Discussion: besides "looks", currently pc gaming is the same as console

[Mira Yurizaki]

I feel like there's an argument that one isn't doing something, but is totally doing it for something else.

 

(Vague vagueness is totally vague)

[Gdourado]

I see all over people bashing the original ps4 for using what is referred to as a tablet cpu. 

And I as a tech enthusiast love all the advances and hardware there is today. 

A person can use a 16 thread Ryzen cpu or a beast 12 thread 5ghz Intel cpu to do wonderful things with a pc. 

But when it comes to gaming, developers are not using all that power and are limited by console hardware. 

 

[Mira Yurizaki]

7 minutes ago, Gdourado said:

But when it comes to gaming, developers are not using all that power and are limited by console hardware.

Even in PC exclusive land, nobody would do this. Why? Because practicality. Why would you limit yourself to a tiny fraction of the potential user base?

 

Here's another reason why: what does doing more add to your game? We could have learning AI in our games, but if they get too smart to the point where you lose all the time, the game is no fun (and no, you can't use the excuse "git gud scrub"). We could have billions of particles all around but does that do anything? Does having 16K resolution textures on a character model make sense? Or what about 10 million polys per character, regardless of who they are or what part in the story they have? Adding more for the sake of adding more doesn't really make a game any more fun, exciting (well, except to those with huge epeens), or better.

 

If a game isn't fun, it doesn't matter if it puts Superposition or Time Spy to shame. It's a bad game.

[Sniperfox47]

1 minute ago, M.Yurizaki said:

Even in PC exclusive land, nobody would do this. Why? Because practicality. Why would you limit yourself to a tiny fraction of the potential user base?

 

Here's another reason why: what does doing more add to your game? We could have learning AI in our games, but if they get too smart to the point where you lose all the time, the game is no fun (and no, you can't use the excuse "git gud scrub"). We could have billions of particles all around but does that do anything? Does having 16K resolution textures on a character model make sense? Or what about 10 million polys per character, regardless of who they are or what part in the story they have? Adding more for the sake of adding more doesn't really make a game any more fun, exciting (well, except to those with huge epeens), or better.

 

If a game isn't fun, it doesn't matter if it puts Superposition or Time Spy to shame. It's a bad game.

You could have raytraced holographic sights on your gun so the holographic sights don't look like garbage? Note, I'm not saying raytraced the whole scene, that would be dumb, just the sights themselves.

[Mira Yurizaki]

17 minutes ago, Gdourado said:

But when it comes to gaming, developers are not using all that power and are limited by console hardware.

(Yes I'm repeating this quote, but I'm certain this thought wouldn't be seen if I edited my post)

 

This may also come as a surprise, but console game development spurred a lot of graphical effects that modern games enjoy today. The N64 itself has an impressive list of graphical effects for its time (http://gliden64.blogspot.com/2013/10/frame-buffer-emulation-intro.html). And then there's everyone's favorite lighting method: deferred lighting. It was developed for an Xbox game. Though to be fair, the Xbox had a much better GPU than PCs did at the time of release. It really wasn't until the Eighth Generation did all of the consoles actually lag behind the power of PCs. Until then, consoles either beat or matched what was available to PCs at the time.

 

Another fun part is everyone likes to praise id. Their old stuff doesn't seem impressive when you start looking at it in more detail. Maybe for the time it was impressive, but to point, the original Doom engine had an FPS cap of 35 (whereas Wolf3D was 75 or so). The original Quake also had an FPS cap, but then again it doesn't look so well when the animations were choppy as heck. Also even then, those games weren't "using all the power" because the requirements for the games were hardware that was a generation or two old.

Just now, Sniperfox47 said:

You could have raytraced holographic sights on your gun so the holographic sights don't look like garbage? Note, I'm not saying raytraced the whole scene, that would be dumb, just the sights themselves.

If it's good enough and does the job, it's good enough.

[App4that]

32 minutes ago, Gdourado said:

I see all over people bashing the original ps4 for using what is referred to as a tablet cpu. 

And I as a tech enthusiast love all the advances and hardware there is today. 

A person can use a 16 thread Ryzen cpu or a beast 12 thread 5ghz Intel cpu to do wonderful things with a pc. 

But when it comes to gaming, developers are not using all that power and are limited by console hardware. 

 

Look at the Steam survey to see all that "power", then remember most are prebuilts choked by bloatware.

