What the Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 mean for PC gaming

Console tech affects the kinds of games on PC. Even among indie developers, multiplatform game development is normal these days, and the capabilities the platforms share naturally become the baseline. Both in terms of games and tech, here's what PC gamers can expect from this year's new console releases:

[Jin_Sakai]

It means they become the lowest common denominator. Every single Series X and PS5 owner will has a fast SSD at their disposal.

[Tech5]

PC already has faster SSDs though
the Samsung 980 pro already does 6.5GB/s
https://www.overclock3d.net...
and the XPG Sage already does 7GB/s
https://www.tomshardware.co...

and Nvidia's latest hardware is scheduled to release soon. (RTX 3060 GPU will retail for $399)
https://www.dsogaming.com/n...

it's just only a mater of time before all of the prices reach the typical pc market. like always.

[Jin_Sakai]

It doesn’t matter if PC has faster SSDs or not because until it becomes the standard and every PC has one you’ll have to account for HDDs.

Also we’ve been through this many times, even though PC may have faster SSDs they can’t handle the bandwidth like PS5 because of the custom 12 channel controller Sony developed.

[Tech5]

"It doesn’t matter if PC has faster SSDs or not because until it becomes the standard and every PC has one you’ll have to account for HDDs."

that's not how pc gaming works though. the original Crysis 2007 released in full scale from.
it was not downgraded because of gamers failing to have a $2,000 gaming rig.
in the pc gaming community all games are released in their full form. from there they can scale back to any gaming pc.

edit - it makes it simpler for developers. if gamers have to upgrade then that is the result of buying a new gen title. this nothing new to the pc gaming community. it has many different generations of games added to it's selection of games. eventually all new hardware runs games even better than before.

[DevilOgreFish]

@ Tech5
agreed. Crysis made gamers upgrade, same with every title with new features. how is this any different?
whether it's a CPU upgrade, GPU, HDD space, or god forbid a sound card upgrade. upgrading is upgrading.

[tontontam0]

I've had my m.2 nvme ssd on pc for quite a while now, I've never encountered a game that loads blazing fast.
even with ssd, any game on pc takes about 5 secs or above load.

RDR2 takes 2 minutes to load on a samsung 970 pro ssd. THEORETICALLY with the speed of that SSD it should not take 2 minutes.

but with next gen consoles coming devs are suddenly boasting that their game will have virtually no loading screen.

pc gamers should pray hard that devs will optimize the games to take advantage of ssds on pc, considering that "millions" of pc gamers only have "HDD's".

[outsider1624]

Yeah but are there games built around that SSD?

Unless everyone owns a gaming pc with that kind ssd, i don't think we'll see games built around that. It'll just be like it has always been before- powerful hardware.

[lonewolf10]

@Outsider1624

How many games do you think in the first few years of the consoles cycle do you think will be developed solely for SSD speed, I think there will be a few games that might be impacted by PC's that have older SSD's but not enough to worry about.

[ProjectVulcan]

"It doesn’t matter if PC has faster SSDs or not because until it becomes the standard and every PC has one you’ll have to account for HDDs."

Firstly Microsoft have made it clear they are still supporting very old consoles with very old hard drives in them. That means every cross gen title designed for these platforms finds that a 7 year old Xbox One is the slowest machine, and that has to be taken into account for at least the first two years!

How many next gen consoles do you think will be sold in the first couple of years? Priced at $499 or $599 in this economic climate?

Not enough to impact PC gaming. It'll be 3 or 4 years before next gen hardware are the default platforms for developer focus, another 3 or 4 years while every PC gamer pretty much already has an SSD now anyway. I have not met a PC gamer in the past 5 years that does not use an SSD, even a small one for for their latest games. It's the small file read/write speed that matters more, not a headline theoretical peak speed.

Still, accounting for peak speeds If PS5 can load a full scene in 2 seconds how fast can a previous gen PCIe 3.0 drive on direct storage load the same scene? Well even if it is only half as fast that's still only 4 seconds. Nobody will care. Or notice. Twice as fast for something already very fast isn't nearly as important as you think it is.

Finally you have the constant advantage PC has always enjoyed, and that is most machines has much more RAM than consoles. It wouldn't be a stretch to use a bunch of it as a fast cache on PC, assigning a portion to be used as a volatile virtual SSD. Typical bandwidth (to CPU) in excess of 30GB/s with slow DDR4. If peak speed were everything then RAM caching is the top dog.

