Xbox To hold back PS3?

First off I know this could easily turn into a flame war but lets keep it clean. This is more so a question about Xbox games then an actual comparison to the PS3, the title I just got from the question being asked.

Here is an interview about UT3 with Jeff Morris:

Question: How are you finding fitting the massive wads of game data onto the Xbox 360's DVDs, as opposed to larger PC HDD and PS3 Blu-ray discs?

Morris: Blue-ray is certainly appealing for guys coming from a hard drive background to have a much larger footprint to store that sort of data, but because we want the game to be the same on all platforms the chances are it'll be the same sort of size that will fit on all of them.
Edit

I can tell you we have 30GB versions here today and we copied two versions to each of those PCs, so by the end of it we had about a terabyte of copies over there. So we've got to get smaller - big is cool, it lets you have more environment diversity and stuff like that but at the same time you have to deal with the actual load times. We don't know the exact number of maps we'll ship with but we want it to be between 30 and 40 - that's substantially more than other games in the genre.

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http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=156415

Just wondering what everyones opinion on this is. With games coming out in HD they are really starting to take up a lot of space, I know Metal Gear is already taking up over 25GBs of space. So my question is in the next couple of years with graphics getting better and better just how much content do you guys think will be cut out of these games, and do you think in the future games will start to require Multi DVD, HD-DVD, or maybe even HD storage space?

tenchi86 said:

First off I know this could easily turn into a flame war but lets keep it clean. This is more so a question about Xbox games then an actual comparison to the PS3, the title I just got from the question being asked.

Here is an interview about UT3 with Jeff Morris:

Question: How are you finding fitting the massive wads of game data onto the Xbox 360's DVDs, as opposed to larger PC HDD and PS3 Blu-ray discs?

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=156415

Just wondering what everyones opinion on this is. With games coming out in HD they are really starting to take up a lot of space, I know Metal Gear is already taking up over 25GBs of space. So my question is in the next couple of years with graphics getting better and better just how much content do you guys think will be cut out of these games, and do you think in the future games will start to require Multi DVD, HD-DVD, or maybe even HD storage space?

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Anything is possible i suppose. Multi-disk games are nothing new though. Wasn't common on the PS2 but on the original play station it was very common.

Personally I don't see any of those options taking off besides maybe a bigger HDD for the Xbox. Multi-Disk you run into problems in that people are lazy, and what about if say you are online and the level you load up is on disk 2? HD-DVD could happen but MS would have to lower the price of the HD-DVD unit so that more people could afford it or else game devs will not want to release games on it since the market will be so small.

i thought we already had a multi-disc Xbox360 game out. Blue Dragon. Its out in japan, and will be out around spring/summer for the US.

Its a 3 disc game.

Now, i don't think those are HD-DVD's, simply because well...the 360 doesn't use HD-DVD's for its games yet. The add-on is for watching movies...at the moment.

will we ever have a multi-disc Nex-gen game out, that uses Blu-ray/HD-DVD? I say yes. this happens every generation ( since discs came out ). Everyone has always said ( Man, we went from CD's which is 700 megs, now to DVD's, 4.7 gigs! we will never see a multi-disc game again! ) Then we had multi-disc games pop out. Yeah, it was quite a bit more rare than what the PS1 had, but it still happened.


Though, not to thread-jack....but i have another question to ask that is probably more important to us, than the PS3/360 debate.

It was kinda touched on, in what all you said tenchi.

With the new console games getting bigger and bigger, using HD-DVD and Blu-ray. These games are NOT small. MGS4 at 25 gigs? Whats mass-effect supposed to be at? Is it going to be on a regular DVD?. Well, what happens to the PC ports of those games? Will we lose an ungodly ammount of content, just so we don't have to buy a 200 Gig HDD so we can install a whole 5 games? Or will they try to force all that space onto the computer?

Will they try to use better compression?

Will they try to make it, so we play the game off the Disc, instead of installing all the files to your PC?

Hell, will we even have ports anymore? Will they even bother trying to port over a 20+ gig game to the PC?????

i'm less worried about the PS3/Xbox360/Wii battle. I'm more worried about the console vs. PC. Sadly, alot of the PC games that people buy, is ports from the console to the PC. and we ALL know that while there is a few really good ports.....there have been MANY MANY terrible ports. Which does nothing but hurt the PC gaming experience.

