Id / John Carmack announces the PS3 version of RAGE will run at only20-to-30fps, breaking promise of all versions running at 60fps. Meanwhilethe Xbox 360 version still runs at 60fps

wrote in message
...


Is there really any evidence that DX11 will be that more compelling
than DX10? And was DX10 really that much more compelling than DX9?
I'm not trying to be overly skeptical here, as I look forward to new
technology too, but I get the increasing sense (especially after
eyeballing FC2 at DX10 at high resolutions with everything maxed) that
we are "there" when it comes to graphic quality, and that game
developers should be focusing on things like immersion, value to
consumer, overall fun factor. Breaking away from the hyped corporate
marketing-team inspired bull**** and focusing on how to appeal to
gamers rather than buyers of well advertised crap.



we are not 'there' in computer graphics.
does a race game look like real life cars - in the same way a crappy low
resolution AVI can ? - does a desert in fallout 3 look like a real life
desert?
does a character in a modern game look like a real person?
no no and no.
we are still in the 'looks like a cartoon 'era.


--
Gareth.

that fly...... is your magic wand....

On Aug 1, 1:15*pm, wrote:
On Sat, 1 Aug 2009 00:57:35 -0700 (PDT), argento32



wrote:
On Aug 1, 4:00*am, wrote:
On Fri, 31 Jul 2009 22:13:43 -0700 (PDT), parallax-scroll

wrote:
On Jul 31, 1:30*pm, Tim O wrote:
On Thu, 30 Jul 2009 11:48:19 -0700 (PDT), Air Raid

wrote:
The Xbox 360 and PC versions of id's Rage sport higher framerates than
thePlayStation 3version, the latest issue of Edge magazine reveals..

I realize this post is intended to start a flame war, and as a fan of
PC gaming, I often try to wind up the console players, but lets take a
serious look at the issue.

Rage was programmed by id, traditionally a PC game company.
The XBox360 shares so much architecture with the PC, that it's not
surprising an id game would run well on it.

Actually that is not really true. *Although the Xbox 360 shares much
in common with PC architecture on the software side, as far as
Microsoft's tools, development environment, DirectX API, etc, but if
you take a close look at the actual hardware architecture of the 360,
it's not a PC at all. *
The Xenon CPU is a custom triple-core PowerPC.
No PC uses PowerPC CPU that I'm aware of. *

Which is really a testament to how good DirectX is at running on
multiple CPU platforms. *What a shame that the PS3 came out with the
selling point that it was some sort of super computer of the future,
with all sorts of mind boggling possibilities, when the reality is
that the aging XBox 360, despite it's on-paper specs, simply had a
much more mature software architecture with which to build games upon.

The Xenos GPU, is also a
custom piece of silicon, that has no direct PC counterpart.

Very true, because the average 3 year old PC runs circles around it.
We would need to go back further to find a true PC counterpart.

Although
PC GPUs that shipped after the 360, starting with the R600 (Radeon HD
2900), took after the 360's GPU, it would not be correct to say the
360's graphics architecture is based on any PC design. *The embedded
graphics memory is one of many features that make the 360's Xenos GPU
a very "anti PC" architecture. It's not unlike the GameCube & Wii,
which, like 360, use a PowerPC CPU and a highly custom, console-
specific GPU created from the ground up specifically for the console.

Not disagreeing, would just like to once again point out that all
these games, despite their higher price tag, not only perform inferior
to their PC versions, but also lag behind in terms of control options,
modifications and the like.

Unlike the original Xbox which used a GPU (NV2A) very similar to the
GeForce 4. Overall, Xbox was just a slightly modified PC in almost
every way, from it's Celeron/Pentium III CPU, to its bus architecture,
to its GPU.

They should have made the 360 more like a PC, since a PC is better at
gaming.

The PS3 actually has more PC-based architecture in it than the 360
does. *

Difficult to imagine. *The PC and Sony are kind of like a water and
wood combination.. *the result can be pretty in the short term and
tends to rot over time.

While the CELL CPU is totally alien to PC architecture, the RSX
GPU is very much a PC-based design, it's basicly a stripped down
GeForce 7800.

How unfortunate for those that paid a lot for this crapstink thinking
they would get entertainment value out of it.

The few technical articles I've read about the PS3 seem to infer that
its an extremely powerful console, but that power is difficult to
exploit.

And power that is difficult to exploit is not very powerful is it?

Sony built something great, but also very proprietary. If you
look at their technology through the years, that is very typical Sony.

