Game exec : 'PS4 will out-power most PCs for years to come' ...

[slayernine]

Most PC's are not gaming PCs. Also most consoles are not new consoles.

If this dude wasn't retarded he would compare new gaming PC's to new consoles. And sorry PS4 but my not-even-that-new gaming PC will destroy you.

 

[PrincessFrosty]

$220 for GPU, you still need CPU, RAM, Bluray drive, motherboard, WiFi, Bluetooth, PSU, manufacturing costs, packaging + PSEye, and somehow managing to fit that in a $399 box.

No actually you don't.

Because console hardware is subsidized by royalties from game developers which hikes the average price of games to be higher than that of PC games. So while you'll never meet the hardware price of a console, the difference in total cost between the 2 systems will swing in favour of the console being more expensive after you reach a certain amount spent on games.

This is the console business model, it's there to fool people like you in to thinking that gaming is actually cheaper on consoles when that's just not true when averaged over long periods of time and across lots of people.

 

[slayernine]

If we are talking in generalizations like "most" the statement should be revised to say:

"Most consoles are inferior compared to most PC's"

This statement is true because there tons of old consoles on the market and they are generally a lot slower than a similar generation computer.

There is some point to what the guy is saying because many PC game developers cater to all the people with ancient computers that can barely run DX9 so PC's averaged out are not as or similarly powered to the PS4.

I haven't looked at a Valve hardware survey recently but that has some really good stats in it. Like how most users have dual core processors or better and 4gb ram is pretty average. Someone should look up the actual recent results because I'm feeling too lazy to do it.

 

[badb0y]

No actually you don't.

Because console hardware is subsidized by royalties from game developers which hikes the average price of games to be higher than that of PC games. So while you'll never meet the hardware price of a console, the difference in total cost between the 2 systems will swing in favour of the console being more expensive after you reach a certain amount spent on games.

This is the console business model, it's there to fool people like you in to thinking that gaming is actually cheaper on consoles when that's just not true when averaged over long periods of time and across lots of people.

You can use GameFly it's like 16$ a month and you can rent the game, beat it, send it back and get another one. It's like a Netflix for games.

 

[slayernine]

No actually you don't.

Because console hardware is subsidized by royalties from game developers which hikes the average price of games to be higher than that of PC games. So while you'll never meet the hardware price of a console, the difference in total cost between the 2 systems will swing in favour of the console being more expensive after you reach a certain amount spent on games.

This is the console business model, it's there to fool people like you in to thinking that gaming is actually cheaper on consoles when that's just not true when averaged over long periods of time and across lots of people.

You are right on man, PC games start at $50 while consoles have console tax and start at $60-70. Other than the @55hole dev's like EA who try and charge you $60 for a PC game (I'm looking at you BF3!!!).

 

[slayernine]

You can use GameFly it's like 16$ a month and you can rent the game, beat it, send it back and get another one. It's like a Netflix for games.

How can you compare renting to owning? Renting is something you do only if you have to. Unless it is a crappy game I almost always want to keep it in my game library.

Renting does enable console gamers to put up with the overpriced bull that you have to put up with but it sucks and the pricing on console games is just getting worse every year as they find new ways to suck money out of you. Not that PC gaming is immune to it but there are definitely good games on PC that don't have DLC, Season passes or other money grubbing fingers in your wallet.

 

[Regs]

Also on a uniform platform, you can really optimize and get the most out of your system.

Which makes me wonder why they went x86.

 

[blackened23]

Which makes me wonder why they went x86.

It doesn't matter. They can write directly to hardware which is currently not possible on PCs, DirectX 11 is crippled by the fact that even simple draw calls take hundreds of cycles longer than it does on a console. PCs have to brute force everything in a very unelegant manner, while consoles can bypass the API nonsense.

Furthermore, PS4 will allow the use of libGCM which will provide superior performance given the similar hardware as a PC. In other words, a console with a 7850 class GPU with libGM will be a _lot_ faster than a PC using a 7850 with directx11 API. APIs cripple PCs.

Now with that said, PCs will eventually brute force their way past consoles again. Eventually, PCs will be on top again. Unfortunately, microsoft isn't interested in gamers since they absolutely will not allow games to bypass API. Currently that is making us realize only a FRACTION of our possible performance - if we could get past that we could probably do 4k gaming at 60 fps already. But we can't. Thank microsoft for this.

