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

[Wade88]

Aurelius you know you can PC game on TV's? You don't even have to have the PC in the same room for some years now, you just get a nVidia Shield TV and do that nVidia game stream crap. It works well over hardwired LAN, allegedly it works on good wifi but I haven't tried it. They also make home theater PC's if you don't want to do that. Depending on how your house is built and if you own it you might be able to put a PC and a 3 meter HDMI cable on the other side of an interior wall.

If I were to do it again I'd use more than a double gang box, probably 2 triples. This is to my wife's office and not a home theater but I do a similar, less clusterfucky version of this for the home theater.

 

[chithanh]

Some people don't mind 30FPS because they've only ever played at 30fps - you know, on consoles.

lets not pretend that 30-60 fps is anywhere as enjoyable as 144

That is a common misconception by 60+ fps proponents, but the data says otherwise. Insomniac (before they were acquired by Sony) did study the effects of 60 fps vs. visual fidelity on sales, review scores, etc. and found that visuals are important while fps is not:

• A higher framerate does not significantly affect sales of a game.
• A higher framerate does not significantly affect the reviews of a game.

And in particular they found that there was a clear correlation between graphics scores in reviews (where they are provided) and the final scores. And they found no such correlation between framerate and the graphics scores nor the final scores. As an interesting side-note, our team also found no direct correlation between gameplay scores and final scores, however it does appear that gameplay scores are also influenced by graphics scores. i.e. Better looking games appear to be more “fun” to reviewers, in general.

https://web.archive.org/web/2017082...niacgames.com/how-much-does-framerate-matter/

It is clear that people who demand 60 fps are a (vocal) minority, but gamers and reviewers are largely fine with 30 fps games.

 

[Deleted member 89018]

That is a much better way of explaining the point I was trying to make. Although I find I prefer the smoother animation that comes with 60fps, I play a lot of games on console and 30fps has always been fine for me. And a lot of people wouldn’t even notice, I expect.

these conversations about frame rates, I think, have become the modern “32-bits vs 64-bits”. I still remember people asking “how many bits does the GameCube have?” and “Is the PS2 128-bit so it’s better than the Nintendo 64?”

After a certain point it didn’t matter. it became a useless metric. And with TV shows and movies still sitting at 30/24fps, I think it’s just hard for people who focus on frame rates so heavily (PCMR types) to remember that... actually 30 is just fine.

this new console generation is starting to push 60fps more as a selling point for upgraded / new titles, so maybe that will start to change. But unless all the tv shows and movies start doing 60fps as well I think a lot of people still won’t care.

 

[GreenOrbs]

Market preferences do change over time. I would expect that more people care about frame rate today than in 2016-2017.

In that blog post, Insomniac said that the PS4 Rachet and Clank would be their last 60fps game going forwards. This hasn't actually turned out to be the case-- instead they give a 30 fps and a 60 fps performance option in spiderman and the unreleased new game next year. By adding in graphics options in the menu, it's possible to please BOTH crowds. This is the way and Insomniac has done well to do this instead of no more 60 fps games as they initially said.

 

[T4rd]

Aurelius you know you can PC game on TV's? You don't even have to have the PC in the same room for some years now, you just get a nVidia Shield TV and do that nVidia game stream crap. It works well over hardwired LAN, allegedly it works on good wifi but I haven't tried it. They also make home theater PC's if you don't want to do that. Depending on how your house is built and if you own it you might be able to put a PC and a 3 meter HDMI cable on the other side of an interior wall.

If I were to do it again I'd use more than a double gang box, probably 2 triples. This is to my wife's office and not a home theater but I do a similar, less clusterfucky version of this for the home theater.

I have a Shield TV and occasionally will try to play a game from my PC to the living room just so my wife can watch me play and it's a very hit-or-miss solution. Half the time the game simply doesn't support it neither on the Steam Link app or via Gamestream, the other half it usually works OK but the last time I was trying to play a game and it would stutter for a few secs every few mins while playing with the little "connection lost" icon blipping up despite me being on a hardwired gigabit connection. The other (minor) issue is that I wish I could get 4k/120 Hz to my TV or at least G-Sync/VRR since my TV supports it (C9 OLED). In general the Steam Link app works much better than the Gamestream app for controller support and compatibility on the few games I've tried lately, but even then it's spotty sometimes and I couldn't get a couple games to respond to my controller once it launched and some games would just launch and not display anything at all with the "connection lost" icon displayed while I can still hear the game menu audio through the TV somehow and it playing just fine on my PC's monitor.

