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[acm2000]

Yes, one year probably wouldn't have made much a difference. Let me change it to 2 -3 years. What I'm trying to get across is that Microsoft accelerated the start of this generation prematurely and in doing so, compromised the power of both ps3/360.

but sony juped MS into launching early with their bullshit dates, they both played each other at that game, the ps3 wouldn't have changed much if it was delayed even more anyway, but it wouldve at least launched cheaper

 

[Klocker]

you are right, but still the main problem of the ps3 is the under utilization of the CELL, something that would have not changed one year later (it would be even worse, because we would be one year later in the mastering of the CELL). And I'm not sure they would have pushed for a better GPU since Sony was all about the CELL. one year later, CELL yields would have been better, some the 8th SPE would have been ok at least, maybe a second CELL in the wildest dreams.

the GPU is the cause of underutilization with regard to CPU

Cell is being used to help RSX

 

[Haint]

Is NG2 60FPS? I would quantify the (bullshots) visuals as being nice and serviceable, but FAR from any sort of benchmark. Would be a complete and total failure IMO if they only managed 30 in comparison to what they pulled off on Xbox 1. So far this year we got NG2, GTA PS3, and very like MGS4 (see MGO) rockin the sub-HD--pretty much every single major release. It is definitely the new standard no question about it. I wouldn't be surprised if they have dropped the resolution on Resistance 2 and Gears 2 as well.

 

[RobertM]

Here's a better question. With both consoles outputting everything at 720p anyway, how many people on GAF can actually tell if a game is "sub-HD" without a pixel counter TELLING everyone that it is?

Some games I can some I can't. Darkness was one helluva blurry mess and that's one of the first indicators that the game is running below the native resolution of my monitor (yes monitor). GTA4 had the same problem and I was having problems liking the game until I got used to blurriness. CoD4 is one of those games that is hard to tell whether it is running below 720p, but in some levels if you looked in the distance you could see distortions. Whenever I see blurry crap on screen, I have a hard time enjoying the game.

 

[acm2000]

Some games I can some I can't. Darkness was one helluva blurry mess and that's one of the first indicators that the game is running below the native resolution of my monitor (yes monitor). GTA4 had the same problem and I was having problems liking the game until I got used to blurriness. CoD4 is one of those games that is hard to tell whether it is running below 720p, but in some levels if you looked in the distance you could see distortions. Whenever I see blurry crap on screen, I have a hard time enjoying the game.

you mustve hated the ps2

 

[Teen Ape]

I think going forward, one aspect of HD that can drastically alter someone's perceptions of how good a game looks is simply the TV/display that they are playing on.

My brother just bought the 52" Samsung ToC 1080p TV with the 120hz processing, and I shit you not, you have to see it to believe it, but it makes Halo 3 look smoother, with much drastically less noticeable aliasing. We were fricken stunned to say the least.

And he has the TV in his master bedroom, so we're only about 6ft away from the screen and for the love of god that damn Samsung smooths everything out...it is unreal how much better it makes the game look.

 

[H.Cornerstone]

I think going forward, one aspect of HD that can drastically alter someone's perceptions of how good a game looks is simply the TV/display that they are playing on.

My brother just bought the 52" Samsung ToC 1080p TV with the 120hz processing, and I shit you not, you have to see it to believe it, but it makes Halo 3 look smoother, with much drastically less noticeable aliasing. We were fricken stunned to say the least.

And he has the TV in his master bedroom, so we're only about 6ft away from the screen and for the love of god that damn Samsung smooths everything out...it is unreal how much better it makes the game look.

Thats just because the TV has a better response rate, thats why it makes it look smoother


For me, the lack of AA in a game means more to me then Resolution. It's hard for me to tell the resolution of a game, but Boy AA is the first thing I see. Which doesn't make sense, because me 3 year old x800 GTO can run half-life 2 1280x1080 with 4x AA and full detail and what not, and yet still looks better than most games out this gen (save Uncharted and the other heavy hitters).

