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Crackdown 3 uses cloud-based physics processing to enable environmental destruction

Impressive tech demo, they are certainly setting themselves up for a challenge. Can't imagine it being that impressive outside a demo though.
 
TheDarkTriforce said:
This! Microsoft is doing so much for their gamers while Sony is doing nothing besides moneyhatting games, announce games that are 3-4 years away and act like they won E3 2015, don't add bacward compatibility, don't allow EA Access and abandon the PlayStation Vita!
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good...goooood.

Let the salt flow through you, then your transition will be complete

has to be joke post right?....right?

Bam Bam Baklava said:
Is it wrong to want to see the delivered final product in action? That's all I'm saying. People want to use this video as the end all be all "discussion is over!" trophy. But in reality, we're still waiting to experience this cloud power for ourselves.

The naysayers and the believers are both eager to make final conclusions, but in reality, both sides have to wait a long time to see what's really going on.
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That would be the logical thing to do...
 
AndyD said:
That's a very good point. If the buildings collapse but then most "particles" disappear or become fixed, then it's relatively useless from a gameplay perspective. It would be similar to the mass destruction events in Battlefield games where the destruction alters the landscape in a significant way. But I doubt that's the case. This seems to be a more permanent type of available destruction.
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Yep. One of the articles posted in this thread highlighted how every broken wall sticks around after it falls to Earth, and can even be tossed around if your strength is high enough.
 
Hockeymac18 said:
Dave Jones confirms in the 10 minute demo that the damaged/broken pieces persist through the session (so you can jump up on it or break the pieces down further).

Also said here (timestamped video): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFWIpAPvF-Q&feature=youtu.be&t=8m00s
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What about the singleplayer damage? Will it stick around or reset at some point. That's one of the big questions for me. Along with if the multiplayer mode makes any sacrifices in terms of map size, NPC count, etc. Will this be a really substantive mode or just a sort of destruction playground?

This tech seems to be more on pace for the next xbox than this current system in terms of wide usage and scope of usage. Crackdown is the only game I know of that is in development with this level of cloud focus. I assume there will be some more within the next year or two but these systems only have another 4 years in them at most.
 
Trup1aya said:
No, even if you are using cloud computing, if your game includes an online component (like Multiplayer), you're going to pay to rent servers anyway...

So you can either choose a less flexible option like rackspace, or you can choose an On demand option like Azure..
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No. Because you don't pay for servers once regardless of how you use it, compute servers don't work like that. It's not a case of "hey I've got a multiplayer game that uses servers I can run anything I want on it".
 
This sounds like loads of fun. It's a shame we've only seen co-op. I'd love to be in a team trying to escape a building while another team nails the crap out of it from the outside.
 
Three said:
No. Because you don't pay for servers once regardless of how you use it, compute servers don't work like that. It's not a case of "hey I've got a multiplayer game that uses servers I can run anything I want on it".
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What the hell are you talking about? If your game is online, in needs servers... Whether your using the servers to host multiplayer matches, or using it for compute, or some combination of both, you still need servers. And that costs $.

Azure is an on demand server service. If an applications requests a server for something, an idle VM responds to the request. You only play for the time VMs are handling your requests

With typical server rentals, you rent a server, and pay for it until your rental is up, whether it's actively being used at all times or not.
 
Trup1aya said:
If we're talking dedicated servers, Most companies rent servers, as its prohibitively expensive to own and maintain server farms all over the world..

With P2P solutions, The servers they own are pretty much just used for authentication, and the game sessions are hosted on one of the players local machines...
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How does that negate my statement?
 
This thread is going to set a record in futility for people not reading the OP, previous comments, or watching the video that has only been posted on just about every page of every Crackdown-or Cloud-related thread in the past two days.
 
It is a nice tech demo, I am a sucker for physics effects. But for now that is all. If they get it to work like this, congratulations!
 
Bam Bam Baklava said:
What about the singleplayer damage? Will it stick around or reset at some point. That's one of the big questions for me. Along with if the multiplayer mode makes any sacrifices in terms of map size, NPC count, etc. Will this be a really substantive mode or just a sort of destruction playground?
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Don't know, but I suspect destruction plays a much smaller role in the single player campaign based on the little that has been said about it. Also, the whole design of orbs/missions probably wouldn't lend itself well to total destruction like this.

