Fallout 4 - Not on Xbox 360 and PS3

Well, the thing is that if the majority of PC's have 2 GB memory for example developer will focus on that. They might add a high-res texture pack or some such as extra for the higher end. But the overall engine design and optimization will still be done for the "majority" PC. You cannot compare GTA V or W3 with a highend PC, if you compare the PS4 version with a median PC owners setting, they don't fall far from each other, I'd say the PS4 might even come out ahead.
 
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GothicGothicness said:
Well, the thing is that if the majority of PC's have 2 GB memory for example developer will focus on that. They might add a high-res texture pack or some such as extra for the higher end. But the overall engine design and optimization will still be done for the "majority" PC. You cannot compare GTA V or W3 with a highend PC, if you compare the PS4 version with a median PC owners setting, they don't fall far from each other, I'd say the PS4 might even come out ahead.
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That's just not true at all. They'll focus on consoles as they always do, and they'll simply reduce asset quality for low-end PCs - which is easy to do.

As for PS4 vs median PC - that's not what I'm talking about.

I'm talking about the potential of PC hardware - and how it's not being used at all because of consoles limitations.

Look at something like Star Citizen - and you'll understand why consoles could never get close to such a game at the intended settings. They simply don't have the CPU or GPU power necessary.
 
And Star Citizen can only be developed because of some idealistic core gamers who invest thousands of dollars. It's not Chris Roberts' own money that he is gambling with. It's a tremendous effort, but also a highly particular case. Also there is no proof that Chris Roberts vision works and that he isn't suffering from megalomania. It still has to proof that it is actually fun.
 
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Avantenor said:
And Star Citizen can only be developed because of some idealistic core gamers who invest thousands of dollars. Also there is no proof that Chris Roberts vision works and that he isn't suffering from megalomania. It still has to proof that it is actually fun.
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It's not a proof of fun or profitability - but a proof of what's possible to achieve on PC if you focus on the potential of the hardware.
 
That's not a factor for business decisions.
 
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Avantenor said:
That's not a factor for business decisions.
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If only business decisions was the topic at hand.

But if you think raising 85 million dollars (so far) from crowdfunding means it's bad business to focus on PC hardware, then I guess we see things differently.
 
GothicGothicness said:
Well, the thing is that if the majority of PC's have 2 GB memory for example developer will focus on that. They might add a high-res texture pack or some such as extra for the higher end. But the overall engine design and optimization will still be done for the "majority" PC. You cannot compare GTA V or W3 with a highend PC, if you compare the PS4 version with a median PC owners setting, they don't fall far from each other, I'd say the PS4 might even come out ahead.
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You don't think the average PC only having 2 GB vram has anything to do with consoles? Consoles set the standard so you don't really need anymore than 2 right now. Now recently we've seen cards with 4,6 and even 12 GB of vram. Strangely it coincides with the ps4 and xbone releases. Coincidence, I think not. Now that consoles, which games are made for can support more demanding games you'll see PC median hardware creep up because it will need to.

IM not sure if you forgot PC history or haven't been gaming long enough to know but low end pc's haven't held back video games. If you remember before virtually every game became cross platform we had video cards releasing every 6 months and upgrade cycles of 6 months to a year if you wanted to play the latest and greatest at max settings.

Think back to when the 3dfx voodoo cards were released. Dev's didn't shun the cards because most PC gamers didn't have them. They embraced them and coded for them, leaving setting for people that didn't have them as well. I remember switching my games between 3dfx on and off and marveling at the change in graphics. What happened as a result people started upgrading because they wanted to play those games.

That's the way it should work. Software pushing hardware and hardware advances allowing software to grow. That's what the PC encourages to happen. When you have consoles with the same hardware for 10 years all you can hope for is optimization improvements. Nothing pushes anything.

That's how consoles hold back gaming. It creates stagnation, there's no software pushing hardware or hardware encouraging software growth until the next console cycle 10 years from now.

So, I think if we didn't have consoles you'd see a very different PC median spec but with long console cycles there's just no need.
 
Although I think consoles are not the culprit in the case of Bethesda's outmoded tech, I generally agree with Sakichop. I think that gaming would advance much more quickly if consoles didn't provide a static limit to target for years on end. The consoles certainly provide an upside, in the form of the much larger market for games, but I think it's hard to deny the downside.

Fairly early on in development, devs set the limits they will work to, and this greatly constrains what can be added to the PC version - spaces are designed around the limitations, and adding a few effects and high res textures doesn't really add that much.
 
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sakichop said:
You don't think the average PC only having 2 GB vram has anything to do with consoles? Consoles set the standard so you don't really need anymore than 2 right now. Now recently we've seen cards with 4,6 and even 12 GB of vram. Strangely it coincides with the ps4 and xbone releases. Coincidence, I think not. Now that consoles, which games are made for can support more demanding games you'll see PC median hardware creep up because it will need to.

IM not sure if you forgot PC history or haven't been gaming long enough to know but low end pc's haven't held back video games. If you remember before virtually every game became cross platform we had video cards releasing every 6 months and upgrade cycles of 6 months to a year if you wanted to play the latest and greatest at max settings.

Think back to when the 3dfx voodoo cards were released. Dev's didn't shun the cards because most PC gamers didn't have them. They embraced them and coded for them, leaving setting for people that didn't have them as well. I remember switching my games between 3dfx on and off and marveling at the change in graphics. What happened as a result people started upgrading because they wanted to play those games.

That's the way it should work. Software pushing hardware and hardware advances allowing software to grow. That's what the PC encourages to happen. When you have consoles with the same hardware for 10 years all you can hope for is optimization improvements. Nothing pushes anything.

That's how consoles hold back gaming. It creates stagnation, there's no software pushing hardware or hardware encouraging software growth until the next console cycle 10 years from now.

So, I think if we didn't have consoles you'd see a very different PC median spec but with long console cycles there's just no need.
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O, I totally agree with you that the previous-gen consoles have been holding back PC specs, and I totally agree with you that this gen of consoles will do the same.

I am sure that if we did not have consoles PC's would be so much more powerful today than they are now. What I was talking about now is that the current PC cycle has not yet moved beyond the current-gen consoles for the median user. I predict it'll happen by the end of this year or such though as games finally start requiring more graphics memory now thanks to the new consoles.

Direct X 9 was the standard for like 12 years, it took forever to move to 64-bit and true multi-threading is still not here yet, it is only now that the new consoles were released the 32-bit exe is a thing of the past true multi-threading is around the corner and DX 12 is just about here. If not for consoles we'd probably be on DX 16 right now.

However consoles is now not the only limiting factor of PC specs, phones and PADs and such have also started to effect this, not only do they reduce sales of PC's making it less attractive to developed advanced hardware for those, they steal R&D budget and some software also target that'll it'll run on them.
 
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