Xbox Series X Discussion

Gammerz

So M$ trying to get you to rent consoles + Gamepass for >2 years > $600 instead of $500 + 2 year’s subs??? And that’s “starting at” price and I’ve assumed that’s for the X1SX. Of course, that could be worse if the rental rate is for the S model.

DrDamn

Gammerz All Access gets you 2 years of GamePass Ultimate - which is Gold + GP + EA Play now. So not such a bad deal. XSS is $25/m, XSX is $35/m. $35 × 24 = $840. XSX is $500, GPU is $15 a month - can’t find yearly cost (GP regular is $120). So it’s at least $740 for XSX + 2 years of regular GP bought separately. It’s for people who don’t want the big initial outlay.

Brave

Rental rate?

Gammerz

Brave It sounds like rental. Do you ever own the Xbox if you pay $25-$35/m? Or have I/we misunderstood?

Brave

It’s finance. You own the console after two years. It’s the mobile phone model.

I honestly think that’s very very compelling. GamePass is the real console here, it plays EA Play games and honestly I’m finding the S a very tempting option.

You’re getting everything but the 4k. And these days I go from 4k (living room) to HD (upstairs, and much closer to the screen) and hardly notice the difference.

Gordon

I’ve got a decent 4K TV and can’t see much difference when I switch between resolution and performance modes on the games that support it. Increased framerate is far more noticeable to me.

That said, I think I’d be inclined to wait and see if the XSS really is everything but the 4K. I think there will be other compromises.

Brave

Gordon I think the thing I’m waiting to see now is if download size is different between the two Series consoles. Theoretically they should be smaller for the S as the assets should be lower resolution which in turn would make the 512gb SSD no issue at all (although obviously sound files etc. are a thing and they likely won’t decrease in size).

I would hope smart delivery was built with that in mind. If it’s not, then that’s your first compromise.

Another thing is the dynamic AI based upscaling stuff. If that is really up there with the Nvidia version, then you may either get 4k visuals from hd base assets or 1440p visuals from really teeny tiny assets. DLSS is the only thing I’ve ever geekily Digital Foundried about, ever. I honestly think it’s a far bigger deal than ray tracing from a consumer pov.

Partly because it’s very impressive on rtx cards, but also because I’ve seen what ai based upscaling is doing in my industry, photography.

I can get wall sized prints out of images I made ages ago on relatively low resolution sensors.

Which, to bring in the Switch Pro thread here as well, is why I’m intrigued by the Nintendo rumour. I suspect there’ll be some DLSS stuff going on in there too.

It’s only really just appeared on the scene. I really believe that tech is going to do some very cool things in the next generation.

Jogort

Not really looked at the full specs of both and I know it’s not all about the flops but having 4tflops (less powerful than the x1x?) compared to 12 of the X isn’t gonna mean there’ll other areas cut back and not just the resolution?

Brave

well, I do know you’re right, it’s not all about the flops. All the rest is just excitable theorising ( me included!).

I don’t really buy the less powerful than x1x thing at all. It really is worth looking at the specs, I think. It seems like a capable machine. Dedicated RT, upscaling etc. SSD. I don’t think the comparison is that valuable.

I think people are assuming it’s going to be, I dunno, half as powerful because of the price. But it doesn’t take into acct the value of having market share. We’ve pretty much established they’re really selling gamepass here. I see the S as their loss leader. It’s the gamepass machine. I saw people say it’ll be the Madden machine yesterday, and that was well before the EA announcement.

They’re not trying to win this hardware gen right now imo. They’re trying to grind stadia into the ground before the streaming gen even begins. It’s netflix for games. I honestly think that’s the key thing to keep in mind about the S, as regards price.

I don’t believe it’ll be a slouch. I definitely don’t think I have a more powerful xbox sitting next to me as I type this.

And it’s looking pretty clear that the specs for either ps5 or xbox are really only half the story. Ps5 looks amazing even if it’s less powerful than the series x on paper.

Jogort

I do think it’ll be a bloody good machine but just a quick Google shows it’s a couple of flops down on the 1X but I assume it’s better gfx& cpu chips. it’s also got the dedicated RT and a much better harddrive etc so is better in other areas. Will be interesting to see it running alongside a X1X and a series X
I guess it’ll be down to how developers use the extra power of the big X and how to scale it down to run just as good on the S, just unsure it’ll be a resolution hit only.

Gammerz

Jogort I think I read somewhere that the S may have better frame-rates because it won’t need to struggle with 4K (as all consoles seem to when they up the rez - they always seem to try to push the console too far).

Jogort

Gammerz yeah I get that’s what they’re doing, just be interesting to see if it’s purely resolution that takes a hit when it’s GPU has only a third of the power of the series X

Gordon

The Series S has a significantly better CPU than the 1X and comparing TF values for the two GPUs doesn’t tell the whole story. The Series S GPU is a much more modern design and should perform way better than that 4TF figure suggests.

Eurogamer did a good breakdown of the All Access thing here :

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2020-09-09-xbox-all-access-the-best-way-to-buy-an-xbox-series-x-or-xbox-series-s

DrDamn

Gordon yeah, CPU is much better, GPU is comparable based on architecture improvements. It’s down on memory Vs X1X so certainly older titles may simply look nicer on X1X because of resolution. It’s certainly an interesting proposition.

There is a point to be made about later in the generation when XSX and PS5 stop chasing 4K and go for better quality 1440p and intelligent upscaling (Epic demo was this already). Where does that put XSS then? 720p?

Brave

Are you back in plagueville now @Jogort ?

Jogort

Brave yesterday, left the UK on the 26th April for work and returned 8th September 😭😭🚢🚢
Some time now to relax….. Well, maybe not. New house just bought (all done while offshore, never seen it physically myself 😲😲) and moving next month 🤣🤣 oh also my new 🏍️ is almost ready (1 of only 6 in the UK) and I have some mega gaming to catch up on, got last of us 2 and ghost of Tsushima downloading as well as fall guys 🤣🤣

Brave

Nice!

Deej

Never mind the console, look at the fantastic beard!

Console looks pretty nifty, especially for the price.

Gammerz

10 GB RAM on S vs 16 GB RAM on X.

DrDamn

It’s very interesting/odd that the first show reel of nextgen gameplay on XBox Series is running on the XSS. :-/

It’s also fairly clear that MS doesn’t have much to impress with NextGen games wise as that all looked like an X1 show reel. I’m definitely down with the idea that NextGen is not just about the games themselves but how we experience them - and fast load times, quick resume, 120fps etc show some of that. I think they need something more than “play all the games more comfortably”. 120fps is also a great gamer number to tout, but how many will have TVs which take advantage of that?

I guess I’m just missing a wow factor here still :shrug: Interested but not yet wowed.

BritishBean

DrDamn I felt the same about the video being a montage of existing games. The new generation of console will undoubtably be faster and provide better looking games and that’s great, but at a new console launch I want new games I’m interested in and I nfortunately MS has failed on that front with Halo delayed and Forza looking like it’s at least a year away, if not more!

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