360 Fears : V - Skyrim

» Mon May 09, 2011 1:17 am

I am not a fan of X-box personally, but I have no doubt that it will be able to handle the game properly. It has already been shown that the Dev's use the 360 to make/ test the game, so........ it should be fine. Just as I'm sure the PS3 will be fine. They wouldn't even bother making the game for the console's if they were loaded with tons of issues.

Framerate issues or what not......... When I played OB, it was on the 360 and I had NO issues with it. I'll be playing Skyrim on the PS3, so I hope it is the same :hubbahubba:

» Mon May 09, 2011 10:22 am

I am sure it will be fine. I just hope they don't cut out content because they couldn't fit it on one 360 disk. I'd rather have 2 disks; maybe an initial loader and a play disk. But I do think Skyrim and forthcomming Gears 3 will tap out the current 360.

I look forward to getting Elder Scolls VI on the 720 :goodjob:

» Mon May 09, 2011 2:59 am

Well the screenshots and trailer are from the Xbox, so you go ahead figure it out. And if Bethesda wants my money thet better figure out a way to do it.

» Mon May 09, 2011 5:33 am

It′s kinda bad though that they have to make it work on the 360 as well as on the PS3 and PC, really in pools on this site when there are questions such as "What platform will you play Skyrim on ? X-Box 360 is usually hovering around 25% and the PC at 62% with the PS3 admittedly getting less votes but claiming the remaining 13%

This is based on the thread that was here the other day with nearly the same name as my example was BTW.

I guess 25% is oki though, it is 1/4th but is there anyone really that doesn′t have a PC and is there anyone who would not just get it for the PC if it didn′t come out on the X-Box in the same quality ? I know I would (granted I always just play on the PC, it offers more flexibility anyway and there is no one that can claim otherwise, even if a 360 controler could be used to move as fluidly and as fast as a mouse and keyboard mods are still just too essential to the TES series, especially with a game so large that it′s near impossible to do everything right.

Anyway enough ranting, just stating my mind, and answering the question (granted it has had an answer) again, that it will 100% be on the 360 in as good quality as it can offer (at least I hope Bethesda is not holding back any, Skyrim should push the 360 to the absolute limit).

I don't know the numbers, but I'd wager they sell significantly more copies of the Xbox version than the PC version. Remember your audience participating in the polls on this website is not representative of the average consumer population by any stretch. Make no mistake, this game is being designed with Xbox in mind and will work just fine. In fact, Todd Howard states 360 as his preferred platform for playing the game; So, I tend to think it will operate wonderfully.

» Mon May 09, 2011 2:59 am

From the GI Podcast Q&A which was transcribed by member Vamphaery :
http://www.gameinformer.com/b/podcasts/archive/2011/02/03/toddhowardse.aspx

41:02 Will there be an X64 version for PC players? High resolution textures (will they have to be modded in?) Do you have a dedicated group for the PC version? "We work on it together. The main thing for people to know is our background is PC games. The game is authored here on PCs. That's what we work on. A lot of the team is playing the game on PC all day. We do want the platforms to each have a really, really high level of fidelity. I personally play a lot on the Xbox. It tends to be my preferred platform. We do a lot of graphics development still FIRST on the Xbox, just because it's smoother. And then a lot of that stuff does go over to the PC.
We tend to do as much as we can as the project goes on, because we want to support as wide a range as possible. We also tend to do that stuff late, because right now we want to work on the main game and how it plays and getting the graphics fast everywhere, and then as the project gets closer to release we start supporting all those other things. You'll definitely be able to run the PC on a much higher resolution. All of our games that we've done so far - Morrowind, Oblivion, Fallout - the PC versions have higher res textures they ship with by default. A lot of times you don't notice that, because when you play a console game you're sitting six to ten feet away from the screen. Whereas on the PC, you're sitting a foot, two feet away from the screen. Those kinds of differences in texture resolution, you don't notice unless you're looking at two screenshots on a computer and flipping between them. We are gonna support that stuff. I can't say how far. But the same thing with the interface. We do a lot of PC interface stuff. There are uniquenesses [sic] to how we handle it on the PC."

