| Mr Puggsly said: PC versions of games during the 6th and 7th gen software often had effects that simply couldn't be duplicated on consoles. Hence, developers were raising the bar on high end gaming PCs even while supporting vastly inferior consoles. People often blame consoles for slowing down gaming visuals, but developers have the option to push visuals on PC even while supporting consoles. |
Fundamentally though it is the same game with some design limitations.
Crysis being a prime example...
Crysis 1 was built with PC hardware in mind first and foremost... Which meant various design philosophies were made possible for the first time, almost an open world, industry-leading graphics effects, physics, destruction, lots of freedom.
And then Crysis 2 dropped with it's console-optimized game engine, levels were smaller and more claustrophobic, less player choices, smaller draw distances and didn't push the PC or technology front as hard. - It used more modern effects like deferred lighting, tessellation and so on... But Crysis 1 had a multitude of technical edges in the rendering department despite being on the older CryEngine 2.
This is an example where having to build a game with inferior platforms (from a technical perspective) can hold back a games design choices in an extreme case to the detriment of gameplay.
Crysis 3 did turn things around as Crytek placed the PC as the priority platform, but rendering wise it was still being hamstrung by 7th gen hardwares rendering paradigms... Imagine what that game could have potentially been if Crytek weren't spending time, resources and money on making sure the game ran efficiently on 7th gen hardware?
| Mr Puggsly said: A recent example is PC software experimenting with ray tracing. |
That is because it's using Path Tracing which can be "bolted on" easily to current games using screen-space data, games aren't being built from the ground-up with Ray Tracing in mind.
In-fact, Ray Tracing has been a technique that even some 7th gen titles used... Like. *Drum Beat* Crysis 3 with it's Cone Tracing... Ray Tracing isn't a new "thing". It only seems like it because nVidia has dedicated transistors to aid in rendering Ray Tracing and PC modders have taken it and ran with it, adding it to all the games.
| Mr Puggsly said: CoD Ghosts looked like a 7th gen game, there was just some added effects for 8th gen. Battlefield 4 is one of the most impressive looking games on 7th gen, it also had to be relatively low overhead to achieve 60 fps on 8th gen. Dragon Age Inquisition looks like trash on 7th gen, that's exactly the type of game that wasn't using 7th gen as the lead. AC4 was obviously built for 7th gen, not a debate. |
...Exactly my point?
| Mr Puggsly said: I think you mean Dead Rising 3, not 4. Also, that was clearly a horribly optimized game for launch reasons but developers were also struggling with X1 hardware early on. They surprisingly turned that into a game that stuck to 30 fps over time. |
Er. Yeah. I do mean Dead Rising 3.
| Mr Puggsly said: I actually played Thief and The Evil Within on 360, they're functional but you can clearly tell they were really built for 8th gen. I think its possible early 8th gen games were using less demanding engines, like stuff that works on 7th gen because they were getting their bearings on the new specs. |
Many engines get iterative updates at the start of a generation as developers rush to support new features in the new generation, but try and support the older generation. - Which is why many games towards the 7th gen actually had a regression in visual quality towards the end of the cycle... As developers were leveraging more expensive dynamic effects that had to be deactivated for older devices.
But things like texture quality and geometric complexity didn't really increase much on the newer generation until the umbilical cord of the 7th gen was cut with most games and engines.
The pretty average hardware of the Xbox One didn't help matters either though, especially compounded with a reservation of hardware for Kinect/Other features.
| Mr Puggsly said: I think we agree 8th gen specs can be lead while still allowing support for 7th gen, just depends on the route developers go. |
But the point I am trying to convey is that certain game design choices need to be made in order to continue support for older devices.
But yes, we can agree, goes without saying as the precedent is there.
| Mr Puggsly said: Maybe we can blame consoles for not pushing CPU in games harder, but I just don't think that was a focus of many games. |
Maybe it should be a focus? Either way, the point is moot. We don't get to choose the CPU that console manufacturers opt for, but we can provide constructive criticism in the hopes that the Console manufacturers might do better next time around.
I am genuinely excited for the first time since the Original Xbox about what the increased CPU capabilities of next-gen consoles will mean.
| Mr Puggsly said: For a game like Halo Infinite, I think we'll get a big disparity between base X1 and X1X. Sound like Gears 5 is really being built to take advantage of X1X. For most other games though, I think it will be the same. Base hardware is the focus and mid gen upgrades add polish. |
Gears 5 should be pretty scalable... It is leveraging Unreal Engine which has shown to scale well between GCN performance tiers whilst being conservative with the CPU.
But... It's also Unreal Engine. - Not really a selling point for me.
| Mr Puggsly said: While crossplat software of 8th and 9th gen is being done, perhaps developers might use some aspects of 8th gen as a baseline, like CPU to make sure a game can function on 8th gen. But visually games can still treat 9th gen as the lead, as in just make the 9th gen versions much more visually impressive and add extra effects, high quality assets, etc. There are many examples of this in crossplat years of previous generations. |
The CPU is often tasked with driving visuals though...
I just want to leave behind the 8th gen sooner rather than later, obviously I won't get my way, console transitions take time for ecosystems to build up in population and be more commercially viable for developers to sell for.
| Mr Puggsly said: I remember the 360 version of King Kong looked stunning because it used higher quality assets and effects along with glorious HD resolution. It looks terrible now, but that made the generational leap evident even while using an ultimately 6th gen game. That's kinda my point from the start, Halo Infinite can show a generation leap even if X1 is the lead. We don't know if MS is doing that though, might just focus on 4K and increase effects settings. |
Can it show a generational leap? Yes. I am not saying it is impossible.
I am saying that the leap would be larger if a game isn't being built for inferior platforms from the outset.
It will be interesting to see what concessions are made to Infinite on the base Xbox One, I am guessing significantly reduced rates of various components like character animations... Just like Halo 5.
| Mr Puggsly said: I agree that Sony makes more visually impressive games. That may happen in the next gen as well, cinematic experiences has been Sony's focus. Quality or gameplay in general is very different though. I spend more time with Gears, Halo and Forza then pretty much any of Sony's stuff. That's because those MS IPs I mentioned are fun to play versus Sony's narrative driven games. Which is fine, I like that Sony and MS focus on different styles of games. |
Yeah. Game quality and gameplay is very subjective... And not an argument that is ever winnable.
I certainly prefer some PC exclusives over anything the consoles offer... But those same titles might put someone else to absolute sleep.
--::{PC Gaming Master Race}::--
