Topic: The everything Xbox thread

@Zuljaras No, there isn't. That's what I was trying to tell you: 4K textures are NOT required to play. Only updates and/or patches, but that was also the case with the Xbox 360, so that's nothing new.

But I suppose that if you keep the Xbox off the internet, it can't check if a game needs an update, so in that case, it will be the exact same as on the PS4.

@ThanosReXXX That is good to know. I don't want some half-games like the Switch half-cartridges. Discs may not be reliable but at least they provide the installation data as it seems.

@ThanosReXXX Wait, where is this setting to disable 4K textures? I'm not saying you're wrong, but I went to look for it after you said that, and see no such thing. It could be burred somewhere I'm not looking for it, but I went through the settings menus that seemed relevant and saw nothing like that. You can disable auto-updates overall, but I don't see anything for disabling X1 Enhanced updates, and in the "manage game content" panels, 4K content doesn't seem to be separated. It seems, to me, like it's just a different set of patches if it detects an X. (I googled it and found someone saying it was opt-in and isn't on by default, but my Forza games clearly say XBox One X Enhanced on the splash, so I'm pretty sure it's running a 1X version.) Maybe they removed that setting at some point?

@Zuljaras No real warnings on the box. Most boxes say that online might be required etc, but it's not like the banner of shame (Because in PS4/X1 land you just expect it...) I bought my X1X to be digital-only when I got fiber (finally!), but I used to be in your boat, avoiding any download over a few gig.

I can't comment too extensively on specific games on disc for X1 (because I've been buying digital), but I have both OG PS4 and PS4 Pro. From PS experience (likely to be similar with X1) the older the game is, the more likely the game is on the disc. IT seems every year publishers try to push the limits more and more. So launch era games are probably on the disc. Newer games it's probably best to google each one individually to see (reminds me of the PC gaming days of avoiding Starforce copy protected games (it had a nasty habit of frying DVD drives...)

The general rule is: 4K textures for X and updates for Pro will almost never be on-disc (often it doesn't fit.) Some games (For Honor, Battlefield 1, Need for Speed (2015), Gran Turismo: Sport etc, etc) will require online for single player play as well (this is becoming more common.) It's basically the PC copy protection system ported with it. I'm not sure about the Forza games...they go online if you're online but I'm not sure they require it. Updates, if you're skipping 4k/Propatch, some games you can get away without them (and the game will even work!), other games, (EG, Assassin's Creed Unity on PS4 (and X1) was a broken broken mess at launch. 15GB are required to make it even work. Just Cause 3 (PS4) is broken on disc, it will crash at the end of the first tutorial mission without fail. A 7GB patch is needed to fix that. Very few games don't have a day 1 patch anymore. But where Nintendo day 1 patches tend to be 10-400MB, in PS/XB land they tend to include half the data archive to fix things, so even day one patches are usually a few gig.

When I was on limited bandwidth I used my PS4 very selectively for that reason (Switch's mandatory downloads would have broken me as well.)

On X, MCC, Halo 5, have massive downloads (total install size over 100GB on the 1X.) both due to huge multiplayer content and free additional content. I'm not sure if single player is usable without the updates. Quantum Break is out in any form. The video portion was meant to be streamed. Now that the streaming is down it's a download.....the game + video (optional download, but part of the story) is over 200GB! That's by far the largest game install I think has ever existed.)

Edit: But still keeping in mind none of these issues (other than the sheer download size and internet-connection preferences of most XBox 1st party games) are platform specific. A 2K game that requires 40GB of downloads on X1 will require 40GB of downloads on PS4. (1X may or may not require more downloads....we'll see if Thanos can point us to the setting for that!)

@Dezzy I'm surprised it's at 68! Bland, boring and broken would be perfect adjectives. I'm not sure if the game has been ''fixed'', but I doubt that's possible with a handful of patches alone.

@NEStalgia The option is definitely present. I remember a Digital Foundry video comparing XB1/XB1S, XB1X without 4K update and XB1X with 4K update for Halo 5.

@NEStalgia I have contacted Microsoft support and asked them. They clearly stated that ALL disc based games are playable after installation without the need for internet connection. At least for the single player part. The other stuff like online games and multiplayer require such additional downloads.