That's Sony alright. *Every technology decision is founded in "how can
we lock them into our brand?", rather than "how can we make our brand
known for value proposition to the consumer". *Just like Apple.

For programmers that aren't completely immersed in PS3 architecture,
making a port must be very difficult.

Making a fun game has been a challenge for them too.

The PS3 is really not much more powerful than the Xbox 360. *The
biggest advantage PS3 has, is the amount of floating point performance
it gets from the CELL CPU (over 200 GFLOPs) *It's roughly twice that
of the Xbox 360 CPU (over 100 GFLOPs) .

If only processing floating point numbers were fun, this would make
for great gaming!

The 360's Xenos GPU is very much superior to the RSX GPU in PS3.

Therein lies the crux of the thread subject line.

For the most part, the extra power that CELL has, has to go into
making up for the shortcomings of RSX, just to get roughly upto the
360's level in graphics. *Sure there are some PS3 games specifically
written to take full advantage of the architecture which outperform
any 360 game, yet there are so many more 360 games that outperform the
same game on PS3, and some 360-only games that outshine anything on
PS3.

And almost all of them, where a port to PC was even attempted, perform
better than either one, offering better graphics, even with lots of
other services running in the background, an e-mail client, the PC
doubling as a web server, and so forth.

Overall the 360 and PS3 *are very close in capability, much closer
than PS2 and original Xbox. * Both consoles are well behind even
modern low-end PCs that have decent gaming performance.

Amen brother.

I must say, as a console gamer, I am already looking forward to the
next-gen Xbox3 and PS4, as well as the rumored 'Wii HD'

The innovative Wii controller throws a whole different topic in. *They
did something nobody else was doing, focused on having fun, and
benefitted from it. *Hats off to Nintendo.

As a tech enthusiast, as far as the PC side, I am looking forward to
the upcoming DX11 GPU from AMD & Nvidia, the R8xx/Evergreen and GT300,
as well as Intel's 'manycore' Larrabee architecture.

Is there really any evidence that DX11 will be that more compelling
than DX10? *And was DX10 really that much more compelling than DX9?
I'm not trying to be overly skeptical here, as I look forward to new
technology too, but I get the increasing sense (especially after
eyeballing FC2 at DX10 at high resolutions with everything maxed) that
we are "there" when it comes to graphic quality, and that game
developers should be focusing on things like immersion, value to
consumer, overall fun factor. *Breaking away from the hyped corporate
marketing-team inspired bull**** and focusing on how to appeal to
gamers rather than buyers of well advertised crap.

Screw tech talk.

I find PC Gaming annoying and prefer console gaming. I don't care what
the power under the hood is. I know what I like though and PC gaming
isn't for me I'll take my PS3 and 360 anyday.

It's okay man. *A lot of people just stick to playing tic tac toe on
paper because it gives them a headache to try to wrap their feeble
minds around the technology.

I see PC gaming as the lowest level on the gaming rung.

On Sat, 1 Aug 2009 16:26:54 +0100, "The dog from that film you saw"
wrote:


wrote in message
.. .


Is there really any evidence that DX11 will be that more compelling
than DX10? And was DX10 really that much more compelling than DX9?
I'm not trying to be overly skeptical here, as I look forward to new
technology too, but I get the increasing sense (especially after
eyeballing FC2 at DX10 at high resolutions with everything maxed) that
we are "there" when it comes to graphic quality, and that game
developers should be focusing on things like immersion, value to
consumer, overall fun factor. Breaking away from the hyped corporate
marketing-team inspired bull**** and focusing on how to appeal to
gamers rather than buyers of well advertised crap.



we are not 'there' in computer graphics.
does a race game look like real life cars - in the same way a crappy low
resolution AVI can ? - does a desert in fallout 3 look like a real life
desert?
does a character in a modern game look like a real person?
no no and no.
we are still in the 'looks like a cartoon 'era.

Whether or not the graphics are "there" is a subjective discussion we
could debate all day I suppose. I don't think it makes much sense to
choose a specific game (i.e. Fallout 3 etc) and say because the
artistic style of that game is not realistic enough to your tastes,
that it is a benchmark for what current technology is capable of.
While I've had plenty of fun with some of Bethesda's games, I wouldn't
say realistic graphic style is their strong point. Many 3D artists
are also into comics and related drawing styles, so a cartoony look
often creeps into their work by design.

