(UPDATED) Microsoft walks back decision to double price of Xbox Live Gold subscriptions

Ps5 and Xbox ponzi scheme. Like all of the games for both systems are year old PC games.
 
10x $500 is $5000. What ignoramus would spend $5k on a gaming PC? You would need to buy the most overpriced scalper products to reach that amount.

Someone who is [H]ard.

And no, you don't need to pay scalper prices to get there. I didn't. I've had many PC's over the years well beyond $5,000. It's pretty easy when you spent nearly $3,000 on a pair of Titan X's and had a $1,000 Extreme Edition CPU. Your at $4,000 without even having a case, power, supply, motherboard, etc.

Turns out, getting to nearly 5K wasn't that hard.

https://pcpartpicker.com/list/TyWLqp

Granted, you can take off some from the RTX 3090 if you bought it at MSRP, but I didn't include cooling here. I've got at least $800 in watercooling hardware in my machine. I didn't include fans or other small incidental items that drive the price up. Again, this is without monitor, keyboard or mouse.
 
Someone who is [H]ard.

And no, you don't need to pay scalper prices to get there. I didn't. I've had many PC's over the years well beyond $5,000. It's pretty easy when you spent nearly $3,000 on a pair of Titan X's and had a $1,000 Extreme Edition CPU. Your at $4,000 without even having a case, power, supply, motherboard, etc.

Turns out, getting to nearly 5K wasn't that hard.

https://pcpartpicker.com/list/TyWLqp

Granted, you can take off some from the RTX 3090 if you bought it at MSRP, but I didn't include cooling here. I've got at least $800 in watercooling hardware in my machine. I didn't include fans or other small incidental items that drive the price up. Again, this is without monitor, keyboard or mouse.
^^^

There's a PC for every budget.
To say that a PC is more expensive to own than a console, is like saying owning a truck costs more than owning a Mustang GT. There are cheap trucks and expensive trucks, ranging from a nissan hardbody to a Belaz 75710 dump truck. But there's really only one type of Mustang GT.

Bad analogy I know, but I didn't spend much time to think of a better one, and the point still gets across when you assume $$$ spent == the perf you get and that trucks can do more things than cars can.
 
Also, you can buy used games on consoles for sometimes very cheap if they are older.

And you can sell your games if you bought discs. I recouped some cost when I sold my whole Xbox360 collection for like $250.
 
^^^

There's a PC for every budget.
To say that a PC is more expensive to own than a console, is like saying owning a truck costs more than owning a Mustang GT. There are cheap trucks and expensive trucks, ranging from a nissan hardbody to a Belaz 75710 dump truck. But there's really only one type of Mustang GT.

Bad analogy I know, but I didn't spend much time to think of a better one, and the point still gets across when you assume $$$ spent == the perf you get and that trucks can do more things than cars can.

agreed, but we are talking about “for gaming” here. If you need a PC to do other things, get a PC that can do other things and play games too.

if gaming is your primary purpose and you give yourself a console budget, then right now that means you’ve got to build a gaming PC for $500 and never upgrade it just to break even with the hardware cost of a console.

I am sure you could do that but somewhere in the next 8 years you’d probably want to upgrade it if you’re still playing games on it.

if you want to have the conversation of “but I can run office on my PC and do schoolwork and I can’t do that on an Xbox” then, sure, you’re right. But also that’s not what we’re taking about.

to use your car analogy it would be like someone saying “I need a daily driver for commutes, I never haul anything” and then you coming in and saying “$75,000 F-150 raptor is faster. Why would anyone get a small car when you can spend 3x as much to get a big fast truck?”
 
In the end, it's a choice you make.

Since I play anywhere from 30-80 hours every 2 weeks, totalling ~1560-2080 hours , or ~65-86 days out of the year.

Imagine you use the same PC for 3 years. (Mine is 3 and still works fine).
That's up to 256 days of time. I can't imagine wasting all of the time on a crappy console.
 
Consoles are cheaper, which is cool, but anyone who has the option to play on a UW display or a LG OLED, on a PC, is never going to pick a console over a PC.

30-60 fps is unplayable for me; let alone the terrible graphics; at the worst, it just feels laggy. I don't want to feel like I'm in a powerpoint slide. At least money spent on hardware goes to your gaming experience, not a 'gaming network' which should be free.

Lets not pretend the shops aren't massive ad-blocks generating revenue... and worse even probably takes a cut of the sale. Paying for that privilege... smh.

Like the old saying goes.. buy cheap, buy twice.
Really? Literally anyone?

Er, no. Playing on a large, quality TV is a beautiful thing, just as it's beautiful to play on an ultra-wide PC monitor. Besides, there are certain advantages to playing on a TV; I can't have my fiancée cuddled up next to me at my desk.

Also, while I'll certainly understand if you prefer certain frame rates, please remember that you don't speak for everyone. I find many games in the 30-60FPS range to be perfectly playable, including action titles. And I'm glad the added power of the PS5/XSX means that a steady 60FPS is available for those games that benefit from it.

Your statement on shops is a bit odd. You do know Steam, EGS and other stores take cuts of sales as well, right? That's how they make money. The main disadvantage of consoles is that there's typically only one game store, so companies can't either sell direct or find a shop with better terms. It's difficult to make a principled stand here unless you insist on buying all your PC games directly.
 
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It's not odd. It's plain and simple. Steam, GOG, Battle.Net, EA Origin, etc is free and doesn't charge you a subscription fee. How is that complicated? What service is the PS store or MS store providing you other than charging you money for using their product?

