What will PS4 graphics be like?

[szvwxcszxc]

less than today's PCs? Your opinion/knowledge welcome


Moved from PC Gaming

Anandtech Moderator
KeithTalent

 

[mikegg]

My opinion: it will look amazing.

Incoming opinions:
-Who cares? It's all about the game play.
-PC will always have better graphics(actually not true.)

 

[szvwxcszxc]

My opinion: it will look amazing.

Incoming opinions:
-Who cares? It's all about the game play.
-PC will always have better graphics(actually not true.)

ppl who like graphics care

 

[KirklandBrand]

Since we have not heard anything on this topic it would be pure speculation at this point. I would hope that it would be as powerful as the 680 or at least 660ti.

 

[szvwxcszxc]

Xbox 720 is only getting 5xxx series ati card.

 

[ImpulsE69]

Due to the ever increasing costs of making games and the ever increasing profit companies want to make, they will be cutting corners this time around and going with 16bit graphics with no voice acting. This ensures that the maximum $$ can be put to development and overall game polish.

At first this may be apalling to many so called gamers these days, but then, as EA and Ubisoft said in their latest statements "Those aren't real gamers anyway."

Sony went on record as saying, "Our latest venture may surprise some. Many were expecting lifelike graphics and top notch A list actors in rehashes of games they've seen 10 or 15 times before, but really when you think about it, that's all just needless fluff. Minimalist, that is our new approach."

Many are speculating this has more to do with the large supply of older cheaper parts that are readily available and is just a quick money grab.

Microsoft, not to be outdone by Sony has hinted that it's next console may in fact not be a console at all, but just a tablet with no inputs. "We've seen the massive amounts of money that things like the Ipad Apple store and Android store have made and we think we can do it better. Making games for little of nothing that require no extra inputs but we can sell for $5-10."

 

[Aikouka]

I think it's worthwhile to keep in mind that Sony, as an entire company, isn't doing too hot. Their entertainment division does fairly well, but everything else is pretty much floundering. Can Sony afford to put out a "monster" and make it affordable (i.e. sell at a loss) or will they be forced to take concessions and put out a weaker machine?

Personally, I don't care which route they go. This is my opinion, but I'm tired of Sony's terrible excuse for operating system software. I own a PS3 (3 of them) and a Vita, and I've concluded that Sony is just downright awful at developing good game-related software. I went to see if they had a Sonic Transformed demo on the PSN (they don't, but it's on XBL -- another problem), and I found that I needed to download new PSN Store software. That software is sooooooo slooooooooow. It's just hard for me to look at Sony's software and take them seriously. I find the Vita to have some terrible design decisions and the PS3 is no better. Microsoft is probably the only good contender when it comes to their console's OS.

 

[videogames101]

Worse than whatever PCs can do at the time, given that new GPUs will have been released since the design of the PS4 was finalized.

 

[Arkaign]

I don't expect PS4 and X720 to be anything more than fairly low-cost devices that can reasonably do 1080p @ 60FPS with minimal AA. There's not going to be nearly the push from either company to move the bar too far this time around, just from a pure economics standpoint. This is for several reasons :

In 2005, Microsoft, having some momentum from the first Xbox's eventual success (it didn't really catch fire until Halo, a good long while after the console was released), and facing the huge hype about the upcoming 'super' powerful PS3, had to really go big in order to make an impact. They were still billions in the red on the Xbox division even with Halo selling large, and they bet it all with a huge push emboldened by massive profits from their OS and Office divisions. This was their push to get deeply embedded into our living rooms.

In 2006, when PS3 was released, Sony was in the middle of a format war, and so used the PS3 as the vanguard to defeat HDDVD, as well as a desperate attempt to hold the lucrative gaming sphere it had a giant stake in for over a decade.

A lot was on the line for both companies, each knew the other was going big, and so they both threw everything at it. This resulted in consoles that cost many hundreds of dollars, but STILL lost money unit for unit on release.

This time things are a lot different. Microsoft is shrinking, but fairly secure in the popularity of the Xbox branding now. They have little reason to go berzerk and try to push things very far. Sony is also seeing little reason to risk inflating the MSRP of the new console in order to please a significant minority of gamers who would even notice the power difference between say something on the line of a 7770 and a 7870.

The power is there now, without going insane, to have very detailed and fluid 1080p graphics with a bit of AA. I don't expect either side to do anything that would cause them unneccesary costs.

TL : DR - No way. PS4 and X720 will not beat even mediocre PC specs on release. I'd honestly be surprised if either was any better than a 7770.

 

[Maximilian]

Like this:

 

[Grooveriding]

The upcoming new consoles will not be even close to where high end GPUs are right now today. We're not getting the situation we did with 360/PS3 at their time of release being close to par with the best PC cards at the time.

There have already been leaks about hardware, and the XBox 720 development machines have been shown. They contain an AMD GPU and the thought is that performance is about 7770 level.

Console makers are not going to be interested in doing a repeat of selling consoles at a loss because of the hardware costs. Take a look at the WiiU and add 20-40% performance and that is where PS4/Xbox720 will be.

 

[Red Hawk]

Like this:

Look at those lighting effects. The shadows have such a high resolution!

 

[VulgarDisplay]

Look at those lighting effects. The shadows have such a high resolution!

Those graphics are pretty amazing, but I like other games with better art style like this.