You don't seem to understand that the difference between these console SSDs and everyone with an SSD already on PC is meaningless. PC gamers are already there. It's the consoles that are finally moving forwards to meet PC standards, and eventually the software too. It's only a good thing for PC gamers.

[_LarZen_]

Don’t matter if PC has faster SSD/NVMe as the IO is a bottleneck on all PC’s. There’s a solution but it’s costs a ridiculous amount of money and not for the consumer market at all.

[Master of Unlocking]

OK for the SSDs, but did you see the price of the Nvidia graphics card Ampere RTX 3090 on that Twitter page? First it's mentioned at a price of 2000$, then corrected at 1400$. That's still one hell of an investment for plenty of folks out there...

[rainslacker]

It'll take a while for PC minimum standards require an SSD for gaming. It's not just something where one or two games come out which cause a large number of people to upgrade, and suddenly all devs are making games which take advantage of SSD.

Just think of any relevant jump in DirectX....the one's that don't skip a version or two. They get all these great new features, but it takes years before they ever get used, and often, the version has already been updated again. It caused a hardware cycle where whole GPU lines would go under-utilized.

While it won't be like that for SSD, it's the same principal in terms of what devs are coding for.

That said, the advance in console GPU's means the PC GPU standards will rise sooner rather than later. PC will still offer more powerful GPU's though, but they won't be the minimum, so nothing will change there.

[Babadook7]

"PC already has faster SSDs though "

Not really. A faster SSD, (although none of those PC SSDs have as many levels of priority as PS5 so in actuality they aren't faster) is only one piece of the pipeline. You have to look at bottlenecks in the whole pipeline. PS5 and even XSX have a major advantage out of the gate.

[FanboysKiller]

Legacy games won't show a massive upgrade to loading speed , games should be rebuild from the scratch to take the full advantage of the ssd.

[XxINFERNUSxX]

Exactly, I'm more excited for the 3000 series GPUs out of all of this. Even if the SSD on the Series X is slower than the PS5's and most PC gamers use PCIe 3.0 for their nvme drives devs are nothing going make it seem like the Series X's SSD will be an issue, same with PC. They will have tricks to minimize that. And I saw that awesome 980 Pro. I'm using a 970 EVO 1TB and I know without a doubt any PC game now or in a few years will not be an issue with the PCIe 3.0 SSD speeds.

[nowitzki2004]

Just stick to Playstation talk Jin, do yourself a favor.

[Matology]

Most modern mother boards have an m.2 drive and SSD drives are cheap for enough for PC owners. You put the operating system on the m.2 and games can go on a SSD or hybrid drive and it works fine and dandy...

[CaptainHenry916]

It also means you don't need an Xbox

[Donnie81]

Or a PlayStation for that matter because they are putting everything on to.

[CaptainHenry916]

@Donnie

Every Playstation exclusive won't be on PC though and you'll have to wait a year if they decide to release it on PC. All Xbox exclusives will be on PC on day one

[Weapon_of_choice]

Also HDR 4k as a standard and out of the box

[Profchaos]

Yes in a regard that PC games will need to start addressing hard drive speeds as a minimum component.
Also the thing I've noticed is despite GPU models evolving over the past few years is that the bulk of users are running older models according to steam db
With only under 1% of users with a 2080 and over 11% with a 1060 the hardware out there paints a different story about what Devs will target in the Future
https://store.steampowered....

I think we will see PC gamers being forced to upgrade their rigs in order to keep up as consoles become the baseline and the 10 series of GPU cards will not be able to really keep up.

I get that the 20 series was disappointing I own a 2070 I loved it but I understand why it was generally skipped. But I'm very excited to see the 30 series in action

[Einhander1971]

It means pc development will have to pull its finger out and get creative. Consoles always have the best games anyway.

[FlyingFoxy]

Enjoy playing FPS games with a controller! Couldn't go back to that personally.

Plus I like all the options I get on PC, and I use it for things besides gaming

[kneon]

I do enjoy playing FPS with a controller as I hate mouse and keyboard controls, mostly the keyboard part. I could play on one of my PCs that are all more powerful than my consoles, I even just added another 4k monitor to my main machine. It's starting to look like mission control, I counted 8 monitors in my home office not including all the laptops, and it's just me working in there. But I'm already on my PCs 8-12 hours a day, when I'm goofing off I'm not going to use a PC.

