Next Gen Xbox Reveal Confirmed for May 21

[SoleByThePound]

I haven't read the responses in here because I am sure there is a lot of negativity. I watched the conference and I am definitley looking forward to the new system. I personally never purchase a system in it's first two years because the library isn't ideal and developers are still figuring the machine out. That however might change with this system because I mostly use my 360 for everything and gaming comes in a distant second. Can't wait until E3 to see more coverage.

 

[bamez]

^^ you can put your NES cartridge in a SNES? you can put SNES cartridges in N64? You can play genesis games in a..... sega saturn?

 

[Bad Religion]

^
I was going to say I must have been dumber than I thought buying all those brand new SNES games.

 

[ssjjfar]

^^ you can put your NES cartridge in a SNES? you can put SNES cartridges in N64? You can play genesis games in a..... sega saturn?

Yeah what is he talking about?
PS2 was first console that was backwards compatible.
PS3 did it at the start, then they limited it, then they removed it(PS2 part of it not PS1).
360 has always had it although limited.

I'm pretty sure Wii and Wii U are both backward compatible, but I don't pay attention to Nintendo anymore.

 

[waitwut]

Homie went in!

god dam nobody gonna cop an xbox

 

[ssjjfar]

it was NEVER a priority for Sony

Sony had no system before PS1.
PS2 was fully backward compatable
PS3 had backward compatability.

PS2 was first to introduce backward compatibility to consoles, and it was one of the things that made ps2 so popular because beyond new ps2 games, at launch it had hundreds of games already available to play. Sony even forced PS2 integration into PS3 which helped contribute to its orginal high price because it required a separate engine inside it solely to play ps2 games.

How can you say it was never a priority for Sony? It only just recently got knocked off with their latest two products Vita and PS4.

 

[concordflightxi]

Digital foundry, xbox one is officially 33% weaker than PS4


Spec Analysis: Xbox One
Is PlayStation 4 really more powerful?



As a core gamer, it's difficult not to be frustrated by the manner of yesterday's Xbox reveal. Microsoft set out to champion its innovative platform, its vision for multimedia and a renewed focus on making Kinect relevant again as a convincing alternative to the traditional remote. But we wanted to know about the new generation of gaming and the approach in revealing Xbox One titles via trailers with no single identifiable example of actual live gameplay was an enormous error in judgement. The problem is that next-gen trailers look no different to current-gen trailers - so there was no groundbreaking innovation, no authenticity and therefore no buzz. Even the promising Call of Duty: Ghosts reveal - perhaps the closest thing we had to actual gameplay - was in-engine footage apparently running on Xbox One hardware. Yet there were no assurances that this was actually real-time, or that this would be the actual quality of the game we will be playing in November.

There was a similar level of inscrutability about the actual specs of the Xbox One hardware too. In the presentation itself, Microsoft talked in broad strokes about the internals of the box - eight CPU cores, 8GB of (non-descript) RAM, multi-channel 802.11n WiFi, and a Blu-ray drive. But the only new information we had that hadn't previously leaked was the inclusion of a 500GB hard drive and a five billion transistor count for the main processor. Gaming specs like the CPU clock-speed, the type of RAM, the make-up of the graphics core - all the most controversial elements of the leaked information, in other words - were ignored. The cynical may suggest that highlighting this would do Xbox One no favours in comparison to the PlayStation 4, while the Microsoft faithful could perhaps hold out hope that the more disappointing elements of the previous leaks were outright wrong.

A follow-up architecture panel hosted by Microsoft's Larry Hyrb soon put paid to the latter, more optimistic appraisal of the situation. Very early on it was established that ESRAM is indeed incorporated into the Xbox One design - essentially a large, very fast cache of embedded memory attached to the GPU and CPU that helps to make up the bandwidth deficit inherent in using slower memory. So even without direct confirmation, we now knew that the 8GB of memory in Xbox One is indeed DDR3 as opposed to the bandwidth-rich GDDR5 found in the PlayStation 4 (and Wired's internal photography of the One confirms 2133MHz DDR3 Micron modules). Xbox One may well have a latency advantage over PS4 and power consumption will probably be lower, but GPU bandwidth - a key element in graphics performance - is indeed more limited on the Microsoft hardware.