 

Work my job one day holmes and you'll see thousands of PC users complaining about "optimization" because the PC the salesman told them did "60fps in any game", can't. Console doesn't hold back PC games. The wide range of possibilities on the PC side as far as possible configurations does. 

[Thaldor]

I didn't read through the whole thread and my points might be pointed out many times.

 

The graphics options on PC work both ways. With the high-end PC you can enjoy all the eyecandy the developer wanted to include. But they also give PC one very big advantage over consoles that consoles can probably never get, upward compatibility. It is not often mentioned, because no one really likes to play the game 24 fps and minimum settings, but it still is there. You can take older computer and play newer games with it as long as you can live with worser graphics than on a console and worser framerates, it's like playing Xbox One game on Xbox 360, yes, you need to make compromises and you may even need to suffer a lot, but it's still possible.

 

The thing why I have stopped even following console markets is that consoles have become PCs. In the 90's and 00's consoles were acctually very good choice for PC gaming just because the simplicity, you popped the game into the console and started playing it, no installation, no updates, no hassle, just play it. But now the difference is very small since there's the same problem of storage space and installing the games no matter the platform (Nintendo is probably the only one left who somehow still tries to keep the old values alive), only difference is that when your PS/Xbox runs out of memory you need to start to think what you want to uninstall and on a PC you go and buy another HDD/SSD and install it.

 

Then there's the "ecosystem". PC is flexible not only because it can run games on higher and lower graphics depending on the performance, but because you are not binded to anything. You don't need to buy the one and only available wheel controller that the manufacturer allows you to use or the more expensive one that has been branded by something like Momo but is almost the same. You want to use that old joystick that barely has USB? Go ahead, as long as you find working drivers for it and it works you're good to go. You want to use real cars driving wheel and pedals and make them as real as possible, go ahead, there's no Microsoft or Sony with their licences stopping you. Most of the time you can even use the console controllers on PC without problems. On console, it depends, I wouldn't be suprised if Microsoft and Sony flash the possibility to enforce their right to the platform and ban every single 3rd party device on their console (this has been flashed in the past quite often, even more often than banning the second-hand games).

 

As I see it and have lived it (born in 1989) the consoles had a huge uphand when I was child compared to PCs and it was mostly because they could give something that PC couldn't. Then PS came and IMO the consoles started to degenerate, they lost that something and PS2 was the first console I still kind of refuse to call "gaming console" and for me it's "multimedia device" and when the PS3 came, in my circles most of my friends who bought it didn't buy it to game with it, they bought it to watch BR-movies with it and for some it wasn't even gaming console and they didn't buy any games for it, they just used it to watch movies, YouTube, later Netflix and so on. I was kind of raged when Wii came and reviewers gave it bad reviews just because it wasn't "multimedia device" but a "gaming console", machine that is ment to play games with and any multimedia features it has are bonus and for me that marks the end of the gaming consoles, when the most important thing in the console isn't that you can play games with it, but what else you can do with it. And that is why I love Nintendo so fucking much, they are not even trying to directly compete with anyone, they are just trying to experiment with stuff, you wouldn't first say about Nintendo that they are experimenting with something, but that is what they have been doing since Wii after a long time since the great "failures" with Famicon and NES experiments with a lot of, at the time, odd stuff. They are not even trying to compete against "multimedia devices" they even take some thought and remove multimedia features from their consoles and really try to create something new instead of copy-pasteing the old and making it more powerful, and that is something what I think the consoles need to make a difference from the PC and not just be PCs without option to upgrade, with limited usability, with limited freedom and so on (you probably get what I mean).

[redsquirrel0249]

On 5/9/2018 at 4:14 PM, App4that said:

nothing tells you that you can only pick one

Not what I'm saying. Choice is what allows us to decide what to like and what not to, it just often manifests in purchases, not always.

 

On 5/9/2018 at 4:14 PM, App4that said:

we write down

Who's that? I can't find it.

 

On 5/9/2018 at 4:14 PM, App4that said:

CSGO

That's one of the games I mentioned, yes. At any rate, this comes back to points 2, 4 and 5, of my previous statement.

 

On 5/9/2018 at 4:14 PM, App4that said:

modern

I didn't say that

 

On 5/9/2018 at 4:14 PM, App4that said:

nitpicky isn't what I'd call it

Are you attempting to insult me?

