PS4 / Xbox One console war

[ZellSF]

it would be nice if the CPUs in these things were clocked at a reasonable speed
and my ideal vision of next-gen systems is constant 60fps in every game, but we know that's not happening

Why would you want thirty frames more a second than your eyes can actually see, and will just look like some cheap soap opera? Much better to aim for a stable, cinematic 24 frames per second.

[ST Dragon]

Unfortunately, PS4 won't have PS3 BC, as expected.

Oh well, I will hang onto my 80GB PS3 that also plays PS1 and PS2 games

Was that one of the early 2006-2007 versions? Which model could actually play PS-1 & PS-2 games and could it play PS-1 & PS-2 games from any region?

[Udderdude]

Much better to aim for a stable, cinematic 24 frames per second.

Yes, a perfect fit for the ridiculous cutscene overload quick-time event heavy "interactive experience" bullshit being piled into modern big budget games.

Why would you want thirty frames more a second than your eyes can actually see,

Sounds like your eyes are borked, buddy. Better go see an optometrist if you can't tell the difference between 30 and 60 FPS.

[MadScientist]

I think he was being sarcastic. At least I hope he was. Otherwise his post contradicts itself by claiming that your eyes won't notice a difference ("thirty frames more a second than your eyes can actually see"), yet also saying it will look different ("will look like some cheap soap opera" rather than something more 'cinematic').

[Ed Oscuro]

Something I just spotted, not PS4-related off the bat, but possibly quite good for gaming in general:
http://www.altdevblogaday.com/2013/02/2 ... trategies/ (John Carmack)

Also, Carmack writes this:
https://twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack/statu ... 8839515137
"I do think PC gaming needs to get more serious about vsync over tear now."

These problems are by no means restricted to PC gaming, however.

Sure, maybe better graphics (though the current gen graphics are incredible, so...)

Funny how we get jaded so quickly (well, some of us). I don't know whether it's right to say that the consoles are now a limiting factor in PC game production - certainly it's cheaper for most gamers to just keep an up-to-date console than to keep a PC system "up to date" for the latest releases. I think there's some real promise, graphically, although I don't think we're really all that much closer to comprehensive physics or ray tracing (which also could bring along with it improved physics simulation), for example, and it doesn't really feel like a lot more needs to be done in many cases after the success of even launch (original) Xbox titles in physics, like Wreckless (!).

I'm not ready to say that 1920x1080 is a big disadvantage - there's still far more work that can be done in modeling and textures before the resolution becomes a limiting factor. What I would like to see is less use of simple clutter and more interesting effects and moods - like those seen in the Epic Games "Samaritan" demo, which used three GeForce 580s, instead of the new Titans, but that's still an impressive amount of hardware; in either case it's probably considerably more power than will be seen in the PS4, yet Epic are already chatting up Unreal Engine 4 which they say make Samaritan look "feeble."

On the previous page I wrote that GDDR5 is probably a poor match for a x86-64 CPU (or whatever the PS4 will feature) and that is borne out by AnandTech's review of the GeForce GTX Titan. Although it is probably well beyond the capabilities of whatever graphical hardware is likely to be seen in the PS4, they noted this from a Civilization V benchmark:

With Civilization V having launched in 2010, graphics cards have become significantly more powerful since then, far outpacing growth in the CPUs that feed them. As a result we’ve rather quickly drifted from being GPU bottlenecked to being CPU bottlenecked, as we see both in our Civ V game benchmarks and our DirectCompute benchmarks.

Of course, Civ V or games like the new Sims (which models each agent, i.e. each car on the road, independently, instead of using formula for calculating densities and behaviors in aggregate) are probably not the typical action-game formula seen in games that will likely remain a staple for the PS4. Of course whatever horsepower is present may be put to use mainly in the GPU for things like cloth or possibly fluid simulation.

[BryanM]

It's kind of telling that we're gabbing about hardware, price point and market position (and incomprehensibly knifing each other every now and again) instead of the games.

I think I speak for everyone when I say I'm more excited about pretending to be a dragon on a train than Diablo (Gauntlet) 3.

The new Halo cloud simulator looks the most promising though.

