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We Actually Do Need Pro Consoles Again

Boss Mog

Member
The game could have a bottleneck in some part where PS5 Pro being more powerful is not 60fps locket yet.

That is the reason that kind of wishing is dumb. PS4 pro didn't fix anything
The only thing that's dumb is your post. Any PS4 games that had an uncapped framerate averaging 45-60 fps on the base model ran at a locked 60 on PS4 Pro, without even the need for a patch (Boost Mode). This is the exact scenario that FFXVI would be facing on PS5 Pro.
 
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Eiknarf

Banned
Stop with the Pro consoles bullshit. Enough. Make em powerful enough from the start, or just make the next generation a couple years sooner.

So ridiculous

It’s like graduating from 12th grade (a.k.a. high school) and then…
going to 12th 1/2 grade

Knock it off

It’s called college or trade school. Not 12.5th grade
 
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Celcius

°Temp. member
Stop with the Pro consoles bullshit. Enough. Make em powerful enough from the start, or just make the next generation a couple years sooner.

So ridiculous
To your first point, they make them as fast as they can at launch to fit the price point they want, but over time games become more demanding and technology improves… thus pro consoles become beneficial.

To your second point, usually a new generation is more than just a power bump. PS5 offers the dualsense controller improvement, nvme storage for the first time ever, faster WiFi, more memory, and more beyond just power. And Nintendo usually completely changes the way we interact with a console or the form factor between generations.

A Pro console is only a spec bump, so it’s less than a new generation but is helps existing generation games run better or at a higher res.

I think the only issue this time around is that inflation is a problem and things are better more expensive rather than cheaper.
 
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Eiknarf

Banned
To your first point, they make them as fast as they can at launch to fit the price point they want, but over time games become more demanding and technology improves… thus pro consoles become beneficial.

To your second point, usually a new generation is more than just a power bump. PS5 offers the dualsense controller improvement, nvme storage for the first time ever, faster WiFi, more memory, and more beyond just power. And Nintendo usually completely changes the way we interact with a console or the form factor between generations.

A Pro console is only a spec bump, so it’s less than a new generation but is helps existing generation games run better or at a higher res.

I think the only issue this time around is that inflation is a problem and things are better more expensive rather than cheaper.
Those are some great points. I stand corrected.

It’s just disheartening to those of us who, really just this year, got a PS5

“Oh damn! Now my machine isn’t capable enough! I need to drop another $450?”
 

Corndog

Banned
That's not how things work, most of the revenue would come from base consoles, so they have every incentive to make them run well on them.
Then why do they use the pro footage for advertising?
How did cyberpunk work on old versus pro?
 
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Celcius

°Temp. member
Then why do they use the pro footage for advertising?
Companies want to show off their games looking as good as possible visually. For example, during the GranTurismo 7 trailers and commercials do you think they showed the PS4 or the PS5 version of the game? Even though many people bought the game on PS4, they showed off the PS5 version to get people excited about it. Many people on PS5 may play in performance mode but they still showed off ray tracing (only available in graphics mode) to get people hyped. Eye candy sells games, regardless of what platform or setting people end up playing it on.
 
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Azurro

Banned
Then why do they use the pro footage for advertising?
How did cyberpunk work on old versus pro?

A) Because publishers always show the product in the best light possible. Doesn't mean the base console will not look good.

B) While there are always exceptions ( in this case Cyberpunk was made for PC and would have never performed well on base consoles even without Pro/X1X so it's a bad example),
to make your point valid you'd have to demonstrate that at least a plurality of base console games performed like shit compared to the mid gen refresh ones.

Magical "optimization" won't give you next gen visuals while keeping 60 FPS and above native 1440p. It seems that your feelings would get hurt if there is an option that provides better performance, which is not a compelling argument.
 

Mobilemofo

Member
I don't think 4090 users care about settings lol. That's for us, mid range users. I'm happy that I don't need more than high settings in 1440p-4K (native or using FSR) at around 65-70 fps. That's how I play all games, basically console Quality settings at 60+ fps. My wallet appreciates that since that's already at consoles prices these days.
You know what I mean when I say "settings" 😄.
 

PaNaMa

Banned
Pro consoles I think are not popular with developers. Just another x2 skus they have to develop for, optimize for etc.
I want an upgrade for my Series X, but with MS already under fire for the Series S I can't see them throwing a 3rd one into the mix. They just doubled down on S with a new black edition and double the storage, and as a whole S has outsold X 3:1 - so we know it's not going anywhere. If Sony releases a PS5 Pro it would actually put MS in a really bad position imo
 

Corndog

Banned
Companies want to show off their games looking as good as possible visually. For example, during the GranTurismo 7 trailers and commercials do you think they showed the PS4 or the PS5 version of the game? Even though many people bought the game on PS4, they showed off the PS5 version to get people excited about it. Many people on PS5 may play in performance mode but they still showed off ray tracing (only available in graphics mode) to get people hyped. Eye candy sells games, regardless of what platform or setting people end up playing it on.
Correct. I agree.
 

