Bethesda: New Consoles Are Cross-Platform Development Hell

[Karloff]

Bethesda: New Consoles Are Cross-Platform Development Hell

Individually the PS4 and Xbox One are PC architecture, but they don't play well together.

Bethesda's Pete Hines is looking forward to developing on the new consoles. The PS4 and Xbox One are basically high-end PCs, as far as the architecture goes, making both machines much easier for developers to work with. But cross-platform? "They don't all play with each other," says Hines. "Xbox One is its own thing and PS4 is its own thing. The whole cross-platform thing is just a nightmare." Not a good position to be in, if you happen to be the folks bringing The Elder Scrolls Online [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/124925-Elder-Scrolls-Online-Will-Segregate-PC-Console-Players] to all the new consoles simultaneously. Imagine running completely separate servers for each machine, just to avoid a cross-platform train wreck. Previously the separate servers issue was put down to PvP problems but, while it probably plays a role, PvP might not be the only reason for putting separate servers out there.

At least Hines likes the Xbone. "It's a nice robust machine that allows to do lots of cool stuff and put more cool things in the game," says he. But of course, practice makes perfect, and Hines knows full well that it will take time to master all the new tricks the Xbox One gives Bethesda access to. "The further forward we go, the better and better it's going to be."

The Xbox One and PS4 are due late 2013, while Elder Scrolls Online has a projected release of Spring 2014.

Source: OXM [http://www.oxm.co.uk/57868/bethesda-xbox-one-is-a-nice-robust-machine-cross-platform-work-is-a-nightmare/]


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[ph0b0s123]

The PS4 and Xbox One are basically high-end PCs,

Erm, that's not quite right. Mid range at best.

"Is it any good?

In a word, no. Not in a gaming context. To be fair to AMD, the A4-5000 is a nice chip for its intended market ? mobile devices at the cheaper end of the market. It?s got miles more horsepower than existing Atom chips (though Atom is due a major overhaul to its cores very soon).

But as a gaming CPU? Let me give you some numbers. In raw processing terms, these four Jaguar cores have slightly less than a quarter the grunt of a Core i5-3570K. It?s the same story on a core-by-core basis. Less than one quarter of the performance."

Source: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/05/27/week-in-tech-hands-on-with-those-new-games-consoles/

 

[rasputin0009]

Huh. I thought it'd be easier to port between the new consoles than the Cell and PowerPC architectures of the last gen. Then again, this is Bethesda talking. They really can't make a non-glitchy game for the life of them.

 

[ph0b0s123]

Huh. I thought it'd be easier to port between the new consoles than the Cell and PowerPC architectures of the last gen. Then again, this is Bethesda talking. They really can't make a non-glitchy game for the life of them.

They are not talking about porting, but running just one server for the on-line gaming between Xbone and PS4. Don't see any mentions of porting in the article.

 

[UnnDunn]

At least Hines likes the Xbone. "It's a nice robust machine that allows to do lots of cool stuff and put more cool things in the game," says he. But of course, practice makes perfect, and Hines knows full well that it will take time to master all the new tricks the Xbox One gives Bethesda access to. "The further forward we go, the better and better it's going to be."

Oh my god! Someone said something positive about Xbox One! The internet is not going to be happy about that, not one bit.

TBH, I wasn't too enthusiastic about ESO after playing it at Pax East this past March. Maybe I'll find the next-gen console version more appealing.

 

[UnnDunn]

The PS4 and Xbox One are basically high-end PCs,

Erm, that's not quite right. Mid range at best.

"Is it any good?

In a word, no. Not in a gaming context. To be fair to AMD, the A4-5000 is a nice chip for its intended market ? mobile devices at the cheaper end of the market. It?s got miles more horsepower than existing Atom chips (though Atom is due a major overhaul to its cores very soon).

But as a gaming CPU? Let me give you some numbers. In raw processing terms, these four Jaguar cores have slightly less than a quarter the grunt of a Core i5-3570K. It?s the same story on a core-by-core basis. Less than one quarter of the performance."

Source: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/05/27/week-in-tech-hands-on-with-those-new-games-consoles/

If you click through to the source article, you'll see that the "high-end PCs" observation is a direct quote from Pete Hines.

 

[SonOfVoorhees]

Oh my god! Someone said something positive about Xbox One! The internet is not going to be happy about that, not one bit.

XB1 is the console equivalent of Twilight or Bieber. lol. Wasnt all console different from each other? I guess companies will have to learn the next gen consoles and work out a way to port things over. Or just not be lazy and try to make a game that benefits both consoles strenghs. Im sure they will cope.

But with Bethesda, maybe its difficult to ensure all the different platforms get the same bugs and glitches. ;-) Come on Bethesda, wheres Fallout4?

Capta said - total shamble. lol

 

[rasputin0009]

Huh. I thought it'd be easier to port between the new consoles than the Cell and PowerPC architectures of the last gen. Then again, this is Bethesda talking. They really can't make a non-glitchy game for the life of them.

They are not talking about porting, but running just one server for the on-line gaming between Xbone and PS4. Don't see any mentions of porting in the article.

My bad. But wouldn't they have to port them in some way to make them match up on the server?

