Topic: Dodgy generation transition

[Cobra951]

Great. Just freaking great.

So, Witcher 2 was the game I really built this PC for.
Now, Witcher 3's the game to really make me want to upgrade.

How fitting.

[insert foul language here]

haha yeah

Guess I'll just buy a PS4?

That game is unwinnable, man.  As soon as you dive in, you get swept down the stream.  There is just no good answer, since consoles are closed, restrictive and are not the same thing at all.  I don't know.  Maybe I'm getting fed up with the gaming scene.  It's in a low point right now, I think.

Well part of it is the new generation transition. I've gotten a LOT of use out my PC with minimal upgrades (replaced a burned out video card). Shit, I only have 2GB of RAM and still on WinXP and its only in the last year or so where its gotten annoying for things not being able to run. The upgrade cycle wasnt so bad since the last console gen ran so long and no one really wanted to push PCs too hard. I think we got a little spoiled.

On the other hand, I hope its a jump and then stays level for a while. I dont want to go back to when new videocards jumped so much that you needed a new one every year or two.

That's it.  You're right.  This transition is rough.  For now, Gen 7 remains the top console generation ever, over a year after the introduction of the 8th.  Pair diminishing returns with growing pains, and the result leaves much to be desired.  Add a pinch of new anticonsumer restrictions, and a dash of cheaping out (by Sony too--they use an even slower version of the same low-power mobile-tech CPU) and the stew sours by the minute.

It's not like console gamers have a choice.  Once the industry shifts gears, the old gen becomes a fond memory.  I have both sitting side by side, and it is disheartening to see a well-behaved mature achiever upstaged by an undisciplined brat.  So far, it's mostly as I predicted.  Nothing is new; it's just sharper and (sometimes) more fluid.  What I did not predict are the steps backward.

(1) All I/O is appreciably slower.  The bus speeds, HDD speeds and internet speeds didn't change too much, but the amount of data that has to flow quadrupled or worse.  Downloading, game loading, game saving, transitions, all take their sweet time.  Another fallout from this is the inadequacy of the current 500GB storage size.  With games in the 20-40GB range, the space runs out quickly.

(2) Work in progress.  The 7th generation was one too.  It's hard to believe that an Xbox 360 from 2007 is the same hardware spec as one from 2013.  Everything vastly improved, as did the games themselves.  The system is functionally flawless.  I can't think of a single thing about it that ruffles my feathers.  Those are in the past, the RRoD in particular--which was put to bed decisively.  During its lifetime, the system saw hardware overhauls, firmware overhauls, and UI overhauls.  It saw disc-based gaming transition to HDD gaming, along with digital availability of nearly its entire catalog.  (It never did solve the issue of multi-disc games which need disc swaps.) 

The Xbox One, on the other hand has much improvement needed.  It's still in its infancy, with a confusing UI, hiccups which lead to reboots, laughably limited apps like Media Player (the 360's puts it to shame), and game design still struggling to get a grip on the system's quirks and strengths.  This last one is the killer.  I knew games would not be much better than last gen's (just sharper and more fluid).  But I did not expect them to be worse.  I did not expect them to be riddled with bugs, or choke on their own I/O.  I did not expect for growing pains to have so much of an impact on the top games after a full year.  That's why I waited a full year.  The system engineers have more work to do, and the game coders have more work to do.  It's back to Square One.  (Heh, there's a new name for the system.)  Come on.  Let's get a move on.

Idol and D, good luck with the PC scene guys.  Personally, I don't find any solace there either.  I think for a while, the console pains will spill over to your side of the fence as well.

[gpw11]

You know, a lot of this happens every time, it seems to me.  Or at least with the last generation as well.  The 360 wasn't entirely impressive when it first came out and a lot of people though the current consoles still had life in them.  Like you said, fast forward six years and it's hard to believe we're talking about the same hardware.  It's also hard to believe we were once commenting on how the PS3 had zero games.

My "I guess I'll buy a PS4?" comment in that thread wasn't really a knock or complaint of the current situation at all - it just happens, right? I have no doubts that I'll buy a PS4 at some point - I don't feel the need to really right now, but games like Witcher 3 are starting to hit and the typical early adopter dry spell will probably be ending soon.

