Next Gen Consoles

So Sony finally told us the specs of the PS5. They did a lot of talking without any showing of any kind. Well, I take it back. They did have a power point to go along with the presentation. It was a very poor first impression of the next generation. Most of the news wasn't good. What little good news they had they didn't have anything to show their features off. We still don't know what it will look like or what changes they did with the controller. Some people are saying this was really meant for developers. I disagree. Most would devs would already know this stuff and the ones that don't wouldn't need this kind of lecture explaining the benefits of SSD storage. Overall, I am still excited for what is to come from Sony but this was super lame.

On the flip side Xbox has shown every little detail of whats in the box how the box is made and why. Spoiler, it's for air flow. On top of that we have Digital Foundry doing a deep dive into the features and why they matter. Then there's Austin Evans showing off the same info in his own, more playful, way. They have posted videos showing off how the SSDs helps performance with an older open world game that isn't even optimized for the Series X. As well as a video showing off how Quick Resume works.

I am surprised at the lack of confidence Sony is showing at the moment. They had a great first showing last gen and used that momentum to destroy the Xbox One for most of this generation. This time is seems Xbox has the laser focus. I hope they both have strong showings once they start showing the games. But this isn't a good look for Sony at the moment.
 
I am watching the old PS4 announcement and Sony knocked it out of the park. They showed off the controller, they showed off prototype performance using the Unreal Engine. They showed off new gameplay from Knack and the dashboard. They showed social features like the share menu and uploading videos. They showed remote play between the PS4 and Vita. They showed off performance within KillZone Shadow Fall. Drive Club, Infamous Second Son, Watch Dog, Destiny... So many games.

Today we got....
New.png


To say I am disappointed would be an understatement.
 
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I am watching the old PS4 announcement and Sony knocked it out of the park. They showed off the controller, they showed off prototype performance using the Unreal Engine. They showed off new gameplay from Knack and the dashboard. They showed social features like the share menu and uploading videos. They showed remote play between the PS4 and Vita. They showed off performance within KillZone Shadow Fall. Drive Club, Infamous Second Son, Watch Dog, Destiny... So many games.

Today we got....
View attachment 231194

To say I am disappointed would be an understatement.

You are comparing two different things. What we got today was a technical deep dive that was intended to be a presentation at GDC. In other words, something for industry professionals, not consumers. While it would have been nice for Sony to throw a small nod to the consumer and give us some details, that definitely wasn't the intention of this presentation. Sony will do a consumer focused unveiling where we see hardware and games. Logically, they would have planned this around E3, so June. With E3 canceled, who knows what the will do. Maybe still June, since that's when Microsoft and major publishers will still be having digital conferences. Maybe they will wait until Gamescom in August, which at least as of yet, is still on.

In any event, the reveal you are wanting... it's coming. Sony did a poor job of setting the expectations for what today was about.
 
I get all that.. BUT they should have done something consumer focused prior to this. However, at the same time, I feel like if this was only meant for devs they wouldn't have had to explain what an SSD is. At least not to the level of detail they did. Regardless, they knew consumers were going to see it and they knew this was the first time we would have the official specs. They could have at least ran this past their marketing department. It was a very poor first impression.
 
Lets not forget Xbox also had a presentation for developers today. But they didn't stream it from their youtube channel. Instead they allowed IGN and GameSpot to stream it. It's more of a live conversation about the series X. But even this was more consumer and dev friendly compared to the mess Sony showed today.

 
What I don't get it is - both current and next gen are basically identical machines - Jaguar cpu to Zen 2, new AMD RDNA 2 gpu, with a difference in CU/memory etc based on individual choices, but its still the same sysem.

Why then is Xbox 100% backward compatible but PS5 isn't? That's a HUGE deal because I can just trade in my Xbox on launch, get a Seriex X and not lose anything. And with the great deals MS runs this is exactly what I plan to do.

