A Developer's Defense Of 30 Frames Per Second

[Hidden Orange]

I think the issue here is: "Don't bite off more than you can chew". Tons of games out there are being tech demoed instead of demoed. The Order: 1866 and Watch_Dogs being recent offenders. They're going off saying this is "next-gen" and guess what? It is next-gen, but the developers haven't found the tricks and loopholes yet to pull it off like with recent last-gen games: GTAV, Metal Gear Solid V, Uncharted 3, and more which looked great for last-gen games on obsolete systems. Or games like Tomb Raider, Crysis 3, and Sleeping Dogs.

 

Personally, I don't care about the graphics that much whereas performance and gameplay is higher on my list, but lying or misleading others is just unacceptable. I'd rather have it where developers release a tech demo and say something like this is possible in the near future or hint that the game will look similar to this, but not exactly like this. Kojima Productions did that with Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes. They made sure that the preview looked like a tech demo to show what the new MGS game could look like. Hell, even before that, they released Fox Engine in-game screenshots and gameplay clips. The final game doesn't look like the tech demo, but it still looks good enough without misleading or looking like night and day. Nintendo tends to do this as well along with Square Enix. The Wii U Zelda tech demo and Agni's Philosopy just said: "Hey, our games might look like this in the future". Nintendo even said that the tech demo might just stay as is and the next Zelda could be something radical like sci-fi Old West. Then you have Mashiro Sakurai only releasing images of his team's work when the game's pretty much close to being done and only needing finalized balancing - it's a fighter after all. Take DmC's initial teaser that looked really bad for a 2010 game in general and ended up looking flashy, fun, and great for a game focused on combat. That's even better: making the game look better than the demo.

 

Now, it's the opposite where devs are overestimating their system, not knowing their systems, or outright just lying to consumers in their face instead of showing true products or going beyond it.

[deathjester]

I think the issue here is: "Don't bite off more than you can chew". Tons of games out there are being tech demoed instead of demoed. The Order: 1866 and Watch_Dogs being recent offenders. They're going off saying this is "next-gen" and guess what? It is next-gen, but the developers haven't found the tricks and loopholes yet to pull it off like with recent last-gen games: GTAV, Metal Gear Solid V, Uncharted 3, and more which looked great for last-gen games on obsolete systems. Or games like Tomb Raider, Crysis 3, and Sleeping Dogs.

 

Personally, I don't care about the graphics that much whereas performance and gameplay is higher on my list, but lying or misleading others is just unacceptable. I'd rather have it where developers release a tech demo and say something like this is possible in the near future or hint that the game will look similar to this, but not exactly like this. Kojima Productions did that with Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes. They made sure that the preview looked like a tech demo to show what the new MGS game could look like. Hell, even before that, they released Fox Engine in-game screenshots and gameplay clips. The final game doesn't look like the tech demo, but it still looks good enough without misleading or looking like night and day. Nintendo tends to do this as well along with Square Enix. The Wii U Zelda tech demo and Agni's Philosopy just said: "Hey, our games might look like this in the future". Nintendo even said that the tech demo might just stay as is and the next Zelda could be something radical like sci-fi Old West. Then you have Mashiro Sakurai only releasing images of his team's work when the game's pretty much close to being done and only needing finalized balancing - it's a fighter after all. Take DmC's initial teaser that looked really bad for a 2010 game in general and ended up looking flashy, fun, and great for a game focused on combat. That's even better: making the game look better than the demo.

 

Now, it's the opposite where devs are overestimating their system, not knowing their systems, or outright just lying to consumers in their face instead of showing true products or going beyond it.

Well the "trick" was just to make everything a grainy ugly mess. The truth is they have never been this far behind.  With low level API's coming and it being impossible to keep up with PC's on price/value within a couple years? They need to just abandon the dumb things or else offer something truly unique.

 

Wii wasn't powerful and look how many consoles that thing sold.  Just being a budget PC that sucks isn't going to cut it. Add to this building your own PC back in first and second gen was still considered really hard. Now with sites like this and people making better stuff (simple things like hd bays just sliding in etc) these consoles just suck. 

 

I mean Sony has that VR Helmet but I have no idea how the hell they are going to get it to work on basically a 7790 desktop GPU as far as power.