To me, how much fun I have with a game is all that matters. "Good"
graphics (which I define as not only visually appealing but also
running consistently smooth on whatever machine I'm running it on) do
not necessarily have to be realistic to be immersive to me. TF2 was a
good example of cartoonish graphics that resulted in a game that I
enjoyed. Arma2 is an example of a very ambitious attempt at realism
which probably makes some tradeoffs in the fun-factor area in order to
do so.

Maybe I am one of those where a certain level of surrealism can
enhance the gameplay. You mentioned race games.. I find the graphics
in Grid to be as realistic as a racing *game* needs to be. Do they
look like real cars? The answer probably depends on who you ask. If
I want total realism, I should hope someone comes out with a
contraption that is perfectly modeled like the inside of a car, which
I can sit in...and, it has features built in that actually break my
legs in real life if I slam into a wall too hard. Very realistic!
Fun? I guess, if you want a true racing sim you gotta take the real
life bumps and bruises along with it. Instead of playing first person
shooters, lets just get real guns and go out in a field somewhere and
shoot at each other. Granted there won't be any respawns when we die,
but at least its realistic.

Isn't the whole reason we are playing games to get away from reality
a bit? Isn't exercising our imagination part of the fun? Is what we
really are after is an interpretation of real life that plays off
metaphors of reality, without requiring us to experience the less
pleasant aspects of the same real life activity?

This is why I don't think graphics need to be perfectly realistic,
only immersive, and to me even graphics with varying levels of
cartoonishness or surrealism can still be immersive. Your mileage may
vary.

On Sat, 1 Aug 2009 09:05:48 -0700 (PDT), argento32
wrote:

On Aug 1, 1:15*pm, wrote:
On Sat, 1 Aug 2009 00:57:35 -0700 (PDT), argento32



wrote:
On Aug 1, 4:00*am, wrote:
On Fri, 31 Jul 2009 22:13:43 -0700 (PDT), parallax-scroll

wrote:
On Jul 31, 1:30*pm, Tim O wrote:
On Thu, 30 Jul 2009 11:48:19 -0700 (PDT), Air Raid

wrote:
The Xbox 360 and PC versions of id's Rage sport higher framerates than
thePlayStation 3version, the latest issue of Edge magazine reveals.

I realize this post is intended to start a flame war, and as a fan of
PC gaming, I often try to wind up the console players, but lets take a
serious look at the issue.

Rage was programmed by id, traditionally a PC game company.
The XBox360 shares so much architecture with the PC, that it's not
surprising an id game would run well on it.

Actually that is not really true. *Although the Xbox 360 shares much
in common with PC architecture on the software side, as far as
Microsoft's tools, development environment, DirectX API, etc, but if
you take a close look at the actual hardware architecture of the 360,
it's not a PC at all. *
The Xenon CPU is a custom triple-core PowerPC.
No PC uses PowerPC CPU that I'm aware of. *

Which is really a testament to how good DirectX is at running on
multiple CPU platforms. *What a shame that the PS3 came out with the
selling point that it was some sort of super computer of the future,
with all sorts of mind boggling possibilities, when the reality is
that the aging XBox 360, despite it's on-paper specs, simply had a
much more mature software architecture with which to build games upon.

The Xenos GPU, is also a
custom piece of silicon, that has no direct PC counterpart.

Very true, because the average 3 year old PC runs circles around it.
We would need to go back further to find a true PC counterpart.

Although
PC GPUs that shipped after the 360, starting with the R600 (Radeon HD
2900), took after the 360's GPU, it would not be correct to say the
360's graphics architecture is based on any PC design. *The embedded
graphics memory is one of many features that make the 360's Xenos GPU
a very "anti PC" architecture. It's not unlike the GameCube & Wii,
which, like 360, use a PowerPC CPU and a highly custom, console-
specific GPU created from the ground up specifically for the console.

Not disagreeing, would just like to once again point out that all
these games, despite their higher price tag, not only perform inferior
to their PC versions, but also lag behind in terms of control options,
modifications and the like.

Unlike the original Xbox which used a GPU (NV2A) very similar to the
GeForce 4. Overall, Xbox was just a slightly modified PC in almost
every way, from it's Celeron/Pentium III CPU, to its bus architecture,
to its GPU.

They should have made the 360 more like a PC, since a PC is better at
gaming.

The PS3 actually has more PC-based architecture in it than the 360
does. *

Difficult to imagine. *The PC and Sony are kind of like a water and
wood combination.. *the result can be pretty in the short term and
tends to rot over time.

