Epic's Mark Rein: "I really am excited" about PlayStation 4's 8GB of Ram

Epic Games co-founder and vice president Mark Rein has been expressing his excitement about the PlayStation 4 on Twitter, saying "I really am excited" about the 8GB of GDDR5 memory.

"8GB of super-fast RAM - holy cow!" Tweeted Rein. "Can't wait to see what Microsoft has in store to combat this!"

[NastyLeftHook0]

bring the gears of war games collection to ps4 on a single disk and price it at 39.99

[TitanUp]

ms owns the ip

[majiebeast]

No they own publishing rights that is a very different thing.

[Gamer1982]

Yep they own publishing rights and those rights are only on a timed basis. It's why you see old final fantasy games now on modern consoles and ipads where Nintendo owned publishing rights to them. Mark Rein however loves MS though and this tweet partly proves this as hes hoping MS match it for his new gears game. MS makes him a LOT of money through exclusive publishing rights and I feel that's what cause Cliffy B to leave EPIC in the end as he just wanted to make great games and not just gears every year.

[morganfell]

And we owned you:

Mark Rein has said Epic owns the rights and they can do what they want.

http://www.vg247.com/2010/0...

Next time do some research. Publishing rights mean squat. Remember Jade Empire published by two different companies, one on the 360 and one on the PC?

How about Mass Effect published by Microsoft now it's on the PS3?

[mandf]

@ Farsendor1

No they don't. Epic owns it all. Gamers made up that lie to feel better about their choice of console.

[medziarz]

they don't own anything Gears of War

[TitanUp]

ha it was my mistake i even admitted the mistake below.

i would like to see gears come to ps4 that would be cool.

[Dark5tar1]

It's better avoiding those games.

[perfectCarbonara]

Won't matter how excited you are when you're Microsofts pet.

[sashimi]

^ this right here, unless they plan to develop more than microsoft exclusives its moot.

[sherimae2413]

well said oni-chan ^_^

[R_aVe_N]

You will most likely not even see one of their games on the PS4 unless its something totally new, or Unreal Tourny 4

[TitanUp]

ah i thought ms owned gears of war but thanks to majiebeast and google i now know better :)

[Animal Mutha 76]

8 gig of gddr5 is impressive but could be expensive. Note they didn't mention the cost.
I'd be interested to see if the bandwidth claims are accurate.

MS is rumoured to use the super fast ED ram as a buffer cache for their slightly slower ram so the difference between the machines might not be that different.

I wish we knew the full spec sheets for both machines.

[Whitey2k]

but even with ED ram still wont be a match for GDDR5 expecially 8 gigs of it

[juandren]

Animal Mutha, that little bit of ED RAM won't make the RAM nearly as powerful as PS4's RAM. Imagine pouring water into a bucket from a Coke bottle. If you poke an extra, small hole in it the bucket will fill up faster, but if the top of the Coke bottle is twice as big (PS4), it will go WAY faster

[Animal Mutha 76]

For gods sake I'm not 5. I do understand how memory and bus speed work. I'm talking about the end bandwidth between the parts which is most important at the end of the day. The ps4s memory bandwidth sounds like its unrestricted to the potential of the gddr5 but it's the bandwidth to the bus and GPU that's important.

The EDram solution isn't as good but it can make up for the slower speed to ddr3 by having buffer memory and it's own high speed interconnect to the GPU so the GPU thinks is connected to a higher speed bus/ram pipe but can only get smallers chunks.

PS4s setup does look impressive.

[bicfitness]

They're not mentioning the price, because they're allowing MS to do it first at E3. Then you undercut the competition.

I think Sony finally developed some business savvy.

And from a tech standpoint, we can assume that all the leaked specs for both machines are accurate, as it turned out to be the case for Orbis. MS has a slightly weaker GPU and worse memory bandwidth. EDRAM won't make up for that. In fact, its more irritating to program for. What's incredible is that after the Cell fiasco (for developers), Sony has made the most off the shelf and developer friendly environment around.