 

[Agent Icebeezy]

Is NG2 60FPS? I would quantify the (bullshots) visuals as being nice and serviceable, but FAR from any sort of benchmark. Would be a complete and total failure IMO if they only managed 30 in comparison to what they pulled off on Xbox 1. So far this year we got NG2, GTA PS3, and very like MGS4 (see MGO) rockin the sub-HD--pretty much every single major release. It is definitely the new standard no question about it. I wouldn't be surprised if they have dropped the resolution on Resistance 2 and Gears 2 as well.

NG2 is 60fps

 

[Marty Chinn]

The topic is about developers having difficulty getting their titles up to HD resolutions. You want to give Sony a pass even though the CEO of their Entertainment division said that the PS3 would run 32:9 1080p at 120fps in the 4th fucking dimension. And that's not a joke, he actually said that.

The discussion is only relevant because you want to turn this into some kind of "But Sony didn't say" thing, which is clearly bullshit. They did say they would hit 1080p and then some. They said it over and over and over again. And so far, they've come woefully short of the benchmark they set for themselves. Microsoft too.

But it's not like it's any different this time around. The only thing that has changed is that the focus now is on resolution. Console manufacturers have always made these grandiose, ridiculous claims that their hardware was going to be the second coming of Christ in digital form. And they always fail to deliver on their lofty promises.

It is interesting to see what developers are doing to squeeze more out of each piece of hardware, so I'm always interested at what's being rendered natively, but so far as I can tell, the lowered resolutions isn't the clear indication of one consoles superiority over the others some people want it to be.

Also, Blast Processing.

This is just pure crap. You're comparing Microsoft claiming all games would be 720p to Sony saying that the system could hit 1080p. In fact games did on day 1. Sony met their claims. Sony NEVER said that ALL games would be 1080p, just that the system was capable and you would see some. You have. Sony didn't lie in this aspect. You can claim they lied about other things but you can't claim that they said all games would be 1080p because they NEVER did.

 

[Ptaaty]

The worst part about this is that console games in a way have become more PC like in the ways I disliked...comparos of resolutions, hard drive installs, you name it.

I like consoles because they just work.

Interesting how so many people seem to think that any type of delays would have magically cured the rez and AA complaints, particularly blaming MS for putting it out too soon.

News flash...PC cards even a couple years before could handle 720p with AA. The issue is that adding those extra wide busses to shovel the data at a sufficient bandwidth costs $$. Moreso that some internal silicon or xtra transistors to add number crunching and thereby polys and effects. Consoles are all about bang for the buck....and adding the hardware to do high levels of low porformance impact AA just isn't as cost effective. The 360s eDRAM is a bit odd in that it uses extra transistors in a different way. They might have been better off in the long run making the size so that two full 720p frames would fit, but i guess cost was just too high.

Now someone that knows what they are talking about can come in and correct my rant.

 

[OldJadedGamer]

This is just pure crap. You're comparing Microsoft claiming all games would be 720p to Sony saying that the system could hit 1080p. In fact games did on day 1. Sony met their claims. Sony NEVER said that ALL games would be 1080p, just that the system was capable and you would see some. You have. Sony didn't lie in this aspect. You can claim they lied about other things but you can't claim that they said all games would be 1080p because they NEVER did.

Actually... they did:

http://www.us.playstation.com/News/PressReleases/279

To match the accelerating convergence of digital consumer electronics and computer technology, PS3 supports high quality display in resolution of 1080p(*) as standard, which is far superior to 720p/1080i.

 

[BeeDog]

Actually... they did:

http://www.us.playstation.com/News/PressReleases/279

To match the accelerating convergence of digital consumer electronics and computer technology, PS3 supports high quality display in resolution of 1080p(*) as standard, which is far superior to 720p/1080i.

I really think they mean it more like "out of the box".