That is a common misconception by 60+ fps proponents, but the data says otherwise. Insomniac (before they were acquired by Sony) did study the effects of 60 fps vs. visual fidelity on sales, review scores, etc. and found that visuals are important while fps is not:


https://web.archive.org/web/2017082...niacgames.com/how-much-does-framerate-matter/

It is clear that people who demand 60 fps are a (vocal) minority, but gamers and reviewers are largely fine with 30 fps games.

Indeed, but since the PS4 Pro/Xbone X consoles, it's also becoming pretty common for games to support both resolution and performance modes, which usually only entail a resolution difference with little IQ setting differences otherwise in order to meet both 30/60 FPS targets. I think this is the best way to approach this for devs and hope it becomes standard in this next generation of consoles. I also hope now that the current gen consoles support VRR (though the PS5 has yet to be updated with it - its hardware supports it), they start utilizing that more to squeeze better IQ out of games while not being completely locked to a 60/120Hz target. It seems that 60 FPS is becoming the standard now though with many previous gen titles being updated for 60 FPS support via BC support on the new consoles too, which is a good sign IMO.

 

[Wade88]

I have a Shield TV and occasionally will try to play a game from my PC to the living room just so my wife can watch me play and it's a very hit-or-miss solution. Half the time the game simply doesn't support it neither on the Steam Link app or via Gamestream, the other half it usually works OK but the last time I was trying to play a game and it would stutter for a few secs every few mins while playing with the little "connection lost" icon blipping up despite me being on a hardwired gigabit connection. The other (minor) issue is that I wish I could get 4k/120 Hz to my TV or at least G-Sync/VRR since my TV supports it (C9 OLED). In general the Steam Link app works much better than the Gamestream app for controller support and compatibility on the few games I've tried lately, but even then it's spotty sometimes and I couldn't get a couple games to respond to my controller once it launched and some games would just launch and not display anything at all with the "connection lost" icon displayed while I can still hear the game menu audio through the TV somehow and it playing just fine on my PC's monitor.

I've never had this problem but it might be because the computer and the shield tv are on the same switch. I've never tried it on the downstairs TV's that are on a different segment. I've had lots of problems with Steamlink but the gamestream has been reliable. Before it I used a 15' long HDMI cable to a beefier system on the other side of the wall. I do share your sentiment regarding the resolution and framerate, to defeat that I still use the long HDMI cable though that has been a royal pain in the ass to get all the gbps on a long hdmi cable. 3 meter displayport is a lot easier. I don't usually bother due to the distance between my mk. 1 eyeballs and the screen 1080p looks fine. The times I do use the cable it's for better sound, the other end plugs into a nice AVR and RBH/rythmik setup. Gamestream does multichannel pretty well but it's not as good as Kodi on the Shield for movies and for music I think the hdmi to the gpu works better than gamestream's streaming of the desktop. That doesn't even need all the gbps.

 

[DukenukemX]

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?

I think Microsoft was betting that their Game Pass would bring customers to the Xbox platform, which maybe the reason they wanted to increase the price of Xbox Live since it isn't happening as fast as they'd like it to. Even on PC Microsoft is pushing for Game Pass because reoccurring revenue makes a lot of money. Most people were happy with Xbox Live and so Microsoft attempted to double the price to nearly match that to Game Pass. That's how I feel this went down with Microsoft.

Microsoft has no plans to pump money in the franchises they have. They bought Zenimax for the purpose of making those games exclusive to Xbox, which won't go as well as Microsoft would like to think. They have a lot of great Intellectual Property that was better before Microsoft took over. Without good exclusives, game consoles don't sell. Pretty much any good exclusive for Xbox has ended up on PC, and even the Switch and PS4 at some point.

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.