[RandomDude655]

The EDRam (or esram) is still SLOWER than GDDR5, so Microsoft needs more special sauce.

[juandren]

Dude relax, I was just trying to be helpful

[Darrius Cole]

Well, I'm not 5 either but I don't understand what difference the faster RAM will make if there is the same amount of it. I know that they PS4 will have faster RAM, (unless MS changes the specs to be different from the rumors) but I'm not a computer guy. Could someone who knows more tell me....

1) what difference will the extra RAM make?
2) what difference will having the CPU and the GPU on the same die with equal access to the RAM (I think that was what the guy said) make?

[rainslacker]

1. Bigger worlds, bigger textures, less loading, more stuff being able to be used at one time. More complex code to handle AI or physics. Pretty much allows for more or bigger of everything. Some of this is still limited by the actual hardware to process the information, but in general, more is always better. The fact that it's faster also means less wait time for the processor, and memory swaps are less likely to cause the games to glitch while the processor is waiting on information.

2. More efficient. Cost less to produce. Less heat production.

As to your actual question on 2, I'm having a hard time figuring out how to describe it to someone who isn't a computer guy.

Basically it makes everything more streamlined, with tasks being able to be passed off much easier to the processor which can handle it better(see Havok engine demo). This is possible now, but a GPGPU makes it much faster since it doesn't have to swap in and out of memory to get from one to the other and can all be handled internally on the chip.

Specialized chips such as these are already being used for computational heavy tasks in many areas of computing. Sony's chip is more mainstream but the concept is the same. It's not unlike the Cell in it's approach, just different in it's implementation.

[Bathyj]

He "Can't wait to see"

You mean Mark Rein doesnt know?
When is this thing coming out?

[Skate-AK]

Holiday 2013.

[Bathyj]

No I meant whens the XB3 coming if Mark doesnt even know what MS has to combat PS4

[rainslacker]

LOL, I thought the same thing. If he really doesn't know then MS may be much further off from a new system than we think. I wouldn't doubt if UE4 already supports the 720 however.

[sandman224]

Mark rein, I'm glad you're excited about ps4 hardware now do the gaming community a favor and don't let Microsoft buy you. Make games on both consoles enough with exclusives

[kwyjibo]

He was never going to let Microsoft buy them. Epic is a middleware developer with a sideline in games. For Epic to make the most money, they need to be platform agnostic.

[GiantFriendlyCrab]

so how much better is 8gb gddr5 vs ddr3?

[Saleem101]

Giant performance difference...

[Drekken]

The PS4 will not release for less than $600.00. That is the bottom line low ball figure. I didn't think Sony would release another $600 console - but with DDR5 ram which isn't available to DIY PC builders - This machine will cost Sony $600 to build.

[TheEnigma313]

Sony won't make the same mistake twice with the pricing. I think it will start at 399

[DragonKnight]

The rumoured price of the PS4 is between $450 and $550. You are forgetting that these companies get substantial discounts on components because they buy in bulk, so there is no reason to believe that the price the average consumer pays for gddr5 ram is the price that Sony paid for it.

[KwietStorm_BLM]

Even if it did cost $600 to build, a number you just pulled out the air, what makes you think it would SELL for $600? It will be cheaper. Sony may have made some missteps this generation, but they're not batshit stupid. And the Blu-Ray and Cell at the time were much higher priced than the "standard" tech inside the PS4.

[bunfighterii]

I imagine Xbox won't be very different. I expect 8GB in that too. whether its GDDR3 or 5 is another story.

[blakstarz]

People keep talking about the price....it was announced that the PS4 is selling at 499, which is damn good considering what we know so far under the hood.
I'm going to still keep my PS3 60GIG (damn that!) but I have an extra 360 I might trade it in towards to the purchase of the PS4.

