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HD Really The Future of Gaming?
Eurogamer.com has an editorial discussing the "HD Future", as revealed in the Microsoft Keynote at GDC. In the article, author Kristan Reed argues that while the crispness of the HD Living Room would be welcome, "using it as a hook to hang next gen console gaming on is misleading to say the least, and there are more than a few barriers to entry for the masses."
Using it as a hook to hang your kids on is a bit extreme, don't you think? Why not just setup a wooden beam in the floor and call it first post?
I am sure that in the next generation of gaming systems, there will be HD options offered by Microsoft and Sony. Has anyone heard anything from Nintendo for their next system? As we all know, they stress games instead of hardware but the Gamecube currently supports HD.
What MS is counting on is that consumers will believe that somehow, even though they don't have an HDTV, the HD capabilities of the X-Box 2 will make it display a higher quality picture on their regular TV.
While it almost certainly will look better on a regular TV than an X-Box, HD is not the reason. On the plus side, though, mandating HDTV support in all games is a positive step towards forward-compatability. It will ensure that the console will work well with TV's that come out even a decade down the road.
I still don't understand what all the huge fuss is about though. Was this a surprise to anyone at all? Does anyone think that the PS3 and Revolution won't also have HDTV support in every game? It only makes sense to support the technology as, in 6 years when these consoles are really hitting their mainstream, there's a strong possibility that HDTV will become more of a mainstream technology.
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I'd rather be flamed than ignored.
HDTV is drastically cheaper that it was even 2 years ago. I can walk in to Wal-Mart and buy a 30" diagonal wide screen direct-view Sanyo set WITH BUILT IN HD TUNER for $699. This set supports all the HDTV standard resolutions (yes, including 720p). It also has built-in stereo and speakers. Not the same as a 5.1 or 7.1 system, but that can always be added. In another 6 months to a year, as more people replace their older NTSC sets, the price should drop even more. Sorry, I just don't see the problem here.
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For console gaming, yes.
Next article please.
TFA bemoaning the sporadic HD support in current generation consoles, bringing up PC gaming, etc. seems like it is just trolling for an excuse to pick on MS. Yes HD is the future of TV, so of course it's the future of console gaming. And console gamers everywhere will joyously welcome all the HD gaming to come.
What's the point of this article anyway?
Operator, give me the number for 911!
HD will be the future of consoles , as it will be the future of TV. ,
The question is not if , it is when.
Tv standerds will contiune to improve and pixel counts will push ever updward
Now that These standerds are making the way to the market it is clear that we will see them in games (many have suported HDTV since 2000 or so iirc ).
I expect normal standerds to hang on for a good while longer though
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
Very, very well put. Know that you are not alone in this thinking. Simply upgrading for the sake of upgrading is no longer an option for me. I look back to my parent's refusal to buy any more consoles, and "upgrade" to a Colecovision as an indication of what is coming ahead.
Likewise, I only upgrade my PC these days when I absolutely MUST. It is no longer a luxury, but a necessity.
Somewhere in the closet I have an old PlayStation One packed neatly in its original box. Game makers' fundamental strategy is to get the consumers to keep buying the "latest and grandest" so they can sustain the industry. Their marketing scheme dictates that they constantly talk about that "illusive future game super console" or else people will find other brands or other forms of entertainment.
Always remember, the marketing mantra of any consumer hardware industry is: "Talk up a storm about the 'mystique' of the yet-to-be-released new product, so people will buy them at the premium price as soon as it comes out, because that is how they make profits with the biggest margin."
Yep, that's why I paid $299 for my PlayStation One, which I doubt I could fetch more than $10 (if at all) for at a garage sale.
Sun and Fun
Innovation happens elswhere. It's been said a thousand times, but Microsoft won't know what business it will need to be in until that business is already two years past them and they adopt it.
Sun and IBM are much bigger risk takers, right now, which is amazing for how big and relatively old these companies are. HP took a big risk too, but...the execution is leaving something to be desired.
If IBM takes off with the theories about IBM-branded Linux desktops, and Sun has a compatible Java Desktop System (Linux/Solaris), both of which are much cheaper than Windows and Office...I mean, really, where does that leave Microsoft in ten years?
The future is Linux/UNIX, OpenOffice.org, and Mozilla/Firefox. The cheaper-is-better lessons of history require it. And, IBM and Sun can back up their software with selling real hardware and services (it's called diversification, which Microsoft really doesn't do).
-- Microsoft is the most expensive commodity operating system and office suite vendor in the marketplace.
That is the same thing that John Romero said in pre launch Daikatana hype. Now he is making PocketPC games.
I think that content is king, but I also think that the since of wonder at new technologies on the part of our community is justified. That is to say we ain't see nothing yet.
"My God, this must be a truly remarkable corn chip, to be so widely and confidently touted."
420p is Enhansed Definition and 4:3 (although it is somtimes streched for 16:9)
... ...
720p and 1080i are HD
and nothing the writers ignorance more
it has also been stated (through gamespy articles) that ALL xbox2 games will support 720p
as opposed to the ~31/532 listed on hdgames.net of the current xbox generation
The fact of the matter is that most people don't have an HDTV. That doesn't mean they're not gamers it means they're not yet ready to shell out the cash for one. I'd tend to agree with them. It's good that MS is including all there titles with HD for the xbox but to go on the assumption that the majority of consumers have one is just foolish.
Society never gets more or less violent, the definition of violent just keeps changing.
And I've never had a console.
I've been playing in 1280x1024 since 2001, when I got a Gateway computer with a TNT2 in it and a 17" monitor.
1280x720 is 720p HDTV, with 389,120 pixels less than 1280x1024, a relatively common PC resolution.