 

[Pojo]

There is not bottleneck, its just that gamers would rather have more effects than pure 720P that most people can't even distinguish until someone with a framebuffer capture tells them.

More like you can't tell the difference between 480p and 580p.

I think it sucks. So much for standards, yeah? I can live without 1080p, but 720 unified was the goal. Otherwise, we'd have Nintendo's policy of do whatever you want to.

 

[Marty Chinn]

Actually... they did:

http://www.us.playstation.com/News/PressReleases/279

To match the accelerating convergence of digital consumer electronics and computer technology, PS3 supports high quality display in resolution of 1080p(*) as standard, which is far superior to 720p/1080i.

That's not claiming that all games will be 1080p. That's claiming that it's a standard feature of the system because at the time the 360 was incapable of delivering 1080p.

 

[Nif]

More like you can't tell the difference between 480p and 580p.

640x480 vs 1120x585? I'd be surprised if anyone couldn't tell the difference.

 

[PetriP-TNT]

I can't see the difference, but it's fine by me if you want to spend your days counting pixels instead of, you know, playing the game.

 

[Ynos Yrros]

the GPU is the cause of underutilization with regard to CPU

Cell is being used to help RSX

Heavenly Sword runs at 720p, has 4x AA, looks stunning, and doesn't use any sort of rendering on Cell. It's all RSX.

 

[OldJadedGamer]

That's not claiming that all games will be 1080p. That's claiming that it's a standard feature of the system because at the time the 360 was incapable of delivering 1080p.

The should have advertised that the PS2 was 1080i standard then.

 

[duckroll]

The should have advertised that the PS2 was 1080i standard then.

Since when is the PS2 capable of displaying 1080i as a -standard- including the user interface?

 

[krzyspc]

The problem with this discussion is that most users on these boards feel the need to think these consoles are some what comparable to PC, when they suffer huge bottle necks to make a game run anywhere around 1600x1200 plus.

These are just baby computers but to be honest I would have thought because the price alone you would think it would be closer. Hell I built a PC that can kick any console ass for under 600 and could have gone for 500 if I went a bit cheaper on parts, but then again the tech has come along way while console is static.

The only thing I take from this discussion is that HD-consoles have yet to arrive and did little to stop the non HD-console this gen.

 

[Marty Chinn]

The should have advertised that the PS2 was 1080i standard then.

Did we not get 1080p games on day 1? Did we not get several releases at 1080p? Sony met their claims.

 

[a Master Ninja]

I expect 1120x585 to become a new standard on the 360. Games like COD4, Oblivion, PGR3 use 1024x600, but according to the beyond3d guys 1120x585 is the better use of the 10MB EDRAM bottle-neck, using 9.998MB and just leaving 2KB unused. Contrary to what you might think, this 585p has more pixels than COD4's 600p.

I'm not defending this "sub-HD" thing, but it seems like the EDRAM forces developers to do shit like this to make the rest of their visuals "keep up".

 

[OldJadedGamer]

Since when is the PS2 capable of displaying 1080i as a -standard- including the user interface?

I was saying that if they stated it because it's supported out of the box, the PS2 and Xbox should have advertised 1080i since both of them supported it out of the box.

Off the top of my head, I know that GTA3 supported 1080i but would have to research other games that supported it.

 

[duckroll]

The PS1 and Saturn were 3D consoles that didn't really have a good solid delivery of the technology too. Shortly in their lightspan, PCs were already way more advanced in the application of the technology in resolution, effects - both hardware and software, and general rendering power. It's not different now. There's just more internet communication and information sharing now so more people tend to jump on a bandwagon and bitch. The truth is that consoles will always be behind in the tech curve, but will often make up for it in art direction and original ideas, simply because the console market is bigger than the PC one.

I was saying that if they stated it because it's supported out of the box, the PS2 and Xbox should have advertised 1080i since both of them supported it out of the box.