Sony's 'top PS4 games will be playable' is the kind of hand wavy nonsense I don't expect from them. This isn't some massive engineering effort and emulation layer they had to build like MS did, its the exact same x86 code and gpu architecture. This is just being lazy.

Of course its all about the games but I just don't get it.
 
After looking at specs of both consoles, I now feel confident that both consoles will launch in the $450 - $550 range

Despite going big (12 teraflops), Microsoft has made some clever choices, to keep costs in control, such as
1) tower form factor for better heat dissipation & silent operation
2) dramless NVMe SSD using directStorage technology will ensure NVMe cost is cheap (for Microsoft) while not lagging behind by much compared to PS5

Sony's choices such as higher frequency, shared uniform memory & standard internal NVME SSD have been made keeping developers in mind but all these tend to push the cost higher

As for Microsoft, I foresee a big difference in quality between first party games optimised for XboxX & third party games made keeping in mind PS5 & PC also
 
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What I don't get it is - both current and next gen are basically identical machines - Jaguar cpu to Zen 2, new AMD RDNA 2 gpu, with a difference in CU/memory etc based on individual choices, but its still the same sysem.

Why then is Xbox 100% backward compatible but PS5 isn't? That's a HUGE deal because I can just trade in my Xbox on launch, get a Seriex X and not lose anything. And with the great deals MS runs this is exactly what I plan to do.

Sony's 'top PS4 games will be playable' is the kind of hand wavy nonsense I don't expect from them. This isn't some massive engineering effort and emulation layer they had to build like MS did, its the exact same x86 code and gpu architecture. This is just being lazy.

Of course its all about the games but I just don't get it.


PS1 and PS2 games, I agree with you, they should be able to emulate those.
THe PS3 is a different beast.

Though, as I've said before, I'm honestly fine without backwards compatibility. I still have a fat PS3 which played PS2 games. The PS3 games that I still have, I haven't touched since I got a PS4. I had more, but, they remade some of them for the PS4, I purchased the remakes, and sold my PS3 copies.

My PS3 died, and, I don't feel the need to fix it, as I am able to play PS1 and PS2 on my PC, if I wanted, and, I haven't wanted to. Yeah, the option is nice to have, but, I haven't taken advantage of it in years.
People are different, but, I also know there are a lot of people who feel the same way.
 
Not only is Sony limiting their backwards compatibility but it seems they are not upgrading the games in any way. They should load faster and have more stable frame rates. But if they were 30FPS on PS4 they will be 30FPS on the PS5. Same goes for resolution. From my understanding they are just making them playable in whatever fashion they were able to on the PS4. So if you watch a Digital Foundry video where a game on PS4 might dip from time to time. They shouldnt dip anymore. However, if they were 1080/30 on a PS4 they will still be that same setup on the PS5.

Where on the Xbox they are already showing how they can add HDR to newer titles like Halo 5 as well as OG Xbox games like Fusion Frenzy. Both running at 4k 60.
 
Not only is Sony limiting their backwards compatibility but it seems they are not upgrading the games in any way. They should load faster and have more stable frame rates. But if they were 30FPS on PS4 they will be 30FPS on the PS5. Same goes for resolution. From my understanding they are just making them playable in whatever fashion they were able to on the PS4. So if you watch a Digital Foundry video where a game on PS4 might dip from time to time. They shouldnt dip anymore. However, if they were 1080/30 on a PS4 they will still be that same setup on the PS5.

Where on the Xbox they are already showing how they can add HDR to newer titles like Halo 5 as well as OG Xbox games like Fusion Frenzy. Both running at 4k 60.

Do you have sources for any of this? When Sony first started talking about the PS5's SSD, they used Spiderman to demonstrate the difference it made. Obviously a tech demo, but the implication would be that some older games would be made to take advantage of the new hardware. I watched the presentation and other than the one off "100 titles" comment, they made no talk of BC. Likewise, I've seen no claims from Microsoft about adding HDR to older titles, or any indication that the XSX is somehow better equipped for this than the 1X (to which they took a hard no on adding HDR to Halo 5).

