The Next Next Gen Thread o/\o - The Bear and Badger

LivDiv

Is Glasgow just really shit for internet?
It always seems to be you guys that have a bigger problem with it than anyone else.

The other night I had Batman AK, Shenmue 1 & 2, DC Super Villians and Supermarket Shriek all downloaded in a couple of hours.

Yossarian

Minnesänger wrote:

Yossarian wrote:

I blame Rocket League for being so damn fun and quick enough to play for a few rounds after a session on something else. Damn you Rocket League.

I really wanna play that game but China lag is such a big issue for me in multiplayer. It’s either smooth as butter here or completely unplayable. It makes me feel guilty every time I play with friends from the forum and end up leaving them in the middle of shit without help.

I’ll happily take my chances with it.

afgavinstan

My bone is supposed to be "always-on" but I still find updates when I get home, booting the console is quick though. My pipe is fat enough either way, mind. Oo-er.

poprock

LivDiv wrote:

Is Glasgow just really shit for internet? It always seems to be you guys that have a bigger problem with it than anyone else.

I’ve got decent fibre. G has not.

hunk

The interesting thing about next gen is this might be the first time ever PC/bone/PS5 start off with similarish performance levels due to amd's current commanding lead in the tech space? Sure, you can always build a more faster and powerful pc but due to price performance ratio I believe a Zen2- Navi setup will be a preferred sweet spot by devs/gamers for some time to come.

It might also have the effect that next gen will look boringly samey as effectively the target hardware is the same amd setup. Except for nintendoh...
Porting should be much easier for Devs.

Moot_Geeza

What is the extra grunt likely to mean for indie games? As most use Unity afaik are they likely to look roughly the same next gen? A lot of the current smaller titles aren't far off what was possible in the PS360 gen, a big boost would mean Switch ports suffer or presumably not be possible in some cases. Which would high on my absolutely do not want list.

djchump

I don't think single-player indie games are gonna change much from the current scene. PBR and current-gen grunt is enough that small scale indie games can have beautiful realistic visuals that compete with AAA, but just can't fill a whole large scale world at the same content level. NPR styles will probably make more of a comeback to differentiate the indie market from the AAA visuals that they can't compete against - e.g. Sable looks stunning.

What might be interesting is the multiplayer indie scene - tech middleware like SpatialOS and whatever Embark are working on, along with maturing cloud providers competing against each other to make the services more affordable, might open up MMO to the indie devs.

Interesting times, for sure, and moving to a "PC-like" architecture this gen was probably the best thing that could have happened for the health of the indie industry.

hunk

Next gen Nintendo could overclock the switch as effectively the Switch runs the Tegra soc severely underclocked to save battery. There's ample room there to up that but it will chomp away at battery life.

Longer term they could go for a new soc. Tegra2 perhaps if they want to stick to similar architecture?

As for type of (indie) games running on the switch, I don't expect that will be a problem. As long as they keep dev tools in sync and an eye on performance levels. Remember, the switch can run a downscaled Witcher3. One of the most demanding games on pc in handheld form. That's quite a feat for a tiny arm based handheld system.

LivDiv

Switcher 3 looks a bit shit though.
580p in handheld and it looks like detail has been stripped out a fair bit and that's what we know of.
It's not really running The Witcher 3 as we know it.

I think the Switch could start to look pretty bad on third party AAA in the next few years. It's already starting really. Mortla Kombat 11 for example looks gash. Fifa lacks features but is still the same price or more.

hunk

Aye, Switch's limiting factor is always resolution. Nintendo may or may not address that in the next hw reiteration.

Moot_Geeza

Tegra2 was the architecture some were expecting for the Switch iirc?

The Witcher thing is positive for keeping some sort of pace (and showing it's technically possible), but some indie devs seem to struggle with ports as it is (Sexy Brutale, Rime etc). I'd imagine smaller teams would find the road bumpier in the future. I don't really care what the third party AAA games look like because I don't tend to buy those on Switch (and Nintendo's own output always seems to look pretty good). There's absolutely no way it could host full worthwhile fat ports going forward, surely.

Tempy

Port struggling tends to be down to Unity and poor engine optimisation, as it effects the PS4 versions too.

Moot_Geeza

Now that you mention it Rime wasn't exactly buttery smooth on PS4 either.

hunk

Switch architecture should be scalable just like PS and bone. Play Witcher3 on a next gen switch and the game should 'upscale' with it.

Tempy

I’ll pretty much always take improved performance over visuals these days

hunk

Smooth Framerate pwns resolution.
A pet peeve of mine is crappy framepacing. Looking at you DarkSouls3...

Moot_Geeza

I hate the run up to next gen consoles because I'd always prefer to squeeze an extra few years of juice out of the ones I own. Ideally I'd like another three years out of my Switch rather than having to fork out for a hw revision, not that the JoyCons could take it.

Yossarian

hunk wrote:

Smooth Framerate pwns resolution.
A pet peeve of mine is crappy framepacing. Looking at you DarkSouls3...

HDMI 2.1 should go a long way to solving this.

I’m currently using Freesync over HDMI and I don’t notice framepacing issues any more.

LivDiv

What's frame pacing?
Is that keeping a consistent rate even if low?

hunk

Thank God for that! Will keep an eye out for that when upgrading the TV.

hunk

LivDiv wrote:

What's frame pacing?
Is that keeping a consistent rate even if low?

Yes.

LivDiv

Ok, yeah. I'm not overly fussed by frame rate but when it jumps about it is a pain in the arse.

Dark Soldier

LivDiv wrote:

Ok, yeah. I'm not overly fussed by frame rate but when it jumps about it is a pain in the arse.

Console thing. It's why 30fps on PC feels so rough

ShabbyMcCrabby

Moot_Geeza wrote:

Now that you mention it Rime wasn't exactly buttery smooth on PS4 either.

I think that's why some devs are going over to Unreal. It's very scalable now and a bit better optimised. I think

MattyJ

Unless Sony come out with some banging all out equivalent to Game Pass, I will most likely be getting Scarlet at launch and get PS5 a year or two after once exclusives are in effect.

Game Pass has already changed my purchasing and gaming habits and I've only had it a few months.

acemuzzy

Yup agree with that. I very nearly didn't bother renewing ps+, haven't had anything on it I really wanted for months, and barely MP, while gamepass has multiple things in keen to play through.

I suspect Sony will up their game to keep it tempting next next gen, they're bond to have noticed that gamepass is doing well. Or we're in the minority ofc and FIFA punters still mean they're raking it in.

It will depends on games, but FH5 for "free" given I'm gamepassed up till 2021 will be hard to resist...

mistercrayon

It’s kind of weird but the end of gen “free games” trick is being played in exact reverse...and having a similar effect on sympathies for a particular console.

acemuzzy

Loser's prerogative innit.

The fact that gamepass is free in perpetuity via http://thebearandbadger.co.uk/discussion/2310/microsoft-quests-google-rewards-sell-your-soul/p1 also helps ofc

nick_md

I power my PS4 down fully whenever I finish using it; it starts up from dead to on in a few seconds, how fast do you lot want it?

Granted I don't use it to play games, just watch youtube or listen to Spotify.

RedDave2

Using a ps4 for spotify seems.. energy excessive? Maybe I'm missing something but wouldn't a blue tooth speaker/ echo dot/ hifi linked to your phone be a better choice. Each to their own etc. etc.

As good as gamepass is, Sony would have a fantastic back log of first party stuff to fall back on if they wanted to copy the system. Anything from ps3 will hold up and theres a lot of stuff from ps2 / Vita age that would also be great. Curious if they feel the need to provide a similar system.

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