When will gaming costs stop the growth of hardware power?

[vivster]

Darwinianevolution said:

Intrinsic said:
The whole power and cost of games don't quite work like you think it does.

Basically, think of it this way; there is SD development and HD development. HD dev is more expensive. But even at that its finite. Take for instance a game requires the use of 4k texture assets. Making the same game and using 16k texture assets will be a waste of resources because it would be impossible to differentiate between 4k assets and 16k in a game environment though one will be using 4 times the resources.

But there is a minimum requirement for current gen gaming. And the WiiU obviously isn't it. That's why people say the NX should at least be as powerful as the ps4 if it wants to stand a competing chance.

More power doesn't not mean that games will automatically cost more to make. Sometimes it may actually be the opposite. Cause with more power you can also just brute force your way through what you would otherwise have needed 100s of hrs of code optimization to do.

Yes, but that's the thing. With more and more power we may reach a point that both hardware developers don't need to refresh their machines in a very long time (because the ones already on the market are enough) and the software developers find that they don't need to put more resources than needed, because the power at their disposal is enough and because the userbase doesn't grow enough to justify the expenses. When will gaming in general reach that point where noone is really clamouring for more power?

That is a fallacy. There is never enough power. Hardware has and will be lacking behind the demands of software forever.

That point you're looking for is not in sight. Even if we had 5 times as powerful hardware today, software developers would still scream for more.