I'm not saying your wrong, but I've been following both consoles closely and have seen none of this. If I'm missing out on information, I'm curious to know where it's hiding.
 
I suppose I shouldn't talk too definitively on the PS5 just yet. However, with what was shown and said during the presentation yesterday nothing lead me to believe that we were getting anything other than their native PS4 modes. At this point we know they will run in their "legacy modes". Nothing more or less was stated yesterday.
BC PS.JPG


As for Xbox... Watch this video at around the 23:49 mark and let it play for a bit.


And then watch this video around the 20:04 mark and again let it play for a bit.


Trust me I never intend to miss lead anyone. I'm just trying to learn as much about the these next gen systems as everyone else. I want nothing more than to play the full Kill Zone and Resistance series in glorious 4k/60 HDR. But short of a remaster, I don't think I am going to get that wish.
 
If these consoles retail for <600 USD i might make the jump -- that's a lot of hardware for such a tiny price that the equivalent gaming PC likely won't match
 
I suppose I shouldn't talk too definitively on the PS5 just yet. However, with what was shown and said during the presentation yesterday nothing lead me to believe that we were getting anything other than their native PS4 modes. At this point we know they will run in their "legacy modes". Nothing more or less was stated yesterday.

Trust me I never intend to miss lead anyone. I'm just trying to learn as much about the these next gen systems as everyone else. I want nothing more than to play the full Kill Zone and Resistance series in glorious 4k/60 HDR. But short of a remaster, I don't think I am going to get that wish.

With both consoles, I wouldn't expect any game to just be magically better. Console games aren't made to be fluid in their visuals or performance like PC games. Any game that gets changed, even for simple things like a bump in resolution or framerate, requires developers to jump back into the game and start optimizing it for a new platform. In other words: it costs money. In Microsoft's camp, your going to see it with their first party titles because they aren't doing it to sell more copies of an old game, they are doing it to get people to upgrade to a new console. Third parties don't have that incentive, they only stand to benefit from updating their back catalog if they think it will sell more copies. Expect far less updated games from third parties.

As for Sony, they simply don't seem to value BC as much as Microsoft does. I think they are just sort of assuming people who had a PS4 will buy a PS5 regardless of what sort of BC support they provide. And truthfully, I'm not convinced their wrong to think that way. I see Sony only doing the bare minimum in regards to BC. Time will tell if that was wise of them.
 
I think you missed that part about the Xbox enhancements being at the system level. Also, there are already plenty of 3rd party games enhanced for the Xbox One X. So, while I totally agree with you on the PS5 doing the bare minimum in regards to BC, I don't agree with you at all about the Xbox.

As far if its working or not? At the moment, I won't buy a PS4 exclusive until I know it will fully work with enhancements on the PS5. I don't want to buy The Last of Us 2 on PS4 just to have a remaster come out for the PS5. I went through that this gen. On the flip side the reason I bought an Xbox One X was so I could play Fallout 3, Red Dead Redemption, and Oblivion in 4k with enhanced graphics without even having to re-buy them again.
 
Third parties don't have that incentive, they only stand to benefit from updating their back catalog if they think it will sell more copies. Expect far less updated games from third parties.

Here's a list of 10 of the best X enhanced games. Sorry to burst your bubble but 7 out of 10 are third parties.

 
Sony put more effort into faking that audience than they have into BC.

Seriously, its a video loop of another audience with suspiciously real humans superimposed onto Cerny in an empty room. Why bother??
 
PS1 and PS2 games, I agree with you, they should be able to emulate those.
THe PS3 is a different beast.

Though, as I've said before, I'm honestly fine without backwards compatibility. I still have a fat PS3 which played PS2 games. The PS3 games that I still have, I haven't touched since I got a PS4. I had more, but, they remade some of them for the PS4, I purchased the remakes, and sold my PS3 copies.