While the CELL CPU is totally alien to PC architecture, the RSX
GPU is very much a PC-based design, it's basicly a stripped down
GeForce 7800.

How unfortunate for those that paid a lot for this crapstink thinking
they would get entertainment value out of it.

The few technical articles I've read about the PS3 seem to infer that
its an extremely powerful console, but that power is difficult to
exploit.

And power that is difficult to exploit is not very powerful is it?

Sony built something great, but also very proprietary. If you
look at their technology through the years, that is very typical Sony.

That's Sony alright. *Every technology decision is founded in "how can
we lock them into our brand?", rather than "how can we make our brand
known for value proposition to the consumer". *Just like Apple.

For programmers that aren't completely immersed in PS3 architecture,
making a port must be very difficult.

Making a fun game has been a challenge for them too.

The PS3 is really not much more powerful than the Xbox 360. *The
biggest advantage PS3 has, is the amount of floating point performance
it gets from the CELL CPU (over 200 GFLOPs) *It's roughly twice that
of the Xbox 360 CPU (over 100 GFLOPs) .

If only processing floating point numbers were fun, this would make
for great gaming!

The 360's Xenos GPU is very much superior to the RSX GPU in PS3.

Therein lies the crux of the thread subject line.

For the most part, the extra power that CELL has, has to go into
making up for the shortcomings of RSX, just to get roughly upto the
360's level in graphics. *Sure there are some PS3 games specifically
written to take full advantage of the architecture which outperform
any 360 game, yet there are so many more 360 games that outperform the
same game on PS3, and some 360-only games that outshine anything on
PS3.

And almost all of them, where a port to PC was even attempted, perform
better than either one, offering better graphics, even with lots of
other services running in the background, an e-mail client, the PC
doubling as a web server, and so forth.

Overall the 360 and PS3 *are very close in capability, much closer
than PS2 and original Xbox. * Both consoles are well behind even
modern low-end PCs that have decent gaming performance.

Amen brother.

I must say, as a console gamer, I am already looking forward to the
next-gen Xbox3 and PS4, as well as the rumored 'Wii HD'

The innovative Wii controller throws a whole different topic in. *They
did something nobody else was doing, focused on having fun, and
benefitted from it. *Hats off to Nintendo.

As a tech enthusiast, as far as the PC side, I am looking forward to
the upcoming DX11 GPU from AMD & Nvidia, the R8xx/Evergreen and GT300,
as well as Intel's 'manycore' Larrabee architecture.

Is there really any evidence that DX11 will be that more compelling
than DX10? *And was DX10 really that much more compelling than DX9?
I'm not trying to be overly skeptical here, as I look forward to new
technology too, but I get the increasing sense (especially after
eyeballing FC2 at DX10 at high resolutions with everything maxed) that
we are "there" when it comes to graphic quality, and that game
developers should be focusing on things like immersion, value to
consumer, overall fun factor. *Breaking away from the hyped corporate
marketing-team inspired bull**** and focusing on how to appeal to
gamers rather than buyers of well advertised crap.

Screw tech talk.

I find PC Gaming annoying and prefer console gaming. I don't care what
the power under the hood is. I know what I like though and PC gaming
isn't for me I'll take my PS3 and 360 anyday.

It's okay man. *A lot of people just stick to playing tic tac toe on
paper because it gives them a headache to try to wrap their feeble
minds around the technology.

I see PC gaming as the lowest level on the gaming rung.

Then you're clearly out of touch with it.

On Aug 1, 2:38*pm, wrote:
On Sat, 1 Aug 2009 09:05:48 -0700 (PDT), argento32



wrote:
On Aug 1, 1:15*pm, wrote:
On Sat, 1 Aug 2009 00:57:35 -0700 (PDT), argento32

wrote:
On Aug 1, 4:00*am, wrote:
On Fri, 31 Jul 2009 22:13:43 -0700 (PDT), parallax-scroll

wrote:
On Jul 31, 1:30*pm, Tim O wrote:
On Thu, 30 Jul 2009 11:48:19 -0700 (PDT), Air Raid

wrote:
The Xbox 360 and PC versions of id's Rage sport higher framerates than
thePlayStation 3version, the latest issue of Edge magazine reveals.

I realize this post is intended to start a flame war, and as a fan of
PC gaming, I often try to wind up the console players, but lets take a
serious look at the issue.

