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Xbox Series S is More of a Support Console – The Crown of Wu Dev

THE DUCK

voted poster of the decade by bots
During crossgen yes. Outside crossgen its already dropping down to 540p and its only been 2 years.

This post just exemplifies the inccorect characterization of power level of the S, considering the vast majority of games run at 1080p or higher. So we should be worried about 1-2% of games that run at 540p or 720p and ignore the 98-99% that run fine?
 
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GHG

Gold Member
Been around the avs forums enough to know that in a thread about a samsung A series there isn't a bunch of S22/S23 owners running in calling the A series outdated and garbage.
Nor is there samsung 90 tv series owners running to the 70 series thread crapping all over that either. So your point is way off.

Yeh and lower end hardware users don't roam the forum adversiting their lower end hardware to everyone and anyone unfortunate enough to come across their posts. Funny that.

Comparison threads are comparison threads (e.g. DF threads), the Series S rightly gets called out for its subpar performance when it occurs, there's no need to defend it, it is what it is. This is a thread about a developer commenting on the hardware in a very factual manner, again, no need to defend it, it is what it is.

As far as I can see there's no specific Series S owners thread here that is full of Series X/PS5/PC users "crapping all over it".
 

ReBurn

Gold Member
It's only good because my preferred brand of worship made it.

Lemme tell you that the XSX and PS5 are underpowered too (as if that's some weird defense), but then praise the even more inept shitbox.

Fantard mental gymnastics.
I love how you have to drop back to ad hominem and insults to soothe the pain you feel because Series S is just fine. It plays all the games the big boy consoles play. That's all that matters.
 

THE DUCK

voted poster of the decade by bots
Yeh and lower end hardware users don't roam the forum adversiting their lower end hardware to everyone and anyone unfortunate enough to come across their posts. Funny that.

Comparison threads are comparison threads (e.g. DF threads), the Series S rightly gets called out for its subpar performance when it occurs, there's no need to defend it, it is what it is. This is a thread about a developer commenting on the hardware in a very factual manner, again, no need to defend it, it is what it is.

As far as I can see there's no specific Series S owners thread here that is full of Series X/PS5/PC users "crapping all over it".

There's a whole club of posters on this forum that have made it their life's mission to run into every series S thread talking about performance, and crap all over it. Just look at how this thread starts and the reactions about the impending posts.......

This club consists of people not really wanting to talk about actual performance, or the positives that the machine may bring to the table, but rather instead to basically say it sucks and runs everything at 360p or 480p or 720p, whatever they make up that week.
It just becomes trolling at a certain point.

There are three perfect examples -

First the discussion of screen resolution vs size. It is put aside as some sort of internet myth. Sure.......

The second is the system runs games at 480p, despite 98% of the games running at 1080p or higher in most cases. I mean who cares if most games run fine.

The third is the notion brought up over and over and over again about S bringing down the whole generation despite 95% of games being made mutiplatform with other platforms having lower specs. Simply ignored.
 
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CGNoire

Member
This post just exemplifies the inccorect characterization of power level of the S, considering the vast majority of games run at 1080p or higher. So we should be worried about 1-2% of games that run at 540p or 720p and ignore the 98-99% that run fine?
Its a next gen console not a cross gen only console if games with true next gen visuals are at that super low IQ already then things are only gonna get worse.
 

THE DUCK

voted poster of the decade by bots
Its a next gen console not a cross gen only console if games with true next gen visuals are at that super low IQ already then things are only gonna get worse.

We are like 30% of the way into this generation, there isn't going to be a sudden paradigm shift on graphics at this point.

Also what's your position if we get "pro" machines next year? Technically all of the older machines (including ps5 and series x) will be left in the dust at that point......won't make them crap and won't make them poorly engineered or a bad value.
 

CGNoire

Member
We are like 30% of the way into this generation, there isn't going to be a sudden paradigm shift on graphics at this point.

Also what's your position if we get "pro" machines next year? Technically all of the older machines (including ps5 and series x) will be left in the dust at that point......won't make them crap and won't make them poorly engineered or a bad value.
Pro machines will never get utilized either way. All you would end up with is mostly Higher fidelity RT. I dont see them changing the landscape.