My PS3 died, and, I don't feel the need to fix it, as I am able to play PS1 and PS2 on my PC, if I wanted, and, I haven't wanted to. Yeah, the option is nice to have, but, I haven't taken advantage of it in years.
People are different, but, I also know there are a lot of people who feel the same way.

I don't expect PS3 emulation. PS3 played PS2 games by basically including a PS2 inside fat PS3, no one wants that. MS did herculean efforts to emulate OG Xbox and 360 on XB1. Sony doesn't have technical expertise or resources for that.

But all PS4 games should work day 1, none of this 'top 100 will be playable'. Its like upgrading your pc and suddenly your old apps/games don't work, its completely unacceptable.
 
Sony followed Microsoft in saying that the launch of the PS5 this year will not be delayed.

Who knows at this point, its not really upto them.
Honestly a new game console is pretty far down on list of things I'm worried about - lots of people will be losing their jobs, economy is tanking, and of curse your health.
 
I'm going to take a leap and posit that Sony isn't committing to backward compatibility because they're changing their OS and API to better take advantage of the new hardware.

Perhaps there's something limiting about the PS4 software stack that would inhibit performance on the PS5.

Of course, if backward compatibility were something they were interested in to begin with, they'd have made it happen. I don't buy them having less resources for the purpose than MS. Sony is a different company overall, but software development is absolutely something they're in resources for. They simply chose not to go there.

And honestly, I see the idea of a second new Xbox running previous games with better performance upon release to be a feather in Microsoft's cap.
 
I don't know about that them having the software resources. Have you used any Sony products outside of the PlayStation? Their TVs run a very stripped down Android OS. Phones, cameras, receivers, car radios.... Pretty much everything Sony makes has either a very basic UI/OS or is using someone else's product like Android. Not that the PS4 OS is bad. I like it a lot. Same for their other products. I like how simple they are. I just don't see Sony investing a lot of resources into their UIs.

I will agree that if they truly wanted to invest there they absolutely could. But that is obviously not a high priority to them throughout their product line.
 
I'm going to take a leap and posit that Sony isn't committing to backward compatibility because they're changing their OS and API to better take advantage of the new hardware.

Perhaps there's something limiting about the PS4 software stack that would inhibit performance on the PS5.

Of course, if backward compatibility were something they were interested in to begin with, they'd have made it happen. I don't buy them having less resources for the purpose than MS. Sony is a different company overall, but software development is absolutely something they're in resources for. They simply chose not to go there.

And honestly, I see the idea of a second new Xbox running previous games with better performance upon release to be a feather in Microsoft's cap.

Sony is not a software company. It works out in their favor for most of their product lines - I don't wany yet another skin for Android etc or like their tv's like mentioned ^.

My guess is the team who built the software API for PS5 is different and backcompat was not a design goal due to time pressure. Even on a pc when you build a new version of a product its common to have it not be compatible with old one (different file format, api etc) and you need skilled engineers and plan for it. Its not a technical problem at all. They don't think its a priority.
 
But all PS4 games should work day 1, none of this 'top 100 will be playable'. Its like upgrading your pc and suddenly your old apps/games don't work, its completely unacceptable.
I wouldn’t say completely unacceptable, sometimes things just do change enough. Look at the various audio media changes, or home video. No BC used to be pretty common with consoles, and even on PC upgrading can absolutely kill how an old game runs.

It sucks but sometimes that shit is just life. It’s why people hold onto older consoles, or use dosBox. I’d love for 100% BC but I don’t count on it.
 
I don't know about that them having the software resources. Have you used any Sony products outside of the PlayStation? Their TVs run a very stripped down Android OS. Phones, cameras, receivers, car radios.... Pretty much everything Sony makes has either a very basic UI/OS or is using someone else's product like Android. Not that the PS4 OS is bad. I like it a lot. Same for their other products. I like how simple they are. I just don't see Sony investing a lot of resources into their UIs.
Outside of their consoles and perhaps simpler devices, Sony ranks about the level of ass when it comes to software / UI / ergonomics.