Dunno, just a thought

Though I agree space on Blu-Ray will run out, if the PS3 drive can handle the 200GB disk I don't think that will be anytime soon. You bring a good point though, will that add on unit be able to play games even if they wanted it to? I am not sure what connection it even uses so that right there could be a major wall for it. As for Multi-Disk games, there is one out and it is an RPG. However this is for Japan which at least from what I have heard is not as lazy as America, not to mention it and RPG so that means you only have to switch the disk every couple days or so. I really wish Microsoft would loosen the grip on their HDD and allow it to accept any brand/model used instead of this Proprietary crap they have going on. Anyway back to the Super Bowl, Colts for the win!

From what Major Nelson and Jay Allard have said on the subject of the 360 and high definition gaming (taking for granted that they work for Microsoft) the compressions techniques they use and how much easier it is to program for the 360 than the PS3 they felt they didn't need to use a HD drive for the 360 for gaming. They admitted that the PS3 probably needed it but then they cited a couple of game publishes's quotes as saying how the same game for the 360 took 1/5th time to develop and 1/5 of the disc space. So, if the stadard BluRay DVD is 25GB, 1/5 of that is about 5 gigabytes and a DVD holds 4.7 so I image they could cut 300mb somehow.

FudgeNuggets said:

From what Major Nelson and Jay Allard have said on the subject of the 360 and high definition gaming (taking for granted that they work for Microsoft) the compressions techniques they use and how much easier it is to program for the 360 than the PS3 they felt they didn't need to use a HD drive for the 360 for gaming. They admitted that the PS3 probably needed it but then they cited a couple of game publishes's quotes as saying how the same game for the 360 took 1/5th time to develop and 1/5 of the disc space. So, if the stadard BluRay DVD is 25GB, 1/5 of that is about 5 gigabytes and a DVD holds 4.7 so I image they could cut 300mb somehow.

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Don't forget Fudge 4.7 for a single layer. I don't know about 1/5 the size but compression techniques are getting better all the time so I don;t think 360 will have to worry and it's a simple solution, if you need to do 2 discs, it's not a big deal.

/\It can be a big deal on some games though. I do agree thought that right now the PS3 probably is harder to program for, but no way its games take up 5 times more space, I mean look at Madden or any of the other games like NFS: Carbon, they managed to keep those the same size as the Xbox counter part give or take a gig or two. Fact is people are having to cut content just as the UT guys are doing.

Interview with Forza 2 Dev: Edited of course

Yes, tracks will be made available after the release of Forza 2, the ones they couldn’t fit on the disc initially. So although the 12 environments may sound a little disappointing in terms of volume of content, that will increase

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http://www.xboxic.com/news/2334

tenchi86 said:

First off I know this could easily turn into a flame war but lets keep it clean. This is more so a question about Xbox games then an actual comparison to the PS3, the title I just got from the question being asked.

Here is an interview about UT3 with Jeff Morris:

Question: How are you finding fitting the massive wads of game data onto the Xbox 360's DVDs, as opposed to larger PC HDD and PS3 Blu-ray discs?

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=156415

Just wondering what everyones opinion on this is. With games coming out in HD they are really starting to take up a lot of space, I know Metal Gear is already taking up over 25GBs of space. So my question is in the next couple of years with graphics getting better and better just how much content do you guys think will be cut out of these games, and do you think in the future games will start to require Multi DVD, HD-DVD, or maybe even HD storage space?

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HD gaming doesn't make much of a difference, its all the CG stuff. Its no suprise MGS is 25 gigs, probably 20 of it is CG stuff considering 50% of MGS games are CG stuff.

To kill 10-20 gigs with content, just isn't happening and won't happen for a while yet. So far its just a few Japanesse developers who are in love with the CG that need to worry about disk space.

/\That is not what Game Devs are saying. The man behind Metal Gear himself said that going HD game play alone massively increases game size. (I can get link if you want) Also just so you know the last Metal Gear didn't even use CG, so no telling if this one will. I mean the UT guys who are just making a FPS and are not done said they are already at 30GB, and they are not exactly known for a lot of CG in their games. As for compression you hear this term thrown around a lot like it's some god send, however there is a limit to it which is shown when you say watch an HD movie compared to a DVD.

Edit: Also I am mainly speaking of big titles here, ones that actually have a lot of work go into them. Like Grand Theft Auto, there is no way they could fight an entire city in the Rage engine and have everything the Devs want without cutting out content.

tenchi86 said:

/\That is not what Game Devs are saying. The man behind Metal Gear himself said that going HD game play alone massively increases game size. (I can get link if you want) Also just so you know the last Metal Gear didn't even use CG, so no telling if this one will. I mean the UT guys who are just making a FPS and are not done said they are already at 30GB, and they are not exactly known for a lot of CG in their games. As for compression you hear this term thrown around a lot like it's some god send, however there is a limit to it which is shown when you say watch an HD movie compared to a DVD.

