5 ms·

It's amusing that both the Xbox and PS5 stories are leading with "8K gaming", which is of course empty Big Number nonsense that's not going to materialize in re

It's amusing that both the Xbox and PS5 stories are leading with "8K gaming", which is of course empty Big Number nonsense that's not going to materialize in real games. I remember being a wide-eyed teenager that would get hyped up into a fever pitch by this kind of game system marketing.

dahart 7y ago
Even if it did, do people want 8k? I haven’t been pining for more than 1080p with my Xbox. Why isn’t HDR color moving very fast? I feel like I’d rather have more color resolution than spatial resolution given the choice...
- FridgeSeal 7y ago
  > Even if it did, do people want 8k? As a current PS4 owner, I’d definitely prefer 60+ fps baseline then 8k resolution.
- buildzr 7y ago
  I'd kill for 60fps 4k on anything. Sitting fairly close to a 65" TV it makes a big difference. But no console can even deliver that, I doubt they're going to deliver 8k gaming at any reasonable framerate in a modern AAA game, maybe 8k menus. EDIT: Maybe they're planning to go the way Nvidia is doing now with things like Deep Learning Super Sampling and try to scale up content in intelligent ways. I'm not sure how well that would work with realistically priced console hardware or what kind of results it would produce, maybe someone more familiar can comment on it.
  - MegaButts 7y ago
    > I'd kill for 60fps 4k on anything. There are a couple games on Xbox One X that support 4k60 - the one people care about is Forza Motorsport 7. From what I can tell, the Xbox One X can actually support 4k60, but I imagine it's a pain in the ass to accomplish and most studios don't bother since it's a niche market.
    - buildzr 7y ago
      You wouldn't think it's really a niche market - most TVs made in the past several years are 4k, prices have become quite cheap, if you're buying a new mid or high end TV today chances are it's a 4k panel. It's just a cost factor more than anything, if you spend $1200+ on video cards you can pull it off on PCs today with most major titles, but that price alone is several times what top of the line consoles run. That price is rapidly dropping, but just isn't there yet. As such, bragging about 8k support on a console that's probably not going to cost that much more seems... unrealistic to say the least.
      - MegaButts 7y ago
        I meant they have to optimize the games just for Xbox One X users, which I'd guess is less than 10% of Xbox One owners.
        rocky1138 7y ago
        This is one area that I wish the community was given more control. I don't know of a solution but it would be great if companies of all kinds would just say "We don't think this feature has a worthwhile financial return but if you (the players) want to find a way to make it work, here are the tools to do that." Then, interested parties, like GP, could take up the mantle.
- CharlesW 7y ago
  > Why isn’t HDR color moving very fast? Xbox One X supports this now. Here's a good list of titles that take advantage of it: https://www.xbox.com/en-us/games/xbox-one/xbox-one-x-enhanced-list https://www.xbox.com/en-us/games/xbox-one/xbox-one-x-enhance...
- xienze 7y ago
  > Why isn’t HDR color moving very fast? My theory on tech adoption is that the advantages of some new piece of tech have to be _immediately_ obvious to the average person and to such a large degree that they would actually care. E.g.: * Records -> Tapes: smaller, portable. * Tapes -> CDs: obvious sound quality improvements, never degrades, don't have to rewind/fast-forward. * CDs -> iPod et al: "you can carry hundreds of CDs in your pocket." * VHS -> DVD: just say "it does for movies what CDs did for music" and that's all it takes to convince someone of the benefits. * DVD -> Blu-ray: now it gets a little dicier. Yeah it's an obvious jump in quality but a lot of people just don't care. * Blu-ray -> UHD (just the resolution aspect): the average consumer isn't the most discriminating in terms of source quality, and even to someone who really cares it can be a bit tough to tell the difference (talking about movie transfers here, in particular). Generally the biggest benefit I've found here when going from Blu-ray to UHD is when the movie's existing Blu-ray transfer is 10+ years old and just terrible. The fact that the studio simply did a new scan is what brings out the improvement, and it would look pretty damn good on Blu-ray (just look at any Blu-ray sourced from a 4K scan). * SDR -> HDR: "the colors are better, man." Forget trying to sell this to your average consumer, even if they notice they won't care. 4K -> 8K? It's really out there as far as diminishing returns goes. It's not going to be embraced in any meaningful way by the average consumer. It'll be ubiquitous simply because hardware manufactures are eventually going to make nothing but 8K TVs, but the average person probably won't be able to tell it from 4K, perhaps even 1080p.