 

On 5/9/2018 at 4:14 PM, App4that said:

You want to argue for PC

No, I just pointed out that there are worthwhile PC exclusives that were ignored.

 

On 5/9/2018 at 4:14 PM, App4that said:

can't get HDR working on PC

It functions, it's just weird. But I don't care about HDR, so whatever.

[App4that]

6 minutes ago, redsquirrel0249 said:

Not what I'm saying. Choice is what allows us to decide what to like and what not to, it just often manifests in purchases, not always.

 

Who's that? I can't find it.

 

That's one of the games I mentioned, yes. At any rate, this comes back to points 2, 4 and 5, of my previous statement.

 

I didn't say that

 

Are you attempting to insult me?

 

No, I just pointed out that there are worthwhile PC exclusives that were ignored.

 

It functions, it's just weird. But I don't care about HDR, so whatever.

PC exclusives aren't ignored. They're just not on the same level as current console exclusives. 

 

HDR matters. It's a technology that PC is way behind console on.

[Sniperfox47]

6 hours ago, App4that said:

PC exclusives aren't ignored. They're just not on the same level as current console exclusives. 

That's a huge matter of perspective. I don't personally feel "Open World Sandbox Game X" is better than any of the PC exclusives right now because that's not my taste. If you're into those kinds of games that's fine, but to act like they're somehow "better" than games other people like is a bit egocentric.

 

6 hours ago, App4that said:

HDR matters. It's a technology that PC is way behind console on.

At the moment? It really doesn't. At the moment, for the vast majority of users HDR is just a marketing Gimmick specifically because they don't have an HDR display.

[App4that]

7 minutes ago, Sniperfox47 said:

That's a huge matter of perspective. I don't personally feel "Open World Sandbox Game X" is better than any of the PC exclusives right now because that's not my taste. If you're into those kinds of games that's fine, but to act like they're somehow "better" than games other people like is a bit egocentric.

 

At the moment? It really doesn't. At the moment, for the vast majority of users HDR is just a marketing Gimmick specifically because they don't have an HDR display.

The adoption rate of HDR is pretty strong. Also calling it a gimmick is kinda silly, it's a larger visual improvement than resolution in some cases. HDR is why nothing I've seen on PC can beat Horizon Zero Dawn for visuals. Not that HZD beats PC, just that impressive. 

 

Look at the sales numbers for Horizon Zero Dawn, watch the sales of Red Dead Redemption 2 and the Spiderman exclusive on PS4. If these titles weren't as I say, those numbers wouldn't be as high as they are, and those titles wouldn't sell millions of consoles. 

 

 

[Sniperfox47]

53 minutes ago, App4that said:

The adoption rate of HDR is pretty strong. Also calling it a gimmick is kinda silly, it's a larger visual improvement than resolution in some cases. HDR is why nothing I've seen on PC can beat Horizon Zero Dawn for visuals. Not that HZD beats PC, just that impressive. 

Gimmick: a technique or device meant more to draw attention and inspire business than to serve a functional purpose.

 

As the majority of users still have SDR displays (SDR display shipments still exceeded HDR in 2018, much less all the legacy displays), HDR is exactly that until more users have displays capable of handling it.

 

 

[App4that]

2 minutes ago, Sniperfox47 said:

Gimmick: a technique or device meant more to draw attention and inspire business than to serve a functional purpose.

 

As the majority of users still have SDR displays (SDR display shipments still exceeded HDR in 2018, much less all the legacy displays), HDR is exactly that until more users have displays capable of handling it.

 

 

Only HDR serves a purpose. CD Project Red implemented HDR in The Witcher 3, are you saying they did so as a gimmick, for a game years old?

[EunSoo]

28 minutes ago, Sniperfox47 said:

Gimmick: a technique or device meant more to draw attention and inspire business than to serve a functional purpose.

 

As the majority of users still have SDR displays (SDR display shipments still exceeded HDR in 2018, much less all the legacy displays), HDR is exactly that until more users have displays capable of handling it.

 

 

The shipments of 60hz displays exceed those of 120+hz displays in 2018, so are high refresh displays now gimmicks? Or is that logic inherently flawed?

[Peskanova]

<120hz no real gaming XDDD

[Sniperfox47]

3 hours ago, Sombra said:

The shipments of 60hz displays exceed those of 120+hz displays in 2018, so are high refresh displays now gimmicks? Or is that logic inherently flawed?

