E3 2011 Carmack PCs an order of magnitude more powerful than consoles

Yesterday Tim caught up with id Software co-founder John Carmack for a frank discussion about the evolving technology powering the games industry, and why advances on the PC in recent years have convinced him to make a "large change of direction" in the way he develops games.

The main reason for this? Sheer processing power. When Carmack started developing Rage, consoles and the PC were roughly equivalent. Now Carmack says "we have an order of magnitude more power on the PCs

Any exclusive content is difficult to develop these days unless a developer is paid to keep it on one system.

For multi-platform titles, it should always be about scalability - it can run on anything and can take advantage of better hardware, but that wouldn't be necessary to enjoy it.

Think next gen consoles will be improved greatly..Sure pc advanced as of right now..There are penty of titles like skyrimm lookng good on the xbox..If what hes talking about it sounds like its hard for him to stay pc only..Rage though is going on the xbox i think also..Im def getting it for the pc though pre-ordered on steam already..If i get to choose between my xbox and pc..Pc wins hands down every time..Ive been following rage for a very long time im excited to play it this year finnally we get our hands on it..He sure put enough time an development into the game..It shows and it still looks great..Times are changing though..Devs cant take 5 to 7 years to create a game..Techknowlogy changes drastically now for him to produce games like rage..Think a cycle now is more like every three years..

It takes John Carmack to say this for people to take notice? I'm shocked that some people may be shocked by this revelation.

I just watched the video interview. Damn the guy has gotten old. Damn I'm getting old.

This is not news. PC's have been more powerful than consoles for a long time now. In fact, consoles have never truly caught up.

This is not news. PC's have been more powerful than consoles for a long time now. In fact, consoles have never truly caught up.

THA-TODD-BEAST

When they came out they were actually more powerful than what you could get.

This is not news. PC's have been more powerful than consoles for a long time now. In fact, consoles have never truly caught up.

THA-TODD-BEAST

At launch consoles are generally cheaper than PCs for the same power. When Oblivion came out, it cost about an $800-1000 computer to equal what the Xbox could do for $400. Sure Oblivion could only be maxed out on PC but that would cost a further $200 in high end gaming parts. I think around 2007 the cost of PC vs Xbox for graphical power was about equal. Then after that the PC starts to get a lot cheaper.

You are misremembering the past, when the Xbox 360 came out, the graphics it had were equivalent to what we got with the R600 but it came out way before, the best computer gamers could get were R520s.

We already know this. We just need good developers to take advantage of the extra power. All the devs apart from Blizzard are developing multiplatform now, so you don't see any games making full use of PC technology.

We already know this. We just need good developers to take advantage of the extra power. All the devs apart from Blizzard are developing multiplatform now, so you don't see any games making full use of PC technology.

-Unreal-

Have news for you..Even blizzard is now making diablo 3 on the xbox shame as it is...Its how the new era is..Sad to see i come this way but..Only ones sitll making pc games seams like cdproject..Even they will head to consoles in the future i bet..

[QUOTE="-Unreal-"]

We already know this. We just need good developers to take advantage of the extra power. All the devs apart from Blizzard are developing multiplatform now, so you don't see any games making full use of PC technology.

Gladestone1

Have news for you..Even blizzard is now making diablo 3 on the xbox shame as it is...Its how the new era is..Sad to see i come this way but..Only ones sitll making pc games seams like cdproject..Even they will head to consoles in the future i bet..

[QUOTE="-Unreal-"]

We already know this. We just need good developers to take advantage of the extra power. All the devs apart from Blizzard are developing multiplatform now, so you don't see any games making full use of PC technology.

Gladestone1

Have news for you..Even blizzard is now making diablo 3 on the xbox shame as it is...Its how the new era is..Sad to see i come this way but..Only ones sitll making pc games seams like cdproject..Even they will head to consoles in the future i bet..

[QUOTE="-Unreal-"]

We already know this. We just need good developers to take advantage of the extra power. All the devs apart from Blizzard are developing multiplatform now, so you don't see any games making full use of PC technology.

Gladestone1

Have news for you..Even blizzard is now making diablo 3 on the xbox shame as it is...Its how the new era is..Sad to see i come this way but..Only ones sitll making pc games seams like cdproject..Even they will head to consoles in the future i bet..

Which is no big deal unless we starting getting console ports like leftover table scraps. Not many people really cared much that Crysis went multiplat until the "Push start" screens started showing and then the no DirectX 11 at launch (or maybe even at all) started popping up. A game going multiplat is not really a concern of most PC gamers. It's when the game is dumb downed (not streamlined), made with only controllers in mind, made with console limiteations in mind, and is sloppily ported that we start caring. Now if a game starts out on consoles (like say the Uncharted series went multiplat) there wouldn't be much of an uproar if we got any of those things. It would be expected for a console only series to keep some of it's console roots when it ported. It's when homegrown classics like Diablo, Starcraft, Crysis, etc start doing the same thing that tempers start to flare. As long as it's PC first for PC born games no really cares if it's ported to another system.

Edit: There will be some that care but for the most part PC gamers aren't as into exclusive bragging rights as consolites are.

[QUOTE="THA-TODD-BEAST"]

This is not news. PC's have been more powerful than consoles for a long time now. In fact, consoles have never truly caught up.

When they came out they were actually more powerful than what you could get.

[QUOTE="THA-TODD-BEAST"]

This is not news. PC's have been more powerful than consoles for a long time now. In fact, consoles have never truly caught up.

GummiRaccoon

When they came out they were actually more powerful than what you could get.

In certain ways, yes.. I terms of GPU horsepower and RAM/storage capacity, absolutely not.

You are misremembering the past, when the Xbox 360 came out, the graphics it had were equivalent to what we got with the R600 but it came out way before, the best computer gamers could get were R520s.

GummiRaccoon

You could SLI a pair of Geforce 7800gt/gtx cards in 2005 and have a fair amount more GPU horsepower than the X360 and PS3.

screw Carmack, the guy almost forgets entirely about PC, says we are basically not worth it "due to piracy", then sees the light all of a sudden?

I am done with his nonsense: you make good games, Carmack, and I will buy them, otherwise STFU and dance, little man, dance and make good games.

I just watched the video interview. Damn the guy has gotten old. Damn I'm getting old.

AdamK47

i know, right? I was a kid when he was a pioneer, now I am an adult and...its weird seeing people that you once might have considered like an older brother or cousin looking old all of a sudden.

*sigh*

Im gonna be there in a decade or two...

Who really cares? Very few games have ever used that extra power to make the games better. Hell half this generations games could run on the Wii with a big drop off in graphics.

Who really cares? Very few games have ever used that extra power to make the games better. Hell half this generations games could run on the Wii with a big drop off in graphics.

magnax1

[QUOTE="magnax1"]

Who really cares? Very few games have ever used that extra power to make the games better. Hell half this generations games could run on the Wii with a big drop off in graphics.

Makari

Well I knew that was true, but I'm just talking about developers never doing anything inovative with the new horsepower. Not specifically PC, but the only difference between most games this and last gen is a new coat of paint, excluding a very small minority.

[QUOTE="-Unreal-"]

We already know this. We just need good developers to take advantage of the extra power. All the devs apart from Blizzard are developing multiplatform now, so you don't see any games making full use of PC technology.

Gladestone1

Have news for you..Even blizzard is now making diablo 3 on the xbox shame as it is...Its how the new era is..Sad to see i come this way but..Only ones sitll making pc games seams like cdproject..Even they will head to consoles in the future i bet..