Scorpio offical reveal incoming, along with 4K Forza, RDR2 and Battlefront.

[George P Global Moderator]

31 minutes ago, Asmodai said:

I don't think any current TV supports Freesync nor do I think they likely will in the future.  It's neat to have in there and you can use it if you hook your Xbox to a monitor but major televisions aren't designed to support video games and freesync has no value in normal video content.

True, but monitors that do support this seem to be getting bigger, the type of gamers who love this stuff will probably use something like a 4k 30" monitor or bigger if they can get one.   As far as my post, I wasn't going to wait more to get a 4k HDR tv and my old one has been acting up for months so it was time to change anyways.

[George P Global Moderator]

Here's some Scorpio dev kit information, even more of a beast.

[+Asmodai MVC]

Just now, George P said:

Here's some Scorpio dev kit information, even more of a beast.

That link is blocked at work... any chance you could quote some highlights?

[George P Global Moderator]

Just now, Asmodai said:

That link is blocked at work... any chance you could quote some highlights?

There's a few other sites with info, let me post those links.

 

WindowsCentral

TheVerge

The dev kits come with 44 Compute Units compared to 40 for the retail units, also it has 24GB of RAM compared to 12GB for the retail units.   It also has a second NIC to send debug code for multiplayer testing, and a 2nd 1TB SSD along with the 1TB HDD that will come with the retail units, so two drives in total.

[+Asmodai MVC]

8 minutes ago, George P said:

There's a few other sites with info, let me post those links.

 

WindowsCentral

TheVerge

The dev kits come with 44 Compute Units compared to 40 for the retail units, also it has 24GB of RAM compared to 12GB for the retail units.   It also has a second NIC to send debug code for multiplayer testing, and a 2nd 1TB SSD along with the 1TB HDD that will come with the retail units, so two drives in total.

ROFL, my work blocks the t.co url replacer you used too but fortunately both WindowsCentral and TheVerge are not blocked.  Thanks for the heads up!

[George P Global Moderator]

Looks like we'll be waiting till E3 to find out what the scorpio is finally called, priced and looks like.

[Skiver Veteran]

Obviously not official but...

 

Xbox Scorpio price REVEALED: Would you pay this for Project Scorpio?

 

Quote

Xbox Scorpio price details may have been leaked ahead of the holiday 2017 release date.

Microsoft is expected to announce the Xbox One Scorpio price at E3 2017. However, one retailer may have spilled the beans early.

Spanish retailer XtraLife (via DesiXBL) is advertising the upcoming Xbox Scorpio console with a €399 price tag. That's roughly £335 in the UK, although it's more likely to cost £399 if the advert is accurate.

1

Source

 

I personally don't believe this, I think the price will either be stupidly high for a console £800 region or it will release at around £400 which was the same rough price as the XB1 on release. 

[+Asmodai MVC]

8 hours ago, Skiver said:

Obviously not official but...

 

Xbox Scorpio price REVEALED: Would you pay this for Project Scorpio?

 

Source

 

I personally don't believe this, I think the price will either be stupidly high for a console £800 region or it will release at around £400 which was the same rough price as the XB1 on release. 

I don't know the currency conversions and such but I strongly suspect Project Scorpio will cost no more than the original Xbox One at launch (when it came with Kinect).

[George P Global Moderator]

I expect $499 which was the same price for the original Xbox One, but if it's anything less than that, then we're talking a deal, hell at $499 I think it's a good price already when you think about it.

[dipsylalapo Supervisor]

If that's the price, that's a good spot to hit. But MS really need to hit a home run with the games they provide. The Xbox One isn't a bad system but there aren't as many of the exclusives as the Playstation. Let's hope they can start catching up on that front too.

[+Asmodai MVC]

On 4/21/2017 at 7:24 AM, dipsylalapo said:

If that's the price, that's a good spot to hit. But MS really need to hit a home run with the games they provide. The Xbox One isn't a bad system but there aren't as many of the exclusives as the Playstation. Let's hope they can start catching up on that front too.

