Crackdown 3 Campaign Lasts 15+ Hours; Dev: We Have Harnessed Only a Fraction of Cloud Compute Power

Crackdown 3 Creative Director Joe Staten confirmed the campaign will last 15+ hours. The dev also said he's eager to see other developers using cloud compute in different ways than just destruction.

[Imp0ssibl3]

It can be interesting but only in the hands of skilled developers.

[_SilverHawk_]

They've been talking about the power of the cloud for years and years with nothing of substance to show. That's why PlayStation has been destroying them

[ArchangelMike]

@SilverHawk

Exactly. If this is all they have to show for it, it doesn't seem to have been worth the time, money or effort.

[S2Killinit]

Its more puffery like the AI in Forza, Milo, hololens, secret sauce in 360, power of cloud make 360 4X more powerful, etc.

[Kumakai]

wrong. they have been talking about the cloud for a long time - but because the way they are using it is new, innovative and there are no best practices because nobody else is using it yet its going to be difficult to bring to market. at least they are trying to innovate and look to the future.

You're basically saying Sony won because they didn't try to innovate anything, which is a super weird angle and incorrect. Sony won this generation in sales because of a number of perfect storm situations:
A) the OG ps4 was cheaper and more powerful than the OG xbox one
B) the ps4 had a much more successful reveal than the botched xbox one reveal that left lots of ppl pissed and confused.
C) they had the advantage on 1st party exclusive games

First impressions are hard to break and the xbox suffered as a result of those things.
A lot of ps4's success (not all) came at Xbox's bad decisions.

Regardless, Xbox has been way better since then at hardware (the one x) more software updates and features, more services and friendlier retail policies. Xbox is also way better poised for the next generation as well. Sony has been cocky and riding so high on the ps4's success they've slipped on their own innovation. If you want proof of this, look at all the things under the Playstation brand that have failed - pretty much anything that isn't a Playstation console specifically.

everybody talks about how nobody innovates, but then criticizes ppl when they try. innovation is hard. its uncharted territory. At least give MS the credit for trying to elevate the potential of gaming as a whole.

Now everybody disagree with me because looking at things objectively on this site is a mortal sin.

[ApocalypseShadow]

Kumakai, don't lie to yourself that Sony is being cocky like Microsoft. Or lies constantly about exclusives,power from the cloud for their games like crackdown, lies about high fidelity VR.

Sony takes risks that doesn't always pan out. But at least they try. And PSVR is doing well for trying to innovate. Microsoft could have took effort in making Kinect viable and give reason for its existence by producing great games or used it for VR. But again, they lied about its capability and abandoned it just like they always do.

Sony won because they do what they always do:MAKE GAMES FOR A GAME SYSTEM.

Not expect other companies to take the load off and sit in the background collecting royalty checks from them. If this Gen was reversed, Microsoft wouldn't even be trying to look like they are making the game industry better.

They would be bleeding gamers dry with even more sadistic schemes. If my memory serves me right, F2P is still behind a paywall is it not?

[TheHan]

@Silverhawk

You sound ignorant sense it takes time to create video games just like movies. Of course they wouldn’t have anything to show for it.

[Wallstreet37]

Kamakai..

I wont bother responding to all the nonsense you said but your fanboy opinion is riddled with holes. More features is bs, better updates etc.. and the funniest is your innovation agenda, are u smoking crack? That cloud compute is hot air and a fraction of innovation compared to a console maker bringing full fledged VR to the masses like Sony did. They innovated tremendously more than anyone in the hardware space bringing VR to consoles when no one else could or would. Please take tht bs elsewhere. Just like Sony led the charge with streaming, psnow and ppl want to act like Microsoft is ushering in a new streaming era and innovating, you dont fool us.

Sony bust that ass for many reasons besides Microsoft anti consumer bs in the beginning. Better os, better features like shareplay on release, better controller for most, definitely better exclusives, innovating with Psvr, cheaper, stronger console at launch, Psnow service which makes most revenue on console streaming services and other things. Dont blame Somy blame Mictosoft but at least thy have taking a cue from big brother and are copying the steps with like console streaming, some ps features and focusing on first party devs ala Sony :)

[Bane35]

Look at all these comments xbox one really is the black sheep this generation

[chiefJohn117]

Well said kumakai

[gravedigger]

Quote :

"We Have Harnessed Only a Fraction of Cloud Compute Power"

And yet still destruction is downgraded compared to what was shown at E3 few years ago.