Thanks for missing my point entirely. The key difference here is that:

A) 120Hz products have been widely available for a decade, while HDR display sales were negligable until the past two years.

B) the market segment we're discussing (Gamers) has a higher than typical affinity to 120Hz displays, while their affinity to HDR displays has been about on par with the average consumer.

C) legacy software supports 120Hz right out of the box. There is *not* a wealth of content for HDR meaning even if you buy a display, only a few titles will even benefit from it, titles you may not even play.

 

And yeah, if you had sold a game in 2009 touting "This groundbreaking game supports 120Hz gameplay!" that would be a gimmick.

 

 

4 hours ago, App4that said:

Only HDR serves a purpose. CD Project Red implemented HDR in The Witcher 3, are you saying they did so as a gimmick, for a game years old?

I'm not saying it doesn't serve a purpose period. I'm saying it doesn't serve a purpose *for most current users*.

 

They most likely implimented it on PlayStation because:

• Their rendering pipeline already was handling it anyways meaning it wasn't a ton of work for them to just expose the higher colour space.
• It acts as a gimmick for users, drawing additional marketing attention to the game
• It gives them PlayStation Pro badging
• As a major content creator they likely received additional funding from PlayStation to impliment it as a showcase software on the PlayStation Pro

I imagine the reasons for Xbox One S were similar.

 

I never said HDR isn't useful. Just that at the moment, it's used as little more than a marketing tool. In 5 years when there's actual decent amount of content for it will it be important? Sure. But at the moment for most users it serves far less purpose than how it's marketed.

 

[App4that]

3 hours ago, Sniperfox47 said:

Snip

Now you're just being sour.

 

No where in the definition of gimmik does it say most it's a gimmik because most people don't use it, or speak of a matter of time.

 

Ask someone sour who can't afford a high refresh rate monitor or console gamer sour about 30fps caps why they don't have one and it's because it's a gimmik, "the human eye can't see past 30fps." 

 

Sour grapes. 

[Sniperfox47]

56 minutes ago, App4that said:

Now you're just being sour.

 

No where in the definition of gimmik does it say most it's a gimmik because most people don't use it, or speak of a matter of time.

 

Ask someone sour who can't afford a high refresh rate monitor or console gamer sour about 30fps caps why they don't have one and it's because it's a gimmik, "the human eye can't see past 30fps." 

 

Sour grapes. 

Considering I have an HDR AMOLED TV (Sony A8F), a PS4 Pro, and a workstation with HDR output and editing capabilities; there's nothing for me to be "sour" about.

 

A gimmick is a sales technique that pushes a feature on it's ability to attract customers as opposed to it's usefulness. Being a gimmick doesn't make something bad or useless, it just means that it's marketing value is greater than. It's usefulness.

 

You can say what you want about HDR but that doesn't change the fact that there is *very* little content out there right now and your average gamer isn't going to see any benefit because the content they play currently in most cases doesn't support it.

 

Out of all the games available on the PS4, as of August last year only ~30 of them supported HDR. That's out of the ~100 games that were updated for the PS4 Pro at the time. And even among new releases since then HDR support in games has been hit and miss. And that's with Sony launching a program where they actively paid and encouraged major developers to upgrade their old games.

 

If you're one of the Gamers who plays one of those 30 games? Great for you. But for the rest of users the fact that their console or display supports HDR is meaningless. And even for players of those games, how much time are you spending in those games?

 

HDR is great, but the fact that "Consoles had it first" is about as meaningful as "Movies had it first", since even today neither movies nor consoles have any significant amount of content taking advantage of it.

[App4that]

Just now, Sniperfox47 said:

Considering I have an HDR AMOLED TV (Sony A8F), a PS4 Pro, and a workstation with HDR output and editing capabilities; there's nothing for me to be "sour" about.

 

A gimmick is a sales technique that pushes a feature on it's ability to attract customers as opposed to it's usefulness. Being a gimmick doesn't make something bad or useless, it just means that it's marketing value is greater than. It's usefulness.

 

You can say what you want about HDR but that doesn't change the fact that there is *very* little content out there right now and your average gamer isn't going to see any benefit because the content they play currently in most cases doesn't support it.

