Topic: The Nintendo Switch Thread

@rallydefault Well it certainly doesn't help that Sony has yet to announce the PS4 NEO, and I don't think we've had a lot of details on the Scorpio yet either. From what we know, Giant Bomb got their hands on documents that detailed the specifications and other details regarding NEO. It was specified that all games must have a vanilla mode that runs on PS4 and a NEO mode. They're pretty strict about it. There's good reason too, they're not going to screw over their 45 million userbase for an exclusive game that could've easily been released on the vanilla system as well. The regular PS4 won't be replaced either, but will exist as a ''budget'' console, whilst the NEO will be the high-end machine. It only makes sense to support both when you're selling both. Currently, I don't see the problem at all, we're certainly not going to see the ''new 3DS exclusive'' type of deals for the NEO in the first couple of years. If PS4 is their iterative console, and if we're getting a NEO 2.0 in 2019 for example, then it would make sense to move on and forget about the regular PS4. Or at least make games exclusive to the NEO and NEO 2.0. However, for the coming years? I wouldn't worry too much.

@Octane Heheh don't let the site and speculation get to ya. (I am the first to admit I have no idea what I am talking about. I just like to play games Ninty, Sony or MS, Capcom, heck I still like Konami! lol)

I highly doubt Sony will make a NEO 2.0

The next PlayStation after NEO will be PS5, probably coming Holiday 2020.

@parallaxscroll Wowsers that sketch is very sexy.

Ms haven't said that every game will run on the old Xbox. It seems people assumes this will be the case.

And apparently Sony forces every game to be run in 1080p but not forcing a target frame rate. So we will probably see some games stutter on the original ps4. Frame rates are more important than resolution, especially in action games.

why not? What benefits do Sony gain by restarting their install base?

@Therad I'd don't remember where but I'm pretty sure Phil Spencer has actually said about no Scorpio exclusives. He even said that there's no point in owning Scorpio if you don't own a 4K TV.

@Therad According to the head of Xbox Games marketing, there won't be any Scorpio exclusives:

And here's some more on NEO:

Sony isn't forcing anyone to make games in 1080p. The NEO mode already upscales the game from the looks of it and developers may release games running in 4K native, but that isn't required. The framerate should match the vanilla mode, so NEO games cannot sacrifice framerate for graphics.

I think people are looking at it the wrong way. Developers will still develop PS4 games, but are can upscale certain features in NEO mode. It's not as if NEO suddenly has to become the priority, since the game has to be the same on PS4, it makes a lot more sense to develop with the PS4 in mind and upscale where possible for NEO mode. Seems like everyone is expecting every PS4 game after the release of NEO to run like garbage; pretty sure that won't be the case. At least, if they do, they would've ran like garbage anyway, even without the existence of NEO.

@Therad A short term loss will make sense if it gains a long term contract with long term profits. Tegra already has no real customers this fiscal year, so it's a bust anyway. NVidia can lump the short term loss in this year's accounting and realize the profits in the next year. It's all in the accounting. Moreover, there's that additional speculation in that post that fabrication contracts mandate certain order amounts with penalties: NVidia's only choice may be between a loss and a bigger loss.

I can't see how you can say NVidia is "top dog" in graphics when they are shut out of every single current-gen game console. Wii U, PS4, XB1 ... they are not in any of them. They aren't even "middle dog". They are "no dog". Nobody wants them. That's got to hurt them, prestige-wise. In the console gaming world, NVidia is "top dog" in the same way Nintendo is "top dog": in their memories and dreams.

@skywake I don't know anything about their future automotive business, but it really won't help their reputation. Even if you could make every Buick that lumbers by sport an "NVidia Inside" sticker, the relationship to gaming graphics won't be obvious. Think about it this way: even as BlackBerry slid into irrelevance in the smartphone market, they were "top dog" in the automotive OS market. That sure did not do them any good.

@Octane
Yea, I see what you're saying. I own both a PS4 and Xbox One. To be honest, I don't really use them, so it doesn't really mean much coming from me when I say that I'm not going to be buying either of the upgrades.

It just still feels.... kind of weird? For some reason? I don't know, I can't explain it. I don't feel betrayed by them or anything because, like I said, I don't even really use their machines much, but to me it just feels like an awkward mid-cycle thing to do. And to be fair, the New 3DS feels pretty awkward to me, too. I didn't buy one, either.

It's just my feeling, though. And it's probably just a symptom of change if this is what console cycles are going to look like in the future. The first bump will always be the most jarring, but then you get used to it.

I still fail to see the point of the NEO.

@Lzeon Until proven wrong I'm considering the NEO a console designed to improve the PSVR experience.

