Microsoft Xbox One Revealed (Coming Holiday 2013) $599 AUS RRP / $499 US RRP

[gregpolk]

Highly doubt we'll see it this year. Rumours are pointing towards a November launch for Wii U and we've known about that for a while now. But it is plausible that they want to keep it very secret to keep X360 sales going strong. As soon as people know there is a new console set to launch I'd expect they'll be hesitant to invest in the current gear. I find it highly unlikely that MS would have kept their new console development so closely under wraps if it was launching this year. Surely we should have more solid rumours, instead we have many conflicting stories about its hardware. But then again we have conflicting reports about the WiiU as well and its actually been revealed.

Be a pretty great win for AMD if they got their CPUs/GPUs into all 3 platforms. WiiU is still an IBM cpu though I think.

[mtma]

Originally Posted by SLATYE

When people say x86 these days, what they mean is x86-64. I doubt that AMD would sit down and deliberately cut out the 64-bit parts of a Phenom II, and Sony wouldn't ask for that anyway.

POWER advantages:

• Well suited to consoles
• Might be easier to get a more "customised" chip from IBM
• Compatibility with current generation
• Harder to emulate on a PC - at least if someone breaks the encryption, they'll still be playing on the right console.

x86-64 advantages:

• Easy to port between PC and console, increasing potential market size
• 20+ years of development experience - good tools, easy to find programmers, etc.
• Could be cheaper due to mass production advantages, if they are just using desktop cores.

Speaking of which, in the PS4 thread (or maybe in one of the processor forums) there was some talk about the legacy stuff that's still in x86-64 that's really just been in the core platform due to very long in the tooth x86 compatibility. I wonder how much of a core size/power etc. deficit x86 is really taking in terms of a special purpose application like a gaming console, simply because of the legacy stuff.

Mind you either way I don't see AMD doing a 86-64 stripped down version of the APU core just for that market. I'm guessing the whole point of the excercise is to maximise economy of scale in the first place.

[SLATYE]

Originally Posted by mtma

Mind you either way I don't see AMD doing a 86-64 stripped down version of the APU core just for that market. I'm guessing the whole point of the excercise is to maximise economy of scale in the first place.

Yes, if they were going to buy a custom CPU they might as well just go back to the IBM POWER chips. Those definitely work fine on consoles, as both Sony and MS have demonstrated.

I'd be somewhat surprised if the "legacy" x86 stuff is taking up much space. After all, the basic 32-bit architecture hasn't really changed much since the 386 days, and the whole 386 was only 275,000 transistors. Obviously there have been improvements (pipelining, cache, etc) but removing the old stuff wouldn't change that.

The bigger problem is that the original 16-bit design (8086) moulded later architectures around it (eg. always the same set of registers as the 8086, because it'd be incompatible if they were changed to something more logical). Taking that out of a modern 64-bit chip would just leave a 64-bit chip that's incompatible with a lot of software and much less efficient than a purpose-built 64-bit chip like the POWER or SPARC designs.

[Philll]

http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2012/0...eal4/?pid=2562

The Witcher 2 already looks better than that

http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2012/0...eal4/?pid=2550

I see next-gen isn't losing its bloom trait

[Zerstorer]

Epic seem to be choosing ease of development over pushing graphics further. With the amount that developers bitch and moan about used games, high detail graphics, and voodoo magic hurting their bottom line thanks to raised development costs, this is good.

[proffesso]

Originally Posted by Philll

http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2012/0...eal4/?pid=2562

The Witcher 2 already looks better than that

http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2012/0...eal4/?pid=2550

I see next-gen isn't losing its bloom trait

not really in the same ballpark. the witcher2 looks good, but its quite obvious to see the shortcomings.

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ChThellSed...screenshot.jpg

just the emissive object lighting alone is worth its weight in gold, and what looks to be secondary bounced light specular.

[Philll]

Shortcomings, as you purposely pick a screenshot that tries to make it look bad (which still looks better than most games)

just the emissive object lighting alone is worth its weight in gold

Worth its weight in gold to who? The majority of gamers that couldn't even tell you what anti-aliasing is? If it doesn't look good, they could care less about the technical feat.

[proffesso]

an interesting post on a gamedev list -

What Epic is doing is basically saving the hides of Sony and MS.

There's going to be a new console generation at some point, right? Ergo, if you upgrade, you'd better be seeing visual acuity you cannot see on the existing hardware generation, otherwise, what's the point?

Look at each of the increments of hardware - each time it's trumpeted by some amazing visuals that never actually turn out to be possible in real time in a real gaming environment - not and have a playable game anyway. Lair anyone?

But the fact remains that most gamers are visual whores and pretty, well lit 'game engine produced' images like this get them excited, and the fact is that while lots of current gen tech could produce an approximation of this, none of them can actually do it as well as what top end Unreal produced content can do in real time (provided, of course, you stay within the confines of what Epic decides it's necessary for you to do. Ie, what they want to do.).

I quite believe that some of the lighting in this is not really do-able on scale on the current gen hardware - you need to see it as a moving image to understand that. They are actually emulating in real time quite a lot of what the offline shaders do in movie CG processing. Sure, a lot are short cuts too, but the point is they are now actually doing the same kind of processing, even if they aren't doing it as in depth as the offline renders do. That's some serious real time horsepower being touted there.

However. What's NOT being pointed out here is that to get those results, content creation costs fucking skyrocket - to the point where you are effectively creating the same kinds of assets as movies, only it's worse for games because most of the time you don't control the camera, and the content can be interactive, so your animation creation and rigs behind it need to be an order of magnitude more complicated than movie ones.