I'm pretty sure the Xbox brand is dead for years now, and will continue to be dead even with the Xbox Series. Microsoft buying exclusives is just like Epic games buying exclusives. You're just going to piss off a lot of people instead of win them over to Xbox. I doubt a PS5 owner wants to hear that Doom Eternal 2 or Fallout 5 is exclusive to Xbox, and PC owners won't like delayed releases to PC. I doubt Zenimax games on PC will be well optimized as well. Instead of making another Conker's game or Banjo Kazooie, Microsoft just wants to buy wants currently relevant in the market.

 

[Wade88]

... doubt Zenimax games on PC will be well optimized as well. Instead of making another Conker's game or Banjo Kazooie, Microsoft just wants to buy wants currently relevant in the market.

How about Microsoft wants current market relevance? I'm not interested in Game Pass but they did a $1 for Christmas through the beginning of April deal that I'm trying and it's ok except the microsoft store downloads. It sometimes ignores what target disk you want to install it to unless you change the default installation destination disk in programs and features.

 

[Aurelius]

Aurelius you know you can PC game on TV's? You don't even have to have the PC in the same room for some years now, you just get a nVidia Shield TV and do that nVidia game stream crap. It works well over hardwired LAN, allegedly it works on good wifi but I haven't tried it. They also make home theater PC's if you don't want to do that. Depending on how your house is built and if you own it you might be able to put a PC and a 3 meter HDMI cable on the other side of an interior wall.

If I were to do it again I'd use more than a double gang box, probably 2 triples. This is to my wife's office and not a home theater but I do a similar, less clusterfucky version of this for the home theater.

I do, but that doesn't make PCs the best options for living room gaming.

I don't want to have to wrestle a desktop OS, or break out a mouse and keyboard. I also don't want to deal with lag over the network, or chain myself to running Windows on at least one computer in the home. Sorry, honey, we can't play Jackbox just yet, we need to sort out a graphics driver glitch.

You see what I'm getting at? The PC-over-all types here are convinced that only raw performance matters, but this just isn't true. Living room gaming is supposed to be a retreat from complexity, not a painful reminder of it; it's the thing you do when you just want to crash after work or curl up with your partner. And let's not forget kids — do you really want to make them deal with PC eccentricities on the couch?

Now, if you're willing to use Windows in the living room and have an understanding family, more power to you. But I'd really rather just play games and cuddle with my fiancée than worry about Destiny's frame rate.

 

[Wade88]

I do, but that doesn't make PCs the best options for living room gaming.

I don't want to have to wrestle a desktop OS, or break out a mouse and keyboard. I also don't want to deal with lag over the network, or chain myself to running Windows on at least one computer in the home. Sorry, honey, we can't play Jackbox just yet, we need to sort out a graphics driver glitch.

You see what I'm getting at? The PC-over-all types here are convinced that only raw performance matters, but this just isn't true. Living room gaming is supposed to be a retreat from complexity, not a painful reminder of it; it's the thing you do when you just want to crash after work or curl up with your partner. And let's not forget kids — do you really want to make them deal with PC eccentricities on the couch?

Now, if you're willing to use Windows in the living room and have an understanding family, more power to you. But I'd really rather just play games and cuddle with my fiancée than worry about Destiny's frame rate.

I can't remember the last time I had a graphics driver problem with a game. I also purposefully picked a woman that is about as technologically savvy as I am. The technologically inept members of my family all died between 2008 and 2013. RIP, everyone over the age of 43.

That said I do have consoles, for my nieces and nephews to play while I'm busy and the pets are tired. Their mom doesn't like big dogs and I have 4 of those and a 19lb lap cat. I do sometimes use a launch day xbone because it has the HDHomerun app and HDHomerun on android doesn't do chromecast so I have to cast the whole thing and that sucks because my phone isn't 16:9 it does black borders on the last of the high end plasma TV's in my bedroom. This is not cool so that system stays plugged in.

 

[Aurelius]

I think Microsoft was betting that their Game Pass would bring customers to the Xbox platform, which maybe the reason they wanted to increase the price of Xbox Live since it isn't happening as fast as they'd like it to. Even on PC Microsoft is pushing for Game Pass because reoccurring revenue makes a lot of money. Most people were happy with Xbox Live and so Microsoft attempted to double the price to nearly match that to Game Pass. That's how I feel this went down with Microsoft.

