The Xbox Onesie

So there are 3 people that actually think that all games will be native 4K. Interesting.
Well it doesn't have to be because pro doesn't do it. So if 1 game isn't 4k native it is then equal in power to the pro.
 
We still doing polls after that last debacle?

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No I dont think it will because that will be a games developers choice. Dont be mistaken that this device can't do 4k.
 
Nope... at least, he hasn't voted yet....

I was hoping he'd vote so i wouldn't be the only one. Come on Val, we've been over this man. When i bleed blue it's to back you up. With Andy gone, there's a big drop off in support here for PlayStation. MW's only giving me one post a month and it's like two words every time.

Maybe Val is finally throwing in the towel? I mean, he only plays Destiny on PS4 anyway and it will look and run better on Scorpio if everything goes right. Might as well get things in order now instead of looking foolish later.
 
Nope... at least, he hasn't voted yet....
I was hoping he'd vote so i wouldn't be the only one. Come on Val, we've been over this man. When i bleed blue it's to back you up. With Andy gone, there's a big drop off in support here for PlayStation. MW's only giving me one post a month and it's like two words every time.

Maybe Val is finally throwing in the towel? I mean, he only plays Destiny on PS4 anyway and it will look and run better on Scorpio if everything goes right. Might as well get things in order now instead of looking foolish later.
As I suspected, he'll take a break and cool off.

He'll be back. Like other times he takes a hiatus due to frustration, he'll take a break, then rejoin the board posting low key posts. Then after a short time, he'll be back full swing into it.
 
Where did andy go?
He is taking a vacation from Union. He may be back some day. I talk to him on occasion over PSN, and he isn't missing the place. If he came back now, he would leave again because it hasn't changed. Even though the forum is called UNION, the majority are Xbox fans from Team Xbox. Andy like PS and the games they offer, and there isn't enough PS conversations here.
 
He is taking a vacation from Union. He may be back some day. I talk to him on occasion over PSN, and he isn't missing the place. If he came back now, he would leave again because it hasn't changed. Even though the forum is called UNION, the majority are Xbox fans from Team Xbox. Andy like PS and the games they offer, and there isn't enough PS conversations here.

Tell him that I miss him and still <3 him even after abandoning us.
 
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Where did andy go?

He posts over at PSU, the place me and Kvally used to post at. I still have an account there, but only post once a month now. It's PS centric, so i'm sure he's enjoying it more than he did here.

But yeah, he's killing me in the PS section here. He used to post all kinds of great reviews and insight and now the section is dead because he's gone. :really:
 
He posts over at PSU, the place me and Kvally used to post at. I still have an account there, but only post once a month now. It's PS centric, so i'm sure he's enjoying it more than he did here.

But yeah, he's killing me in the PS section here. He used to post all kinds of great reviews and insight and now the section is dead because he's gone. :really:

That's a real shame. Hope he returns.
 
You get rid of ambient occlusion!? That's probably one of the most important effects for making games look better! I couldn't do that!

HBAO, HBAO+, VXAO, are all pretty demanding.

They really only add to the depth of shadows. Otherwise I would consider texture quality the most important in making games look better IMHO.
 
I'm positive he'll be back.

Hey Val, I'm going to assume you read this, but here's a tip if you don't want 90% of the forum coming at you. Personally, I don't think you really care, and you know exactly what you are doing. Your 18,000 posts are heavily skewed to pro-Sony/anti-MS, so the writing is on the wall. I don't think even those perma-banned guys like consolewarz and yoyoniner were this bad. At least for them, they only posted a few thousand times and that's it. Even they run out of steam at some point.

But if you really are puzzled why you feel like an outsider here, it really has nothing to do with being a PS fan.

There's lots of Sony fans on this board. And many gamers here have multiple platforms.

The difference is that almost all of your posts involving the console war. You know it, I know it, every knows it. So don't play dumb.

Given your posts over TXB and Union, you seem like a guy who's probably around 40 and has experience over numerous generations of systems and games. Now if you can take that experience and contribute to gaming threads here, you;d be more appreciated.

