Pemalite said:
curl-6 said:
Anywho, yeah, it's quite ironic that the the last time a Halo game launched an Xbox console, with the original game, it was very much a showcase for the capabilities of next gen hardware that simply couldn't have been replicated on the hardware of the prior gen. And I can't help but feel that a Combat Evolved that was multiplat with N64/PS1 tier hardware would not have been the classic it became as its signature sophisticated AI and huge levels just wouldn't have been possible.
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Precisely.
I mean the Nintendo 64 could have replicated the indoor environments of Halo to a degree... But once you landed on the Halo ring and stepped outside for the first time and seeing the pixel shader, bump mapped surfaces and long draw distances, you knew the hardware has opened up something new on the gameplay front... And because of such propelled Halo as a massive franchise in gaming.
chokingvictim2 said:
Would it though?
I just don't see the incentive for people to buy Xbox anymore. The Xbox One has been out for 5 years, and it's sold only 45 million. The OG Xbox was out for 4 years and sold only 24 million. The Xbox One is pushing into six years now, and has only sold just under double that? It's almost on par sales percentage wise. Especially considering nearly all of their exclusives are available on PC now... why would anyone really spend the money on a new Xbox when they can just play all of those games on a PC? Reasons I'm saying this is because all my friends that are into gaming are either playing on a PS4 & switch, just a PS4, or sold their consoles and built gaming rigs. Halo is a massive franchise, but it's been in decline since Bungie handed the reigns over to 343. I'm stoked for the new Halo and intrigued as always, but I really don't think it would be in anyones interest at Microsoft to make Halo a Scarlett exclusive. It would hurt their pockets way too much given how dismal their sales were this generation, and it would be a huge disservice to all of the people that bought Xbox's and have been waiting for 3 years for this game. I really don't think Scarlett will be big either. I see it as a stepping stone for their transition into game streaming. I truly believe Scarlett will be the last physical console that Microsoft puts out. They've proven unable to topple Sony, and they have a new competitor with a giant load of money and developer support behind them (Google).
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Different devices for different rooms.
I am primarily a PC gamer, but will use consoles in the living/games/bedrooms.
Often I will buy a game I really really really like more than once to be able to play on all my platforms.
Mr Puggsly said:
Heh, you finally understand my point about Fable 3. I already said it should be patched to remove the GFW crap as other studios have done. The thing is GFW is a pain in the ass on modern PCs, it may not even work for many people without extra work. So delisting Fable 3 actually makes sense to me until they decide to patch it or make a new port, whatever the plan is.
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I couldn't care if Games for Windows Live is there or not. Just sell the damn game. That is my point.
Mr Puggsly said:
Halo 3 on 360 didnt run as bad as HL2 on OG Xbox. I dont understand that comparison. But I agree OG Xbox was a rad console of the time for decent PC ports.
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Halo 3 ran like shit on Xbox 360... Mostly because of it's poor frame pacing. Did it run as bad as Half Life 2? No. You would hope not with more capable hardware.
After playing the game at 60fps on the Xbox One X, it's unplayable on the Xbox 360 though, lets not beat around the bush, the controls feel floaty because of the poor frame pacing.
That era was notorious in how it was unable to have solid 30fps with good frame pacing in general, thus Half Life 2 fell well within expectations of the era.
Even the generation prior before that, games would often dip to 10fps like in Perfect Dark on the Nintendo 64.
Mr Puggsly said:
So youre suggesting console games require less memory because theyre stripped down? Im not sure if that holds water, but okay. I think we're agreeing the console versions are atleast more efficient.
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If you can point to a console game that has equivalent ultra-PC settings and fits within the consoles DRAM with full resolution+ramerates... Go for it.
Mr Puggsly said:
If open world games are more common now, I feel its more of a game design choice, not specs per se. I mean Skyrim and GTAV are still somehow impressive compared to many newer games.
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Specs have enabled it.
Skyrim and GTA5 had a ton of resources thrown at it to make them viable on 7th gen, GTA5 was the most expensive game ever made at that point... Those costs significantly drop on 8th gen as the hardware is far more capable for open-world titles.
Mr Puggsly said:
I already said the Jaguar CPUs have limitations. I just dont think they've been fully utilized for unique experiences either. I just dont feel developers were really interested in pushing CPU in a way that really affected gameplay. There wasnt really a Hydrophobia or Red Faction Guerilla tech show case this gen, although Just Cause 4 was impressive.
