GamingFan4Lyf

@Tyrant_T103 The thing is, there were a ton of games that ran at 60fps back then and there were games that ran at less. However, no one really could tell the difference because no one knew the actual framerate because no one was analyzing it. Slowdown was the only thing people noticed.

Once these things started to get reported on and analyzed, it suddenly became a "problem".

Now, I definitely support your argument that developers (and gamers) should lower expectations, but I don't think 60fps should be a mandate. I do think a locked framerate on a console should be a mandate.

However, developers should be able to make the game they want to make without reprisal whether they choose to make things more graphically dense at 30fps or choose 60fps+ at the cost of visual fidelity.

If the developer wants to have "Modes" in these games, the highest performing mode should be main target during development and any lower-performing modes are secondary.

Trying to push a 30fps development target up to 60fps sours the experience as it generally leads to terrible image quality and unstable performance.

That screenshot reminds me that The Coalition are absolute wizards with Unreal Engine.

Can't wait to see what they come up with next!

@awp69 I miss the "old days" when games just released and no one really knew what framerate a game was running - nor was it even reported by anyone.

I had no idea that Ocarina of Time ran at like 25fps or that Star Fox was like 15fps. I just played the game and was never bothered. Heck, I still don't care.

While I certainly love Digital Foundry analysis because I am fascinated about technology and how developers do what they do, but, at the same time, they kind of popularized performance metrics being a "thing".

Developers should just release games how they want to release them, offer no modes, and never report performance metrics and DF should just focus on the visual aspects and leave the framerate analysis out.

60fps is a design choice, not some "option" that gets shoe-horned in because..."60fps or bust".

Believe me, no one was saying "gosh this framerate is unbearable" back in those days (well, unless slowdown was atrocious to the point of unplayable). They talked about the content and fun-factor of the game instead.

30fps is fine for me as long as it's a steady 30fps.

Honestly, unless you switch to 60fps and then switch back, the difference isn't as staggering as some people make it out to be.

Developers should have every right to push visual fidelity at 30fps if that's the experience they want without "gamers" moaning and groaning that it's not 4K60.

Heck, I am sure that if video game consoles were able to engage a TV's 24fps mode like movies do, developers would use that for "cinematic experiences" (that would be pretty awesome actually).

I personally can't wait to see this in action.

It feels like there is a definite disconnect between the gaming community as a whole and those handling the reviews.

One would look at those scores and think "Wow, Microsoft has released a fair amount of really good games" and, yet, to look at the comments section of many sites, Microsoft doesn't have any good games. 🤷‍♂️

Seeing as how the shadows at their highest setting on PC also look "worse", I'd chalk this up to simply API differences between DirectX and whatever Sony uses.

But, of course, the internet has to make mountains out of molehills.

@Jenkinss Sung by Ian Gillan from the classic band Deep Purple

Amazing game and it plays perfectly on Series X (and I assume S)! No slowdown or screen tear!

@Tomato_Goose I hope it's not true that it's open world. In my opinion, it kind of "breaks" the tension of Resident Evil.

The biggest strength of Resident Evil is feeling constrained and having no choice but to fight your way out of a situation. I feel like going open world would ruin that.

@northernmonkey75 Probably take you from an average ~40fps to an average ~42 fps.

I understand that this is Capcom's first foray in open world game with the RE engine, but this doesn't give anyone a great first impression.

And with talks of RE9 going open world, this game doesn't instill confidence it will be any good.

I hope the 30fps cap is at least smooth for those interested in this title.

I am really starting to hate the game industry - especially the "release now, patch later" mentality.

Nintendo are one of the few developers out there who don't rely on "Day 1 Patches". Its games are the only games I have confidence that, when I insert a cartridge into the Switch, I won't be greeted with a lengthy download before I can play.

All good things must come to an end, I guess.

Honestly, I haven't really touched an indie game in a while. Nothing against them, just so many other great games out there that grabbed my attention.

I honestly thought Gearbox was already under 2K's wing.

@NEStalgia Yeah. LOL!

Okay, so maybe saying "I don't care" was a little misleading. I do care to a certain degree (and I am aware of the pros and cons for each mode), it's just that the default setting is perfectly fine for the vast majority of games.

@NEStalgia Ugh, all that smoothing in TV's is terrible - I turn off all video processing on my TVs.

I do set "film mode" on my TV - but that's for 24fps films and is not soap opera mode.

I will say, if the Default Mode is hot garbage...I do switch it.

I play Final Fantasy XVI at the default Graphics Mode because the 30fps is actually a lock and it's stable where the 60fps isn't.

I did the same for Final Fantasy VII Remake (though I stopped playing a few hours in to focus on FF16 because I try to discipline myself to playing and finish 1 game at a time).