Rage was programmed by id, traditionally a PC game company.
The XBox360 shares so much architecture with the PC, that it's not
surprising an id game would run well on it.

Actually that is not really true. *Although the Xbox 360 shares much
in common with PC architecture on the software side, as far as
Microsoft's tools, development environment, DirectX API, etc, but if
you take a close look at the actual hardware architecture of the 360,
it's not a PC at all. *
The Xenon CPU is a custom triple-core PowerPC.
No PC uses PowerPC CPU that I'm aware of. *

Which is really a testament to how good DirectX is at running on
multiple CPU platforms. *What a shame that the PS3 came out with the
selling point that it was some sort of super computer of the future,
with all sorts of mind boggling possibilities, when the reality is
that the aging XBox 360, despite it's on-paper specs, simply had a
much more mature software architecture with which to build games upon.

The Xenos GPU, is also a
custom piece of silicon, that has no direct PC counterpart.

Very true, because the average 3 year old PC runs circles around it..
We would need to go back further to find a true PC counterpart.

Although
PC GPUs that shipped after the 360, starting with the R600 (Radeon HD
2900), took after the 360's GPU, it would not be correct to say the
360's graphics architecture is based on any PC design. *The embedded
graphics memory is one of many features that make the 360's Xenos GPU
a very "anti PC" architecture. It's not unlike the GameCube & Wii,
which, like 360, use a PowerPC CPU and a highly custom, console-
specific GPU created from the ground up specifically for the console.

Not disagreeing, would just like to once again point out that all
these games, despite their higher price tag, not only perform inferior
to their PC versions, but also lag behind in terms of control options,
modifications and the like.

Unlike the original Xbox which used a GPU (NV2A) very similar to the
GeForce 4. Overall, Xbox was just a slightly modified PC in almost
every way, from it's Celeron/Pentium III CPU, to its bus architecture,
to its GPU.

They should have made the 360 more like a PC, since a PC is better at
gaming.

The PS3 actually has more PC-based architecture in it than the 360
does. *

Difficult to imagine. *The PC and Sony are kind of like a water and
wood combination.. *the result can be pretty in the short term and
tends to rot over time.

While the CELL CPU is totally alien to PC architecture, the RSX
GPU is very much a PC-based design, it's basicly a stripped down
GeForce 7800.

How unfortunate for those that paid a lot for this crapstink thinking
they would get entertainment value out of it.

The few technical articles I've read about the PS3 seem to infer that
its an extremely powerful console, but that power is difficult to
exploit.

And power that is difficult to exploit is not very powerful is it?

Sony built something great, but also very proprietary. If you
look at their technology through the years, that is very typical Sony.

That's Sony alright. *Every technology decision is founded in "how can
we lock them into our brand?", rather than "how can we make our brand
known for value proposition to the consumer". *Just like Apple.

For programmers that aren't completely immersed in PS3 architecture,
making a port must be very difficult.

Making a fun game has been a challenge for them too.

The PS3 is really not much more powerful than the Xbox 360. *The
biggest advantage PS3 has, is the amount of floating point performance
it gets from the CELL CPU (over 200 GFLOPs) *It's roughly twice that
of the Xbox 360 CPU (over 100 GFLOPs) .

If only processing floating point numbers were fun, this would make
for great gaming!

The 360's Xenos GPU is very much superior to the RSX GPU in PS3.

Therein lies the crux of the thread subject line.

For the most part, the extra power that CELL has, has to go into
making up for the shortcomings of RSX, just to get roughly upto the
360's level in graphics. *Sure there are some PS3 games specifically
written to take full advantage of the architecture which outperform
any 360 game, yet there are so many more 360 games that outperform the
same game on PS3, and some 360-only games that outshine anything on
PS3.

And almost all of them, where a port to PC was even attempted, perform
better than either one, offering better graphics, even with lots of
other services running in the background, an e-mail client, the PC
doubling as a web server, and so forth.

Overall the 360 and PS3 *are very close in capability, much closer
than PS2 and original Xbox. * Both consoles are well behind even
modern low-end PCs that have decent gaming performance.

Amen brother.

I must say, as a console gamer, I am already looking forward to the
next-gen Xbox3 and PS4, as well as the rumored 'Wii HD'

The innovative Wii controller throws a whole different topic in. *They
did something nobody else was doing, focused on having fun, and
benefitted from it. *Hats off to Nintendo.

