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Call For Questions For DF Direct Weekly #165 (Patreon)

Published:
2024-05-29 15:26:36
Imported:
2026-06
Tags:
Q&A

Content

Hi everyone, Rich here! Getting all admin out of the way before I head off to London for dinner with Alex and John, here's this week's call for questions post. We'll be discussing the contents of the Sony State of Play that 'airs' on Thursday night, and we may well cover a few other things such as Black Ops 6 definitely appearing on Game(s) Pass, plus the alleged existence of an actual PlayStation VR2 PC adaptor.

Everything's up in the air right now so more topics will be added - and you can suggest them by using the comments box below. And of course, any and all questions you have for the show should go there too.

I'm also happy to report that yesterday, John, Alex and I filmed DF InDirect #2 - the next episode of our Supporter-only show - and it should be with you soon... next week at the latest. It was fun to do and somewhat more relaxed than usual where - and let's be honest - energies can be flagging after an hour plus of standard 'Directing'.

Anyway - the stage (or rather the empty box below) is yours!

Files

Comments

nicklip__pt

Any news on "DF Indirect" please, gentlemen? Been a while since the first episode.

1040STF

I think you didn't read the just above text haha.

Stephen Marshall

He just said in this message that they finished recording episode 2

nicklip__pt

Hahaha maybe subconsciously I just couldn't believe my eyes 😅 thanks

top.dps.delivery

Hey DF gang, love from Poland! I've started gaming back in the 90s and have something of a problem with most modern big-budget releases - visual clarity. I'm not talking about resolution, but rather about my eyes and my brain not being able to decipher useful objects in a visually busy scene. As an example, in Hitman: World of Assassination the player is constantly hitting the instinct button and it outlines "interactables". In RoboCop: Rogue City the RoboCop vision does pretty much the same. But in a lot of other games there's no such mechanic and the developer doesn't really solve the problem, making my head hurt (not really, but close!). We're getting closer and closer to "photorealism", and the problem will get more and more pronounced imo, and I don't see enough people talking about it. Thoughts?

1040STF

Do you think the announcement of a PSVR2 adapter for PC marks the resurrection of the PSVR2 support on PS5... or its funeral?

Takeshino

I saw a rumour claiming that Sony is making a handheld capable of playing PS4 games. Now, rumours are rumours, but thinking about it, a decent Switch-sized screen would probably make a game like Bloodborne look pretty good, which the heavy post-fx was too much on a "27 monitor for me. Don't you think that the PS4 library has a lot of games that would benefit from that form factor?

Jonny_5a

Any tips on finding a CRT TV from the Retro enthusiasts on the team? Feels like all I can find are people on eBay asking a lot for rather rough ones and charity shops dont seem to sell them anymore. Thanks for all the great content as always

Tamerator

Hi DF gentlemen, do you believe that the game pass model is sustainable in the long term? We’re already seeing video streaming services racing to the bottom and videos are cheaper and easier to produce compared to games. Do you think it’s a good strategy for Microsoft to put all of its eggs into the game pass basket?

StefanSt

Hi DF! Do you guys think we will be able to use PS VR2 with the Steam Deck in a dock?

captainbridger

Consoles seem to avoid #stutterstruggle by having precompiled shader. Would a PS5 Pro need new precompiled shaders for existing titles to avoid shader related stutters?

Hobobench

Hello DF Boyos, do you feel like Sony gave up way too fast with PSVR2? It kind of feels like they never even really did a marketing campaign for it and basically shadow dropped into and out of existence. Looking forward to PC compatibility at least so I can get some more value from it.

Ben Fisher

Hi gents, love the podcast! I've heard it mentioned here that end-game frame gen is to output the refresh of your display and alter the amount of generated frames based on rendering loads. Any idea how you'd compare a theoretical 6070 and 6080 GPU, if they output all games at X refresh rate, just the rendered frames would differ. You'd need to somehow assess how the naked eye visualised the effect?

McGridlz

What’s up all? I’d like everyone to put their tinfoil hats on for a sec. With Microsoft leaning into ARM a little bit harder, how do you see this affecting gaming in 10-15 years? Does x86 become an enthusiast platform where we will have to purchase a special x86 version of Windows now that Windows ARM is now the main consumer choice with all of the power efficiency and performance? Does Nvidia start making ARM systems that are console like? Will this Prism translation layer be good enough to ensure backward compatibility with almost every game that currently exists?

Retro Sean

It was recently announced that the USA will be adding a 25% import tax to things like graphics cards assembled in China. Do you think this will mess up already messy (and expensive!) prices in the rest of the world? (EDIT -- this has been pushed off to next year, but it could still happen, making gaming PCs more expensive.)

Ben Fisher

My daughter was born with a missing right arm. I really want to start her gaming soon and wondered if there were some simple platformers John might recommend to start off with? I'm planning on evaluating and setting up the playstation Access controller.