[Ed Oscuro]

I think I speak for everyone when I say I'm more excited about pretending to be a dragon on a train than Diablo (Gauntlet) 3.

I gave up on the digital forests because I found the real outdoors...not really helping me at the moment though!

[Udderdude]

It's kind of telling that we're gabbing about hardware, price point and market position (and incomprehensibly knifing each other every now and again) instead of the games.

Like I said earlier in the thread, it's just the same shit from last gen except with smaller and shinier pixels.

Nobody is going to get excited over that except graphic whores, and we all know how many of those there are around here.

[BryanM]

Definitely more excited by the Grand Theft Auto x Lovecraft x EVE Online game that exists only inside of my mind.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0rJDn0jRnUQ

I shouldn't have to say this, but if you haven't watched this video yet, it is mandatory viewing for anyone with a soul. No amount of describing how empty and grey your life will be without it would be hyperbole.

[Udderdude]

Definitely more excited by the Grand Theft Auto x Lovecraft x EVE Online game that exists only inside of my mind.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0rJDn0jRnUQ

I shouldn't have to say this, but if you haven't watched this video yet, it is mandatory viewing for anyone with a soul. No amount of describing how empty and grey your life will be without it would be hyperbole.

"It's got RAM in it!"

[Ed Oscuro]

ahahah clouds made of viagra

nifty as a physics demo, though, but kind of pointless as usual

"The future is an old man with lovely eyes" so, uh, we're all going to become "Julie" Deane from Neuromancer?

[null1024]

That video is the best thing I've seen all month. Damn.

[mesh control]

http://imgur.com/a/FS86x

[jonny5]

That video is the best thing I've seen all month. Damn.

Seriously. I could care less about this gen, or the previous gen, but that video was hilarious!

[moh]

That video is the best thing I've seen all month. Damn.

Seriously. I could care less about this gen, or the previous gen, but that video was hilarious!

DID SOMEONE SAY 'CLAY PENISES' ?

[louisg]

OK, so here's some ramblings...

Also, Carmack writes this:
https://twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack/statu ... 8839515137
"I do think PC gaming needs to get more serious about vsync over tear now."

About fucking time. The biggest problem I see coming out of the Windows/Mac/Linux world is that it's all about numbers and benchmarks. I always see stuff on forums like "If I disable vsync, I get 300 FPS, where I only get 60 if I enable it. Therefore, it slows my game down to enable vsync". I've even used drivers where you *couldn't* vsync them, and played games where even if you turn it on, it still doesn't sync. It looks tacky and broken, and more importantly, this along with terrible variable framerates makes it harder for your eye to track fast-moving objects. I've noticed also that just from a game design perspective that you want to adjust speeds sometimes to suit the framerate. If you don't know how it's going to run, then that seems like a huge problem to me because it affects the whole feel.

That said, I've noticed tearing a lot even in modern console releases. Gran Turismo 5 tears a lot, for example, though I think it only does it when the rendering engine gets behind (which seems like pretty frequently ). Maybe it's not a bad decision because the alternative is a jarring halving of the rate, but the best solution seems to be to find a rate that the system can handle consistently and just go with that, even if it has to be 30fps the whole time.

On the topic of hw, I worry a little about the "8 core" decision, because there aren't a ton of algorithms which naturally fit into parallel computing. It makes a lot of sense for a multitasking system, servers, or for raytracing, video, or audio rendering, but maybe a little less sense for a gaming system..? It can't be any harder than Sony's recent architectures I guess, but I do wonder how much you can really make use of this. One use that springs to mind is a thread pool for calculating physics for hundreds of objects, but what else could you do with it? Any game programmers here wanna chime in?

Re: PC vs. embedded PC consoles, there are a couple MAJOR advantages over PC that immediately come to mind:
1.) Customized OS with everything prioritized correctly and without a ton of unneeded services running. This is potentially a lot smoother.
2.) Predictable hardware configuration-- this is very important when you write software. If you have to write software for any number of configurations, it suddenly becomes a much harder problem.