[Parasyte]

That is not why PS has been kicking MS's butt this gen. It all started with the disastrous reveal of the Xbox One, and Sony decided that they could take advantage of MS's screw up and capitalize on it, and they did.

They also focused on putting out the best, most enticing exclusive games. MS has had next to no exclusive games this gen that were worth a damn. Their insistence on backing Kinect didn't help either.

[NarutoFox]

What?🤔

[trooper_]

Yeah...except they're doing more talking than walking.

[badz149]

I can't believe they still think "the powah of ze cloudz!" is still the best marketing slogan for this game! the more they tout it that way, the more people are going to be skeptical about it because let's just be honest here, the game looks last gen and the "cloud powered destruction" is underwhelming.

[ccgr]

May pick this one up on sale

[CyberSentinel]

Exactly.

Physical should drop fast, since most will just download it off game pass.

[Pantz]

I wouldn't count on it. Sea of Thieves physical copy didn't drop in price for a long time and even during sales it was $30-$40.

[Pantz]

What's with all the downvotes? Look on ebay, a year later and Sea of Thieves is 30 bucks. MS first party physical copies hold their value for the most part.

[CyberSentinel]

@Pantz

I consider 29.99 a price drop.
I guess it depends on what you consider a "sale".

[Pantz]

Sure, but you would of had to wait until Black Friday November to get that price. If you're ok with that then that's cool.

[frostypants]

Game Pass sure seems to be becoming little more than an ongoing excuse for mediocre AAA games. "At least it's on Game Pass" is quickly becoming an unofficial motto for the service. It's almost never "omg I can even get this on Game Pass!!!". It's like grabbing furniture someone left by the dumpster.

[rainslacker]

Now, you can finance your $60 game that you wouldn't spend full price for, in 6 monthly installments of only $10 each.

If a person isn't willing to spend full price for the game, I don't see why Game Pass makes a game more worthwhile. You're basically saying, "sure, it's not that great, but hey, it's cheap". Is that really the message Xbox fans want MS, or themselves sending about its first party line up, when its something that MS is apparently trying to eradicate from their perception? it's one thing to consider that a game may be worth playing, or buying, if it's cheaper, it's another to keep on this path that the games are fine, because you can try them out for only $10/month. The price for the game is going to be $60. That's how it should be judged. It shouldn't be judged because you can pay to have a demo service to try it out first.

I wouldn't pay $10/month for PSNow which has better games, even though they're old. I wouldn't spend $10/month for access to hundreds of mobile games. I don't see why I'd spend $10/month for mid-tier games, which I could just buy cheaper one day, or buy outright if they were worth the price.

[Alexious]

It's on Game Pass anyway!

[memots]

it will be free soon

[Bronxs15]

I wouldn’t spend 10 dollars on game pass if it was full of mediocre games. But it isn’t. It also has great games like Forza horizon 4, all gears and halo games, hitman resident evil, doom, sunset overdrive , rise of tomb raider etc. So as a by product of that I’ll get the try out crackdown.

Don’t try spinning it like we’re paying 10 dollars a month for crackdown only lol

[fishaz780]

Game Pass will let me play it

[bluefox755]

Why only a fraction? They've had years.

[CyberSentinel]

PR speak.
Don't believe the hype.

[The Wood]

Lol. . You've changed your tune since you've been a member. . .

[zackeroniii]

Mircrosoft tings...can't believe they still have a loyal fanbase. Idk what there is to be a proud fan of with microsoft and xbox. All they're good at is mediocrity and lies.

[DragonbornZ]

Dealing with the technical aspects of working with cloud computing on this scale across 4 studios.

Computing isn't new, but the way they are applying it here isn't something that's been done before. You wont get %100 out of any tech when you first start off, but methods and understanding improve over time, allowing you to get closer to that %100.

Artificial intelligence for example; has been pretty stagnant in gaming for a whole generation, and it's been slowly getting better in other aspects outside of gaming. It's a tough part of any kind of tech. But with a focus on stronger CPU and the advancement in the tools available, there should be a pretty sizable improvement next generation.

