8th generation of consoles

[Serge 13]

Yeah. For the next 3 or 4 months or so until new PC hardware arrives...

...which you need to pay 300+ bucks for it. Then after 2 years you'll have to change your GPU again if you want the games to look better than the console version. In 2007 I spent something like 450 euros on a 8800 Ultra. Let's put the fact aside that it got toasted after 2,5 years, but the thing is that even though it is stronger than any other GPU used in the consoles I doubt it could have run The Witcher 2 for example on the same setting as the upcoming 360 version. It's clear that nVidia and AMD Radeon don't want you to have a graphics card that lasts for 4(or god forbid 6!)years. I mean where would the "fun" in upgrading be that way?

 

[Sub-Human]

Even Crysis 1 was generally more powerful than Crysis 2.

That's because the team made an extremely unstable game. Both Crysises share the same quality in terms of graphics and sound.

Also, in ~May apparently we'll have Kepler GTX 600s, which, at least from my observations, can double previous models, especially the old junk like GeForce 400.

Then after 2 years you'll have to change your GPU again if you want the games to look better than the console version.

Considering that consoles aren't upgraded after 2 years, I doubt you'd need to install a new graphics card. Add overclocking and multiple GPU solutions, you'll be pretty stable for quite some time.

 

[PainlessDocM]

Crysis 2 is set in a linear urban environment which is far less taxing on the system than the lush open island setting of Crysis 1.

 

[Crni Vuk]

Yeah. For the next 3 or 4 months or so until new PC hardware arrives...

...which you need to pay 300+ bucks for it. Then after 2 years you'll have to change your GPU again if you want the games to look better than the console version. In 2007 I spent something like 450 euros on a 8800 Ultra. Let's put the fact aside that it got toasted after 2,5 years, but the thing is that even though it is stronger than any other GPU used in the consoles I doubt it could have run The Witcher 2 for example on the same setting as the upcoming 360 version. It's clear that nVidia and AMD Radeon don't want you to have a graphics card that lasts for 4(or god forbid 6!)years. I mean where would the "fun" in upgrading be that way?

Do you know how old my computer is by now ? That i have literaly NO money for hardware ? That I rarely if ever do updates in the hardware ? And yet. I can play TODAYS games on almost max settings. They look awesome compared to the console.

Now tell me again. Why do you have to give out 300 or more dollary for new hardware ? Who is saying you have to buy the best stuff available. Only to find out that the games still lag on your hardware because of driver issues or what ever else. I was always a very strong PC gamer in the past. For the last 12 years for sure. Yes. I had times where I spend a fortune on hardware and PC gaming. It was a hobby back then. But you grow older and you know what to buy and what not. In the end updating your system is not THAT expensive. Not if you compare it to the console in the long run which requires as well a few things here and there to run well. Sure not the same for everyone. Granted. I am a very bad example since I would have to buy a new TV if I wanted to enjoy the consoles in their full potential. But that alone would cost me around 300 right now. Then a console for 500 or what ever "new" one costs (they are less now I know).

I am not trying to compare them directly. Both are great platforms. What angers me is actually how stupid companies act right now. And how the whole gaming world is working currently. A bunch of assholes runing the buisness if you ask me. They slowly but steadily destroy a hobby I once loved. And you can be sure what started on the PC (accounts, cloud shits and all that stuff) will continue on the console as well the more sophisticated the technology will be there.

Crysis 2 is set in a linear urban environment which is far less taxing on the system than the lush open island setting of Crysis 1.

Actually both can be very demanding. Crysis 2 is doing it worse then Crysis 1 as it indeed looks worse in some departments (textures for example). Hence it works better then Crysis 1. They have to otherwise it would not work on todays consoles.