Also, 30-60 fps being acceptable for an action title, is YMMV. Personally I find it unacceptable. You shouldn't be able to feel lag in a game; takes you out of the experience 100%. It gets worse when you try to play sports titles, like FIFA or Rocket League. Go to 144 fps then to 30 fps, and then you'll want to cry.

Also - er yes; not having raytracing or proper detailed models, or whatever other graphics concessions to make the game playable at 4K on low with HDR, being loaded because of optimization is a subpar experience.

Lastly, there's nothing saying you can't build a microATX case that has a handle to sit in the living room with you, while you're all cuddled up.. The only reason I'd ever want a console is because some titles are too stubborn to make it to PC, like Halo 5.
 
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It's not odd. It's plain and simple. Steam, GOG, Battle.Net, EA Origin, etc is free and doesn't charge you a subscription fee. How is that complicated? What service is the PS store or MS store providing you other than charging you money for using their product?
"free" depending on the platform 10%-30% (like for the PS/MS store) of the money you spent on games on them goes to them, competition and seldom usage for many do not let them charge a subscription.

PS store and MS store have a monopoly and constant usage that let them charge and what is provided by the total experience they are a part of is a lower entry cost, they also usually come with a list of title no ? Remove that monopolistic power and ability to get a cut from the sales from the Sony/Microsoft/Nintendo of the equation and the lower entry cost would kind of disappear, consoles would disappear I would imagine.

The fact that they are so popular indicate that people are finding the service worthy almost in a trivial way.
 
It is free if you buy your keys elsewhere, like G2A or CDKEYS and activate them, for example. Otherwise, you can wait for a sale. Otherwise you can buy a used physical copy if you really want. PC just has every option available; not just more options, so you can do whatever you'd like. There's never a subscription with a PC to play with friends (except for MMO's like WoW, which don't even exist on consoles, or also charge the sub), and discord is integrated.

I do agree that without the kindle-esque marketing strategy, consoles would die. It's kinda like they're a restaurant and they use 2$ meat and 5$ sauce; trying to hide the flaws of a cheap hardware.
 
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Look, we get it. You hate consoles. You want PCs to have a total monopoly in gaming and to kill choice in the market.
That's not how PC gaming works. It's not a single market. No single entity owns it. Sony and Nintendo could sell their games on their own store on PC and it would still have to compete with Steam, Epic, and Origin. You don't even need to stick with Windows, you can even port games to Mac and Linux as well. If consoles were to die then we'd have more competition not more monopoly. Consoles are the monopoly because the only way consoles survive is with exclusives. Exclusives aren't good for consumers.
It's not enough for you to simply say you prefer PC gaming; you genuinely believe you have the only right answer, and want to force your views on others. It's tired, it's narrow-minded, and it's only going to galvanize those of us who get plenty of enjoyment and value from consoles.
Microsoft just attempted to double the price of playing games online for the Xbox, and you're defending consoles? You were about to pay $120 a year to be able to play Dark Souls 3 online. The game itself costs $60, and you pay for the internet connection every month. Sony now charges $70 for a remaster of Demon Souls which is an 11 year old game. Stop defending the console industry and it's anti-consumer practices. Someone in 2014 could build an i5 2500k with a GTX 970 and still be able to play Cyberpunk 2077, while the PS4 can't. The best thing Sony can do is refund your money and remove the game from their digital store.
 
That's not how PC gaming works. It's not a single market. No single entity owns it. Sony and Nintendo could sell their games on their own store on PC and it would still have to compete with Steam, Epic, and Origin. You don't even need to stick with Windows, you can even port games to Mac and Linux as well. If consoles were to die then we'd have more competition not more monopoly. Consoles are the monopoly because the only way consoles survive is with exclusives. Exclusives aren't good for consumers.
I would imagine it is a bit more complex than that, exclusives can mean cheap (if not free) capital and marketing to devs that would have an hard time to get it otherwise in some case (or at least theoretically) as well as simpler/optimised game that can run well for less dev cost (at least theoretically), would a customer in the market for a forza/gran turismo game was hurt or gained from the the Microsoft/Sony exclusive war on that flagship product on that market for example, did a flight sim enthusiast hurt or helped by Microsoft making a cloud flagship product like Flight Sim 2020 (would they have done it without the concept of making it a pc/xbox exclusive)

If the only ways to game would be open PC with an higher entry bar maybe you end up with a smaller market with less competition from some of the world giants fighting in it (google, sony, Microsoft).
 
Unfortunately, you could argue that consoles are not future proof either. E.g. PS3->PS4 = lost games. I got a bunch of games trapped on my PS4 account because my optical drive broken on my PS4 (LOL) so I stupidly bought digital games there, which are now worthless. I guess you could also say the build quality of the console, and the ability to do something elementary like removing dust, is difficult, is also a bad thing compared to how easy it is on a PC.

Steam has been there for me since it launched. ;)
 
My rig is about $5,000.
$1000 for the monitor
$1000 for the speakers
$1200 for the mobo, cpu, ram
$800 for the GPU
$1100 for hard drives and SSD's
$250 for the sound card
$150 for the case
$500 for the cooler, fans, controller and leds.

View attachment 321784
The monitor and speakers are costs that console users would also pay. Their monitor is a TV, which is what I also play my PC games on, and could cost $200 - $2000+.
Speakers, they could use the TV's speakers, they could get a sound bar, they could use a headset, they could have a 5.1-9.2 surround system - $0 - $5000.

