By Robert (A Virtual Duck), Week of April 28th 2014
The Amazing Spiderman 2 is out on Xbox One...Three days early.
The game, which released on the US Digital Store today, was originally cancelled for the Xbox One. Microsoft said an issue with the publisher (Activision) arose, but apparently good 'ol Phil sorted it out for us and even got us it three days early, even if the retail version seems to have gone MIA. The Xbox 360, PS4, PS3, and PC versions of TAS2 will release on May 2nd. Get in your extra time, Xbox Fans!
Technically, the game is the same as the PS4 version, running at 1080p 30fps with the same graphic settings. No advantage for PS4 in resolution, and no advantage for Xbox One in textures. It's an even playing field, which is what we really want to see this generation. Each fanbase receiving a proper port of their games.
In other news, Driveclub has announced an October 8th release date after a nine month delay. The PS4 exclusive will hopefully (for all you PS players) release then, if it isn't delayed again like Watch Dogs was back in 2013.
A blog focusing on Xbox One and Xbox One games, especially upcoming Xbox One Exclusives.
Tuesday, 29 April 2014
Tuesday, 22 April 2014
Fable Legends Sure Is Pretty
By Robert (A Virtual Duck), Week of April 21st 2014
Fable Legends is due out in 2015.
And they have just released the first pictures of it, as an Unreal Engine 4 tech demo and to show the capabilities of Xbox One using DirectX 11.2 and DirectX 12. This tech demo is to do with 100% dynamic lighting, and how much better it looks reflecting light where developers and artists may have missed a reflection with baked lighting. Take a look for yourselves and make sure to click on and enlarge the images. For reference, these are from the Fable Blog here, run by Lionhead, a 1st Party Microsoft Studio.
All of these pictures are full 1080p as is the game, so enjoy. Fable Legends is scheduled to release in 2015.
The above image is of a forest with a loot chest within it, using the Dynamic Lighting parameters.
The picture above is of an arch without using the Dynamic Lighting parameters. Look at how flat it looks.
The above picture is the same arch, with the Dynamic Lighting parameters enabled. Look at how vibrant and realistic it is.
The picture above is a tech demo of how the lighting works. See how the bottoms of the spheres are darkened, and the sunlight conforms to the shape of the objects above it.
If you enjoyed these images, look here for more of the tech demos a la the final picture. There are no more "world" pictures like the arch.
In my opinion, if Sony had published this, the gaming sites would be going mad about how gorgeous it looks and how Sony had once again succeeded in topping the competition. If Microsoft publishes it? Not a peep. It's ridiculous.
Fable Legends is due out in 2015.
And they have just released the first pictures of it, as an Unreal Engine 4 tech demo and to show the capabilities of Xbox One using DirectX 11.2 and DirectX 12. This tech demo is to do with 100% dynamic lighting, and how much better it looks reflecting light where developers and artists may have missed a reflection with baked lighting. Take a look for yourselves and make sure to click on and enlarge the images. For reference, these are from the Fable Blog here, run by Lionhead, a 1st Party Microsoft Studio.
All of these pictures are full 1080p as is the game, so enjoy. Fable Legends is scheduled to release in 2015.
The above image is of a forest with a loot chest within it, using the Dynamic Lighting parameters.
The picture above is of an arch without using the Dynamic Lighting parameters. Look at how flat it looks.
The above picture is the same arch, with the Dynamic Lighting parameters enabled. Look at how vibrant and realistic it is.
The picture above is a tech demo of how the lighting works. See how the bottoms of the spheres are darkened, and the sunlight conforms to the shape of the objects above it.
If you enjoyed these images, look here for more of the tech demos a la the final picture. There are no more "world" pictures like the arch.
In my opinion, if Sony had published this, the gaming sites would be going mad about how gorgeous it looks and how Sony had once again succeeded in topping the competition. If Microsoft publishes it? Not a peep. It's ridiculous.
Friday, 11 April 2014
Sunset Overdrive Reveals Hinted at May 8
By Robert (A Virtual Duck), Week of April 7th 2014
Get ready folks, because the extremely highly anticipated Xbox One exclusive developed by Insomniac games may finally be getting a proper gameplay reveal on May 8. These were hinted at by Sunset Overdrive's official Twitter account with these images, pertaining to Edge Magazine and Edge Online.
Get ready folks, because the extremely highly anticipated Xbox One exclusive developed by Insomniac games may finally be getting a proper gameplay reveal on May 8. These were hinted at by Sunset Overdrive's official Twitter account with these images, pertaining to Edge Magazine and Edge Online.
What's this in this month's print edition of @edgeonline? https://t.co/BcaaepbYoP
Or this in the digital version?: https://t.co/GCBfUfHJL0
— Sunset Overdrive (@SunsetOverdrive) April 11, 2014
Here are the images:
Sunset Overdrive's Logo is pictured in the first image, with May 8 written on the top next to the number #267, obviously pertaining to the issue the reveal will happen in. The second image shows Sunset Overdrive's "OverCharge" cola, again with the May 8 and #267. What could this mean? Will we see game play? All will be revealed... soon...