Bit off topic, but there was this Blender conference talk with Andrew Price where he talks about how 3D modeling and game development tools (when it comes to A.I) will drastically affect the process of assets creation, motion capture, and animation in the near future.
He showed a lot, and one cool thing was where he showed how this program worked to create multiple variants of a house solely based on the paramaters of what a house should look like: how many doors, windows, etc. Instead of having to model it yourself itd spit them out at you. Is an example of how the evolution of technology works, even though you can say we've had I7 processors since 2008.

TLDR:
Drifted a bit lol, but what I mean overall is that cloud computing was already kind of in its infancy for gaming. Cloudgine, Sumo Digital, Microsoft, and everyone else are taking it up a notch, but it's not something that'll just work well, like A.I for example, even though there's been years and years of hands on with it. Tech and the tools devs use are ever evolving and like the stagnant evolution in A.I and NPC in gaming we've had for years and years, computing is similar in terms of how much of a pain it is to get it to work properly when you're trying push it to its extremes.

They're hoping to pave the way and show developers that using the tech in extremes can work. I hope the tech can be utilized more impact fully like CD3 going forward.

Edit: Talk from Andrew Price if anyone is interested lol:

https://youtu.be/FlgLxSLsYW...

[letsa_go]

lol

[DragonbornZ]

@letsa_go
Dang. I can't figure out why I'm having trouble responding to your points when you've given me such a detailed and well written "lol" to work with.

[rdgneoz3]

"Computing isn't new, but the way they are applying it here isn't something that's been done before."

So how have MMOs had hundreds or thousands of people online in a single instance with tons of explosions / computing power needed? They're basically using it like dedicated servers here.

[rainslacker]

I can understand they can't get 100% out of it on the first go, but I'd at least expect them to get more than what could be done on the system on its own. From what I've seen, I'm not convinced this couldn't be done locally .

[DragonbornZ]

@rdg
By using the cloud. I'm not saying what Crackdown 3 is doing is working on different magical clouds, I'm saying its ambitious and different. There are no doubt a ton of variables to account for with mmos, but at the same time there are a lot of unknown variables with what CD3 is doing because it's using the tech to push extremes different from the norm, and they were basically working through them as they go.
The biggest difference being large scale real time physics simulation with thousands of pieces interacting with one another, rather than with your example, tons of particle effects that last for the duration of the char/npc animation, though what you are talking about definitely still does cost a lot of computational power. Picture a lighting strike skill in an mmo. When it strikes the ground the rubble and debris would scatter, but they'd either disappear after a certain amount of time or disappear when there's too much of it build up. In Crackdown 3 the same lightning strike would produce the rubble and debris, stay there until the match ended, and would have physical properties, allowing it the be kicked around by players as they move.

They are both using servers and taking advantage of processing power, but that doesnt mean they are using the same tools or the same methods, because they are tackling different things.

@rain
The thing that annoys me about tech is that the results wont always match the effort put in. They can say they are using the computational power akin to 12 xbox ones and that every piece is accounted for and reacts to one another, but while that may be true as shit and they could show the servers spinning up and the amount of processing power they are using, the visual end result could look average compared to the details, when in reality that technical work is being put in.

In that, I think it boils down to the knowledge and efficiency of the tools they work with (and Crackdowns art style), but I think it looks damn impressive, though the geometry looks unfortunately simplistic.

I highly doubt this could be done locally outside of a tech demo.

Like the example rdg gave above with mmos, there's a reason Crackdown spins up servers on demand to handle the physics.

[DragonbornZ]

@rain
To add to that I'm surprised you think this can be done locally. I know you deal in the technical aspects of gaming. You know that Nvidia Physx enabled games had/do have a noticeable drop in performance. Just cause 3 doesnt have consistent interactive destruction and has performance problems. Many didnt want to bother with Geralt and Laras hair physics in TW3 and Tomb Raider because of the drop in performance.

You know physics are a massive strain when it comes to processing power.

[letsa_go]

@DragonbornZ I was trying to figure out why you were giggling throughout your PR response. Very unprofessional!

[DragonbornZ]

@letsa_go
Holy fuck. No joke, I somehow literally had an epiphany, like I had forgotten this site was N4G.