I think a realistic gaming rig cost is 2x-3x console price.
 
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I do kind of miss having physical copies of games on PC. That is one thing I like about console. It sure is easier being able to download all of my games on Steam, but there is definitely an element of ownership missing.

Anyway, I'm glad that Microsoft settled on only charging people $10 a month to use a basic service.
 
That's not how PC gaming works. It's not a single market. No single entity owns it. Sony and Nintendo could sell their games on their own store on PC and it would still have to compete with Steam, Epic, and Origin. You don't even need to stick with Windows, you can even port games to Mac and Linux as well. If consoles were to die then we'd have more competition not more monopoly. Consoles are the monopoly because the only way consoles survive is with exclusives. Exclusives aren't good for consumers.
Agreed, though we do still need to get Bloodborne moved over to PC sooner than later!
Microsoft just attempted to double the price of playing games online for the Xbox, and you're defending consoles? You were about to pay $120 a year to be able to play Dark Souls 3 online. The game itself costs $60, and you pay for the internet connection every month. Sony now charges $70 for a remaster of Demon Souls which is an 11 year old game. Stop defending the console industry and it's anti-consumer practices. Someone in 2014 could build an i5 2500k with a GTX 970 and still be able to play Cyberpunk 2077, while the PS4 can't. The best thing Sony can do is refund your money and remove the game from their digital store.
hmm, sounds a bit like Corporatism at work with yet another megacorp screwing everyone over until public backlash made them step back for fear of looking back (aka, losing sales). ;)
Demon's Souls does look fun, but not $70 fun - also, we have yet another exclusive that really needs to get moved to PC; at least the silver-lining is that it will be highly optimized for the PS5, it's just too bad there are no PS5 consoles available at this point, and having to buy yet another console, ugh...

Also, if Bloodborne had made it to PC, it would look even better than this:


This video is the prime example of how bottlenecked the PS4/Slim/Pro is by the weak Jaguar CPU in it.
At least the Cell in the PS3, when fully optimized for, was a true powerhouse, but the PS4 at launch was barely mid-range PC-equivalent back in late 2013... let alone in 2021; truly, neither console has aged well, but the PS5 (despite its current availability) does have some decent hardware in making it semi-competitive against PC gaming at that mid-range GTX 1060-level (if one does nothing but game).

I would say the new consoles actually have some decent hardware in them, but again, they can't be found anywhere, and they are absolutely not worth the scalper prices available now.
Then again, GPUs are going for insane prices on PCs now, so talk about being between a rock and a [H]ard place.
 
See, you can go back and forth about which is a better platform and argue points about framerates, ports, resolutions, whatever. That will just go in circles endlessly. Some people don't mind 30FPS because they've only ever played at 30fps - you know, on consoles. TV is 30FPS. Movies are 24FPS. The rare game that would come out and run at 60FPS was a big deal. But so much of that is subjective - do you prefer playing on a couch, in front of a big TV? Is it more immersive for you to play with headphones right in front of an 38" Ultrawide? Do you neeeeeeed 144hz refresh rate screens and a $1500 video card to feel like you're really gaming at speed? Maybe you do! Maybe you want a 240hz refresh rate for competitive dota? That's great! You can do that ona PC. Games run at higher resolutions and framerates on an expensive PC than they do on a cheap console? You are correct! But maybe you prefer lounging on a couch, and don't mind that with the TV 8-10' away you wouldn't be able to see all that detail anyways. Maybe you don't want to keep track of 6 different game storefronts. Maybe you don't like the keyboard and mouse for gaming, and prefer a controller.

Whatever the reason for your preference, a console is still cheaper. It costs less dollars than a gaming PC. You can build a PC for even less, no doubt, but it might not be a very good gaming experience. And even if it is - even if you get a sweetheart deal on a full build gaming system that's a few years old for less than the retail price of a new console - over the life of the system vs. the life of a console, you will spend more money on PC hardware than you do on the console hardware, unless you never upgrade the PC.

But to that last point, I will ask again: is anyone here still playing games on a PC they built for $400 in late 2013, that has never been upgraded? If so, how does that Haswell i3, 8GB of RAM and R7 260 compare to a PS4 in, I don't know, Horizon: Zero Dawn, or Assassins' Creed: Origins? Runs them just fine?
 
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That's not how PC gaming works. It's not a single market. No single entity owns it. Sony and Nintendo could sell their games on their own store on PC and it would still have to compete with Steam, Epic, and Origin. You don't even need to stick with Windows, you can even port games to Mac and Linux as well. If consoles were to die then we'd have more competition not more monopoly. Consoles are the monopoly because the only way consoles survive is with exclusives. Exclusives aren't good for consumers.
You know damn well what I mean; please don't pretend otherwise. It's about having a choice — as in a real choice — in the kind of platform you use to play. Yeah, it would be better to have multiple store options on a given console, but I don't want to have to wade through a PC operating system or be confined to generic hardware just to play a game. Console exclusives can suck, but a game truly optimized for a narrow set of hardware can provide experiences you won't necessarily get from a PC title that has to run on everything from a $500 Best Buy clearance special to a $5,000 custom rig.

