New game consoles not comming any time soon. What does this mean for PC Games?

New game consoles not expected until 2013 ? Video Games Reviews, Cheats | Geek.com

This probably means nothing revolutionary graphics wise for quite some time. Just a lot of good looking console ports for the next three years I guess for pc, seeing that games sell more on the console? Sure hope my w870cu lasts that long at least. I expect the next gen consoles to (xbox 720 and ps4) have good graphics capability though, maybe graphics close to desktop 5870 quality.

 

it's depressing. It means that technology in games is going to look more like a jagged staircase that spikes every decade rather than a smooth curve of continuous innovation.

 

Or, maybe, the programming side gets better, and games actually utilize every ounce of performance of the current hardware? I don't know. Sony says they still haven't maximized the potential of the ps3? I find that hard to believe.

 

They haven't reached the cell cpu limit, but the poor thing's gpu is at it's limits already. So technically they aren't lying...

Also it means we might see more cpu intensive games; they better do a better job than GTA4 did.

 

Nah, not better, just dirtier. It's happened on consoles for a while since SNES cartridges and their FX chip and N64, etc. It's true every ounce of performance will be squeezed, but it will be done not necessarily through efficient programming, but rather through all sorts of dirty hacks meant to exploit every last system resource. The result is a collection of dirty programming techniques that are so esoteric to a single platform that they are completely useless everywhere else and probably cause current technology to take steps backwards.

 

As a matter of fact, I do like the fake reflections in PGR4. Ray tracing is sometimes impossible.

But I think games like Crysis 2 will let other developers take notice of the fact that today's PC hardware deserves more than lazy ports.

 

It's not so bad. Now that they've reached the graphical limit, maybe it's time for gameplay innovations to follow.

 

Yup. Innovations such as "shake a white stick" to "shake a black stick with a light up ball" all the way to "shake your entire body".

Edit: Oh, all in 3D btw.

 

well the immidiate advantage for us is our laptops will last longer as gaming machines
in the medium term this is what i wrote in another thread:

i think there may be a resurgence in pc games in the following years. the consoles are ageing and if developers push games to the pc's limits we may have a graphical divide that may entice console gamers to shift towards pc. i think thats what happened a few years back when the ps2 lost steam.
so brace yourselves, we may have a pc gaming renaissance yet - if we get passed 2012

 

I mentioned this a while back in the E3 thread, when I heard about the "new" Xbox360 "update". The post explains the reasons why I think we're in for a resurgence on PC.

It basically boils down to: those who want "casual" games, "party" games, and "social" games (none of which are real games, gamer games) are the most catered-to audience for consoles at the moment. This may be a factor in convincing "real" gamers (many of which are, for various reasons, starting to look for a new gaming system) to not purchase a console, but instead save up and buy a decent PC gaming rig (an option that's especially attractive now that a decent gaming laptop can be found for only ~$700, much less than that used).

Ultimately, it is up to developers to make good, fun, quality games for the PC, and publishers to fund them and give them sufficient time to make their product quality. But the market is poised to reward those who move to (or stick with) PC gaming.

My original post can be read here.

 

It means we get even more console ports.

 

I love it: eat themselves to death! I don't see it happening for a long while, but you could be right. Maybe the final straw will be embedded gaming platforms in TVs, when even console gamers can't suck enough through that straw. I think Kotick would have to clone himself and kill Microsoft before Xbox is crippled into a party-games-only platform, but it's a glimmer of hope.

 

Sony and Microsoft will continue to pressure developers into primarily developing for their consoles instead of the PC. Since console games are more profitable (I guess), developers will have to succumb to their wishes. Technical advancements in games plateaus until the new console wave.

The PS3 and 360 haven't even made profit yet (well that's what they say), and we won't see new consoles until they do.

I just love speculating.

 

^I doubt that especially for the 360, I'm sure they made a ridiculously huge fortune with just xbox live. Look how much Activision makes just by the mw2 map pack.

 

i remember a bloomberg newscast saying that sony only started making profits on the ps3 starting h2 last year.
you bet theyll milk this cow as much as they can (4-5 years? maybe).