Consoles are their rare high point in terms of overall user experience. Not perfect, but definitely a standout in their portfolio.
 
Top 100 have been tested in ps5 boosted mode, all work in ps4//ps4 pro mode, they are still testing and they can't say that all will work on boosted mode because it depends on how the games got coded, I'll point out the original Dark Souls on pc with the 60fps patch, you know what happened? The game had durability tied to frame rate for some reason and it took the talented hobbyist that created the 60fps patch (Durante) a lot of tinkering to find a way to unlink those two things without breaking the game. That kind of interaction is out of the hands of the console maker and this is why they didn't commit to every game will work boosted as a statement.

Edit: I did try to play with the 60fps patch and not fixed durability, it had issues. A couple of speed run skips also became impossible at 60fps and immunity frames were iffy. Still fun tho.
 
If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Other than the color scheme, looks like a slight evolution from the PS4 controller. I'm guessing there will be solid-color models, which is what I'd prefer.
I'll hope that the triggers don't have those sharp reservoirs like the PS4's do. The area where the triggers push into the controller are kinda sharp/angled. This image makes it look like that's no longer the case.
 
I like the overall design. It looks like a blend of things I like from both PS4 and Xbox One controllers. The sticks look to have a lot more texture on the edges. There's no longer the circle ridge around the DPad and face buttons. And then the sides/handles are shaped much more like an Xbox controller. But if there is one thing I like the most it's the USB C. I am so ready to have all devices on type C.

Edit: of the things I don't like... I'm not sold on the white. I like the clear/white dpad and buttons but I don't really like white controllers.
 
Sony is not a software company. It works out in their favor for most of their product lines - I don't wany yet another skin for Android etc or like their tv's like mentioned ^.
Sony is a massive multi-conglomerate. They do in fact produce software.
https://www.vegascreativesoftware.com/us/
Vegas is amongst the top 5 NLEs. I have a cousin whose credits include script writing for "reality TV", and their preferred scrubbing software is in fact Vegas.
They sold Vegas in 2016 after developing it for 15+ years. They then went onto develop:
"Catalyst", their new NLE.
https://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/catalyst
Most people don't use this at all except with specific cameras to perform specfic functions. The Sony FX9 as an example creates gyroscopic data and the Catalyst software will be able to translate that into motion smoothing. However technically it is also a Linear RAW converter and NLE amongst other things.
Also, Sony has multiple game studios that they own, which is also software.

I say this to say that if Sony wants to invest in software they can. But because the business is so segmented it's not exactly as if each of their teams touches every product. In fact mostly the opposite.
Still the Playstation has quite a bit of UI/UX development and the OS that has driven each successive model isn't nothing either. Their designs haven't been class leading, but credit where it is due, it's not exactly easy to create intuitive interfaces. Simplicity while maintaining functionality is incredibly difficult.

Anyway, I realize this wasn't your overall point.
 
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Found this on another site. I fully agree.

View attachment 236425

I'm sure they'll have other colors or at least a black version of the controller if not at launch, at some point afterwards like they have the past couple gens. I would definitely prefer to have an all black or some darker color one, but the console's and controllers aesthetics are pretty much the last thing I care about on them.
 
Top 100 have been tested in ps5 boosted mode, all work in ps4//ps4 pro mode, they are still testing and they can't say that all will work on boosted mode because it depends on how the games got coded, I'll point out the original Dark Souls on pc with the 60fps patch, you know what happened? The game had durability tied to frame rate for some reason and it took the talented hobbyist that created the 60fps patch (Durante) a lot of tinkering to find a way to unlink those two things without breaking the game. That kind of interaction is out of the hands of the console maker and this is why they didn't commit to every game will work boosted as a statement.