Microsoft just attempted to double the price of playing games online for the Xbox, and you're defending consoles? You were about to pay $120 a year to be able to play Dark Souls 3 online. The game itself costs $60, and you pay for the internet connection every month. Sony now charges $70 for a remaster of Demon Souls which is an 11 year old game. Stop defending the console industry and it's anti-consumer practices. Someone in 2014 could build an i5 2500k with a GTX 970 and still be able to play Cyberpunk 2077, while the PS4 can't. The best thing Sony can do is refund your money and remove the game from their digital store.

Did I say I was defending Microsoft's price hike, or CDPR's botched Cyberpunk 2077 launch? No, I wasn't. You can like consoles in general without explicitly endorsing every practice associated with them, just as I don't fault PC gaming because of Valve/Epic abuses or rampant cheating.

And I noticed you dodged the central point: you have a serious psychological hang-up here. You can't fathom the notion that someone enjoys a platform you don't like, and will contort yourself to insist that someone is having fun the "wrong" way. You know that "shh... let people enjoy things" comic? Yeah, it's meant as a criticism of people like you. What's the problem with accepting that consoles can offer their own value, even if this includes some drawbacks?
 
I would imagine it is a bit more complex than that, exclusives can mean cheap (if not free) capital and marketing to devs that would have an hard time to get it otherwise in some case (or at least theoretically) as well as simpler/optimised game that can run well for less dev cost (at least theoretically), would a customer in the market for a forza/gran turismo game was hurt or gained from the the Microsoft/Sony exclusive war on that flagship product on that market for example, did a flight sim enthusiast hurt or helped by Microsoft making a cloud flagship product like Flight Sim 2020 (would they have done it without the concept of making it a pc/xbox exclusive)
The whole point of exclusives on consoles is to get you to buy the hardware, because that game only exists on that hardware. While you're at it you might as well buy Fallout 5 or Far Cry 7, since you now have this machine. Exclusives don't make the real money, the 30% they get from 3rd party sales do. The best selling exclusive game is Wii Sports at 90 million sales which is not even close to Minecrafts 200 million.

Unfortunately, you could argue that consoles are not future proof either. E.g. PS3->PS4 = lost games. I got a bunch of games trapped on my PS4 account because my optical drive broken on my PS4 (LOL) so I stupidly bought digital games there, which are now worthless. I guess you could also say the build quality of the console, and the ability to do something elementary like removing dust, is difficult, is also a bad thing compared to how easy it is on a PC.
I don't understand this, for I'm no console peasant. How are digital purchases trapped on a PS4? You couldn't transfer that to another PS4?

hmm, sounds a bit like Corporatism at work with yet another megacorp screwing everyone over until public backlash made them step back for fear of looking back (aka, losing sales). ;)
Don't start that again, we had a thread locked because of it. No more politics.
Demon's Souls does look fun, but not $70 fun - also, we have yet another exclusive that really needs to get moved to PC; at least the silver-lining is that it will be highly optimized for the PS5, it's just too bad there are no PS5 consoles available at this point, and having to buy yet another console, ugh...
Demon Souls might end up on PC because the sales aren't so hot. The original sold like 1.7 million and I'm hearing not such hot sales for the PS5 version. If people really wanted to play Demon Souls then they could have done so on the much cheaper and more available PS3 version. I played Demon Souls on PC a few years ago, so it isn't hard to do. They even got online play working when Sony removed it on the PS3. So yes, I see a PC version being released eventually. Also the PS5 version plays just like the PS3 version, down to its faults. So it's just a graphics upgrade, not a gameplay upgrade. They didn't even bother to finish the DLC that was suppose to be released on the PS3 version.
but the PS5 (despite its current availability) does have some decent hardware in making it semi-competitive against PC gaming at that mid-range GTX 1060-level (if one does nothing but game).
As Gamers Nexus put it, the PS5 is a mid range to high end PC from 5 years ago. Their words, not mine.
I would say the new consoles actually have some decent hardware in them, but again, they can't be found anywhere, and they are absolutely not worth the scalper prices available now.
Then again, GPUs are going for insane prices on PCs now, so talk about being between a rock and a [H]ard place.
Can't fault consoles for something that's happening on PC. At least one could acquire a PC for a reasonable price if they avoid RTX and AMD's RX 6000 hardware.
 
You know damn well what I mean; please don't pretend otherwise. It's about having a choice — as in a real choice — in the kind of platform you use to play.
That choice is an illusion. Consoles are now running x86 Ryzen CPU with RDNA2.0 graphics. It's a PC without Windows installed. You can't even run a word processor on it. It's a walled garden that's limiting your choice, not expanding it. What difference would there be if Microsoft made the Xbox Series into a Windows PC? You would at least run Windows applications and even print.

Console exclusives can suck, but a game truly optimized for a narrow set of hardware can provide experiences you won't necessarily get from a PC title that has to run on everything from a $500 Best Buy clearance special to a $5,000 custom rig.
Doom Eternal. That's one well optimized game. You could run that on a toaster if that toaster was running x86 and Windows.
Did I say I was defending Microsoft's price hike, or CDPR's botched Cyberpunk 2077 launch? No, I wasn't. You can like consoles in general without explicitly endorsing every practice associated with them, just as I don't fault PC gaming because of Valve/Epic abuses or rampant cheating.
You do know that Microsoft screwed up before even the Xbox One was released by preventing used games? It's much easier to screw over console users when they're locked to your garden.
You can't fathom the notion that someone enjoys a platform you don't like, and will contort yourself to insist that someone is having fun the "wrong" way.
Anything wrong with being correct?
What's the problem with accepting that consoles can offer their own value, even if this includes some drawbacks?
Those drawbacks are very expensive. If Microsoft did enact their $120 extortion price, then you'd pay $120 per year to play games online. Someone at Microsoft forgot they just released a new console and would deter people from buying it if they knew they had to pay $120 per year to use it. Microsoft will eventually double the price of Xbox Live Gold, once the Xbox Series consoles are established. Either that or Microsoft will remove it and merge it with Game Pass and force you to pay either way. You don't have a choice to go with Gabe Newell Game Pass or Tim Sweeney Game Pass. You're forced to pay or don't play. You don't have a choice. You never had a choice if you bought a console.
 