[Hidden Orange]

Well the "trick" was just to make everything a grainy ugly mess. The truth is they have never been this far behind.  With low level API's coming and it being impossible to keep up with PC's on price/value within a couple years? They need to just abandon the dumb things or else offer something truly unique.

 

Wii wasn't powerful and look how many consoles that thing sold.  Just being a budget PC that sucks isn't going to cut it. Add to this building your own PC back in first and second gen was still considered really hard. Now with sites like this and people making better stuff (simple things like hd bays just sliding in etc) these consoles just suck. 

 

I mean Sony has that VR Helmet but I have no idea how the hell they are going to get it to work on basically a 7790 desktop GPU as far as power.

The Wii sold because people were so infected with the "Don't get fat craze". Most the games sold on the Wii was mostly Wii Fit rather than actual games like Super Mario Galaxy, Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, or The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. The other trick is to do the best you can with a system which is what Nintendo seems to be aiming for right now. They're making games that look great in art style and what the Wii U can perform without having to resort to tons of motion blur, poor/primitive AA, low FPS, or other stuff to justify the graphics. Mario Kart 8 looks fun and that's what they're going for which is also, the only thing they can go for, unfortunately. Contrast this with Project CARs, Gran Turismo, and Forza which are focused purely in creating simulations.

 

Consoles are just in a weird situation nowadays. In the past when PCs were used mostly for programming and work, the console thrived as a home arcade. Now, with PC's being able to do everything, consoles are just there and many feel they're crippled system surviving only on brand name and exclusives. The same can be said with handhelds except handhelds have a much stronger and larger exclusive library compared to phones. Laptops and PC are sort getting into situations where people feel they're unnecessary since tablets and phones are more flexible for light uses like e-mail, web browsing, music, and even work and movie. PCs are kings/queens in graphics design, gaming, programming, and development though. Consoles are just there for gaming and sometimes videos which PCs can do already. Steam Machines are trying to go for the whole "PC in your living room" or "upgradeable consoles", but I don't think that's a viable plan compared to streaming games which is not that advanced or common enough compared to PC gaming and console gaming. Also, streaming would be very strange and shocking to developers and publishers used to selling their games since it could work through a rental system and that would mean lower pricing and lost profits. That or something even worse: pay by the hour...

 

Who knows, maybe in the future Sony and MS will move on to making branded PCs instead of PC-console thingie-mah-bobs. They'll cost maybe around the same as a med-range PC and would act as entry-gaming PCs for the lazy or ignorant. Hell, if they can sell $400 PCs that provide as much power as a $350 PC, people might bite and with AMD's APUs, that might be become a possibility in the future. For now, we have to deal with a weird transition or wait for consoles to crash and become a novelty like arcade machines. What would be funny is if Nintendo's "future system" is exactly this or some unexpected partnership with Valve, AMD, Nvidia, or whatever company's out there and it sells like hot cakes. They still get to remain a name-brand at home, but now in the form of PCs making Sony and MS flabbergasted.

[deathjester]

The Wii sold because people were so infected with the "Don't get fat craze". Most the games sold on the Wii was mostly Wii Fit rather than actual games like Super Mario Galaxy, Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, or The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. The other trick is to do the best you can with a system which is what Nintendo seems to be aiming for right now. They're making games that look great in art style and what the Wii U can perform without having to resort to tons of motion blur, poor/primitive AA, low FPS, or other stuff to justify the graphics. Mario Kart 8 looks fun and that's what they're going for which is also, the only thing they can go for, unfortunately. Contrast this with Project CARs, Gran Turismo, and Forza which are focused purely in creating simulations.

 

Consoles are just in a weird situation nowadays. In the past when PCs were used mostly for programming and work, the console thrived as a home arcade. Now, with PC's being able to do everything, consoles are just there and many feel they're crippled system surviving only on brand name and exclusives. The same can be said with handhelds except handhelds have a much stronger and larger exclusive library compared to phones. Laptops and PC are sort getting into situations where people feel they're unnecessary since tablets and phones are more flexible for light uses like e-mail, web browsing, music, and even work and movie. PCs are kings/queens in graphics design, gaming, programming, and development though. Consoles are just there for gaming and sometimes videos which PCs can do already. Steam Machines are trying to go for the whole "PC in your living room" or "upgradeable consoles", but I don't think that's a viable plan compared to streaming games which is not that advanced or common enough compared to PC gaming and console gaming. Also, streaming would be very strange and shocking to developers and publishers used to selling their games since it could work through a rental system and that would mean lower pricing and lost profits. That or something even worse: pay by the hour...