Oh, that's almost certainly how it went down. Microsoft did have a point when it said Live Gold prices hadn't changed for several years or more in many places, but this felt too much like a "please switch to Game Pass Ultimate" push than anything.

I'm pretty sure the Xbox brand is dead for years now, and will continue to be dead even with the Xbox Series. Microsoft buying exclusives is just like Epic games buying exclusives. You're just going to piss off a lot of people instead of win them over to Xbox. I doubt a PS5 owner wants to hear that Doom Eternal 2 or Fallout 5 is exclusive to Xbox, and PC owners won't like delayed releases to PC. I doubt Zenimax games on PC will be well optimized as well. Instead of making another Conker's game or Banjo Kazooie, Microsoft just wants to buy wants currently relevant in the market.

Quite possibly. Part of why the Xbox 360 succeeded was Sony's initial failure with the PS3. The Xbox was flat-out better until Sony found its groove, red ring issues aside.

And it already sounds like Microsoft is in a pickle with Bethesda, since it can't do what it wants (make all Bethesda games Xbox/Windows exclusive) without angering a lot of gamers. It has to either cherry-pick exclusives or accept that it'll be writing games for Sony and Nintendo consoles.

 

[Aurelius]

I can't remember the last time I had a graphics driver problem with a game. I also purposefully picked a woman that is about as technologically savvy as I am. The rest of my family is dead so it doesn't matter how much or how little adeptness they have. There are upsides to death

That said I do have consoles, for my nieces and nephews to play while I'm busy and the pets are tired. Their mom doesn't like big dogs and I have 4 of those.

You get the idea — it's about focusing on the games instead of all the preamble that comes with a PC. Even software updates on a PS5 are pretty seamless and are often done in the background by the time you sit down.

 

[Wade88]

We're on [H} though why wouldn't you just do all the preamble in the background while you're doing something else on the computer? It's not like we don't have cores, RAM, GBPS disks, et al out the wazoo these days. For me it's not about focusing on the games, it's so those kids don't screw up my computers.

 

[M76]

That is a common misconception by 60+ fps proponents, but the data says otherwise. Insomniac (before they were acquired by Sony) did study the effects of 60 fps vs. visual fidelity on sales, review scores, etc. and found that visuals are important while fps is not:

I've owned a 144hz monitor, and I can see the difference, except I Don't care about it. If a game can hold 30fps I'm fine with it. Cyberpunk currently averages 37FPS on my PC and I'll be damned before I turn down any graphics option.
Would 60 FPS be better? Sure, 120FPS? Even better! But not at the cost of graphics fidelity, not on my watch!

You get the idea — it's about focusing on the games instead of all the preamble that comes with a PC. Even software updates on a PS5 are pretty seamless and are often done in the background by the time you sit down.

Are background/unattended updates still a ps+ feature on the ps5? For me it is always a nightmare. Every time I turn on the console there is either a new firmware, game update, or both. Sometimes it takes 20 minutes to finally get into the game I wanted.

 

[Aurelius]

Are background/unattended updates still a ps+ feature on the ps5? For me it is always a nightmare. Every time I turn on the console there is either a new firmware, game update, or both. Sometimes it takes 20 minutes to finally get into the game I wanted.

Haven't seen mention of it being a PS Plus feature. I do know they work more effectively, though. Like you said, it used to be that you'd have to wait for a system or game update half the time. That happens much less often with my PS5, even when there's a major update. I'm not sure how much of that is due to smarter operation versus the raw speed of an SSD shrinking the update times, but I'll take it.

 

[defaultluser]

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.

And you have to buy three different consoles in that same 12-year period, if you're chasing the same performance metric:

$400 for PS4, $400 for PS4 Pro (really just a GPU-upgrade), then $500 for PS5. Total cost: $1300

You can get a faster system than those consoles from a $1000 PC plus two $250 GPU upgrades every four years (gives you twelve years total.) That's only $200 more for a vastly more capable system.

Yes, consoles are cheaper on the surface, but when you think about it from a demanding performance perspective, it gets more complicated! I've been upgrading mine with used gpus, which cuts the cost significantly. (picked up my GTX 1060 6gb for $125 during the mining selloff). it's hard to get such a deal on consoles before they are already-outdated (so, unless you use that outdated console for twelve years, you're not really getting as good a deal as you're selling it as)


I'm saying folks who bought their $1000 system 8 years sgo (Haswell core i5) can continue to use it for gaming for a few more years on a RTX 3050. They will still get 60 fps in current games for the next few years. Core 2 is a 14-year-old tech, you fool!