 

[PrincessFrosty]

You are right on man, PC games start at $50 while consoles have console tax and start at $60-70. Other than the @55hole dev's like EA who try and charge you $60 for a PC game (I'm looking at you BF3!!!).

Yep, I did a blog post on this years ago that sums up the genuine cost comparisons between equal games on both platforms on or close to release day, although the prices will be out dated now.

http://www.pcgamingstandards.com/Blog.aspx?blogid=4

The simple fact is that you cannot get something for nothing, it's not that the PC hardware is overpriced, it's at a reasonable price point for what it actually is. It's that the console hardware is cheaper than it costs to produce or at the very least not sold at a profit.

You can use GameFly it's like 16$ a month and you can rent the game, beat it, send it back and get another one. It's like a Netflix for games.

I'm talking about like for like here, I mean I could argue that you can play an entire swath of free games on the PC even large modern MMO ones for absolutely nothing. Most gaming is done on large AAA titles bought on or close to release day at full price point, that's when the most units ship.

I mean the idea of console gaming being more expensive over time is simply a fact of the situation, you can say that without even needing to calculate it, you can simply infer it from the fact that the console business model works, if on average every console gamer rented games and never bought brand new then the console manufacturers would make a massive net loss and the whole model would fail.

 

[Wreckem]

4K will take what...3 or more years to become anywhere close to standard?

sorry, I meant to say $K

Its going to take about a decade for decent market penetration in the consumer home entertainment market. Early adopters and home theater enthusiasts will adopt it in 3-5 years but its going to take a long time for a sizable amount of people to adopt it. More so since the avg joe blow can't really tell the difference between 720p and 1080p. Most joe blows only recently upgraded to 1080p, and most of those are SHITTY sets. They aren't likely to be upgrading unless they have a failure and even then, they aren't likely to get a 4K TV anytime soon, not until they get down to current TV prices. The prevalence of cheap shitty 1080p sets is what has given 1080p its market penetration.

As for the desktop pc market, well, I don't see it being widely adopted on the desktop for consumers. Since the desktop is dying(slowly) in the consumer market place. It will be adopted by pros and enthusiasts.

And as for gaming, the reality is everything comes down to market penetration. Yes, todays fastest high end enthuists systems, and even high end performance systems beat out the PS4 and XboxNext. The market penetration for those types of systems is tiny and an even tinier when compared to what the the market penetraton for the next gen consoles will be. Add to that only some games take advantage of the cutting edge PC power. Most still cater to the lowest common denominator. Frankly, you only need a high end system so you can have enough framerates for a few games at 1440p/1600p and the vast majority of gamers play on 1080p or less. And IIRC lower resolution monitors have more market share than 1440p/1600p and thats even when counting all those 27" iMacs out there(the 27" iMac being one of the most prevelent 1440p panels out there).

 

[werepossum]

If we are talking in generalizations like "most" the statement should be revised to say:

"Most consoles are inferior compared to most PC's"

This statement is true because there tons of old consoles on the market and they are generally a lot slower than a similar generation computer.

There is some point to what the guy is saying because many PC game developers cater to all the people with ancient computers that can barely run DX9 so PC's averaged out are not as or similarly powered to the PS4.

I haven't looked at a Valve hardware survey recently but that has some really good stats in it. Like how most users have dual core processors or better and 4gb ram is pretty average. Someone should look up the actual recent results because I'm feeling too lazy to do it.

Still, console numbers and penetration (virtually 100% of consoles are used for gaming after all) are so high that developers are free to program only for latest generation consoles. By contrast, when developing for/porting to PCs developers must consider the entire installation base and try to min/max hardware requirements & performance to get the most sales.

I'm very glad to see the PS4 go to PC-type hardware because it will ease porting to PCs, which should leave developers more resources to optimize PC ports.

 

[Midwayman]

Its going to take about a decade for decent market penetration in the consumer home entertainment market. Early adopters and home theater enthusiasts will adopt it in 3-5 years but its going to take a long time for a sizable amount of people to adopt it. More so since the avg joe blow can't really tell the difference between 720p and 1080p. Most joe blows only recently upgraded to 1080p, and most of those are SHITTY sets. They aren't likely to be upgrading unless they have a failure and even then, they aren't likely to get a 4K TV anytime soon, not until they get down to current TV prices. The prevalence of cheap shitty 1080p sets is what has given 1080p its market penetration.