 

Who knows, maybe in the future Sony and MS will move on to making branded PCs instead of PC-console thingie-mah-bobs. They'll cost maybe around the same as a med-range PC and would act as entry-gaming PCs for the lazy or ignorant. Hell, if they can sell $400 PCs that provide as much power as a $350 PC, people might bite and with AMD's APUs, that might be become a possibility in the future. For now, we have to deal with a weird transition or wait for consoles to crash and become a novelty like arcade machines. What would be funny is if Nintendo's "future system" is exactly this or some unexpected partnership with Valve, AMD, Nvidia, or whatever company's out there and it sells like hot cakes. They still get to remain a name-brand at home, but now in the form of PCs making Sony and MS flabbergasted.

 

Yup. The next gen consoles are trying to play realistic PC games like you said. So now instead of just one Mass Effect which looks like ass compared to the PC version they have tons of those types of games, while being further behind on hardware then they ever have been (this early), and the same shooters, which are just going to look worse and worse every year compared to a PC.

 

Nintendo? Like you said, hardware doesn't mean much. 

 

When I was a kid consoles were about sports games, side scrollers, and platformers or clever 4 player shooters which offered a unique experience like Golden Eye 64. A console experience was different because they invented new genres and those genres were popular, or they offered something unique.  Now they are trying to just be PC's. It could work in the past (weren't so far behind hardware and low level API could have them ahead for awhile). Now? Not really. Hell the consoles are lucky EA keeps their sports titles or neuters them on the PC (on purpose like with FIFA), or they would just do that average as well. The new NBA 2k15 for PC is going to be using the newest engine, so I am pumped about that. If NFL 2k ever came back (Madden is garbage) and was on PC? I would have zero reason to ever even want to touch one of the things. We have Steam big picture mode. We can play on our TV's with a console controller, AND we have low level API's here and coming which removes the one thing the consoles had to make up for lack of hardware.

 

I'm with this guy. I think these things are doomed. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XcAX9RYtkWI

[Kilerbomb]

This is pathetic.

[Khvarrioiren]

Well, this is what happens with bloated development teams and too much money. These poor sods actually think that they're making movies.

[Hidden Orange]

Yup. The next gen consoles are trying to play realistic PC games like you said. So now instead of just one Mass Effect which looks like ass compared to the PC version they have tons of those types of games, while being further behind on hardware then they ever have been (this early), and the same shooters, which are just going to look worse and worse every year compared to a PC.

 

Nintendo? Like you said, hardware doesn't mean much. 

 

When I was a kid consoles were about sports games, side scrollers, and platformers or clever 4 player shooters which offered a unique experience like Golden Eye 64. A console experience was different because they invented new genres and those genres were popular, or they offered something unique.  Now they are trying to just be PC's. It could work in the past (weren't so far behind hardware and low level API could have them ahead for awhile). Now? Not really. Hell the consoles are lucky EA keeps their sports titles or neuters them on the PC (on purpose like with FIFA), or they would just do that average as well. The new NBA 2k15 for PC is going to be using the newest engine, so I am pumped about that. If NFL 2k ever came back (Madden is garbage) and was on PC? I would have zero reason to ever even want to touch one of the things. We have Steam big picture mode. We can play on our TV's with a console controller, AND we have low level API's here and coming which removes the one thing the consoles had to make up for lack of hardware.

 

I'm with this guy. I think these things are doomed. 

At least Nintendo sort of continuing the trend of different games, but it's still mostly nostalgia based. Hell, even though Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze is sort of different while being familiar, people complained about it's difficulty. Really? DKC were difficult games to begin with. I'm still going to buy consoles for the exclusives though. We have superhero games sure, but they're mostly based on existing heroes like Batman or Spider-Man. inFAMOUS is fresh since it's about heroes who aren't established. Dragon's Crown never made it to PCs (yet), but there aren't a lot of games with that art style besides Vanillaware's games - they made Dragon's Crown, Odin's Sphere, and Muramasa: The Demon Blade - nor are there a lot of games like Golden Axe that's relevant or recent. As far as I know. Ratchet & Clank is funny, wacky, and can't be found on other systems except through emulation of the PS2 titles. Kingdom Hearts, Metroid, I could go on and on and not just on consoles, but on any system.