Corndog

Banned
A) Because publishers always show the product in the best light possible. Doesn't mean the base console will not look good.

B) While there are always exceptions ( in this case Cyberpunk was made for PC and would have never performed well on base consoles even without Pro/X1X so it's a bad example),
to make your point valid you'd have to demonstrate that at least a plurality of base console games performed like shit compared to the mid gen refresh ones.

Magical "optimization" won't give you next gen visuals while keeping 60 FPS and above native 1440p. It seems that your feelings would get hurt if there is an option that provides better performance, which is not a compelling argument.
I never said there were magical optimizations. I said it would lead to less optimization. Why spend money on optimization when you don’t have to?

We are already seeing it now with AMD FSR.

I personally am not against a pro console. I own one. I’m just saying it will be used as a crutch.

Edit: on cyberpunk I agree it would never run well on the base console. It should have never been released on the base console. It should have just released on pc and current gen. The pro consoles allowed them to show in running on ps4 and Xbox one. Notice how the expansion won’t run on last gen.
 
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ergem

Member
with MS already under fire for the Series S I can't see them throwing a 3rd one into the mix. They just doubled down on S with a new black edition and double the storage, and as a whole S has outsold X 3:1 - so we know it's not going anywhere. If Sony releases a PS5 Pro it would actually put MS in a really bad position imo
This is one of the reasons I believe the pro is existing and real. Because it’s so smart for Sony to do so.

PS5 base model being the target specs for PS exclusives targeting 30fps. That’s when we’ll start to see real leap in graphics. Oh you want to play in 60fps? You get the PS5 pro.
 

Azurro

Banned
I never said there were magical optimizations. I said it would lead to less optimization. Why spend money on optimization when you don’t have to?

We are already seeing it now with AMD FSR.

I personally am not against a pro console. I own one. I’m just saying it will be used as a crutch. Edit: on cyberpunk I agree it would never run well on the base console. It should have never been released on the base console. It should have just released on pc and current gen. The pro consoles allowed them to show in running on ps4 and Xbox one. Notice how the expansion won’t run on last gen.

I don't know what point you are trying to prove here. Before frame reconstruction techniques games simply reduced resolution and framerate when they wanted to do more. How is that any better?

Another thing, optimizations will usually be shared. For example, there are some improvements that are not directly related to the platform's API so that gets shared by every platform. Some versions use DirectX, the methods that get optimized that might have a DirectX dependency will be shared will all the platforms that use that. Similarly for Sony's API, if you improve a method that has that dependency, then that improvement will be shared to both PS5 and PS5 PRO. There are relatively minor parts of the engine that are platform specific, but fhe great mayority of the code is not that.

Another thing that people need to keep in mind, just because a feature exists doesn't mean the system has the performance to use it extensively or even at all. Look at the Matrix demo, it struggled to keep a steady 30 FPS, and that's using the geometry engine from what I understand. Some phone chipsets are capable of raytracing, but will any game will make a meaningful use of it at all?

Once more, this point of it being a "clutch". The great mayority of the time nobody gives devs a pass if the base version sucks, that's a useless "clutch".
 
I really think Pro Consoles are needed heavily, i would buy day1. Developing for them can‘t be that much work. You develop for PS5, and crank up resolution on Pro model as much as it goes for the performance target.
Crank up resolution to what? We are already getting 4K games. Do you see how pointless that "pro" upgrade is. You want 8K? Who has 8K TVs?
 

01011001

Banned
Even on third screenshot you can see how bad is quality in third screen around robot.

I mean yeah! it dared to move! and you can't do that with FSR2 🤣🤣🤣

fucking robot... ruining the image quality, pfft 😅


blurskeue.png
blur248ft5.png



comparison, native + FXAA (I assume it's FXAA)
blur37uifp.png


sadly, the image quality is pretty bad because he uploaded JPEG files... which is awful to do comparisons with.
 
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hoplie

Member
Crank up resolution to what? We are already getting 4K games. Do you see how pointless that "pro" upgrade is. You want 8K? Who has 8K TVs?
We are far far far away from native 4K/60 on something like Unreal Engine 5 with all bells and whistles with base consoles.
If that‘s pointless for you - great. Not for me.
And no, i don‘t want to game on PC. I am working all day on PC and IT stuff.
 