I'd be shocked to see 4k replace the market in general any quicker than the lifetime of current sets. And that's if there is negligible difference in price by then. It simply isn't a useful tech for the size of sets most consumers are buying and content will be spotty at best for an extremely long time. Hell cable and satellite have a tough time delivering any signal better than 720p as it is. Bandwidth is going to get a lot better before we see any change there.

 

[zinfamous]

Its going to take about a decade for decent market penetration in the consumer home entertainment market. Early adopters and home theater enthusiasts will adopt it in 3-5 years but its going to take a long time for a sizable amount of people to adopt it. More so since the avg joe blow can't really tell the difference between 720p and 1080p. Most joe blows only recently upgraded to 1080p, and most of those are SHITTY sets. They aren't likely to be upgrading unless they have a failure and even then, they aren't likely to get a 4K TV anytime soon, not until they get down to current TV prices. The prevalence of cheap shitty 1080p sets is what has given 1080p its market penetration.

As for the desktop pc market, well, I don't see it being widely adopted on the desktop for consumers. Since the desktop is dying(slowly) in the consumer market place. It will be adopted by pros and enthusiasts.

And as for gaming, the reality is everything comes down to market penetration. Yes, todays fastest high end enthuists systems, and even high end performance systems beat out the PS4 and XboxNext. The market penetration for those types of systems is tiny and an even tinier when compared to what the the market penetraton for the next gen consoles will be. Add to that only some games take advantage of the cutting edge PC power. Most still cater to the lowest common denominator. Frankly, you only need a high end system so you can have enough framerates for a few games at 1440p/1600p and the vast majority of gamers play on 1080p or less. And IIRC lower resolution monitors have more market share than 1440p/1600p and thats even when counting all those 27" iMacs out there(the 27" iMac being one of the most prevelent 1440p panels out there).

yeah, I haven't been following this closely...my 3-5 years was being a little liberal, under the assumption that they were further along than I thought--that these units were already "somewhat" available.

 

[Arkaign]

Haha, I'd say that the PS3 significantly outguns the average PC in gaming ability already. Now 95+% of PCs are not gaming units anyway, or they might play solitaire or minesweeper from time to time. PS4 and X720 will just increase that average lead.

But full-fledged gaming PCs? PS4/X720 will approach a mediocre 'gaming' PC on launch, but will be outgunned for resolution/framerate from the day they drop compared to even 2nd-tier builds like my current one. Not to mention customization.

It's good that they're finally upgrading them. It won't really change anything. PC gamers aren't likely to want to drop their PCs for consoles (most PC gamers already play at least one console for the types of games which aren't that great/available on PC anyway), nor will console-only players consider switching to PCs (browsing console-only forums around the web, these are stunningly non-technical users that would burst into flames if you told them to install an updated video driver).

Anyway, PR BS is PR BS, and it's not like the PC industry doesn't have truckloads of it's own PR BS.

 

[Arkaign]

I'd be shocked to see 4k replace the market in general any quicker than the lifetime of current sets. And that's if there is negligible difference in price by then. It simply isn't a useful tech for the size of sets most consumers are buying and content will be spotty at best for an extremely long time. Hell cable and satellite have a tough time delivering any signal better than 720p as it is. Bandwidth is going to get a lot better before we see any change there.

I'm one of the most excited people on earth about 4K, but realistically, we're talking 2022-2025 before the 'average' set at Wally world/etc is 4K. And that's fairly optimistic. They are hugely more expensive to produce, and that's not going to change any time soon. In the day of 42" 1080p for $349/etc, it's hard to get joe blow to spend even $1k on a 4K set. And $1k for a 42" 4K? Maybe by 2019 or 2020 at the earliest.

And that's not even the worst part. The worst part is that broadcast/cable/satellite as you say won't be 4K ready for a loooooooooooooooooooooooooooong looooooooooooooooooooooong time.

The reasons are many, and with so many huge obstacles it's incredibly difficult for them to overcome.

(1)- Most areas of the country don't have good fiberoptic network connectivity, which is needed to pipe the kind of bandwidth even fairly compressed 4K needs.

(2)- Virtually all existing networks aren't even properly set up for 1080p.