In terms of the GPU hardware, hard information was difficult to come by, but one of the engineers did let slip with a significant stat - 768 operations per clock. We know that both Xbox One and PlayStation 4 are based on Radeon GCN architecture and we also know that each compute unit is capable of 64 operations per clock. So, again through a process of extrapolation from the drip-feed of hard facts, the make-up of the One's GPU is confirmed - 12 compute units each capable of 64 ops/clock gives us the 768 total revealed by Microsoft and thus, by extension, the 1.2 teraflop graphics core. So that's another tick on the Durango leaked spec that has been transposed across to the final Xbox One architecture and the proof we need that PlayStation 4's 18 CU graphics core has 50 per cent more raw power than the GPU in the new Microsoft console. Now, bearing in mind that we fully expect PlayStation 4 and Xbox One to launch at similar price-points, how did this disparity come about?

The answer to that comes down to a specific gamble Sony made that Microsoft could not - the utilisation of a unified pool of GDDR5 memory. In the early days of PS4 development, only 2GB of this type of memory looked viable for a consumer-level device. As higher density modules became available, this was duly upgraded to 4GB. By the time of the reveal back in February, Sony had confidence that it could secure volume of 512MB modules and surprised everyone (even developers) by announcing that PS4 would ship with 8GB of unified GDDR5 RAM. The design of its surrounding architecture would not need to change throughout this process - one set of 16 GDDR5 chips would simply be swapped out for another.

Microsoft never had the luxury of this moving target. With multimedia such a core focus for its hardware, it set out to support 8GB of RAM from day one (at the time giving it a huge advantage over the early PS4 target RAM spec) and with serious volume of next-gen DDR4 unattainable in the time window, it zeroed in on supporting DDR3 and doing whatever was necessary to make that work on a console. The result is a complex architecture - 32MB of ESRAM is added to the processor die, along with "data move engines" to courier information around the system as quickly as possible with bespoke encode/decode hardware to alleviate common bottlenecks. Bottom line: if you're wondering why Xbox One has a weaker GPU than PlayStation 4, it's because both platform holders have similar silicon budgets for the main processor - Sony has used the die-space for additional compute units and ROPs (32 vs. 16 in One), while Microsoft has budgeted for ESRAM and data move engines instead. From the Xbox perspective, it's just unfortunate for Microsoft that Sony's gamble paid off - right up until the wire, it was confident of shipping with twice the amount of RAM as PlayStation 4.


Read more here http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-spec-analysis-xbox-one

My concern here is, I hope that the PS4 isn't hampered by the weaker Xbox One. Like they just build a game for the Xbox One call it a day and bring a weak port over to the PS4. Does it work that way? Honest question.

I just still feel a little burned that I chose the PS3 since it was the stronger system, but I ended up getting NBA 2k13 and Madden not being as smooth as its Xbox 360 counterpart. They say it had alot to do with the PS3 being hard for Devs and that the PS4 is more Dev-friendly. But only time will tell.

 

[championboyz7]

^^ you can put your NES cartridge in a SNES? you can put SNES cartridges in N64? You can play genesis games in a..... sega saturn?

when did I specify JUST home consoles? I didn't, so sit down moron.

Game Boy/DS systems were backwards-compatible for years; Sega Genesis could play all Master System cartridges with an adapter. This was always a [somewhat] important part of Nintendo & Sega's "plans" for their consoles; it was NEVER a priority for Sony or MS. look how Sony royally screwed over all original PSP owners with the release of the Vita (no disc tray for PSP UMDs) and that's just ONE generation cycle...for a handheld nonetheless (would've been much easier to make that 100% BC than the PS4)

but keep nitpicking for s*** to troll with

PS3 did it at the start, then they limited it, then they removed it(PS2 part of it not PS1).
360 has always had it although limited.

further proving my point that NEITHER CURRENT CONSOLE was ever 100% backwards compatible with ALL Xbox 1/PS2 games. wasn't a priority this gen, it won't be one for the Xbox One nor PS4. some of ya'll are slow as hell lol

Take your loss and be out.
80gbs that were FULL backwards compatible. You failing to notice whether they did it fully backwards compatible or not they still did it period. The ps2 and ps had and extensive library which is why the ps3 was backwards compatible up until the slim. The xbox didn't in my imo so they made certain games backwards compatible on the 360. The 360 on the other hand has an extensive library gears cod 4 etc which should be allowed to play on the next gen console. We're complaining because we want the choice to play those games on the new gen console. It's an opinion nobody is forcing you read of respond to what we say.
You already looked dumb as hell many times ^ just read what you've said so far . Take your L and keep itmoving.