Yeah, the trailer was shot using the 360 -- other than the pre-rendered shots of Alduin's Wall that you've already seen in the announcement trailer.

That being said, iIt's looking really sharp on PS3 and PC, too :hubbahubba:

I'm confident it will look great on whatever we prefer to play it on.

» Mon May 09, 2011 5:12 am

It′s kinda bad though that they have to make it work on the 360 as well as on the PS3 and PC, really in pools on this site when there are questions such as "What platform will you play Skyrim on ? X-Box 360 is usually hovering around 25% and the PC at 62% with the PS3 admittedly getting less votes but claiming the remaining 13%

They should also ask "For which platform will you buy Skyrim." You see, playing it isn't same as legally owning it when talking about PC and developers are only interested about those players that actually buy the game.

» Mon May 09, 2011 1:44 pm

You're wrong on that part! The Xenos GPU outperforms the RSX any day

The Cell CPU has more firepower though...

It's not so clear cut, the Cell is capable of doing fast rendering by itself, not needing a dedicated GPU.

They should also ask "For which platform will you buy Skyrim." You see, playing it isn't same as legally owning it when talking about PC and developers are only interested about those players that actually buy the game.

Yes, because piracy doesn't happen on consoles, and nobody buys PC games! Neither of those things has ever been true, industry estimates over here in the UK put it at a 50% piracy rate for consoles - while there's no hard data for PC, most estimates put it at less than 50%, especially with services like steam making it quite literally easier to buy than pirate.

» Mon May 09, 2011 5:24 am

Drop the piracy discussion folks. It is off topic and will get this thread locked. :toughninja:

» Mon May 09, 2011 2:39 pm

If the 360 can handle this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEMxSUGZ6TU
... then it should definitely be able to handle Skyrim.

Of course, there are limitations, as seen in this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WJG14uLA3k
But because of the limitations things will be scaled down a bit. Look a bit worse. But it will still run, of course.

Loading screens will definitely only be between a change of interior to exterior cells. The question is if there will be stuttering, which has been a huge problem so far in Bethesda's games.
I certainly hope things will feel seamless. It really really lowers the experience with stutters. Other games seem to have managed to do this well though, and I don't see why Skyrim would be an exception.

» Mon May 09, 2011 6:22 pm

This may seem like a stupid question but will the 360 be able to handle the awesomeness that is skyrim without constant loading screens and frame rate issues? I've been playing on pc lately and its really made me doubt the power of the xbox... :confused:

I really dont think developers who make games, such as Bethesda, are going to make a game and then realise that the biggest selling platform can't handle it. Do you?? The game is designed around perameters set by the console limitations, the Xbox version will run perfectly how intended for that particular platform, dont worry. The 360 wont compete for many more years, but it is more than up to the job for this game.

» Mon May 09, 2011 5:56 pm

the 360 is still a powerful machine.
and if anything it will have less framerate issues than the ps3.
but i'd doubt bethesda would make anything the consoles can't handle, and the new engine will probably fix the problems seen in oblivion.

» Mon May 09, 2011 6:41 am

Oh no, this thread isn't gonna end well. People should really do more research before posting flamebait like this. Why can't all platforms get along dammit!?

» Mon May 09, 2011 2:49 am

Do you guys remember the days when games were ported to the consoles FROM the PC, and were always inferior ports? Remember DOOM for the SNES?

» Mon May 09, 2011 4:14 pm

This may seem like a stupid question but will the 360 be able to handle the awesomeness that is skyrim without constant loading screens and frame rate issues? I've been playing on pc lately and its really made me doubt the power of the xbox... :confused:

Yes, the xbox will be able to handle the game since it is being developed specifically for this purpose.

» Mon May 09, 2011 3:10 pm

The 360 should be able to handle this. Bethesda was able to avoid the loading problem entirely in FO3. Don't see why they wouldn't get the same improvement, or something better even, for this game.

» Mon May 09, 2011 9:31 am

Remember. This is an internet forum. Odds are, most of the people reading & posting are PC users.