(3)- Dish/etc satellite cannot do 4K with existing infrastructure.

(4)- Overcoming these and other problems will require the investment of many, many billions of dollars. Nobody is going to spend these billions when the market/demand for such products is nonexistent.

I honestly believe that we're looking at a repeat of Laserdisc with 4K tech. The parallels will be astonishing.

(A)- A great technology, but expensive, and initially adopted by only a tiny fraction of owners.

(B)- Shortly after launch, mostly forgotten and idle.

(C)- As better TVs start to become more widespread, and the costs come down, demand increases quite a bit, and it becomes at least a vibrant niche home theatre standard.

(D)- Replaced by something better.

That's what happened with Laserdisc. It officially debuted in 1978, but it was ahead of its time. Basically nobody had TVs that could do it justice, and content was next to nil. By the mid to late 1990s (until DVD killed it), it had become a centerpiece of any home theatre buff. Content was robust, and tons of amazing director's cuts, Criterion discs, etc were out there.

 

[Midwayman]

That's what happened with Laserdisc. It officially debuted in 1978, but it was ahead of its time. Basically nobody had TVs that could do it justice, and content was next to nil. By the mid to late 1990s (until DVD killed it), it had become a centerpiece of any home theatre buff. Content was robust, and tons of amazing director's cuts, Criterion discs, etc were out there.

Pretty apt comparison. I think it'll end up a very niche product that only a few HT geeks care about. If they every figure out glass-less 3d that works well, or holographic sets or something. That'll be big I think. 1080p is 'good enough' for the size of sets most people have. Kinda like sdtv was good enough for a very long time due to small tube sizes.

 

[MeldarthX]

Pretty apt comparison. I think it'll end up a very niche product that only a few HT geeks care about. If they every figure out glass-less 3d that works well, or holographic sets or something. That'll be big I think. 1080p is 'good enough' for the size of sets most people have. Kinda like sdtv was good enough for a very long time due to small tube sizes.

I loved Laserdisk - my parents had that set up with amazing 5.1 surround; *my dad said he was going to update his sound and tv and spend a lot of money on it*

Its only now with bluray disks that sound if finally equalled to Laserdisk sound as sound isn't compressed anymore like it was on cds and dvds......

Best way to test it; take a copy of Top Gun on laserdisk......and compare to top gun on dvd...

The sound qualify different will blow you away......then compare with bluray....the same finally

That's just one of the many reasons i always call bullshit on people when they say 1080p compressed stream can equal the quality of a bluray playback.....

 

[alcoholbob]

Due to API overhead, the statement might not be far off. Didn't Carmack say it takes something like 10 to 100 times longer to make a texture call on a PC vs a console because of API overhead?

 

[disappoint]

Comparing a gaming console to non-gaming PCs is like comparing cars to trucks. TEH 2014 TOY YODA CAMRY WILL BE FASTER THAN A UPS TRUCK FOR YEARS TO COM! Wow really?

Is he trying to get me to hurt myself rolling my eyes?

 

[HeXen]

Comparing a gaming console to non-gaming PCs is like comparing cars to trucks. TEH 2014 TOY YODA CAMRY WILL BE FASTER THAN A UPS TRUCK FOR YEARS TO COM! Wow really?

Is he trying to get me to hurt myself rolling my eyes?

Not too many people have a UPS truck. He's comparing 2 mass consumer items. Mass consumers as an average have very crappy gaming PC's, therefore they cannot do much gaming on them and is why they buy consoles. As Arkaign said, a PS3 will play and look better than similar games would on most peoples PC's. Naturally a PS4 would do the same for years to come. Even high end rigs don't see much ram being used, 8 gigs will be pretty nice for devs, hopefully we'll see more 64bit ports making use of it on the PC side too at some point.

 

[Doppel]

He's not wrong. Most pcs are old mom and pop things that have celerons and maybe low grade duo cores. Even older gaming PCs will probably be outpowered (1st gen quads).

True but this is not what he meant unless he thinks that most people play games on these old things. They sure don't. Or else congrats the console is better than some old pos that grandma uses to dial up aol

 

[blackened23]

True but this is not what he meant unless he thinks that most people play games on these old things. They sure don't. Or else congrats the console is better than some old pos that grandma uses to dial up aol

Oh please. Just drop the PC elitism nonsense and realize that using a PC or console isn't mutually exclusive, you can enjoy both. I personally plan on buying a PS4 for exclusives and multiplayer games to use alongside my PC.