Like I said, no point

@rallydefault I think it's more a thing of keeping the available systems up-to-date. It's a weird thing though if you think about it; at the end of a generation cycle, we're still playing on 6-year old machines. From a technological perspective, that's pretty old. The good thing is that nobody's forced to upgrade anything. I'm not going to buy a NEO, but if there are people that have 4K TVs and don't mind spending a bit more for a NEO, then that's their choice. I think that most of the NEO adopters will come from people that don't own a PS4 yet. Now you don't have to buy a 3-year old machine, but you have the option to buy the newest iteration instead. Of course, there's VR as well. VR requires to render two screens at once, so VR games can't be as graphically intense as regular games; the extra horsepower of NEO can boost the performance of VR games as well. It's just another option to choose from in the end, I don't see the harm.

@cwong15 You are missing all the other areas that exists outside consoles, such as PC-gaming, graphics processing, workstations, embedded systems etc. Consoles are such a small fraction if you look at technology as a whole.

Amd has razor-thin margins in the console space, because they are dependent on that revenue to even stay in business. In fact, there has been warnings about bankruptcy.

It has been like this for ages, and it hasn't helped AMD that the console market has shrunk from last gen.

If you don't believe me, look at the yearly revenues for both companies. Nvidia has a much more healthy revenue stream.

@octane I stand corrected. 1080p was apparently just for Neo games, the article I first read wasn't clear about that. MS though, I won't trust until I see it. He just says it can technically run on Xbox One. And no part about exclusive content.

We're talking about self driving cars here where there's a lot of image processing involved. Something where you need low powered and reliable parts and where GPUs are particularly efficient. It's not a small market. Also I don't think they particularly care about how it'll impact their "reputation". Nor do I see how partnering with companies like Audi and Tesla is going to hurt them.

BTW, their reputation is pretty solid. If you are someone working in any sort of media field professionally? Odds are you have an NVidia GPU. If you walked into Pixar and grabbed a PC from under one of their desks? It's going to have an NVidia GPU in it. If you walked around the back to their server room? That would also have NVidia GPUs in it. And you'd probably find the same if you walked into other animation studios, film studios, TV networks and even the Universities where they teach this stuff.

And for PCs it's largely the same. You pay a premium for NVidia GPUs because they're made by NVidia. They're a little bit quieter, a little bit cooler and a little bit more reliable. Which you pay a premium for. I have an AMD GPU in my PC because it was better value. No doubt about it, AMD is usually the one with a better value part. But despite that, if you look at the Steam Hardware survey? 18% of gaming PCs have an Intel GPU, 25% have AMD, 57% have NVidia. They need NX to build up their reputation? NVidia are already the kings.

PS4 isn't going to last forever. What you're saying makes sense for this mid-generation upgrade, and developers cannot make Neo-exclusive games, they have to work on the base PS4. But eventually the industry will move on, including Sony.

Andrew House, president and CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment, told the Financial Times that the "high-end" version of the PS4 — rumored to be codenamed "Neo" — would be more expensive than the current $350 model. House added that it was designed to "sit alongside and complement" the standard version of the PS4.

"We will be selling both [versions] through the life cycle," House said.

http://www.polygon.com/2016/6/10/11902000/ps4-neo-confirmed-s...

PS4 has a life cycle. That implies it will eventually have an end, which implies PS4 will eventually be replaced by a next generation console. I don't think Sony will have a PS4 Neo 2.0 meaning "an even higher-end PS4".

At some point the base PS4 will be completely obsolete. Sony will introduce a PS5. Whether that's 2020 or 2021 or 2022, nobody knows, but it will happen. With x86 architecture PS5 will be backward compatible with all PS4 games, but at the same time, it will be a new generation where developers are able to make games that would be impossible on the base PS4 from 2013.

Why would Sony restart their install base? Because developers won't keep making games for PS4 forever once the market is saturated with PS4s and there's no way to get anything more out of the base hardware. That's a long way away but even the mighty PS2 came to an end, after 13 years of production (2000 - 2013), and even though PS3 launched halfway through PS2's run (2006).

@parallaxscroll Sony and Microsoft can say what they want, but I think they both have plans to start having games stop supporting the original XB1/PS4 at some point but continue with the upgraded versions. In 4-5 years, at the latest, I think we will start to see exceptions being made for certain games and those exceptions will continue to expand to the point where no games support the older model. By then, the next hardware versions will be released and they could be called XB2/PS5 but the XB1.5/PS4.5 will still be compatible. It will basically turn into the mobile hardware releases but a bit slower and more impactful.

@DefHalan

That is a reasonable expectation - Exceptions could be made for both Neo and Scorpio where new games only run on the newer iterations. In that sense, PS5/XB2 could be out as early as 2019.

@parallaxscroll You didn't really answer my question, what do they benefit from restarting their install base? The answer is nothing. By only doing incremental upgrades, they get a much more stable revenue stream instead of high fluctuations. An added benefit is for developers, they can be sure their work on a title stays relevant, even if hardware gets upgraded. And customers can start upgrading when it suits their wallet. Some may buy every third, some might buy all iterations. Win-win for everybody. Except people that wants console wars.

It isn't like it is unheard of PCs have been doing it forever and smartphones are even better at it.

And even if Sony hasn't caught on to it you can be sure MS has, especially in light of all their games coming to PC.