Here's a good writeup about Crackdown, and they go into some detail about the single player game:
http://www.windowscentral.com/crackdown-3-multiplayer-game-will-blow-you-and-everything-else-away
The single player game doesn't take anything away from what Crackdown has always set out to be. It's still a 3D platforming game; you can climb any building you can see, and you're still trying to take down the Crime Lords as a member of the Agency. It's skills for kills, so you'll get better the more bad guys you take out, but there's a new gameplay mechanic in action known as the Hate System.
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Bam Bam Baklava said:
This tech seems to be more on pace for the next xbox than this current system in terms of wide usage and scope of usage. Crackdown is the only game I know of that is in development with this level of cloud focus. I assume there will be some more within the next year or two but these systems only have another 4 years in them at most.
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I'm sure it'll be a lot more prevalent by the next generation. The way I'm looking at what MS is doing with this cloud technology is what MS did with Xbox Live on the original Xbox. Or even what Sega did with their online system on the DC. It's an early proof-of-concept thing to make sure that this can work in video games.

I read that it's rumored that other games are working with this tech. And I think one of the main goals of cloudgine's founding was to not just make Crackdown, but expand their engine/tools to any other game that wants to use it - so that would make sense if other games are starting to play with this tech.
 
I'm confused why the article mentions the low bandwidth costs associated with the tech. That was never going to be the problem--the potential issue is latency. With the game rendering at 30fps, your ping to the server has to be below 33ms. That seems a tall order for all players, all the time.

So what happens when the ping goes above the frame time? Does the destruction animation framerate go down (while everything else stays at 30)? Do they cull to attempt reducing the load, so smaller pieces just disappear (for everyone, based on the slowest connected player)? Does the local machine continue trajectories, and then snap chunks into the right place/orientation when the server finally responds?

The technology in an ideal environment is cool. But I think the most interesting open question is whether/how it handles degradation gracefully.
 
Neff said:
I saw it and I'm not convinced that any actions in the demo are based on computations an isolated Xbox One can't make, let alone based on computations being bounced from the console to an outside source, and back again during real-time action gameplay. I'm not doubting the tech's viability to demonstrate additional power within a demo, but I very much doubt the practicality of it during gameplay. Sure, the guy in the video asserts that the tech isn't representative of his game, but the hyperbolic claims being made as to its usefulness in gaming, and the ammunition it's already offering in e-playground console warring isn't something we should devote too much attention to imo.

If you think I'm trolling just because I'm cynical, then I suggest you distance your passions from this subject.
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and thats its a fine responde,this whole "look at the video" thing is gettin ridiculous,i love of console warriors use a video on a controlled setting from microsoft (lets gonna remember all the times microsoft have done similar things in the past) like its the final proof,when the game got released we will talk,until now its normal people ar sceptic




LyleLanley said:
Milo was but Kinect is an actual functioning product.
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yeah.look where is now because it was "functioning" .no,kinect was something who failed a lot to be accurate.not the say the insane amount of bullshit ms did on the fist presentations,i still remember the star wars one

341x.gif
 
Pathfinder said:
I think the big question is why does it matter?

This is a thread about cloud computing and Crackdown 3.

Might want to save the resolution talk for the resolution thread, once we get information on what it will be.
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Resolution difference is subjective, I agree. what I was referring to was the console "Becoming more powerful" because of the cloud compute. It is still the same console hardware wise. The cloud stuff is intriguing, and there is no doubt the Crackdown 3 tech demo was impressive but my post was more about "It's still the same tech in the box" than it was about starting a res war. My guess is that whatever the res/framerate for C3 will end up being, the cloud won't impact that. If I am wrong than that is a win for gamers and more specifically Xbone Owners (Which I will be one soon)
 
RiccochetJ said:
Because the Milo demo was supposed to show the potential of Kinect. It was proven to be complete bullshit.
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Except it wasn't an actual demo that people/the press demoed live on stage to hundreds of people, like this Crackdown demo.