 

i just wish developers would make gameplay over graphics. Some do, but 99% does not. The only game after year 2004 i have bothered to finish are half life 2 and mirrors edge. I started so many but they r all boring after a short while.

 

I think people forget, the Xbox 360 and the PS3 still HAVE NOT MADE A PROFIT. Why would Sony or Microsoft release the next gen if they still haven't made money on the current?

And every year, Sony and Microsoft reps say, they expect the current gen to last 9-10 years.

Every year Sony has said the full potential of PS3 has not been tapped yet.

Yet no one believes. Sometimes people live in la la dreamworld.

That's why I don't think DX11 is not imminent nor needed. I think those using GTX 280, HD4870 are find and dandy for another few years. And why a SLI GTX 480M is stupid.

 

it means no need to spend money on graphics cards until 2013

 

Well it all depends on the game developers.

I think like the PS3, the potential of our gaming notebooks has not even been close to be reached.

Games like Metro 2033 that crush the performance of PCs does not mean it utilizes the full potential. All that tells us is 4A developers suck at programming and like other game developers have not adapted to the new technology.

I think it will take some creative minds and people willing to try new ideas to really take advantage of PC Hardware. And when that happens, I think we may see games that look better than Metro 2033 and perform numerous times better and efficiently. Efficiency in PC Gaming seems to me non-existent.

And like the Metro 2033, Crysis 2 and any of the other new visual blockbuster games, they are using cross platform engines. When will there be a game engine really combine efficiency, and flawless performance made for PC Hardware?

I mean c'mon. The HD5870M has 1.2-1.4 teraflops of computational power and close to 30 gigatexels per second...Something tells me software is generations behind current hardware.

Why is our hardware infinitely times better than our old gaming machines over a decade ago. And yet game visuals and physics nearly unchanged. It's really not that much better considering how much better our hardware is.

Me sad.

 

From a business standpoint, the fact that 360/PS3 have not made profit yet has no bearing on the development of a new console. A company doesn't care if it has made a profit or not with its current project. It only cares if it can make more profit by staying the course or by developing something new.

It's like if you buy something, expecting the price to go up in 3 months so you can sell it at profit, but then the price of that item goes down. A person might instinctually want to hold onto that thing until the price does increase. A company will only consider whether its money will be best invested in that thing or if it can make more money by selling it even at its lower price to buy another thing. (Hope I'm explaining that economic principle well)

But again, it's publishers and developers who will ultimately decide the fate of gaming (and perhaps the platform owners can influence this by making deals, but even MS and Sony can't force developers to make a good game that sells well (they can, however, ruin a game, as MS seems intent on doing with GFWL)).

 

HD5870 vs Nvidia RSX (PS3)

The HD5870 is....
- 103X greater shader operations per second
- 3X the Pixel Fill Rate
- 5X the Texture Fill Rate
- 3X the memory bandwidth

Lastly the HD5870 has more computational power than the Nvidia RSX and Sony Cell Processor combined

But in game... Why do games run better on the PS3 than on the HD5870?

Lazy PC Game developers, if they even exist.

 

*Hopefully looks at Valve and Blizzard*

You're referring to something like "damage control", right? Loose, loose a lot or loose even more?

 

Maybe Valve if they ever get around to Episode 3, but you can count Blizzard out: they've never really been about cutting-edge engines. If I were to place all my eggs into one basket, I'd easily put them into id Tech 5, or 6. Anything that John Carmack touches is going to be efficient and powerful as hell, he's an OpenGL programmer.

 

I thought of Blizzard from the scalable and efficient point of view, but you're right about id (had forgotten about it, even though I'm hoping Rage delivers what I dream of it).

 

Because of the following:

#1 PS3/X360 are pure gaming console. No other unnecessary applications and services running background that eat up resources and could slow down games.

#2 Some games are optimized for consoles and then later ported to PC.

#3 Games can't fully use PC's processor(s) and memory to 100%. Add up Windows' paging file which is an HDD bottleneck.

