Can we admit now that current-gen console specs are tragic

So bad that both Microsoft and Sony are planning new versions of their respective consoles with higher specs.

I've been calling them WealSauce all gen. :P

Edit: I forgot to add; I blame it squarely on Nintendo and the success of the weak ass Wii last gen. Made others think they could do the same to gamers and print money.

Nope, can't do that.

Why not? There has never been a console generation with has taken such a meek technological step.

Even the Xbox 360 outclassed PC at the time of its release.

No. People lost their shit over a 600 dollar console last gen so that's what you get. Considering there are pc graphics cards that cost twice what the console market finds acceptable, the reality is that uberriffically powerful consoles will never happen again. Welcome to the 21st century.

Frankly, I think people complaining about this generation are morons. Utterly contemptible morons living in a fantasy land making everyone miserable unecessarily.

Meh...they aren't groundbreaking, yes, but it does a good job with playing games at 30/60 fps and has good graphics. It's only a $400 machine, that's what it offers as well as it's almost 3 years since launch and it still looks good but not great....only reason they are making a new one is just for more business, more $$$. Also so they could move away from 720p for the Xbox and 900p for PS4. Remember, it's all rumors right now...

This has been a weak jump imo. The leap from ps1/n64 to xbox/ps2/gamecube to xbox360/ps3/wii were better imo.

Yeah but a lot of the PS3's high price came down to the BD drive and proprietary CPU (cell).

Both companies skimped tremendously with the XB1 and PS4, the XB1 perhaps less so because it came with a Kinect 2.0 initially, but the Sony were making a profit on the PS4 from day 1 (the cheap build of the PS4 and DS4 speak volumes).

@DressYouUp: Until you can prove that Sony wasn't taking a loss on hardware initially, your entire argument hinges on what amounts to a conspiracy theory.

When I'm playing my current gen games I'm not thinking "jeez, these current gen consoles aren't cutting it". If anything worries me it's the changes to studios, publishers. They no longer seem to make games as well as they could, or they do just people don't buy them so they don't have money to keep going, or aren't able to support series like they could. Staff and studios are getting cut, revered series disappearing. If anything, many of this gen's limitations are financial, and creative; however, technical limitations I hardly feel are the most pressing.

@DressYouUp:

Well with the 360/PS3 you talking about a jump from standard to high Def so of course the jump would have to be big. This gen no one expected the jump to be that big cause it's still in the high def range other than making a jump to 4k, which these consoles or the rumored upgrades won't be able to do.

Nov 2013: http://www.forbes.com/sites/danielnyegriffiths/2013/11/19/report-sony-near-to-profit-on-ps4-hardware/#6e66adf32d3a

May 2014: http://www.polygon.com/2014/5/23/5744344/ps4-already-profitable-for-sony-ceo-says

Neither am I, but lo and behold, here comes the "hardware refresh" 2.5 years into the generation - it's painfully obvious that developer vision is being paired down to meet the weak specs of the consoles.

And this is why I been going back to my Retro gaming for the most parts. This gen isn't to brag about I will say this, I been enjoying both PS4/Xbox One for what they had to offer and that's about it.

No but the output rate for games is tragic.

I have no problem with the current performance of my console, but what the market wants is a different story. If MS/Sony are doing this, it's because they believe there is a market for it.

Can't do that. We're gonna suck MS and Sony's willy for whatever they throw at us. All praise the overlords!

Blame TSMC.

1st gen Xbox 360's GPU size = ~180 mm^2

Xbox One's GPU size = ~160 mm^2

PS4's GPU size = ~212 mm^2

Polaris 10 GPU size = 232 mm^2

@DressYouUp: So, they did take losses on hardware at launch and it turned profitable in two quarters. Okay then.

@ronvalencia: I never have a clue what your saying?

Only in the System Wars do "gamers" care about resolution and framerate.

Sorry, I don't agree

PS4 is quite nice to tell you the truth, but I'm happy to hear about an optional upgrade. If I had never learned of this upgrade news I would have been happy with the current PS4 level of graphics for the next couple of years.

It's cool to be able to get higher level PC-esk performance out of a newer version of a system without having to sacrifice loosing the quality of console exclusives.

The PS4k/neo is a win win no matter how I look at it...If I don't feel like upgrading, I can just play my ol PS4 and enjoy all the new games coming out until the next gen comes :)

They'd be fine if devs would just provide graphics options so people can get a decent frame rate. Game development is all about scalability.

That's what you get after the $600 PS3 launch last gen. I admit I'd rather Sony and MS just have 5 year console gens than this mid-gen console upgrade crap. Still, it is an optional upgrade (atleast for Sony).

Naw, nothing tragic about it as you still could enjoy the games that's offered.

