240°

Why Console Specs Don't Matter

The Extra Credits crew discusses why there's a lot more in determining a console's quality and predicting its sales than the specs of the hardware itself. Many interesting insights shared within.

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penny-arcade.com
Knight_Crawler4049d ago (Edited 4049d ago )

Next gen console sales will be determines on how much features and entertainment each console has to offer at the cheapest price and not by how many GDDRx100 or GPUx100 each consoles has.

@knifefight: He has a point, you cannot compare the 90's and early 2000's economy to todays economy.

People, specially the casual consumer do not care about which product has the most advance and powerful technology but only care that it does what it is suppose to do and its mainstream - The 3DS vs the Vita is one of many examples of this.

Apple and Samsung Galaxy fanatics are a different breed of consumers so my comment does not apply to them as they would rather not buy food or pay child support to buy a new $600 phone each year.

wishingW3L4049d ago (Edited 4049d ago )

sales are always determined by price. The cheapest always win. But thinking it again that might change since the Wii U will be the cheapest by the time the PS4 and X720 hit the market but it appears that nobody gives a crap about it.

knifefight4049d ago (Edited 4049d ago )

So why didn't the Genesis (cheaper than SNES), GameCube (cheaper than Xbox and PS2), and Dreamcast (cheaper than Xbox and PS2) dominate their more expensive counterparts?

@caseh
Yes, *I* know that. I was asking the guy above me who said that the cheapest always wins.
The cheapest obviously does not always win. You and I know this, but my question is directed at wishingW3L, because he claims that price always wins.

caseh4049d ago

@Knifefight

SNES was technically superior, and it had SF2. :)

Gamecube was looked at as a 'kids console'

Dreamcast alienated devs like EA before launch.

In a nutshell. :D

AsimLeonheart4048d ago (Edited 4048d ago )

I believe sales depend upon a continuous stream of quality games and services at a reasonable price. PS3 is still the most expensive console but is now considered to be the best console to own. As far as specs go, only supporters of underpowered consoles like Wii and Wii U say that specs dont matter. Has anybody ever seen a PC, PS3 or XBOX gamer say that specs dont matter? Specs do matter, otherwise we all would still be playing Tetris and Pacman. Obviously, specs are not everything BUT they are important when it comes to creating bigger, better and prettier games.

Clarence4048d ago

The PS3 is the most expensive console on the market yet it has outsold the 360. Now it is currently outselling the Wii and Wii u.

Specs only matter if the developers choose the ultilize them.

adorie4048d ago (Edited 4048d ago )

$599 has destroyed your theories of "cheapest always win" Especially how it seems that the PS3 will outsell the Wii, before it's discontinued.

Qrphe4048d ago

The Dreamcast and Gamecube were cheaper than the PS2 and look how that turned out.

ThanatosDMC4048d ago

I disagree. Quality games matter.

jmc88884048d ago (Edited 4048d ago )

What's so funny about the ignorant comments in reply to what you said is them using PS3 sales totals through now to justify the $599 price tag assertion.

What these morons are doing is pretending that the PS3 sold all those units at $599 price. If they had a hint of common sense or integrity they'd realize that the vast majority of the sales came after the PS3 was significantly discounted.

Then they took a step further by pretending again that the $599 console was beating a $299-$349 console in the Wii U.

You can buy a PS3 for $229 with its much larger catalog of games.

During sales you'll see it under $200.

Why can't people realize that Wii/PS3/360 will continue to outsell Wii U/PS4/720 for the first couple of years....it's called....COMMON SENSE.

Oh and I bought a launch premium PS3. Still works and hasn't had to be serviced at all, unlike my launch 360.

+ Show (5) more repliesLast reply 4048d ago
4049d ago Replies(3)
Jek_Porkins4049d ago

I think they matter somewhat, where I think Nintendo losses it a bit is by not having a more mature first party game to show off what the Wii U can do. If they had brought out a new game that looked better than Uncharted 2, I think people wouldn't have said much, we do know the Wii U can do pretty good things graphically, but the art style of most Nintendo first party games don't allow it.

I got caught up in the "power" wars years ago with the first Xbox, I remember arguing how much better it was, HD capable, high speed internet modem right out of the box and a HDD included, but at the end of the day it didn't do as well as the much less powerful PS2.

Oddly enough, the most powerful console has never really won a generation....weird when you think about it.

I usually buy all the consoles eventually anyway, but power is usually pretty far down the list when I'm considering a new console.

Hicken4048d ago (Edited 4048d ago )

Except this gen.

Edit: This gen isn't over, smart guy. And, currently, the most powerful of the three consoles of the seventh generation is poised to be in first place before it's all said and done.

So I repeat: except this gen.