 

Out of all the games available on the PS4, as of August last year only ~30 of them supported HDR. That's out of the ~100 games that were updated for the PS4 Pro at the time. And even among new releases since then HDR support in games has been hit and miss. And that's with Sony launching a program where they actively paid and encouraged major developers to upgrade their old games.

 

If you're one of the Gamers who plays one of those 30 games? Great for you. But for the rest of users the fact that their console or display supports HDR is meaningless. And even for players of those games, how much time are you spending in those games?

 

HDR is great, but the fact that "Consoles had it first" is about as meaningful as "Movies had it first", since even today neither movies nor consoles have any significant amount of content taking advantage of it.

The issue is your gross misuse of "gimmik", the irony is you posted the definition yourself. 

 

The fact you don't see the value in HDR while your only gaming access to it is PC. Proves my point. HDR doesn't work on PC, while it does on console. 

[Sniperfox47]

43 minutes ago, App4that said:

The issue is your gross misuse of "gimmik", the irony is you posted the definition yourself. 

 

The fact you don't see the value in HDR while your only gaming access to it is PC. Proves my point. HDR doesn't work on PC, while it does on console. 

A) Like I just said, I have a PS4 Pro.

B) Both Windows 10 and Linux support HDR just fine with my GPUs (Titan X Pascal) so I have no idea what you're talking about.

[App4that]

8 minutes ago, Sniperfox47 said:

A) Like I just said, I have a PS4 Pro.

B) Both Windows 10 and Linux support HDR just fine with my GPUs (Titan X Pascal) so I have no idea what you're talking about.

So we're side stepping you misusing "gimmick", OK then.

 

If you have a PS4 Pro and have played HZD in HDR, you know the influence HDR has and how PC doesn't have an exclusive to compete with it.

 

HDR does not work on Windows, Dymitry covered it. The latest 1803 actually, somehow, made it worse. I've run a 980ti, 1080, and 1080ti to see if I could get HDR working. All failed. Only way to get HDR in Windows atm is using a Radeon card.

[Sniperfox47]

3 hours ago, App4that said:

So we're side stepping you misusing "gimmick", OK then.

I've already quoted the definition of gimmick and have followed every bit of it to the word. That you have a different understanding of the word doesn't change what it means.

 

3 hours ago, App4that said:

If you have a PS4 Pro and have played HZD in HDR, you know the influence HDR has and how PC doesn't have an exclusive to compete with it.

Eh. HZD is a pretty game, and it's a prettier game with HDR, but it's not some magical unicorn leagues above anything else. It's just a game like any other. There have been better games before and there will be better games after. It makes it slightly more pretty but doesn't actually change the game in any meaningful way.

 

Besides, why are you so focussed on exclusives? Being locked to a single platform doesn't magically make a game better. There are plenty of great games that manage to be cross platform. Buying into a console for exclusives only serves to lock yourself into an ecosystem and take away freedom from yourself. 

 

3 hours ago, App4that said:

HDR does not work on Windows, Dymitry covered it. The latest 1803 actually, somehow, made it worse. I've run a 980ti, 1080, and 1080ti to see if I could get HDR working. All failed. Only way to get HDR in Windows atm is using a Radeon card.

I don't know what you're talking about. I've played Redout and Nex Machina in HDR just fine, and have watched HDR movies just fine. Do you have a source to this supposed coverage that it doesn't work?

 

What does happen is if you have HDR enabled, it "dulls" the colours (i.e. makes them more accurate) for non-HDR content, but that's because you're no longer stretching to the monitors full colour space. Just don't enable HDR support in Windows itself unless you're watching HDR videos.

[App4that]

1 hour ago, Sniperfox47 said:

I've already quoted the definition of gimmick and have followed every bit of it to the word. That you have a different understanding of the word doesn't change what it means.

 

Eh. HZD is a pretty game, and it's a prettier game with HDR, but it's not some magical unicorn leagues above anything else. It's just a game like any other. There have been better games before and there will be better games after. It makes it slightly more pretty but doesn't actually change the game in any meaningful way.

 

Besides, why are you so focussed on exclusives? Being locked to a single platform doesn't magically make a game better. There are plenty of great games that manage to be cross platform. Buying into a console for exclusives only serves to lock yourself into an ecosystem and take away freedom from yourself. 

 

I don't know what you're talking about. I've played Redout and Nex Machina in HDR just fine, and have watched HDR movies just fine. Do you have a source to this supposed coverage that it doesn't work?