[juandren]

I must have completely missed that announcement

[blakstarz]

Well, I'm from NJ and it was announced on 1010 WINS the price.

[DragonKnight]

They didn't announce the price at the conference, so anyone claiming to know the price of the PS4 when Sony themselves haven't released it is lying.

[FunAndGun]

No price has been announced. Whatever you heard is speculation.

Sony mentioned zero details on price.

@below

I know, I am excited too! Just wanted to let you know that nothing is official on price just yet. :)

[blakstarz]

I guess it is speculation, but if it is 500, that is perfect!

[KwietStorm_BLM]

LOL 1010 WINS? so you get your confirmed game news from that old radio news station? You can't really be serious.

[blakstarz]

Well, maybe I'm old school, but its a good station for news nonetheless...hey, they said it not me.

[isa_scout]

I know they haven't showed off what the actual console looks like yet, but damn I wish I could pre-order it already. Shadowfall, Watch Dogs, Diablo 3, Destiny, Second Son, Drive Club I've never been this excited 4 months before E3.

[jmc8888]

They haven't shown what the actual PS4 can do yet. All they've shown is what a PC can do and say that a PS4 is 'targeting' that level of performance.

You were gawking at PC not PS4.

This might lead to some major disappointment a la Killzone 2, Final Fantasy VII, or Aliens Colonial Marines.

It simply isn't honest to use a PC to announce/reveal your new console.

[isa_scout]

You sure like to act like you know a lot dont you? Did you not notice that he was playing it on stage or did we watch two different conferences? Enjoy your PC and I'll enjoy my PS4, how about that? What's that, the PS4 stole all your PC games? Tell me it isn't so... So you mean your bored? Well, why don't you play Crysis again? Because it sucks you say? Wuh, you seceretly want to play Killzone? Ok,(smiles) your secrets safe with me.

[Apex13]

If they ever brang gears to ps4 I would not buy the next box but the way MS are closing their system, used games and making things compulsory will hurt them and for that reason I am not looking forward to it anymore.

[saint_seya]

First of all im a sony fan, but i have to tell u this, how u can u talk about used games when MS didnt announced anything?, wait for MS to announce something before judging, i think MS wont ban used games :)

[ExitToExisT]

Am i the only one who is not impressed with 8gb ram? I mean it's good for today, but just 'okay' for a device that will be released at the end of 2013 and be active for 7-8 years.

I mean i have 16gb ram on my PC for 1.5 years. 8gb just doesn't impress me.

[blakstarz]

But think about it, a PC also have to run an OS, virus software and among other things, people tend to forget a console is primarily focused on gaming w/o other services running in the background, or at least not as much as a PC if any.

[jmc8888]

Wrong.

Consoles have a bloated OS now. These aren't Sega Genesis's we're talking about anymore. The PS4/720 OS is more advanced the Windows XP. All the stuff going on in the background will give you a performance hit. These aren't do one thing at a time console and thus you have a benefit over PC's. These are consoles with bloated OS'es that will be do 5-10 things at a time, possibly more.

On a PC you run virus software? Maybe. You can shut that off easily. But that is the point, the whole viewpoint was it doesn't have ANYTHING, and now it's 'not as many'. Consoles have lost almost all of that advantage.

Also 8 GB's of GDDR5 ram is about 4x as much as the GPU can properly power. It can utilize 1.75-3 GB's. (and I think I'm being generous).

You have 2GB's reserved for your OS (you think that stuff there won't be hitting performance?).

Then the other 3-4 GB's is so they don't have problems at the end of the console cycle. Which means it isn't something used to properly push the GPU, but used because it needs to use it in a rudimentary way to avoid needing special tricks. Similar to how even though the 360 and PS3 are mightily outclassed, if they had a bit more ram they would have performed better.

Think of it another way. Most PC GPU's only need to be 2 GB's? Why? Because 3-4 GB's is needed for ABOVE 1080p resolutions. So for PC's that need to run 1600p or 5760x1080p then THOSE need higher amount of GB's.