When Memory heavy design paradigm changes are required they will be skipped over because they cant run on the S.
 

UltimaKilo

Gold Member
I don’t know, has been one of my favorite consoles due to its size, price and ease of use. Then again, I’m not a hard aire gamer, but if I was, the lack of games would be more of an issue for me.

The Series S will be fine if they can work with these older machines to achieve some good AI upscaling.
 

Kataploom

Gold Member
It's not end of anything, just because a couple of forum warriors state it.
It plays most properly developed games at 1080p with no issue, hardly "barely".
I get what year it is, I don't need to go hard for series S at all, the biggest question is, why do you feel the need to say it's underpowered? Why go hard for disparaging it?
Does it scare you somehow? Offend your console sensibilities? It bothers you when people play game at less than 4k?

If you want to get really "technical", you could say all of the next gen consoles are "underpowered". Series X and PS5 are often not able to meet the 4k 60fps target most next gen gamers want and we are early in the generation.
You should just let it go. For a lower cost console, it's not underpowered.
The fun part is that all consoles are just the bare minimum in power, but they decide to just go after the Series S, which GPU is just half as powerful as PS5 GPU. All consoles are budget machines, no exception, and none of them reached 4K consistently enough not even at halved frame rates (30).

Series S being 720p machine brands nothing if buyers don't care or play on 1080p or lower gaming monitors (which is a popular tend these days for console gaming, mind you).

BTW if Plague Tale Requiem and Dead Space don't go that low on resolution, then it won't happen, save for that unavoidable unoptimized mess.
 

Kataploom

Gold Member
Yeah the highest end PC gamers,not your average PC gamer. The PC games that used to set benchmarks graphically were unable to run on most gamers PC lol,just look at crysis back then. If anything most PC gamers want consoles to be underpowered so they don't need to upgrade much. See late 7th gen ports and most of Last gen.
Current consoles have mid-low range GPU PC equivalents though, ranging from 6600 to 6700xt (when the game is less optimized for PC at least, I've counted one around this level of requirement and still unreleased, gotta confirm first).

You just need a 3070 or 6700xt in order to be noticeably above consoles most of the time and a bit above in the rest.

Bashing the XSS for it's performance when it's just half as powerful as the PS5 GPU wise and the same of the XSX for the rest like those are "the powerful machines" is very hypocritical imo... All consoles are budget devices, no exception, if people wanna brag about power PC is literally their only choice.
 

PillsOff

Banned
Haha ...
Since when is it up to Devs?

You can clearly see that the support for Series S is actually getting better.
Probably cos it Sells.
Sales ll decide what platform is a priority.

With 3rd world being it's target market Series S could theoretically make every other console a "support"
 

Bojji

Member
I could spend all day linking you a thousand sites and you would deny them all. Enjoy your alternate reality.

The fact is the human eye has limits on what it can see in terms of detail vs distance and size. None of this is "theory", it's fact.

What they are saying may be true for movie/video watching when resolution is not as easy to see in many scenes (lacking details) and everything has perfect anti aliasing.

In games, difference between 1080p and 4k native game is quite big, anti aliasing methods work better with more pixels. Same goes for depth of field and similar effects, they have better quality the higher resolution they are tendered at. Not to mention games are filled with small details and high res textures.
 
I think the problem with the Xbox Series S is that Microsoft have set a certain standard that people expected from it (1440p and ray-tracing) when the reality is that it is more of a 1080p console with RT where resources allow. If you look at the PS5 and Xbox Series X as being a gaming PC then the Xbox Series X is a gaming laptop; a lower spec platform that can play all the same games as its big brother but at lower resolutions, framerates and sometimes with missing features (60 fps modes and/or RT).

Developers of PC games have to target a wide-range of specs and hardware and have done so for years without complaint so I really don't see why the Xbox Series S's lower specs are suddenly a big deal.
 
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This isnt an audiovisual or mobile phone enthusiast forum.

Go to avforums or avs and post about how you are proud of a lower end setup and how anything more isn't necessary in one of the most popular sub-forums. Let us know how it goes.