So, I wouldn't say that because it's related to PC architecture that it's necessarily going to be bad. It has *potential* to be bad, but I'm guessing Sony will do it right since they seem to have enough custom OS experience. It's vaguely Linux-based, I'm guessing, given Sony's obsession with it?

[ST Dragon]

It's ironic that despite the great technological leaps in gaming hardware, they still haven't accomplished true photo-realistic looking video games in real time. They still look fake albeit good.

[EmperorIng]

If it were photorealistic in real time, it would just be real life, dude.

[louisg]

It's ironic that despite the great technological leaps in gaming hardware, they still haven't accomplished true photo-realistic looking video games in real time. They still look fake albeit good.

It's weird, right? I still see graphics that are like, "2d texture smeared onto polygonal plane, NOW IN SUPER HIGH RESOLUTION!!". I'm not much of a graphics guy, but I do wonder if it's possible that projected 3d can ever approach the quality we see from raytracing. Lighting really improved a lot this generation-- maybe it'll continue that way..?

[Ed Oscuro]

Don't forget about tessellation!

You probably need raytracking and very fine geometry to get 'er done. It'll just be creepy by that point if you try for realism though, so uh, I guess neorichie will be getting his wish sooner or later.

[louisg]

Don't forget about tessellation!

You probably need raytracking and very fine geometry to get 'er done. It'll just be creepy by that point if you try for realism though, so uh, I guess neorichie will be getting his wish sooner or later.

Yeah, full 3d textures all the time would be nice

I have to say though, this last generation was the first one where "photorealistic" didn't mean "all the characters look like they're wearing soiled clothes cuz someone included shadows in the textures, and everything is monochrome". The graphics tend to have a sharp, vivid, clean look that I think is going to age a lot better.

[Ed Oscuro]

Haha, soiled clothes. I rather liked the way Morrowind looked, anyway.

I always see stuff on forums like

Well, put that aside; dolts are going to be dolts regardless of whatever we do.

"If I disable vsync, I get 300 FPS, where I only get 60 if I enable it. Therefore, it slows my game down to enable vsync". I've even used drivers where you *couldn't* vsync them, and played games where even if you turn it on, it still doesn't sync. It looks tacky and broken, and more importantly, this along with terrible variable framerates makes it harder for your eye to track fast-moving objects.

fps_max

I'm a year out of date here (the last thing I played was CS-GO, and not online much at that) but I didn't have the same impressions you're getting.

Just getting the timing of frame pushes to the buffer right could be one way of doing things right. vsync strikes me as a terrible "solution." I'm for more speed, not less!

But I'm a guy who generally never turned on anti-aliasing, even when I had hardware that could do it.

On the topic of hw, I worry a little about the "8 core" decision, because there aren't a ton of algorithms which naturally fit into parallel computing. It makes a lot of sense for a multitasking system, servers, or for raytracing, video, or audio rendering, but maybe a little less sense for a gaming system..?

I obviously didn't watch anything other than the spoof video, so I've got no clue about what the specs breakdown are. I think that actually most all of what modern console games - of the straightforward FPS / action game mold - do is push frames out, with a minimum of AI or other in-order types of tasks going on. My guess (based in part on the use of GDDR5) was that there is going to be a heavy emphasis on parallel computing. A lot is being done on-GPU these days, and physics (PhysX, for example, even if it is terribly implemented) is a natural example of that. In most games the only use of a strong CPU would be to leave as much GPU time available for graphics as possible.

I also think that, in terms of energy requirements and die size, nobody really has found a way to boost single-threaded speed dramatically beyond current stock speeds without requiring much higher voltages and consequently higher TDPs, higher draw from the wall, and much higher heat impact. Intel's dynamic OC stuff is kind of a stab at this but I don't see it as giving you a CPU development generation's worth of improvement, and it doesn't seem intended for constant use anyway. No doubt that for us MAME players and the like there would be some heavy interest in a smaller-die, high performance single core part, but I think regular desktop usage is changing somewhat towards favoring multicore CPUs.

Re: PC vs. embedded PC consoles, there are a couple MAJOR advantages over PC that immediately come to mind:
1.) Customized OS with everything prioritized correctly and without a ton of unneeded services running. This is potentially a lot smoother.