If you share any type of passion for game development i'd recommend taking a look at that video I linked because it's pretty damn fascinating, otherwise keep fighting them wars my guy.

[rainslacker]

@Dragon

Yes, large scale physics models are a drain on systems. Which is why CD3 is not coming out as impressive, because the Physics being applied, are shallow and not constant for the entire duration of an objects movement or interaction with other objects.

Here's what I see with CD3.

They are implementing the cloud, and the destruction physics are indeed being processed through the cloud.

But, they promised a much larger scale of destruction than they delivered.

Engineering for games, isn't about finding out how to do more with more, but doing more with less. Everything in games is done through tricks, which mimic the real. The complex physics calculations which determine how objects move, aren't calculated with every calculation that goes into how the universe works. They're moved with nothing more than an update to locations by adding the momentum(inertia) and direction of an object. When an object falls, you don't calculate the mass, the air pressure, and the relative velocity of the object, you simply apply the constant of gravity to the transpose position.

So, no, the way the damage is done in this game couldn't be done locally, but what the actual end result is, could be done the way it's shown here. The cloud here only starts the object moving. It's not doing anything after that. You don't need realistic calculations to make that happen. If I were to build a damage model to mimic this, I would simply have a pre-detemined variable to handle how it moves when a destruction event is applied to the object. I'd probably have several pre-set variables to handle different situations. I may even add in more collision detection so those object interact with one another as they interact with one another....which isn't hasn't been shown to be done here, even though it was one of the original promises of what they'd actually deliver.

In this game, the object moves, but doesn't do anything to impact the player, or the other objects. We saw on several occassions where the player simply ran through falling material, and kept on going. The objects kept falling the way they were, and a rotation or slight movement in another direction was applied to them as they kept falling at the same velocity. We've seen better than that in other games already.

Basically, I'd fake my way through it, and provide a similar, or possibly better result given enough time and a team of people to make it happen.

I hope that makes what I'm saying more clear.

What it boils down to, is that despite all the power of the cloud, the local hardware is still to reliant on moving those object to make them useful.

[GrubsterBeater]

It really bothers me that you keep putting the % symbol in front of the number, as opposed to the way that normal people use it. (eg. 100%)

That’s all.

[DragonbornZ]

@Rain
Yeah it's interesting. That's the thing about game development - faking using less expensive solutions to get a better result. It's why people kept comparing Red Faction to Crackdown 3, because even though it's doing way way less in terms physical calculation it's doing a lot to mask its shortcomings and the destruction in the end looks more layered.
Not sure why they didn't try and implement some of those tricks. There's multiple reasons I can think of as to why they went the route they did with the simplistic destruction on the visual front, but I do agree that its lacking in that aspect. It is disappointing they decided to essentially brute force it to an end result of chunks of mass physics, because while it's impressive because of the power at their disposal, visually it looks less like buildings being destroyed and more like Lego buildings being destroyed.

In terms of gameplay, I think the destruction does what it needs to do personally. I dont really care for the word "promised" as games change throughout development and CD3 has had a long time to do so. Debris was indeed supposed to damage players, but characters didn't even have a jetpack in the tech demo, nor Crackdowns signature lock on aiming. That and the added manueverability would make debris damage an annoyance to players, because the focus is to outmaneuver your opponents while using a destructable map to your advantage. You can't do that at the fast pace of the gameplay if every possible act of destruction would damage the player. The destruction is pretty simplistic looking, but its intricate enough to where players can create structural advantages during gameplay.

Despite its shortcomings I keep saying it's impressive because tech-wise, physical calculations of the destruction isn't all they had to account for. If so, we'd have seen way more games take physics to this degree. I remember reading something funny as hell about the destruction during development. Something about the synchronization between players sending the destruction haywire I believe. Take that with a grain of salt though honestly, I'm gonna have to try and find it.

Also the game is chaotic as hell, but I've seen that interactivity with the rubble in some instances, and in some I haven't. It's odd.

@Grubster
Damn. I was so busy typing a novel I didn't even realize.

[Omegasyde]

lol at Your “tl;dr”

Its still too long, so I didn’t read it.

[DragonbornZ]

@blue25 @Omega
Shhh quiet kiddies, me and rain are having a conversation.

[rainslacker]

@Dragon

I think it's a technical achievement as a proof of concept. But to me, it seems more like it's just that. A proof, not a full implementation.