Hey, everyone knows I like MS now. I used to be a PS fan, but now prefer MS. So what? I also enjoy talking CoD, NHL (during the TXB days when we had a TXB team for two years), old time classic gaming in the 80s etc.... If anyone wants to talk about Intelly, Apple II, or quarter munching arcade gaming, I'm in. Anyone want to know how I rack up insane k/d camping with ARs and LMGs, ask away.

You have your preferences and experiences you could surely add, yet you focus almost all of your efforts into the MS vs Sony fight.

The only real neutral posts you do that seem interesting are your electronics thread posts where you educate gamers on TVs, features etc.... You think I know anything about backlit vs full array? Nope. But good to see people discussing it. Because at some point I'm going to get a new TV too.
 
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HBAO, HBAO+, VXAO, are all pretty demanding.

They really only add to the depth of shadows. Otherwise I would consider texture quality the most important in making games look better IMHO.
I want textures too. And I don't get why we don't have it yet. It's so confusing.
 
HBAO, HBAO+, VXAO, are all pretty demanding.

They really only add to the depth of shadows. Otherwise I would consider texture quality the most important in making games look better IMHO.
Those gathered shadows add a ton of depth to the scene. I can't stand baked shadows on dynamic ojects. Everything just looks flat to me. Like when an arm gets close to the body, or within grass. I really hate when the implementation sucks around eyes and in mouths. Or just the corners in rooms...
 
The recent interview with Phil Spencer has given us a bit more clarity on where Xbox stands when it comes to first party and they promise to bring the same kind of commitment to that as they did for Xbox in general, great stuff!

https://www.theguardian.com/technol...ncer?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_BaconReader_Premium

But he also said one thing that has caused quite a commotion on sites like NeoGAF. Not a big surprise there because it can be quite a echo chamber there and also because folks just don't fully read an article and jump to conclusions. But enough of that, i want to know what is your take on this:

“The audience for those big story-driven games... I won’t say it isn’t as large, but they’re not as consistent. You’ll have things like Zelda or Horizon Zero Dawn that’ll come out, and they’ll do really well, but they don’t have the same impact that they used to have, because the big service-based games are capturing such a large amount of the audience. Sony’s first-party studios do a lot of these games, and they’re good at them, but outside of that, it’s difficult – they’re become more rare; it’s a difficult business decision for those teams, you’re fighting into more headwind.

If he's talking about games like Watch_Dogs 2 (sadly) he's got a point, that one didn't do too great. But Jesus man, masses bought a Switch to play Zelda, a huge system seller. And Horizon did amazingly well too. So i can't really agree with him there. I get it though, their SP focused games so far haven't done too well at all but i'd say story-driven games overall are still doing really well. Witcher 3 and Fallout 4 say hi for example. Lots of people on GAF interpret this as ''You want story-driven games, get a Switch and PS4, we won't bother with them. Only Games as a Service (GaaS) from now on from us.''

“We’ve got to understand that if we enjoy those games, the business opportunity has to be there for them. I love story-based games. I just finished [LucasArts-inspired RPG] Thimbleweed Park – I thought it was a fantastic game. Inside was probably my game of last year. As an industry, I want to make sure both narrative-driven single-player games and service-based games have the opportunity to succeed. I think that’s critical for us.”

People seem to have the perception that GaaS ONLY means MP focused games. By that logic i guess Gears 5 won't have SP anymore. Correct me if i'm wrong but can't GaaS mean games that offer both a robust story mode and a MP mode? And that the MP mode is where the GaaS things comes in? Phil mentioned those two story-driven indie games that he really enjoyed, which is fine but as a big SP fan (that undoubtedly favors Xbox) i do hope it won't be just the smaller indie games that are their story-driven games. Please let us have more games like Crackdown that offer both content for SP fans and MP fans.

Unless things have changed drastically for that game and that it only has a MP focus now...which would really really destroy me. But what is your take on what he said? How do you interpret it? I don't believe for a second they will only put focus on MP from now on, because no way that's going to last because not every game can stand on it's own with just MP. It does seem like MS won't soon make a game like Zelda and Horizon in the sense that it's solely SP focused and no MP at all, but i am fine with that. Just don't abandon SP though.
 
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I do think single player games have a harder time because for them to be big hits the quality has to be much higher. When the quality is there so is the market and you see that with Zelda which is going to be the biggest game and the series by far. A game like Destiny doesn't need to be anything resembling a flawless product to be a big hit.