 

[wizzi01]

And you have to buy three different consoles in that same 12-year period, if you're chasing the same performance metric:

$400 for PS4, $400 for PS4 Pro (really just a GPU-upgrade), then $500 for PS5. Total cost: $1300

You can get a faster system than those consoles from a $1000 PC plus two $250 GPU upgrades every four years. That's only $200 more for a vastly more capable system.

Yes, consoles are cheaper on the surface, but when you think about it from a demanding performance perspective, it gets more complicated! I've been upgrading mine with used gpus, which cuts the cost significantly. (picked up my GTX 1060 6gb for $125 during the mining selloff). it's hard to get such a deal on consoles before they are already-outdated (so, unless you use that outdated console for twelve years, you're not really getting as good a deal as you're selling it as)

Ok, now edit your comment for today's times. How much will that 6gb 1060 cost you right now?

 

[M76]

Ok, now edit your comment for today's times. How much will that 6gb 1060 cost you right now?

Why, how much a ps5 will cost you? An arm and a leg? It's pointless to even compare. Nobody in their right mind should pay the current price for any GPU. Thankfully gaming is a want, not a need, so just wait until things get back to normal.

 

[cybereality]

Also, if you plan to get a new hard drive or SSD, that's extra cost too. A 500GB drive doesn't get you that far these days when games can be over 100GB each.

 

[defaultluser]

Also, if you plan to get a new hard drive or SSD, that's extra cost too. A 500GB drive doesn't get you that far these days when games can be over 100GB each.

I didn't mention storage because it's identically-expensive to add it to a PC (for Sony)., or they charge you out-the-ass for this on the MS side.

It's going to mirror the increase in PC's pcie storage price, thanks to the overkill that is PS5

 

[hajalie24]

I have a Shield TV and occasionally will try to play a game from my PC to the living room just so my wife can watch me play and it's a very hit-or-miss solution. Half the time the game simply doesn't support it neither on the Steam Link app or via Gamestream, the other half it usually works OK but the last time I was trying to play a game and it would stutter for a few secs every few mins while playing with the little "connection lost" icon blipping up despite me being on a hardwired gigabit connection. The other (minor) issue is that I wish I could get 4k/120 Hz to my TV or at least G-Sync/VRR since my TV supports it (C9 OLED). In general the Steam Link app works much better than the Gamestream app for controller support and compatibility on the few games I've tried lately, but even then it's spotty sometimes and I couldn't get a couple games to respond to my controller once it launched and some games would just launch and not display anything at all with the "connection lost" icon displayed while I can still hear the game menu audio through the TV somehow and it playing just fine on my PC's monitor.



Indeed, but since the PS4 Pro/Xbone X consoles, it's also becoming pretty common for games to support both resolution and performance modes, which usually only entail a resolution difference with little IQ setting differences otherwise in order to meet both 30/60 FPS targets. I think this is the best way to approach this for devs and hope it becomes standard in this next generation of consoles. I also hope now that the current gen consoles support VRR (though the PS5 has yet to be updated with it - its hardware supports it), they start utilizing that more to squeeze better IQ out of games while not being completely locked to a 60/120Hz target. It seems that 60 FPS is becoming the standard now though with many previous gen titles being updated for 60 FPS support via BC support on the new consoles too, which is a good sign IMO.

I've never had this problem but it might be because the computer and the shield tv are on the same switch. I've never tried it on the downstairs TV's that are on a different segment. I've had lots of problems with Steamlink but the gamestream has been reliable. Before it I used a 15' long HDMI cable to a beefier system on the other side of the wall. I do share your sentiment regarding the resolution and framerate, to defeat that I still use the long HDMI cable though that has been a royal pain in the ass to get all the gbps on a long hdmi cable. 3 meter displayport is a lot easier. I don't usually bother due to the distance between my mk. 1 eyeballs and the screen 1080p looks fine. The times I do use the cable it's for better sound, the other end plugs into a nice AVR and RBH/rythmik setup. Gamestream does multichannel pretty well but it's not as good as Kodi on the Shield for movies and for music I think the hdmi to the gpu works better than gamestream's streaming of the desktop. That doesn't even need all the gbps.