Saturday, 5 April 2014
Exposing the Lies
After Titanfall's success and Infamous: Second Son's success, along with hardware sales doubling for both new consoles in their respective launch weeks, surely it would be a GOOD time to be a console gamer?
According to the SDF, only if you are loyal to Sony.
The SDF's hate has stepped up on Twitter this week, with some ridiculous claims and clashes with Xbox loyals over what they KNOW is a lie.
I decided I would expose a few lies in this article while on the slopes today. Guess I'll begin.
According to the SDF, only if you are loyal to Sony.
@VirtuaMe @majornelson Everyone knows @Titanfallgame would run 1080p/60fps on PS4. So when Nelson talks about Cloud bullshit, it's insulting
— Shane Stocks (@Shane_Stocks) April 4, 2014
Firstly, the cloud demonstration by Microsoft at the Windows Build Conference last week show a 10,000 particle destruction of a building at 32FPS. The local-compute version of the demonstration dropped down to single-figures, whereas the version with a large amount of the processing offloaded to Azure ran smoothly at 32FPS without a drop. Secondly, the servers were the nearest Azure farm, not in the room next door. Thirdly, apparently the building-explosion was not a throwaway project, so it could, and probably will be, part of an upcoming game.I decided I would expose a few lies in this article while on the slopes today. Guess I'll begin.
Lie #1: Games Look Better on PS4
It is true that the native resolution of some multiplats is higher on PlayStation 4 than on the Xbox One. However, the texture resolution has been ridiculously toned down to reach the 1080p (or 900p) targets. Here is a notable example: Thief running at 900p->1080p on Xbox One, 1080p on PS4 and 1080p on PC. As you can see, the Xbox One stands up well to the PC version with only a tiny decrease in sharpness. The PS4's textures, meanwhile, are disgustingly low-res. This is one of the more noticeable texture problems, but another example is BF4: It runs at 720p->1080p on Xbox One and 900p->1080p on PS4 and yet the textures are HD on Xbox One and SD on PS4, making the Xbox One version look superior. The Xbox One also has another advantage: The RGB colour mode is FULL on Xbox One (255R 255G 255B) and it is limited on PS4, which is why the PS4 games in comparisons look washed out. The SDF will attempt to tell you that is more realistic. Don't listen to them.
Lie #2: PS4 Has Superior Exclusives
The SDF repeatedly claim that the PS4 has multiple AAA exclusives on the Horizon, but the only one I see is The Order: 1886. Driveclub has disappeared into the ether. And The Order has wonderful 1920x800 Black Bars. Mmm. Meanwhile, the Xbox One has Sunset Overdrive, Quantum Break, Kinect Sports Rivals, a new Halo, and likely a new Horizon in 2014. Your move SDF. Oh yeah, don't say Indies. ID@Xbox has us covered.
Lie #3: The Cloud is a Lie
I kind of dealt with this one up top, didn't I? If you need more proof, Driveatars and Titanfall's AI and ships should be enough to show you the way.
Lie #4: Sony is For The Gamers
Sorry to burst your bubble SDF, but Sony couldn't care less about you. While Microsoft is apologising for a five-hour outage which affected less than 1% of the population on LIVE by gifting everyone 7 Days of LIVE, and constantly updating, fixing and refining their console... Sony is sitting on its arse. When PSN went out for more than a month and millions lost their credit cards to hackers, did Sony offer compensation? No, in the face of blinding evidence they said no-one was compromised when it was quite obvious they were, and simply let it slide. Not a cent.
They also lie. They lie to sell their products. There isn't any disc-based DRM, until you take it out of the drive. It's against the ToS to resell games. But shh! The end consumer might find out!
They said Killzone: Shadowfall's Multiplayer ran 1920x1080p 60fps. It runs 960x1080i with an average of 50fps. But who cares? "Sony are fine, Sony are great, they'll never go bankrupt because they're so great."
They sold the PS4 in Canada at parity with the US, and post-launch bummed the Canadian audience by upping the console to $450 and every peripheral and game by $10. MS didn't do that, but it's OK. Sony wouldn't deceive us.
They said that 7GB of the 8GB of GDDR5 in the console was reserved for games, but in reality games are allowed a whopping...4.5GB. Woot. It has the same amount of RAM as a crappy laptop for gaming.
They said that their CPU is supercharged, but it devotes just 6 of its 8 cores to games, exactly as the Xbox One. The only difference is that the Xbox One's CPU is at 1.75GHz and PS4's is at 1.6GHz, which means the Xbox One's CPU is more supercharged than the PS4's. "Shut up, logic."
They have been filling gamers' heads with BS about GPGPU, when they don't seem to realise that their GPGPU technology is on the wrong side of the bridge to work as a CPU. Sorry guys. We also have a GPGPU and a 128bit bus is sufficient for a GPU of the new consoles' strength. Sorry.
Microsoft aren't saintly but they also don't lie to our faces and leave grinning.
So if you see another member of the SDF out there on Twitter, Facebook, LIVE, or even real life (omg rite), then give 'em a good (verbal) slap with these facts. I hereby release you from this article.
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