Playstation 5: Thread 01

[briareos_kerensky]

Tech wise, the PS5 is going to use PCIE4 and an NVME drive, both are available for PC, and probably faster drives will become available as PCIE4 starts becoming mainstream; what will be interesting to know is how both Sony and MS are managing the drive's FAT, maybe Sony are using something something akin to what Apple are doing with the FAT on their devices.

LOD is not just loading, it's also available CPU and GPU resources; everything might be already in memory but the hardware is too busy processing something else. No matter how amazing the underlying hardware or engine used is, we'll still see LOD pop-ups, maybe not much as before, or at least they'll be masked by fade-ins.

Raytracing is possible right now on any device, but it's computationally intensive. The nVidia's RTX series has hardware capabilities for that, think when they created the first GeForce with hardware T&L. However raytracing is still expensive resource-wise, just take a look at the Quake 2 RTX demo and you'll see that even top-of-the line computers are struggling to get 4K60 with raytracing on with a 2080.

[nonny]

Careful, you might upset people.

I don't think that will upset anyone, it's pure fact looking at the numbers. That isn't to say the XSX SSD isn't good going by conventional numbers but it's clear the PS5 is different for a specific reason.

I'm keen to see what happens here as it's the one clear difference in delivery between the consoles. The XSX is like a beefy standard PC spec and the PS5 is more custom around this IO approach even if the other architecture is similar.

I've a feeling while the approaches as different the actual % difference in usable "power" is much closer. If the XSX is more powerful on paper reality is these two are closely matched and it might only equate to 10% +/- in finished games. Then of course you've got 3rd party titles which need to work across the platforms which may or may not lean towards one architecture than the other... You might argue with PC in the frame the XSX is better placed because it's similar, but who really knows until we have real world games for places like digital foundry to paw over.

It's a given first party titles, on either platform are the ones to excel on either platform.

So yes that SSD is better, fact... So let's see what they do with it.

[Cassius_Smoke]

As a developer for Xbox you'll be faced with a few choices.
1: you utilise the Xbox hardware to its full, knowing you will be unlikely to port it to pc.
2: you use traditional programming techniques (LODs and HDD scanning) to ensure it works on PCs of any build and the Xbox, but you'll be limiting development options.

[CMcK]

Developers are already used to scaling games to suit the wide range of PCs out there so this is nothing new.

[Brad]

Developers are already used to scaling games to suit the wide range of PCs out there so this is nothing new.

But it is new. Some old limitations are potentially gone, which might be expand what is possible in the future.

[Neon Ignition]

Really then there's only one option for developers on Xbox - use traditional programming techniques. Literally not a single developer including the ones at Microsoft are going to develop with the sole intention of maxing XSX out and not porting to PC or more so that would mean to an extent the system will forever be hobbled. Not that it matters as we'll get the Series X2 in three years and brute force through old issues.

[Cassius_Smoke]

This is all theorising of course, but let's say that PS5 exclusives don't have multiple assets and LODs but Xbox exclusives do because of PCs. Won't that mean Xbox Exclusives will be a magnitude of GB larger to download.
This image is an explanation of Spiderman with and without multiple assets.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EZp-FBLWsAEOaj3?format=jpg&name=small

[Brad]

It will mean exactly that, but that’s true for Xbox as well. If I understand correctly the duplicate assets were a trick to reduce load time on, first Optical discs and latterly mechanical hard drives. So, I would expect file sizes to be smaller for both platforms.

On top of that the ps5 pipeline and controlling software is able to ask the ssd for something critical whilst it’s in the middle of doing something else. An example would be the game engine preloading an area the character is about to go into, when the character suddenly does a 180 and they need the assets for what’s behind them. I would imagine this is useful for VR where the direction a character is moving in and the directions they look in are not so closely linked; I know that I’m constantly looking around me whilst moving in VR games, both wipeout and Skyrim for example so so it’s a very general requirement. I think!

[Cassius_Smoke]

It will mean exactly that, but that’s true for Xbox as well. If I understand correctly the duplicate assets were a trick to reduce load time on, first Optical discs and latterly mechanical hard drives. So, I would expect file sizes to be smaller for both platforms.

On top of that the ps5 pipeline and controlling software is able to ask the ssd for something critical whilst it’s in the middle of doing something else. An example would be the game engine preloading an area the character is about to go into, when the character suddenly does a 180 and they need the assets for what’s behind them. I would imagine this is useful for VR where the direction a character is moving in and the directions they look in are not so closely linked; I know that I’m constantly looking around me whilst moving in VR games, both wipeout and Skyrim for example so so it’s a very general requirement. I think!

That's just it though, xbox developers can't make a game with a SSD as a requirement if not all PCs have one. Meaning they'll have to continue to have multiple assets surely?

[Family Fry]

I suppose ultimately it’s easier to say to PC owners, here are the minimum specs and you now REQUIRE an SSD drive.
They’ll just get on overclockers and order one to play games, they love that stuff.

[CMcK]

That's just it though, xbox developers can't make a game with a SSD as a requirement if not all PCs have one. Meaning they'll have to continue to have multiple assets surely?

Xbox One has things like hardware decompression for assets and the Shape audio hardware not available on PCs and yet developers still managed to port games to computers. It would be strange to cripple the console versions of a game to accommodate low end PC gamer sales.

[Neon Ignition]

That's the kink in MS's plan for now though. Until they are willing to abandon a sizeable chunk of the PC market, the entire Xbox One market and any other platform or device they hope to get Game Pass released on that won't be dependent on xCloud as the delivery method it means that Microsoft can't actually utilise the full Series X power and given the low end figures Xbox currently commands as a userbase it likely means that going all out on Series X is the worst thing they could do for their business.

The kind of top end graphical showcases Sony pushes out aren't really MS's forte though. I can't recall the last game MS released that truly, truly caned their consoles graphical abilities though so I guess it won't be too much of a concern (maybe Halo 4 on 360?)

[Cassius_Smoke]

It does seem like MS has backed themselves in to a corner. jack of all trades master of none. They have built a super powerful PC console, but tied themselves down with having to provide the same game to Xbone and PCs. Even if they tell pc owners to buy a SSD for the new games, it will cut out some of the pc userbase who can't or don't want to upgrade. And for those who do, why buy the seriesX?
It seems to me that MS have just looked at the new console as another graphical upgrade rather then an opportunity to move gaming forward. Who knows at this point if the PS5 will make a change to game design, but it feels like they've tried.

[fishbowlhead]

We’re probably going to see a sizeable gap between Sony 1st party and everyone else for the time being (graphics wise), few years and either dedicated hardware to do the same job will creep into pc’s and eventually the next xbox Iteration as well.

Or maybe not for the next Xbox console ss it would surely require a complete redesign on their architecture and dev tools.

[CMcK]

Why would Microsoft design the Series X to massively reduce the biggest bottlenecks in consoles and then not use those features because a few PC gamers are still using hard drives?