Off the top of my head, I know that GTA3 supported 1080i but would have to research other games that supported it.

The PS2 does not support it out of the box, the games that do use 1080i output do funky things to get it to output that way. It has nothing to do with standard output that the PS2 supports. The PS3 supports 1080p as a standard, natively. You can set it in the display settings.

 

[FightyF]

Because that's a modern console that targets 480p.

No no no no. It wasn't meant to push 480p visuals to be better. You're talking as if 480p visuals hit their peak with the Wii...no no no no no. I can't say "no" enough.

Even if consoles weren't designed with HD in mind, they would have benefitted from PC hardware technology that was pushing shaders, pushing multicore CPUs, pushing processing power that could benefit console gaming. It's been this way since the Atari, despite the consoles being played on 640 by 480 TV sets.

If HDTVs did not exist (which is a pretty pointless assumption to begin with), who's to say MS wouldn't have put out a Xbox1.5 and Sony continue on the PS2. Realistically, I don't see any reason why would invest so heavily in this next-gen otherwise. There was a big jump because HDTVs were getting more popular and they wanted in on that market of people who were willing to spend more money.

That doesn't make any sense, considering that every single new console hardware pushes and adopts the latest technology. To think that MS wouldn't have adopted the latest tech is ridiculous. As I said, some aspects of the new hardware are made with HD in mind, but a large portion of it is a natural evolution of graphics hardware. We saw the importance of multitexturing and shaders on the Xbox, it would have made sense to take that to the next level.

Again, the whole point is that a lot of the processing muscle and power is dedicated to HD visuals. The whole point is to demonstrate the jump in processing power we have seen with these next gen consoles.

Yes, one year probably wouldn't have made much a difference. Let me change it to 2 -3 years. What I'm trying to get across is that Microsoft accelerated the start of this generation prematurely and in doing so, compromised the power of both ps3/360.

I agree. Normally, this is ALWAYS the case that you compromise the power of a machine...but the 360's launch was at a critical time when 1080p sets weren't even available. Though I think it would have been better for all of us if MS waited a bit, I don't think MS regrets their decision...

 

[Agent Icebeezy]

I expect 1120x585 to become a new standard on the 360. Games like COD4, Oblivion, PGR3 use 1024x600, but according to the beyond3d guys 1120x585 is the better use of the 10MB EDRAM bottle-neck, using 9.998MB and just leaving 2KB unused. Contrary to what you might think, this 585p has more pixels than COD4's 600p.

I'm not defending this "sub-HD" thing, but it seems like the EDRAM forces developers to do shit like this to make the rest of their visuals "keep up".

Look at all of UBIs games, 720p and in the case of Splinter Cell it has 4xaa as well.

 

[Marty Chinn]

I was saying that if they stated it because it's supported out of the box, the PS2 and Xbox should have advertised 1080i since both of them supported it out of the box.

Off the top of my head, I know that GTA3 supported 1080i but would have to research other games that supported it.

GTA3 does not support 1080i, and the Xbox did advertise it could do 1080i and 720p as some games did do it too. I think you're a bit mixed up in all this.

 

[a Master Ninja]

Look at all of UBIs games, 720p and in the case of Splinter Cell it has 4xaa as well.

But they aren't 60FPS or "pretty". It's a balancing act.

 

[Randy Lanzarote]

Should have spent extra $$$ on 14mb of edram. Wonder how much that would have costed MS in the long run?

Still, whatever. I'm very happy with the way this generation is progressing with not just the standard increase in visuals, but gameplay as well. Long may it continue, sub-HD and all.

 

[duckroll]

But they aren't 60FPS or "pretty". It's a balancing act.

I dunno, Assassin's Creed is the prettiest next-gen game out now imo. It's not 60fps though.

 

[OldJadedGamer]

GTA3 does not support 1080i, and the Xbox did advertise it could do 1080i and 720p as some games did do it too. I think you're a bit mixed up in all this.