Ergo, HD console gaming isn't a big novelty, it's just catching up to what you can do with a PC or a Mac.
The author ignoring this fact destroys a huge part of his argument. MS stated pretty clearly that 720p was what they were talking about as a minimum for the "HD era", not 480p. It seems like a third of the silly article is spent arguing that earlier systems supported 480p too. That's not what MS is talking about. And honestly, I don't think they are claiming to be the first to do HD anyway - the point is to make it the standard for gaming, not to invent it.
(Bizarrely, the author seems to actually recognize that 720p is the minimum standard for the Xbox2 late in the article. Why did he spend so much time arguing that 'many Xbox2 games wouldn't support that and so 480p isn't a big deal because other consoles support that blah blah blah' earlier in the article?)
There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion. -- Francis Bacon
How many people who have optical audio speakers have been annoyed when their DVDs would not play any sound, due to a stupid and short-sighted copy protection scheme? I would happily pay $20 or $30 more to go completely optical, but having a stupid limitation like that totally breaks the deal.
Here are the questions that I ask about new tech:
1) What can it allow me to do that I cannot do now?
2) What will it stop me from doing that I can do now? Some very old VCRs completely ignore macrovision, so older tech is sometimes the best.
3) How much does it cost?
But you are absolutely right about "outstripping our ability to care," but I also think that it is also outstripping our ability to afford it too. I would love to have a nice HD setup with surround sound. HD is too expensive right now. Plus, I do not watch much television in the first place. Would I take it for $100? Sure! Would I pay $500 for the honor of having HD? Nope. Not worth it.
And surround sound is out because I would have to somehow get a half-dozen speakers mounted to walls and ceilings, and run all sorts of ugly wires. Two speakers are easy - on either side of the TV. Six speakers only work for people who have one entire room dedicated to the television. So, this is not a factor of money, but one of convenience. Surround sound would be cool, but is not necessary.
"-1 Troll" is the apparently the same as "-1 I disagree with you."
I went to the big Microsoft talk at the GDC and my understanding was that Bill was going to solve the whole "digital divide" issue by buying us all HDTVs.
Or did I miss something?
Spell cheek you've failed me four the last thyme!
Having worked at Ulimate Electronics for awhile (before it went bankrupt), I've encountered most of the common questions/confusions regarding HDTV. Despite the fact the FCC is still hammering away at moving towards all digital signals by end of 2006, for the most part the general public is quite clueless about HDTV and digital television in general.
Alot of people I encountered believed that digital cable is HDTV. In realty, the compression used for digital cable usually makes the picture even crappier than analog cable.
And don't get me started about HDTV-built-in vs. HDTV monitors. Alot of people were dumb-founded that their new $5500 plamsa TV actually wouldn't be able to pick up HDTV signals out of the box, but instead needed to be hooked up to a seperate $500 over-the-air tuner to get any local signals.
And this is just for watching television . . .
My point being is that if Joe and Jane Public are confused by just the appliance used to display a game, they're probably not not going to understand how to get their gaming system to work in HD either. When I see a friend's Xbox hooked up to their HDTV with analog RCA cables (at least try S-Video), I realized that most people either don't know or don't care that they are under-utilizing their expensive investment.
PS . . . What the alphabet would look like if Q and R were eliminated --- Mitch Hedberg
Why did microsoft disable HD on XBOX for PAL?
Why did sony disable HD support in PAL releases of games?
Given the various standards involved, I seriously doubt that it was techincal (i.e. "these games require extra coding to work on PAL HDTVs" that we cant afford to do). Especially in the case of the XBOX (where it should be up to the game maker to decide if they want to invest the $$$ to make their game HDTV aware in PAL regions)
According to this article the next-gen Xbox lacks the next-gen optical media meant for HDTV (Blu-ray/HD-DVD). Even though the next-gen Xbox can support 720p/1080i for the output, it seems a bit odd that MS put emphasis on the 'HD era' as the Xbox 1 already supports 720p/1080i for some games though not obligatory.
The article was supposed to be about the case for HD and the case against HD, but it spent most of its time talking about lack of (good) HD support on current generation hardware and software. What a waste of time.
The article also claims that mass market HD is 5 to 10 years away. 10 years???? I don't think so. Lots of companies in Japan are already working with Super HDTV (SHDTV) with 3840 x 2160 resolution.
The author doesn't even acknowledge the fact that developers can very simply support multiple resolutions so that it runs fast on standard TVs and runs beautifully on HD TVs.
PowerLevel.com - A next generation marketplace for virtual items and services
I say bring it on.. let HD become the standard. Ever since I picked up by 57" hitatchi with 720p/480p/1080i support, I have been blown away by playing Soul Calibur 2 in 720p (although in 4:3 which is strange) and NBA2K3 in 720p is just gorgeous. Tekken 5 for the PS2 supports something around 520p (don't remember) and it too, is beauty in motion. The advent of HDTV could really help console makers pull moderately commited PC gamers off the desktops and onto the consoles. Granted the price of HDTV is not right for a great majority of the public, but hey niether were CD players around 1984-1989, and look at what a low-cost standard they have become. I see HD as the technological future of gaming, that and standard 5.1+.
Well what is stopping them from changing to Linux then? They have a choice of operating systems to use.
Oh really? Go to dell.com and tell me how to get GNU/Linux pre-installed on a new home PC. And tell me how to use consumer-priced flatbed scanners sold new at Best Buy with GNU/Linux when the driver manufacturers don't want to reveal detailed specifications to the SANE project maintainers. And tell me how to run video games from those developers that console makers won't talk to without spending $100 for Windows OEM or $60 for Cedega.
True, there is a choice, but for common home computing tasks, there is no viable choice other than Microsoft Windows.