Morgan Freeman Good Luck GIF


If you think gamers are snobs you've not seen anything yet.

You don't say.

Anyone who has wasted enough time and money in audiophile/ videophile tomfoolery, only they can appreciate how great Series S is.

Myself being one. And I was regular poster at headfi. No one makes fun of anyone who is satisfied with their set up. Not even once have I seen. Regardless of the cost.

Having spent close to USD 3k on my headphone setup, I can say, I appreciate Series S very much. Latest and greatest in tech industry is a moving target. Next year we will get pro versions of the consoles. Where will that leave base versions of Series X/ PS5? They will be in same situation as Series S in a very short amount of time.
 

kingyala

Banned
PC gamers reading this:

first time GIF


PC gamers has been held back generations because of consoles.
which pc... most pc gamers 90 percent of them have pc's with or less than ps5 series x specs... only 10 percent have monster pcs that can beat current consoles... the problem isnt consoles its the incomppetent 3rd party devs who not only keep making mediocre games with mediocre engines but are also stuck on crossgen development....
 

fallingdove

Member
We are like 30% of the way into this generation, there isn't going to be a sudden paradigm shift on graphics at this point.

Also what's your position if we get "pro" machines next year? Technically all of the older machines (including ps5 and series x) will be left in the dust at that point......won't make them crap and won't make them poorly engineered or a bad value.
I don’t know — most of the games to date have been cross platform.

Some of the facial modeling, mocap and texture stuff we have seen from updates to Unreal 5 are going to start pushing the PS5 and SX. If devs are already struggling to offer feature parity within the Xbox family, I can’t see the SS keeping up — especially as the PS4/XO loose support.
 
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jm89

Member
Next year we will get pro versions of the consoles. Where will that leave base versions of Series X/ PS5? They will be in same situation as Series S in a very short amount of time.
And what situation does that leave the series s in when the pro version come out? If you are saying the base version could be where the series s is now? :messenger_tears_of_joy:
 

Deerock71

Member
Lol, I’ll be happy if even 1/3 of the big, graphics heavy AAA games uses those settings on the Series X and PS5 throughout the whole generation.
I think 1440p 30fps will become the norm within a couple of years, possibly with a performance mode targeting 1080p with DRS.
And Jimmy cracked corn, and I don't care!
 
And what situation does that leave the series s in when the pro version come out? If you are saying the base version could be where the series s is now? :messenger_tears_of_joy:

It will be where it already is.

My point was about chasing latest and greatest in graphics fidelity.
 

jm89

Member
It will be where it already is.
Its already heading towards being worse then what people thought it would be. What do you think adding another 2 pro models will do it?

Developers not only will have to worry about the base models, but now have another model which is significantly underpowered then the base models.
 
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THE DUCK

voted poster of the decade by bots
What they are saying may be true for movie/video watching when resolution is not as easy to see in many scenes (lacking details) and everything has perfect anti aliasing.

In games, difference between 1080p and 4k native game is quite big, anti aliasing methods work better with more pixels. Same goes for depth of field and similar effects, they have better quality the higher resolution they are tendered at. Not to mention games are filled with small details and high res textures.

Non of what you are saying is untrue, but it misses the point completely. Nobody was saying 4k doesn't look better if your tv was big enough or if you sit close enough, or combination of the two.

here's an example: On a 50" 4k tv at 10 ft, the human eye cannot resolve 4k. It can barely do 1080p from that distance.
 

THE DUCK

voted poster of the decade by bots
I don’t know — most of the games to date have been cross platform.

Some of the facial modeling, mocap and texture stuff we have seen from updates to Unreal 5 are going to start pushing the PS5 and SX. If devs are already struggling to offer feature parity within the Xbox family, I can’t see the SS keeping up — especially as the PS4/XO loose support.

Fortnite updated to ue5 and seems to run fine. I don't think it's a big issue since they still have lots of older pc specs to support and the engine was built for scaleability in mind.
 

Kataploom

Gold Member
The last of us with its lack of optimization run pretty decent in a 1060 6gb at medium settings and 1080p with FSR... You can't eat more resources than that unoptimized mess and yet it's perfectly playable on a GPU similar to the XSS.