I turned RT on in Resident Evil 4 because the SSR on water bodies was really bad and extremely distracting. The unlocked framerate was covered by VRR.

I left it in Quality Mode on Jedi Survivor.

I left Alan Wake 2 in the Default Mode.

I changed to Performance Mode on Redfall because the game was virtually identical between modes except for 60fps.

I switched to Performance Mode in Elden Ring because those games need to run higher than 30fps and VRR ironed out the framerate drops.

But I understand what you mean about people potentially not getting the best experience either due to marketing decisions or plain ignorance.

Honestly, I wish we didn't have modes. I miss the days of games just being "as is" on consoles. If I want to fiddle with settings, I'd go back to PC gaming. Well...except for 120Hz Mode...I understand having that choice as 120Hz is not standard.

But if a developer wants to make a game target 4K (or 1440p) 60fps on consoles, then make it the best game possible at a locked 60fps on consoles.

If a developer wants to target 4K (or 1440p) at 30fps on consoles, then make it the best game possible at a locked 30fps on consoles.

And no, I don't think developers should get crapped on for making a 30fps with no other options. Usually, you can tell when 30fps was a target as the Performance Mode is extremely compromised and uneven.

@NEStalgia On one hand, I agree with you, but then you see thing things like the Nintendo Switch almost being the highest selling console of all time - beating out consoles with considerably more power.

I would bet a vast majority of people don't even open the Options menu of a console game and simply play on "Default" settings. And I bet those people couldn't even tell you if a game is 30fps or 60fps. 1080p or 4K. Rasterization or real-time RT. They simply don't care.

I know I have gotten to that point. I play on whatever Graphics Mode is the default because I just stopped caring and want to play the game.

The only reason I go into the menu is to ensure spatial audio settings are set (because I care more about that than fussing over Performance or Quality).

That being said, I still stand by what I said about why I want RT to become standard: to take some of the load off artists during development.

I was a little skeptical about this, but I could see this being quite popular with those who hated what happened to Overwatch when it was taken away after Overwatch 2 came out.

It's not something I am interested in because I don't like these kinds of games, but it does look better than what I imagined.

People argue if real-time raytracing all together is a waste of time - especially when there is little to no perceptible difference between the rasterized lighting and the ray-traced lighting.

I'd say it's too much for current-gen consoles.

But I don't think RT is a waste of time.

Here's why: it's a huge "time saver" for developers - especially as character models and environmental effects get increasingly more complex. It just starts to get harder to convincingly "fake" proper lighting when more and more objects are on screen or there is more geometric complexity of a scene. That doesn't mean games will come out any faster, it just means that artists can focus on something else more interesting now that lighting elements are handled via RT.

4A games (makers of Metro) has switched over entirely to an RT studio because of the time it saves by not worrying about rasterized lighting "issues".

Rather than having to approximate/handcraft shadows, light placement, bounce lighting, ambient occlusion, etc. having a full RT (or better yet, path-traced) pipeline lets the artists be more like set designers - they place the lights where they want for the desired look without having to worry about ensuring the other aspects of lighting are properly addressed - they just "work".

This opens up more possibilities for artists since the lighting model is completely "trivialized" - perhaps artists can make scenes even more complex. Character models looks more complex. Perhaps even new gameplay mechanics will emerge when light doesn't have to be quite so "hand crafted".

3D at one point looked way worse than 2D Sprite-work. 3D also ran horribly (Star Fox was 15fps, Ocarina of Time was like 25fps, etc). Yet, switching to 3D helped overcome certain obstacles in order to focus on other things that would have become an absolute nightmare using 2D sprites. We are starting to get to that point with lighting, too.

3D rendering has all but become trivial at this point because major players in technology took it seriously enough to actually try to advance it. While it feels like Nvidia is the only one driving the RT train.

So, while the technology certainly doesn't have a huge benefit right now, I do want to continue to see it get used in the future until it becomes a "standard" so developers can focus on improving things elsewhere rather than worrying about whether the GI looks right, or if the shadows are animating at the proper speed and proportions, or if a probe light to simulate "darkness" is too light/dark, etc.

If Microsoft can get Steam, GOG, Epic on Xbox consoles, then it achieve what it set out to do over 20 years ago: finally making the dream of PC in the living room.

This depends on your definition of Xbox, though.

I think a lot of people define Xbox as the physical box with which you use. So, for them, they feel like all the investment they made in the ecosystem becomes moot and should invest elsewhere so that they only have to pay one low price for a console that plays everything.

Microsoft defines Xbox as the gaming wing of Microsoft. So, in that sense, it does make Xbox stronger because it supplies more revenue (and hopefully profit) to the gaming wing of Microsoft.

