Thoughts on next-gen consoles

[SephYuyX]

Pics of mom prease.

[Scythiroth]

Pics of mom prease.

She is like 50... >_>

[netz]

Anyone know of any good HD video capture devices? PCI would be okay, but FireWire would be interesting. I play my PS2 through normal analog video capture cards since I'm too cheap for a TV, but it'd be great if I could just rig something up to use my laptop LCD instead, assuming it's even possible given the bandwidth required for HD resolutions and what I have for inputs.

Wait wait, you play your PS2 games on your PC instead of your TV? How? :O hook a computer noob sister up plz.

Right now, I have ATI All-in-Wonder Radeon 9000 Pro on my computer that doesn't play games. It's got a breakout box for composite and S-Video input, so I just use the TV app in Live display mode with the input set to composite. I have a DirecTV receiver connected via S-Video, so whenever I want to watch TV I change the audio cables on the composite connection and set the input video to s-video in the TV program.

For my laptop, I bought a USB capture device (Plextor ConvertX) and that does the same composite and s-video inputs, but I haven't received it yet to try it out. I don't know what app I'm going to use to display it, though... maybe something ghetto like VirtualDub in its recording mode, or whatever silly software they have packaged in the box.

I want HD capture so I can do the same thing with next-gen consoles or an HD DirecTV or cable TV receiver if I ever pick one up.

[Scythiroth]

Does that look weird at all compared to a TV or do you have a really good monitor? A while ago I heard TV looked weird on monitors, but it was before LCDs were everywhere.

[Scragg]

Um, there is tons of good Xbox360 games aside from Gears of War ;x. It's been out for a while.

I still like Burnout Revenge on the 360, the most fun game I can think of that's also in HD. GoW is also fun, but fps games are better with the control of a mouse, imo.

Gears of war isn't a FPS, have you even played it? I used to play a ton of FPS online (SoF half life UT etc) and all of my controls were set to my mouse, keyboard only used to type and open doors really... going by that experience, i would HATEEEEE playing Gears with a mouse, it would be absolutely terrible.

yes, I have played it (I own it)... Often times the fighting is done after having barricaded yourself somewhere. Of course it's not all truly in the first person, and I only meant using the mouse in aiming situations rather than a joystick. Like you described with the mouse and keyboard, people set it up in their own ways, I used the keyboard a lot more than you would, the mouse was only used for aiming for me.

[Nightstriker]

If I may ask, whats this rumor of MGS 4 coming to 360? Is there a creditable source for this or is it just bullshit someone started on the interweb.

[BRP]

If I may ask, whats this rumor of MGS 4 coming to 360? Is there a creditable source for this or is it just bullshit someone started on the interweb.

Rumor, based off some or little fact from interviews/statements.

[Btight]

If I may ask, whats this rumor of MGS 4 coming to 360? Is there a creditable source for this or is it just bullshit someone started on the interweb.

Well the rumor is based off the fact every other MGS game has been ported to XBOX, so why not this one?

[netz]

Does that look weird at all compared to a TV or do you have a really good monitor? A while ago I heard TV looked weird on monitors, but it was before LCDs were everywhere.

Well, right now this stuff's designed to look best on your average NTSC analog television. The image is a lot sharper on TVs. I don't know the technical explanation for it.

I just sorta sharpened mine up a bit by setting my monitor refresh rate to 60Hz (using a CRT on my computer out here, not my laptop LCD).

The other thing I know is that H.264 1280x720 and 1920x1080 anime encodes look INCREDIBLE on my laptop, so that's sorta what spurred my interest in the possibility of HD capture :D

[GRT]

By G.O.W. do you mean Gears of War? Because heavenly sword looks nothing like Gears.

think he meant god of war

[Scythiroth]

Well, right now this stuff's designed to look best on your average NTSC analog television. The image is a lot sharper on TVs. I don't know the technical explanation for it.

I just sorta sharpened mine up a bit by setting my monitor refresh rate to 60Hz (using a CRT on my computer out here, not my laptop LCD).

The other thing I know is that H.264 1280x720 and 1920x1080 anime encodes look INCREDIBLE on my laptop, so that's sorta what spurred my interest in the possibility of HD capture :D

Time for me to build a new computer. D:

[GRT]

If I may ask, whats this rumor of MGS 4 coming to 360? Is there a creditable source for this or is it just bullshit someone started on the interweb.

