Xbox One

^x2 Dude, just give it a rest. Just Cause 2 impressively exploits the capabilities of the PS 3's and XBox 360's hardware, we get it. Let's go back to talking about MS.

edited 8th Mar '11 3:01:50 PM by TheGinkei

People get over consoles so they need to churn out new ones. the only reason they've stayed around so long this time is because the market has shifted to big money sequels which don't need much innovation. I honestly don't really need a new console. the games I play look fine and work so why update?

I have a feeling they're gonna announce an Xbox 720 soon and I'll look like an idiot.

There's been several generations of CPU and GPU improvement since the 360. These days CP Us and GP Us occupy the same die space which lowers production costs and speeds up communication between the GPU and the CPU. Fast solid state harddrives are slowly replacing magnetic drives as the standard on P Cs and it's highly likely that the next generation of consoles will use them. There's no doubt in my mind that MS could design a system that could run games that are very noticeably visually better than the 360, and do so at an affordable price. The real question is, will people care? Have gaming graphics reached the point of "good enough for most gamers"? Personally I'm always looking for better graphics, but I don't think I'm a typical gamer in that regard.

Every time the subject of the next generation of video game systems comes up in this and other forums I've noticed a lot of people saying things like "it's way too soon!". Perhaps it's partially because of the amount of money that many gamers have spent on this current generation of systems (in terms of hardware and software) combined with the dread of feeling obligated to spend another $300 or $400 or $500s on some new piece of hardware so they don't feel like they're missing out. But I think it might be more than just that. I think most gamers are content with the level of graphical fidelity on the current hardware. But then again maybe if most gamers saw a really spectacular tech demo for a next gen system they might change their tune. Who knows?

Never underestimate the power of developers to make games that require even more power.

The biggest thing holding this back from happening, isn't that we're hitting anywhere near the roof of potential, but that more power using games, especially efficient ones, tend to mean more effort.

And as for the graphical aspects of improvement, I've never come across a game that wasn't pixelated in some area. How much farther can they come? Giving texture to every single leaf. Allow the player to pick up that leaf and look at the texture. And still look like a leaf instead of a pixelated mess when looking at closely. And of course, much much higher resolution. I've heard some computer enthusiasts say anything above 20 inches for 1080p is a waste. So I can't imagine what would be flawless for a 50 inch screen. We're going to see a lot of resolution improvement in the future. And we're going to use it. I've already heard rumors of the "next Blu-Ray" which will contain a much higher resolution than 1080p. And you may think it's a waste, but it's not. Only on a small screen is it a waste. The bigger the screen, the more resolution you want. And some people apparently think 23 inches for "only" 1080p is a bad idea.

7680×4800 is coming. It'll be here before you know it. And you'll be playing games on it.

We can make prettier games and the like but the question is why bother? Big AAA titles are so damn expensive that even one flop can kill a company, they're not going to want to move on to a new technology that is even more expensive and time consuming.

Now that's definitely true.

That CG looks hard to make. And coincidentally enough, is hard to make. All those 3D textures you think must look like took forever to make, did take forever to make. I can't believe the audacity people have had to attack Square as much as they did for recycling a few textures on Final Fantasy XIV. I mean, a few similar areas is not that bad considering how much time must have went into programming and making this game.

After as many flops as MMORP Gs have had lately, I'll be surprised if anyone else actually wants to give it another go.

edited 9th Mar '11 1:44:23 AM by Ukonkivi

Now, it probably seems like there must be a stage reached where the graphics of games will simply hit a wall, because getting any more detailed will be too expensive. But prices will go down - compare early PS 2 games to late PS 2 games like God of War 2, and you'll see how experience with a console plus economic change definitely helps things along for developers.

Eh, this post wasn't very good, I removed it.

edited 9th Mar '11 3:07:10 AM by Ukonkivi

Concerning graphics being able to improve, I'll just leave this here.

4 Questions: Yeah? And? So? What?

It's a teaser trailer. Those always look good.