Microsoft is going to play to their strengths which is MP just like Sony would to SP so you can't blame them. I think the only problem would be if they try to make everything "service based" like they did with Fable.
 
It's reality- any game that comes back at you for more money with new DLC and continuous updates is a game as a service. If the game is good people are willing to pay for that. If you are a game maker you are foolish to ignore that reality and as a game player you benefit by bigger, continuously evolving games.

http://www.techspot.com/news/69034-5-billion-year-worth-downloadable-content-killing-creativity.html

Agreed. DLC, microtransactions, MP online aspects....they all can allow a game to make a lot more money. And in the end, it's a business.

I think GTA is a perfect example of a game that is obviously story driven, and a great SP experience. But look how it's evolved with its MP aspect, and how much money that has made them, and continues to do so. That must make most other devs salivate at the potential of doing some similar: minimal investment for a potentially huge return.

Once most SP games are finished, how many people keep playing them..? DLC can keep the experience going, but only for so long. Zelda is a bit of an outlier due to its incredible popularity, so the amount of units sold (and the coming DLC) outweigh any need for anything else.

I expect CD3 to follow this model. It'll be a game like GTA online that you can just keep playing and doing new things. RDR2 as well.
 
It's reality- any game that comes back at you for more money with new DLC and continuous updates is a game as a service. If the game is good people are willing to pay for that. If you are a game maker you are foolish to ignore that reality and as a game player you benefit by bigger, continuously evolving games.

http://www.techspot.com/news/69034-5-billion-year-worth-downloadable-content-killing-creativity.html

Oh it sure makes a lot of sense for game makers and publishers. Sony is in a great position where a lot of their SP games sell damn well and MS just doesn't have their answer to that and they decide to give GaaS a try. But that doesn't mean they aren't capable of it. 343 and The Coalition are very talented people and who knows what they could make with some creative freedom or if 343 really wants to keep making Halo games, take a break from the FPS Halo and make a third-person RPG set in the Halo universe. It could work for damn sure, for both SP and MP.

But i just don't understand this perception that this automatically means the death of any SP experiences on Xbox. Phil clearly says he wants both of them to succeed on their platform and i doubt he only means Inside and Thimbleweed-like games when talking about story-driven games.

Agreed. DLC, microtransactions, MP online aspects....they all can allow a game to make a lot more money. And in the end, it's a business.

I think GTA is a perfect example of a game that is obviously story driven, and a great SP experience. But look how it's evolved with its MP aspect, and how much money that has made them, and continues to do so. That must make most other devs salivate at the potential of doing some similar: minimal investment for a potentially huge return.

Once most SP games are finished, how many people keep playing them..? DLC can keep the experience going, but only for so long. Zelda is a bit of an outlier due to its incredible popularity, so the amount of units sold (and the coming DLC) outweigh any need for anything else.

I expect CD3 to follow this model. It'll be a game like GTA online that you can just keep playing and doing new things. RDR2 as well.

I hope Crackdown still has the story mode that they talked about quite a while ago. This game is not really going to succeed if it ships as a online only game where players just shoot the s*** out of eachother and bring down buildings. That story mode makes it a complete package. It just sucks that they have shared so so little about the game. Really hope we can still look forward to singleplayer with missions, customisation, orb collecting etc.
 
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How many times do you see people saying 'would buy if it had MP' or 'not worth full price without MP'?

Sadly single player games are a hard sell now with only a few seeing success which is a shame.
Smaller digital titles could be the answer.
 
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How many times do you see people saying 'would buy if it had MP' or 'not worth full price without MP'?

Sadly single player games are a hard sell now with only a few seeing success which is a shame.
Smaller digital titles could be the answer.

Yes that's very true. I see those kind of comments very often on forums. Personally i don't care and i would buy a SP focused game all the same. It's quite something that Horizon did so very well for Sony. SP only and not exactly from a studio that has always made gems or anything, not in my opinion. Of course the fact that almost everyone has a PS4 definitely helps too. Hopefully at E3 we get a better idea of where they are going.
 
It's a different console world the last 10 years.

The best selling games are: AAA production values + high quality.