I get why people want to make this comparison, but it is a very shallow comparison.
 
I wonder how the competition would compete, based on price? MS has the benefit of being able to do this at cost, but Sony would have to eat/pass on the mark-up on server rental.
 
Mr. Giggles said:
good...goooood.

Let the salt flow through you, then your transition will be complete
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:)

I imagined Darth Sideous saying those words...

MS is on a roll. If they are confident enough to should this tech demo, I think that they believe that they can pull this off.

I am cautiously optimistic.
 
LyleLanley said:
Milo was but Kinect is an actual functioning product.
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I think the comparison they're trying to make is that the Crackdown 3 demo and the potential of cloud computing is as much as a fabrication as the Milo demo was with Kinect. I don't believe so, but we'll find out next year.
 
Liabe Brave said:
I'm confused why the article mentions the low bandwidth costs associated with the tech. That was never going to be the problem--the potential issue is latency. With the game rendering at 30fps, your ping to the server has to be below 33ms. That seems a tall order for all players, all the time.

So what happens when the ping goes above the frame time? Does the destruction animation framerate go down (while everything else stays at 30)? Do they cull to attempt reducing the load, so smaller pieces just disappear (for everyone, based on the slowest connected player)? Does the local machine continue trajectories, and then snap chunks into the right place/orientation when the server finally responds?

The technology in an ideal environment is cool. But I think the most interesting open question is whether/how it handles degradation gracefully.
Click to expand...

I think the destruction animations runs at lower than 30 hz. That's a good way to hide latency.
 
Thinking about it some more last night, While the technology shown in the video is awesome, it really is, I am curious to see how the gameplay itself turns out. Meaning I am not sure how fun of a game it is if it is just people standing around shooting at shit so it falls. I am curious to see how it is actually implemented into the gameplay itself.
 
RiccochetJ said:
I think the comparison they're trying to make is that the Crackdown 3 demo and the potential of cloud computing is as much as a fabrication as the Milo demo was with Kinect. I think it's different, but we'll find out next year.
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But the Milo demo wasn't even a real demo that people played with/used...this is clearly not the same thing. Other than people wanting to be skeptical of a MS product. Healthy skepticism is fine, and I encourage it - but this comparison is not a good one.
 
Sorry Mr. Jones, I was told it couldn't be done on an average internet connection.
You're telling me it's being optimized for those with DSL?
 
not_so_special said:
yeah.look where is now because it was "functioning" .no,kinect was something who faileda lot to be accurate
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I use mine on an almost daily basis but sure.

RiccochetJ said:
I think the comparison they're trying to make is that the Crackdown 3 demo and the potential of cloud computing is as much as a fabrication as the Milo demo was with Kinect.
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But the Milo demo wasn't nearly as detailed of a technical demo as the 10 minute Crackdown demo. I think the skepticism was warranted when the game was first announced with just a trailer but this seems to be taking it a bit to far.
 
Garrett 2U said:
Sorry Mr. Jones, I was told it couldn't be done on an average internet connection.
You're telling me it's being optimized for those with DSL?
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Didn't Uverse roll out their 1gig speeds across a ton of cities already? Internet speeds are about to blow up across the U.S. Comcast already introduced a 2gig tier, and their 1gig tier is going to be available to most of their customers by next year.
 
Popsickles said:
I cant see how this can make all that much difference a few physics calculations made in the 'cloud'. Surely this is just something that devs could ofload onto the GPGPU cores on ps4 as it has more than Xbox to get a similar or better result as it doesn't require internet. And all that talk of most powerful console do these guys really belive their own spin or is it shear arogance that they think we will.
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Why do people keep trying to push the idea of GPGPU overcoming a CPU?

GPGPU couldn't even match the internal CPU on the PS4, how do you expect it to overcome 20x more powerful CPU that is already more powerful than the PS4 CPU?

If GPGPU was better than a CPU, we wouldn't be using CPUs.