@ThanosReXXX @Ryu_Niiyama BTW, I found this:
https://www.eventhubs.com/news/2018/jun/08/we-made-conscious-...

“We wanted to make a more cool and mature Dead or Alive this time, and to that end we made a conscious decision to make the characters less sexualized,” said director Shimbori via IGN.

Female characters' breasts will no longer feature the exaggerated 'jiggle physics' or seemingly defy gravity with their bouncing as was becoming somewhat of a staple for the series.

Looks like they might be aiming to make DoA something to be taken more seriously...which is cool, because it's still awesome. Maybe it has a lot in common with Tekken's combat. Maybe Tekken is vastly superior in its combos. But daaang Tekken is fugly. Characters are weirdly blurry. Strangely story mode has really beautiful graphics, while all the arcade and online modes have PS3 looking graphics.

@DarthNocturnal @Zuljaras @NEStalgia This is interesting, I wonder if you guys are thinking of a setting to optionally pre-download 4k assets on an X1/X1S for planning an X1X upgrade with an option not available on the X itself:
https://support.xbox.com/en-US/games/game-setup/download-4k-g...

"Can’t I get 4K updates on my Xbox One X?

If you don’t download ahead of time, your 4K content will arrive in the form of an update the first time you launch an applicable game on Xbox One X. This will be a required update—skipping it will not let you play the non-4K version offline. The update will be required even if you’re not viewing on a 4K TV. On Xbox One X, 4K updates will download automatically if you’ve told your Xbox to “Keep my games & apps up to date” (in Settings > System > Updates > Games & apps).

Some games streamline installations and updates based on your language setting, reducing download time and storage space. In those cases, changing your console language will trigger game updates, which (unlike the 4K update) are optional and can be canceled."

IF that article is still relevant it sounds like 4k downlods are not at all optional on the X1X, meaning if you don't have high end internet, X1X is probably a poor choice (not a coincidence then that my ISP was co-advertising the X1X with their services last year and briefly ran a "3 months of XBLG" promotion. I had to laugh that an ISP would actually be encouraging X1X use.... ) That's also why I made it my digital-only console. Even with discs it's kind of all the problems of digital only anyway.... (X1S would behave a lot more "normal"....as would PS4. PS4 Pro....seems more like normal. There are "enhancement" packages, but not the massive 4k texture packs the 1X has.

@DarthNocturnal Yeah, it's possible "intelligent delivery" may help with that. I interpereted as just a better fast start, downloading things in appropriate chunks to start it up faster before the DL is done, but it would be nice if a side effect of that would be the ability for X players to skip the 4K content. (I wonder if that's possible though? It depends on how the X1X patches are applied and if it would need to be changed at a code level.) But they have a good system for DLC management and such they could use for game chunks. IIRC, Quantum Break uses a version of that system to split the video content into a separate download....so I suppose they could treat the core game like various pieces of DLC. You know..."Capcom emulation mode"....

@DarthNocturnal Their naming is so confusing. I wish they didn't need a FirstPix(TM) trademarkable BrandIdent(TM) with every FeaturPak(TM) they announce.

Ok, so Intelligent Delivery is the chunked games separate from the "machine learning" based fast start thing? It doesn't seem to be in heavy use so far. Out of 130 games on my machine, maybe 3 have content available in chunks, excluding DLC (free, bundled in complete editions, or otherwise.)

@NEStalgia well since mechanics wise they are trying to make it VF light I’ll keep any eye on it lol.

@NEStalgia It seems I was mistakenly assuming that the same options would be available on both the S and the X: like you mentioned, you can choose to auto-download 4K content to an external drive on the S, in preparation for moving it to the X, and that option can also be switched off (Settings -> System -> Backup & Transfer -> Deselect download 4k game content). On the X, however, it is unfortunately NOT optional.

It all sounds very convoluted and dumb, because even if you use an X on a non-4K TV, it STILL needs to download the 4K content regardless, because apparently, it "needs" that, to be able to do the downgrading and super-sampling. They should have just chosen an option for upscaling instead, so to me this just sounds so infinitely stupid, that it even makes me reconsider buying an X.