I don't care how pretty a teaser trailer looked and I won't care if it's the best looking game they've done since Gears of War 2 (or whatever they've made between then and now). All I want to know is if it'll be fun enough that I'll play it for a long time, even after I've beaten it.

edited 9th Mar '11 5:41:20 AM by NULLcHiLD27

Honestly, I wish developers would stop going for "perfect" graphics, because it seems to eat up so much focus/money during development at the cost of other aspects of the game. I don't care about photorealism or picking up a leaf and seeing the textures. A game is about the gameplay (and the story, for certain genres), not the graphics or the music. Nice graphics and music are a plus, but the primary focus should always be on the gameplay.

Honestly, the games that impress me most aesthetically aren't current gen "wow" games like Final Fantasy XIII, it's games that did something incredibly beautiful and artistic with what they had, like Seiken Densetsu 3 and Okami.

There have been hardware improvements since the last generation came out, but not nearly as much as between the PS 2/Xbox and PS 3/Xbox360 launches. I honestly don't see a need for a new generation of consoles. Handhelds, yes. Miniaturization of technology marched on quite a bit. Consoles, no.

edited 9th Mar '11 5:44:10 AM by ccoa

@Mukora: That demo is very carefully tailored to play to the Unreal Engine's strengths. Like I said before, I think the whole hardware accelerated Gouraud shaded triangles with bitmapped surfaces thing is too inflexible, and has reached its limits. Think of what each generation added to 3D:

4. Flat shaded solid polygons and sprites.
5. Bitmapped textures, fog effects.
6. Antialiasing, simple shaders.
7. Advanced shaders, simple realtime shadows and bumpmapping.
8. Not too much, maybe… Displacement mapping? I dunno.

In that perspective, I don't think PC gaming has found enough new ground enough to justify another console generation just yet, for that I'd look to something like Intel's hybrid CPU-GPU Larrabee chip.

Also, for all the “Another generation, again!?” folks, better graphics won't just be prettier, it'll remove some of the crippling limits enforced on game design by current graphical technology.

@deuxhero: The current generation of consoles is MUCH better than previous ones in that regard, with about 0.5GB in the PS3 & 360, as opposed to the paltry 32, 43, or 64MB in the prior generation. Though I admit there's no real financial reason they couldn't have sprung for the full 1-2GB this time around (ESPECIALLY dedicated VRAM) with RAM so cheap, they're not RAM stingy to horribly painful degrees like back then, and they've got HDDs for virtual memory now, too.

edit: Argh! Ultra ninja'd!

edited 9th Mar '11 6:02:53 AM by EricDVH

Woops, accidentally made a bad post again.

edited 9th Mar '11 5:47:04 AM by Ukonkivi

Evidence mounting.

2015?

If they can clear out "clipping" of hair, swords, beards etc in games I will be happy.

Interesting, but I hope that the X Box 3 has something more going for it beyond better graphics, Kinect +, and more reliable hardware. I mean, all three would be great, but it just doesn't have that oomph that the 360 had over the original X Box...

[1]

This generation added global illumination and tessellation.

FAAAAAAAAAAAAKE!

That particular one is, but Microsoft is/was hiring positions that sound like they're related, so it's still possible that an Xbox 3 or Xbox handheld is in the works.

There's now some rumors about EA getting dev kits for Microsofts next generation console. There's also talk of MS actually having something to show for E3 (seems unlikely to me) and for the system being available by Christmas 2012

Sounds familiar.

As to the general 'why bother' questions:

Developers have already started complaining about the limitations of the consoles. There's a risk that devs will start going PC only again if they don't eventually upgrade.

Keep in mind that except for the Wii successor these things are expected for 3-4 years from now, so hardware will be even better than it is today.

Also, there's that Wii successor rumor. If Nintendo really does put out a new console with better (or even equal) graphics than the 360 or Ps3 in 2012, then that creates competition for the kinds of games that are usually only developed for Sony and Microsoft boxes, they'll both want to reestablish the current order of things.

Crytek says Microsoft prepping 720 for E3 2012.

Codenamed "Oban"? Huge, huge news here.