I'm not sure how that would happen.  Microsoft isn't going to suddenly burst out with a whole ton of new first party studios and I don't think they've been holding back games from the ones they have.  3rd parties aren't going to turn their back on Sony's larger install base which even if Project Scorpio does well, and I believe it will, it's not going to flip the overall numbers and outsell combined PS4 lifetime sales.  Japanese developers aren't going to pick Project Scorpio for exclusive JRPG launches.  What's more likely to happen is just that Sony will get less non-first party exclusives because the gap won't be quite so large if sales are good and developers want to play with the better tech.  Also Microsoft will get the best versions of the multi-platform games for Project Scorpio going forward.  I'm already holding off on buying Middle-Earth:  Shadow of War for example for my PS4 because I want to get the "better" version on Project Scorpio when it comes out.  I suspect I'll be buying very few non-PS4 exclusives going forward because I'll want the Project Scorpio versions instead.  My PS4 will end up being just for exclusives (like the upcoming God of War) and my existing library of games.

[MikeChipshop Member]

I'll be very surprised and happy if that's the price it comes in at. I had thoughts of this being a high end, premium model with a high end premium price, but at £399, it's a lot, but no where near where i was expecting. Fingers crossed eh?!

[+Asmodai MVC]

4 minutes ago, MikeChipshop said:

I'll be very surprised and happy if that's the price it comes in at. I had thoughts of this being a high end, premium model with a high end premium price, but at £399, it's a lot, but no where near where i was expecting. Fingers crossed eh?!

It is the "high end, premium model".  The "normal" model would be the Xbox One S which is currently seling for what... $250?  You figure they might even have a price cut on that before the end of the year when Project Scorpio will launch so it may be as low as $199 by then.  Even $399 would be DOUBLE the price then, that's a "premium model" to me.

[George P Global Moderator]

Sure 3rd party developers aren't going to turn their back on Sony at this point BUT, like MS did with TR, they can just get timed exclusives, and while the Xbox One install base is smaller if they do Xbox + Windows 10 and make them play anywhere, like a few have already, RE7 for example, then I don't think developers will say no.    

 

Also, there's lots of games out there that need a publisher, why not spend the money?   MS not spending on games is why they're lacking at the moment.  Sony has and still does, pay to make games exclusive, even keeping them off of the PC, while some are just made console exclusive and make their way to Steam, like Nier.   

[+Asmodai MVC]

1 hour ago, George P said:

Sure 3rd party developers aren't going to turn their back on Sony at this point BUT, like MS did with TR, they can just get timed exclusives, and while the Xbox One install base is smaller if they do Xbox + Windows 10 and make them play anywhere, like a few have already, RE7 for example, then I don't think developers will say no.

My understanding is that TR was a 2nd party development not 3rd party as Microsoft funded it's development.  1st and 2nd party exculsives will of course continue but I wouldn't expect them to ramp up significantly above what they are already doing just because Project Scorpio launched.  I think MS is doing them when they can now and launching new hardware isn't going to make a bunch of new opportunities available.  Also I didn't get the feeling TR worked out so well, but maybe that's because I tend to be more on the PS side and forum posts tend to skew negative.  There's a fair amount of hate out there for Crystal Dynamics because of the TR deal though and I'm not sure it made much on PlayStation after the year delay.

 

I wasn't counting timed exclusives though either, MS can have as many of them as they decide to throw money at I'd expect but I really don't see them just dumping a ton of money more than they do now just because the new hardware launches, I think they'd at least hope developers would want to focus on the new, more powerful hardware, without them having to throw tons of money their way.  Maybe they'll have things like exclusive map packs or some such too but those are just little extras and I thought we were talking about whole games.

 

My understanding of the Windows 10 situation from the people in the industry is that game developers still almost universally HATE UWP that I believe the "Play Anywhere" thing is tied to.  Most "Play Anywhere" games are first or second party not typically third and while there have been a few 3rd party experiments they've largely been seen as failures thus far.  I expect that will change as UWP continues to develop but I'm not sure it well be changed significantly by the end of the year when Project Scorpio launches.  3rd party multi-platform games will likely remain Win32/64 for some time which there are even PS "console exclusives" that have Windows/Mac versions as well.  I certainly don't think 3rd parties are going to drop PS4 support to make Win10/Xbox One exclusive games... that's leaving way too much money on the table from the larger PS4 install base.

 

Quote

   Also, there's lots of games out there that need a publisher, why not spend the money?   MS not spending on games is why they're lacking at the moment.  Sony has and still does, pay to make games exclusive, even keeping them off of the PC, while some are just made console exclusive and make their way to Steam, like Nier.   