Shit, I added an "A" in GT3 when I shouldn't have. Gran Turismo 4 supported 1080i.





edited cause my brain is fried this morning... I can't type to save my life.

 

[zoukka]

Maybe the next generation will be the HD-one.

 

[Marty Chinn]

Shit, I added an "A" in GT3 when I shouldn't have. Gran Turismo 4 supported 1080i.





edited cause my brain is fried this morning... I can't type to save my life.

GT4 didn't do true 1080i though. It did a weird field rendering method where it really was just 540p. It was more of a trick than offering true 1080i support.

 

[quest]

Should have spent extra $$$ on 14mb of edram. Wonder how much that would have costed MS in the long run?

Still, whatever. I'm very happy with the way this generation is progressing with not just the standard increase in visuals, but gameplay as well. Long may it continue, sub-HD and all.

I would of rather had those transistors spent on things to improve texture filtering. I don't like sub 720p res but I hate the lack of AF in 360 games. I have been spoiled by AF since I bought a 9700pro years ago. If not that maybe another shader array. If not that 256 megs more ram. Resolution of this generation is the last of my complaints.

 

[SapientWolf]

Here's a better question. With both consoles outputting everything at 720p anyway, how many people on GAF can actually tell if a game is "sub-HD" without a pixel counter TELLING everyone that it is?

I can tell if it's sub-HD, but only because I sit about 2 feet away from a 27" monitor, and because I'm so used to playing at 1024x768/w AA. The actual data on AA and resolutions still surprises me. I didn't know The Club had 4xAA and I didn't know the 360 was capable of upscaling all those weird in-between resolutions.

 

[FunnyBunny]

I have a handful of thoughts about this.

First, I think many of these issues are developer based. There are a handful of games out there that are jaw-dropping. It's not that the 360 and PS3 cannot do amazing things. It's just that getting from here to there takes a lot of work and money.

Secondly, I think it is still relatively early in these console's life spans. The 360 has been out for three years, the PS3 for two. We're just now getting a better idea of what "next-gen" will look like.

First generation 360 titles looked like XBox ports, because many were. The second generation (titles like Gears of War) showed more promise. But we are beginning to enter the third generation -- and things look very promising.

Hell, look at early titles in the PS2's lifespan... and compare them to titles late. There are big visual improvements. Developers were learn what to do, it will just take them time. Developing games now is more time consuming and expensive -- which means learning new tricks will likely take more time.

 

[Tobor]

1. Console game developers have used fluctuating resolutions since the dawn of time.

2. The only reason any of you care at all is that MS and Sony have been force feeding gamers resolution as the new **bit/polygon count fanboy bullet point.

3. The rest of us non-videophiles don't give a crap, can't tell the difference, and don't let marketing tell us why a game is great.

 

[Mr. Wonderful]

Sub SD - 512x512(or 448) was common, because difference between 640 and 512 horizontal, is imperceptible on 99% of SDTV displays. Heck it's tough to spot the difference on any CRT displays, including VGA monitors.

That was pretty horrible. It didn't bother me on my HD CRT, but on my LCD, 448p looked like crap, especially now that I've seen 480p from the Wii. It's funny how that stupid difference makes a big difference in scaling.

 

[Slavik81]

It would be nice if they just said 'fuck it, let's do 480p and actually have decent framerates/anti-aliasing'.

I dunno, Assassin's Creed is the prettiest next-gen game out now imo. It's not 60fps though.

It's not even 30. :lol
Sooo much tearing.