If I had to guess, they may have wanted to make it more advance, and have the cloud do more with the debris, but it's gotten to the point where MS needs to release the game, so it went into code lock when they had something that could be said to be using the concept in a way that does what they said on a basic level. Any optimization or improvement to how it works within the game got put on the back burner, or scrapped altogether.

I realize that games change all the time during development, and while "promised" may be the wrong word to use, they made it seem like we'd get a lot more out of the destruction than what we actually got.

If its a matter of that it didn't work within the game play mechanics or design of the game itself, then the scope of the project was misappropriated. One article said that they had this tech idea they wanted to implement, and they just said, "Hey, lets try that with Crackdown".(paraphrased from the report). While that's a reasonable thing to do, it's usually on the devs, and the producer to then analyze if the new design principals will work within the scope and confines of the game itself. If it didn't, due to the chaotic nature of the game play, then it needs to be reassessed if it's practical, or change the scope of how the new tech is used within the game. You can't add a major thing like this, and not adjust the game play to suit, without expecting a lot of headaches when it comes to game balance issues.

Cloud destruction probably delayed this game well beyond what would have been necessary had it used more traditional models. The amount of money spent on getting it to work in the way it did would have greatly increased the budget for the projected sales of a game like this. It got the game more attention, but while doing so, made it so the tech itself gets more scrutiny, and with a lackluster showing, it delays people's desire to see it done more, or better in the future. Devs and pubs may be less biased, and may see better practical applications for it, but without consumer demand, it takes ambition of other parties to show why it's needed to the general consumer.

[DragonbornZ]

@rain
I can see that; I think it lies somewhere in the middle. Them wanting to include more, but MS wanting them to release seems like a possibility as it has been 5 years. Especially since they only got the tech working properly about a year ago. I think they may have had more than they could handle, well, in a "normal" development cycle.

The change through development thing; idk I still have the same opinion, but understand the disappointment.

I can't recall the feature from the article your'e talking about, but I feel like they've tailored the destruction to suit Crackdowns gameplay.

I realize they want the gameplay to be different than past games, but if they kept the same gameplay from Crackdown 2 (my example disregarding how it would affect the single player) and maybe slowed the movement speed a tiny bit, they could've shaped the destruction more around tighter engagements where the damage from debris would come more into play, and dropping floors on people would matter more. Because right now it's easy for a player to boost around buildings and hop from one to the next, really making destruction useful for outmanuevering your opponent, which is still cool, because that does add depth to gameplay, but it's so fast that other factors that could've mattered really don't.

Again though, Single player would probably suffer. Even with the evolved movement people say it's too similar to bits predecessors, and I imagine slower gameplay is the last thing they want to present to fans of the past games.

[crazyCoconuts]

It was just an MS distraction when people were talking about PS4s power advantage. That propaganda campaign is obsolete now...

[rainslacker]

Because the local hardware still has to do something with all that data. It won't do more than it can do. Just because you can process millions of variables a second, if the system can only handle applying those variables to a thousand objects, then a thousand objects is the limit.

The way they did this was just start the destruction part on the cloud, but it was still up to local hardware to update all those objects movement variables, which isn't overly complex, but there is a hardware limit.

[NarutoFox]

Five people are in denial

[OffRoadKing]

So when the game does poorly and the reviews say the destruction is limited they can say well we told you we only used a fraction of the power.

[LoveSpuds]

Still waiting for the power of my OG Xbox to be tripled via cloud implementation, I'd sure appreciate an update on the progress of this project from Phil Spencer, given he was the one who promoted it.

[The Wood]

C'mon now. . .Phil is impervious to criticism because he's done so much this gen. . . . . . . . . Leave him be

[AmUnRa]

You forgot something like this 😋

[Alexious]

Are you sure it was him?

[Thundercat77]

Sorry pal but you have been lied like so many others.

[slavish0]

Link?

[LoveSpuds]

You know, you could look yourself!

https://www.mcvuk.com/conso...

https://www.tekrevue.com/mi...

I also watched an interview back around 5 years ago where Spencer himself indicated that Xbox One performance would outstrip PS4 once Cloud implementation was properly integrated.

