That has to be with optional side quests. As much as I hate short games no game should take more than about 30-40 hours to complete. I wouldn't buy a 2000 page book and I won't buy a 200 hour game.

@silversix_:

I was as pro Xbox as a guy could be the last two gens and I'm saying it but I was never really a fanboy just truly felt and still do that they were the better console. Obviously this gen hasn't started yet but with on hand info I just can't see how anyone could argue that MS didn'treally eff this console up in terms of specs compared to Sony.

This is coming from someone who was very pro Xbox in the last two gens but this time around it's very obvious that when it comes to gaming the PS4 is undoubtedly the more powerful and easier to develop for console. They fixed their crappy controller, they focused on making a console that is first and foremost about the games and they clearly have a pretty decent size advantage when it comes to raw horsepower. They also are coming to market with a console that is $100 cheaper which make no mistake in today's economy will be very relevant when they are sitting there side by side.

MS totally dropped the ball when it was so easy to hit a home run. Their stubbornness to keep pushing a wildly unpopular add on (kinect) instead of using that money to improve the actual console is going to be their downfall. Now I'm not saying that the Xbox one is not going to make some great looking quality games but I am saying more times than not the best PS4 games are going to look noticeably better. Now to 80% of the market they won't know or won't care but to that last 20% of informed gamers the PS4 is going to be the first choice. 20% may not seem like much but when it's 20% of a couple hundred million possible customers that is the difference between winning and losing the war.

Very few games are that CPU intensive in the sense that the CPU you have now at that clock speed wouldn't be able to handle them at a very solid frame rate. If you upgrade the CPU you will also need a new motherboard, all in you are probably looking at close to $400. There are some RTS games and a few demanding others where you will gain 20-25 FPS but keep in mind that the gain is going to be from 60FPS to 80 FPS which in reality is a very meaningless bump. Now if we are talking about going from 35FPS to 60FPS that is a huge difference. If you have a good GPU this is not going to be the case, IMO you are going to be throwing away money that you should spend in a year or two. There isn't a game out there that I know of that your CPU is going to hold you back from playing at atleast 45-50 FPS which is more than acceptable. You have to decide if it's worth $400 of your dollars to play games at 75 FPS over 50 FPS and in most cases the gain won't even be that unless you have a top end GPU like a 7970 or 680.

not worth it..the 7850 is only slightly better than a 5850.  If you want a good upgrade i recommend getting at least a 7870 or better yet a 7950.

blaznwiipspman1

Ya the 7850 2gb will allow you to jack the AA up a bit and some higher end settings in a few games that your 1gb 5850 can't do but in general you're probably only going to gain 6-7 fps with a small bump in visual quality. For a $100 more you can get a 7950 which has 3gb of vram (future proofing) and will plow through basically every game at max settings with 4XAA and you'll gain something in the neighborhood of 15-20 FPS over your 5850 assuming you have a good CPU. If you buy a 7850 you'll be here again in a year asking about another upgrade, get a 7950 and you'll be set for 2 years minimum!

They both cost the same and with the exception of a few games (that perform better on either the 7950 or 660ti) they are very close in terms of performance across the board. The 7950 by most accounts seems to be the better overclocker so you can squeeze a bit more juice out of it but in reality that juice means nothing if you are not playing at resolutions over 1080p. If you are playing at 1440p the 7950 makes a little more sense with its 3gb of video ram and its higher bus but even then there is the odd game that favors nVidia's architecture. If you are playing at 1080p you really can't go wrong with either card, we are usually talking a few FPS difference depending on the title 90% of the time.

Bottom line is with the exception of a few games either card can max out every game at more than playable frame rates at 1080p. The odd game maybe you'll have to turn down shadow detail a bit (always a GPU killer and never worth the performance hit for max settings) and you may have to settle for 2XAA instead of 4XAA (which at higher resolutions like 1080p is basically a non existent difference) for consistent 50-60 FPS but in the end which ever you go with you will have a card that will make you very happy for the next couple years assuming you have it surrounded with other quality components.