I can't comment on the I/O speed or the computing power of the new consoles, and I actually DO think we could have gone a few more years this time - but competitors have to compete, right? 

The PC scene is in that rough transition right now and games are just coming out that I'm not hitting the specs for - I bought my desktop in 2007, I believe. It wasn't even high end at that point but mid-range.  I upgraded RAM at some point and upgraded the videocard for like $100 at some point.   PC gaming is now far more tied into console gaming cycles and I have no doubt that if I built a new system now it'd last me until the end of this console life cycle as well.


I don't really have any more complaints about the state of the hobby (As far as hardware goes) than I did ten years ago.

[Cobra951]

If my life continues to be uneventful for a while, I'll probably end up with a PS4 as well (not now, though--I've pretty much shot my wad).  This time around, I have no hard barriers on that front.  I always thought the PS3 was overly convoluted and overpriced.  The Cell architecture made things much more difficult on PC-weaned devs than the Power-PC architecture of the 360, and the games reflected the disparity for years.  The unified memory on the 360 is also a much superior approach.  I last looked at the PS3 a couple of years ago, when the latest slim model appeared.  It was still overpriced, and that was that.  

Great contrast now.  Sony's entry is the stronger system, the architecture is close to the PC's (which is ideal) and the price is where it should be.  And I typically get all the worthwhile consoles.  (Last gen was an exception.)  Some games on the horizon, No Man's Sky in particular, hopefully will be the best push behind that.  Remasters of great Sony exclusives I missed will help too.  Games are always the key.

Edit:

I can't comment on the I/O speed or the computing power of the new consoles, and I actually DO think we could have gone a few more years this time - but competitors have to compete, right? 

That's just it.  The transition was driven by business realities and perception rather than technical need.  People don't understand diminishing returns, and how new software technology can squeeze so much out of old hardware (especially on systems with invariable specs).  It was time for a transition, but that doesn't change technical reality.  We could already do everything needed on Gen 7.  Gen 8 feels like someone polished a dirty screen, and so far, little else.

[K-man]

With every change in generation there's something of an adjustment period.  It's not like you can take what you've learned on the 360 to make it more efficient and then apply it to the current architecture.  Games 5 years from now on both consoles are going to look and play much better than games in the current window.  It's always been like that.

You're essentially starting at square one again.

[Quemaqua]

Yeah, I don't see the current generation as any different from the last. It's got the same growing pains, as they all generally do. It's slightly different due to the fact that we've got potentially different issues to address in some small ways, but those differences don't really mean much of anything. This is what always happens.

I was firmly in support of the PS3 last generation. The games were better, everything was more stable/accessible/cheap (fuck pay-for-multiplayer in the ass), the hardware was more reliable. Microsoft lost me forever with the 360, which I will always think of as the shitty console that died on me and didn't see as much use as my PS3. How Microsoft recovered from that fiasco is beyond me. I have my complaints with Sony, too ... the PS3 I had outlasted my 360 by a whole hell of a lot, and under a lot more sustained use, but it still broke down sooner than it should have. Getting in on the ground floor has its price, and while it may have been a mistake for me to get in on the PS4 this early (time will tell), it's the only new (non-handheld) console I'll be buying this generation. I have less than zero interest in the Xbone or the WiiU.

PC-wise, I have zero complaints. My computer is somewhere in the vicinity of six years old, and the only upgrades I've done to it are replacing defective PSUs, a cheap new videocard, and sticking 2 more gigs of RAM in it. It still runs Skyrim. The CPU at this point is just way too old, but that's really the big bottleneck ... if I could get a new CPU in this thing, the rest of it would still serve a while longer. You ask me, that's entirely acceptable. But as this next generation improves, my chances of running new stuff on PC will continue to get narrower. That's expected, and a new PC will likely be my next big thing. And probably not so much for gaming as just for making sure this thing doesn't suddenly die on me and leave me without a working machine. Either way, I have more games than I could ever play, which is why I'm in the process of trying to get rid of as many as possible. I still love this hobby, but not enough to keep a bunch of useless crap around. I suspect that for the next few years, 99% of my game purchases will be imports. And hopefully few and far between.