 

[RJ 17]

At least Hines likes the Xbone. "It's a nice robust machine that allows to do lots of cool stuff and put more cool things in the game," says he. But of course, practice makes perfect, and Hines knows full well that it will take time to master all the new tricks the Xbox One gives Bethesda access to. "The further forward we go, the better and better it's going to be."

Oh my god! Someone said something positive about Xbox One! The internet is not going to be happy about that, not one bit.

Unndunn, my little MS fanboy, no one doubts that MS has the capability to build a kick-ass machine (well, I'd imagine there are plenty of people that doubt it). What people hate is all the BS strings that are coming attached with said machine. They've snipped a few of those strings, but there's still one big one hanging on. Buuuuut we've already been over this matter.

 

[GonzoGamer]

Huh. I thought it'd be easier to port between the new consoles than the Cell and PowerPC architectures of the last gen. Then again, this is Bethesda talking. They really can't make a non-glitchy game for the life of them.

My first thought reading this: already coming up with excuses. At least this wont be a reason for the ps4 to have the worlds worst ports.
They need to come up with a completely new game engine, one that works.

 

[oliver.begg]

Huh. I thought it'd be easier to port between the new consoles than the Cell and PowerPC architectures of the last gen. Then again, this is Bethesda talking. They really can't make a non-glitchy game for the life of them.

They are not talking about porting, but running just one server for the on-line gaming between Xbone and PS4. Don't see any mentions of porting in the article.

My bad. But wouldn't they have to port them in some way to make them match up on the server?

probally as easy as making mac, linix and windows versions play together.

just cos the hardwares the same dosn't mean the OS is, or the file structure.

what it does mean is you don't have to muck round with how diffrent core processing methods affect load times and orders

 

[RicoADF]

Huh. I thought it'd be easier to port between the new consoles than the Cell and PowerPC architectures of the last gen. Then again, this is Bethesda talking. They really can't make a non-glitchy game for the life of them.

They are not talking about porting, but running just one server for the on-line gaming between Xbone and PS4. Don't see any mentions of porting in the article.

My bad. But wouldn't they have to port them in some way to make them match up on the server?

My guess is that the live logins on XBone doesn't like connecting to non live servers. I know the 360 has had issues in the past since microsoft was refusing to allow cross link with PSN, even if they've allowed it now the systems may not be setup to support it yet/properly. Hard to tell without more information.

 

[TiberiusEsuriens]

The PS4 and Xbox One are basically high-end PCs,

Erm, that's not quite right. Mid range at best.

"Is it any good?

In a word, no. Not in a gaming context. To be fair to AMD, the A4-5000 is a nice chip for its intended market ? mobile devices at the cheaper end of the market. It?s got miles more horsepower than existing Atom chips (though Atom is due a major overhaul to its cores very soon).

But as a gaming CPU? Let me give you some numbers. In raw processing terms, these four Jaguar cores have slightly less than a quarter the grunt of a Core i5-3570K. It?s the same story on a core-by-core basis. Less than one quarter of the performance."

Source: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/05/27/week-in-tech-hands-on-with-those-new-games-consoles/

This whole "high end PCs" thing is a mis-nomer. PCs don't follow the same 'generation' archetype as consoles do, but it might be better to view them as such.

Lets dumb it down to just the basics:
Last gen PCs: used 32x bit OS, and could only use max 4GB ram.
Current gen PCs: are those that first adopted the 64x bit OS, letting us use the current standard of 8GB ram, computers often have multiple cores.
Next gen PCs: have excessive tons of ram, (my buddy has 64GB) and require many cores and many SLI graphics cards to do the super cool/neat graphics stuff.

When people say High End PC they're talking about high end for the current generation. The Next-Gen pc above will never be standard because mass consumers (remember, we/you aren't the mass consumer) don't want to buy what are deemed excessive/reduntant video cards, etc. PCs are modular and ever evolving, which means that a "Standard Next-Gen HEPC" that enthusiasts want will never exist because it would require parts from the future. To make a true "Console/High-End PC Hybrid" next-gen PCs need to further evolve where we never need something like SLI bridges; making one card that is like two SLI'ed, but half the price. To truly embrace the spirit of PC enthusiast we have to recognize that WE WILL ALMOST NEVER BE THE TARGET DEMOGRAPHIC. EVER. We're just too far ahead of the curve, and that's okay. When execs talk about high end PCs the enthusiast will always be ignored because they are a statistical outlier.

TL; DR
Most machines at the 'current' level run things just as fine as the 'next' level. To a lot of people the different between 30 frames and 120 frames is minimal. It's not a comparison between fast and slow, but between fast and faster. Or to fit the vernacular used by these execs, High-End vs Higher-End.

 

[josemlopes]

If its things like servers and stuff then it seemes that they are complaining about running an MMO on 3 different systems

 

[Ed130 The Vanguard]

At least Hines likes the Xbone. "It's a nice robust machine that allows to do lots of cool stuff and put more cool things in the game," says he. But of course, practice makes perfect, and Hines knows full well that it will take time to master all the new tricks the Xbox One gives Bethesda access to. "The further forward we go, the better and better it's going to be."