Futhermore, realize that by using libGCM a console with directly comparable hardware will outperform the PC using DirectX11 by leaps and bounds. Simply put, APIs have latency overhead which creates hundreds of cycles of wait time for even simple draw calls. When you program direct to hardware with libGCM this is not the case.

I don't know the specifics of the hardware in the PS4, but if it's comparable to 7850 as the specs suggest. It would actually not be surprising if it did outperform PCs with even higher levels of hardware. You can find many interviews from folks like John Carmack or Tim Lottes discussing libGCM use on the PS4. If that is indeed usable on the PS4 expect some amazing things - By programming directly to hardware with libGCM, a 7850 in a PS4 will simply outclass a PC using a crippling middleware API such as DX11 with the same 7850.

 

[badb0y]

How can you compare renting to owning? Renting is something you do only if you have to. Unless it is a crappy game I almost always want to keep it in my game library.

Renting does enable console gamers to put up with the overpriced bull that you have to put up with but it sucks and the pricing on console games is just getting worse every year as they find new ways to suck money out of you. Not that PC gaming is immune to it but there are definitely good games on PC that don't have DLC, Season passes or other money grubbing fingers in your wallet.

I was just offering it as an alternative like I go for the best deals on the PC I always go for the best deals on consoles and the best deal on consoles is hands down GameFly. If you rent a game and you like it, you can actually buy it at a discounted price so it's pretty much the same thing unless you insist on having every God of War game in your collection or something like that.

Yep, I did a blog post on this years ago that sums up the genuine cost comparisons between equal games on both platforms on or close to release day, although the prices will be out dated now.

http://www.pcgamingstandards.com/Blog.aspx?blogid=4

The simple fact is that you cannot get something for nothing, it's not that the PC hardware is overpriced, it's at a reasonable price point for what it actually is. It's that the console hardware is cheaper than it costs to produce or at the very least not sold at a profit.



I'm talking about like for like here, I mean I could argue that you can play an entire swath of free games on the PC even large modern MMO ones for absolutely nothing. Most gaming is done on large AAA titles bought on or close to release day at full price point, that's when the most units ship.

I mean the idea of console gaming being more expensive over time is simply a fact of the situation, you can say that without even needing to calculate it, you can simply infer it from the fact that the console business model works, if on average every console gamer rented games and never bought brand new then the console manufacturers would make a massive net loss and the whole model would fail.

I disagree with this, I don't know how PC gamers have convinced themselves that PC gaming is somehow cheaper than console gaming. Unless you are a casual PC gamer, you will probably upgrade your PC twice over the lifetime of a console. I upgrade my components multiple times a year and spend about 4-$500 easily every time. My consoles? I paid like $300 for my PS3 and I got my Xbox 360 for free with my TV and that's about it. If a game is multiplatform then I buy it on the PC simply because I like to crank the eye candy and prefer using a Mouse/keyboard but if it's not available on the PC then I buy it for my console.

Your F2P analogy doesn't really work because most of those games have micro transactions and some are even Pay2Win type of games. With GameFly or a similar rental service I get full games and I get unlimited rentals in a year. I wish I had a similar service on my PC because yea, that Bioshock game on my Steam list is so useful after beating it once and never touching it again.

 

[guidedbyechoes]

I would stay exclusively with consoles if I have more options for custom setups for controls, like having the option to use mouse and keyboard.

They allowed modding of games to expand content and you don't have to buy every little extra you get.

If they included some free to play games.

Not start every game at 60-70 dollars and expect you to pay more for first day dlc.

Not load it full of apps and BS and bury games and demos in the back of the interface. Not change the interface every 4 months would be great too.

 

[BD2003]

I just wonder what's going to happen when PS4 games start taking full advantage of the 8GB of GDDR5. Most PC games are still just dressed up ports of console games that need to squeeze into 512mb of DDR3.

I imagine in a year or two, console ports (ie: everything that isn't an MMO or RTS) will regularly demand a minimum of 8GB-12GB DRAM (cause of OS) and 4GB VRAM to match the visual quality of the consoles, despite all the brute force computational advantage a GTX 680 might have.