As a tech enthusiast, as far as the PC side, I am looking forward to
the upcoming DX11 GPU from AMD & Nvidia, the R8xx/Evergreen and GT300,
as well as Intel's 'manycore' Larrabee architecture.

Is there really any evidence that DX11 will be that more compelling
than DX10? *And was DX10 really that much more compelling than DX9?
I'm not trying to be overly skeptical here, as I look forward to new
technology too, but I get the increasing sense (especially after
eyeballing FC2 at DX10 at high resolutions with everything maxed) that
we are "there" when it comes to graphic quality, and that game
developers should be focusing on things like immersion, value to
consumer, overall fun factor. *Breaking away from the hyped corporate
marketing-team inspired bull**** and focusing on how to appeal to
gamers rather than buyers of well advertised crap.

Screw tech talk.

I find PC Gaming annoying and prefer console gaming. I don't care what
the power under the hood is. I know what I like though and PC gaming
isn't for me I'll take my PS3 and 360 anyday.

It's okay man. *A lot of people just stick to playing tic tac toe on
paper because it gives them a headache to try to wrap their feeble
minds around the technology.

I see PC gaming as the lowest level on the gaming rung.

Then you're clearly out of touch with it.

Enjoy your moms basement and your WOW.

On Aug 1, 10:26*am, "The dog from that film you saw"
wrote:
wrote in message

...

Is there really any evidence that DX11 will be that more compelling
than DX10? *And was DX10 really that much more compelling than DX9?
I'm not trying to be overly skeptical here, as I look forward to new
technology too, but I get the increasing sense (especially after
eyeballing FC2 at DX10 at high resolutions with everything maxed) that
we are "there" when it comes to graphic quality, and that game
developers should be focusing on things like immersion, value to
consumer, overall fun factor. *Breaking away from the hyped corporate
marketing-team inspired bull**** and focusing on how to appeal to
gamers rather than buyers of well advertised crap.

we are not 'there' in computer graphics.
does a race game look like real life cars - in the same way a crappy low
resolution AVI can ? - does a desert infallout 3look like a real life
desert?
does a character in a modern game look like a real person?
no no and no.
we are still in the 'looks like a cartoon 'era.

--
Gareth.

that fly...... is your magic wand....

I 100% fully agree that we are "not there yet" in graphics.
Especually real-time in-game graphics for games. Think about this,
lets take one of the first 3D graphics demos for PC, the extremely
crude, blocky Virtua Fighter Remix demo by Nvidia for their NV1 chip
used in the Diamond EDGE 3D card, shown in 1995. This is PRE-3Dfx
Voodoo1, folks. Now go all the way forward to the very best current
tech demos from AMD & Nvidia for DX10 and upcoming DX11 GPUs, demos
from the last year or so, i.e. AMD's Cinemo 2.0 demos for RV770, or
the new DX11 demos of the last month or so We have come a very
long way.
If you don't believe in tech demos, lets just look at games. Take
VQuake (for Rendition Verite) or GLQuake from the mid 1990s, and
compare that to Crysis of today.
In either case, demos or games, we've come a very long way. Yet,
we're not even half way "there" yet, to totally realistic graphics.
We will not get there in our lifetimes. All we will see is a continual
improvement. We have had roughly 15 years of real-time 3D graphics on
PC and console. In another 15 years, we will have improved greatly,
but still have many years to go. There is no end in sight, unless
however there comes a time when real-time graphics are concidered
"good enough", like what happened with sound cards a decade or so ago.
However, graphics is a different medium than sound. Graphics might not
parallal audio. Anyway, I do not believe in the idea of "diminishing
returns" for computer graphics. Current real-time graphics look
pathetic compared to where they could be.
I don't expect total life-like realism, like watching real footage of
real-life, but I do hope that realtime graphics can mimic pre-rendered
CG of years past. Obviously pre-rendered CG can be many steps ahead
of real-time, because each frame of CG can get hours or days of render
time, whereas real-time has to be rendered in 1/60 or 1/30 of a
second. With that said, current real-time graphics have already
surpassed some of the lower-end CG of the 1990s, like the stuff used
for FMV in PlayStation1 game intros & cut-scenes. I'm talking about
low-end stuff, not film-quality CG like Toy Story.

I would say that within the next 5 years or so, realtime graphics on
PC will rival the first Toy Story movie. Many would say PC graphics
have already surpassed Toy Story, but they confuse realistic artwork
with technical graphics quality, and it just isn't true.