Oops, make that 9 monitors, I forgot the little one for the server.

[TheSaint]

Do you play driving games with a mouse?

[Father__Merrin]

Console games have always been better for AAA pc does have an advantage in indies as its cheaper to publish etc. But overall PlayStation gamers have been the happiest this generation.

PS5 when it gets into full swing will humiliate pc

[Donnie81]

How’s it gonna do that ? It might help make checkerboard rendering a more common setting on pc. Be about it

[Clonetrooper1139]

You have no idea what you are talking about.

[NeoGamer232]

I can play Horizon Zero Dawn on PC. And with its success I can see more and more PS exclusives come to PC.

Between exclusives coming to PC and PS Now I can play most major Sony exclusives through my PC.

[rainslacker]

What we'll probably see in PC game programming for the short term is more use of system memory to make up for the lower drive speeds in most PC gamer's setup. This shouldn't be an issue since most games don't use anywhere near as much as would be available to them on modern PC's, or at least don't need to. This will mean devs will also have to consider how much data they can pre-load into memory, but it also means that more will be available to do the same thing that the SSD's can do, just without as much flexibility. In the larger picture, this means devs will also have to be more mindful of their memory management on PC, which I feel was always kind of half-assed by most PC devs for years now.

This in turn will also help devs come more to grips with predictive models that can be used to stream in assets which is the biggest benefit of SSD, and since this principal can be used for any data transfer medium(hard drive or memory) it'll also benefit those who have SSD's.

PC owners with the appropriate hardware can see added benefit with SSD, as they may be able to free up more memory for other things, which will be important for maintaining GPU compute which is pretty well utilized today.

Overall, devs are pretty creative when it comes to getting things done.

The biggest drawback to PC's outside of all that is what it's always been. The OS handles data transfer at a higher level, and DMA access isn't as quick because of the need of OS's to keep themselves secure(stable in this context).

[kneon]

The SSD pipeline on the PS5 is so fast that they don't need to bother with this predictive nonsense, it just loads in so fast that it doesn't matter.

[rainslacker]

It's not nonsense to do predictive models. But, there is less need to spend resources on it in the consoles compared to the PC in the scenario I cited in my original comment. Predictive models allow for a lot more than just pre-fetching data, and can lead to more innovation in things like animation and AI through more complex algorithms which it wouldn't be reasonable to store within memory at all times.

This of course would be years in the making, and not something you'd see overnight, but built upon through smaller steps.

[agent4532]

Not really for its subjective. Some PC exclusives include Planet Coaster, Planet Zoo, Green Hell, Total War Franchise, King Crusaders Franchise, To the Moon series, etc. Most genres started on PC before moving to consoles like survival games, battle royale games, VR, etc. PC still offers horror exclusives like HK, Doorway Franchise, Dreadout Series, etc. Is the system you can play any game in any genre including AO games which are forbidden on consoles

[Father__Merrin]

nothing will change games will be console forst and this time the visuals and performance on next gen consoles is soo good its going to be very difficult for them to spew thier nonsence on here. if you notice they seldon talk about games but rather wait till this wait till that faster this faster that

[lonewolf10]

Talking of spewing nonsense.

[agent4532]

I am rare for one of my favorite indy game series that didn't came to consoles is To the moon for it offer a great story about marriage. Green Hell difficult as hell for being the most realistic survival game. Then there is the Total War Franchise, King Crusaders, Planet Coaster/Zoo along with my favorite game Enola. Not the best visual game but it talks about rape, husband abuse, and has a very trippy environment. The biggest drawback to pc gaming is early access for most early access games end on console.

[SegaGamer]

"if you notice they seldon talk about games"

Are you sure you're not talking about yourself? You're on every pc article complaining about pc's, same for Xbox. We get it, you're PS fanboy, you're not special, there are tons of them on here.

[Clonetrooper1139]

JESUS...Do you believe that tripe you just typed? Talk about delusional.

[franwex]

I think it will propel SSDs more. Maybe even becoming a requirement with some games.

[lonewolf10]

Quite a possibility.