But yeah, what a generation the last was. It's hard to come from something so solid and find yourself on the uncertain ground of a new thing ... but that's what we've done before too. The PS2 generation was utterly amazing. Stepping into the world of the PS3 and 360 didn't feel as exciting and healthy as it might have. But we saw that change eventually, with huge libraries of great games and much better, more stable, more capable hardware. No doubt it'll be the same this time around.

[MysterD]

Idol and D, good luck with the PC scene guys.  Personally, I don't find any solace there either.  I think for a while, the console pains will spill over to your side of the fence as well.

With PC versions of Ryse, ACU, Wolf: TNO, The Evil Within, and Shadow of Mordor having either stiff min. requirements and/or recommended specs to run games at 1080p, I just can't help but see this trend continue. The new consoles, more or less, became the low-end specs for many of these new games - so, now our PC version requirements get major spikes somewhere.

Witcher 3's PC specs weren't too bad to me, until I saw my video card was out of range. And lately - that seems to be the real kick in the pants, is the vid-card requirement is killing me. 4 GB VRAM GeForce 970 seems like a real winner to me, but I don't feel like dropping full MSRP on it ($329 and up, depending on what version you buy) - especially when it's selling real well (seems to sell out well at retailers online or in store) and gamers want this damn card; and there's a manufacturer's lock on the pricing right now.

I don't own enough of these stiff games yet, for them to push me to buy this card yet...especially since the card prices ain't budging much. For stiff games, I have both The Evil Within + Wolf: TNO. Plus, my backlog's just increasing like crazy (especially on Steam) - and it's always easy enough just to pick something from there that I can actually run.

[Cobra951]

With every change in generation there's something of an adjustment period.  It's not like you can take what you've learned on the 360 to make it more efficient and then apply it to the current architecture.  Games 5 years from now on both consoles are going to look and play much better than games in the current window.  It's always been like that.

You're essentially starting at square one again.

I know you're right.  Part of it is that I went from a PS2 & Gamecube to a 360, which was a huge step up graphically right from the start.  The extra generation of improvements that they squeezed out of that hardware over 7 years was icing.  The move up now to the 8th gen is subjectively much less, so problems can't be overlooked as easily.  Yes, games will improve markedly, as will the system software supporting them.  Of that I have no doubt.

With PC versions of Ryse, ACU, Wolf: TNO, The Evil Within, and Shadow of Mordor having either stiff min. requirements and/or recommended specs to run games at 1080p, I just can't help but see this trend continue. The new consoles, more or less, became the low-end specs for many of these new games - so, now our PC version requirements get major spikes somewhere.

Witcher 3's PC specs weren't too bad to me, until I saw my video card was out of range. And lately - that seems to be the real kick in the pants, is the vid-card requirement is killing me. 4 GB VRAM GeForce 970 seems like a real winner to me, but I don't feel like dropping full MSRP on it ($329 and up, depending on what version you buy) - especially when it's selling real well (seems to sell out well at retailers online or in store) and gamers want this damn card; and there's a manufacturer's lock on the pricing right now.

I don't own enough of these stiff games yet, for them to push me to buy this card yet...especially since the card prices ain't budging much. For stiff games, I have both The Evil Within + Wolf: TNO. Plus, my backlog's just increasing like crazy (especially on Steam) - and it's always easy enough just to pick something from there that I can actually run.

See, that's just crazy.  A whole new console plus 2 games can be had for that much, and all you're talking about is one component (albeit a key one) in a PC that's already going to set you back a pretty penny without one.  And you have to be spending all that every time game designers choose to push the envelope again?  I was there myself at one time, but at least then videocards weren't these air-conditioning-looking power-sapping behemoths.  Whatever floats your boat, man.  I'm out.

Tell me:  Can you run these "stiff" games at lower settings with your current hardware?  Or is it that you would be too unhappy doing so?

[K-man]

It would appear, at least in the last console generation or two, that PC reqs remain relatively constant during a console cycle.  Presumably for ease of development, but I can't say for sure.  Course 1080P gaming became the "standard" to aspire to, and my current setup does that well with current titles (Skyrim, Dishonored, etc etc).  The next real push will be in the 4k arena, and with 4k-capable televisions already hitting near if not under the 1000 mark I suspect it will all come sooner than we want. 