Well the rumor is based off the fact every other MGS game has been ported to XBOX, so why not this one?

not that i consider it impossible, but MGS games on the PS2 being ported to the Xbox is reasonable considering how much more power xbox has... but would you rather kojima take in mind the limitations of x360 "which he needs to later port the game to" when he is making it for the PS3?

[aurik]

Biggest advantage to 50GB discs for now is they won't have to compress stuff nearly as much when they put it on disc. Hi2u HD video/audio without nasty compression artifacts.

Still, they managed to get all the videos and audio for FFX on a single DVD -- compare this to FFVIII etc which were 3-4 discs before the PS2 disc format came along -- so it's not like people have been really pushing against the disc size limit (yet).

I'm not trying to negatively twist your words, but would it be fair to say that the biggest advantage of a larger disc is to pleasure graphic whores?

For instance, if graphics weren't your primary concern with a game, say, you were willing to give up HD graphics in favor of more time spent on gameplay, a smaller disc wouldn't really affect all that much? Seeing as how, like you pointed out, all of FFX / FFXIII etc fit on a single DVD and looked beautiful.

You could put it that way, I guess. The real answer is that good gameplay is pretty damn light on disk space requirements, and scales pretty well to hardware power too. Even HD textures won't really push the need for more than 1 DVD, yet. It's all because of the pre-rendered video that you might exceed 1 DVD.

Great video will enhance a good game, but it's by no means necessary. For example, n64 games had virtually no pre-rendered video due to cart size, but that didn't stop some of the best games of all-time from landing on that system.

[Nightstriker]

hmm alot of people seem to hate nice smooth and real graphics. I dont know about you but graphics do matter and they matter alot. As the gaming industry started from the NES to where it is today. It was a natural thing to increase the graphics back then so why is it so bad now a days?

Gameplay does matter but gameplay has been the same for 10 years now, we all used a controller from our NES days until today, because now the Wii is out to try and change all that. Difference in gameplay back in the NES days was for the arcades and hell I still think it should stay in the arcade. If you wanted innovation in gameplay you went to the arcade and use a joystick, gun , dance pad, motion sensor equipment and etc. All genre's all play the same in shooters you shoot and action you run around and do shit and etc. Personally I tend to find the story far more important then the gameplay because if the story can't keep your attention then whats the point in playing? So shouldn't we all be stressing better story's instead of gameplay and graphics?

[aurik]

hmm alot of people seem to hate nice smooth and real graphics. I dont know about you but graphics do matter and they matter alot. As the gaming industry started from the NES to where it is today. It was a natural thing to increase the graphics and dont see anything wrong with it. So why is it so bad now a days?

There's nothing bad about pretty graphics. You seem to be confusing with "a good game doesn't need pretty graphics" with "good games don't have pretty graphics".

Gameplay does matter but gameplay has been the same for 10 years now, we all used a controller from our NES days until today, because now the Wii is out to try and change all that. Difference in gameplay back in the NES days was for the arcades and hell I still think it should stay in the arcade. If you wanted innovation in gameplay you went to the arcade and use a joystick, gun , dance pad, motion sensor equipment and etc. All genre's all play the same in shooters you shoot and action you run around and do shit and etc. Personally I tend to find the story far more important then the gameplay because if the story can't keep your attention then whats the point in playing? So shouldn't we all be stressing better story's instead of gameplay and graphics?

Hate to break it to you, but controller design has been changing steadily from NES until PS1. The SNES generation introduced shoulder buttons. N64/PS1 generation introduced analog input and force feedback.

It was only the PS2 generation that nobody did anything really innovative with the controller. XBox and PS2 both have analog buttons, but nobody really did anything creative with them--instead, people independently shipped "alternate" controllers. And now 2 of the 3 nexgen systems have some sort of motion-sensor.

As for story being better than gameplay, good story doesn't make for good game. They're pretty much orthogonal--most of the best games of all time have almost no story, or just enough story to explain to you what tasks you need to complete in order to win. Particularly, if I want a good story, I'd much rather have it in book/dvd form so that it didn't get diluted by hours of grinding in order to enjoy it.

[BRP]

They're pretty much orthogonal--most of the best games of all time have almost no story, or just enough story to explain to you what tasks you need to complete in order to win. Particularly, if I want a good story, I'd much rather have it in book/dvd form so that it didn't get diluted by hours of grinding in order to enjoy it.

Your post was all factual up until this point ;o. This pretty much opinion, just like saying gameplay hasn't changed much at all in the last 10 years in an opinion.