 

Watch_Dogs is sort of modern day Assassin's Creed. Hell, it even suffers from the performance issues ACIV had. Well, at least The Order: 1866 involves a rare era: The French Revolution which coincidentally one of the next AC is going to involve.

[Peacefulwarrior]

What is disturbing to me, is that I would see youtube comments and other websites revealing information on a game and if the graphics don't look good then people in the comments begin thrashing it as if it was the only thing that mattered. I wonder if that crowd of gamers will rather demand better frames then the overall graphics. However, this still doesn't explain why they would create amazing demos only to downgrade it heavily and release it then have every reviewer go "Why isn't the graphics being shown, as advertised in trailer/tech demo." It is arguable to say, the consoles simply can't handle it but I am sure you can optimize it enough and what happened to that advertisement about ps4 running watch dogs 1080p at 60fps only to pull it down later? Or am I missing some information here?

 

I really wish I can understand the mind of the developer sometimes and how they manage their game.

[Askew]

As well as there being more performance involved with PC gaming, there is also in some ways less bullshit (as in lies/marketing drivel)  from the games industry involved as far as I'm concerned.

 

This argument is a console argument, the hardware causing the problem is consoles, the people being constrained by the problem are developing for consoles, the people revealing that there is a problem are talking to the console market, the people justifying it are talking to console users, the end users  being prepared gently to experience the problems are console users.

 

This thing right here is a perfect example of the whole chain of shit that exists with a console production that I can just click 'Purchase' in Steam and avoid all of if I just spend a little bit more cash on hardware, and a little bit less on the game.

 

The focus of PC vs Console debate always being centered around price, and PC being more expensive makes me giggle a bit, because there is a whole other dimension of labour involved in being a console gamer who cares about technology that I consider my time to be worth more than.

 

So that's the one boon of being a PC gamer that I can never see myself being bothered to explain to somebody on the other side of a price oriented PC vs console argument, and I can happly say that I don't have to listen to or argue with people justifying the consequences to the limitations of console hardware to me, because it's not my market and I don't care.

[Askew]

Carmack back to develop truly optimized game engines for their crap hardware

 

Yes, like getting RAGE to run at 60fps on PS3 and Xbox 360 (despite the vastly different architecture) and stay there almost all of the time while still looking better than most other games for those platforms despite the real time resolution scaling on textures.

[felixbearpig]

in 5 years it will be .... pfff 60FPS !!!!!!! these game sould run in 120 fraames maxed!!!!derp derp!! stupid consoles, holding back PCmaster race derp 

[Kamina]

But films have motion blur to create the illusion of fluid motion. 

[Silent_Xaxal]

While I would call BS, I actually agree at least with the first statement. Yes, I like the fluidity of 60, but having come from older systems and what not, and going back to those systems, 30 isn't that bad. It's not on par with 60, but it's acceptable.

 

What isn't acceptable is restraining the PC due to console's lack of stuff.

[MooseParade]

I might be one in a million, but I truly can't tell a difference between 30 and 60 FPS. Take Borderlands for instance. I have the first game on both PC and Xbox 360 and besides the graphical clarity and resolution I can't tell a difference in frame rates.

[Verne]

It's a shame that people like this exist. It would be better for developers to just say they can't get something to run at 60 FPS with all the eye candy they have put in the game (this way you don't have to say you are bad at optimization). This is a pretty bad blow at "next-gen" right after the whole Watch-dogs thing (first a reduction of graphical quality, then drop FPS from 60 to 30 and finally lowering of the resolution from 1080p to 900p...).

[ivhyn]

People write a lot of BS here.

It's a console game which is played with a controller, 33ms input time is okay with a controller.

Also, if you had seen their game you'd know that they go for a filmic look, the Order 1886 even has black bars for a 2.35:1 format.

[Misanthrope]

People write a lot of BS here.

It's a console game which is played with a controller, 33ms input time is okay with a controller.

Also, if you had seen their game you'd know that they go for a filmic look, the Order 1886 even has black bars for a 2.35:1 format.

 

You mean those games that basically play themselves by adding auto-aim? Now THAT is what I call BS. People here simply expect better cause they know better, nothing wrong with that.