Rain City Gamer said:
I was impressed with the demo and the destruction is amazing, but that doesn't change what the console has under the hood.
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Rain City Gamer said:
Can't wait to level an entire city in 720-900p.

The 100% destructibility is really cool, but the Xbone is still the Xbone
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Someone is really insecure.

Trup1aya said:
Because your suggesting developers and publishers don't rent servers, when they do... All the time..
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They rent servers to run matchmaking and leaderboards, few rent for dedicated gameplay servers and almost none for cloud computations.
 
Chobel said:
I think the destruction animations runs at lower than 30 hz. That's a good way to hide latency.
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It doesn't. No idea why you would think that? if you look up the original videos showing the tech in action that came out last year, you would have a better ideas
 
DirtyLarry said:
Thinking about it some more last night, While the technology shown in the video is awesome, it really is, I am curious to see how the gameplay itself turns out. Meaning I am not sure how fun of a game it is if it is just people standing around shooting at shit so it falls. I am curious to see how it is actually implemented into the gameplay itself.
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I'm assuming it will be a lot like crackdown 1+ falling buildings...
 
FordGTGuy said:
If this were true than it would be more common, it requires control over services to provide a consistent experience globally.
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Huh? Renting cloud infrastructure is extremely common. It's the main reason that these companies invest in building the infrastructure to begin with.

Trup1aya said:
Because your suggesting developers and publishers don't rent servers, when they do... All the time..
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No, I'm suggesting that many of the big 3rd party publishers already have their own servers and use them instead, which they do. If it was more cost effective for EA to utilize Azure, why aren't they doing it?

Edit: And please don't use Titanfall as an example. That was a game partially funded by MS and was used as an example of MS's cloud services.
 
oldergamer said:
It doesn't. No idea why you would think that? if you look up the original videos showing the tech in action that came out last year, you would have a better ideas
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I'm looking at the demos shown at Gamescom, and it doesn't look like the animation of destruction is running at 30hz.
 
arent the 300,000 servers free for a developer who uses the xbox one/windows 10? or something like that?

of course i know they cant use them all at once.
 
Nafai1123 said:
Huh? Renting cloud infrastructure is extremely common. It's the main reason that these companies invest in building the infrastructure to begin with.
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Renting cloud infrastructure to run matchmaking and leaderboards is completely different to renting cloud infrastructure for cloud computing.

Not sure why you think this is the same thing or has similar costs.
 
quickwhips said:
Have they said once this was multiplayer only? I think people are assuming it for pvp and not coop.
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Yes they have said that, but as you say, I think people haven't quite twigged co-op is multiplayer and are assuming it's just deathmatch
 
FordGTGuy said:
They rent servers to run matchmaking and leaderboards, few rent for dedicated gameplay servers and almost none for cloud computations.
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Smh... It doesn't matter how they use the server... A rented server is a rented server is a rented server... If your game is online, servers will be rented... Point blank period. And you'll be paying for that server whether your are maximizing it's utility or not...

THAT'S WHY few dev's even use dedicated servers at all... Because there's too much potential to over/under estimate demand, which adds costs.

An on demand solution ensures that you are only paying for exactly what you need, when you need it... Which make a dedicated option viable... And once you can make a cost argument for dedicated servers, you can make a cost argument for compute...
 
Stiler said:
Yes,
http://www.ign.com/articles/2015/08/06/gamescom-2015-crackdown-3-release-window-announced

"Further clarification stated the 100 percent destruction is only available in online mode, due to the cloud processing required.

Offline mode will have limited destruction."
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I do think part of that might be to maintain consistency with the story/missions/orbs, too. It might be "due to the cloud processing" requirement, but it might also work out that it's naturally better/more interesting for the story if you can't just destroy the entire city.

I'm looking forward to playing both modes, though. And seeing the differences between local destruction vs. cloud-assisted destruction.
 
Trup1aya said:
Smh... It doesn't matter how they use the server... A rented server is a rented server is a rented server... If your game is online, servers will be rented... Point blank period. And you'll be paying for that server whether your are maximizing it's utility or not...
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You'll have to pay for a lot more servers to run this than to run some leaderboards lol.
 
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