Oh my god! Someone said something positive about Xbox One! The internet is not going to be happy about that, not one bit.

TBH, I wasn't too enthusiastic about ESO after playing it at Pax East this past March. Maybe I'll find the next-gen console version more appealing.[/q]
No UnnDunn, its only blatant astroturfing, paid shills and corprate MS suits gushing about 'features' that are anything but that gets the internet angry.

 

[Dragonbums]

to all the new consoles simultaneously.

Bullshit.
By all the new consoles, they mean the same two console the Elder Scrolls have always been on. Which is a Xbox and Play Station.
Not gonna lie, I would be the first one to get a Wii U if it came on the system.
At least I have a PC to enjoy the game on :/

On that note, don't they get a dev kit early on so they can figure out the system before hand?
I'm not saying it's going to be easy or anything, but why even complain?
I mean you all know that they are different.

 

[Trek1701a]

I really don't know why anyone would ask Bethesda about programming difficulties, it almost like asking a fouth grader to solve a calculus problem. Sad thing is you are probably more likely to get a fourth grader to answer correctly than get less bugs/glitches from Bethesda in their programming.

And on the good things he said about the Xbox One, and I'm sure he meant them, but he was being asked by an Official Xbox Magazine so what else is he going to say.

 

[Petromir]

Lets dumb it down to just the basics:
Last gen PCs: used 32x bit OS, and could only use max 4GB ram.
Current gen PCs: are those that first adopted the 64x bit OS, letting us use the current standard of 8GB ram, computers often have multiple cores.
Next gen PCs: have excessive tons of ram, (my buddy has 64GB) and require many cores and many SLI graphics cards to do the super cool/neat graphics stuff.

PCs do have a proper generational system, but due to their more modular nature it tends to a split system, and more iterative than the console system, mainly based around 2 parts the CPU and the GPU. Oh and far better backwards compatibility. (seriously i have games from the old DOS days on my quad core gaming machine). Most PC hardware cycles on a 12-18 month generational cycle, but as they are smaller and close together you can skip generations more easily, Hell since my Quad core Core 2 Quad processor was released Intel have gone through at least 4 generations of processor, and my 560 is now 2 generations old (and a similar amount of generations newer than it's predecessor at least).

 

[Steve the Pocket]

Wait, so they're trying to offer cross-platform play between the Xbox One and PS4? Will Microsoft and Sony even allow that? They didn't last generation.

Don't get me wrong; if they do pull that off, they might manage to have the MMO equivalent of Halo Goldeneye: a game that became a success by bringing a PC-exclusive genre to consoles for the first time. I mean, that's basically the one thing that World of Warcraft ? the game that's keeping all other MMOs from succeeding ? doesn't have going for it, besides next-gen graphics.

 

[TiberiusEsuriens]

PCs do have a proper generational system, but due to their more modular nature it tends to a split system, and more iterative than the console system, mainly based around 2 parts the CPU and the GPU. Oh and far better backwards compatibility. (seriously i have games from the old DOS days on my quad core gaming machine). Most PC hardware cycles on a 12-18 month generational cycle, but as they are smaller and close together you can skip generations more easily, Hell since my Quad core Core 2 Quad processor was released Intel have gone through at least 4 generations of processor, and my 560 is now 2 generations old (and a similar amount of generations newer than it's predecessor at least).

I have a Core 2 Quad and 560 as well! That's exactly my point, though: our chips are several generations old, and while they don't have the raw power as newer hardware, they do the core job just fine. Of all the new big leaps in graphical processing, which in any way actually change the way modern gaming systems work? 'Back in the day' games wanted to do new/crazy things but were limited by processing hardware and memory space. The next-gen hardware just allows cool things like ambient occlusion, higher FPS, crazy excessive motion blur, and all that jazz. But the new big cards often cost exponentially more.

The two major leaps forward that could theoretically require new fancy cards are open world environments and fluids simulation. if we look at the new consoles, they are running older hardware like ours and they seem to be doing both of these just fine. While the consoles are upgrading, there's no NEED to go for the crazy new stuff when the newer-but-not-NEW hardware is all that mass consumer (again not us) really want. It's also hella cheaper to mass produce.

If we really want to push the new tech on the mass market we have to prove why it should be used. Someone needs to make a "Jason and the Argonauts" game where you have to use reflections to survive Medusa's stare. Then we can say that without X or Y new hardware the ray tracing won't work properly and the core mechanic central to gameplay of lighting and reflection doesn't work. That isn't a game that would just look better on new hardware, that's a game that REQUIRES it. Look and Nintendo and Microsoft, we have cases where new hardware (the Wii) is introduced and because they showed off how special it was people loved it, and then the Xboner's new hardware is loathed in large part because they failed to show us why we NEEDED it.

Just as you pointed out with Intel, there are many iterations, but they're in between generations, not generational leaps themselves. Next-Next-Gen will bundle it all together, but not because it's cool and hip, but because by that time hardware will have evolved to contain it all as base operational procedure. By that time all the PC enthusiasts will be complaining about some other niche thing that new hardware can do that doesn't actually effect anything.