Edit: Also I am mainly speaking of big titles here, ones that actually have a lot of work go into them. Like Grand Theft Auto, there is no way they could fight an entire city in the Rage engine and have everything the Devs want without cutting out content.

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The UT guys having 30 gigs of material seems a bit like screaming the sky is falling. Game devs probably have tons of fat that needs to be trimmed and cut. UT2k4 is capable of HD+ resolutions and is no where near 30 gigs. Things are always cut from games due to ram, disk and processing power limitations.

Not saying the extra space isn't nice, but it seems premature to start worring now when HD games fit easily on 1 DVD and PC games with assests capable of higher then HD resolutions are still being released on CDs/DVDs.

If it does become a factor, the funny thing is the 360 has more ram to display HD assests, while the PS3 will have disk space for better assets, but will lack the ram to display them. Its a catch 22 I guess.

im just waiting for something like metal gear to come out before i can get a real idea of what true hd gaming is gonna be like. so for i cant see how they will keep load times down without putting massive amounts of data on the hdd. dvd, hd-dvd, or blue-ray, that is just a massive amout of data to stream off of a disk. the discs can only spin so fast without exploding (i belive 52x is the fastes "safe" speed.) so how can they get that much data from the disk to the ram, to the screen in a reasonable abmount of time?... im sure they will find a way, and i may eat my words, but i think if they keep trying to push the limits of there hd-gaming, then we are going to go back a step and have the 12 minute load times we had back on the ps1. i hope im wrong, but personally i would rather have great gameplay, and fast/no load times than INSANE graphics. we will see...

(and yes i have a 360 and a high def projector. this is not and anti-anybody rant)

I don't really believe the compression myth. I think that was microsoft anti-hype to cover Sony hype. Compression only gets you so far. And the uncompressed graphics will almost always look better/be smoother.

I personally don't see a problem with having multi-disc games. We've had them for YEARS. (Anybody remember final fantasy 7 and up?) As for how that would work in multiplayer... it's simple: You just load the level (as host or client) before playing the game. Exactly how it works when you have the disc in the drive. It'll simply say "insert disc." And we're not talking about loading EVERY LEVEL either. We're talking maybe 2 or three discs as opposed to one. Which isn't really much of a hassle at all.

I also don't think anybody in their right minds actually believes that Microsoft isn't eventually going to use the HD-DVD drive for games. I also don't believe there's anything wrong with the price (considering the going rate for stand-alone... or even PC HD-DVD drives. And the fact that you get a remote and a movie with the damned thing.)

Next gen games are eventually going to go onto next gen media whether anybody likes it or not. Might as well be sooner rather than later. (Although it would take one hell of a game... that's not going to be available on PC eventually... to get me to get the HD-DVD drive for the 360. I'd get a 20gb PS3 before I got that.)

rainless said:

I don't really believe the compression myth. I think that was microsoft anti-hype to cover Sony hype. Compression only gets you so far. And the uncompressed graphics will almost always look better/be smoother.

I personally don't see a problem with having multi-disc games. We've had them for YEARS. (Anybody remember final fantasy 7 and up?) As for how that would work in multiplayer... it's simple: You just load the level (as host or client) before playing the game. Exactly how it works when you have the disc in the drive. It'll simply say "insert disc." And we're not talking about loading EVERY LEVEL either. We're talking maybe 2 or three discs as opposed to one. Which isn't really much of a hassle at all.

I also don't think anybody in their right minds actually believes that Microsoft isn't eventually going to use the HD-DVD drive for games. I also don't believe there's anything wrong with the price (considering the going rate for stand-alone... or even PC HD-DVD drives. And the fact that you get a remote and a movie with the damned thing.)

Next gen games are eventually going to go onto next gen media whether anybody likes it or not. Might as well be sooner rather than later. (Although it would take one hell of a game... that's not going to be available on PC eventually... to get me to get the HD-DVD drive for the 360. I'd get a 20gb PS3 before I got that.)

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They aren't going to sell tens of millions of console and then just tell all those people you are screwed because we are integrating an HD-DVD drive and games will be on that media now. Maybe if the addon is cheaper and capable of running games.