It's the game design that is sad, not the hardware. Even current hardware allows for some evolution.

I've been having a great time with X1/PS4 and the games look and perform better than previous gen.

@Heil68:

Pretty much, I can understand if your just a PC gamer then yes the consoles would be underwhelming. But people in here only play Playstation or Xbox and complaining about the graphics of the games lol. Give me a breal.

Game design doesn't prevent games from being able to run at 1080p 60fps in 2016.

Pretty much this^^^. People demanded cheap. They got cheap.

Consoles aren't weak. PC gaming hardware is simply too powerful.

@DressYouUp:

Sure it does. A game like Wave Race 64 was pushing the hardware very hard, and offered a new experience.

They should have released a more powerful console. Console gaming is holding PC back

It couldn't happen soon enough. The PS4 and X1 are total weak sauce.

Nah, though the CPU on the PS4 should have been better (that seems to be the bottleneck, and there was really no reason for the CPU to be that weak) - overall they hit a pretty nice sweet spot at launch for price/performance with the 8GB RAM and GPU. They could probably get away with PS4 for a couple more years before planning the proper PS5.

I think they are going with the PS4.5 simply because it's more practical to do this now, with the architecture they chose. People were predicting this might happen when PS4 was unveiled. The "off the shelf" parts make upgrading especially easy - whereas upgrading the cell would have been a nightmare, upgrading the "emotion engine" of the PS2 would have been a nightmare, etc. Now they are using standard chips and standard GPU, so even backwards compatibility shouldn't be an issue. It could very well be that going forward our Playstation Store accounts are fully backwards compatible on all future platforms, which is really the way it should be. They might still try to create "remasters" with higher settings, but the goal should be for all digital purchases to be playable "forever". Then again, stuff tends to disappear from iTunes and Google Play despite their devices being iterative, so I guess we'll see how this works out with PS4.5 and beyond.

Sad, but true. The first rule of gaming is: No Fun Allowed.

no. i think this console upgrade mid cycle thing is tragic.

i think sony got it absolutely spot on with the PS4 this gen and the X1 is also a fine console. yeah its not going to give a top end gaming PC a run for its money but it can still deliver very nice looking games and, as we saw last gen, most people dont care about the tech. they just want to play some games.

the core issue here is that MS (im assuming MS is going to follow suit) and sony have lost all quality control on 3rd parties and dont focus on it enough in their own studios and they are trying to take the PC approach to the problem...brute force your way through bad software.

the state of games released on consoles today is shoddy, the performance is lackluster and i think the software quality is being badly neglected in an effort to put out product faster. with these new consoles the cost of development will also go up...again so this problem just going to get worse.

i didnt hear any major complaints from developers. sure some mumble about the CPU but they always mumble about something..last gen it was the ram. the gen before that it was ram again (and everything on the PS2...developers hated the PS2). its not worth releasing a mid gen upgrade...its not a fundimental flaw.

but nope...consoles are just picking up another bad habit from the PC industry...release software in a rubbish state and have the customer pay more to brute force their way through the problem. thats the tragedy here.

and console gamers still dont get any of the benefits of PC gaming...just the downsides. yep...the console gamer in me is now a bit pissed >:(

WealSauce? Oh man.. I've been calling them WeakSauce, why didn't anyone tell me!?!

Consoles shouldn't need to go up against PC from the start of this gen. Consoles were meant to do there own thing, not trying to be somebody else like a PC wannabes. In short, these current-gens going up against PC is just suicidal.

Credit goes to Wii U for doing something new and not trying to be like PS4/Xbox One.

Have you seen the Gears 4 beta?

It was a racing game. On water. Not the first one, either.

Well take your pic, cutting edge with a $600 price tag at launch and a 8 year cycle. Or mid tier for $400 with a refresh.

The current specs for all the systems except the WiiU; because of its awful "hd storage", is well within spec. Due to the resolution and framerate focus of gaming as of late, possibly due to the influence of PC gamers nonsensical rants, console gamers;specifically this forum, are anal about performance. Consoles have typically been subpar performers and the platform was praised for the games that were exclusive to these systems. With the new focus on graphics and less on the actual game, these systems have made themselves practically unnecessary for they are more focus on flash and more flash with a pinch of substance. Faster consoles would not fix the problem because people would demand more graphically and bitch that their games are not 4K at 60FPS.

Nope.

if they were tragic not as many ppl would be buying them at record pace (PS4).

So much BS console/hardware talk lately, I for one don't give a shit about the specs of these consoles, all I care about are the quality of the games.

@i_p_daily: exactly. The number one reason why I didn't upgrade is because I don't see many games that I want. I'm in no hurry to jump to next gen. There hasn't been one must have game for me that came out yet.