Linux is gaining significant ground for gaming, and even a Windows novice with some time for research can figure out ways of removing many offenders.

In practice, Windows 7 on a beefy machine with proper streamlining for performance isn't choppy at all.

The consoles are always playing catch-up, to some extent, with expectations based on PC gaming. Personally I think 360 games don't look too bad given the age of the hardware, but there is a very notable difference, and I think inexact scaling of components (not just textures and poly counts, obviously, but underlying things like logic, AI, and anything exotic) between the 360 and PC can mean that the consoles end up choppy anyway.

[shmuppyLove]

Unfortunately, PS4 won't have PS3 BC, as expected.

Oh well, I will hang onto my 80GB PS3 that also plays PS1 and PS2 games

Was that one of the early 2006-2007 versions? Which model could actually play PS-1 & PS-2 games and could it play PS-1 & PS-2 games from any region?

It's a launch model, and yes it will play PS1 and PS2 discs. I don't know if it's region-free for those titles, but I doubt it.

[BryanM]

I also think that, in terms of energy requirements and die size, nobody really has found a way to boost single-threaded speed dramatically beyond current stock speeds without requiring much higher voltages and consequently higher TDPs, higher draw from the wall, and much higher heat impact. Intel's dynamic OC stuff is kind of a stab at this but I don't see it as giving you a CPU development generation's worth of improvement

I'm still optimistic that a less gentle material will eventually be rendered viable; whether that's graphene, diamond, or leprechaun gold. The step forward that would be.. it would be insane.

(Not that there would be any kind of game they would use it for besides Call of NFL Blitz. Unless Kurzweil makes some hella progress with his robot hookers initiative.)

It's kind of neat how they were aiming for as close to 7 Ghz as they could with the ultimately doomed Tejas project, though.

[ST Dragon]

It's a launch model, and yes it will play PS1 and PS2 discs. I don't know if it's region-free for those titles, but I doubt it.

You mean the very 1st PS-3 model released in November 11, 2006?
Weren't the later models backwards compatible to the PS-1 & PS-2 games?

[louisg]

I'm a year out of date here (the last thing I played was CS-GO, and not online much at that) but I didn't have the same impressions you're getting.

Just getting the timing of frame pushes to the buffer right could be one way of doing things right. vsync strikes me as a terrible "solution." I'm for more speed, not less!

Right, but you don't get "more speed", what you get is updates happening mid-frame. The content on the screen will never go faster than the refresh rate of your monitor, despite what the FPS counter says. It's basically going the exact same speed it was before, only now it just looks worse. If vsync is causing a game to perform erratically or too slowly, then it's really a performance glitch that should be properly addressed.

Re: PC vs. embedded PC consoles, there are a couple MAJOR advantages over PC that immediately come to mind:
1.) Customized OS with everything prioritized correctly and without a ton of unneeded services running. This is potentially a lot smoother.

Linux is gaining significant ground for gaming, and even a Windows novice with some time for research can figure out ways of removing many offenders.

In practice, Windows 7 on a beefy machine with proper streamlining for performance isn't choppy at all.

I think as computer geeks we overestimate how accessible Linux is. Even as someone who's a professional programmer, there are a lot of configuration issues to overcome, especially if you have newish hardware. And just because someone is running Linux doesn't mean that they'll have a well-setup system-- I think for a good platform that is running anything time-critical, you should have a realtime kernel, for example. This is not as common on Linux as it should be. There's a patch that people use for audio applications, but it's not mainstream. Start here:

https://rt.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Fr ... _Questions

When it comes to Windows gaming, I honestly haven't touched it in a while. In the early 00s I gave up in disgust. I checked back in around 2005 when I went to GDC and anything PC-based was tearing and otherwise spazzing out where the console booths generally had fluid and consistent performance, the awful Geist display not withstanding . I've seen the same at arcades that use PC hardware. The frame rate is high in terms of frames per second, but it's erratic and unpredictable (and again, I do suspect this is down to game coding more than anything). I have no reason to suspect they've somehow improved. I *do* suspect that most PC gamers can't tell or don't care.