Wait, is that racist? Blackface in video games in the 80's. We've come a long way since then.

 

[StinkyPinky]

Yeah I'm not expecting much. Graphics have reached a point for casual people that they don't care too much about it anymore. I'm picking the 720 to be the most powerful this round, but even that will be mediocre compared to what you can get on a pc.

BUT at least it will be some improvement. At least games will be designed around higher ram and vram, and DX11. I'll take anything at this stage.

 

[CPA]

Console makers are not going to be interested in doing a repeat of selling consoles at a loss because of the hardware costs. Take a look at the WiiU and add 20-40% performance and that is where PS4/Xbox720 will be.

Not questioning your intelligence, but how do you know they aren't interested in repeating that business model? Are there articles out there stating such?

 

[BrightCandle]

Just like the last round of consoles it seems the new set will be based on entry to mid level PC graphics technology and low end CPUs. Graphically they will do well for their hardware but its unlikely surpass a decent PC. High end kit simply doesn't fit in the price or power budget that a console maker has set.

 

[disappoint]

Crysis 1 graphics finally make it to the console.

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

It'll be a little better than ps3 but they will release it with Call Of Duty 7 and the console crowd will eat it up.

 

[Pr0d1gy]

Graphics are so overrated. Borderlands looks like a cartoon and is one of the best games of this generation. Personally, I find the "realistic", i.e. top flight, graphics to be too dark and muddied to be enjoyable. It's almost like they're trying to hard to make it look real at this point.

I think the PS4's graphics will be a little sharper and smoother and darker than they are now, but I don't see them taking the huge leap they took from say PS1 to PS2 or when we went from SD to HD on our TV's. 1080p to 4k is not the massive leap those were.

 

[kache]

Agree with everyone who said performance is not going to be groubdbreaking.
As the casuals increase has shown, the real money doesn't come from hardcore gamers, but from casuals, who don't care about graphics, and from people who use the console as media center.
So there is no need for MS and Sony to lose money.
This is especially true for MS, since they get royalties from any PC game made, so they don't really care if hardcore move to PC.

 

[BenSkywalker]

What will PS4 graphics be like?

Noone knows yet. Even the rumors are based on early dev kits, dev kits tend to keep getting upgraded until shortly before launch. For Sony I expect at least passing 4K resolution support and 1080p 60 3D simple due to them trying to promote the rest of their high end home entertainment components.

 

[Arkaign]

Not questioning your intelligence, but how do you know they aren't interested in repeating that business model? Are there articles out there stating such?

Look at how quiet both Microsoft and Sony have been this time around compared to the outright bluster of last time. Last time was a real war with a ton at stake. This time around I think they are basically ready to accept the status quo. I doubt the boardroom and investors of either company is willing to accept the large risk of losing money on each unit this time around. There's just not enough demand for next-gen graphics. Also remember the massive expense of more expensive PSUs, cooling apparatus, and warranty costs replacing dying/dead units because they really pushed the envelope of what they could stuff into a console.

Now look at a desktop 7950, the power draw that has, the cooling requirements, and then look at a typical console-sized box. There's not reasonably enough room to fit one in there without being even more extreme in terms of power draw, heat, size, and expense. Hence, we're going to see something on the scale of a 7770, and we'd be really lucky to see something in the range of 7850/7870 instead. Process tech is basically stalled, so even cutting edge TSMC/GF fabs aren't going to magically make higher specs possible within target TDP numbers.

In all cases, things are a lot different this time around. It's not all gloom though. With fewer massive changes, development on the new consoles should be less problematic than the seismic shift last time. Evolutionary rather than revolutionary will be a smoother transition for developers, and thus for gamers as well. Remember, all that is really required is decent ability to do high details at 1080p with moderate AA, something that even a 7770GE can do. I believe both new consoles will hit that easily. A big upgrade from the low-detail trickery-based 1080p currently, and the domination of 720p (or even lower) core resolutions current-gen consoles render things in. Ram is a big deal as well, and those limitations will be vastly moved out to enable much more complex AI and larger maps/levels/more textures with less loading times.

 

[Anteaus]

The PS4 will look like the PS3 albeit at higher framerates and some AA/AF.

The 360 and PS3 were designed for 1280X720. They were later pushed to 1920X1080, but they really don't have the memory or GPU to handle it so alot of shortcuts are taken with the graphics, specifically with low res textures and heavy DOF blurring, or as I like to call it abusive mip mapping. The average gamer sitting 10 feet from the TV probably wouldn't notice much, but once you get close any PC gamer can tell you how bad they are compared. Dark Souls is a good example because it came to PC looking just like it did on consoles.

The PS4/720 will be optimized for 1920X1080 gameplay. Proper aliased textures and higher framerates with a few bells and whistles. To console gamers it will be a big step up but for PC gamers it will be comparable to what we saw 12-18 months ago.

 

[Arkaign]

Also remember that in the current economy, even if console X was better, costing $100 or $200 more than the competition could actually cost a company millions of sales (installed base is massively important), so don't expect them to pile on the expense at all.

 

[Anteaus]

I think most of the advances that will come with the next console generation will be digital distribution and more robust social media. Until TVs jump in resolution again console makers will have some wiggling room in that department. The good news is that unless they do something out of the ordinary, the new consoles should be a bit cheaper to make than the last ones, as they are using off the shelf PC gear that was more than capable of 1920X1080 gameplay even a couple years ago.