You make it sound like I'm saying they aren't going to spend money on publishing games anymore.  I'm not saying it's going to STOP, I'm saying it's not going to suddenely jump because they launched new hardware.  Yes there's lots of games out there that need a publisher, why do you think MS isn't spending the money on them now?  You seriously think they're holding back supporting their platform until Project Scorpio launches.   I'm saying they're going to continue doing what they're doing now once Project Scorpio launches... there isn't likey to be a huge sudden shift.

 

I don't think Sony pays a ton of money to get 2nd or 3rd party exclusives either.  I DO think their first party studios make more games than Microsofts first party studios and I don't see that as sunddenly changing when Project Scorpio launches either.  I think a fair amount of Sony 3rd party exclusives are a direct result of them having a significantly larger market share, NOT Sony paying them money.  I'm not saying Sony NEVER pays 3rd parties for exclusives but I don't believe that's the main reason exclusives exist.  Also American companies aren't as loyal to Xbox as Japanese companies are to Sony.  A fair amount of Sony's 3rd party exclusives are from Japanese developers who have no interest at all in developing for Xbox which sells horribly in their home country even without Sony paying them a cent.  Heck there are a bunch of PS4 games over there that never even get officially released in the U.S. at all.  MS doesn't really have an equivalent to that.

 

As for PC I don't think Sony cares if games release on PC as well.  I don't think they see PC as console competition at all.  Again there are PS4 "console exclusives" and Sony is fine with that.  They don't care to spend the development effort to make more than one version of their own internal projects or have to support the multiple hardware/software configurations on a PC but I don't think they pay anyone to keep their products off PC.  If 3rd parties don't support PCs it's probably because they don't want to have to mess with the headaches of dealing with all the various hardware/software configurations that you have to deal with when you make a PC game... not because Sony is encouraging them not to.

[spaceelf]

On ‎4‎/‎24‎/‎2017 at 2:30 PM, Asmodai said:

If 3rd parties don't support PCs it's probably because they don't want to have to mess with the headaches of dealing with all the various hardware/software configurations that you have to deal with when you make a PC game... not because Sony is encouraging them not to.

Agree and disagree with that point.  MS makes it very easy to do cross platform with similar APIs and dev tools for xbox and Windows (especially win10 where you can use a lot of the same background systems,) where with PS4 the only renderer and tools available to my knowledge have no PC counterparts.  So yeah, Sony doesn't have to care but that doesn't mean they don't make it more difficult.

 

Anyvey on topic: I think Scorpio might be the first one I've ever bought at launch.  We'll see.  I've always been wary about launch hardware for manufacturing issues but it'll be damn hard to resist unless it's above 450.

[+Asmodai MVC]

15 hours ago, dwLostCat said:

Agree and disagree with that point.  MS makes it very easy to do cross platform with similar APIs and dev tools for xbox and Windows (especially win10 where you can use a lot of the same background systems,) where with PS4 the only renderer and tools available to my knowledge have no PC counterparts.  So yeah, Sony doesn't have to care but that doesn't mean they don't make it more difficult.

There's is difference between making something more difficult not going out of your way to make it easier.

Sony doesn't use a different API to make it difficult for developers to port games.  They use a different API because they make a new API for every console generation that's super low level and hardware specific.  They actually DO try to make it a little easier for developers by making it look SIMILAR to existing APIs that developers would be familiar with but they aren't going to use OpenGL or DirectX that they have no control over for their custom hardware.

 

In the case of this generation Sony launched the PS4 in 2013 with an API called GNM.  GNM is ultra low level, lower level than DX12 or Mantel or Vulkan which came out later.  Being so low level makes it EXTREMELY powerful but also very difficult to program (the developers have to do darn near everything manually).  To make things easier and more familiar though they created a bunch of wrappers that did things that DX11 and such does for developers and the API using these wrapper is called GNMX and looks very similar to DX11.

 

Not using someone elses API doesn't mean they are trying to make things more difficult.  They try to make thinks less difficult by making their API look familiar to other APIs while still being able to control the API for their specialized hardware.  If the PS4 had to use OpenGL or DirectX at launch it would have taken a serious performance hit.  MS took a lot of flack from developers for launching Xbox One with pretty much vanilla DX11 on day one instead of a lower level API.  They quickly upgraded the Xbox API through XDK updates to improve the situation so Xbox One was running a more tailored version of DX11 but it was a mistake to launch with near vanilla DX11 and performance took a hit because of it.  DX12 largely resolves that and it much closer to GNM but it didn't come out until around 2 years after the console launched and while much closer to GNM it's still not quite as low and it's not specific to the Xbox ONe hardware so it has a bunch of stuff in it that the Xbox One hardware doesn't support... why would Sony want to copy that?