On Sat, 1 Aug 2009 13:14:17 -0700 (PDT), parallax-scroll
wrote:


I would say that within the next 5 years or so, realtime graphics on
PC will rival the first Toy Story movie. Many would say PC graphics
have already surpassed Toy Story, but they confuse realistic artwork
with technical graphics quality, and it just isn't true.

Interesting that you mention Toy Story (2005). Compare that to say Final
Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2001). Even 8 years later that film has
phenomenal artwork. Games wise I think Toy Story has been surpassed and I
don't think we are too far from equaling the Final Fantasy film.

On Sat, 1 Aug 2009 11:41:35 -0700 (PDT), argento32
wrote:

On Aug 1, 2:38*pm, wrote:
On Sat, 1 Aug 2009 09:05:48 -0700 (PDT), argento32



wrote:
On Aug 1, 1:15*pm, wrote:
On Sat, 1 Aug 2009 00:57:35 -0700 (PDT), argento32

wrote:
On Aug 1, 4:00*am, wrote:
On Fri, 31 Jul 2009 22:13:43 -0700 (PDT), parallax-scroll

wrote:
On Jul 31, 1:30*pm, Tim O wrote:
On Thu, 30 Jul 2009 11:48:19 -0700 (PDT), Air Raid

wrote:
The Xbox 360 and PC versions of id's Rage sport higher framerates than
thePlayStation 3version, the latest issue of Edge magazine reveals.

I realize this post is intended to start a flame war, and as a fan of
PC gaming, I often try to wind up the console players, but lets take a
serious look at the issue.

Rage was programmed by id, traditionally a PC game company.
The XBox360 shares so much architecture with the PC, that it's not
surprising an id game would run well on it.

Actually that is not really true. *Although the Xbox 360 shares much
in common with PC architecture on the software side, as far as
Microsoft's tools, development environment, DirectX API, etc, but if
you take a close look at the actual hardware architecture of the 360,
it's not a PC at all. *
The Xenon CPU is a custom triple-core PowerPC.
No PC uses PowerPC CPU that I'm aware of. *

Which is really a testament to how good DirectX is at running on
multiple CPU platforms. *What a shame that the PS3 came out with the
selling point that it was some sort of super computer of the future,
with all sorts of mind boggling possibilities, when the reality is
that the aging XBox 360, despite it's on-paper specs, simply had a
much more mature software architecture with which to build games upon.

The Xenos GPU, is also a
custom piece of silicon, that has no direct PC counterpart.

Very true, because the average 3 year old PC runs circles around it.
We would need to go back further to find a true PC counterpart.

Although
PC GPUs that shipped after the 360, starting with the R600 (Radeon HD
2900), took after the 360's GPU, it would not be correct to say the
360's graphics architecture is based on any PC design. *The embedded
graphics memory is one of many features that make the 360's Xenos GPU
a very "anti PC" architecture. It's not unlike the GameCube & Wii,
which, like 360, use a PowerPC CPU and a highly custom, console-
specific GPU created from the ground up specifically for the console.

Not disagreeing, would just like to once again point out that all
these games, despite their higher price tag, not only perform inferior
to their PC versions, but also lag behind in terms of control options,
modifications and the like.

Unlike the original Xbox which used a GPU (NV2A) very similar to the
GeForce 4. Overall, Xbox was just a slightly modified PC in almost
every way, from it's Celeron/Pentium III CPU, to its bus architecture,
to its GPU.

They should have made the 360 more like a PC, since a PC is better at
gaming.

The PS3 actually has more PC-based architecture in it than the 360
does. *

Difficult to imagine. *The PC and Sony are kind of like a water and
wood combination.. *the result can be pretty in the short term and
tends to rot over time.

While the CELL CPU is totally alien to PC architecture, the RSX
GPU is very much a PC-based design, it's basicly a stripped down
GeForce 7800.

How unfortunate for those that paid a lot for this crapstink thinking
they would get entertainment value out of it.

The few technical articles I've read about the PS3 seem to infer that
its an extremely powerful console, but that power is difficult to
exploit.

And power that is difficult to exploit is not very powerful is it?

Sony built something great, but also very proprietary. If you
look at their technology through the years, that is very typical Sony.

That's Sony alright. *Every technology decision is founded in "how can
we lock them into our brand?", rather than "how can we make our brand
known for value proposition to the consumer". *Just like Apple.

For programmers that aren't completely immersed in PS3 architecture,
making a port must be very difficult.

Making a fun game has been a challenge for them too.