Anyone know the transfer rates on the HD-DVD drive and if it would be feasible to offer it as an upgrade required for gaming? Even that seems a bit too Sega to be likely, though. I guess its an option if they get desprate.

OC Noob said:

They aren't going to sell tens of millions of console and then just tell all those people you are screwed because we are integrating an HD-DVD drive and games will be on that media now. Maybe if the addon is cheaper and capable of running games.

.

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Who's this "They" you're talking about? Microsoft? Are you saying MICROSOFT wouldn't do that? Microsoft dropped support for operating systems that were still being run by far more, and better paying, corporate clients than there are gamers. And you think, if push came to shove, they'd hesitate on doing whatever was necessary to keep its lead in the console/HDDVD market? Why do you think they released the drive in the first place? It's USB. They could've released it for PCs... but they specifically released it for the 360. Why do you think that is?

Well if any Xbox game can do that it's Halo. As for game size though I do of course of that 30GBs a lot could be cut down, there is no doubt some content will be left, out the devs themselves have said that. Though they hope to add it later with downloads just as the Forza devs are doing. Metal Gear I would not really count to show off "True HD" as in most interviews the guy himself says he does not all care about HD as they are going for a grainy look anyway. As for UT2k4 though a good game the graphics are not anything close to mind blowing or what we get today, it also was not a very long game. Right now I don't think many games will be affected by this except the titles like I said that will be huge such as RPGs, GTAs, or big bugget games. However what about 2-4 years down the road?

Forza will take much much more effort and need more space than UT3 or Halo3, because Forza will have tons of unique cars and tracks. All those Doomesque games are is run around the maze fight the baddies and find the exit, so there'll be textures for walls and monsters but they can repeat those over and over again. I'm REALLY looking forward to Forza2, Forza1 is still the best looking and playing racing game.

/\Thats the thing though you don't want to just repeat the textures or else it starts to not look as unique in each level and thus lowering the quality of the game. That just goes to show you though, a few vehicles and levels and you are already at 30GB. Some of which I am sure they would cut anyway, but cutting 21GBs of data is an extreme amount.

tenchi86 said:

Well if any Xbox game can do that it's Halo. As for game size though I do of course of that 30GBs a lot could be cut down, there is no doubt some content will be left, out the devs themselves have said that. Though they hope to add it later with downloads just as the Forza devs are doing. Metal Gear I would not really count to show off "True HD" as in most interviews the guy himself says he does not all care about HD as they are going for a grainy look anyway. As for UT2k4 though a good game the graphics are not anything close to mind blowing or what we get today, it also was not a very long game. Right now I don't think many games will be affected by this except the titles like I said that will be huge such as RPGs, GTAs, or big bugget games. However what about 2-4 years down the road?

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UT2004?

Are you talking about the right game? Because if you are, that game came out YEARS ago... and you do realize it was built for multiplayer don't you? In that regard there was nothing short about it.

@Fudge: I think you've suggested this game before. I'll go check it out

I dont have the exact link, or maybe I read it in xbox mag, but it was stated that microsoft said the HD-DVD addon will not play HD-DVD games ever because it wont be able to read the boot code. Would be like trying to boot a ps3 game in a 360 or vice versa. It wouldn't work. At least thats what I think.

tenchi86 said:

Well if any Xbox game can do that it's Halo. As for game size though I do of course of that 30GBs a lot could be cut down, there is no doubt some content will be left, out the devs themselves have said that. Though they hope to add it later with downloads just as the Forza devs are doing. Metal Gear I would not really count to show off "True HD" as in most interviews the guy himself says he does not all care about HD as they are going for a grainy look anyway. As for UT2k4 though a good game the graphics are not anything close to mind blowing or what we get today, it also was not a very long game. Right now I don't think many games will be affected by this except the titles like I said that will be huge such as RPGs, GTAs, or big bugget games. However what about 2-4 years down the road?

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Then they will just release that content via download and make us pay for it and install it on our 20/60 GB HD's.

I dont have a problem with multi-disk games either. Blue dragon, as already stated, is 3 discs. However, Blue dragon uses alot of CG, and all the discs contain the same information. The only difference is is the CG's on the games. Everything else is the same on all 3 discs. I would imagine if larger games had multiplayer with different levels on the discs, then whhich ever disk you had in, you would be limited which levels you could play. I dont actually see this happening, since most developers, I hope, would be smart enough to say, have different sound tracks and such on different disks before they had to take such action.