And from everyone I know, gaming on computers sounds like it's become a DRM hellhole (I have no problems personally with DRM, but it shouldn't need always-on internet or be unreliable in any way). No thanks.

[EmperorIng]

From my understanding, the 60GB launch models of the PS3 can play PS1 and PS2 games (albeit with some input lag), and later 80GB models have software emulation for PS2.

[rapoon]

mechanical eyeballs (PS4 Vision) using recognition software. scanning my room, scanning me, scanning my toilet. cramming and shoveling the same "it's so easy!" and "personalization" bullshit
down my throat while it mines anything and everything there is to know about me. no, it's not as invasive as the google glasses but this is pretty bad. I don't need some asshole
shoving me in a virtual box, hammering me with personalized advertisements and god knows what else. the social aspect of gaming is fine at times but this is entirely different. fuck all that....

[TransatlanticFoe]

I think as computer geeks we overestimate how accessible Linux is. Even as someone who's a professional programmer, there are a lot of configuration issues to overcome, especially if you have newish hardware. And just because someone is running Linux doesn't mean that they'll have a well-setup system-- I think for a good platform that is running anything time-critical, you should have a realtime kernel, for example. This is not as common on Linux as it should be.

Whilst definitely not for computer n00bs, it is something that's not beyond most PC gamers. It's relatively straightforward to grasp the basics for anyone willing to learn and the community is there to pick up the slack. It's got a long way to go but it's picking up momentum - I think forcing the Windows 8 touch interface on desktop users is definitely making IT savvy people think twice about their next OS.

And from everyone I know, gaming on computers sounds like it's become a DRM hellhole (I have no problems personally with DRM, but it shouldn't need always-on internet or be unreliable in any way). No thanks.

It's overstated. Most DRM now just involves Steam or Origin, both of which have proper offline modes which work fine and don't need periodic online authentication. Ubisoft were the main offender when it came to always online, because their DRM was basically half the game is downloaded as you play - that shit I want no part of. Having a Steam/Origin/Games for Windows client is a nuisance but not a game-breaking experience by any means.

Should PS4 and the next xbox lock games to an account (with a fee to activate used games), that's effectively the level of DRM that most PC gamers have to put up with. If that is the case, the benefits of console over PC are gradually being eroded.

[Ed Oscuro]

I'm a year out of date here (the last thing I played was CS-GO, and not online much at that) but I didn't have the same impressions you're getting.

Just getting the timing of frame pushes to the buffer right could be one way of doing things right. vsync strikes me as a terrible "solution." I'm for more speed, not less!

Right, but you don't get "more speed", what you get is updates happening mid-frame.

Well, if you're denying that vsync causes lag, you don't understand the topic.

"Updates happening mid-frame" is another way of saying that you get a partial image (almost) immediately, rather than delaying that image for the monitor to sync with it. I believe that every current desktop graphics system uses double buffering, so if you see part of an image the entire image is actually ready to be displayed - a mismatch prevents the monitor from starting its refresh at the moment the image is available. It's pretty simple to see how this causes lag. Buffering solutions inherently introduce lag (and potentially a lot of wasted processing; Oblivion on PC had a bug with the "frames to render ahead" option which is a similar idea), although I haven't played around with them much. People claim that triple buffering has no lag but (as a commenter in the last link below notes) it depends. It's quite possible for triple buffering to be so expensive that it causes significant lag.

http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=928593
http://www.tweakguides.com/Graphics_9.html
and on the input lag side...
http://www.anandtech.com/show/2803/5
and for triple buffering http://www.anandtech.com/show/2794/2

So is it getting "more speed" or preventing lag? That's a half dozen the one, six the other kind of question. It's certainly a good preventative against input lag to disable vsync and buffering though.

Also, are you seriously talking about PC gaming without having played anything since 2000-2005? vsync wasn't as big a problem with old titles back then, if it was even implemented. Today we have plenty of games with creeping per-frame complexity and even without any buffering or synchronization the time spent waiting for a frame can be significant (especially depending on the hardware and software combination). Actual experience with semi-recent games shows that it's very common for vsync to cause horrendous lag (again, I haven't fooled with buffering so much but I don't like that either). And I also find that tearing isn't usually a big problem.