Is technology not as advancing as much now or am I just a jaded gamer?
gamercraig
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Having now seen both Sony's and MS's new technology presentations I am feeling pretty meh about the next generation.
Having been a gamer since the ZX Spectrum days, I haven't had a WTF moment like when I first fired up an Amiga, SNES, XBox (the original 1 ! ) etc.
Sure they are a bit prettier but I can manage without constant particle sparks just for the sake of it. I just don't see a big jump like before.
Have we almost reached a peak until true photorealism is available?
Having been a gamer since the ZX Spectrum days, I haven't had a WTF moment like when I first fired up an Amiga, SNES, XBox (the original 1 ! ) etc.
Sure they are a bit prettier but I can manage without constant particle sparks just for the sake of it. I just don't see a big jump like before.
Have we almost reached a peak until true photorealism is available?
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I think we are going to be stuck at the kind of graphics we have now, and are about to get on next gen for a long time. The tech has not moved as fast I thought it was going to over the past 6 to 8 years.
Doesn't seem to happen very often. There has been a lot of games that have bugs or rely on over complicated controls.
This is exactly it with Consoles and the step to the so called "next gen" on a console is not big enough to get excited about in terms of technology power and graphics, it's all about fancy gadgets streaming and video messaging.
Everything in gaming terms, with those 3 key elements has all been done before, there is very little original in games we see these days. That's why your jaded, it's nothing to do with graphics.
For those reasons, I think MS new Xbox could offer something different to the bored gamer, it just seems to have more depth to it with Kinect, or at least potentially have more depth, all depends how clever the game makers are.
I'll probably buy a PS4, just to cover all the bases, but it's quite possible an Xbox ONE could grace my gaming room at some stage.
Yeah, graphics really don't NEED to get that much better right now; hopefully devs are coming to realise this. I mean, having a few more scraps of burning paper floating through this air is clever an' all, but I'd rather they put more effort into the gameplay.
Lets not forget most people aren't going to get 4k and then 8k TV's to make the most of the graphics either.
The new consoles are surely going to bring 1080@60fps which doesn't require 4k TVs to start with?
As time goes on, more and more games will be targetting a lower resolution and/or framerate because people will complain if games aren't more impressive 4 years down the line than they were at launch. Ridge Racer 7 was the first ever retail native 1920x1080 game (it also ran at 60fps) back in 2006 but I'm sure everyone would say that the latest Forza, NFS or the upcoming GT6 are more impressive graphically than RR7 and they aren't native 1080p games (NFS:MW is sub-HD).
4K on the PS4/X1 only refers to video in/output not gaming.
4K is only really playable on high end graphics cards, the cards that cost more than these consoles will, then it's limited to less graphically intensive games. I can do 4k on Skyrim, Fallout3/NV and other CPU intensive games, games like Far Cry 3 don't do well at all, they dip below 30fps quite often, that's on a £500 card. I assume 4K will be limited to video as Conroy says.
Gtav will do it but its still limited imagine the possiblitys that GTA6could have it will have probly 3 whole fully detailed citys with huge amounts of detail
Uncharteds style of setpieces push current games to there limit that should be a thing of the past on ps4
Both Microsoft and Sony have gone with pretty modest hardware because the last generation hardware was too expensive for them to make a profit at launch.
There's a lot about this generation that seems "unpalatable", but if everyone's doing it, then Microsoft and Sony (Nintendo to a lesser extent too) don't need to worry about consumer reaction.
I believe the next step is virtual reality, then real life, with no psychical repercussions.
Really don't like how Kinect dependent X1 seems to be, not great for those playing in small rooms. And the used game charge is a backward step too... not much positive coming from this, which is a shame as it could've blown the lacklustre PS4 away with some more thought.
More social media intrusion... whoopiedoo! :mad:
Just hope the XBL price doesn't increase off this, it's expensive as it is now.
^this, to an extent.
We're not seeing the advance in pushed polygons any more, we're seeing it in other areas- multitasking and connectivity, for example.
Just like improvements with TV, VHS to DVD was an improvement in many ways, Blu-ray only improves picture and audio quality not longevity, convenience etc. Or like going from dial-up to broadband much bigger deal (always on, no hogging of phone line) than ever faster speeds.
It's all just diminishing returns. Plus mobile games and facebook games have shown how you don't need to have fancy graphics to have a good time. As Nintendo fans always said - gameplay matters.
For me the decline in gaming is all this social media, casual, waving hands to control games nonesense. This is why I have started getting into indie gaming on the PC - old school flavoured inventive, innovative games that don't rely on graphics or gimmicks.
What the hell does that mean?
From my own tech journey, I don't think anything will ever beat having a Spectrum then seeing the Newtek Demo on the Amiga. 4,096 colours on screen, fantastic synth chip and more. Damn you for going bust Commodore!
Correct answer.
Dear developers
Please stop making our games look unnecessarily pretty at the detriment to just about everything else, focus on the AI and the playability. Next-gen offers enough power to be great looking too!