#4 Many developers are still either not knowledgeable or didn't want to take advantage of PC's multicore parallel programming. Learning it isn't a rocket science.

 

I'm not a bit surprised and what I expected. It's more the Publishers telling Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo we can't afford to start over in this economy and we need to get our investment back for this generation. Graphics wise I have no problem with that. To me games currently look fantastic and I still play Xbox, PS2 and Gamecube games and still enjoy them.

The PC publishers need to capitalize on this by taking advantage of DX 11 and all the new hardware including quad cpu's.

 

This can turn out to be a good thing !

Instead of Developers worrying about how to add more "Bling,Bling" and "Eye-Candy", maybe they will concern themselves with better gameplay, stories, i.e.

 

#5 Graphical quality is lower

 

See that's where you are wrong.

#1 A Sony Cell Processor is actually better for just pure number crunching than for gaming.

#3 And you talk about memory? ROFL the PS3 is running on 256 MB of GDDR3, same for the 360.

So even there it's not true, yet Game Developers seem to work so hard to games run fantastically well on a processor that's not even well designed for gaming.

I'm the same, I do think games look great now. But what I do wish is while consoles are frozen in time for the next 3-4 years, why can't a few game developers focus on learning to utilize PC Hardware? It's obvious they spend far more time figuring out how to make sure 360/PS3 gets constant 30 FPS with 4x Anti-Aliasing and all the effects of soft shadowing, ambient occlusion, and other goodies that seem to require 3-4X the PC power to do the same for consoles.

 

I think the main reason is because the console is a static component so when you program for it, you know exactly what you can do and that will never really change. That 256MB restriction you have on the console won't suddenly go up or down, the CPU speed will always be the same and all of the hardware that you got used to won't be different next week. This is why some of the Console ports run too fast after being ported to the PC as well.


You can optimise for static hardware a lot easier than you can for generic hardware and as you become better at doing it, you can use the same techniques and improve on them each time.

With the PC, you are programming for a multitude of different systems having to cater for low, mid and high end, different GPU's, different CPU's, varying configurations, different memory and architectures so it will take much more effort to optimise for. So part of it does come down to laziness but it could also be due to budget constraints.

The developers and publishers know that they are more likely to get more sales on Consoles because it takes much more effort for people to pirate when compared to PC's so they stick to what they know.

Our greatest gift of having access to a completely open system such as the PC is also our greatest downfall.

 

The answer is quite simple, piracy. It's much easier to pirate PC games and the devs and publishers have taken that into account, no different with the PSP which is why the platform is hurting. Nintendo has also been put on notice as well. Just my 0.02 cents regarding piracy on the PC.

 

On #1, it shows you lack knowledge about PS3 eh? Never heard of Heavenly Sword and Uncharted 2? They are optimized to run on PS3 which normally not possible on PC and XBOX 360? Why? There are alot of game effects and elements that are offloaded to PS3's SPUs that are traditionally done on GPU. And I doubt GeForce and Nvidia's GPU can match Cell on floating point calculation. If Uncharted 2 is ported to 360 and PC, and that requires rewriting engine from scratch, will not be able to match the performance in the PS3 version.

On #3, what is there to laugh? PS3 has little RAM compared to PC since it doesn't have any extra programs and services running. PS3's RAM is much faster though comparable to a Video Card. PC has slower RAM and requires 1GB and higher for games to run at its potential.

/palmface

What the hell are you talking about? Every processor has the ability to be designed for gaming. It's what OS and SDKs are for.

1) PC has a high rate for piracy.
2) PS3 and XBOX 360's costs much cheaper compared to a PC with a same or higher performance.
3) PC owners with the same or higher performance than XBOX 360 and PS3 are much more smaller install base than XBOX 360 and PS3 have.
4) Game publishers are businessmen. They would care less on things the have much lesser profit.

That's just some common sense.

 

They don't. What are you talking about?

There is no multiplatform game in existence, which runs better on PS3.

 

LaptopNut I think you are probably right on that.

 

Yes sadly it mostly have to do with PC is really hurt by piracy. Now multiplats always runs better on the PC and looks better too.