  - ummwhat 7y ago
    This is true even outside video tech. To gain adoption a product doesn't just need to be better. It needs to be so much better that it's worth the effort of adoption. That's why every "Facebook killer" dies on the vine. They just aren't better enough. That's why every Bitcoin killer fails to displace Bitcoin as number 1. Etc
- pier25 7y ago
  Many PS4 games run in HDR. It’s just slow in the Microsoft world.
CharlesW 7y ago
It gets more interesting when you think of use cases beyond an 8K mono screen. "8K VR" typically means 3840×2160 per eye, for example. It could even theoretically unlock scenarios like simultaneous 4K to a local display and 1080p to a handheld device.
- DaiPlusPlus 7y ago
  4K+1080 is a matter of downsampling, not re-rendering. You could even do the downsampling “for free” if it’s done by the part of hardware that reads from the framebuffer to generate the output signal just by skipping lines. Stereoscopic rendering (e.g. 2x4K) can far more expensive than 8K rendering despite brung half the pixels because all of the non-pixel-related scene rendering calculations have to be re-done to account for the two different camera positions.
  - CharlesW 7y ago
    > 4K+1080 is a matter of downsampling, not re-rendering. I'm talking about supporting multiple local players simultaneously. (Apologies if this wasn't obvious enough.)
mxfh 7y ago
The video at the event didn't even say anything about gaming specifically, just nebulous 8K "capabilities". https://twitter.com/Xbox/status/1137844761253957632 https://twitter.com/Xbox/status/1137844761253957632
- wildrhythms 7y ago
  My cynical side sees this as: "Your games still render at 1080, we scale the video up to 8K to output on your 8K screen."
  - asdff 7y ago
    Outputted to your 1080p screen 8 feet away from your head
- pier25 7y ago
  Maybe it’s just support for 8k movies... Who has an 8k tv anyway?
  - dcosson 7y ago
    Even if the cost premium wasn’t an issue, who has the geometry in their living room to be able to take advantage of an 8k resolution? Even 4K is hard to take advantage of in a living room setting, you need a huge tv with your seating set up very close to it.
    - pier25 7y ago
      I agree. I have a 65'' and 4K is not a huge improvement over 1080p at 10 feet. For 8K to make any sense you'd need a 100'' at least which is massive and prohibitive. IMO HDR is a much bigger improvement than 4K.
toomuchequate 7y ago
The whole commercial was a reminder how closed off console gaming is. >SSD Yeah that reminds me how far behind console gaming is.
- Someone1234 7y ago
  You can get an X-Box One S 1TB w/Game for $225. A 1 TB SSD costs upwards of $115 (48% of the total console cost). The gap was significantly wider when the X-Box One S launched in August 2016. Therefore it is less about how behind/ahead they are and more about creating a consistent platform and setting a price that is comfortable for the mass market appeal they're aiming for. By contrast a GeForce RTX 2060 starts at $350. Hardly comparing like with like price wise. Even their "high end" X-Box One X is only $400. And we're missing CPU, RAM, SSD, motherboard, case, and Windows license and already $50 shy of that.
  - luhn 7y ago
    Xbox One S is still spinning rust.
- rolltiide 7y ago
  My PS4 has had an SSD in it since 2014. Wow half a decade. I recently upgraded it to 1tb, from 512gb. I also realized that my systems have SSDs in them no matter how optimistic I feel about my future spending capabilities. Matter of priorities. I didn't find this SSD part of the teaser compelling, but I'm looking forward to the 8K pipeline in 2023 I guess. Will my short-throw projector support 8K? Will my internet connection support 8K streaming without restrictive bandwidth limits? Will my cellular connection support 8K streaming without consequences for my otherwise casual use? Will there be a lot of content? Will I actually enjoy any of this more?

dahart 7y ago

Even if it did, do people want 8k? I haven’t been pining for more than 1080p with my Xbox. Why isn’t HDR color moving very fast? I feel like I’d rather have more color resolution than spatial resolution given the choice...

