• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Engadget: Why Baldur’s Gate III is an accidental PS5 console exclusive

DeepEnigma

Gold Member
But that's not the premise Microsoft built on in relation to Series S. Don't you remember that video 'it's the same features just lower resolution?'. I know MS pulled the video down already, but I remember :X
"It's like flicking a switch. 1440p 1080p box."
 

diffusionx

Gold Member

Microsoft cannot and will not drop feature parity, give me a break. Not launching BG3 on Xbox is a better outcome than MS telling all the people who bought Series S consoles that they are idiots for believing and trusting MS when they put out this console, a la Sega in 1994.

if Series S is a huge mistake then they just have to live with it and make it work to the end.
 
Last edited:
Don't we need a few more examples of this before people call it MS's biggest mistake?

Well this example shows that it is an issue. A game being delayed due to the Series S can be seen as a pretty big thing. In the past there were differences between the S and X versions but that's to be expected. A delay of a game due to the Series S can't be seen as a good thing.

Out of all the mistakes this policy can delay or stop games from releasing. It's why I believe its one of their biggest ones.
 
Last edited:

West Texas CEO

GAF's Nicest Lunch Thief and Nosiest Dildo Archeologist
So, in reality, the situation with the Series S will keep on getting worse, right?

I wonder how long until MS finally decides to ditch the Series S and focus on the Series X.
 

Zheph

Member
Well on PC the difference between single and split screen seems to be about 30 mb according to these screens here so the problem might be elsewhere..



This is deffo not telling anything but is the game looking like dogshit here also an indication of what's gonna happen on S?
 

jroc74

Phone reception is more important to me than human rights
Well this example shows that it is an issue. A game being delayed due to the Series S can be seen as a pretty big thing. In the past there were differences between the S and X versions but that's to be expected. A delay of a game due to the Series S can't be seen as a good thing.

Out of all the mistakes this policy can delay or stop games from releasing. It's why I believe its one of their biggest ones.
Agree.

MS's biggest mistake? Hard to say. Its debatable.

One of MS's biggest mistake? Definitely, even if its also debatable.
 

skit_data

Member
I think one of the things that just instinctively had me thinking
"this amount of RAM is simply too low"
when Series S specs came out was remembering some interview with a developer on some youtube channel. He said one of the requests that always come up among developers when it comes to specs of a new console gen is "more RAM".
Now, he said something along the lines of that for each console gen the amount of RAM is usually increased by a fairly high factor but this gen it is only increased by a factor of 2x (8GB -> 16GB) but by having much faster storage this can hopefully be offset at least to some extent.

I think this "PS5/Series X having only 2x the amount of RAM" has led me to believe that devs are already seeing less of an increase with the Series X and PS5 and have to put extra effort into memory management compared to earlier gens, leaving the Series S to be more even of a headache to contend with.
 
Agree.

MS's biggest mistake? Hard to say. Its debatable.

One of MS's biggest mistake? Definitely, even if its also debatable.

If Larian can't get it to work on the S does that mean Xbox owners can't ever enjoy the game?

I'm curious to see if Microsoft will let it go that far.
 

Topher

Identifies as young
I setup a quick split screen session. Only changes I made were to drop the resolution down to 900p and quality down to low.
VRAM usage 5637 mb
Sys Ram 13255 mb

And this is obviously not testing being on different parts of the map.

IcJu4VY.jpg
 
Last edited:

twilo99

Member
I setup a quick split screen session. Only changes I made were to drop the resolution down to 900p and quality down to low.
VRAM usage 5637 mb
Sys Ram 13255 mb

And this is obviously not testing being on different parts of the map.

IcJu4VY.jpg

Thanks for doing it that’s exactly what I was going to do..

So it’s definitely a system memory situation..

Did you snap a non split screen usage of the same area to compare? Just curious what the split screen tax really is.
 
Last edited:

FunkMiller

Member
isn't there already games that are 60 on X and 30 on S? That isn't a feature I guess

Not sure, but the fact it only runs at a locked 30fps on Series X must be due to it also having to run on the retarded little brother. That's why I'll be buying it on PC - with a laptop rig that isn't all that much better than the Series X's power.
 

FunkMiller

Member
They don’t run frame rate parity between the two, at least I don’t think they do since there are a few titles where one does 60 and the other does not?

Would have liked to at least been given the option of a performance mode on Series X. The whole thing smacks of MS trying to prop up the Series S, instead of allowing the Series X to shine.

Which is very frustrating, because it's a genuinely great console being forced to drown because its moron little brother is weighing it down.
 

DeepEnigma

Gold Member
Would have liked to at least been given the option of a performance mode on Series X. The whole thing smacks of MS trying to prop up the Series S, instead of allowing the Series X to shine.

Which is very frustrating, because it's a genuinely great console being forced to drown because its moron little brother is weighing it down.
Why no unlocked and that marketed VRR™ feature they went heavy on (as wall as their social media shills) when the competition didn't have it at the time? VRR not good enough any longer?
 
Makes sense - I mean does anyone really expect the major demographic that likely owns a Series S (casuals) to pick up BG3? Does suck for the 5 people (me included) that owns Series X, but I imagine a lot of these people own a PC as well. No reason to waste resources catering to the very limited audience.

W for sony without even trying
 

Zheph

Member
Makes sense - I mean does anyone really expect the major demographic that likely owns a Series S (casuals) to pick up BG3? Does suck for the 5 people (me included) that owns Series X, but I imagine a lot of these people own a PC as well. No reason to waste resources catering to the very limited audience.