Jek_Porkins4048d ago

How has power won this gen? Wii was the least powerful and sold 100m, Xbox 360 wasn't as powerful as the PS3 but is closing in on 80 million, both Microsoft and Nintendo made significant increases in sales from the previous generation.

khowat4048d ago

The fanboyism, it hurts, gens never end even after consoles are discontinued, because each competitor is in their own pseudo gen. The wii u is the start of the eighth gen and therefore the seventh gen should have ended but no, because the seventh gen is still going on with the ps3 and xbox 360 so we have to wait for their new console to release right? So now the eight gen starts when those two release but wait we have to wait for all the consoles to be discontinued right? So if we look at the 6th gen, the xbox was discontinued in 2006 and the ps2 was discontinued in 2012, if the ps2 wasn't the honking unbelievable god system of the second gen and the race was much closer with the xbox on top, the ps2 would have had 6 more years to catch it and surpass the xbox *note even though sales decrease drastically after a successor is released in this day and age, successors start off really close to their predecessors and therefore 6 more years can make a difference when it comes to measuring console sales*. We don't have a standard by which to fairly measure gens because ending them a different times gives some consoles advantages and disadvantages and before we decide when a gen starts and ends you will always have arguing and therefore you can only compare console sales when they are all still running, the moment the wii drops out and is discontinued you have to stop measuring because microsoft and sony have an inherent advantage. Finally all consoles are running different races on different lengths (MY OPINION HAS NOT BEEN PROVEN JUST AN IDEA ,and the only sure fire way to measure how well a console did is to measure it in its peak year and lowest year at the end and then find the average, and then compare the time difference between these years, although that it is not indicative of how well the console did throughout the gen it is indicative of whether or not the console started off well and fizzled out or was consistent all the way through which I think is more important than total sales,) but in the end we should let companies worry about sales and not fans. How many people buy your console of choice shouldn't be important to you.

Disgruntled sony fanboys are so happy that the wii dramatically declined in sales so they can feel like they won this gen too it's kind of sad to see people so enamoured with a company enough to not realize that when something is over it is over, when the wii is discontinued it physically cannot compete sales wise against the ps3 and therefore it is actually impossible to compare them after the wii is discontinued you can only compare them at the last moment, right before the wii was discontinued. It is like if they were running a race and the wii broke its legs not at the finish line but somewhere else. If the wii got to that point in 2 hours and the ps3 gets there in 4 hours then we can measure for real who would've won the race. The problem is is that is the wii didn't run consistently from start to end and started slowing where it broke its legs and could no longer compete we cannot know if it would have won because we could guess that it would have slowed down substantially be fore it got to the end or that it may have gotten renewed strength of will and would have sped up again, also if the ps3 didn't run the race consistently from start to end then it could have picked up the pace from where the wii broke its legs and could've finished the race substantially faster

If you want to measure sales thats fine but all the ways we have now will always lead to debate so don't be so rude eg. This gen isn't over, SMART GUY (caps locked for emphasis and not quotation). And, currently, the most powerful of the three consoles of the seventh generation is poised to be in first place before it's all said and done.

puamdefokejpn4049d ago

Yes they matter a lot,.. though I still play old games a lot,.. The hell I am buying a new system, if it does not have better sound, graphics, features and new gaming experiences produced on that basis.

amiga-man4049d ago (Edited 4049d ago )

Of course it matters or we would still be happy gaming on the playstation 1, Sony certainly seem to have set the bar high for next gen console gaming and as long as they don't charge for online gaming they seem to be in the box seat as far a performance and features go.

Show all comments (49)
60°

How to recruit Lam in Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes

Lam is among the 120 characters available for recruitment in Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes. While she is one of the many straightforward recruits, a known bug may prevent players from recruiting her if certain conditions are met. Despite developers’ assurances of fixing the bug, some early access players still encounter issues with recruiting Lam despite attempting the standard method.

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infinitestart.com
310°

Tomb Raider Remastered just quietly censored one in-game detail

Tomb Raider 1-3 Remastered players are ticked off by the game’s most recent patch, which censors in-game pin-up posters of Lara Croft.

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gamingbible.com
rlow110h ago

This is why gaming is screwed. When people change things to fit someone’s agenda, it’s a slippery slope downhill.

Christopher10h ago(Edited 10h ago)

Even if that agenda is of the developer? Way to remove developer rights.

***One player called it a “huge problem with modern games,” saying they can now be “ruined AFTER people buy them”.***

The level of drama. Yes, I recall sitting there for more hours than I did anything else in the game. These two pinups are the core of the game, after all!

coolbeans8h ago(Edited 8h ago)

rlow1's cringe catastrophizing aside, I do think developers *ought* to strive to maintain an original work to the best of their ability. The language of a "remaster" tacitly implies that - for good or ill - what's being resold is what fans remember but better.

