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EDGE 252 - Reviews + stuff [LEGO City, Luigi's Mansion etc]

RAM speed or whether or not memory is unified is completely irrelevant, the mass storage device is and will always be the bottleneck. Faster RAM makes zero difference here. And the PC really has no place in this equation to begin with, as most PC games are just console ports and were therefore designed for systems with much less memory and much slower drives.

It's possible to hide load times or reduce them by streaming the data properly, but I don't think that's Telltale's area of expertise.
First, im aware of the bolded. Just mentioned the bigger RAM pool and faster memory will improve some situations like for example transitioning from one level to another. But let's stay focused here.

Your reply doesn't disqualify what i said. Many PC games, even ported ones, have bigger memory requirements than console games of this gen and the Wii U, yet in PC when installed even on slower mechanical drives load times are tolerable.

Wii U not having a mass storage solution from the box and Nintendo not providing an speedy interface when in pressence of one is an important issue not many people took the time to consider. The other platforms will have the benefit of mass storage devices so installation will be possible and load times, even with the massive memory, will fare better than on the Wii U. So i don't think is sound to generalise this will be a widespread problem for the other platforms also due to the increased RAM pools. That's the point im contending, and proceed to give the example of how PC instalations help to mitigate the problem.

Don't know how we can be arguing about facts that are clear and experienced by many gamers already wsippel.
 

.la1n

Member
Why is a 7 considered a bad score for Rising? Seems like a great score coming from EDGE. It's a great game with the flawed action game camera rearing it's ugly head. I think it's more about what the reviews contain and less about knee jerk reactions to a number.
 
At least give a warning when you post something from this shitty gimmick channel. I just managed to forget this poor attempt at a review series, which has me really doubting they've got an actual review copy.
It doesn't take a genius to figure that one out. All of their footage is stolen from elsewhere, and they only have a whopping 268 subscribers, which is even fewer than me; I don't upload any videos. I'd be disgusted if Nintendo actually sent these clowns a review copy.
 
Posted in the Undercover OT but will repeat here as I didn't realise this thread existed...
Edge review of Undercover is a bit odd. I think if you enjoyed Lego games previously you'll probably like it (unless your liking came down to the attached licence of said game)
Some review quotes:


The tragedy of the denizens of this Lego city is their complete and utter conviction that their sole rasion d'etre is to endlessly rehearse police movie cliches - Doughnuts, grumpy captains, a maverick hero and a sassy deskbound dispatcher. They're all here living in a city built to be a child-friendly pastiche of films most children are unlikely to have ever seen.


Often witty, Undercover constantly strains to be wittier as part of a doomed attempt to make up for the fundamental blandness of its world.

On vehicle handling:

These trucks and cars behave like, well, pieces of plastic when other vehicles smash into them - unpredictably tipping over or getting wedged between bollards

On technical issues:

Both interior and exterior sections suffer from performance issues, with slowdown and pop-in proving to be particularly frequent annoyances. These problems don't ruin Undercover but after a series of lacklustre Wii U ports, it's disappointing that the first of the systems major exclusives in 2013 runs anything less than smoothly.

In summary:
A number of Undercovers flaws won't matter to its target audience - kids.....However, for adults it is a less inviting prospect, even with its satirical undertone. It's a plastic facsimile of GTA - a game that was hardly humourless in the first place and one that has already spawned a genres worth of more sophisticated rivals and clones.

No mention of long loading times in the review...
 

pswii60

Member
Yeah, I can tell you what's wrong: Too much RAM.

More specifically, it's about the relationship between mass storage speed and memory capacity. The Wii U has a a pretty fast optical drive at 22.5MB/s, but reading 1GB still takes 45 seconds in an ideal case (sequential read). Optical drives don't get much faster, as the disks start to vibrate heavily at higher RPM, so you're free to imagine how ridiculous load times will be on systems with 8GB RAM. Unless pretty much every game needs to install first - which will most likely be the case. And load times even for installed games will probably still be horrible if not hidden properly, as even hard drives aren't that fast. A WD Scorpio Black reads at 122MB/s, so it takes more than a minute to read 8GB.

I thought a lot of the game data - be it textures, audio or otherwise - is stored in compressed formats on the disc, but takes up much more actual physical RAM when it is decompressed in game. So, that 8 GB will get filled up quicker than the optical drive transfer rate.
 

AgentP

Thinks mods influence posters politics. Promoted to QAnon Editor.
Yeah, I can tell you what's wrong: Too much RAM.

More specifically, it's about the relationship between mass storage speed and memory capacity. The Wii U has a a pretty fast optical drive at 22.5MB/s, but reading 1GB still takes 45 seconds in an ideal case (sequential read). Optical drives don't get much faster, as the disks start to vibrate heavily at higher RPM, so you're free to imagine how ridiculous load times will be on systems with 8GB RAM. Unless pretty much every game needs to install first - which will most likely be the case. And load times even for installed games will probably still be horrible if not hidden properly, as even hard drives aren't that fast. A WD Scorpio Black reads at 122MB/s, so it takes more than a minute to read 8GB.

No game is going to load 8GB before you get into the game. Load times will be bad, but not worst case.
 
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