Anything wrong with being correct?
But... you're not correct. (I'm not going to get into specific issues at this point, as it's clear you're not interested in an honest conversation.)

PC gaming is great, but has significant flaws; console gaming is great and also has significant flaws. What baffles me is that it's apparently impossible for you to accept this, to live and let live, to simply let people... have fun.

If anything, you're a ringing endorsement for console gaming — it's worthwhile if it means they can avoid self-important people like you and simply focus on the games. I'm going to enjoy my PS5 that much more now, thanks!
 
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Ahh, whenever I want to see an example of willful ignorance (as if people don't exhibit that enough these days in all facets of life), I come to the News subforum to see what DukenukemX is posting one one of the various console threads. He never fails to get a small chuckle and shake of the heard from me.

I'm going to get off my 2.5K PC now and go play Spiderman on my PS5 or maybe Streets of Rage 4 on my Switch. :D
 
Those drawbacks are very expensive. If Microsoft did enact their $120 extortion price, then you'd pay $120 per year to play games online.

yeah! Imagine if Nvidia started charging $1500 for video cards and Intel and AMD started charging $500+ for processors and motherboards starting going for double what they used to? I’m so glad that the cost of building a nice gaming PC has stayed exactly at 2013 levels.

(what you have here is a “red herring” - double appropriate for AMD references!)

also, I have to ask - how many of you guys are really enjoying playing Skyrim, Witcher 3, Cyberpunk and Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla multiplayer? That’s some real good times.

(you can skip the subscription and then... what, you don’t have the option for a bunch of kids screaming at you in Fortnite? You guys play a lot of Fortnite?)
 
The whole point of exclusives on consoles is to get you to buy the hardware, because that game only exists on that hardware. While you're at it you might as well buy Fallout 5 or Far Cry 7, since you now have this machine. Exclusives don't make the real money, the 30% they get from 3rd party sales do. The best selling exclusive game is Wii Sports at 90 million sales which is not even close to Minecrafts 200 million.
Not so sure exactly what you respond mean relative to what I wrote, that in line with my point, the amount of money put in them or the very existence of those games would not be certain if they were not financed as flag ship to help console sales, it is not fully obvious they hurt the consumer of those games (the claim being they are not good for the consumer) if I am a consumer of gran turismo type of race sim, did the concept of exclusive was not good for me ? (maybe obviously, but I am not sure of that at all, maybe I had better game than without it)

You do know that Microsoft screwed up before even the Xbox One was released by preventing used games? It's much easier to screw over console users when they're locked to your garden.
Yes and I imagine much easier to attract developpement capital if you can guarantee a fully locked garden to them. There is a balance of good minus to most things, including this.
 
You do know that Microsoft screwed up before even the Xbox One was released by preventing used games? It's much easier to screw over console users when they're locked to your garden.
Yes and I imagine much easier to attract developpement capital if you can guarantee a fully locked garden to them. There is a balance of good minus to most things, including this.

They actually did not go through with that plan. Gamers and media tore them to shreds over it, and Sony excoriated them at E3 with a video with so much sass I am pretty sure some folks at Xbox are still feeling the burn from it.

In the same way, the news about doubling the price of xbox live gold, the topic of this thread, was quickly walked back. I'd prefer it if they just didn't make these obvious mistakes in the first place, though.

The Xbox One launch was a mess for Microsoft, and their early focus on watching TV and the bundled Kinect, the sale price ($100 over the PS4) and all that "media central" nonsense really flopped. By the time the One X / One S launched I thought they really had things together, but the damage was done and the system ended the generation with about half of Sony's numbers. I prefer the interface, store and online features of my Xbox One S to PS4, but Sony had more of the games I wanted to play. Pretty sure it was that way for a lot of people, given the system sales numbers (something like 110 million for Sony and 50 million for Microsoft).

I feel like there is a team of people at Xbox who really get gaming and want to be on top, and then there's... I don't know, accountants or market research types or someone who is just faffing about and saying stuff like "hey guys, let's double the price of this service but not provide any additional value". It's probably the same group that pushed for the used game thing. You'd think after the backlash of that one they'd have someone vetting these decisions for "most likely reaction from our customers" but it seems that were not the case here, again.
 