I was a day one adopter for the 360 and Wii in the last gen.  I picked up a 60 gig ps3 with backwards compatibility a few months after production on them ceased so I would have one.  I have not adopted anything day-one since.  I suspect that once a game hits on PS4 that I want, I'll bite.

[MysterD]

See, that's just crazy.  A whole new console plus 2 games can be had for that much, and all you're talking about is one component (albeit a key one) in a PC that's already going to set you back a pretty penny without one.  And you have to be spending all that every time game designers choose to push the envelope again?  I was there myself at one time, but at least then videocards weren't these air-conditioning-looking power-sapping behemoths.  Whatever floats your boat, man.  I'm out.

Tell me:  Can you run these "stiff" games at lower settings with your current hardware?  Or is it that you would be too unhappy doing so?

I would probably be too unhappy doing so.

I tried TEW Demo - and it ran like garbage, at 20 frames or less. I've heard the TEW full version runs better since its newest patch - so, I might and probably should give that a shot. It's a gorgeous-looking gaming (from what I saw on the demo), provided you can run it at worthwhile settings (1080p).
I have not touched Wolf: TNO, even though I do have it downloaded + installed - can't speak on it yet.
I don't really care too much on these - b/c I only spent $10.xx or so on these each around Thanksgiving from Gamersgate.

Also, if one does buy a 4 GB VRAM GF 970 for $329 or so - look around and see what games they come bundled with. Many cards come w/ games these days. There is a NVidia promo w/ Ubi games and you pick b/t PC versions of ACU, Far Cry 4, and The Crew for your free game download.

I'd also like to say - I really don't spend very much on games. I watch a lot of the sales, bundle-sites, and whatnot - and I can't really tell you the last time I spent $30 or more on a game. Actually, Witcher 2 PC was probably the last game I spent big money on ($45 or so). I normally spend $10 or less on games (sometimes $15 or less), often waiting for the crazy sales. I try to aim for 75% off lowest MSRP or better for games I won't play ASAP; and will spend whatever on games I don't wanna wait on + will play as soon as its purchased (in which, I try to aim for 50% off or better on games I don't wanna wait too long on). I don't think most games are worth dropping $30 or more on ASAP b/c they don't offer content galore, there will be Season Passes, inevitable Re-Release Edition w/ everything, possible HD Redux Re-Release Edition, game could be released in a poor state, might be better off waiting for more patches, and many other anti-consumer business practices. Many times, it's better to just have patience - wait it out a few months or so.

[MysterD]

It would appear, at least in the last console generation or two, that PC reqs remain relatively constant during a console cycle.  Presumably for ease of development, but I can't say for sure.  Course 1080P gaming became the "standard" to aspire to, and my current setup does that well with current titles (Skyrim, Dishonored, etc etc).  The next real push will be in the 4k arena, and with 4k-capable televisions already hitting near if not under the 1000 mark I suspect it will all come sooner than we want.  

I was a day one adopter for the 360 and Wii in the last gen.  I picked up a 60 gig ps3 with backwards compatibility a few months after production on them ceased so I would have one.  I have not adopted anything day-one since.  I suspect that once a game hits on PS4 that I want, I'll bite.

I remember when the X360 console launched - and I was complained about stiff vid-card requirements. History repeats itself.

But, yeah - I built this PC back in May 2011. I haven't had to really upgrade anything in hardware to run games here, until these new consoles decided to come out and dev's decided to push new hardware - since they're using the consoles as the new starting specs. So, yeah - you're right; the PC specs don't move too much during a console-generation, until the next-consoles come along.

Only upgrade so far made here for hardware is just recentedly added 8 more GB of RAM - so I now have a total of 16 GB of RAM. Looks like the vid-card's next to upgrade. Sure, I could probably get a GF 7xx series card and save a few hundred - but that 970 looks phenomenal (i.e. it's basically offering the power + benchmarks you'd see normally in their high-end $500 card, which they priced low purposely; and you can overclock these 970's to receive GF 980's benchmarks; plus it runs much cooler than a high-end 7xx series card).