com/showpost.php?p=1307580&postcount=776
http://forum.beyond3d.com/showpost.php?p=1307589&postcount=777
http://forum.beyond3d.com/showpost.php?p=1307590&postcount=778

I also think a lot of games still lack that extra polygons. You know since the focus was shifted to processing power via shaders, the basic 3D we knew before, aka Polygons or Triangles (per seconds) did not get a much needed upgrade.

Yeah though scene complexity has gone up dramatically so each individual asset wont get as much increase as one would think ignoring scene complexity. I think it is here where tesselation will do wonders.

 

[eastmen]

Very very informative posts from Laa yosh, who is a professional from the 3D field, we can now form an image of how next gen graphics can look. I seen Arma2, yes the lighting/HDR does look much more realistic....however still find it a little lowrezy, a little murky..must we move to 256bit HDR to get that a sharper CG look?

TBH with the Unigine and Oblivion screenshot.....i do not think the jump is anywhere i thought it would be with 3 years and 2 DX gens later.....the lighting again still has that "same" taste...I also think a lot of games still lack that extra polygons. You know since the focus was shifted to processing power via shaders, the basic 3D we knew before, aka Polygons or Triangles (per seconds) did not get a much needed upgrade. Tessellation could be nice but my understanding is, it would only go as high as the hardware's output. I want my bricks to be feel solid and full of volume and weight from every angles! It is just me, but i can detect a missing need for polygons....and today g ames still have some way to go before tricking my eyes.

Another upgrade i want to see is a more living breathing world...i made a topic at PC Games forums about Company of Heroes, a old game today, but still a lot of eye candy that stands up to the best! IT all comes from those little animation scripts and Havok physics interaction. I hope next gen CPU has enough power to quadriple what COH did (COH illusion is broken after prolonged play and noticing the 5-6 repeating scripts, but still awesome!) for every genre...which they should...then again...content creation may go up? Or not since this is more engine side...?

With regards to unigine and oblivion , remember one is a demo and one is a game that was in development for a few years and had a budget tens of times higher than the demo. So art and other things would of course look better.

But just use unigine shots as an example of the starting point for next gen.

 

[assen]

With regards to unigine and oblivion , remember one is a demo and one is a game that was in development for a few years and had a budget tens of times higher than the demo. So art and other things would of course look better.

But just use unigine shots as an example of the starting point for next gen.

On the contrary, a demo showing a focused, single area, and is produced exclusively to be pretty and promote an engine, will be prettier than scenes from a real game which has to be produced under many more constraints. Unigine IMHO is a fairly good representative of the "DX9 gen", nothing "next" about it except the tesselation.

 

[Neb]

With regards to unigine and oblivion , remember one is a demo and one is a game that was in development for a few years and had a budget tens of times higher than the demo. So art and other things would of course look better.

But just use unigine shots as an example of the starting point for next gen.

The techdemos files are as is open to tweaking. Would be funny to show proof of concept how some lighting related color changes makes it look far more photoreal. Ofcourse that goes against the devs choices. But apart from tesselation the engine sports quite a lot of tech features something people seem to forget and focus to much on artistic choices.

http://forum.beyond3d.com/showthread.php?t=55449&highlight=unigine

http://unigine.com/features/