FridgeSeal 7y ago
> Even if it did, do people want 8k? As a current PS4 owner, I’d definitely prefer 60+ fps baseline then 8k resolution.
buildzr 7y ago
I'd kill for 60fps 4k on anything. Sitting fairly close to a 65" TV it makes a big difference. But no console can even deliver that, I doubt they're going to deliver 8k gaming at any reasonable framerate in a modern AAA game, maybe 8k menus. EDIT: Maybe they're planning to go the way Nvidia is doing now with things like Deep Learning Super Sampling and try to scale up content in intelligent ways. I'm not sure how well that would work with realistically priced console hardware or what kind of results it would produce, maybe someone more familiar can comment on it.
- MegaButts 7y ago
  > I'd kill for 60fps 4k on anything. There are a couple games on Xbox One X that support 4k60 - the one people care about is Forza Motorsport 7. From what I can tell, the Xbox One X can actually support 4k60, but I imagine it's a pain in the ass to accomplish and most studios don't bother since it's a niche market.
  - buildzr 7y ago
    You wouldn't think it's really a niche market - most TVs made in the past several years are 4k, prices have become quite cheap, if you're buying a new mid or high end TV today chances are it's a 4k panel. It's just a cost factor more than anything, if you spend $1200+ on video cards you can pull it off on PCs today with most major titles, but that price alone is several times what top of the line consoles run. That price is rapidly dropping, but just isn't there yet. As such, bragging about 8k support on a console that's probably not going to cost that much more seems... unrealistic to say the least.
    - MegaButts 7y ago
      I meant they have to optimize the games just for Xbox One X users, which I'd guess is less than 10% of Xbox One owners.
      - rocky1138 7y ago
        This is one area that I wish the community was given more control. I don't know of a solution but it would be great if companies of all kinds would just say "We don't think this feature has a worthwhile financial return but if you (the players) want to find a way to make it work, here are the tools to do that." Then, interested parties, like GP, could take up the mantle.
CharlesW 7y ago
> Why isn’t HDR color moving very fast? Xbox One X supports this now. Here's a good list of titles that take advantage of it: https://www.xbox.com/en-us/games/xbox-one/xbox-one-x-enhanced-list https://www.xbox.com/en-us/games/xbox-one/xbox-one-x-enhance...
xienze 7y ago
> Why isn’t HDR color moving very fast? My theory on tech adoption is that the advantages of some new piece of tech have to be _immediately_ obvious to the average person and to such a large degree that they would actually care. E.g.: * Records -> Tapes: smaller, portable. * Tapes -> CDs: obvious sound quality improvements, never degrades, don't have to rewind/fast-forward. * CDs -> iPod et al: "you can carry hundreds of CDs in your pocket." * VHS -> DVD: just say "it does for movies what CDs did for music" and that's all it takes to convince someone of the benefits. * DVD -> Blu-ray: now it gets a little dicier. Yeah it's an obvious jump in quality but a lot of people just don't care. * Blu-ray -> UHD (just the resolution aspect): the average consumer isn't the most discriminating in terms of source quality, and even to someone who really cares it can be a bit tough to tell the difference (talking about movie transfers here, in particular). Generally the biggest benefit I've found here when going from Blu-ray to UHD is when the movie's existing Blu-ray transfer is 10+ years old and just terrible. The fact that the studio simply did a new scan is what brings out the improvement, and it would look pretty damn good on Blu-ray (just look at any Blu-ray sourced from a 4K scan). * SDR -> HDR: "the colors are better, man." Forget trying to sell this to your average consumer, even if they notice they won't care. 4K -> 8K? It's really out there as far as diminishing returns goes. It's not going to be embraced in any meaningful way by the average consumer. It'll be ubiquitous simply because hardware manufactures are eventually going to make nothing but 8K TVs, but the average person probably won't be able to tell it from 4K, perhaps even 1080p.
- ummwhat 7y ago
  This is true even outside video tech. To gain adoption a product doesn't just need to be better. It needs to be so much better that it's worth the effort of adoption. That's why every "Facebook killer" dies on the vine. They just aren't better enough. That's why every Bitcoin killer fails to displace Bitcoin as number 1. Etc
pier25 7y ago
Many PS4 games run in HDR. It’s just slow in the Microsoft world.