Gamers Nexus did a video that shows that the PS5 is equivalent to a GTX 1060, 1070 Ti, and 1080. If you avoid buying Nvidia's RTX or AMD's RX 6000 cards it's certainly doable.
On their video the PS5 had a performance similar to a 1060 on a 2019 game (DMC5) and to a 1070 Ti on another 2019 game (Borderlands 3), and outperformed a 1080/2060 on a 2020 game (Dirt 5, PS5 119 fps vs 108 fps on that PC).
Broadening the data range and including Digital Foundry comparisons of consoles to PC you can see the newer games take better advantage of the newer hardware, which is to be expected.
GameReleaseComparable GPULink
DMC52019, March1060Gamers Nexus
Borderlands 32019, September1070 TiGamers Nexus
Dirt 52020, November1080 (PS5 119 fps vs 108 fps PC)Gamers Nexus
Watch Dogs Legion2020, November2060/SDigital Foundry
Hitman 32021, January2060SDigital Foundry
AC Valhalla2020, November2070/SDigital Foundry
Gears 52020, November2070S / 2080Digital Foundry
CoD BO Cold War2020, November2080Digital Foundry
More recent games seem to better utilize the newer hardware, that trend should continue as it happened with previous generations. There's a significant difference between a game receiving a patch to work better on newer gen consoles versus being developed and optimized with those systems in mind.
As developers gain knowledge of the XSX and PS5 and their drivers/software stack matures we should see some really good performance for a $400~500 machine.
For a while, on games targeted for this gen, it will be hard to match the same experience for the same price on PC, until some new GPU generations arrive and give us better performance/cost.
To be clear, if you want top experience, PC is the way to go. When on a budget, and depending on preferences, a console might be good value for the hardware they pack.

(Somehow I predict a disclaimer like this is necessary: I work on PC and I game on PC. Last console I bought was around 2005, don't use one now and I'm not planning on buying one. Still, I can see a good value proposition on these $400~500 consoles)
 
Just started playing The Order 1886 on a PS4 Slim. The graphics are insane, definitely better than most current PC games. Wish I would have played it when it was new, but I'm trying to go back and catch up on some titles.

The PS4 exclusive games generally look way better than multi-platform titles. Like Until Dawn, that game looked so good. I wish they would make PC games like that. The closest we got was the port of Detroit, but I haven't played on PC yet.
 
Microsoft has been terrible for the last 7 years or so? No clear direction, have no idea what they are doing. Lets try this and backtrack on that.
They have simply lost focus and don't know what they are doing along with a clear direction on where they are going.
Yes I am using a Windows PC but for gaming, I LOVED my PS4 when I had it.
 
The monitor and speakers are costs that console users would also pay. Their monitor is a TV, which is what I also play my PC games on, and could cost $200 - $2000+.
Speakers, they could use the TV's speakers, they could get a sound bar, they could use a headset, they could have a 5.1-9.2 surround system - $0 - $5000.

I think a realistic gaming rig cost is 2x-3x console price.

And the best thing about paying double the price of a console is you can ride the typical multi-year delay it takes new console games to really utilize the extra CPU power - it's typically the GPU first; add a GPU today, then plan to do a full upgrade of your system in 3-4 years.

You can get 6 years out of a console before it's outdated, or you can use a $1000 PC for 10 -12years (with 2-3 GPU upgrades, depending on your tastes) ;only the hardcore need to touch their gaming PC yearly
 
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You can get an above-ground pool, and go swimming, or save a bit more to get an in-ground pool. Both let you go swimming ....

Exclusives aren't really a good thing for consumers, but I understand why consoles buy games; to force people to buy consoles. I have a PS4 Pro for the FFVII remake as well thanks to this... (paid 450 to play 1 game, so screw exclusives). I wish it was on the PC, it would look and play much better... I have never played 'The Order 1886', but I guarantee it would look much nicer on a PC even with a cheap port. I can only imagine how Halo 5 would look on PC. Ironically, most game studios probably spend countless hours (CDPR) pulling the settings back, and even downscaling hi-res models from PC levels just to make it playable on crappy console HW. Certain genre's of game don't even exist on consoles, like Moba/MMO.

That being said, I admit there's a time and a place, and equation for console gaming. For me specifically, anywhere from 180-265 days playing per 3 years means I should spend top dollar relative to what I can spend rationally for my enjoyment, so definitely not a console. Not everyone has that same equation, but lets not pretend that any console game looks half as good as a the same game with an 2000x/RTX rendering it, and further; lets not pretend that 30-60 fps is anywhere as enjoyable as 144. Anyone's eyes can see the difference, and before you whine about TV or movies, stop comparing input fps to passive fps; its not the right way to compare it. If it doesn't bother you, see my analogy about pools in line one.

Consoles are worth it for some, I'll never doubt that.

To be clear, if you want top experience, PC is the way to go. When on a budget, and depending on preferences, a console might be good value for the hardware they pack.
This, 100%
 
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You can get 6 years out of a console before it's outdated, or you can use a $1000 PC for 10 -12years (with 2-3 GPU upgrades, depending on your tastes) ;only the hardcore need to touch their gaming PC yearly

All things being equal, that means your “$1000 PC” is actually a “$1000 + the cost of 2-3 GPUs” PC, and it also means you decided your PC was outdated 2-3 times in that theoretical 10-12 year lifespan.

upgrades aren’t free. And I don’t see anyone here installing RTX cards into core 2 quad systems.

although I could see some gamers stretching Sandy Bridge systems for another year or so, and buying an expensive GPU now as the first part of a new build. But you’ve got to take into account the total cost of the hardware if you want to make that price comparison.
 