Not that I was going to buy one any time soon any way, but this puts it even further down on the list. There's nothing wrong with my internet connection, so that wouldn't be the problem for me, but I wouldn't want to have filled my hard drive after only having installed 3 or 4 games, and then being forced to invest in an extra large external drive to accommodate for additional games...

@NEStalgia WHAT??? DoA going non-jiggly? For certain fans of the series, that will probably turn the meaning of the acronym from "Dead or Alive" to "Dead on Arrival"...

@ThanosReXXX yeah, i hear you. Even having bought the x specifically because i now have unlimited bandwidth to abuse however i please, just the principle alone that every disc purchased has a mandatory 25-65 gb download is kind of offensive. It's almost like the og xbone idea. Yuck.

Makes me really fear the ps5/x2 era.

One of the updates was 20GB in size. Sounds like they probably added quite a bit:

https://gamerant.com/state-of-decay-2-patch/

They've updated it like 4 times in the last month too. So it does sound like they're pretty active in improving it. Those updates included both bug fixing and adding new gameplay features.

@Zuljaras BTW, the TL;DR of all the above was, if bandwidth limitations are a concern, absolutely avoid the X1X at all costs, it will be an expensive paperweight for you.

It 100% depends on having an internet provider offering tons of allotment (either unlimited, or at least a high cap if you plan to play a lot of games.) It also depends on external HDDs if you plan on playing a lot of retail games. (1TB fills up fast when games like Quantum Break + Halo 5 + Forza 7 + Halo MCC consume most of the entire drive just with those 4. Though those are the largest. I have 130-some games on mine ranging from those monster sized games to smaller games like Everspace at 8GB, and have eaten maybe 3.4TB, so obviously the heavyweight games are the exception more than the rule.) (Games that are note X1X Enhanced will not have extra downloads than the S, but no point in getting an X only to avoid X enhanced games.)

To summarize: PS4 Slim/OG and X1 S/OG will be pretty similar in terms of downloading. Both will have a lot more downloading than you're used to from Nintendo, even in the "banner of shame" era. That's a reality this gen and will only get worse next gen. Some games will not require downloads, many will benefit from them, some will require, research will be required. PS4 games for some reason seem to have slightly smaller downloads for patches (sometimes, but not always.)

PS4 Pro sits in between. Unlike X1X there are no actual 4k texture packs (it's not actually a 4k console), mostly just code/asset updates, and sometimes "enhanced textures" (but nowhere near the size of X textures) for Pro support, so while the Pro has additional downloads, IIRC they are 'optional', unlike the X. However they are part of the game patches, like Switch, so if you need to download a patch to fix a broken game and have a Pro, you're going to download the Pro patch. Usually Pro patches are only 1-3GB though versus the commonly 15-50GB patches on X.

There is one advantage for downloading in the XBox ecosystem depending on the nature of your bandwidth constraints. With the X1, you can buy a backup hard drive and copy all your downloads to it so you don't need to download them again if the console/drive dies. PS4 won't let you do that. You'll have to let the nature of your ISPs constraints guide you on that one.

Also, if you're waiting a while, @DarthNocturnal made a good point about "Intelligent Delivery'. I can't imagine MS will try a truly "digital-only" console for the next XBox after what happened with the XBone launch, so they may have to bake in "optional" support for 4k, meaning the "mandatory" X1X patches could in the future become optional (or might not.) It took them 5.5 years to build support for folders/groups long after everyone abandoned hope. It could happen, but you won't know for quite a while. I could see them enabling an option so that the "XBox Two" will behave like a better 1S if buying discs and like a 4k monster if going digital/hybrid digital. Why knows?

Do also note that PS4 has zero backward compatibility with PSX/PS2/PS3. It's supported only through PS Now streaming subscriptions. X1 has an ever growing amount of backward compatibility, however the backward support is provided by downloading a digital version of the game even if you insert a disc, so playing X-BOX/X360 games requires 5-9GB downloads......

.....and now you're thinking "Nintendo is awesome!" aren't you?