 

What does happen is if you have HDR enabled, it "dulls" the colours (i.e. makes them more accurate) for non-HDR content, but that's because you're no longer stretching to the monitors full colour space. Just don't enable HDR support in Windows itself unless you're watching HDR videos.

Your view of the definition of gimmick, does not match the definition you posted.

 

Person John = 1;

 

John walks into a bar, kidding. 

 

John walks into a bic box store. John sees two 4k televisions. One is HDR, the other is not. John buys the HDR television, he finds use in HDR watching HDR content and playing games. HDR is not a gimmick, he found as much or more use from HDR than the marketing to buy that television.

 

Back to top.

 

John walks into a big box store. John sees two toasters. On has self loading and the other doesn't. He finds the self loading has the bread not dropping in right so the toast isn't toasted evenly. He stops using the self loading feature. Self loading is a gimmick.

 

On the topic of HDR and Windows, if I don't have HDR enabled so that my non HDR content is washed out, I can't take advantage of HDR in supported content. While on both the PS4 and Xbox One (ironically) automatically change between SDR and HDR depending on the content. Now HDR just straight up doesn't work with 1803...

[Sniperfox47]

10 hours ago, App4that said:

Your view of the definition of gimmick, does not match the definition you posted.

 

Person John = 1;

 

John walks into a bar, kidding. 

 

John walks into a bic box store. John sees two 4k televisions. One is HDR, the other is not. John buys the HDR television, he finds use in HDR watching HDR content and playing games. HDR is not a gimmick, he found as much or more use from HDR than the marketing to buy that television.

 

Back to top.

 

John walks into a big box store. John sees two toasters. On has self loading and the other doesn't. He finds the self loading has the bread not dropping in right so the toast isn't toasted evenly. He stops using the self loading feature. Self loading is a gimmick.

The fact that something gets used by users doesn't make it suddenly not a gimmick. The fact that it gets used by a single user in that example even less so. Right in the definition it specifically states "more" towards marketing, not "only" towards marketing.

 

Even if he buys it and enjoys HDR content on it is he really getting anything more out of it than he would have out of the SDR TV? HDR is heavily marketed as a transformative technology but is it really transformative for him, or is it a feature he just uses because he's paid for it so feels he should use it? He takes it home, is he even going to be able *to* use it in the first place? He has no content that supports HDR.

 

10 hours ago, App4that said:

On the topic of HDR and Windows, if I don't have HDR enabled so that my non HDR content is washed out, I can't take advantage of HDR in supported content. While on both the PS4 and Xbox One (ironically) automatically change between SDR and HDR depending on the content. Now HDR just straight up doesn't work with 1803...

On Windows it switches too, if the content is fullscreen (i.e. true fullscreen, not borderless Window) and supports HDR output. That's the same requirenments for it to switch automatically on Xbox one. The consoles aren't magically knowing when to switch, the display server just doesn't care about outputting HDR or not HDR if there's only a single app. Linux also supports it for these kinds of apps, even though X11 (the display server) isn't even capable of handling HDR. The OS doesn't really need to do anything to support them outside the display drivers

 

The difference on Windows is you also have a desktop and other legacy non-hdr apps running at the same time, so the compositor needs to also account for these apps. If you enable HDR support in Windows, it enables HDR for composited windows (i.e. windowed mode and borderless window/windowed fullscreen) by explicitly telling the compositor to look out for them.

 

Soin order to do this it has to remap SDR content to your HDR colour space. Prior to the latest build of Windows all this did was statically map the colours across which meant they appeared more realistic (less vibrant) on your monitor afterwards.1803 shifts content by a certain amount, but it's still a squished colour space because you're trying to somehow display together content with two *very* different colour spaces at the same time.

[Gdourado]

I agree with the part about windows being a problem.
For me at least. 
I know it is a good part of the pc ability to perform several kinds of task, like productivity and work related task and content creation.
But for me that is part of the problem. 
The computer is a work tool and the desk, keyboard and mouse is associated with work. 

When I game for leisure, I don't want to continue at the desk, I want to go to the couch or recliner and game on the big screen TV. 

I could build a great itx pc to game with a console formfactor, great specs and the excellent Xbox one controller is widely supported for almost all recent games. 

But I just don't want to go through the troubles of having to use a wireless keyboard and track pad to deal with windows, installations, drivers, windows optimization, disabling services, security patches...