[rainslacker]

It almost has to. There is a limit to how much physical memory is reasonable to put into an actual PC. While modern systems can certainly use much more than they typically have, it's silly to just keep upping that memory. Plus, you still have to fill that memory, which takes time.

SSD's will become a standard, and always would have. I also expect more integrated solutions to come which means CPU, GPU, bus, and hard drive all on single chips, or smaller pre-made boards, because the technology is there to make such small systems without the use of moving parts.

[kneon]

I'm currently struggling with 64gb, but I'm not playing games. For games I just can't see too many main stream games requiring more than 16gb.

[tontontam0]

We'll finally have games with superfast loading.

I've had my SSD for a long time now, but I haven't seen games which boast 2 seconds loading.

then suddenly just because next gen consoles are coming , developers are now boasting 2 second loadings for their games.

This is proof that games have to be designed to take advantage of ssds.

[Acecalibur]

Im not sure why people even care.

[ChiefofLoliPolice]

Not a damn thing. PC has always be ahead of consoles and always will. The only thing I can think of is maybe some games having a requirement of a fast SSD like the PS5.

[Rimeskeem]

PC gaming will need to get cheaper hopefully. Paying 500$ for hardware capable of 120hz at 1080p means that PCs will have to be able to compete with that sort of thing. If these consoles are truly able to hit 4K 60fps then PCs cant have GPUs that cost the same as the console and give maybe the slightest more if it wants to compete. At the same time, PC gamers dont tend to care about cost, more about the fact that PCs are not super friendly to younger audiences and those not adept and scared of entering the market.

[ocelot07]

Pc gamers care more about higher fps rather than resolution. Budget pc gamers aim for 1080p 60. Mid range aim for 1080p/1440p 120fps. High end aim for 1440p 144+fps or 4k 60-90fps.

That's the beauty of pc gaming. Want the best visuals and resolution possible you can do it. Want the highest possible fps? You can do that instead. Unlike consoles look at the new assassin's creed game. New consoles with decent CPU's and better gpu's than most pc gamers.

Yet it's only a painful 30fps. Yet someone with say a Ryzen 3600 cpu and a old 1070 gpu will be able to play it at 60fps.

[FlyingFoxy]

Upcoming and already existing games prove that 4k is still very demanding depending on the titles you play. I bet Cyberpunk will be a bit of a struggle, maybe the remastered Crysis as well. Flight Simulator is one for sure and will probably require the 3090 just to get a steady 60FPS at 4k. Console gamers seem to be expecting 4k 60 will be easy judging by many comments, this isn't going to be the case for demanding games as even top PC hardware struggles by it as is evident by benchmarks.

I prefer the smoothness of higher frame rates so am happy to go with something like a 3080 to keep my 1440p high refresh screen happy.

[Rimeskeem]

I mean yes, I understand all of that I have a very good PC. However, just those two parts you listed are around the same price as a console. Add the mobo, ram, storage, PSU and you got yourself something that can play shit at 60fps but cost way more than what the next consoles will. Of course you could probs find rebates and deals but I highly doubt that PC would be cheaper and more effective than new gen consoles.

[LoveSpuds]

I think that these consoles will definitely close the performance gap more than the last few generations of consoles have and I think they may even lure some back to consoles from PC, provided the consoles do deliver on the performance being alluded to.

Obviously, PC will always have the lead where raw power is concerned, but its all about closing the gap enough to where the differences are less stark, the reality is, a tiny proportion of PC gamers have cutting edge PC's and if the consoles give the kind of results being suggested, then these consoles will be hard to ignore for many.

There will always be some who have killer rigs who won't need a console of course, but even then, if they want to play the PS5 exclusives, they will need to pick up a console to supplement their PC.

The biggest impact will be in respect of standardising SSD use in games, so I expect to see game design adjust to take advantage of this.

[agent4532]

Is not only closing the performance gap but more like:

Will mods be available to consoles

Will games get cheaper. I bought Doom Eternal for $25.00

Will playing online be free. Meaning I only pay for ISP that's it.

For right now the Xbox Series is not worth buying for all of its games are coming to PC. Flight Simulator is not coming to Xbox anytime soon😜

[DFresh]

It means that you can expect 4K, SSD (faster load times), Ray Tracing (better lighting) and DLSS 2.0 (better performance) to be the standard moving forward for game development which is a great thing.
I’m also looking forward to what the new NVIDIA and AMD GPUs will do in the near future.
This is an amazing time to be a gamer.
Period.