Celcius

°Temp. member
Crank up resolution to what? We are already getting 4K games. Do you see how pointless that "pro" upgrade is. You want 8K? Who has 8K TVs?
If more demanding games are running at 720p or 1080p then a pro could perhaps help raise those to 1440p or 4K, just like the ps4 pro did for the regular ps4.
 

Rentahamster

Rodent Whores
The existence of Tears of the Kingdom makes me think we don't, but the existence of almost everything else in the last year makes me think we do.
 
Those are some great points. I stand corrected.

It’s just disheartening to those of us who, really just this year, got a PS5

“Oh damn! Now my machine isn’t capable enough! I need to drop another $450?”
Here's the thing though. Game consoles are in a unique spot where it's generally 1 per 5-8 years while most of the tech world is .5-2 years. Phones are outdated within a year, and same with tvs and computers.

What I'm saying is it could be worse. I'm personally down for mid-get refreshes. They are optional. You aren't getting a worse experience then you would without them as base consoles will still be the main benchmark.
 
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Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
What I'm saying is it could be worse.
Yeah, this is the saving grace.
I'm personally down for mid-get refreshes. They are optional.
Not really, they are significant billion dollar level investment that could go into more optimised dev tooling, first party games, better services, indies, etc… as well as in more focused R&D for the next generation of consoles.

So yeah, you are getting less on base consoles because of that (and anything that introduces HW variation lowers incentive to optimise for any one of them and pushes for API’s that make it easier, see even Xbox switch from XDK to GDK this generation) and the more that is true that they are truly optional nobody caters for the more Pro owners are actually shortchanged and will not get what they seek. Still, it is not optional nor free.
 
This is blowing my mind right now!!! Have consoles become that streamlined to develop that we've already reached the theoretical performance limit? I remember back when the early PS3 games vs the ones at the end of the console generation had a graphical leap on the same engine. Now we need a "Pro" version to simply get a better "remastered" version of the same game generation?
 

Aces High

Member
I'm not gonna buy a pro console ever again. The resolution upgrade isn't worth the money and what's even worse is that it will make the next gen system feel less impressive. I buy a new generation console on launch day and invest my money in games instead.
 

charles8771

Member
Most people on console do care about 60 FPS. Every game comes with a performance mode now. The most played games on both current gen consoles. Why do you think it was Call of Duty specifically that became popular during the Xbox 360 days?

This whole narrative that “Only enthusiasts care about good performance” is completely baseless and unfounded.

PC is a completely different platform and a completely different audience. Furthermore, plenty of games aren't released on PC and vice versa.
The multiplayer component of COD 4 is why COD was so popular during 7th gen.

Nothing to do about frame rates.
 

hinch7

Member
Not sure if they are going forward with a Pro. But they really should really wait until AMD nails down Raytracing performance in their GPU's.

Have a feeling RDNA 4 (and beyond) will be substantially faster there than previous iterations in that regard.
 
Not sure if they are going forward with a Pro. But they really should really wait until AMD nails down Raytracing performance in their GPU's.

Have a feeling RDNA 4 (and beyond) will be substantially faster there than previous iterations in that regard.
Do not underestimate the mad lad that is Mark Cerny with his own RT solutions
 

hinch7

Member
Do not underestimate the mad lad that is Mark Cerny with his own RT solutions
True. They could do something like repurpose some of the CU towards Ai and RT. Much like they did with the audio like with the Tempest Engine.

I just don't see it being that much more a jump for most people to really be worth it. Unless ofc they go balls to the walls launch a $700 PS5 Pro, but that'll be a hard pill to swallow for most people to pay for a console.
 
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Rykan

Member
The multiplayer component of COD 4 is why COD was so popular during 7th gen.

Nothing to do about frame rates.
The multiplayer of CoD4 was popular partly BECAUSE it ran at 60 FPS. CoD simply felt much better to play than any other Multiplayer FPS on the market.
 

hlm666

Member
This is blowing my mind right now!!! Have consoles become that streamlined to develop that we've already reached the theoretical performance limit? I remember back when the early PS3 games vs the ones at the end of the console generation had a graphical leap on the same engine. Now we need a "Pro" version to simply get a better "remastered" version of the same game generation?
Nothing changed that required a big learning process, same x86 arch, another gpu arch from AMD with improvements but again not requiring big learning curve and the same api's. They hit the ground running basically, it wasn't a big hardware change like ps2 to ps3 to ps4. Ontop of that last gen got a massive boost to visuals with baked lighting (at the cost of interactivity and inconsistent visuals) and there is no new graphics cheat like that. It's actually the reverse with raytracing being used to push visuals and even console friendly implementations like lumen is still heavy.

There's probably some room for improvements over the generation but it's not going to be the level of change ps3 saw from start of gen compared to end of gen.
 
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