Edit (Clarification to above, when I say Pro patches are usually 1-3GB, I mean 1-3GB additional for being on Pro over the patch size already between 1-40GB. FWIW I ran a PS4 (base not pro) with a limited, capped ISP of 30GB or so, and most games if I played few I was ok, patches usually fit under 10GB and I just didn't download patches for any games that were over 10GB, even if it meant not playing the game I paid for. At least up until the past year or two it was generally pretty much ok for games that didn't have a big online. Uncharted 4 was painful at 19GB for a patch, because it included all sorts of free DLC for the online play in the patch. Assassin's Creed: Unity went in the bin with a 28GB patch.....the whole game, on X1X is only 48GB.....the patch included more than half the full game data.) These days there are games with 40+GB patches. But there are still some with 750MB-4GB patches. You're just going to have to do a lot of pre-search when buying games.... Those sizes should apply both to base PS4 and X1S. Add a few gig to PS4 Pro numbers.

@DarthNocturnal

Why on earth would they release a patch that reinstalls the game?

Anyway, I went ahead and bought it. Found it for half-price so it seemed like a bargain given that they're updating and fixing so regularly.

@NEStalgia Internet is no concern for me. I was just asking if there are games on XboxOne that are in the same idiotic state as in the Switch.

I am able to Download everything just fine. The thing is that I want to own the games I buy. After years I want to be able to still play them even if servers are down. Look at the Wii.

I know it is silly but I want it that way.

Also games run better on XboxOneX right? That is worth the price at least for me.

@ThanosReXXX If you're playing fighters to watch the creepy alien jello molds shaped like cleavage, you're counting the wrong frames Either that or DoA is just a bad fighter that nobody buys if it's not softcore.

Seriously though, DoA is a really good fighter, and it's a shame it gets overlooked because it's...so fanservice saturated. I can't imagine this will hurt it much. It's actually a lot like Tekken in some ways. Not as combo-centric, more grounded and boxing-like, which IMO might be a really good thing. As Ryu said, both are VirtualFighter inspired. I really like both of them (and again, Tekken 7 is fugly...no idea why characters are blurred like a PS3 game, DoA looks a lot cleaner.)

DoA: FR, Tekken 7, DB:FZ, BB:CTB (started it, but wrong thread to discuss), Injustice, MKX are all excellent. I'm liking KI less and less every time I touch it I think. Oddly I wanted KI and was pleased to get it for $10 on sale. I bought MKX as an impulse buy thinking I'd not like it, and ended up liking MKX and generally dislking KI...

I tried basically mashing like crazy on KI....and started winning. And makes me feel like it's not intended for sticks at all (which is crazy for an old arcade series, even if it did start on Nintendo.) I'll revisit periodically and see if it grows on me, but I think for now it's out of the lineup.

Also, I got Burnout Paradise on the sale....never tried it before....it's crazy! A racer with no racing line, and no GPS of where to go.....you just have to figure out the streets as you go.... It's both frustrating and very uniquely interesting in that it's set up to just learn the routes. And the bikes are as fast as WipeOut, only with intersections. Crazy game, but pretty cool. Arcade racer in the purest form of 90's arcades....very different from even NFS and Horizon.

@Zuljaras Ahh, if interent isn't a limitation that does change things quite a bit! That's going to be the biggest nightmare for most. So given your concern is digital rights and longevity, the X1X may still be a problem since all X1X-Enhanced games and X360/X-Box BC games will fully depend on the downloadable component to run (like Switch.) However that problem is also somewhat mitigated by the ability to backup said downloads like with PC games. If you have to replace the hardware of your "primary" unit you'll still be at the mercy of the licensing server, however MS has a long track record of keeping licensing servers running effectively forever, so it's a bit of a trust system.

But yes, the X is a very very nice system, and, in my own experience, the difference in some games even compared to PS4 Pro is very noticeable (Nier Automata is a great example. Not the best looking overall game but looks less bad on the X ) And framerates do tend to be more stable. PS has that great stable of 1st party single player adventure type games though that X1 lacks. X1 1st party seems to have an online focus. For me PS4Pro is an "exclusives" system (and including back catalog there's dozens of exclusives making it worthwhile) and the X1X is the multi-plat system.

If you REALLY want to avoid dependency on digital access 30 years from now though, backward compatibility and X1X-Enhanced games will be a problem, but at least X1X-Enhanced games should still play on a used 1S 30 years from now even if they won't play on a download-dependent X (assuming the game isn't broken and requiring a patch....or is L.A. Noire or such that shipped in the same broken state on every platform.)