Yep, and an american forum, too. There are far fewer PS3s in the US, than overseas.

» Mon May 09, 2011 5:30 pm

The PS3 is better on paper (though "the power of Cell" was a vast overstatement at the time), but unfortunately for developers, it's also a real pain in the ass to develop for. This isn't a problem for developers making PS3 exclusives, who can produce some outstanding visuals because the PS3 is the only hardware they have to care about. The moment you decide to go multiplatform, however, the PS3 becomes the weakest link, because developing for it is apparently very different than developing for the 360/PC, who feature very similar architecture. There's a reason most (not all) crossplatform titles end up looking better on the 360.

I could come up with a random number right now.... let's say 80... 80% of anything related to video/computer games is massively over-hyped... now I made up 80% but I am pretty sure the vast majority of stuff is still over-hyped. 360 has a more similar architecture to the PC, true, but it still varies. For example on a PC, the only graphics cards that don't have their own RAM are Integrated Graphics Cards but we can be assured that ANY such card won't be cared about why Bethesda for the PC, since those entry level chipsets would never be able to handle Skyrim. PC Architecture is more variant then any other system too, consoles are pretty similar on the inside while how many different types of PC exist... so sure, an X-Box 360 is more like a PC then a PS3, but it's not really that meaningful since you'd still have a lot of re-writing to do anyway. In the case you already had working engines tho (and this is the assumption I am going off of), if you are going cross platform, you are going to be limited by the system that can handle the least, in this case that would be the X-Box 360, the PS3 might be more complicated but it's still more powerful. Also I'd say you were wrong about most, off of the games I personally look at, however any such discussion of cross platform titles could only really be opinion but I would mention that Fallout 3 did seem to look rather noticeably better on PS3 then X-Box 360.

You're wrong on that part! The Xenos GPU outperforms the RSX any day

The Cell CPU has more firepower though...

Actually I am not wrong, because I was including both together, while I have not looked into the architecture of the two machines myself, I am lead to believe the X-Box 360 has pipelines which are shared between the CPU and Graphics Card that only one can any given pipeline at any given time, thus why I said the X-Box 360 is more dynamic then the PS3, but overall it has less processing power. I can't remember what the pipelines were too mind you, but If I remember right the Xenos GPU has no real RAM of it's own, so it's probably memory. On top of this the RSX is capable of far more gigaflops then the Xenos processor, gigaflops being a measure of floating point operations per second what is a measurement of processing power. So again, I am not wrong on this count. Processing power is not always equivalent of performance, however, anecdotally, on the majority of games (not all because the PS3 is harder to make games for due to the architecture) I tend to see slightly better graphics on a PS3 then an X-Box 360, on average.

» Mon May 09, 2011 3:41 pm

I tend to see slightly better graphics on a PS3 then an X-Box 360, on average.

Really? That's not what I have gathered from all the examples I've seen. Do you have any examples you could provide?
Thanks.

» Mon May 09, 2011 5:36 am

Let's look at the maximum theoretical numbers for the Xbox 360 and PS3 GPUs.
Xbox will be fine,as will other platforms: Here is researched information...This will hopefully put things like this to rest.
Read the spoiler for console comparison.

Spoiler

Triangle Setup
Xbox 360 - 500 Million Triangles/sec
PS3 - 250 Million Triangles/sec

Vertex Shader Processing
Xbox 360 - 6.0 Billion Vertices/sec (using all 48 Unified Pipelines)
Xbox 360 - 2.0 Billion Vertices/sec (using only 16 of the 48 Unified Pipelines)
Xbox 360 - 1.5 Billion Vertices/sec (using only 12 of the 48 Unified Pipelines)
Xbox 360 - 1.0 Billion Vertices/sec (using only 8 of the 48 Unified Pipelines)
PS3 - 1.0 Billion Vertices/sec

Filtered Texture Fetch
Xbox 360 - 8.0 Billion Texels/sec
PS3 - 12.0 Billion Texels/sec