If you want to really do city landscapes well then it will eat hardware like nothing else. I know this from talking with modders. Once you go with a certain size you are not talking anymore about buildings or plants or what ever but objects and the polygons they have. A building with interriors for example can be just as demanding like a pile of trees or some jungle. Usualy the advantage you have here is if you have buildings you dont have to always give them interriors while trees have to be done seperately. But. There are ways how to save polygons and power in various ways while intereriors HAVE to be done sometimes except you want to have the game playing all the time outside (which would be boring). Hence why some games are better with their hardware as narrow corridor shooters while others look impressive with their landscape. Arma 2 for example their interiors and buildings are nothing worth though but if you spend time in a chopper or tank driving around the location it stuning. Its very difficiuilt if not impossible to do a game that is doing everything right here.

 

[Serge 13]

Do you know how old my computer is by now ?

No, I don't. But since I'm a console-tard please do tell me:

-how old your GPU is
-how much you payed for it
-what games it can run on max settings and such

 

[mobucks]

Console vs PC wars starting in 3...2....1....
I like console ports for the PC. No overheating, silky smooth framerates. Games like Shogun 2 and Empire Total War, while they run smooth on max settings, are out to melt my card. Same thing with ARMA II, whenever I use a sniper scope, I get the alarm I have set that tells me the GPU has passed 85c. (submarine diving alarm:ahooooooghaaa!)

 

[PainlessDocM]

Stock Vga coolers are more often than not pretty horrible but you can simply get an aftermarket cooler for a mere 30$ and you will never have to worry about high temperatures again.

Actually both can be very demanding. Crysis 2 is doing it worse then Crysis 1 as it indeed looks worse in some departments (textures for example). Hence it works better then Crysis 1. They have to otherwise it would not work on todays consoles.

Sure they can but in the case of Crysis 2 and many other games the buildings are used to create corridors so the hardware doesn't have to render a huge amount of data like in Crysis 1.

 

[Ohaimerk]

I've never played a single moment of the current generation of consoles so I don't know of the fragility of them, but in my ps1/ps2 days the system would wear out in around a year and I ended up being forced into buying several of each just to play the games of that generation. With PC I can buy one pc for around triple the price of a present-gen console every ten years, be guaranteed to stay generally up to date with upgrades costing less than the amount of a console every five years, play any pc game ever released from 1972 to present day, I can buy a game now and still be able to play it in 5/10/15 years without having to keep around a dedicated system, and on top of it all I can do normal computer stuff as well as millions of things you can't do with a console. I'm having to sacrifice not being able to keep up with the few console exclusives (goodbye MGS ) but it's a small sacrifice for the benefits and I'm proud to say I'll never be buying another console as long as I live

 

[Crni Vuk]

Console vs PC wars starting in 3...2....1....
I like console ports for the PC. No overheating, silky smooth framerates. Games like Shogun 2 and Empire Total War, while they run smooth on max settings, are out to melt my card. Same thing with ARMA II, whenever I use a sniper scope, I get the alarm I have set that tells me the GPU has passed 85c. (submarine diving alarm:ahooooooghaaa!)

arma 2 runs shit becaues of stupid programming not because of the game beeing so demanding. It took them literaly 3 or 4 patches to get that part right. And it still has issues. But hey. Its not like people didnt knew it. Those issues exist since Operation Flashpoint 1 which was done by the same company. Arma 1 got only interesting after patch what ? 8 or so ?

 

[mobucks]

Yeah, the games could certainly use some optimization. Case in point: Upgrading from a GTX260 to a 560Ti gave me ZERO increase in FPS.

 

[PainlessDocM]

arma 2 runs shit becaues of stupid programming not because of the game beeing so demanding.

Yeah the ARMA engine is pretty horrible and as a result it's a huge resource hog.

It's understandable that the game requires a fast cpu and lots of ram because of all the AI routines going on all the time but still it runs unacceptably slow.

I can't wait to see if they managed to improve this in ARMA III.

Yeah, the games could certainly use some optimization. Case in point: Upgrading from
a GTX260 to a 560Ti gave me ZERO increase in FPS.

Same here, I upgraded from an 4890 to a 560ti twin Frozr and I get maybe 5 FPS more. Terrible engine.