The PS3 is really not much more powerful than the Xbox 360. *The
biggest advantage PS3 has, is the amount of floating point performance
it gets from the CELL CPU (over 200 GFLOPs) *It's roughly twice that
of the Xbox 360 CPU (over 100 GFLOPs) .

If only processing floating point numbers were fun, this would make
for great gaming!

The 360's Xenos GPU is very much superior to the RSX GPU in PS3.

Therein lies the crux of the thread subject line.

For the most part, the extra power that CELL has, has to go into
making up for the shortcomings of RSX, just to get roughly upto the
360's level in graphics. *Sure there are some PS3 games specifically
written to take full advantage of the architecture which outperform
any 360 game, yet there are so many more 360 games that outperform the
same game on PS3, and some 360-only games that outshine anything on
PS3.

And almost all of them, where a port to PC was even attempted, perform
better than either one, offering better graphics, even with lots of
other services running in the background, an e-mail client, the PC
doubling as a web server, and so forth.

Overall the 360 and PS3 *are very close in capability, much closer
than PS2 and original Xbox. * Both consoles are well behind even
modern low-end PCs that have decent gaming performance.

Amen brother.

I must say, as a console gamer, I am already looking forward to the
next-gen Xbox3 and PS4, as well as the rumored 'Wii HD'

The innovative Wii controller throws a whole different topic in. *They
did something nobody else was doing, focused on having fun, and
benefitted from it. *Hats off to Nintendo.

As a tech enthusiast, as far as the PC side, I am looking forward to
the upcoming DX11 GPU from AMD & Nvidia, the R8xx/Evergreen and GT300,
as well as Intel's 'manycore' Larrabee architecture.

Is there really any evidence that DX11 will be that more compelling
than DX10? *And was DX10 really that much more compelling than DX9?
I'm not trying to be overly skeptical here, as I look forward to new
technology too, but I get the increasing sense (especially after
eyeballing FC2 at DX10 at high resolutions with everything maxed) that
we are "there" when it comes to graphic quality, and that game
developers should be focusing on things like immersion, value to
consumer, overall fun factor. *Breaking away from the hyped corporate
marketing-team inspired bull**** and focusing on how to appeal to
gamers rather than buyers of well advertised crap.

Screw tech talk.

I find PC Gaming annoying and prefer console gaming. I don't care what
the power under the hood is. I know what I like though and PC gaming
isn't for me I'll take my PS3 and 360 anyday.

It's okay man. *A lot of people just stick to playing tic tac toe on
paper because it gives them a headache to try to wrap their feeble
minds around the technology.

I see PC gaming as the lowest level on the gaming rung.

Then you're clearly out of touch with it.

Enjoy your moms basement and your WOW.

I'm too busy enjoying your sister's vagina and her hummer skills. Now
THAT's what makes me go "wow".

"Memnoch" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 1 Aug 2009 13:14:17 -0700 (PDT), parallax-scroll
wrote:


I would say that within the next 5 years or so, realtime graphics on
PC will rival the first Toy Story movie. Many would say PC graphics
have already surpassed Toy Story, but they confuse realistic artwork
with technical graphics quality, and it just isn't true.

Interesting that you mention Toy Story (2005). Compare that to say Final
Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2001). Even 8 years later that film has
phenomenal artwork. Games wise I think Toy Story has been surpassed and I
don't think we are too far from equaling the Final Fantasy film.

You mean 1995 for Toy Story :-). I agree with your statement though. I
actually went and saw FFTSW at theatres, and though I was blown away by the
graphics animation in that movie, still unrivalled even for any PC animation
to this day, but the story was pretty weak so I thought it was not worth it.
That and the fact it was a total box office bomb. I wondered if if the
producers and distributors (Square and Columbia Pictures respectively) put
any thought into the risk of making this movie. It cost nearly $140m to make
(probably would be cheaper today with the newer graphics technologies), but
it barely broke even, if at all, even with rentals included after the
theatre gig was up. On opening weekend, there were only about 60-70 people
in the whole theatre and it opened in over 2600 theatres nationwide. By
week four, it was down to less than 150 theatres being shown. By week six,
theatres gave up on it.

It ranks right up there with some of the biggest budget bombs ever made.

Air Raid wrote:

"The RSX is slower than what we have in the 360. The CPU is about the
same, but the 360 makes it easier to split things off, and that's what
a lot of the work has been, splitting it all into jobs on the PS3," he
said.

BS to English: "We just dont have the know-how".