[The Wood]

Oh. . . No thanks for the link you were given slavish. . That's not very sportsman like is it. . . .how disappointing. Predictable but disappointing.

[cliveo32]

The cloud is like them people who say the world is going to end every month both BS had years to tap the cloud and its still rubbish tbh maybe 5 to 10 years from now there may be something to empress us with i think it has a future but a long way off ....

[Valkron1]

“Empress” is the female equivalent of emperor. Please learn proper punctuation. I wouldn’t have mentioned it but you refused to use a single period during one run on sentence then ended it with four periods in a row. Unless you are just trolling a grammar Nazi, if so, well played! 😁

[cliveo32]

No never went to school never had the chance

[neocores8055]

A fraction of the cloud??? on a game you been working on SINCE LAUNCH OF THE XB1 lol.

[ArchangelMike]

Exactly. Apparently it's equivalent to 12 XboxOnes' tied together, so why does it still look like a last gen game? If you have 12 times the computing power of the Xbox one should'nt it be 12 times better than anything that's currently out there?

I think were being sold a bill of good tbh

[Kribwalker]

If you read the other articles you’ve commented on (you have actually read them right?)you would have your answer. The Physics Engine being used (Havok) is what is being processed by the cloud, and they are saying that the physics calculations are equivalent to what could be done within 12 xbox ones. Not the graphics themselves (which are meant by to be comic book cel shadinig)

It would take 12 og xbox ones to compute the physics the cloud is computing

[rainslacker]

@Krib

Havok can do a lot more than what's been showed in the demo, without putting strains on current systems. So, if it's doing 12X what could normally be done in Havok on the cloud, they certainly aren't showing the results through the implementation. With 10 players, it means you have the potential for 10 destruction events at any given time. Each destruction event seems to be about 10-40 objects, and a total of 10 players, that means between 100-400 possible destruction events per game loop.

Havok on the current base X1, can process roughly 1-10K physics calculations per loop depending on their complexity and requirements for secondary collision detection and reaction.

Havok itself does not handle the physics of destruction, it handles the collision, and movement of the objects, the game code handles what happens due to that interaction. The engine will advance the simulation of what physics it handles based on the interaction of collision detection, and calculating what variables(forces) should be applied during each step. How it does that is based on the parameters set up in the destruction model.

Since CD3's destruction reactions are rather limited, and not that impressive, I'd say that Havok was greatly underutilized in the creation of this game. There is hardly any secondary reaction among destructible objects, and they appear to have no collision detection with anything other than the player, and the ground. Individual pieces do not appear to interact with anything more than a function to prevent clipping of objects, and simply moves them out of the way of one another. Two things which use relatively low amounts of system resources, and is done routinely through general game engine, animation, and collision detection techniques.

They may very well indeed be using enough calculations on cloud to be equivalent to 12 Xbox One's, but the variables it's spitting out for use in the game, are not used to full effect within the implementation itself.

What is being tried in this game is what can best be described as procedural destruction. A seed event is put in place, at which point the destruction starts. Havok will them take over, and process the calculations of how the object has to start moving. That movement varible will be passed to the software, for it to update it's next frame. After that, there isn't anything that shows there is any additional action performed on the cloud, to handle additional destruction events upon the current objects, or that secondary cloud physics calculations are required to handle said object/s destruction or movement. If there are secondary physics calculations in place, and they are being processed, it doesn't appear that the game implements those variables upon the objects in question, so the power if being used, isn't being used in a meaningful way.

[trooper_]

Lol, it's too funny.

[rainslacker]

Does that make the game partly cloudy?

[xX-oldboy-Xx]

Oh dear - what is happening at xbox, the lies are unraveling - don't dig the hole any deeper. Just release it and forget about it. It's best to move on and look to next gen.

[rainslacker]

We're at the point that instead of hyping it up for more than it is, they're hoping people will appreciate that it's complicated, and give them an A for effort, which will go hand in hand in letting people forget that it was overjoyed for 4 years.

[Darkborn]

Oh, so now it's only a fraction of the cloud. A likely story..

[Atticus_finch]

But Phil said....

[Thundercat77]

The folks at Xbox will keep spinning these cloud fantasy as if people were dumb. They have been riding high on these promise and after years, crackdown 3, an average generic game, is the best they can make.

[Lilrizky]

it took 3 developers this many years to harness a fraction?