 

[Sub-Human]

I am a very bad example since I would have to buy a new TV if I wanted to enjoy the consoles in their full potential.

Same here. I have no TV at all and I'm happy.

 

[Bulletmachine]

What I really would like to see are 64bit executables.

I don't see the 8th gen of consoles supporting this however, and probably most of the ports are going to stay in their 32bit shackles since it would be an extra effort, thus money for the big game devs to be spent.

 

[Ratty Sr.]

gibberish

Let's do a quick comparison between specs of the PlayStation 3 GPU (RSX) and GF104 (GPU used in $150 GeForce GTX 460 video cards):

							RSX						GF104
Transistors				300 million				1.95 billion
Vertex pipelines		8							336
Pixel pipelines		24							336
GFLOPS					400.4						907.2
Shader ops/s			74.8 billion			226.8 billion
Texture units			24							56
Texel fillrate			13.2 GigaTexel/s		37.8 GigaTexel/s
ROPs						8							32
Pixel fillrate			4.4 GigaPixel/s		21.6 GigaPixel/s
Memory					256 GB					1 GB
Mem. bandwidth			22.4 GB/s				115.2 GB/s

I think no further discussion is necessary.

 

[Serge 13]

Twas bryllyg, and ye slythy toves
Did gyre and gymble in ye wabe:
All mimsy were ye borogoves;
And ye mome raths outgrabe

Didn't your 5870 die on you? How much did you pay for that?

 

[TheWesDude]

According to rumour the new Xbox will use an Amd 6670 which is a 60€ entry-level card.

On pc this card is by no means capable of "maxing" out current games. In fact you would have to turn down/off a lot of settings to achieve a stable 30FPS @ 1,920 x 1080.

actually the 6670 ( released in jan 2010 ) is the laptop version of the 6760 ( released in mid 2009 ).

the card cannot handle NATIVE 720 resolution. to even do 720 it has to use upscaling tech. when trying to do 720 resolution natively, it can only manage 27 FPS with 256x256 texture size.

its even worse when trying to do 1080 resolution.

 

[Serifan]

Let's do a quick comparison between specs of the PlayStation 3 GPU (RSX) and GF104 (GPU used in $150 GeForce GTX 460 video cards):

							RSX						GF104
Transistors				300 million				1.95 billion
Vertex pipelines		8							336
Pixel pipelines		24							336
GFLOPS					400.4						907.2
Shader ops/s			74.8 billion			226.8 billion
Texture units			24							56
Texel fillrate			13.2 GigaTexel/s		37.8 GigaTexel/s
ROPs						8							32
Pixel fillrate			4.4 GigaPixel/s		21.6 GigaPixel/s
Memory					256 GB					1 GB
Mem. bandwidth			22.4 GB/s				115.2 GB/s

I think no further discussion is necessary.

um so yeah you are comparing a PS3 GPU against a GFX card released close to 5 years after the PS3 came out? I'm confused as to what you are trying to prove?

 

[Brother None]

Are we really doing this? What is this, NMA or the IGN comment forum section?

Everyone knows the whole "PC gaming is much more expensive" thing is a myth. My computer hasn't had an upgrade in 3 years and it runs every modern release fine. It doesn't run them on the highest resolution, but still a higher resolution than consoles do.

If you're looking for top-of-the-line huge screen high resolution gaming then yes, you'll be investing in hardware. But if that's your standard, you're not looking at the lo-res locked-FPS experience of consoles anyway.

Are there advantages to stability and optimization of locked-up hardware? Sure. But good PC ports can run fine on any equivalent set, which means any computer built in the past five years. Bad ports can't.

Aren't we too old for console wars here? C'mon. Who gives a shit. I'd buy a PS3. Albeit only for Team Ico games, Souls games and God Hand.

 

[Crni Vuk]

kinda everyone of those funny topics gets crushed by BN beeing so reasonable

 

[Serge 13]

*anger*

It's all courier's fault, I think we should double permanent ban him.