Vertex Texture Fetch
Xbox 360 - 8.0 Billion Texels/sec
PS3 - 4.0 Billion Texels/sec

Pixel Shader Processing with 16 Filtered Texels Per Cycle (Pixel ALU x Clock)
Xbox 360 - 24.0 Billion Pixels/sec (using all 48 Unified Pipelines)
Xbox 360 - 20.0 Billion Pixels/sec (using 40 of the 48 Unified Pipelines)
Xbox 360 - 18.0 Billion Pixels/sec (using 36 of the 48 Unified Pipelines)
Xbox 360 - 16.0 Billion Pixels/sec (using 32 of the 48 Unified Pipelines)
PS3 - 16.0 Billion Pixels/sec

Pixel Shader Processing without Textures (Pixel ALU x Clock)
Xbox 360 - 24.0 Billion Pixels/sec (using all 48 Unified Pipelines)
Xbox 360 - 20.0 Billion Pixels/sec (using 40 of the 48 Unified Pipelines)
Xbox 360 - 18.0 Billion Pixels/sec (using 36 of the 48 Unified Pipelines)
Xbox 360 - 16.0 Billion Pixels/sec (using 32 of the 48 Unified Pipelines)
PS3 - 24.0 Billion Pixels/sec

Multisampled Fill Rate
Xbox 360 - 16.0 Billion Samples/sec (8 ROPS x 4 Samples x 500MHz)
PS3 - 8.0 Billion Samples/sec (8 ROPS x 2 Samples x 500MHz)

Pixel Fill Rate with 4x Multisampled Anti-Aliasing
Xbox 360 - 4.0 Billion Pixels/sec (8 ROPS x 4 Samples x 500MHz / 4)
PS3 - 2.0 Billion Pixels/sec (8 ROPS x 2 Samples x 500MHz / 4)

Pixel Fill Rate without Anti-Aliasing
Xbox 360 - 4.0 Billion Pixels/sec (8 ROPS x 500MHz)
PS3 - 4.0 Billion Pixels/sec (8 ROPS x 500MHz)

Frame Buffer Bandwidth
Xbox 360 - 256.0 GB/sec (dedicated for frame buffer rendering)
PS3 - 20.8 GB/sec (shared with other graphics data: textures and vertices)
PS3 - 10.8 GB/sec (with 10.0 GB/sec subtracted for textures and vertices)
PS3 - 8.4 GB/sec (with 12.4 GB/sec subtracted for textures and vertices)

Texture/Vertex Memory Bandwidth
Xbox 360 - 22.4 GB/sec (shared with CPU)
Xbox 360 - 14.4 GB/sec (with 8.0 GB/sec subtracted for CPU)
Xbox 360 - 12.4 GB/sec (with 10.0 GB/sec subtracted for CPU)
PS3 - 20.8 GB/sec (shared with frame buffer)
PS3 - 10.8 GB/sec (with 10.0 GB/sec subtracted for frame buffer)
PS3 - 8.4 GB/sec (with 12.4 GB/sec subtracted for frame buffer)

Shader Model
Xbox 360 - Shader Model 3.0+ / Unified Shader Architecture
PS3 - Shader Model 3.0 / Discrete Shader Architecture

Xbox 360 has the advantage in most cases.