Dear Microsoft,
Make your next console seamlessly run the PC versions of games so that way this whole "no point supporting Xbox" goes away.

The original point of the Xbox was so that people making PC games could easily make a console version. That vision seems to have gone away. I thought the GDK was supposed to streamline Windows and Xbox development, but that doesn't appear to be the case (especially when the GDK on PC is apparently only for games meant to be on Game Pass).

If you still choose a "closed system" then figure out a way to get back the basic principles and make Xbox development so trivial that PC versions can quickly get converted to Xbox versions so that this kind of argument is moot.

Sincerely,
Me

No. Just no.

Not everything needs to be converted to an open world - especially Resident Evil where funneling you through specific locations is what builds the tension.

I quite like the current format for RE Remakes and RE 7/8 - let's keep doing that!

I delete games when I am done with them, so storage isn’t an issue.

@NEStalgia Liam said they were provided a file with the list of the MTX and prices as part of the review code.

@NEStalgia From what I have seen (on PushSquare), the press was given a list of the MTX that would be available at launch.

So while I certainly think the MTX are scummy, the press was aware when making reviews.

@alexcarv_guardiang3 @DJKingaling That would be pretty messed up if they took Microsoft's ID@Xbox money and ran!

I understand the market reach is bigger by focusing on PS5 and PC, but at the same time Microsoft appears to do more for helping indie developers than Nintendo or Sony with the ID@Xbox program.

If this is truly what happened, taking that money and turning around and saying they will "reassess the possibility of an Xbox release post-launch." is the very definition of "biting the hand that feeds."

I am waiting for the patch notes to read "Remade the game as a single-player, non-GaaS, non-looter shooter" before I make the plunge.

It's a shame, but, Microsoft is still a business and not a charity.

I am sure everything looked great at first, but it shouldn't come to anyone's surprise that if Microsoft isn't making any money because a lot of people are simply using points to fund Xbox purchases, something was going to change.

Being able to earn points by playing games that can be used to get more games is still pretty darn generous if you ask me - even if you can't get said games as often as you could before.

@PsBoxSwitchOwner But, again, it had zero hinderance on their gameplay experience.

If the reviewer had reached a point where suddenly a paywall had come up, then, yes, I can see where that would reduce the score - part of the experience is inaccessible/significantly hindered due to having to fork over real money.

None of the actual game experience was hindered during the reviewers playtime. They reviewed the game...not the company's business strategy.

The game they played without shelling out money was a 10/10 in their view (bear in mind, it was also noted that MTX was going to exist when the review was written).

I am not defending MTX by any stretch. I think they are ridiculous, and I simply don't buy them. But if the game is 100% enjoyable without ever needing to fork over extra money, then I don't see dropping a score out of principal or to send a message - people's wallets are a better message to send than a review score.

If MTX were an unknown and then suddenly "poof", MTX showed up, then I can see that as a problem. The reviewer knew it was coming and still gave it a 10/10.

If the MTX suddenly made a whole new area available post-review, then yes, I could where the review would want to amend the review because they didn't get the "whole" experience at time of review.

Neither of those happened.

Without really having knowledge of the game, it looks like the MTX are nothing more than convenience fees for those who want an easier time with the game. The MTX don't seem to be intrusive in any way. Why amend the score?

The reviewer knew they were coming. You know there are there. If the MTX are a problem for you, don't buy them or skip the game all together. That's your choice, just like it was the reviewers choice to still give the game a 10/10 despite knowing MTX were coming.

@PsBoxSwitchOwner Why should they? They were able to get a 10/10 experience without having access to this Paid DLC (which means you can too).

Dropping Score for the sake of spite against MTX practices is relatively petty when the reviewer got the full experience without having to spend an extra dime.

This game looks insane. But I am sure running on a high-end PC really helps with the look.

Not saying the console versions will be degraded significantly, but with UE5, it's always a gamble how they will turn out at launch.

I hope these games will be profitable.

I love Remedy, but I worry about the company as well. It's been taking losses and AW2 has yet to be profitable.

Part of me wonders if partnering with Epic actually ended up being detrimental to the financial success of Alan Wake 2 for two reasons:

Epic Store exclusive (majority of PC players use Steam)
Digital-only release (console players like physical releases)

Hopefully Rockstar doesn't do the same thing and we see Max Payne on all storefronts, plus physical.

@Nightcrawler71 Seems the PS5 resolves at a slightly higher resolution (it's reconstructed to 4K) but the Series X runs 2 - 3 frames higher than PS5.

XSX: hovers right around 40 on average
PS5: hovers around 38 on average
XSS: hovers around 35 on average

@InterceptorAlpha So, I found out something interesting:

Series X/PS5/PC use ray-traced global illumination.
Series S does not use ray-traced global illumination.
You can't disable RT on Series X/PS5 (and from what I have seen, the lack of RTGI isn't a huge downgrade)

Every other recent RE game lets you turn RT on/off. Why not Dragon's Dogma 2?! Maybe not taxing the system with RTGI would improve performance?!