On their video the PS5 had a performance similar to a 1060 on a 2019 game (DMC5) and to a 1070 Ti on another 2019 game (Borderlands 3), and outperformed a 1080/2060 on a 2020 game (Dirt 5, PS5 119 fps vs 108 fps on that PC).
Broadening the data range and including Digital Foundry comparisons of consoles to PC you can see the newer games take better advantage of the newer hardware, which is to be expected.
I'm not a fan of Digital Foundry, at least not Digital Foundry for the past 5 years. I felt that Gamers Nexus did a better job matching PC settings to console while also showing the frame time better. Assassins Creed Valhalla for example doesn't support Ray-Tracing, like most games on PS5, and instead of saying RTX 2070 you could say GTX 1080. Hitman 3 has no Ray-Tracing and therefore GTX 1070. Of the games on that list that support Ray-Tracing, it's Gears 5, Cold War, and Watch Dogs Legion. Using RTX as a comparison makes sense with those games. In games like Cold War, Digital Foundry couldn't even lower some PC settings to match while in other games Digital Foundry couldn't find a high enough setting to match PS5, which matches what Gamers Nexus found with their tests. Though Gamers Nexus did show that the PS5 has horrible frame time issues compared to PC. Games like to stutter a lot on PS5.
 
You can get an above-ground pool, and go swimming, or save a bit more to get an in-ground pool. Both let you go swimming ....

Exclusives aren't really a good thing for consumers, but I understand why consoles buy games; to force people to buy consoles. I have a PS4 Pro for the FFVII remake as well thanks to this... (paid 450 to play 1 game, so screw exclusives). I wish it was on the PC, it would look and play much better... I have never played 'The Order 1886', but I guarantee it would look much nicer on a PC even with a cheap port. I can only imagine how Halo 5 would look on PC. Ironically, most game studios probably spend countless hours (CDPR) pulling the settings back, and even downscaling hi-res models from PC levels just to make it playable on crappy console HW. Certain genre's of game don't even exist on consoles, like Moba/MMO.

That being said, I admit there's a time and a place, and equation for console gaming. For me specifically, anywhere from 180-265 days playing per 3 years means I should spend top dollar relative to what I can spend rationally for my enjoyment, so definitely not a console. Not everyone has that same equation, but lets not pretend that any console game looks half as good as a the same game with an 2000x/RTX rendering it, and further; lets not pretend that 30-60 fps is anywhere as enjoyable as 144. Anyone's eyes can see the difference, and before you whine about TV or movies, stop comparing input fps to passive fps; its not the right way to compare it. If it doesn't bother you, see my analogy about pools in line one.

Consoles are worth it for some, I'll never doubt that.


This, 100%

I'm not quite sure that analogy holds up with the swimming pool; as that would equate to many like my self who would have both above and in-ground pools for different uses and I'm not sure that would make sense in any situation compared to PCs and consoles.

I used to be of the same mindset about console exclusives as well, but given that most of the best games I've played over the last several years have been console exclusives, I have come to the conclusion that their exclusives are a "necessary evil" (if you will) that breed the best production values that gaming has to offer (subjective of course depending on your genre preferences in games, but that's my take). For instance, if Sony hadn't built Naughty Dog into what it is today, then I wouldn't have been able to experience two of the best gaming series and experiences I've had to date (the Uncharted and The Last of Us series). Because I don't think that developer team would exist, at least with the same staff if it did, to make those games as they came to be if not for Sony's ownership/acquisition of them. Of course the same goes for Nintendo and their 1st party titles that I enjoy, if to a lesser extent.

But it seems that many with the PCMR mentality ("I guarantee it would look much nicer on PC...") get too hung up on how much better a game could play on PC to enjoy the game for how well it still looks and plays on the console it's exclusive to, to enjoy it... as a game that's meant to be played and enjoyed for its narrative (which most of Sony's exclusives are centered on) along with all the graphical fidelity they were able to fit into its comparatively small performance budget. But also, I have no issues going from 120+ Hz on my ultrawide at maxed IQ to 30 FPS on my PS4 either, mostly because I don't play FPS games on console and the 3rd person action/adventure games I do play are slower paced and still play good regardless. At least now with the new consoles though, 60 Hz seems to be the standard and most of the PS4 games (worth playing) have been upgraded to that, which is always a welcome upgrade.

Side-bar too; you're really doing yourself a disservice by not playing many other PS exclusives if you only got a PS4 for FF7 remake and didn't consider anything else. At least with most of their exclusives too at this point, you can get them for $20 or less after a couple years (I've picked up a couple for $5 or so on sale directly from the PSN store - which is often times comparable to Steam sales), unlike what Nintendo does with theirs. Or you can pick up a year of PS+ for $30 or so online a few times a year and get the PS collection on there that gives you a handful of nice games to play, some of which are exclusives that I forgot to pick up over the years like The Last Guardian that I recently enjoyed playing through a lot.
 
You can get an above-ground pool, and go swimming, or save a bit more to get an in-ground pool. Both let you go swimming ....

Exclusives aren't really a good thing for consumers, but I understand why consoles buy games; to force people to buy consoles. I have a PS4 Pro for the FFVII remake as well thanks to this... (paid 450 to play 1 game, so screw exclusives). I wish it was on the PC, it would look and play much better... I have never played 'The Order 1886', but I guarantee it would look much nicer on a PC even with a cheap port. I can only imagine how Halo 5 would look on PC. Ironically, most game studios probably spend countless hours (CDPR) pulling the settings back, and even downscaling hi-res models from PC levels just to make it playable on crappy console HW. Certain genre's of game don't even exist on consoles, like Moba/MMO.