I've had similar issues with streaming honestly. It's just not 'seamless.' It either has issues starting, stutter, framerate/resolution problems (especially as HDR is added to the mix), crashes, etc.

I have on the other side of an interior wall and a 16' HDMI 2.1 for my downstairs theater/gaming system. But sometimes I want to play in the living room. I already have a hole drilled from downstairs to the living room wall, I'm probably just going to run long fiber optic HDMI cable. I've had good luck in the past with these. The only problem I now have is my 3090 only has 1 HDMI port which sucks as my 1080 ti has 2.

Honestly, I think wired is always going to be the way to go and fiber optic seems to be a huge game changer. It's even possible to just run the thin fiber optic cable and then crimp it to your liking with ethernet, coax, hdmi, etc all on the same cable.

 

[wizzi01]

Why, how much a ps5 will cost you? An arm and a leg? It's pointless to even compare. Nobody in their right mind should pay the current price for any GPU. Thankfully gaming is a want, not a need, so just wait until things get back to normal.

Uh, I can get a ps 5 for msrp if I want to. Tell me where you can buy a brand new 1060 6gb at right now?

 

[DukenukemX]

I don't want to have to wrestle a desktop OS, or break out a mouse and keyboard.

DS4Windows actually allows you to use the dualshock 4 touchpad as a mouse. So you can continue to use a dualshock 4 without needing to break out the mouse.

Oh, that's almost certainly how it went down. Microsoft did have a point when it said Live Gold prices hadn't changed for several years or more in many places, but this felt too much like a "please switch to Game Pass Ultimate" push than anything.

PC users haven't paid jack forever and that will continue forever. Getting silly when the excuse to increase prices is inflation.

And it already sounds like Microsoft is in a pickle with Bethesda, since it can't do what it wants (make all Bethesda games Xbox/Windows exclusive) without angering a lot of gamers. It has to either cherry-pick exclusives or accept that it'll be writing games for Sony and Nintendo consoles.

Bethesda and other Zenimax studios will have a problem since the Playstation is a very large market. Xbox is not a very large market and selling their games exclusive to Xbox will hurt their sales. Windows is just as big as Playstation but it doesn't help that you could be losing something like 40% of your sales. This is why I see some studios either breaking away from Microsoft or key developers leaving Zenimax. Sony has this problem too but since Playstation has good market share, they're not as bothered by it. I do expect Sony to release more Playstation exclusives to PC in time.

I'm saying folks who bought their $1000 system 8 years sgo (Haswell core i5) can continue to use it for gaming for a few more years on a RTX 3050. They will still get 60 fps in current games for the next few years. Core 2 is a 14-year-old tech, you fool!

I don't plan to upgrade my Ryzen CPU for 5 years. Maybe my Vega 56 in 2-3 years from now, but it could be longer considering how overpriced GPU's are right now. Depends if Ray-Tracing is required or not for future titles.

 

[M76]

Uh, I can get a ps 5 for msrp if I want to. Tell me where you can buy a brand new 1060 6gb at right now?

UH, no you can't. Last I checked they said maybe springtime. You can reserve one, and pray for good luck and favorable wind.

Unfortunately, due to global unavailability at this time, the exact date the product will be in stock is unknown. All orders are fulfilled gradually according to availability date

So I can toss my money at them now if I want to, I don't get a PS5 until who knows.

I can get a 1660 tho. which is better than a 1060, not that I'd pay the insane price of $600 for it.

 

[wizzi01]

UH, no you can't. Last I checked they said maybe springtime. You can reserve one, and pray for good luck and favorable wind.


So I can toss my money at them now if I want to, I don't get a PS5 until who knows.

I can get a 1660 tho. which is better than a 1060, not that I'd pay the insane price of $600 for it.

I am glad you know the same people I do, and what I can or cannot get at this time.

 

[M76]

I am glad you know the same people I do, and what I can or cannot get at this time.

