Pemalite said:
SvennoJ said:
How will 3rd party devs handle it. Currently 3rd party devs optimize their games for each console and provide a more generic (ie more power hungry) version (often later) that runs on all kinds of pc hardware. Will they make a special optimized build for each xbox one configuration, or will it be like pc with extra overhead for all the different hardware.
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3rd party devs don't really "optimize" for particular hardware anymore. They build one version and scale it up/down from there, hence why most games look identical between the PS4 and Xbox One -sans framerate/resolution. - PC will sometimes get better shaders, shadowing, textures.
The optimisations are mostly done at the engine level, targeting specific API's, rather than being built to the metal like the consoles of old.
The overheads that PC typically exhibits was mostly because games were not built to the metal, they targeted various high-level API's, games hadn't been made to the metal since the days of DOS.
With Direct X 12 and Vulkan, that console advantage has been essentially eroded away. (Plus we have never-ending driver improvements to thank as well.) as all Platforms are using low-level API's with 3rd party engines optimised for each. (Unreal, Frostbite, Unity, CryEngine, Source and many more.)
Consoles have just become more PC like, drivers, API's and in some cases OS's, Hardware are all PC derived, that's not a bad thing... It allows for a myriad of advantages.
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Not coded to the metal anymore indeed, yet there are still certain nips and tucks to ensure a more stable frame rate on console versions. DF still recognizes the difference between PC and console version and can only give a best guess as to which global settings the console versions run at.
The advantage of console is that you're ensured some kind of base level performance (although it can still dip badly) while I'm encountering anything between 8fps and 55fps while playing Elite Dangerous on my laptop. The difference is on PC I have to go into settings myself during the game, for console that is done for me and usually in more sophisticated ways than the crude sliders the user has access to.
The overhead may be smaller with Vulkan and DX12, yet the variable nature of required workload is not.
