Project Scorpio: Is 2017 the Right Time?

Level Down Games says, "Who would have thought five years ago as we prepared to enter the next generation of consoles with PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, that by 2017, Sony would be dominating the sales charts worldwide over Microsoft. After leading the pack for almost all of the previous generation with the Xbox 360, it was their message at the Xbox One unveiling, and the poor communication afterward, that led to Sony being able to step up and deliver a “gamer’s first” message and really hit a homerun with the PS4."

[skydragoonityx]

If there are games to back scorpio up then yes.

[UltraNova]

Yes they need new games, lots of them. BC and old game subscripition services wont cut it.

I feel Scorpio is xbox brand's final chance, they better not screw this up.

[Gazondaily]

Are you excited for the BEAST?

[UltraNova]

Surely not as much as you seem to be but then why shouldnt you, its been a long long long 3 years for you 😉😎

[Obscure_Observer]

@UltraNova

"I feel Scorpio is xbox brand's final chance, they better not screw this up."

It is not. The Scorpio´s launch will be the final nail in the Mattrick´s coffin and a new beginning for the Xbox Brand under Phil Spencer´s leadership. A new era where generations as we know will not matter anymore. Just like Nintendo, Xbox will follow their own patch and will leave Sony to be one which (at least for now) be the only company to stick with the traditional generation circle. Right now Xbox One rests confortably at a sweety second place this gen and i honestly don´t think that will change now with the Nintendo Switch.

Xbox One is doing better than the Xbox 360 did sales wise in the same time frame. And fi you consider the fact that the Xbox 360 numbers at that time wasn´t that good because of ROD faulty units.

The Scorpio will feature 4K Bluray, Native 4K/60fps DVR, VR/AR, Xbox Game Pass (exclusively on Xbox One consoles), will be a foward and backwards compatibility machine.

So make no mistake, the games will come. Not as much as the PS4 of course since MS doesn´t have the same japanese studios support as Sony and Nintendo does for obvious reasons.

Xbox will be fine and Xbox Gamers will be the ones who will benefit most when the Scorpio finally arrives. ;)

[UltraNova]

@obscure

I hope you are right my friend, I sure do!

[TheCommentator]

We'll see, but if that's your criteria, then I believe you will consider 2017 the right time. I'm really excited for E3 announcements from MS, and I hope you'll be able to admit that MS is making necessary changes when they hold their press conference!

There's been tons of indication over the last 12 months to corroborate the notion of "more games".

• Talking about IP in the works last year they never actually announced.
• Dropping hints of Mech Assault and suggesting Crimson Skies would be interesting to revisit.
• Phil's trip to Japan to talk to 3rd parties.
• Liscensing Blinx out to the guy from IGN.
• Playground working on new IP.
• Announcing several new services/features before E3.
• Saying they may have to reveal Scorpio before E3 in order to make their presentation work.
• They apparently have more games launching this year than last year.
• Moving to Sunday along with Bethesda, when Bethesda has several unannounced IP they are working on (this is THE long shot, but it's plausable that one of these is a MS/Bethesda collaboration).

Considering the ancedotal evidence, and it is a long list, I don't see how MS couldn't be focusing more on games than in the past, and they seem to want the impact of both Scorpio and games to be front and center this year. You could almost look at this like a brand relaunch. Of course, even if many games are debuted, we won't know if this is a short term or long term change until we see a few years worth of commitment to games from them. After all, they did start out strong during the 360 launch before closing studios and relying on 3rd parties for exclusives.

[freshslicepizza]

when exactly is the right time? sony could have released the ps4 pro with the ps4 at launch if they wanted to. that would have given users more time with increased performance. switch could have come out fall of 2017, why now? see, there really is no perfect timing.

[Obscure_Observer]

I personally think that Microsoft did the right thing waiting. The Xbox team has more time to make significant changes on the console. For example; the Scorpio will now feature support for VR AND AR also 1080p tvs and monitors as well.

[MoonConquistador]

It supports 1080p TV'S?

Fuck me, that's groundbreaking stuff, think I'll get one now.

[FyBy]

I dont know why everybody thinks that Sony or Microsoft waited. I think holiday 2017 is earliest time MS can make 6TF console with better arch then XO. Sony and Microsoft can only build console so much powerful as chip manufacturer is able to fulfil. Sony and MS chose AMD. What AMD has to acomplish requirements for powerful console?

At XO ps4 launch, AMD had fx processors with 220W TDP. They also had A10 APUs. Maybe they should make 8core buldozer apus with decent gpu? Why did they chose slow jaguar cores? Maybe for price....or tdp? I dont know. But what I know AMD didnt have better cpus for both tdp and price. Now ryzen 7 is here and maybe ms will use one? But CPU for 300 USD alone....it doesnt make sense for Scorpio...maybe ryzen 5? And what about gpu? Last year AMD released Polaris (which in terms of power per watt is great so it can be used in Pro). If sony waited for another year, maybe they could use apu with vega instead.....and maybe with better cpu, but for what price? Its not about significant changes. Its not about Sony hadnt time to make changes on console. Sony didnt want more changes to be compatible with old games. And also AMD didnt have any APU substitute for ps4.

[FyBy]

Sony couldnt release pro at ps4 launch. There wasnt the tech for affordable price. Pro has new polaris gpu (some people tend to say, Sony only doubled old gpu, but thats not true). Also they used new manufacturing process, which was not accesible when ps4 launched. Its not that simple as single decision if make or not most more powerful console.

[TheCommentator]

Pro is essentially a doubled PS4 GPU. It has elements of Polaris incorporated into it, but is not Polaris. Cerny customized the Pro with "sprinkles" of newer HW like the custom checkerboard accelerators.

Scorpio is also not entirely new HW. Phil said that Scorpio is using the same GPU architecture as XB1, just like PS4 has done with the Pro. The difference is that MS is using a more powerful version of the HW found inside the XB, with new features... not two GPUs working together. There are only 3 "Full DX12" GPU's in the world today and they're found in the XB1, Scorpio, and Vega. MS was working with AMD to create Vega from a time before XB1 even launched, and the GPU in the XB1 is a prototype for the type of architecture used in the Vega chipsets. As much as 40% of the $3b in R&D for XB1 was used for Vega research. There's lots of evidence for this if you take the time to look.

[FyBy]

@TheCommentator

Cernys words:
"Polaris is a very energy efficient GPU architecture that lets us boost the GPU power pretty dramatically, while keeping the console form-factor roughly the same."

Also I don't agree xb1 has full dx12 gpu. It's amds Bonaire chip. It's dx12 compatible.

And I mean hardware level. Ms of course has API optimizations directly for its chip.

[Fishy Fingers]

It's always time for more powerful hardware :D

[demonddel]

They getting scared bruh was it necessary for the pro or switch let Microsoft do they thing

[bamillington]

i dont see any reason atm to change my xb1 i aint got a 4k tv. maybe in few years but im guessing the next all bells and whistles will be out by then

[Jakens]

On the day it releases, it will indeed be the right time.