What, who are you? A model citizen? I thought we were generally speaking. If you know a person that can get you personally a PS5 at MSRP, well lucky you I guess. It doesn't help the rest of the world, including me.

 

[wizzi01]

What, who are you? A model citizen? I thought we were generally speaking. If you know a person that can get you personally a PS5 at MSRP, well lucky you I guess. It doesn't help the rest of the world, including me.

Like you need a person to buy a 1060 6gb, but go ahead and move the goal posts again to something else.

 

[Wade88]

Like you need a person to buy a 1060 6gb, but go ahead and move the goal posts again to something else.

Show us where we can buy PS5 for $499.99 today and M76 might concede. Until then, Good Luck lol.

 

[Deleted member 89018]

And you have to buy three different consoles in that same 12-year period, if you're chasing the same performance metric:

you don’t though. a PS4 from 2013 is still playing new PS4 games.

likewise for my argument, you don’t have to upgrade your PC at all in the same timeframe.

you are talking about chasing performance by upgrading and I am talking about better value for your dollar - and specifically NOT upgrading. Those are two different conversations.

(I don’t know that anyone is playing games on a 7-year old $400 PC to compare performance, but I also don’t know anyone who builds a PC for gaming with the cheapest available parts and doesn’t upgrade anything until 7-8 years later).

 

[Red Falcon]

I do, but that doesn't make PCs the best options for living room gaming.

I don't want to have to wrestle a desktop OS, or break out a mouse and keyboard. I also don't want to deal with lag over the network, or chain myself to running Windows on at least one computer in the home. Sorry, honey, we can't play Jackbox just yet, we need to sort out a graphics driver glitch.

You see what I'm getting at? The PC-over-all types here are convinced that only raw performance matters, but this just isn't true. Living room gaming is supposed to be a retreat from complexity, not a painful reminder of it; it's the thing you do when you just want to crash after work or curl up with your partner. And let's not forget kids — do you really want to make them deal with PC eccentricities on the couch?

Now, if you're willing to use Windows in the living room and have an understanding family, more power to you. But I'd really rather just play games and cuddle with my fiancée than worry about Destiny's frame rate.

As much as PC gaming is awesome, I do agree 100% with the point you are trying to make.
Not saying the consoles don't have issues as well, but normally they are very minimal (rare crashes, verification of game files, etc.), and only require basic end-user knowledge to run and operate.

Just sit down, power the console on, and starting gaming/streaming within a minute - at the end of a hard day of work, that is what many individuals want.
For the rest of us who enjoy the means to the end as well as the end, there is PC gaming.


Also, damn casuals!

 

[chithanh]

It seems that 60 FPS is becoming the standard now though with many previous gen titles being updated for 60 FPS support via BC support on the new consoles too, which is a good sign IMO.

There was an interesting interview from Eurogamer with 4A (who made the Metro series) following PS4 and XB1 launch where this was discussed. Basically, at the start of a console generation and with ports of last-generation titles, there is enough processing power for 60 fps. But as game designers start to load the GPU more heavily, games will more frequently target 30 fps.

Digital Foundry: Surely the easier path would have been to lock at 1080p30 and concentrate on integrating as many high-end rendering features as possible. Why target 60fps over 30fps?

Oles Shishkovstov: Because we can! Actually for the next unannounced project, the designers want more and more of everything (as usual) and quite possibly we will target 30fps.

Look, we shipped a rock-solid 60fps game with the quality right in the middle between the high and very high preset of the PC version. Let's discard around 30 per cent of frame-time for post-processing (as this is basically a constant cost) - so we are at around 11ms for the stuff on screen. Now just imagine if we do target 30fps, that would enable around 2.5 times better, richer visuals.

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/...its-really-like-to-make-a-multi-platform-game

So I think there are two likely scenarios, either we stay with 30 fps / 60 fps options indefinitely, or 60 fps options will go away and 30 fps becoming the standard once again. But 60 fps becoming the standard, probably not.

 

[cybereality]

Developers always want to push the graphics, and if consumer are okay with 30fps, then that is what they will do.

However, with this new gen of consoles talking about 120fps, I could see the continuation of performance/quality mode and I think that is a good compromise.