[GRT]

hmm alot of people seem to hate nice smooth and real graphics. I dont know about you but graphics do matter and they matter alot. As the gaming industry started from the NES to where it is today. It was a natural thing to increase the graphics back then so why is it so bad now a days?

Gameplay does matter but gameplay has been the same for 10 years now, we all used a controller from our NES days until today, because now the Wii is out to try and change all that. Difference in gameplay back in the NES days was for the arcades and hell I still think it should stay in the arcade. If you wanted innovation in gameplay you went to the arcade and use a joystick, gun , dance pad, motion sensor equipment and etc. All genre's all play the same in shooters you shoot and action you run around and do shit and etc. Personally I tend to find the story far more important then the gameplay because if the story can't keep your attention then whats the point in playing? So shouldn't we all be stressing better story's instead of gameplay and graphics?

well said

i wonder if people ever tried to play those "greatest game of all time" from 10 years ago, i mean i absolutely loved FF7 back when it first came out, a while ago i tried to play it again and couldn't bare it past midgar cuz the graphics are so unbelievably bad compared to what i'm used to nowadays, namely FF11, xbox 360 games etc.

those old "greatest games of all time" were the "greatest" because people have not seen "greater", especially in graphics since the technology back then could not achieve it yet... i mean how many people could go back and become monks after they've experienced sex? :wink:

[aurik]

They're pretty much orthogonal--most of the best games of all time have almost no story, or just enough story to explain to you what tasks you need to complete in order to win. Particularly, if I want a good story, I'd much rather have it in book/dvd form so that it didn't get diluted by hours of grinding in order to enjoy it.

Your post was all factual up until this point ;o. This pretty much opinion, just like saying gameplay hasn't changed much at all in the last 10 years in an opinion.

What's not factual about that statement, besides the sentence where I obviously hedge it in a "personally blah blah blah"?

[Nightstriker]

hmm alot of people seem to hate nice smooth and real graphics. I dont know about you but graphics do matter and they matter alot. As the gaming industry started from the NES to where it is today. It was a natural thing to increase the graphics and dont see anything wrong with it. So why is it so bad now a days?

There's nothing bad about pretty graphics. You seem to be confusing with "a good game doesn't need pretty graphics" with "good games don't have pretty graphics".

Gameplay does matter but gameplay has been the same for 10 years now, we all used a controller from our NES days until today, because now the Wii is out to try and change all that. Difference in gameplay back in the NES days was for the arcades and hell I still think it should stay in the arcade. If you wanted innovation in gameplay you went to the arcade and use a joystick, gun , dance pad, motion sensor equipment and etc. All genre's all play the same in shooters you shoot and action you run around and do shit and etc. Personally I tend to find the story far more important then the gameplay because if the story can't keep your attention then whats the point in playing? So shouldn't we all be stressing better story's instead of gameplay and graphics?

Hate to break it to you, but controller design has been changing steadily from NES until PS1. The SNES generation introduced shoulder buttons. N64/PS1 generation introduced analog input and force feedback.

It was only the PS2 generation that nobody did anything really innovative with the controller. XBox and PS2 both have analog buttons, but nobody really did anything creative with them--instead, people independently shipped "alternate" controllers. And now 2 of the 3 nexgen systems have some sort of motion-sensor.

As for story being better than gameplay, good story doesn't make for good game. They're pretty much orthogonal--most of the best games of all time have almost no story, or just enough story to explain to you what tasks you need to complete in order to win. Particularly, if I want a good story, I'd much rather have it in book/dvd form so that it didn't get diluted by hours of grinding in order to enjoy it.

Your right, I never really considered the "shoulder buttons" a change that was important so it was easily forgotten and as far as the analog you sir are correct. I never really used the analog but it was a decent change I suppose.

[GRT]

They're pretty much orthogonal--most of the best games of all time have almost no story, or just enough story to explain to you what tasks you need to complete in order to win. Particularly, if I want a good story, I'd much rather have it in book/dvd form so that it didn't get diluted by hours of grinding in order to enjoy it.

Your post was all factual up until this point ;o. This pretty much opinion, just like saying gameplay hasn't changed much at all in the last 10 years in an opinion.

What's not factual about that statement, besides the sentence where I obviously hedge it in a "personally blah blah blah"?

because those games that had barely any story were the "best games of all times" to you, and clearly he would hate those games with no story and they would not be the "best games of all times" to him