I'd personally go with a 7950 for the better overclocking, higher video ram and that AMD seems to be consistently updating drivers lately to give you a few more FPS in most modern games. Even with that said you can't go wrong either way. The deciding factor for you should be to check out the benchmarks in the games you like most as one may have an edge over the other. If it's just for general gaming flip a coin pick a card and you will be happy no matter which one you come home with.

Im just going to guess about the new xbox.

they should go with an amd 7850 gpu, theyll skimp and go with a 7750.

they should go with 4gb of ram, theyll skimp and go with 2gb.

they should go with a quad core cpu clocked at 3.6ghz or higher, theyll skimp a bit and go quad core around 3.2ghz

they should go with bluray, theyll skimp and go with some modified dvd that holds around 15-16 gigs.

they should have a standard ssd around 64 gigs for saves and to more efficiently run games like the original xbox had and have usb and external hdd handle the rest, theyll skimp and go with another proprietary 250 gig hdd.

even with all they should do that they wont it should be a pretty damn good console, 1080p should be easily attainable with later games being 1080p and 60fps.

[QUOTE="Dark_Knight6"]

The final, near perfect solution is to not have online passes. They are the product ofgreedy publishers being greedy.

HarlockJC

The game industry as a whole is doing better than ever how else can you explain that there are more developers now than at any point in history? If a whack of new car dealerships kept popping up or hair salons people wouldn't be coming to their aid to gouge us for more cash, they'd come to the conclusion if more and more people are trying to get into those industries that obviously those industries are thriving for the most part. Sure the odd developer goes out of business but it's not because games are too expensive to make or because of used games it's because they suck at making games, do a piss poor job of advertising them or are just poorly run business' that don't make proper financial choices. Like any business in the real world some will not make it, that doesn't mean the business model is broken it just means that you were not doing things how the consumer wants them done or in the odd instance just due to bad luck.

As for the more money to run servers what does that have anything to do with used games? If I buy a new copy of a game and sell it in 6 months there is still only one person on the server playing online. I can't overload their servers BECAUSE I NO LONGER OWN THE GAME! There will only ever be as many people online as who bought the game new...that's a simple concept even a 5 year can understand.

The gaming industry will crumble if they put an end to used games, they just can't see the forest through the trees. Do you know how many people will stop buying new games and consoles period if the know they can't get any value for a game once they've grown tired of it or that they will no longer have the option to buy a game at a reduced price when the developer has already made their sale? It's not alwas as simple as if they couldn't buy used games they'd buy new. In a lot of instances they just won't buy the game period. It's better for developers to have gamers buying used games than none at all. Maybe they buy a used game that they really like so now when that developer makes a sequel or another title that is similar they will buy a new copy because to them it warrants a new purchase. There will be a huge ripple affect to killing used games and I can't wait until it bites all these greedy douches in the ass.

[QUOTE="TellDaddy"]

I own a 6670 and the way the card is getting slagged here is a little over the top, it is a pretty capable card and crushes what is currently in the 360 or PS3. Anyone expecting any next gen console to be using top end PC parts is insane, it's not going to happen. As for the 6670 it enable me to play most games at 1080p, at mid to high settings and get 35-40 FPS (usually just turning shadows down gives me huge frame boosts). In less demanding games I can max them out at 1080p with 2XAA and 16XAF at 60+FPS. BFBC2 and GTA4 (horribly optimized game on the PC) are the only 2 games where I play at 1680X1050 to ensure I have a solid 30+ FPS.

With that said I would be very disappointed if a console coming out 18 months from now went with a 6670 (as is) unless they plan to make some changes to it to increase it's performance.