CharlesW 7y ago

It gets more interesting when you think of use cases beyond an 8K mono screen. "8K VR" typically means 3840×2160 per eye, for example. It could even theoretically unlock scenarios like simultaneous 4K to a local display and 1080p to a handheld device.

DaiPlusPlus 7y ago
4K+1080 is a matter of downsampling, not re-rendering. You could even do the downsampling “for free” if it’s done by the part of hardware that reads from the framebuffer to generate the output signal just by skipping lines. Stereoscopic rendering (e.g. 2x4K) can far more expensive than 8K rendering despite brung half the pixels because all of the non-pixel-related scene rendering calculations have to be re-done to account for the two different camera positions.
- CharlesW 7y ago
  > 4K+1080 is a matter of downsampling, not re-rendering. I'm talking about supporting multiple local players simultaneously. (Apologies if this wasn't obvious enough.)

mxfh 7y ago

The video at the event didn't even say anything about gaming specifically, just nebulous 8K "capabilities". https://twitter.com/Xbox/status/1137844761253957632 https://twitter.com/Xbox/status/1137844761253957632

wildrhythms 7y ago
My cynical side sees this as: "Your games still render at 1080, we scale the video up to 8K to output on your 8K screen."
- asdff 7y ago
  Outputted to your 1080p screen 8 feet away from your head
pier25 7y ago
Maybe it’s just support for 8k movies... Who has an 8k tv anyway?
- dcosson 7y ago
  Even if the cost premium wasn’t an issue, who has the geometry in their living room to be able to take advantage of an 8k resolution? Even 4K is hard to take advantage of in a living room setting, you need a huge tv with your seating set up very close to it.
  - pier25 7y ago
    I agree. I have a 65'' and 4K is not a huge improvement over 1080p at 10 feet. For 8K to make any sense you'd need a 100'' at least which is massive and prohibitive. IMO HDR is a much bigger improvement than 4K.

toomuchequate 7y ago

The whole commercial was a reminder how closed off console gaming is. >SSD Yeah that reminds me how far behind console gaming is.

Someone1234 7y ago
You can get an X-Box One S 1TB w/Game for $225. A 1 TB SSD costs upwards of $115 (48% of the total console cost). The gap was significantly wider when the X-Box One S launched in August 2016. Therefore it is less about how behind/ahead they are and more about creating a consistent platform and setting a price that is comfortable for the mass market appeal they're aiming for. By contrast a GeForce RTX 2060 starts at $350. Hardly comparing like with like price wise. Even their "high end" X-Box One X is only $400. And we're missing CPU, RAM, SSD, motherboard, case, and Windows license and already $50 shy of that.
- luhn 7y ago
  Xbox One S is still spinning rust.
rolltiide 7y ago
My PS4 has had an SSD in it since 2014. Wow half a decade. I recently upgraded it to 1tb, from 512gb. I also realized that my systems have SSDs in them no matter how optimistic I feel about my future spending capabilities. Matter of priorities. I didn't find this SSD part of the teaser compelling, but I'm looking forward to the 8K pipeline in 2023 I guess. Will my short-throw projector support 8K? Will my internet connection support 8K streaming without restrictive bandwidth limits? Will my cellular connection support 8K streaming without consequences for my otherwise casual use? Will there be a lot of content? Will I actually enjoy any of this more?