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Rumor: Ubisoft having some trouble bringing Steep to Switch

I'm gonna go ahead and assume you're not a games programmer, and thus you don't know what you're talking about.

You're missing the important bit of my post you quoted:

I'm gonna go ahead and assume that you didn't actually read my whole post, then, and only responded to the part you felt like responding to. I mean, saying it's "equivalent to calling lazy devs" really shows that you didn't read it, because I wasn't really criticizing them specifically - I was just saying it seems to be an industry-wide thing these days where tailored ports or bespoke versions aren't made for handhelds anymore.

I mean, you pretty much agree with my point right here:

There are plenty of games released on XB1/PS4 which would be impossible to run on the Switch, without paring down the features, graphics and mechanics to a point that game doesn't even resemble the vision of it's creator anymore and certainly isn't fun.

Lol. That's exactly what I'm saying! So it is possible then, despite all your noise to the contrary in the preceding sentences.

I mean, of course the creator's original vision would be lost in the process. You can't tell me you played Dante's Inferno or Need for Speed Carbon: Own the City on PSP and thought "this is exactly what the creator had in mind for this game". But they were tailored to the hardware they were running, for better or for worse, and I was musing on the fact that I kinda miss that this had changed, and I wonder why it had. No need to go on the offensive.

Aside from that, I'm assuming Ubisoft, with all their experience in the games industry, obviously saw no reason in theory it wouldn't run on Switch when they announced it, which is enough for me to go on.

Which is exactly what he was saying, there is nothing about Steep's core design that prevents it being brought to Switch (like requiring VR), it's a matter of how much you scale things down and that was something publishers seemed a lot more willing to do back in the PSP era.

The PSP was hardware between PS1 and PS2 level getting ports of mid-gen 360/PS3 games, they ranged from unrecognisable to providing a fairly authentic experience. Hell, I remember the PSP version of Test Drive Unlimited, despite being obviously pretty cut down visually it was still a full blown open world driving game with all of O'ahu to explore. It'd be interesting to find out what has changed about the industry that makes those sorts of games undesirable now.

Yeah, I think you get what I was trying to say and have probably said it a bit more eloquently. TDU is a good example. Thanks.
 

AmFreak

Member
3-4x drop is the GPU. CPU is more like a 2x drop. PS4/XB1 are heavily CPU bound while Switch is more balanced.
~3x is the difference of available cpu resources (7x 1.6Ghz Jags vs 3x 1Ghz A57).
Console games are bound everywhere, that's the advantage/point of fixed hardware.
 

blu

Wants the largest console games publisher to avoid Nintendo's platforms.
NFS:MW surely is based on the ps2 version.
And there were many "ports" - sport games come to mind e.g.
But what i meant with port here was doing something on console x (w/o caring for console y) and then try to port it to console y (later) e.g. Steep.
If your baseline from the start is console y you obviously won't run into the same problems.
Sorry, I was typing one thing and thinking of something else.

I was referring to NFS:MW on the vita and it being a port of a console game designed for much more capable hw.
 

Fiendcode

Member
~3x is the difference of available cpu resources (7x 1.6Ghz Jags vs 3x 1Ghz A57).
Console games are bound everywhere, that's the advantage/point of fixed hardware.
In raw theoretical spec yes, core for core the Switch A57's are roughly equivalent to 80% of the PS4 Jag cores, but the more cores above 3 you add the more dimishing returns you get with performance traditionally. Also some of the 4th A57 core is available to devs but we don't know how much. Functionally Switch is likely closer to 50% of PS4 in terms of CPU.
 

blu

Wants the largest console games publisher to avoid Nintendo's platforms.
Scientifically proven.
There is no way to make a statement like that.
Actually, that statement is much more precise than comparing the num_cores * clock that's been going around. With an aggregate IPC advantage factor of 1.2x for the A57 over jaguars, the situation is:

4 cores in switch, 7 cores in ps4:
Code:
$ echo "scale=4; 4 * 1.2 / (7 * 1.6)" | bc
.4285

3.5 cores in switch, 6 in ps4:
Code:
$ echo "scale=4; 3.5 * 1.2 / (6 * 1.6)" | bc
.4375

Of course, that assumes parallel workloads scale linearly, which is not exactly the case even for embarrassingly parallel (tm) workloads. So 50% might not be that far from reality.

http://switchbrew.org/index.php?title=SVC#svcGetInfo
 
I always find it weird to observe how western third-party porting and handhelds has changed over the course of even 7 years or so.

