Prediction - PS3-PS4 and X360-XOne last big performance spec leap

[EricHiggin]

curl-6 said:

EricHiggin said:

Well PS3 was $500 and $600. XB360 was $300 and $400. For 2005/2006, PS3 was expensive, but 360 was affordable. The prices did come down reasonably fast, but because of things like PS3 removing BC. Your right, 360's performance wasn't the sole reason for the red ring, but it was part of the entire XB vs PS battle royal that was about to begin. The fact that MS decided to create the 360 themselves for the first time, and get it out well ahead of the PS3, was a mistake. They should have either delayed the launch, tweaked and backed off the performance a bit, or relied more on third party engineering.

I agree the games would have been worse than they were, but how much better than 6th gen is good enough? If we would have had PS3 (and 360) around 125Gflops, that still would have been a 21X improvement over the PS2, and it still would have been more than enough to satisfy everyone. Looking back, sure, nobody wants to assume having something worse would have been better, but that sometimes can be the case, in terms of the bigger picture.

I for one don't care all that much that the jump from PS3 to PS4 wasn't as large in terms of Flops. My worry is that over time, as the improvements become less and less, selling new consoles to casuals will become much harder. Mid gen upgrades helps this situation for now. For all we know, PS wants hardware upgrades to become a lesser yearly/bi-yearly thing, so they can focus on online and digital services instead of physical hardware. I know they have said thats not the case and that gens aren't going away, but console marketing, especially as of late, says a lot that is only partially true, or flat out false.

If you halved PS3 and 360's power, then games wouldn't just be graphically worse, they'd also be reduced in terms of physics, world size, characters on screen, AI, things that have an impact on gameplay. And sure, maybe we wouldn't know better if that's how it happened, but given the known quantity of what we did get, I wouldn't change it.

Reaching the point of diminishing returns in graphics was always going to happen eventually, trying to postpone it would be only putting off the inevitable. While I will miss the days of mind-blowing visual leaps, there is still room to grow in other ways; a new wave of hardware with strong CPUs for example could bring a generational leap in the complexity of game worlds and simulation, which could in itself be as exciting as any graphical jump.

Correct. Games would have been worse all around, and some of the masterpieces that came out later in the gen, may never have happened, or may have happend but were considered just ok, or would have had to wait until the jump to next gen. I mean, imagine The Last Of Us as a launch title for PS4, and how that would have effected this gen...

Saturation is something that's tough to fight off. Good business practices really help though. All depends on what the goals of that business are for itself and the industry. The industry will have to branch out, your right, which we're already seeing with VR. PSVR for example, is not just a gimmick, its PS planning for the future when Flops aren't as reliable as a sales tool anymore.

A PS5 with a great CPU and decent GPU would be just fine with me. The overall graphical leap from PS3 to PS4 wasn't all that impressive to me, which was ok because PS3 was quite impressive itself. PS4 just adds some highlights to that. If PS5 can add some polish to what PS4 offers, it should do just fine, as long as they take real advantage of that CPU. 60fps, please?