[Misanthrope]

What is disturbing to me, is that I would see youtube comments and other websites revealing information on a game and if the graphics don't look good then people in the comments begin thrashing it as if it was the only thing that mattered.

 

Performance and framerate directly affect gameplay it's not just the "look" of 30FPS that matters. To many console gamers this is irrelevant cause they quite frankly suck and just grew up having auto-aim play for them but with proper performance and internet connections and homebrew servers, PC gamers actually do know better.

[ivhyn]

You mean those games that basically play themselves by adding auto-aim? Now THAT is what I call BS. People here simply expect better cause they know better, nothing wrong with that.

A console game without slight auto-aim just plays terrible.

I've tried all framerates from 24Hz up to 144Hz and I felt that in some games, especially in the slow paced ones, input time, latency and framerate don't really matter that much. I love first person shooters in high framerates but boy, for a game with the visuals of Order 1886 I'd sacrifice the 60fps for the visuals and a lower framerate, just because it's a game that wouldn't benefit a low frametime.

[Misanthrope]

A console game without slight auto-aim just plays terrible.

I've tried all framerates from 24Hz up to 144Hz and I felt that in some games, especially in the slow paced ones that input time, latency and framerate doesn't really matter that much. I love first person shooters in high framerates but boy, for a game with the visuals of Order 1886 I'd sacrifice the 60fps for the visuals and a lower framerate, just because it's a game that wouldn't benefit a low frametime.

 

You need to literally believe it when you see it: no doubt it will be heavily gimped from all those previews. So you're basically sacrificing performance for slightly less shitty looking graphics, thanks but no thanks.

 

And as to your argument yes, I personally play Skyrim with far too many mods for my current rigs and while I do get 55-60 FPS most of the time it frequently dips well below 50 into the low 40s and stutters and outright freezes are somewhat frequent, but for just mostly walking around and stealth killing mobs it doesn't really matters like you said, so I'd give you that.

 

However I dare to say that even with very outdated hardware, my version of Skyrim looks a hell of a lot better than even what a theoretical PS4 or xbone version could pull off. But alas like I said myself, we'll have to wait and see.

[deathjester]

A console game without slight auto-aim just plays terrible.

I've tried all framerates from 24Hz up to 144Hz and I felt that in some games, especially in the slow paced ones, input time, latency and framerate don't really matter that much. I love first person shooters in high framerates but boy, for a game with the visuals of Order 1886 I'd sacrifice the 60fps for the visuals and a lower framerate, just because it's a game that wouldn't benefit a low frametime.

 

The Order 1886 has already got a graphics downgrade. Sony then lied about it. Sony then delayed it until 2015. You better hope Destiny is good, because this summer is going to be important for these consoles.. I am predicting the biggest hype fest and advertising campaign by laughable "game journalist" sites like IGN ever. 500 million dollar budget? I bet 300 million of that is advertising and deals to advertise with sites that make money generating internet traffic, who also happen to get "sneak peak exclusives" which make them an OBSCENE amount of money from clicks on their site. I think we can pretty much pencil in a 9 rating now from all the big sites who always have "believe the hype" on the game box, even if the game is mediocre.

 

Add to that we have a multiplayer title, that is mmo like, not affected by pirating at all,  which skipped a pc player base of 65 million (just on steam) which is in love with shooters and mmo's for the Xbox One that has 4 million units in peoples homes? That literally makes no sense at all. The whole release of Destiny wreaks of shadiness and it better be a DAMN good game because consoles need a title they can say "GTA V not on PC" with. No one would pass up PC with this game without a reason and those reasons are green. I LAUGHED at Bungies reasons for keeping the game off PC. Bungie simply got more money than they think they could have made on PC. Whether that is because the game is mediocre, or they got a @#%^ load of money? Who knows.

 

Destiny could make or break these consoles, seeing the next E3 is about to show almost all 2015 games or games that are on the PC.  

[kuddlesworth9419]

No one strives to achieve 30 fps in any game. They have 30fps because the hardware isn't strong enough. It's like saying we strive to get 720p on our game because it's better than 1080p. It's bloody stupid. If I was the head of a dev team I would simply refuse to dev on a console and dev for PC instead. I would hate to see a game that I have been working on for years be displayed at sub 1080p and 30fps locked. It would make me feel sick. If the Order was on PC the devs would be able to see their vision actually become a reality. The order in 4k with high resolution textures at 60fps would look simply amazing. Look at what consoles have done to the gaming industry. It's dumbed it down technically and gameplay wise and that is such a shame.