Back in the PSP years, it seems like just about anything could get a handheld port which would be either one of two things - either a custom-build game that was more of a spinoff of a home console title but shared the same name; or a cut-down console port.

EA had a good example of each in 2010. Army of Two: The 40th Day on PSP was an isometric shooter as opposed to the third-person shooting of the home console version; whereas Dante's Inferno was simply the console game with a lot of stuff chopped out to get it onto PSP.

It seems that after the PSP, this kinda stuff hasn't been as prevalent any more. The custom-built games seem to have shifted over mobile now; and the cut-down console ports just don't seem to be happening any more. Vita had a few - things like Borderlands; Mortal Kombat; Need for Speed still happened, but rarely (not helped by Vita's sales). It seems like this kinda stuff is gonna be even rarer on Switch.

I suppose in this day and age, with Digital Foundry picking apart any port and comparing it to the home console versions it's going to make consumers even less likely to buy an inferior version. Even though I feel there's still a market for it - certainly I bought these games on PSP: bought them on Vita and will likely continue to buy them on Switch.

There's no reason Steep can't run on this hardware. I bet it'd run on Vita if they tried - it's what developers used to do. Heck, it's what Ubisoft used to look - look at something like Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 on PSP. But for whatever reason (I'm guessing dwindling sales), companies don't want to do this any more, which is a mighty shame.

Oh well. At least Japan still supports handhelds with their home console stuff I guess :p
I love this post because at first I was like "What!? There's a PSP Dantes Inferno!?" And then a bit later I said "What the hell, how is there a GRAW2 on PSP?" - I guess I'm not keeping up with portable releases (despite owning a PSP and a Vita).
 

VeeP

Member
Bumping this up for an update :
https://twitter.com/TW_PhantomLord/status/901373398667997184


Translation : No, it's still in optimization phase. The framerate is unstable so we can't release it in its current state but it isn't cut off [cancelled].

Oh nice. Since it seems like they got Anvil (and Snowdrop) up and running on the Switch, I wonder if we'll see Rainbow Six or a platform exclusive Assassins Creed (Like Unity on PS4/X1 vs Rogue PS3/360.)
 
Great news that it's still being worked on. If it's playable in portable mode and looks the part I'll happily grab it when it's released.

Also worth noting that Ubisoft hasnt said a word on Steep's new DLC since it was revealed at E3. Maybe the Switch version will arrive alongside it.
 

Neith

Banned
I think the idea is that the game is going to look really bad if or when they do port this.

Steep is an amazing title IMHO. And it is only getting better with the new mountain and Olympics in the future. It is everything I wanted out of a new snowboarding title and more.

Steep didn't impress me one bit from the betas that I've played but from what I read the game was improved over time, because of this it's a shame it might not come to the Switch, the console could really use a couple more 'high profile' games.



I could see the first The Crew on Switch, but not the second one.

Steep is an absolutely beautiful experience with a very decent amount of content right now. I never played the beta, but what they have now is easily the best winter sports game I have ever played. Only SSX3 or Tricky comes close. I actually really liked the Wii SSX as well, but Steep is just something else. It's much more realistic and pretty, and of course now you can do a bunch of different sports.

It doesn't do tricks and pizzazz as well as tricky or even SSX3, bit it has a realism that is really cool and different than what I have played before.
 

ozfunghi

Member

Neith

Banned
I was just thinking about this game today. I wonder when they'll finally fix the issues.

Most the issues are fixed. If you want an SSX trick system I doubt that will happen, but a new mountain and Olympics are in its future. It already has a lot of content.
 
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