I know it's never good to assume but I have to assume that it will be a form of the 6670 (not identical to what us PC owners have in our rigs) but will be built using the newer 28 nm tech as opposed to the 40 nm tech currently used in the six series. By going that way they could increase the power of the card by 10-15% but keep the heat and power requirements the same. I've heard they are going with an IBM power processor but I really hope that is not so. If they paired the 6670 with one of the new AMD APU's you could expect the two paired up to boost the 6670 performance to 35-40% better than what it is capable of now which then doesn't look so bad if the add some eDRAM (like they did on the 360) and bump up the RAM to atleast 2GB. If they do what I suggested I think you are looking at a console that can play games at native 1080p with rock solid 30FPS (60 FPS in some games) and about 20-30% better graphics than what we have now. That's not a monstrous leap but if games looked 20-30% better (plus better AI and a nice increase in on screen NPC) and were in native 1080p I think the majoirty of gamers would be very happy.

I still gotta say I was really hoping for something more along the lines of a card similar to the 6850 with 4GB of RAM (I just can't see them going over 2GB and just like them skimping on RAM by going with 512MB this gen it will bite them in the ass a couple years in). A 6850 with 4GB of RAM on a console without developers having to worry about different specs like they do on the PC and not having a resourse hog operating system like on PC's would give them all the power they need and more but I fear just like this gen developers while still having lots of power are going to have to cut corners in places they wouldn't have had to if Microsoft had just given them a little more power.

mitu123

Well that guy is a complete and total fool, there is really no other way to word it.

When these console makers hope to sell tens of millions of units to customers (the majority of which don't even know what a 6670 is never mind what it is compared to a 6850) of course they are not going to go with the best parts available.

2GB of RAM instead of 4GB of RAM=$10 savings per console made

A hybrid 6670 instead of a hybrid 6850=$15 savings per console made

$25 dollars on the surface doesn't look like much but you multiply that by 80 million consoles in its life span and you are looking at 2 Billion dollars. 2 Billion dollars is the difference between a profitable console and one that can bury a gaming division. Even a drunk monkey should be able to do the math and know that no company is going to put the highest end PC specs in a console.

I own a 6670 and the way the card is getting slagged here is a little over the top, it is a pretty capable card and crushes what is currently in the 360 or PS3. Anyone expecting any next gen console to be using top end PC parts is insane, it's not going to happen. As for the 6670 it enable me to play most games at 1080p, at mid to high settings and get 35-40 FPS (usually just turning shadows down gives me huge frame boosts). In less demanding games I can max them out at 1080p with 2XAA and 16XAF at 60+FPS. BFBC2 and GTA4 (horribly optimized game on the PC) are the only 2 games where I play at 1680X1050 to ensure I have a solid 30+ FPS.

With that said I would be very disappointed if a console coming out 18 months from now went with a 6670 (as is) unless they plan to make some changes to it to increase it's performance.

I know it's never good to assume but I have to assume that it will be a form of the 6670 (not identical to what us PC owners have in our rigs) but will be built using the newer 28 nm tech as opposed to the 40 nm tech currently used in the six series. By going that way they could increase the power of the card by 10-15% but keep the heat and power requirements the same. I've heard they are going with an IBM power processor but I really hope that is not so. If they paired the 6670 with one of the new AMD APU's you could expect the two paired up to boost the 6670 performance to 35-40% better than what it is capable of now which then doesn't look so bad if the add some eDRAM (like they did on the 360) and bump up the RAM to atleast 2GB. If they do what I suggested I think you are looking at a console that can play games at native 1080p with rock solid 30FPS (60 FPS in some games) and about 20-30% better graphics than what we have now. That's not a monstrous leap but if games looked 20-30% better (plus better AI and a nice increase in on screen NPC) and were in native 1080p I think the majoirty of gamers would be very happy.

I still gotta say I was really hoping for something more along the lines of a card similar to the 6850 with 4GB of RAM (I just can't see them going over 2GB and just like them skimping on RAM by going with 512MB this gen it will bite them in the ass a couple years in). A 6850 with 4GB of RAM on a console without developers having to worry about different specs like they do on the PC and not having a resourse hog operating system like on PC's would give them all the power they need and more but I fear just like this gen developers while still having lots of power are going to have to cut corners in places they wouldn't have had to if Microsoft had just given them a little more power.