More powerful PC cards don't even utilized 2GB's at 1080p.

[Skynetone]

your 16 gig is ddr3 but im sure you new that already

the ps4 is a straight up beast

[jmc8888]

No it isn't. People that don't know specs think it is. Those that do aren't really impressed.

8gb's of total memory, with unified bandwith.

PC's have GDDR5, it's been in graphics cards for a long time now. People have 2-6 GB's usually.

Though videocards much faster than a PS4, really only need 2GB's if gaming in 1080p. Now if you wanted to be forward thinking 3GB's is probably necessary, and I could see 4GB's just to be safe.

But really all you need is 2GB's of video memory.

Now PC's also have RAM, which consoles don't really have. Thus PC's have TWO memory areas and TWO memory bandwidths, not ONE.

So you'll have a PC with 6-8-12-16 GB's of SYSTEM memory which doesn't handle graphics, it ferries the info the CPU crunches. That's DDR3.

Plus I'm sure you knew that your DDR5, because it's going to be in such large quantities is going to be the bargain basement GDDR5 that's made because it will dwarf in volume any of the other amount made, thus it will be literally the worst or 2nd worst GDDR5 that is being made.

I'm sure you realize that tablet/mobile CPU, that is running at 1.6ghz, and doesn't have hyperthreading, is less powerful than a midrange desktop CPU from 2007 right?

I'm sure you realize that at 1.8 TFlops you realize that a midrange 2011 GPU beats it...right?

You do realize that by launch a midrange PC GPU will be 2.5-3x a PS4 right? That an uber PC will be 8-9x a PS4 right?

Look the PS4 is a pre-order for me, but let's not pretend it is something more than it is. It's mediocre power at BEST. Really slightly lower then mediocre. Beast it isn't. Fun times in it? Sure will.

But what did we see? All we saw yesterday was a PC that a PS4 is 'targeting' to be at the level of. Anyone that thinks that is the same thing as the final hardware is pretty silly.

[rainslacker]

@jmc

So...you know better than the company that makes probably the most technically demanding game engine on PC? Crytek said they wanted 8GB for the next console. Them actually getting that is a surprise, but the fact they said that was what they wanted means that's what they see as what is needed for next gen consoles. Epic is excited over it, which means they like the amount of RAM. Developers are ecstatic over how easy the system is to work with, and the possibilities the hardware brings to them.

I'm sorry, but I'll take the word of numerous well respected developers and engine makers than some internet analyst who believes they know better.

[KwietStorm_BLM]

Your 16 gigs aren't when getting utilized completely, but it doesn't matter because a game console uses it differently than a PC. 8 gigs of DDR5 in a gaming unit is top of the food chain.

[OC_MurphysLaw]

Rein's response is kinda curious. Clearly he has known all of this info for a while now. So is it him throwing a warning shot to MS as a "told you so" or is it him hinting at he knows something else big is coming from MS? I am a bit inclined to think its the first and its a bit of " i told ya they were stepping it up on memory"

[MadMen]

Sony made the right move with the RAM. Very Happy to see this.

[arbitor365]

man. with Epic and Bungie going multiplat with new IPs, microsoft is going to have to pull some exclusives out of thin air. They still have forza, I guess, but the PS4 has driveclub and i would imagine GT6 is on the way as well.

and of course there's halo. but seriously, after nearly 15 years your only consistent exclusive franchise is still halo?

[medziarz]

He should be.

[worldwidegaming]

Sony is going to eat the ram prices and sell it at a loss.
The big problem is who is going to sell at a BIGGER loss?
Microsoft or Sony?
Microsoft is in big trouble when it comes to ram.
(I am sure they will up the ram to look cool!)
People should know that all of these tricks and special work a rounds on making a console faster and better do not work!
The most straight forward a system is made the better things will be.

[mochachino]

The way the narrative played out over the second and third game, your not missing much by not having Gears.