this post was submitted on 03 Aug 2023

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Baldur’s Gate 3 Delay Shows The Xbox Series S Still A Headache For Developers (www.kotaku.com.au)

submitted 2 years ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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I'm not sure Microsoft did this generation of consoles any favours by launching the Series S.

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[–] [email protected] 26 points 2 years ago (1 children)

For those curious Swen spoke a little about the issues with Xbox they've been having and why they haven't officially announced the game for Xbox yet in this interview on SkillUp a few days ago.

Basically, the gist is that it's just not ready yet. They are currently trying to optimize it well enough so it runs 60fps even with 4 player co-op split screen which is a tall ask for the series S. Rather than hold PC and PS5 back they are instead focusing on their release and then will continue to work on Xbox after much like they did with Switch for DOS2.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Although this is frustrating for XSX owners like myself, it is absolutely the right thing to do. I've played a little bit of early access on Stadia and I hope all the PC and PS5 players are having a blast.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 years ago (1 children)

PS5 owners are still waiting for the originally planned release date in September. Only the PC release moved to yesterday.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago

Ah fair enough I didn't realise that. Still it looks like it'll be 2024 before it comes to Xbox last I saw.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 years ago (5 children)

The Series S specs exceed all the listed minimum specs on the BG3 Steam page for PC. How is the Series S holding anything back when they apparently support their game on shittier PCs?

[–] [email protected] 20 points 2 years ago (6 children)

The problem is that they have couch coop play. They struggle making it work with Series S. From what I understand, they cannot just make a separate version without coop just for Series S. All game features in Series X must also be available on Series S. I guess that’s a limitation imposed by Microsoft.

With PC you don’t have that limitation. If your computer can’t do couch coop then too bad for you. Minimum specs probably doesn’t account for coop.

I’m not sure why they don’t remove couch coop completely from the Xbox versions. Probably because they think it’s removing too much of their vision of the game.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 years ago (1 children)

It may be due to Microsoft demanding certain minimum configurations: at the very least minimum resolution and minimum frame rate. On PC you can always go down to 240p and/or live with 10fps in very high density scenes. Microsoft can (and will) just say "no" if they try that on the Xbox S

[–] [email protected] -3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I understand that but surely the articles should be “developers lie about minimum specs on PC” surely. I believe the concept of a lower priced and accessible console should be encouraged. If that means developers have to try a little harder to support people who buy a cheaper console then so be it.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I guess that's debatable, depends on how you define what "it runs" means. PC gamers with dated hardware may be fine with playing on 1080p, while on the Xbox Microsoft might veto if it doesn't run on 1440p and 30fps. Of course weaker hardware won't run everything faster hardware can, you can't just sprinkle infinite magic optimization dust on a game, there are simply limits what's possible with weaker hardware, and once you've reached them you can't just shout "enhance" like in CSI Miami.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

So MS enforcing a level of quality is a good thing then. The alternative is 12 fps at 720p.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 2 years ago

Not in my opinion: if you read the article, it clearly says that Microsoft enforcing a level of quality for dated hardware leads to devs abolishing features that the hardware series S hardware won't be able to support. They also can't decide to not support the S unless they abandon the Xbox series X as well. It leads to lower quality games for everyone, not just series S owners.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Probably because MS wants feature parity for both consoles where every feature runs at acceptable frame rates. Like the minimum PC spec most likely runs split screen like dog shit. But MS will not accept that for the Series S. While PC gamers with weak hardware accept that the game will not always run optimal

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago (1 children)

My PC is above minimum specs and BG3 ran really poorly even on low. Maybe they got a similar issue with the s.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago

Yeah that’s the problem, they obviously lie about minimum specs on PC but that is OK for some reason. Xbox enforcing a quality experience for its users is somehow “holding the industry back”.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

But the Series S doesn't run the PC game. Just like PC's don't run the Series S version of the game. I'm confused. If it was so easy, why isn't every game available on every platform on day one?

[–] [email protected] -3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Mate the Xbox is a PC with better support and static specs. And yes Most games are available on every platform on day one.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

If it's so straight forward, then what are the devs complaining about?

Microsoft requires they meet a specific standard on both the S and X, which is making it harder for them to do. They don't build to every specific PC variant. But they have to build to both the X and S.

[–] [email protected] -4 points 2 years ago (1 children)

They’re complaining that their job is hard. People do that all day, every day, whether it’s a legitimate complaint or not.

They came up with those minimum specs somehow didn’t they? Either that built to those minimum specs, or……? And those specs are less powerful than the Series S. So here we are again!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

"Because Xbox mandates that any games launched on its current-gen systems run smoothly on both Series X and Series S" - from the article

So no, they don't get to just pick the minimum specs they support like on the PC version. They have to build a game that runs similarly on S and X, or not launch on either. Hence, the S is always going to limit what devs will be able/willing to do on the current gen consoles. More so than if they could just focus on the X and PS5.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I have a feeling all of these complaints about supporting the Series S will disappear once the Switch successor releases and devs have a new console with weaker specs to complain about

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 years ago (1 children)

But devs already have the Switch which has weaker specs.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

Yes but most devs leave it out since publishers originally let them. Activision recently said ignoring the switch was a mistake so I doubt publishers will be making the same mistake again when we have a new switch

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago

With how little power the switch 2 likely will still have, developers will still ignore it.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago (2 children)

For those interested, a certain analytics company claimed on vague terms that certain markets sell more Series S than X consoles.

https://www.gamesindustry.biz/ampere-xbox-series-s-outselling-series-x-in-key-markets?ssp=1&darkschemeovr=1&setlang=en-US&safesearch=moderate

So that suggests, if Microsoft had never released that lower-power console, they’d be selling fewer of the pair this generation.

Ultimately, this issue seems specific to the devs’ wish for a 60fps 4-player split screen mode, something that certainly does seem computationally expensive even if resolution is lowered.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago (1 children)

That article is from 2021 and doesn't provide links or details to any data. The claim in the article says it's 50/50. But again, no data is provided.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 2 years ago

“No data provided” is going to be relatively common for sales of consoles/games, especially when going specific to certain markets. That data is literally valuable, and might be purchased by publishers looking to make development or release decisions.

As such, when we do get it for free articles, it’s from relative comparables, like “More oranges than apples”. Anyone in comments that happens to work for a publisher is likely under NDA agreement not to just give it out.

I agree that I’d like to see more recent data, and made an effort to find what I could - but it’s also hard to say if any specific change in circumstance might reverse sale rates between the two models.

[–] Ilikepornaddict 4 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I don't think it suggests that at all. I think people just saw their options, and went for the cheaper one. If there was no cheaper option, they would've just bought the X.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago

Well, there is a decent chance they would have gone for the PS5 instead.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Developers can shit on series S as much as they want, but if Microsoft relax the feature parity it would be a death sentence for the series S.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago (1 children)

More of a death sentence than games just not coming to Xbox?

They could just run the game on xCloud for certain titles.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

They could just run the game on xCloud for certain titles.

Not a bad idea honestly.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago

Except you'd have to be always online to play it that way, and forcing always online as the only way to play is a huge part of what killed the Xbox One. It wouldn't surprise me if Xbox isn't ready to try and push that again (as the only option, they're obviously fine having it be AN option on their console)

[–] [email protected] -5 points 2 years ago

The game looks boring as hell anyway.

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