That being said, I admit there's a time and a place, and equation for console gaming. For me specifically, anywhere from 180-265 days playing per 3 years means I should spend top dollar relative to what I can spend rationally for my enjoyment, so definitely not a console. Not everyone has that same equation, but lets not pretend that any console game looks half as good as a the same game with an 2000x/RTX rendering it, and further; lets not pretend that 30-60 fps is anywhere as enjoyable as 144. Anyone's eyes can see the difference, and before you whine about TV or movies, stop comparing input fps to passive fps; its not the right way to compare it. If it doesn't bother you, see my analogy about pools in line one.

Consoles are worth it for some, I'll never doubt that.


This, 100%
To add to what T4rd said:

I'd also say you're overstatign how much better games would look on PCs with quick ports. Halo 5 and The Order 1886 would... be higher resolution and run faster. Anything more than that would require more substantial work. And sorry, but it's outright false that "any" console title won't look half as good as rendered on an RTX card, not with the latest console generation at least.

Also, remember that your examples are games that have to run on 2013-era hardware. Yeah, I'd hope that PCs released even a few years later (let alone eight) would crush those titles! The gap will be considerably narrower with PS5 and XSX releases. You'd need an absolute cutting-edge PC to match the PS5's SSD performance, for instance. And yes, frame rate is a key limitation, but c'mon... if you can't enjoy a game running at 60FPS but can at 144FPS, I don't think you were really focused on having fun.

I think we can agree that the equations differ for some people. For me, it's less about frame rate and absolute graphical detail than a game that looks good overall and creates a good couch gaming experience. I love that Spider-Man: Miles Morales is so seamless and weaves a compelling narrative; it plays wonderfully at 30FPS with ray tracing on because it's a cinematic experience, not an eSports twitch-fest. And in games where frame rate actually matters, like Destiny 2... well, 60FPS is plenty at 4K, and I believe at least some Crucible modes support 120FPS.
 
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It isn't unplayable at 30 fps but it would be significantly better at >90 and max graphics settings. That's the whole point. I don't just play games that high fps (see ffvii remake). Just appreciate it when it can run at optimal settings.

Starting to lose the plot by gushing over exclusives, and the "you don't play for fun" (lol?). Yeah some games on consoles are great, and maybe for some they're worth owning a console for. But the performance of the same game on a PC is always going to be far better, which is the whole point I was making.
 
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Microsoft has been terrible for the last 7 years or so? No clear direction, have no idea what they are doing. Lets try this and backtrack on that.
They have simply lost focus and don't know what they are doing along with a clear direction on where they are going.
Yes I am using a Windows PC but for gaming, I LOVED my PS4 when I had it.

On terribleness... yes and no.

The biggest mistake was one that happened even before 2013 — it was the decision to treat the Xbox One as a way to expand Microsoft's PC technologies into the living room. It was part of Steve Ballmer's delusion that every human is pre-programmed to love Windows, and that you'd chuck your PlayStation out the window if you could just have Windows-like features on your TV. So the company focused more on media functions and less on gaming; I still remember that "TV, TV, TV" supercut video someone made showing how little games were mentioned during the Xbox One intro.

The company did quickly realize that it needed to shift back to games. The problem, as I see it, is that Microsoft still had a lot of hubris and assumed its franchises were worth more than they are — look how much it hyped up Crackdown 3. And when it came to brand new properties... well, it oversold there as well. Yeah, you have ReCore and Sea of Thieves, but who cares?

The Xbox Series X/S feels like a return to form in terms of hardware, and some of its recent studio acquisitions (Bethesda, Obsidian, etc.) should ensure that there are genuinely good system firsts or exclusives. But I'd say Microsoft is still learning to prevent... well, Microsoftiness from getting in the way. That sense of corporate mediocrity that pervades Windows, Surface and other Microsoft products. Sony, for all its faults, usually knows how to step back and let PlayStation shine.
 
It isn't unplayable at 30 fps but it would be significantly better at >90 and max graphics settings. That's the whole point. I don't just play games that high fps (see ffvii remake). Just appreciate it when it can run at optimal settings.

Indeed, but I guess it comes down to how much you value that extra performance on PC. For me it's more of a "nice to have" than a "significantly better" experience. For instance, I had zero issues playing 100+ hours of Horizon: Zero Dawn on PS4 Pro at 30 FPS and it was my GOTY that year. So I was definitely surprised and excited when it came to PC just to give me the excuse to play it again at much higher IQ and frame rate. But it was little more than that for me; an excuse to play it again and definitely not a "significantly better" experience for me. But another element of that too is that I prefer playing most games of that genre on controller (which I also use on PC), whereas I know many others (M76) hated the controller for that game and are much more appreciative of KB&M controls for aiming and such when that game was ported to PC.

Starting to lose the plot by gushing over exclusives, and the "you don't play for fun" (lol?). Yeah some games on consoles are great, and maybe for some they're worth owning a console for. But the performance of the same game on a PC is always going to be far better, which is the whole point I was making.

Looking at the big picture here too; gaming is just another hobby for most people. How much you enjoy that hobby often determines how much time and resources (money) you put into it. So as with any hobby, you're likely to buy many products in it that directly compete with each other from other brands that have their own proprietary tech and patents on them. These proprietary things (such as exclusives and accessories) are generally crucial to the overall betterment and progress of that hobby, as often times the best parts of them are emulated and copied by their competitors anyways. So personally I have no issues buying into any platform that provides unique experiences if it means fueling more progress and innovation into that field. Therefore, yeah, the whole plot for me is "play for fun" I guess since I'm never thinking about how much a certain game could be playing on better hardware (which you can always do the same on any non-flagship GPU as well) as long as it's playable and enjoyable at all.
 
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