 

[bully bob]

lol omg xbox sucks balls
 

 

[bamez]

people catchin' feelings hard in this thread... Sound like the 12 year old kids on Live, catching feelings, name calling, 

.  Don't wanna be a part of that community.. Enjoy your high blood pressure getting upset over video games.  Thread was fun tho, made my past 2 days at work go by pretty quickly.  See you all at E3 threads

 

[ravagebx]

What bothers me, as far as the obvious money grabbing tactics by M$ goes, is that this is the natural course of action that could've and should've been expected. Yet so many fans chose to ignore that they themselves opened the door for this to happen. When Live was first introduced as a pay service many people bought into it and to this day Xbox fans harp its marginal advantages and downplay the fact that you're paying for something you should not be paying for. It was never about the money! It's about the principle! Principles that are again being tested. We pay for our consoles. We pay for our games. We pay for our internet. We should not have been paying to play our games online. Bottom line. But fans told M$ it was ok by embracing the concept and letting them further monetize the gaming experience by bringing ads to live. So what's the next logical step? Forcing everyone who wants a next gen XBox to buy live. And forcing gamers to pay full price for used games. From day one M$ has been plugging away at creating ways to take more money out of our pockets. The door was opened with Live and now they're going for the gusto. I borrow and lend games often. If I have to pay full price to play it on my account there's not a chance in hell I'm buying an X1.

 

[derryj3]

[/quote]

WHAT IS THIS INSANITY?!!

According to so many of the detractors in here, people like you don't exist.

Word, I've had my 360 since launch...i used to play all types of games back then...but now my life and time has changed. I purchased like 3 games in 2012, Halo, Sleeping Dogs, and Walking Dead. Everything else was demos or what not, I actually haven't PLAYED a video game in like 3months, although I use my Xbox EVERYDAY. Xfinity App is clutch because i don't have an HD subscription with Comcast and HBO Go is the best thing smoking.

I guess this new Xbox will be great for me. but I can totally understand the frustration and disgust with a system that will not allow Rental games and used games in the traditional sense. I really think M$ is dropping the ball on this one by FORCING us to deal with these changes because market perception is something that can really hurt them. I'll be a day one purchaser either way tho. I hate the PS controller and I actually like the kinect features lol

 

[olx9o]

What bothers me, as far as the obvious money grabbing tactics by M$ goes, is that this is the natural course of action that could've and should've been expected. Yet so many fans chose to ignore that they themselves opened the door for this to happen. When Live was first introduced as a pay service many people bought into it and to this day Xbox fans harp its marginal advantages and downplay the fact that you're paying for something you should not be paying for. It was never about the money! It's about the principle! Principles that are again being tested. We pay for our consoles. We pay for our games. We pay for our internet. We should not have been paying to play our games online. Bottom line. But fans told M$ it was ok by embracing the concept and letting them further monetize the gaming experience by bringing ads to live. So what's the next logical step? Forcing everyone who wants a next gen XBox to buy live. And forcing gamers to pay full price for used games. From day one M$ has been plugging away at creating ways to take more money out of our pockets. The door was opened with Live and now they're going for the gusto. I borrow and lend games often. If I have to pay full price to play it on my account there's not a chance in hell I'm buying an X1.

XBL is only $60 a year...$5 a month for a service I feel is worth it. What you expect big companies to do? Not get money? What would you do if you were on the other end of the stick. It's not even that you shouldn't be paying for it...to me (and others) it's worth it. Of course other people gonna disagree tho. Paying full price $60 for a new game is nothing to me especially since I only play like 2-3 games, I dont like buying anything used. Thats just me though

 

[ravagebx]

This is exactly what I mean lol. Somewhere down the line M$ was able to convince a certain portion of the market that it was worth it to pay for a service that could just as easily be implemented for free and SHOULD be free. Now you're going to have to pay to borrow your friends games when it should be free. Good luck with that.