Edit: I did try to play with the 60fps patch and not fixed durability, it had issues. A couple of speed run skips also became impossible at 60fps and immunity frames were iffy. Still fun tho.

The thing is, that's normal. Remember, at the end of the day most games have one giant executive loop that manages everything, and if all the processing is tied around a certain fixed refresh rate, then it falls to reason that going outside that zone will cause issues.

It happens on PC too; the first Dead Space had an early in-game scene that breaks if FPS goes above 60; you have to force Vsync on outside the game (as the in-game option doesn't work :/) to get past that point. Yes, it's flat out bad design, but you end up having a more predictable codebase as a benefit.

So yeah, it's not shocking at all whatsoever that backward compatability isn't going to work like it was on PCs, despite what many parroted when the consoles ditched POWER for x86.
 
Dead Space is a console port. The terrible floaty controls and lack of many common options are a “dead” giveaway.

FPS lock issues don’t exist on properly coded PC games. Doom is a perfect modern example of this.
 
Dead Space is a console port. The terrible floaty controls and lack of many common options are a “dead” giveaway.

FPS lock issues don’t exist on properly coded PC games. Doom is a perfect modern example of this.
FPS caps are still a thing these days because it has become common for things like AI and physics to run on their own threads at a fixed rate and then push updates into the main loop when it's ready. These caps are usually around 200-300 FPS, though. It is much easier to synchronize everything when all your update loops are predictably finished at the same time, so I understand why developers do it especially on consoles. But for forward compatibility they really need to get with the times. Back in the day it was as simple as just updating with delta time, but things have gotten much more complicated both from a design and hardware perspective. I know a bullet physics system I designed 15 years ago gets wonky over 300 FPS and completely breaks above 500 FPS.
 
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Sighs I've been watching so many peeps arguing the i/o scheme of both consoles and it's driving me crazy how a simple thing is complicated by a lack of understanding.

We have both makers throughput of the ssd, that won't change, it is what it is and the numbers given line up like so:
XSX 2.4 gb/s raw; 4.8 gb/s ideal(this is 50% compression), 6gb max in the hardware.
Ps5 5.5 : 8-9 (31-39%) ; 22

That already accounts for the proper texture compression with bcpack hence the 50% vs 30-40% compression rate, now what the extra compression of bcpack means is on the footprint on the drive itself.

If we asume game X has 70gb of textures raw, 25 GB of other stuff, then with zlib at around 30% compression rate:

XSX = (70*0.5) + (25*0.7) = 52.5 GB footprint on disk.
Ps5 = (70+25) * (a number between 0.6 and 0.7) = 57 to 66.5 GB footprint on disk.

This is a scenario with the relation between textures and non textures taken out of my ass but it does show a potential positive for xsx, the actual game size can be smaller on disk IN THEORY**.

The throughput goes to the ps5 unconditionally, that's just a hardware reality just as the XSX has a slight increase in teraflops.

**This footprint can be changed if, as the engineer of the famous tweets points out, Sony uses some sort of RDO enhanced encoding when compressing textures which is viable for a small texture quality loss (mind you BC is also a lossy compression scheme so let's not chalk this as a win/loss on either side)



TLDR: hardware numbers given for the ssd won't change, size of installed games on disk may be potentially different in favor of xsx.
 
Speaking on The Xbox Two podcast, Windows Central Jez Corden said that he would be surprised if the Xbox Series S has been canceled, as he recently spoke with developers that are still targeting the console. He did highlight, however, how Microsoft did cancel a device that was pretty much ready for an official reveal, the Surface Mini, so plans may even change right at the last minute.

the Xbox Series S is likely going to be announced only when the pricing can be confirmed. As the console is not going to be as powerful as the Xbox Series X, it wouldn't make much sense to reveal it without announcing its most enticing feature.

https://wccftech.com/xbox-series-s-...ly-be-revealed-when-pricing-can-be-announced/
 
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