 

[T4rd]

There was an interesting interview from Eurogamer with 4A (who made the Metro series) following PS4 and XB1 launch where this was discussed. Basically, at the start of a console generation and with ports of last-generation titles, there is enough processing power for 60 fps. But as game designers start to load the GPU more heavily, games will more frequently target 30 fps.

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/...its-really-like-to-make-a-multi-platform-game

So I think there are two likely scenarios, either we stay with 30 fps / 60 fps options indefinitely, or 60 fps options will go away and 30 fps becoming the standard once again. But 60 fps becoming the standard, probably not.

Well another new factor here is 120hz support for the new consoles, which we're already seeing as well in a few titles. So it seems more logical to me that 60 will at least be more standard now with the new consoles as a nice balanced target for new games on them.

Honestly, I don't see most AAA games at least not giving the option given the current trend either.

But also, I'm not buying that those Jaguar cores could even support 60fps in many games, as they continually showed they were the largest bottleneck in the Pro/X consoles as newer titles came out with unlocked framerates even at lower resolutions like 1080p.

 

[vegeta535]

120hz support in console are pretty pointless. Most people don't even have 120hz capable TVs. TVs are a market when to the general population size is king. Price is 2nd. I know so many people that still use 1080p TVs from 5+ years ago and do t plan on upgrading til they die. Parents also buy their kids the cheapest bargain bin TVs. Like my nieces still have 720p TVs from 10 years ago.

 

[Templar_X]

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.

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.

I think DF detailed pretty well what they were able to match and what not, found it more than decent enough for comparison.
GN used different fps measuring technique for each system (despite their address it might skew the values in either direction). They also chose 2 older games not designed for this generation, and all were tested at 120fps. Which meant a small sample of early games for this new generation.
Still, it's an interesting data point but it's a gigantic leap to say the consoles are equivalent to a 1060. (we know for a fact they aren't)

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. Though Gamers Nexus did show that the PS5 has horrible frame time issues compared to PC. Games like to stutter a lot on PS5.

2070 is ~15% faster than a 1080 (link is for 2070S review but you can see the data for the 2070)
2060S is ~35% faster than a 1070
RTX models were used by the reviewer because they fitted better the targeted performance and the consoles are capable of RT so it's an appropriate comparison.

Though Gamers Nexus did show that the PS5 has horrible frame time issues compared to PC. Games like to stutter a lot on PS5.

Some earlier releases seemed to have some stutter, newer releases and patches appear to have that ironed out. I wouldn't expect it to be a problem in either console going forward, we'll see.

This is becoming too much off-topic so I won't comment further about this PC vs console stuff on this thread. I'll just summarize that while GN tests are interesting, it's a small sample of mostly older games. Including more games with more modes (especially newer games) should give a better view of what level of experience the consoles will deliver. Looking at the hardware they pack and how newer games perform it seems like they bring good value at their $400~500 asking price.
Some people will always prefer PC while others will appreciate the accessibility and ease of use of the consoles, that's fine, having choices is good.

 

[cybereality]

Not sure why this is always a big debate. This is [H]ard. You can build the best PC *and* also buy all the consoles you want. That's how I roll.

 

[wizzi01]

Show us where we can buy PS5 for $499.99 today and M76 might concede. Until then, Good Luck lol.

It's from a personal friend, so you won't get the proof you want. Also, I don't care whether he concedes or not. I don't need him for validation.

 

[Red Falcon]

It's from a personal friend, so you won't get the proof you want.

Maybe you should stop acting like it is so easy for the average person out there to obtain a PS5 at MSRP when it is obvious that only you are able to get one at that price.
That is hardly the norm, or common, so please give it a rest.

 

[wizzi01]

Maybe you should stop acting like it is so easy for the average person out there to obtain a PS5 at MSRP when it is obvious that only you are able to get one at that price.
That is hardly the norm, or common, so please give it a rest.

Well, it is if you are patient. Also, I said I can get one if I wanted not people can if they wanted. I know reading is hard, but please keep up.

 

[Red Falcon]

Well, it is if you are patient. Also, I said I can get one if I wanted not people can if they wanted. I know reading is hard, but please keep up.

Your posts in this thread are border-line trolling, and aren't confirming anything nor helping anything other than your ego.
For saying you don't need validation, you sure are doing a lot of validation-posting and ego stroking.