[King_Noctis]

It seems alot of people having fully read the article before commenting. Here’s a quote:

“The thing that’s interesting from a technical, developer point of view–I’m really eager for other developers to take a look at this and see the one interesting choice we made, simulating destruction in the cloud. Smart developers can say, “Well, what could we do?” There are clearly things you can with animation, with AI, with machine learning. Bigger player arenas, higher player counts, you name it.”

[The_Sage]

But the game looks like a early last gen title and the deduction doesn't look as good as Red Faction... And after all this time.

[trooper_]

...Okay?

What does this quote explain?

What the hell have they been doing the past few years?

All this BS talk about cloud this and cloud that and nothing substantial has been shown. I hope for their sake that Crackdown 3 doesn't become an embarrassment of the century.

[King_Noctis]

“I hope for their sake that Crackdown 3 doesn't become an embarrassment of the century.”

That is abit dramatic now isn’t it? CD3 isn’t that big to begin with. It seems the only people who make it to be bigger than what it is is the fans of other consoles which then would celebrate as always when it fails.

Also read the below quote. What he meant is cloud technology can be used for more than just in game destruction:

“There are clearly things you can with animation, with AI, with machine learning. Bigger player arenas, higher player counts, you name it.”

[Omegasyde]

As disappointing as crack down 3 may or may not be, I guarantee it won’t be nearly as bad as fallout 76.

That game is a straight dumpster fire.

[trooper_]

@Noctis: Well it certainly sounds big when Microsoft keeps yapping about the cloud.

[S2Killinit]

Its the only exclusive worth even mentioning for xbone in god knows how long, and it looks like crap. I think the big picture deserves recognition here. I guess MS is doing that thing MS does every generation, abandon ship and focus on a big opening to next gen only to pull the same bull crap next gen.

[King_Noctis]

@S2Killinit

Have you seriously forgotten FH4? And the upcoming games like Halo Infinite and Gears 5? How is CD3 worth more than those games?

[rainslacker]

I'm eager for other devs to do that too. Hopefully they'll do something more impressive. Hopefully they won't spend years hyping it up, but instead, reveal it when it's working, so people can be impressed with the game, and not a hyped of programming principal which is only as effective as its actual implementation.

I'm eager to give credit to a dev who showcases this tech in a way that is impressive to the player. I'll give them credit for being the first mainstream game that implements it, but I can't give them credit for making something impressive.

The other stuff that could come from cloud gaming is going to happen. It won't be because of what they did though. But because it may be required to realize a vision of the developer.

[salmonade]

The game, gameplay and the physics look like hot garbage. Just mediocre crap.

[TheHan]

I can’t wait to hear more about the game before launch.

[InTheZoneAC]

then delay it for 15 more years

[The_Sage]

Dah cloud!

[S2Killinit]

DA POWAH

[The_Sage]

Lol

[masterfox]

"We Have Harnessed Only a Fraction of Cloud Compute Power" <--- What only a fraction ?, what the funk you have been doing all this years then ?, so sad.

[memots]

lol .... is this a meme from 4 years ago ?

[jwillj2k4]

More of the same from Microsoft. We all knew this shitty ass title was a joke. Next comes Microsoft employees doing what they do best, putting lipstick on this turd, patting themselves on the back for their failed attempt at “pushing the boundaries” by under delivering on an over hyped pr stunt. Get ready for a slew of articles calling it a “solid” title or “weekend guilty pleasure”, to cover up yet again another failure project. A fraction of power... shut the fuck up...

[OffRoadKing]

Personally I'm looking forward to the Arron Greenberg announces "number of building destroyed" in Crackdown 3 article.

[chiefJohn117]

You'd think CD3 would capitalize on the battle Royal hype. I feel it's the perfect candidate for the game mode.

[NXFather]

We can tell this aint that great. These sorry Devs. made me do a 180 on my opinions.

[OffRoadKing]

G.E.F.G.P.

Good Enough For Game Pass

[frostypants]

Oh come ON. This game was to be THE showcase for what "CLOUD POWAH" could do. And now in light of underwhelming early impressions they're basically using a "well we didn't try too hard, but trust us it could be awesome" cop-out? Weak. Weak. WEAK.

