From: "Jim Leonard" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Actually, it makes perfect sense to reinvent these things since one of > the whole points of consoles is to keep costs down so that you can make > money on the hardware.
I'm not sure... you have to remember that reinventing stuff costs a lot of R&D dollars. I'm willing to wager that the Xbox was relatively cheap to design, with specs changing up to the last minute, whereas with a regular console, everything has to be made specially for that machine and is fixed early in development, which creates obsolete technology issues.So if you save a ton on R&D then you can take a bigger hit on the actual machine sale. >You can add these things to any new console > design. I started thinking about this yesterday... what more can you add to a console other then a few little graphic tweaks these days? I mean, in the days of 2D consoles, you could add something like a Mode 7 chip, which allowed pseudo-3D and the like, this was a huge innovation, but now that everythign is done in true 3D, you could add lighting hardware and the like, and improve the sound, but there really is nothing beyond just "more power". It seems like we've reached that point with console development.... it's just like pc's in that you are wondering how many polys you can manipulate. >That travesty of pricing is what happens when you > combine licensing with the high cost of hardware (the carts use up to > 32MB of ROM, which is very expensive in terms of manufacturing and > materials). I laughed at my friends who paid exorbatant prices for SNES and N64 games that cost more then 50 bucks... I just can't see that kind of highway robbery. > I'm curious: Why do you think consoles were getting bogged down by not > having internal hard drives? Saved game data primarily (I hate save points that require you to redo stuff). But also from a gameplay standpoint, it's getting harder to make games that look good and fit into system memory. Load times are becoming truly a pain in the butt in many games (especially on PS2) and the problems were only going to get worse with the next generation of consoles. The harddrive, if used right, and I doubt the first generation of xbox titles will do that, is going to make these games easier to deal with and eliminate the loading times that console users used to make fun of (cause carts didn't have them). > Regarding X-Box as being "the most powerful": A very strong argument > can be made for console hardware being less powerful on paper but more > powerful when specifically used for gaming. I agree wholeheartedly, that's why you will see great looking games on xbox that will run much better than they would on a 753mhz pc. But that has largely to do with lack of OS overhead, lower resolutions (really a MAJOR factor when you think about it... how fast does Q3 run at 640X480 vs. 1024X768?) and simplified codesets. I'm not advocating making consoles that are little pcs, but that there are certain extras in a pc which console gaming could really use. The ability to network consoles is great (I remember playing networked WipeoutXL on the old PS1, it was blast) and the harddrive, when used right will add a whole new dimension to the games, that I don't think gamers will be willing to do without from now on. Karl Kuras Visit Our House the online comic strip! http://ourhouse.trantornator.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------- This message was sent to you because you are currently subscribed to the swcollect mailing list. To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of 'unsubscribe swcollect' Archives are available at: http://www.mail-archive.com/swcollect@oldskool.org/