 

Someone needs to put down the fanboi and try thinking about what they are posting.

Gaming PCs have 4GB of RAM.
With everything running in Win7 64-bit including IE with 4 tabs, music playing, and an old game paused, I still have TEN TIMES the available RAM a PS3 starts with.

PS3's while impressive when made are not even close to the hardware PCs have now. PCs are advancing... consoles are not. It is that simple.


As for the effect, they are two different markets and this will increase the gulf.
Game makers are NOT just business people. They are also usually gamers.
They want to make the best and the best is far and away a PC, and will be even more true in 2011 and 2012.
Its the people who package an market this stuff that are bean counters.
Sooner or later the programmers will get tired of making crap and return to their roots.

Consoles will keep getting the "more-of-the-same" shooters, the new innovative games will be made for PC as quite frankly, the consoles cannot handle it.

 

Come on, real gamers don't play on laptops.

 

Then real gaming should be much cheaper (and therefore a more attractive option), right?

Still, that gaming on a $700 laptop is even feasible opens up another option for those in the market for a new gaming machine, and more options always makes the move to PC an easier one.

You can't buy an Xbox that you can haul around in your backpack, plug in to any outlet in the world, and start gaming right then and there.

 

What most people fail to realize is that graphics dont make the game, iis definitely a big aspect but not the only one. Most gamers are casual with a few of us hardcores peppered in there. most people wont be able to tell the difference between the battlefield on ps3 to the battlefield on pc on high settings, most just dont care. And because of this pc is losing grip. IMO anyways

 

Hmm.. I haven't seen a really nicely-made PC game engine since Valve released its first Source game (not sure if it was HL2 or Counter Strike)... It looked really good and could be maximized on my previous PC (unlike the Doom 3 engine). Since then nothing has wowed me as much (Crysis may look good, but it has sloppy performance).

In the end I'm OK with console ports if:
1. They are not poorly optimized like GTA 4
2. No DRM
3. Competent online multiplayer system (not like MW 2...)
4. And good controls (no mouse smoothing)

 

+1!
Now thats why i can enjoy Super Mario Galaxy 1 & 2 on Wii.

I for one like playing on consoles, as i dont get that pesky DRM (Looking at Ubisoft) ruining my gaming.
But i do miss dedicated servers, Section 8 for PS3 supports hosting the server on a PC, so why doesent other game make use of this. xD

 

I think it´s more impressive to run games on all high and at 1080p on a laptop than doing it on a desktop. Ziddy runs Bad Company 2 all high settings and DX11 at 1080p I think at smooth framerates. That is more impressive than doing it on a desktop computer in my opinion.

 

the bad thing about consoles is that the games is like 2 or 3 times the price of PC games, while on steam you can get quite new games at amazing deals.

 

Actually you are the one who seems to lack knowledge. The Cell Processor is the brainchild of IBM primarily and just happens to be used by Sony in the PS3. Toshiba also helped fund the project, but all the developers and facilities are property of IBM and almost all the patents are owned by IBM.

There is no question that the Cell Processor with multi-threading and so many cores is much better at scientific computational processes. Although it will be implemented in imaging devices used in Hospitals in the future.

The fact that Uncharted 2 and other games on the PS3 run so well and look so great is the exact point we are all making. Cause even the Sony Cell Processor on double point floating point calculations pails in comparison to PC.

I've already stated that the HD5870 desktop GPU for example has more computational power than the Nvidia RSX and IBM Cell Processor combined! Double and Single point floating point calculations.

 

Actually the PS3 is not impressive at all. I have both consoles and every multiplat game looks better and runs better on the 360. Damn I am more impressed with the 360 that has 4xaa for free in it´s EDRAM memory. Doesn´t matter the PS3 has the Cell I have not seen any impressive about the console so far yet. Sure Uncharted looks good but could be done on the 360 too.