[spaceelf]

4 minutes ago, Asmodai said:

MS took a lot of flack from developers for launching Xbox One with pretty much vanilla DX11 on day one instead of a lower level API.  They quickly upgraded the Xbox API through XDK updates to improve the situation so Xbox One was running a more tailored version of DX11 but it was a mistake to launch with near vanilla DX11 and performance took a hit because of it.  DX12 largely resolves that and it much closer to GNM but it didn't come out until around 2 years after the console launched and while much closer to GNM it's still not quite as low and it's not specific to the Xbox ONe hardware so it has a bunch of stuff in it that the Xbox One hardware doesn't support... why would Sony want to copy that?

To my knowledge Xbox One has always had a custom renderer as well as DX11 and most devs that used the DX11 renderer (as with Ark) had incredibly crap performance.  DX12 is far better, but is still not the preferred renderer for the X1.

 

So PS4 also having a low level renderer is not much of a win.

 

6 minutes ago, Asmodai said:

There's is difference between making something more difficult not going out of your way to make it easier.

Yes.  Which makes it more difficult by proxy, whether it was through action or inaction.

[+Asmodai MVC]

21 minutes ago, dwLostCat said:

To my knowledge Xbox One has always had a custom renderer as well as DX11 and most devs that used the DX11 renderer (as with Ark) had incredibly crap performance.  DX12 is far better, but is still not the preferred renderer for the X1.

 

So PS4 also having a low level renderer is not much of a win.

 

Yes.  Which makes it more difficult by proxy, whether it was through action or inaction.

I have no idea what you're trying to say.  In both of your replies you directly contradict yourself.

 

In your first response you first talk about how DX11 had incredibly crap performance and then say so PS4 also having a low level renderer is not much of a win.

PS4 having a low level renderer is a HUGE win.  You can go look up the old eurogamer article about the XDK leak (they're under NDA normally) that goes through how MS scrambled to get out XDK updates out to fix the not-very low level but technically custom renderer (which was very similar to vanilla DX11... which is why I said "pretty much" and "near" DX11 and NOT specifically DX11).

 

In your second response you say "Yes" and then contradict it.  Yes there is a difference but here's why there isn't.  I personally think your inaction claim is rubbish but you're certainly entitled to your opinion.  I contend that not helping someone is not the same as harming them, if you believe they are the same then we'll just have to agree to disagree.

 

 

[spaceelf]

28 minutes ago, Asmodai said:

In your first response you first talk about how DX11 had incredibly crap performance and then say so PS4 also having a low level renderer is not much of a win.

PS4 having a low level renderer is a HUGE win.  You can go look up the old eurogamer article about the XDK leak (they're under NDA normally) that goes through how MS scrambled to get out XDK updates out to fix the not-very low level but technically custom renderer (which was very similar to vanilla DX11... which is why I said "pretty much" and "near" DX11 and NOT specifically DX11).

 

In your second response you say "Yes" and then contradict it.  Yes there is a difference but here's why there isn't.  I personally think your inaction claim is rubbish but you're certainly entitled to your opinion.  I contend that not helping someone is not the same as harming them, if you believe they are the same then we'll just have to agree to disagree.

Having a low level renderer is certainly not much of a win over another low level renderer.  I don't know if they had the same capability as now originally, but from what I know there are currently three rendering paths and the vanilla DX11 and DX12 renderers aren't the best option.  If your best source is seriously outdated info, that's not much of a source.

 

As for point 2 it costs money to code everything to separate systems.  So sure they aren't being harmed by Sony directly, but they are being harmed financially (though many devs use middleware to do the work, so much of this can be mitigated easily enough.)

[+Asmodai MVC]

44 minutes ago, dwLostCat said:

Having a low level renderer is certainly not much of a win over another low level renderer.

As I stated MS did NOT have a low lever renderer that was comparable to GNM AT LAUNCH.

44 minutes ago, dwLostCat said:

  I don't know if they had the same capability as now originally,

I do know, they didn't.  That's what I said in the first place.  The preferred renderer changed radically in the early days for MS to close the gap between what they launched with and what Sony launched with.