[MrVux000]

Judging from the comments, the PC defense force has awoken. :D

[FlyingFoxy]

Well these consoles may have a good value for their performance for a little while anyway, I'll give them that

[FPS_D3TH]

Stay mad pc gamers. I’ll be enjoying my ps5 for years to come and nearly every game save for never released early access titles and steam shovelware will be designed with consoles in mind 😂

[FlyingFoxy]

Mad at having better performance and free online play, cheaper games as well as being able to do video editing among other things like emulation etc?

Sure the base console itself will offer good value, it will have some exclusives, you pay more for games and pay for an online subscription, but PC gamers are mad at console gamers, okay.

[Giblet_Head]

Console only gamers are so cute when they're uppity for no justifiable reason.
Stick to your little proprietary "my soulless conglomerate is better" war, you're nowhere near at a comparable level.

[badz149]

yeah yeah yeah...because on the PC side, there are no such thing as AMD vs Intel and AMD vs nVidia thing going on. all smooth sailing on that side with no fanboys everybody plays by the rule with no rampant cheating online and crying foul when publishers put denuvo in there and so on.../s

[Giblet_Head]

There's the freedom of a choice between components with natural bias toward certain brands, but not blind dedicated love for a piece of hardware when stacked up to performance, hence why AMD is currently beloved since Intel dropped the ball. That scenario doesn't exist with console fanboys. They invest, but never let up no matter if the situation is bad on their end. Their brand loyalty irrationally supersedes performance, which is stupidity of the highest caliber. What does denuvo and cheating online have to do with fenboyism again? Denuvo impact is negligible at best(even being removed by studios after the release period), and cheating exists on all platforms. Nice try though.

[contra157]

More console games coming to PC is all it means

[agent4532]

I get a bigger library for I will be able to play all of xbox series games. Next year I am playing Amazon first game ever. The good news is console hardware is better this upcoming generation hopefully this means no more watered down games

[badz149]

gone are the days of Crysis and Metro2033 bringing top PC hardware to their knees, now just console ports with PC versions getting extra bells and whistles. no wonder they are still fully expecting a 2yo RTX2080ti ti max out every game out there at 4K60fps+. ridiculous!

[Traecy]

The PC most of time still won't have AAA interesting exclusives like the PS5.

[agent4532]

It does but PC games lack the promotion/advertising that console game exclusives get unless is a major franchise going back to the eighties like Flight Simulator

[Miraak82]

Hmm maybe just mean HDD is an outdated technology and in the next few years it will go the way of the Dodo . I just see most pcs going forward will have SSD as a standard

[Tyrant 8 RDFL]

What it means to the PC? I can only speak for myself , but with consoles now being able to play games at 60 to 120 fps I really don't see a need for me to play on the PC. I only have to pay $399 for a all digital PS5, and I will will be playing great games at a very silky frame rate. Man where do I sign up!? I'm getting an XBOX also just waiting to hear what the XSS is before I make a decisions between the S and X. I saw a video where a actual developer was discussing that programming for a console is better for him, because they know exactly what they are working with. That is not the case with PC. He admitted they had limitations because of what consoles offered under the hood, but with the new consoles they can really let there art flow in the games without sacrificing as much as they did with past consoles. He was explaining games will be much better both game play wise and substance. I' am very excited for the future of consoles.

[Clonetrooper1139]

It is hilarious listening to consolers. Tech illiterates. Of course Sony fanboys spew the most nonsense. LOL!

[Rhythmattic]

This is not knocking the Mustard Race......
But you must take into account these new consoles design....

As im more a PS guy, Ill reflect on some things that really must be considered....

As many have said.... its not just date transfer speed.... its all in the Design and I/o....

PC - CPU Ram Pool / GPU Ram Pool / SSD is still a seperate data i/o
PS5 CPU and GPU Unified memory , and the SSD on the console is like DMA.... ... It literally can be used as RAM......« This is truly about minimising bottlenecks , and a balance that brings advantages...

Do you not see why this is a step forward , and its a step forward for all.....

NX Gamer did a great vid as to why the high end PC gamer shouldn't under estimate this approach.