The games with the longest lasting communities are: AAA production vales + high quality + good MP

The games that bring in the most money are: AAA production values + high quality + good MP + lots of DLC (maps, skins, season passes you name it)

And devs know this. That's why even games that are SP in nature (100% SP or is a game that is SP first, MP second) still have the option to download dashboard themes, add cosmetic content like costumes and weapon skins, etc.... EA and UBI give financial reports and they always say digital content is big money makers. It's amazing how much money people spend on EA Sports Ultimate Teams. Not my cup of tea, but other people do it. So that's why EA keeps doing it.

If this was the PS2 days where there was hardly any online games (heck, my PS2 didn't even have the ethernet port), everyone played SP or local MP. Any good game could be a big seller. But now, a SP focused game better be good and have lots of content. If not, most people won't bother, and prefer to get the most bang for their $60 which is probably going to be CoD, FIFA, or a large scale SP focused games like R* or Bethesda RPG.

It goes to show what people buy because there has been around 10 CoDs and 25 FIFAs. I guess people prefer to spend their money trusting franchises they like.

People might not like this trend, but I think it's good. Imagine if devs kept making games like 15 years ago. $60, and tons of games with 8 hr content and little replayability, no MP etc....

Now, there's a divide. You can still get SP focused games with 8 hr content, but most probably come from indies. The big studios focus mostly on larger games with DLC.
 
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Microsoft is going to play to their strengths which is MP just like Sony would to SP so you can't blame them. I think the only problem would be if they try to make everything "service based" like they did with Fable.
don't know if you've noticed, but the BIG multiplayer games are doing better on PS4, a system that also has single player games.
 
PlayStation has a bigger install base. Looking at NPD last month I would classify half of the top 10 as a game as a service with Ghost Recon being number one.
 
Having read the ENTIRE article, what I took away from it was that we should expect most (if not all) future titles coming out of MGS to have some kind of online service element (Moba/Co-Op//MMO/DLC/Microtrans) to justify the bigger AAA budgets going forward.

We can only hope that game studios will dedicate themselves to keeping SP campaigns from falling too far to the back of the bus. But this is probably the way of the future for gaming whether you are in house or independent. Your game is going to have to have MP elements if you want big budgets or publishing dollars from MS.

Phil isn't saying that he's going to turn down a great narrative driven SP campaign, but he's stating very plainly that he views games like Destiny and The Division as services, and having communities where millions of gamers are playing and contributing is a business model that MGS intends to foster and support. From MS' perspective they view the services model as a lower risk than just a SP based title. MS also wants it's Azure Cloud Platform to be the solution for small house developers, the incentive probably being free servers offered in exchange for exclusives. That's a business call each studio will have to make on their own.

So hypothetically if I own a studio or small game house, I might have this great concept and I'm pitching it to MGS, they're probably going to ask me FIRST what will be the "persistent world experience" component that's offered with my game. Could be the maker or deal breaker depending on just how much I've conceptualized the MP part of my game experience, and just how MS can take that concept and create a long term financial sustainer. This is going to require smarter planning and more thoughtful creation.

Overall, some very clear insight into how Spencer views the gaming industry and what he thinks the survivability of big budget games will need for the future.
 
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How many times do you see people saying 'would buy if it had MP' or 'not worth full price without MP'?
never seen it once, but i do see people complain about the lack of single player. remember titanfall and the complaints of no single player and how they fixed it in titanfall 2?

Sadly single player games are a hard sell now with only a few seeing success which is a shame.
if memory serves, every AAA single player exclusive on PS4 this year has sold very well. so I don't know how you come to that conclusion.
 
never seen it once, but i do see people complain about the lack of single player. remember titanfall and the complaints of no single player and how they fixed it in titanfall 2?
Shooting games by nature are competitive. Any shooter in modern day lacking SP will still have people complaining, but if it was the reverse and it was SP with no MP, the complaints would be 10-fold, and sales would drop like a rock.

I don't know any shooters in recent times that were SP focused and sold great with a long lasting community.

if memory serves, every AAA single player exclusive on PS4 this year has sold very well. so I don't know how you come to that conclusion.
UC is a SP focused game (though it also has MP) and sells great, but all those Bloodbornes, Niers etc.... have sales that pale in comparison to popular MP franchises.
 
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