It's not just a question of saying "Well, you created 20,000 polygon models by default in maya, all our time is spent making them 2,000 and we don't have to do that any more" because when you build that 20,000 polygon model, you aren't building the rig behind it to actually move 20,000 polygons nicely. You aren't worrying about a facial animation bone structure to handle an 8,000 polygon face.

The work required for this kind of visual real time content is fucking staggering. What Epic is doing here is basically raising the bar so people will want to buy the new consoles, but also making it so that about 6 development studios in the world actually have the ability to make this shit.

It's going to make being a content creator and having a full time job almost impossible, since the number of people required to make content for games like this is going to double, and no studio at all will want to carry that many people full time, so everyone is going to end up contract. Just like in the movie industry.

It's inevitable really - but it's sad and it sucks.

remember what i was saying earlier about production costs?

[proffesso]

Originally Posted by Philll

Shortcomings, as you purposely pick a screenshot that tries to make it look bad (which still looks better than most games)



Worth its weight in gold to who? The majority of gamers that couldn't even tell you what anti-aliasing is? If it doesn't look good, they could care less about the technical feat.

its what you can do with it. lighting currently is a big hack. brdf aproximations, few hardware lights, fewer shadows etc.

object lights / area lights and a general increase in usuable lights will make a big visual impact. lighting has always been a big problem

(defferred lighting is a new hack, but it has plenty of problems as well)

[Philll]

You're always banging on about production costs, and when smaller studios like CD Projekt RED can make a multiplatform game with some of the best visuals ever seen, I don't sympathize with you or anybody else, at all. Especially is cases where more money is spent on marketing a game than developing it.

If the production costs are too much at the present, does UE4 fix that somehow? Did UE3 make things cheaper years ago? As your post stated - "most gamers are visual whores", does it decrease their expectations?

Here's what happened last time, in 2005 (3:55 onwards):



Now that was impressive at the time, and guess what? Development costs increased then, too, but to get back to the point I was originally making, I don't see what is so special about the over use of bloom and low resolution textures in relation to something being next-gen.

Originally Posted by proffesso

its what you can do with it. lighting currently is a big hack. brdf aproximations, few hardware lights, fewer shadows etc.

object lights / area lights and a general increase in usuable lights will make a big visual impact. lighting has always been a big problem

(defferred lighting is a new hack, but it has plenty of problems as well)

Thanks for proving my point again. Lighting is lighting, nobody cares how it is achieved, and more people would be concerned with how gameplay improves over lighting systems, something I doubt any iteration of UE will ever fix.

[proffesso]

Originally Posted by Philll

and more people would be concerned with how gameplay improves over lighting systems, something I doubt any iteration of UE will ever fix.

engines have next to nothing to do with gameplay. if thats your only concern then stop talking about engines.

[Philll]

Originally Posted by proffesso

engines have next to nothing to do with gameplay. if thats your only concern then stop talking about engines.

My only concern? Did you miss the ~3 paragraphs above that?

[proffesso]

Originally Posted by Philll

My only concern? Did you miss the ~3 paragraphs above that?

but you dont seem to grasp the other concepts, and keep falling back to "it doesnt improve gameplay"

CD Projekt RED are a "small dev" with over 100 people. who's game cost at least $11million to make, in poland which has lower wages. and even if that wasnt the case, there is always an exception to a rule. you really should talk about the average industry, not exceptions. (100 person studio, working on 1 game is not considered "small" btw...)

UE4, CE3 etc dont improve production costs, I never said they did. it is what it is. its a pretty simple thing to understand - bigger worlds with better graphics = more cost. I do believe I have pointed out my dislike of rising dev costs, and how its going to turn into hollywood with a few big studios running things.

[Philll]

Originally Posted by proffesso

but you dont seem to grasp the other concepts, and keep falling back to "it doesnt improve gameplay"

I didn't fall back to it, and I only mentioned it once to explain how the average gamer could care less about this sort of thing and what they would be more focused on. You should know. The 'graphics don't matter' drivel should have popped up more than once in topics you frequent.

there is always an exception to a rule

Or, there's a company that gives their customers exactly what they want. With their games and digital distribution service. They also patch and offer extended editions to their games based on community feedback. Who would have thought doing so would make you successful?

you really should talk about the average industry, not exceptions. (100 person studio, working on 1 game is not considered "small" btw...)

I didn't say small did I, I said smaller, nor did I mention any other developers in comparison. Compare it to games of the same type (action RPG). They're smaller.

Do you consider them to have an advantage over any of the 'industry average' when they revamped their engine, made high resolution models + textures for multiple platforms, and have to financially support themselves for a game initially only for the PC? Based on what was originally a PC exclusive?

I don't consider them an exception when they're doing what everybody else could do if they weren't so greedy and stupid.

In one thread you will say "10 - 20mil is considered "normal", but now 11 million isn't apart of the industry average? I can't keep up with these contradictions.

UE4, CE3 etc dont improve production costs, I never said they did.

What do we need it for again? In video games, if it doesn't somehow allow visuals or (dare I mention it) gameplay to progress?

[proffesso]

Originally Posted by Philll

In one thread you will say "10 - 20mil is considered "normal", but now 11 million isn't apart of the industry average? I can't keep up with these contradictions.



What do we need it for again? In video games, if it doesn't somehow allow visuals or (dare I mention it) gameplay to progress?

how is that a contradiction? its normal...you said "smaller" smaller would indicate a smaller than average budget (5 - 10mil). witcher2 devs had the same budget as a lot of places, in a lower-wage area I might add, so it probably worked out quite well for them.

I already said it increases the visuals...im not sure what your getting at?

one day I would like to hear your bullet proof explanation on whats wrong with the industry and a budget breakdown on a game you would like to make.