A Plague Tale Requiem runs pretty well on it.

FS2020 end pretty well on it.

IDK how some people are thinking games are going run heavier if bigger consoles are clearly on their limits running absolutely current gen only ones.

But in the end the real bottleneck this gen is Budget and manpower, nothing else.
 

FrankWza

Member
But in the end the real bottleneck this gen is Budget and manpower, nothing else.
That's why creating another sku develop for adds further strain. The effort it took for the matrix demo to run on the s was called gargantuan by the insider article. They had to bring in extra help.
 

mckmas8808

Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
The last of us with its lack of optimization run pretty decent in a 1060 6gb at medium settings and 1080p with FSR... You can't eat more resources than that unoptimized mess and yet it's perfectly playable on a GPU similar to the XSS.

A Plague Tale Requiem runs pretty well on it.

FS2020 end pretty well on it.

IDK how some people are thinking games are going run heavier if bigger consoles are clearly on their limits running absolutely current gen only ones.

But in the end the real bottleneck this gen is Budget and manpower, nothing else.

TLOU is a remake.
 

Kataploom

Gold Member
TLOU is a remake.
I know, but it's a unoptimized and buggy mess yet it can be played on similar hardware than Series S... Actually if it was using some current gen features, it should be running great on any system apart from PS5 (SFS and DirectStorage are on PC, for starters)
 

Azurro

Banned
A third of the XSX GPU (12 TF), barely a little less than half the PS5 GPU (10.28 TF)

"A third of the XSX GPU" -> 12 / 4 = 3. Assertion passed.

"Barely a little less than half the PS5 GPU" -> 10.28 / 4 = 2.57. Assertion failed.

I think the conversation is silly, but I don't think you can ever claim to be unbiased or have rational arguments when you claim 2.57 is almost equal to 2.
 

Kataploom

Gold Member
"A third of the XSX GPU" -> 12 / 4 = 3. Assertion passed.

"Barely a little less than half the PS5 GPU" -> 10.28 / 4 = 2.57. Assertion failed.

I think the conversation is silly, but I don't think you can ever claim to be unbiased or have rational arguments when you claim 2.57 is almost equal to 2.
I'll give it to ya, I initially thought PS5 GPU was 9 TF, yet it's perfectly scalable down without major concerns beyond resolution and effects, specially when cross gen finally ends.

And? Weren't you talking about whole GPU power? That is just the floating point per sec metric.
They're same architecture from the same generation, the differences won't be as big as, say, compared to any Nvidia or Polaris GPU.
 

Kataploom

Gold Member
I wonder if a pro version of the series S would come out if a pro series x came out?
That would be too overkill for developers, one of the reasons why I think Sony releasing a "PS5 Pro" would be awful for MS is that they'd be obligated to release a more powerful Xbox, which could add yet another SKU for Xbox development. I've always thought they released X and S together because they were confident refreshes wouldn't come anyway
 

SkylineRKR

Member
Montero is on point. I have PS5+XSS as well. For demanding games I use the PS5. But for other games its perfectly fine to use the XSS, especially if they appear on GPU. RE4R i am going to play on PS5 for example, but I beat Scarlet Nexus and Psychonauts 2 on XSS. Hitman 3 I played on XSS because it was on GPU and not on Plus, the difference to me wasn't big enough to warrant a purchase. Game plays great on XSS.

I don't think XSS is going to affect development, rather you see more 30fps or sub 1080p current-gen projects on XSS. Its not like Flight sim looks like shit because its on XSS as well.

But in the end its about the games, if a game is shit, its shit. No matter if its native 4k/120hz or just 1080p.


That would be too overkill for developers, one of the reasons why I think Sony releasing a "PS5 Pro" would be awful for MS is that they'd be obligated to release a mor
powerful Xbox, which could add yet another SKU for Xbox development. I've always thought they released X and S together because they were confident refreshes wouldn't come anyway

Ofcourse. If MS decided upon a Series X Pro, then they will no doubt bury the XSS. They will position the XSX, perhaps in redesign, as a cheaper alternative much like the PS4 and X1 support continued. I see little point in ongoing production of XSS at that point.
 
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