 

[WickedLaharl]

all i got out of reading this thread is that somehow msft is solely to blame for sub-hd resolutions on both consoles

After Microsoft made their claims, Ken himself said that the PS3 would be outputting at higher resolutions than the 360. He even said it would produce 32:9 panoramic 1080p gaming if a player was rich enough to afford having two HDTV's setup side by side.

we must of had the same dream where he said this because it apparently didn't happen

 

[Marty Chinn]

all i got out of reading this thread is that somehow msft is solely to blame for sub-hd resolutions on both consoles



we must of had the same dream where he said this because it apparently didn't happen

The difference is, if you had been actually reading the thread, is that Microsoft declared that every game would be a minimum of 720p with 4xMSAA. GUARENTEED.

Sony on the otherhand made no such declaration. The only thing they stated was what the system was capable of. NEVER did they claim every game would be 1080p. Developers have delivered 1080p games to us.

Thus you can't knock Sony on that aspect since they never did anything like Microsoft did on this topic of declaring minimum and guarenteed resolutions and features. If you can point out a quote from Sony where they declared all games would be 1080p, I will gladly admit I was wrong and you were right. So far nobody has been able to supply such a quote.

 

[Vaxadrin]

Lost Planet is the prettiest game this gen.

...and I'm pretty sure it runs at 720p, with a buttery smooth framerate.

 

[burgerdog]

So for Oblivion did they patch they original x360 version to run in 720p? Or do you only get that upgrade if you buy TSI expansion?

 

[WickedLaharl]

:shrug

nobody may have came out and said that the ps3 could do all those things out of the box but they certainty pushed the "1080p true hd" line and backpeddled on it later.

 

[CrunchinJelly]

Sony on the otherhand made no such declaration. The only thing they stated was what the system was capable of. NEVER did they claim every game would be 1080p. Developers have delivered 1080p games to us.

Thus you can't knock Sony on that aspect since they never did anything like Microsoft did on this topic of declaring minimum and guarenteed resolutions and features. If you can point out a quote from Sony where they declared all games would be 1080p, I will gladly admit I was wrong and you were right. So far nobody has been able to supply such a quote.

Uhhh, both companies spreaded as much bullshit as the other.

Whether it was Microsoft guaranteeing every game 720p or Sony boasting how every game would be 120fps at 1080p.

BOTH parties gave consumers unrealistic expectations for this generation.

 

[Slayer-33]

It's all about the GAME ENGINE.


NG 1 ran @ 720P on Xbox fine with it's current effects/enemy number/no dismemberment, NG2 wouldn't be able to do that with the same game engine + more effects + more enemies + dismemberment + more polys per character/stage on X360 and keep 60FPS without sacrificing resolution.


The game engine is to blame and of course the DEV who didn't upgrade it or make a new one.


This was a lazy job by TN and Itagaki. Nonetheless this is not to say that NG2 will not please all of us. It's a wonderful game that wasn't handled as best it could have.

 

[Snowden]

Lost Planet is the prettiest game this gen.

erm

 

[Durante]

Whether it was Microsoft guaranteeing every game 720p or Sony boasting how every game would be 120fps at 1080p.

Except that Sony never claimed that. But maybe I'm just bitter because I actually bought MS' 720p with AA MINIMUM hype.

 

[burgerdog]

It's all about the GAME ENGINE.


NG 1 ran @ 720P on Xbox fine with it's current effects/enemy number/no dismemberment, NG2 wouldn't be able to do that with the same game engine + more effects + more enemies + dismemberment + more polys per character/stage on X360 and keep 60FPS without sacrificing resolution.


The game engine is to blame and of course the DEV who didn't upgrade it or make a new one.


This was a lazy job by TN and Itagaki. Nonetheless this is not to say that NG2 will not please all of us. It's a wonderful game that wasn't handled as best it could have.

NG1 did NOT run at 720p on xbox, it was 480p.

 

[inpHilltr8r]

last gen resolution was lowered to gain memory, not performance.

The trouble with broad generalisations like this (apart from them telling you nothing useful), is that they're usually wrong. We used most of PS2s VRAM as a cache, so changing the size of the back and front buffers had no effect on the amount of memory available to artists, and was entirely about performance.