W for sony without even trying
Well I surely wasn't expecting the game to have such hype and make those numbers on Steam so who knows now? It looks like it's already selling well on PS
 

DeepEnigma

Gold Member
People testing on PC says 900p on medium with Split Screen uses 3.5gb of Vram......that's about where you would think the Series S version would be.
so-that-was-a-fucking-lie-lies.gif

I setup a quick split screen session. Only changes I made were to drop the resolution down to 900p and quality down to low.
VRAM usage 5637 mb
Sys Ram 13255 mb

And this is obviously not testing being on different parts of the map.

IcJu4VY.jpg
 

onQ123

Member
Not sure, but the fact it only runs at a locked 30fps on Series X must be due to it also having to run on the retarded little brother. That's why I'll be buying it on PC - with a laptop rig that isn't all that much better than the Series X's power.
Actually being on Series S should give it a better chance of hitting 60fps on Series X the situation with BG3 is most likely the size of the dataset.

If it's too big to fit into Series S RAM it will probably have to be redone just for Series S & at this point they might as will make a PS4 & Xbox One port.
 

Portugeezer

Member
I think one of the things that just instinctively had me thinking
"this amount of RAM is simply too low"
when Series S specs came out was remembering some interview with a developer on some youtube channel. He said one of the requests that always come up among developers when it comes to specs of a new console gen is "more RAM".
Now, he said something along the lines of that for each console gen the amount of RAM is usually increased by a fairly high factor but this gen it is only increased by a factor of 2x (8GB -> 16GB) but by having much faster storage this can hopefully be offset at least to some extent.

I think this "PS5/Series X having only 2x the amount of RAM" has led me to believe that devs are already seeing less of an increase with the Series X and PS5 and have to put extra effort into memory management compared to earlier gens, leaving the Series S to be more even of a headache to contend with.
The SSD goes a long way. Mark Cerny said the typical ps4 game would load up the next 30 secons of assets into RAM, which may have not even been needed but it was so slow to remove and load new things that the developers had to do this.
A lot of RAM wasted just "in case".

SSD basically let's developers load the next 1-2 seconds of gameplay assets as needed.
Most RAM can be used for what is actively needed.

But there is bandwidth figures to take into account which I know little about, but it may be the Series S' issue.
 

FunkMiller

Member
I remember when the current gen devices were announced, some people started to warn that the series S would be a problem because it's reduced specs and it might hamstring this generation.

People, mostly people who are into the xbox ecosystem, said that it wouldn't.

Here we are.

It goes against all basic logic to disagree that weaker hardware won't hamstring stronger hardware. Of course that's what happened.
 

DeepEnigma

Gold Member
This post is hilarious. Imagine the huge savings they made on marketing.

Jim: How much money do we need to market Baldur's gate?
Marketing department: It's free.
Yeah, they just sent out random emails after the game's fantastic launch. I'm sure they will have a few YouTube videos and a blog post as well. Minimal and the game's own word of mouth is carrying it.

I am wondering if Sony is going to require then to cover the full-frontal. The age ratings seemed fine keeping them M and Pegi 18.
 
Last edited:

mckmas8808

Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
Makes sense - I mean does anyone really expect the major demographic that likely owns a Series S (casuals) to pick up BG3? Does suck for the 5 people (me included) that owns Series X, but I imagine a lot of these people own a PC as well. No reason to waste resources catering to the very limited audience.

W for sony without even trying

Honestly, I'll expect millions of them to be interested in BG3 this year.
 
Well I surely wasn't expecting the game to have such hype and make those numbers on Steam so who knows now? It looks like it's already selling well on PS

Honestly, I'll expect millions of them to be interested in BG3 this year.

Fair enough. In my opinion, if the goal is the biggest casual market, they are better off focusing on making a port for iOS versus Series S to capture that market.
 

DeepEnigma

Gold Member
Fair enough. In my opinion, if the goal is the biggest casual market, they are better off focusing on making a port for iOS versus Series S to capture that market.
There are far more casuals that own a PS5 than an S. Hard for them to capture the market that mainly plays CoD, FIFA, Madden and GTAV. Their best bet is to keep focusing on good word of mouth and those interested in a more cerebral experience that casuals tend to shy away from.
 

DosGamer

Member
As a consumer and avid gamer since the days of Pac Man and Asteroids... I cant help but think of the numerous bad decisions MS has made regarding this console. Honestly thinking back, I feel like MS was at its best when it didnt really give a fuck. It jumped in the console biz and while they had aspirations to be the best, they beat to their own drum. They offered something new with a hard drive to rip music to. They didnt care that the console was ugly as sin... they just did what they wanted to.
The 360 era was a step up in terms of looks, but the red ring of death was real and soured a lot of people on their hardware.... from that point on, its as if they try to please the masses and thus fail to meet expectations.

MS should say fuck it, and scrap the S series and focus on one console... then a grass roots efforts to bring in games.
They should also give every player with a MS xbox console a free year of online gaming.

There are things they can do!

Hell, they could even hire some designers to come in and mold the PC/ Xbox into a central machine that can be upgraded like a computer with some lesser functionality as compared to a PC. My point is, this company is making poor choice after poor choice. They are like Sega in the Mid to late 90's
 
Last edited:
Top Bottom