Profchaos8h ago

Games can be ruined after purchasing them yeah we know this not from this but from GTA IV which had half it's radio content patched out due to licensing expirations and to me that was a huge deal.

This pin up poster is a bit of nonsense but the whole argument of modern games can be ruined post launch is Absol true.

DedicatedDark7h ago(Edited 7h ago)

It's not their work to censor. They are incharge of restoration & remastering the work, not overwriting it.

Barlos6h ago

It's not the agenda of the developer though, they're pandering and trying to increase their ESG score.

Way to support censorship...

victorMaje6h ago

It’s not the end of the world for sure, but I understand the hate towards this kind of change. I believe it’s also a matter of principle.

Imagine a Picasso painting being restored & the restorer deciding there aren’t enough strokes, or some lines aren’t straight enough or curved enough…not sure it would/should sit well with people.

Have all original devs signed off on this change? Even if it’s the case, are we saying older gamers are better mentally equipped to process what was there than current gamers, hence the change?

Enough time ago the case was made that games are an art form. We’re supposed to have won that case.
So which is it? Are games art or not?

+ Show (2) more repliesLast reply 6h ago
Eidolon6h ago

Hasn't this been happened for over a decade since remasters? I can't see that it's any worse now. Maybe if Sweet Baby starts getting their hands on remasters we will definitely have a problem.

Rebel_Scum9h ago

tbh I dont see something like this as censorship. Does anyone else not find it strange for someone to stick pin ups of themsleves in a locker room?

Now of it was a pin up of some half naked firefighters it might make sense as Lara might like that, and if they removed that I would cry censorship. But removing pin ups of the main character, yeah I get it.

Barlos6h ago(Edited 6h ago)

It's a game, and they were placed there for the audience. It's not real life. If it was, she wouldn't have fought a T-Rex now would she?

Yes, it's censorship but it's a bit less in your face. If they were in the original game, then they should have been in the remasters. It's bad enough that they have that ridiculous unnecessary warning at the start, but then they start removing things post launch. I don't care how small the change, they shouldn't be doing it. It's nothing but ESG pandering but in a subtle way.

Rebel_Scum5h ago

Look bro, if you have pictures of yourself naked on a bear skin rug up in your house let me tell you, its not normal.

jambola4h ago

I wasn't aware censorship was based on what made sense to you

Rebel_Scum3h ago

Likewise, what a stupid comment.

jambola3h ago

I agree
Your comment was pretty stupid

Rebel_Scum3h ago

I never said censorship is based on what I say dumbass. Just because I dont see this as censorship doesnt mean I’m saying others cant.

How about you come at me with your opinion rather than snarky comments with no thought on the matter.

SimpleDad6h ago

By the year 2030, this remaster collection will totally be changed and censored. Probably will remove Lara as a playable character. It's ridiculous. Glad that my family didn't buy this.
I still have Tomb Raider 2 PS1 as a memory.

jambola4h ago

Those shorts are a little revealing
Should probably make them snow pants

Barlos3h ago

They'll probably make her trans

CobraKai5h ago

It’s mentioned in the article, and it’s a point i 100% agree with, it’s the fact that they can censor a game after you buy it. That’s total bullshit.

Killer2020UK5h ago

Whilst it's an overreaction to say this has "ruined" the game, it's still problematic that this has happened post launch and for many, post-purchase.

I don't want someone to change a product for the worse after I've bought it. The same goes for implementing micro transactions after reviews.

I wonder why they did this? Nobody was kicking up a fuss as far as I'm aware.

maykhausonninh5h ago

Nobody was kicking up a fuss as far as I'm aware.

Show all comments (26)
100°

Final Fantasy III Pixel Remaster Review – You Are Your Job, Apparently

Gary Green said: In a time where an enhanced, 3D remake of Final Fantasy III already exists, it’s hard to argue that Final Fantasy III Pixel Remaster is the definitive version we were expecting. With Final Fantasy III already being the last in the series to be translated and make its way west, this is something of a slap in the face for the fans. Still, let’s not be disheartened. There may be many shortfalls in this edition of Final Fantasy III, however there’s no denying that this classic JRPG still holds some nostalgic value, even if it struggles to break away from its original hardware limitations.

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pslegends.com
FACTUAL evidence10h ago(Edited 10h ago)

It’s funny I’m seeing these articles about pixel remaster, and I just platinumed 1-4 within 8 days lol. I’ve been on FF5 for about a week now. Let’s just say 5 was the start of FF having content like crazy. I should have the plat within 2-3 days.

MrBaskerville1h ago

The game being an accurate represantation of the original was not a slap in the face to the fans. The 3D remasters looked like ass (visually) tbh.