It could just be a CPU bottleneck, though.

I would hope that such an option was tested on PS5/Series X and it was found that there wasn't much of a performance difference between RTGI On and Off, so Capcom just decided to leave it on for better image quality.

@InterceptorAlpha Seeing as how I have seen people say that this game drops below 30fps on powerful gaming rigs, I wouldn't hold my breath for 60fps mode. But one never knows - perhaps the engineers will discover some major issue with the game that gets patched out and has a transformative effect on the game.

One thing I do find interesting is that on PushSquare mentions the framerate issues in more than just cities on PS5 - but that could be that the reviewer just notices framerate issues more (some people are sensitive to it, others aren't).

I'll be interested in seeing the DF analysis of this.

I can't imagine a huge performance delta, but perhaps this is a title where Xbox has a more favorable outcome with regards to performance.

Overall, this game just sounds too overwhelming for me.

I recommend The Quarry to any horror fan out there.

NOTE: decisions and actions you make are less obvious as what would be considered the "correct path" than games in the Dark Pictures Anthology - perhaps that might be more frustrating to some as certain "correct" actions are "hidden" and not finding them could lead to a death much later in the game.

It's a fun romp, though!

I’m still very much looking forward to this game!

I tried the original somewhat recently (within the last year or two) and any improvement to the original is welcome as it aged like expired milk.

@rustyduck I’ll take a drive up there and report back (they’re about a 90 minute drive from me - without insane traffic that is common here).

I really want to like Bethesda RPGs, they’re just too overwhelming. Glad to see Bethesda continues to button things up…no matter how many buttons there are to fix.

That is gorgeous!

I can just hear "Prelude" looking at it.

I hope that any money that had exchanged hands to secure this Game Pass release was returned.

@TheLastHarbinger I'm not debating monopiles in gaming - no one has a monopoly in gaming.

I am merely pointing out how many studios and employees fall under Microsoft's gaming wing compared to Sony since you decided to say that Microsoft is "barely above Sony" which isn't the truth.

Microsoft is a huge publisher now because of Xbox Game Studios, ZeniMax/Bethesda, and ABK. Microsoft has a ton of studios under its belt, now. Nothing more, nothing less.

Microsoft itself has (as of 2023) 221K employees across all divisions. But I don't mention them because Consulting, Azure, Retail, Corporate HR, Microsoft 365, etc. don't have anything to do with gaming.

But if you want to talk revenue, King and Call of Duty money alone is a huge boost to Microsoft Gaming.

This just sounds like a terrible decision, if you ask me.

@kihaennem Microsoft Gaming incorporates Xbox Game Studios, ABK, and ZeniMax/Bethesda stuff.

Exclusive doesn't change the fact that Microsoft reaps the publishing benefits of all the games under its umbrella no matter where the games land...just like any other publisher.

@TheLastHarbinger 22 studios under Sony to 34 under Microsoft Gaming.

4000 employees under Sony to 20K under Microsoft.

Yup…”barely above Sony”

Maybe do a single-player focus game but then add a live-service Quidditch portion? I am sure that would be quite popular and enough to keep people playing for a while even well after the credits roll.

I have the luxury of being able to own all three systems. I love video games no matter where they are.

Believe me, I would love to be able to buy one box to play them all!

PC is about as close as one can get, but it's pricey to buy PC that plays everything and there is no real "convenient" couch setup for the PC-space.

@InterceptorAlpha 4 discs of the best JRPG of that generation!

@TheLastHarbinger Microsoft is also the largest game publisher in the world! But, no, not a monopoly...yet (I hope it never gets to be that way)

@HonestHick I like the first-party games Sony has put out. I like the third-party exclusives it manages to get (when it's helping to fund the game and provide technical support, but not paying just to keep the games off Xbox). I don't like Sony.

@rjc-32 Ah, maybe the file size difference could be the culprit. Sucks for a "meager" 500MB.

Then again, that would be a pretty hefty difference in game size to warrant 2 more discs when the PS5 version will probably have just an Install Disc and a Play Disc where the Xbox version will probably have 3 Install Discs and 1 Play Disc. Perhaps it's a combination of both Storage size differences and game data differences.

Interesting. I guess Microsoft is still using 50GB Blu-ray instead of 100GB Blu-ray? That's about the only explanation I can think why this will be double the required discs.

Odd choice seeing as how the Series X has a UHD drive.

"Neither monopoly or cut-throat competition makes the world a better place"

I wonder if he's taking jabs at both Microsoft and Sony in this comment.