 

[infam0usp]

80gbs that were FULL backwards compatible.

the only person losing is YOU

 

[xtapolapacetl]

Is it really true that you need to pay a fee to play used games? That is basically a glorified "always on" feature as far as I'm concerned. So if my console breaks and I have like 30 games I have to pay to play them again? I'm a huge Xbox fan, but if this turns out to be the case, then I'm getting a PS4. If PS4 also has this feature, I'm getting a Wii U, I don't give a damn...

 

[D Double]

My concern here is, I hope that the PS4 isn't hampered by the weaker Xbox One. Like they just build a game for the Xbox One call it a day and bring a weak port over to the PS4. Does it work that way? Honest question.

I just still feel a little burned that I chose the PS3 since it was the stronger system, but I ended up getting NBA 2k13 and Madden not being as smooth as its Xbox 360 counterpart. They say it had alot to do with the PS3 being hard for Devs and that the PS4 is more Dev-friendly. But only time will tell.

That won't happen this time. PS4's much powerful with none of the glaring weaknesses the PS3 had. They learnt their lesson this time. As for them bringing a weak port to the PS4, it won't happen since they are using the same architecture which means they can easily use the extra grunt in the PS4 for better graphics, framerate, resolution, textures etc. It's the first party games or exclusives that will really shine though

XBL is only $60 a year...$5 a month for a service I feel is worth it. What you expect big companies to do? Not get money? What would you do if you were on the other end of the stick. It's not even that you shouldn't be paying for it...to me (and others) it's worth it. Of course other people gonna disagree tho. Paying full price $60 for a new game is nothing to me especially since I only play like 2-3 games, I dont like buying anything used. Thats just me though

The problem for MS these days is that Live is being compared to PS+. One lets you play online while the other gives you free games. Now that they have 300,000 servers, pray they don't increase the price again.

 

[championboyz7]

80gbs that were FULL backwards compatible.

the only person losing is YOU

Backwards Compatible The PlayStation 3 will be backward compatible with most PlayStation and PlayStation 2 games, which means you'll be able to play your favorite games without keeping all the old systems. The console will have slots for Memory Stick Duo, an SD slot and a Compact Flash memory slot. It comes with a pre-installed hard disc drive, which allows you to save games as well as download content from the internet.


I bought it on release date only this and another 80gb bundle is capable of it. Sit down

 

[deleted]

Some of you are gonna be real sour when PSN on PS4 is a pay service.

 

[htownhooper31]

Is it really true that you need to pay a fee to play used games? That is basically a glorified "always on" feature as far as I'm concerned. So if my console breaks and I have like 30 games I have to pay to play them again? I'm a huge Xbox fan, but if this turns out to be the case, then I'm getting a PS4. If PS4 also has this feature, I'm getting a Wii U, I don't give a damn...

Not quite. I think the games will be tied to account so hypothetically if your xbox breaks and you replace it you should be fine assuming you retrieved your xbox live account.

 

[yanky]

Is it true that the kinect system is required to play games?

 

[D Double]

Some of you are gonna be real sour when PSN on PS4 is a pay service.

I think basic online will be free but they'll probably add the Gaikai backwards compatibility and similar servivces on to PS+

Is it true that the kinect system is required to play games?

Yes Kinect must be connected for the system to work.

 

[Bend_The_Knee]

the argument wasn't that the PS3 was BC, the FACT is it's NOT 100% bc with all PS2 games & that chart I posted proves that. if you're too ignorant to see what's clear as day in your face, I really don't care. now take YOUR L & move on lame

You really taking this to heart.

 

[yanky]

I think basic online will be free but they'll probably add the Gaikai backwards compatibility and similar servivces on to PS+
Yes Kinect must be connected for the system to work.

That is ridiculous. I just got my xbox slim back in nov just for forza since I'm not a big gamer and Forza 5 looks really good so far. But since I can't play forza 4 on it and with all the gimmicks Microsoft threw out there with the One they're definitely not getting my money for it.

 

[offwhitewhite]