CONSOLES ::: XBOX 360PS3
Release Date: November 2005Release Date: Spring 2006
Backwards Compatibility: Most Xbox gamesBackwards Compatibility: All PS2 and PSone games
CPU - Main Processor:: Custom IBM PowerPC CPU with 3 symmetrical cores running at 3.2 GHz eachCPU - Main Processor:: Cell Processor with 7 SPEs, at 3.2 GHz
L2 Cache:: 1 MBL2 Cache:: 512 KB + 256 KB per SPE (7 SPE’s in the PS3)
GPU - Graphics Processor:: Custom ATI Processor, at 500 MHzGPU - Graphics Processor:: Custom NVidia Processor called RSX “Reality Synthesizer”, at 550 MHz
Memory:: 512 MB UMA (shared access for CPU and GPU), 10MB eDRAM embedded video memoryMemory:: 256 MB XDR, 256 MB video memory
System Performance:: 1 TeraFlopsSystem Performance::2 TeraFlops
Controllers:: Wireless, 2.4 GHz technology, up to 4 wireless controllers Controllers:: Wireless, Bluetooth technology, up to wireless 7 controllers - extra controllers via 4 front USB ports
Game Media:: Dual-Layer DVD-ROM, up to 17 GB of dataGame Media:: Blu-ray BD-ROM, up to 54 GB of data
Video Output Resolution:: 480p, 480i, 720p, 1080i,(1080p added later,as was display discovery=more resolutions ). Video Output Resolution:: 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i, 1080p, two outputs for two separate displays simultaneously
Wireless connectivity:: 802.11a/b/g Wi-Fi-ready (needs extra adapter)(not with the new xbox) Wireless connectivity:: 802.11b/g Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.0
I/O ports:: (5 on USB's on new xbox) 3 USB 2.0, Ethernet (RJ45) I/O ports:: 6 USB 2.0, Ethernet (RJ45), CF Slot (Type I, II), SD Slot (Regular, Compact), Memory Stick (+Duo), Optical Audio
Removable Storage Media::This info has changed for both consoles since:: 20 GB Removable Hard Drive, 2 ports for 64 MB memory cards Removable Storage Media:: 2.5″ Removable Hard Drive (storage space unknown - possibly varying)
Digital Media Formats:: CR-ROM, CDR+W, DVD, DVD-ROM, DVD-R, DVD+R Digital Media Formats:: D, CD-DA, CD-DA (ROM), CD-R, CD-RW, SACD, SACD Hybrid (CD layer), SACD HD, DVD-Video, DVD-ROM, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW, BD-Video, BD-ROM, BD-R, BD-RE
Special features:: Interchangable Face Plates, Xbox LIVE, Media Center Extender, Eye-Toy like camera for video chat,kinect+ other.Special features:: Improved Eye-Toy camera available,playstation move motion sensor+ other

Skyrim will be fine across the board,don't worry

» Mon May 09, 2011 1:47 pm

That's like saying, "this book is less impressive because less people pay attention to the number of chapters in it"... facts are facts, the PS3 has more sheer and graphical processing power then the X-Box 360, it has blu-ray and ALL PS3's have hard drives. The X-box 360 does have a more dynamic architecture and it is still capable of some good graphics, but with the exception of the wii (which this game isn't slated for), the X-Box 360 is still the weakest link, as such the game will have to be designed to be able to go down as low as the X-Box 360 can handle at best. The PS3 and PC maybe optimized past this, well the PC almost certainly will be optimized further then this, what makes me happier I will be playing it on a PC, oh that and the mods...!

Finally someone who gets it.

» Mon May 09, 2011 8:31 am

Can someone show me the PS3 games that are blowing the 360 away in the graphics department? Just curious, because I haven't seen them yet.

» Mon May 09, 2011 4:24 pm

Can someone show me the PS3 games that are blowing the 360 away in the graphics department? Just curious, because I haven't seen them yet.

They won't...the consoles are extremely similar,check my above post:
I put alot of effort into it,and did my research.

» Mon May 09, 2011 5:37 am

Can someone show me the PS3 games that are blowing the 360 away in the graphics department? Just curious, because I haven't seen them yet.

lookup Killzone 2, Killzone 3, God of War 3, and Uncharted 2. There are some others but these 4 games look better than anything the 360 has. PS3 excells in exclusives since the developers soley focus on the system without having to worry about the limitations of a DVD.

» Mon May 09, 2011 7:24 pm

Its not that graphics intensive, honestly. I dont see a problem. Never had trouble with any other big open-world games like RDR, Assassin's Creed, and GTA4

» Mon May 09, 2011 9:21 am

Its not that graphics intensive, honestly. I dont see a problem. Never had trouble with any other big open-world games like RDR, Assassin's Creed, and GTA4

Yes there won't be a problem, Skyrim just like the games you have listed will be developed using the 360.