 

There's more to it than just "ooh pretty sparklies improved" when it comes to people talking about graphic improvements. Things like sight/view distance, realistic physics, realistic movements... they all fall under graphical improvements. Haven't you ever played a game and said to yourself "huh, I've seen that effect before" even when it was a different studio/dev/company's game? That's what people are talking about when they say the consoles are at their limits. Or with the big motion craze that's going on now, the consoles will start showing lag/their age to be able to keep up with motion games, or the games will have to be very simplistic like on the wii. Hell, my sis's roommates have a wii and she even notices how much the graphics suck, and she is not a gamer at all.

Stuff like AA, HBAO, whatever else you want for advanced settings, a lot of players won't notice. Stuff like jaggies, unrealistic physics/motions/effects whatever and a limited sight distance are noticable to even the most casual players. Yeah, graphics won't hold a great game back, but they def limit the potential.

 

Console games tend to also target 720p which gives developers alot more potential to see what kind of graphics they can put out too. A 1080p image is almost twice as many pixels to z-buffer. Considering ROPs have to sort through alot of data to figure out what color to put on each pixel in the image, it's a huge workload. Backing down to 720p while uncouth to us PC gamers makes plenty of sense for console developers, especially on a system like the 360 where 2x MSAA is essentially free with it's eDRAM and z-buffering daughter die.

As for the Cell, it's "advantage" is it's putting a highly flexible general purpose intended processing system in the hands of developers. However it's also a burden, as they are forced to use it, but it means we see some very impressive stuff done with it too. It pains me to see so little GPGPU programming in games outside of PhysX which of course, can't be done on ATi cards at the time being. With DX11 and it's direct computer abilities as well as OpenCL being supported by the latest crop of Nvidia and ATi parts, we might finally see GPGPU processes in games big time finally.

 

Read my posts as a whole and not by context. I don't see what part it made look I'm a fanboi. I have RROD'ed XBOX 360, PS3, and lately bought G73. laptop. Didn't played much 360 since it's my father's. Had fun with PS3 for months until my interests shifted on PC game development. But before 360 and PS3, I've been playing since DOS games.

What you don't get is whatever the specs and numbers, it all goes down to how optimized the game is. What you don't understand is if a game was emulated (e.g., PS2 emulator), you won't get the same performance against a game created using C++ and assembly. Very hard to program with but will benefit in performance. In short, what ever system or console you are developing with, a skilled programmer and a game optimized in a target platform will always perform best against a game ported on different system.

Still don't understand? Let's have a example on current games:

Dragon Age - Primarily developed on PC and then ported later on consoles. Results?
PC Graphics - Very Good, PC Performance - Very Good
PS3 Graphics - Good, PS3 Performance - Not so good
X360 Graphics - Not so good, X360 Performance - Good

GTA IV - Primarilty developed on consoles, ported later pm to PC. Results?
PC Graphics - Very Good, PC Performance - Not so good
X360/PS3 Graphics - Good, X360/PS3 Performance - Good.

Yeah, like price. What I'm trying to point here is what ever console or system you are gaming with, they both have advantages and disadvantages.

Wrong. Game publishers is always NOT equal to game developers. You're talking like developers and publishers are the same.

Wrong again. Developers can always start developing on consoles, mobiles such as iPod, etc... Whatever the publishers see fit. Games always start with designer's imagination and target platform among with the initial ideas. They don't necessarily think "We should start this as a PC game and port afterwards.".

 

OMG, can anyone enlighten this guy? He's just so wrong on so many levels. And "pails" is not even a word.

Developer #1: Hey, we should use HD5870 so we can have "Double" and "Single point" floating point calculations which beat the hell out of combined "Double" and "Single point" floating point of Nvidia RSX and IBM's Cell processor the PS3 has!

Developer #2: What "Double" and "Single point" floating points? *scratches head*

LMAO!!! Seriously, the more you talk, the more mistakes you make.

 

Not often do I agree with Ziddy, but modern GPUs have much more computational power than the PS3 or the Xbox 360. Not that this is much of a feat - the consoles use 4-5 year old technology.

And I'm pretty sure Ziddy means single and double precision floating point numbers.

Anywho, this is just turning into a console v. PC flamewar. And in that respect, whatever I use is always better than whatever you're using. *Comment about your mom*.