PSX not happening this year

[Mr Puggsly]

Kyuu said:

Mr Puggsly said:

Uhm... cross gen doesn't mean its being held back per se. Because better specs could allow for huge improvements.

I mean just look at Spiderman. That same game could be tweaked for PS5 and look great. Higher quality textures, 60 fps, 4K, and other tweaks would make for a great looking 9th gen product.

That's kinda what Battlefield 4 was at launch. You had a game functioned on 7th gen very well, but 8th gen took it to the next level.

In fact, the Xbox One X is demonstrating that now. The GPU power in that device is a generational leap. The end result is significantly more polished games.

X1X improving X1 games to a notable degree is all the more reason why cross-gen games are completely unneeded this time. Sony should keep TLoU2 a PS4 title and simply patch it up to PS5 specs (If it's backward compatible.)

That being said, cross-gen games, typical (lazy) remasters, and patched games don't offer anything substantially above what the base game has to offer, especially in terms of design, mechanics, and visuals. TLoU vs TLoUR, MGSV PS3 vs PS4, Tomb Raider X1 vs X1X, and even Destiny PS3 vs PS4, the differences between those weren't remotely close to generational. Hell, in most cases they're resolution/performance buffs and little else (it isn't financially viable to fully optimize/re-engineer one game on multiple platforms of varying specs. The few exceptions include Ni no Kuni 1 and Dragon Quest XI which both probably didn't cost much to make on DS/3DS). If PS4 Pro is treated as a lowest common denominator, PS4-Pro exclusives (shared with PS5 via the misleading "forward compatibility") won't visually -maybe not even structurally- be close to the hypothetical PS5-Exclusive form of the same game (designed from the ground up specifically for PS5) With the CPU jump considered, we're talking TLoUR vs TLoU2 level of difference.


I wouldn't criticize MS for supposedly making X1X forward compatible since unlike Sony, they've never been clear about what the system exactly represents. Consumers bought or skipped it with that mystery in mind, so they'd only have themselves to blame if they end up disappointed of MS taking it to an undesirable direction. Furthermore, the X1X is not as weak as PS4P, so making it the lowest common denominator for a few years won't be quite as bad.

Your first sentence negates an obvious argument. Even though the X1X improves games, there is still room for improvement that 9th gen hardware can deliver. Generally the X1X does improve visuals and performance, but there is still compromise. For example, the X1X has many games still doing 30 fps or compromising resolution to achieve 60 fps.

MGSV, RotTR and Destiny have a big visual disparity between generational hardware. Primarily due to textures, higher quality effects, better draw distance, massive disparity in resolution, and of course the silky smooth 60 fps of MGSV.

I've been playing some Halo games recently. The disparity of Halo 4 between generations is huge even without touching the assets. The resolution, improved graphics settings, and 60 fps makes it the definitive experience. With improved textures it could have looked like a game made for X1, its a shame they didn't create higher quality assets for a future port.

Lastly and the best example, just look look at PC games primarily late in the 7th gen. Games like Crysis 2/3, Far Cry 3/4, and Battlefield 3/4 are all examples of games that were built primarily for PC and had great looking assets to take advantage of modern PC specs. Playing those games on 7th vs PC was essentially a generational leap. That's because high quality assets existed for PC specs, while the engine was also designed to scale back for lower quality specs. That's how cross gen games should be designed then scale it back for other platforms. That's essentially what Switch is getting right now, scaled back ports of games built for better specs.

Hence, just because a game is built to work on older specs doesn't mean there isn't room for huge room for improvements that 9th gen specs can provide.

Last edited by Mr Puggsly - on 01 October 2018