 

44 minutes ago, dwLostCat said:

but from what I know there are currently three rendering paths and the vanilla DX11 and DX12 renderers aren't the best option. If your best source is seriously outdated info, that's not much of a source.

Are you for real?  I'm talking about what Xbox One LAUNCHED with.  You aren't going to get articles talking about the state of the API at launch four years later.  Again, as I stated before "They quickly [after launch] upgraded the Xbox API through XDK updates to improve the situation".  I'm NOT talking about the CURRENT state of the API, the situation has long since been resolved.  The eurogamer article is still an excellent chronicle of the early API changes in the first year or so after the Xbox One launch as Microsoft scrambled to catch up and more importantly provides evidence of my claims as opposed to your "from what I know" and "to my knowledge". Clearly you aren't well informed so perhaps if you read the article the sitution will improve.

44 minutes ago, dwLostCat said:

As for point 2 it costs money to code everything to separate systems.  So sure they aren't being harmed by Sony directly, but they are being harmed financially (though many devs use middleware to do the work, so much of this can be mitigated easily enough.)

Sony is not doing something in order to harm them.  It IS a seperate system and thus requires different coding.  Unless they just use all off the shelf parts so nothing needs any special coding then it's going to cost money to code to that seperate system.  That's just the nature of the beast not Sony trying to make things more difficult.  Sony doesn't control OpenGL or DirectX and neither were low enough level for a cosole at launch so they had to make their own API (GNM), just has they have in the past...  they DID go out of their way to make wrappers that worked like existing APIs to make things easier for developers to port (GNMX) but they couldn't just wholesale copy DirectX and even if they could it doesn't have all the features the new hardware supported that they needed to expose to developers.

[spaceelf]

10 minutes ago, Asmodai said:

Are you for real?  I'm talking about what Xbox One LAUNCHED with.  You aren't going to get articles talking about the state of the API at launch four years later.  Again, as I stated before "They quickly [after launch] upgraded the Xbox API through XDK updates to improve the situation".  I'm NOT talking about the CURRENT state of the API, the situation has long since been resolved.  The eurogamer article is still an excellent chronicle of the early API changes in the first year or so after the Xbox One launch as Microsoft scrambled to catch up and more importantly provides evidence of my claims as opposed to your "from what I know" and "to my knowledge". Clearly you aren't well informed so perhaps if you read the article the sitution will improve.

I wasn't talking about launch, except that I don't know the state of the low level renderer at the time.

 

I don't think you gave me a link to read, and yes I prefer to work with actual facts in front of me and searching wasn't finding them.

 

 

[spaceelf]

37 minutes ago, Asmodai said:

Clearly you aren't well informed

On a side note, I read everything I possibly can (available on the web) on these topics.  I just have no idea where I read most of it.

[spaceelf]

It'll be damn good to move past X1 and PS4.  The next generation should be amazing.  After Scorpio and PS5/whatever I think they're going to have to invent reasons for anyone to upgrade so I wonder how things will go there.

[+Asmodai MVC]

On ‎5‎/‎11‎/‎2017 at 6:00 PM, dwLostCat said:

I wasn't talking about launch, except that I don't know the state of the low level renderer at the time.

Seriously!?!  Your first post in this back and forth included my quote where I stated:

"MS took a lot of flack from developers for launching Xbox One with pretty much vanilla DX11 on day one instead of a lower level API."

To which you repied:

"To my knowledge Xbox One has always..."

As if to contradict my statement.  Last I checked "always" includes "at launch" or "on day one".

Since you're now admitting you don't know the state of the low level renderer at the time though this discussion is clearly over.  To your credit though you did prefix your statement with "To my knowledge..." which you now admit you didn't have any.

 

Quote

I don't think you gave me a link to read, and yes I prefer to work with actual facts in front of me and searching wasn't finding them.

I didn't give you a link, I thought I gave enough info to find it but if not:

Google: Xbox One SDK Leak eurogamer

Top Result is:

The evolution of Xbox One - as told by the SDK leak

It covers A LOT more than just the renderer but for the purposes of this discussion pay attention to the original renderer vs. the "monolithic" one.  The mono one is the low level one but it didn't LAUNCH with that as I stated.  It's an interesting read all in all if you like that sort of thing though.