[OffRoadKing]

So with all the time they've had why not harness more and make it better, sounds like an excuse is being made ahead of the reviews.

[S2Killinit]

The missing premise in this MS PR talk is that MS is talking about the HYPOTHETICAL power. In other words, technically anything is possible, but in reality not much can be done with DA POWAH. As always they over hype and under delever. Its Milo all over again.

[cell989]

They just don’t know when to quit. Stop talking about the cloud ffs

[jznrpg]

Didn’t harness much , you are correct

[HighPlayer28]

Disappointed to hear that but still look forward to play.

[Donnie81]

crackdown 3 is gonna be sweet! Keep hating haters

[salmonade]

This game looks like hot garbage. Pure trash. More shovelware for GamePass

[THC CELL]

To enjoy the best of this game u need to always be online. Enjoy 😊

[StifflerK]

To save any progress in the game you need to be online -Gt Sport.

To play online multiplayer - you need to be online -Crackdown 3

Which is worse?

[THC CELL]

To use cloud to see best of game is far worst. Plus I have a hard drive. And don't play mp. Online as much as single player

[razascallinus]

If Sony had have developed the tech and published a similar game it would have been a fantastic success! Literally would have been Gold! What a pity it was micro$oft that did it. This has failure written all over it! LOL

[MasterCornholio]

It would have had a different studio make it that’s for sure so it could have been better. But let’s not kid ourselves this is a Microsoft owned IP so there’s no use in coming up with a what if scenario.

http://physik.uni-graz.at/~...

[JesusBuiltmyHotrod]

LOL all these years, of CLOUD BS from MS and it has come to this. Hilarious. Why anyone believe half the crap MS execs say is beyond me.

[paintedgamer1984]

Who is actually buying this game when its on gamepass? And out of those people, who really actually cares about this game?

[C-H-E-F]

LMAO This whole gen Devs been saying the same crap, I have not seen where the cloud computing has made any improvements on the way games are developed. Like I haven't seen 1 XBOX 1 game where I was like owe, that can't be done on PS4 because of the cloud computing.

[spartan112g]

Ya'll acting like progress in developing new technologies is supposed to happen overnight. This shit takes time. It took over 40 years for the internet be developed. Chill

[Gamingsince1981]

This "New technology" has been used for MMORPGs for about 15 or so years.......not exactly new and not really anything that needs time to get to grips with.

[Sophisticated_Chap]

Pretty good campaign length. Hopefully the multiplayer and the massive destruction are a lot of fun.

[Muzikguy]

So all the talk and hype and hoping for a savior and delays only to use a fraction of cloud power?! OMG.... Welcome to the "we aren't satisfied with how it turned out so let's lie" stage.

[DrShoe]

The Cloud is a lie!

[TheRacingX]

The fanboyism is so rampant on this site, you all sound like youre on the companys board of directors at a share holder meeting, crying about lack of dividends.... you bought a plastic box of chips and wires....thats it..... enjoy the games on said system....if you dont own an xbox, why would you care if said game is 15hrs and there is untapped computational power....you dont own it so go play your favorite box and its games....why come on here and complain about it or its lack of factual story....do you feel slighted if its remotely true??? Everybody today needs some sort of validation for anything they do...... this site should be NC4F.... negative commeting for fanboys.... you people need lives

[paintedgamer1984]

Lmao... you can tell youre def an xbox supporter or thats your preferred "plastic box" 😂.

It really doesnt matter about any of that crap you stated because we all know damn well if it was Xbox winning this gen by a large margin none of this finger pointing would even take place. I love it when an xbox supporter blames everyone but ms... that shit is funny to me. You people need brains, common sense, and a college level math class couldnt hurt either as you guys clearly have problems counting numbers 😂

[TheRacingX]

HAHAHA , that comment goes to show youre nothing but a SONY fanboy, I own ALL consoles, let me correct that , I own every console....I enjoy video games , not a particular console, .... last gen when all the 360 fanboys picked on the PS3 saying it sucked and inferior blah blah....I found it just as assinine as your crew picking on MS fanboys this gen....enjoy self validating your console....I'll go back to Spiderman, Killer Instinct, Forza, God of War, Gears of War, Bloodborne, Breath of the Wild, Horizon , The Witcher Assassins of kings, Metroid...etc etc