 

If consoles died out after the console wars I could only imagine where gaming could have been. But instead we get crappy ports sub par textures, low frame rates, low resolutions. Everything is made worse because of consoles. 

 

Rant over.

[ivhyn]

The Order 1886 has already got a graphics downgrade. Sony then lied about it. Sony then delayed it until 2015.

So say some, I'd wait for the game to release before bashing it, but it already looks better than anything you could achieve on a PC that costs the same as a PS4, got some great particle effects too.

Sony obviously can't come out and say: sorry that this game's graphics suck, we screwed up because we didn't want to sell a $800 console for $500 and make a f-load of loss on it.

[deathjester]

So say some, I'd wait for the game to release before bashing it, but it already looks better than anything you could achieve on a PC that costs the same as a PS4, got some great particle effects too.

Sony obviously can't come out and say: sorry that this game's graphics suck, we screwed up because we didn't want to sell a $800 console for $500 and make a f-load of loss on it.

 

So say some? We aren't blind. The game was downgraded. 

 

Do you really want to discuss cost? BF4 was 25 bucks multiple times this year already (just check cheapshark.com for deals for multiple digital distros). Tomb Raider is currently 7.99. NBA 2k 14 has been under 10. Watch Dog's many got for 28 (deluxe version) many 40. Titanfall was like 40. 

 

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/BzDRzy

 

PCPartPicker part list: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/BzDRzy

Price breakdown by merchant: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/BzDRzy/by_merchant/

Benchmarks: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/BzDRzy/benchmarks/

 

CPU: AMD FX-8320 3.5GHz 8-Core Processor  ($134.99 @ NCIX US) 

CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler  ($29.94 @ OutletPC) 

Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-970A-UD3P ATX AM3+ Motherboard  ($74.99 @ Newegg) 

Memory: Team Vulcan 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory  ($64.99 @ Newegg) 

Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($54.43 @ OutletPC) 

Video Card: XFX Radeon R9 280 3GB Double Dissipation Video Card  ($219.99 @ Newegg) 

Case: Cooler Master HAF 912 ATX Mid Tower Case  ($47.99 @ Micro Center) 

Power Supply: Corsair CX 750W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($69.99 @ Micro Center) 

Total: $685.31

(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)

(Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-05-28 03:43 EDT-0400)

 

685 bucks with tax. Will max Watchdog's. CPU and GPU blow away a PS4. What is the PS4 with tax? 430? Now add in 50 bucks for PS live for just one year. We are at 480. Now go price those games for me on PS4. I will save you the time. They are all 60 bucks. That is 177 bucks saved on 5 games and that is if you missed the Watchdog's Origin India thing where it would have been more? So now we are at  657.

 

You paid around 30 bucks more for the PC at this point, after a few games. You will save hundreds of more dollars and even approach thousands and have a machine that is much more powerful with exclusives of your own like Star Citizen, Wild Star, Diablo expansion that isn't out on PS4 yet, a better version of Planetside 2, Titanfall (can't have that on Playstation), Dark Souls 2 which that GPU can downsample to look ridiculously good with Gedosato.      

 

Pc gaming is cheaper. Please never talk about cost as a plus for consoles. You pay more, get way less and only idiots believe the opposite is true. You could switch the parts for a $129.00 MSI z97 SLI board and a I5 K and a R9 290 and pay less in a year. Then add another after you save tons of money and game at 4k. 

 

Console gaming is expensive not cheap. Oh and btw the AMD GPU comes with 3 free games.

[ivhyn]

Do you really want to discuss cost?

 

I wasn't talking about the overall pricepoint or about the cost that follows, all that I said was, and I quote myself:

but it already looks better than anything you could achieve on a PC that costs the same as a PS4

Aside from included games, cost of the online play: all the low level optimization that the Dev's are doing (reduction of CPU overhead by Mantle) creates possibilites that aren't there on a mid-tier rig. I'm talking about using 4GB of Frambuffer for huge textures and 4xMSAA. Also, take a look at Linus' Ass Creed video where he said that Playstation 4 got some really good bang for the buck.