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Game development has shifted since the 7th gen, there is less incentive for developers to build games that are "different and new" and instead rehash old formulas that sell and make money.
In saying that, Jaguar isn't a generational jump over Cell/Xenon... It's an increase sure, but not a catastrophically large one like what we will see next console generation with 8x Zen2 cores.
Mr Puggsly said:
But even with the cloud, Crackdown 3's destruction wasnt impressive. Hence, it seems just creating that experience was difficult. Was it a hardware issue or did the original plan not really work at that scale? We can only speculate.
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The cloud has fundamental limitations governed by the laws of Physics.
Crackdown 3's destruction just wasn't ready for this generation of hardware... Hence Microsoft's attempt at leveraging the cloud... That is the point I am getting at.
Mr Puggsly said:
I believe storage medium, CPU, RAM and GPU play a role in speeding up load times. For example, games load considerbly faster on X1X versus base hardware even with the same external HDD.
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What you believe is ultimately redundant.
The GPU doesn't play a role in speeding up load times, it doesn't accelerate memory transactions in general.
The CPU can assist in decompression, procedural generation, unpacking, draw calls and so on and can thus influence load times rather substantially.
The Ram can play a massive role as it's the pool of memory that all other processors tend to communicate with... But usually you are loading data into the Ram... And that isn't where the bottleneck tends to lay.
The biggest benefactor to load times is of course the hard drive... The Xbox One X, whilst still using a shit internal 5400rpm hard drive, at-least featured a drive that was substantially faster than the terrible drive in the launch Xbox One... We are talking 40-60MB/s better in transfer rates here, that's not insignificant.
Burst reads also saw an improvement thanks to the increase in SATA speeds, which means the data in the Hard Drives Ram can be read at 600MB/s.
Which is why external hard drives reduce load times regardless if you have an Xbox One, Xbox One S or Xbox One X, especially 7200rpm drives with their reduced seek times allowing improvements in random reads/writes across the board.
The Xbox One X just takes things a bit farther as it's CPU can assist with everything else that I listed prior... But you can bet that the storage medium is the bottleneck for load times... Ask any PC gamer who has moved to a fast nVME SSD from last century's archaic, slow, spinning rust.
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I should clarify something about hardware. I feel the 6th gen, primarily Xbox, was big turning point for game design. I feel that's when ideas and visuals of Halo, Half Life 2, open world games and many other styles of games could be executed without looking like a mess, having poor draw distance or other technical problems that really compromise gameplay. I feel a lot of modern games could still be enjoyable even built around OG Xbox specs, but I don't feel that way about N64 per se. I'm not looking to have a debate on this, but that's a response to people who keep bringing up PS1 or N64.
There is an assumption that everybody has a gaming PC therefore nobody should get a Xbox. This is how out of touch people think.
I'd say its fair to be critical of MS for not selling Fable 3. I also don't really care. I should have said that from the start. The problem is I was explaining MS's decision and I understand it, whether I PERSONALLY like it or not. Maybe you thought I was attacking you for having been critical of MS. Its really a stupid discussion and I feel people who want it should simply pirate it.
I know poor frame rates were pretty standard in the 5th, 6th and 7th gen. I just consider them playable, not fine. Halo 3 didn't run that bad, so we just disagree there. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SygMunkVEzc
I don't feel GTAV was an expensive game to create just because its a technical marvel. Its also an incredibly ambitious game, simply designing a game like that is expensive. The attention to detail and game mechanics certainly take time to design, its not just specs.
I really feel you're confused about my thoughts on the Jaguar CPUs. I'm really saying they could create ambitious experiences and even achieve 60 fps when the GPU wasn't pushed too hard. For example, MGSV was an ambitious game but still hits 60 fps. You're arguing about the hardware compared to other hardware, I'm simply looking at what was achieved in practice.
We agree the Jaguar CPUs were an increase in power, but there wasn't many impressive attempts to leverage it for unique experiences.
In regard to Crackdown 3's MP, I feel the limitation was the developers when it came to designing that experience. Not the X1 or the cloud. At some point they probably determined it was a waste of time and just threw something together.
My main point was load times can improve via upgrades to other specs even if you use an old rusty HDD. In a nutshell, you agreed with me.
I could increase my load times further with a external SSD, but loading in general is already noticeably faster even on my same old 2.5 external HDD.
Also, in regard to GPU I was really saying a video card upgrade can improve load times in a game that's struggling with an underpowered card. Maybe for memory reasons or whatever, it does impact load times.