Didier Lenoir

Any chance that you would still have time to discuss the freshly announced State of Play? Could be interesting to have some PSVR2 discussion in there

Skyrimfest 26 FPS Edition

Apple has been trying harder with gaming over the past year, with Game Porting Toolkit and ray tracing hardware as standard on their latest chips. Even the base model Apple Silicon Macs from 2020 have CPU and graphics performance that can run a game like Baldur's Gate 3. Indie Mac gaming is doing fine, but AAA Mac gaming still seems dead. What would it take to make a AAA Mac gaming renaissance happen?

Joe Doyle

What games do you see as the potential launch games/reasons Sony will tout for getting a PS5 Pro?

Kellan Sandifer

With Black Ops 6 still being launched on PS4 and Xbox one, Should we stop saying last Gen/ Next Gen ? Is it because they all use x86 processors

Someguyperson

If you had a PC that was a bit older (RTX 2060 Super level of GPU & a 5800X3D, a 27" 1440p VA panel with HDR 400 & a VRR range of 60-120 hz) but you had only ~$850 to spend, would you spend it on a 42" LG C3, or an RTX 4070 Ti Super Egregious Edition? I have personally always chosen a monitor upgrade over a GPU upgrade, but I would like to know what you guys prefer to prioritize within a limited budget; GPU horsepower or a beautiful screen? I personally don't mind playing games at 1080p on my big, beautiful LG C3 "monitor".

AdorablyAllPhysical

Hello DF. Been thinking a lot about how I don't think Apple can tackle the games market with the PC approach (lots of constantly evolving hardware SKUs with scalable ports). I just don't see folks investing longterm in buying their games that way instead of on Steam. But if Apple went the Nintendo direction and made a single dedicated dockable handheld based on a cheaper chip (like the A14 or something), to keep the price in that $400-$500, and then spent the big bucks to get lots of ports and a handful or marquee exclusives--I think their silicon expertise and vast resources could really shake up the gaming landscape. Wondering if I'm alone in that thought.

DaJaCo (Dan)

With the PSVR2 PC Adapter being spotted on the South Korean RRA website, recent price cuts to the PSVR2, and the PS5 Pro likely to be out towards the end of this year. Do you think we are likely to see a "mini-renaissance" for the PSVR2 towards the end of this year?

Nusco

Nintendo just acquired Shiver, a studio known for porting AAA games to the Switch. The common explanation is that they need Shiver to port future third-party games to the "Switch 2." But why would Nintendo handle the porting of third-party games? I have another guess: perhaps Nintendo plans to keep the current Switch on the market after its successor is out, and they need Shiver to port their own first-party games from the "Switch 2" to the regular Switch. If that is right, we're looking at an Apple-style lineup of devices from Nintendo. Does this hypothesis sound realistic to you, or am I grasping at straws?

Pol Kallamata

Is launching Black Ops 6 on last gen a tactical mistake on Microsoft's end given that this release is the first in the franchise to come to Game Pass day one? Would it have been a more shrewd business move to cut off the last gen player base from the new entry and heavily market the Series consoles along with the subscription service as the easiest way to transition to playing the game on the current gen?

Thomas Nybergh

Hello! This is more of a comment than a question, but you recently discussed keyboard support on console. Before switching to being an active PlayStation gamer from a very sporadic PC-bound one a couple of years ago, I had (unfounded) concerns about my ability to adapt to controllers at my old age (mid-thirties). However, I've never been able to quite set aside that wider support for keyboard+mouse on console would be good. I recently came across this video by a young gentleman (@champutee_ on Youtube) who recently lost an arm, with discussions on the struggles that brings to gaming. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j2XIzQjgcSM Xbox's and PlayStation's accessibility controllers appear to not be for him. Anyone who's into gaming as a wider phenomenon should look these products, however. As great as it is that they exist, they currently come with weird caveats, and over all, Xbox seems to do better. https://youtu.be/J2J79O5ItSk https://youtu.be/MwYTLiXI6zY @champutee_'s video concludes that a very particular keyboard-based one-handed controller is the best option available on the market for his needs right now, and it completely makes sense. https://store.azeron.eu/azeron-keypads#keypad=cyro But that rules out console gaming. I really hope that industry people in the audience would consider the accessibility implications of wider control scheme support on console. Any accessibility is better than none and keyboard+mouse does feel like the kind of thing that could be patched into games later than initial hectic releases and still bring joy to a bunch of people. Consoles and their ease of use and low cost are great options for some accessibility needs. For me, right now, consoles just ease cognitive load. PlayStation, as a living room+surround sound friendly appliance helps me decompress from my IT jobby job in ways I never accomplished by fiddling with gaming on Windows, at a desk. But anyone could need wider accessibility at any time, really.

Someguyperson

As an aside, you can use a Display port 1.4 to HDMI 2.1 cable to get 4k 120 FPS, but you will lose VRR in the process. I think the only way to get 4K 120 FPS with VRR is to use an HDMI 2.1 capable GPU.

Someguyperson

The Gameboy Advance, Nintendo DS, and the Switch all use ARM processors, yet their capabilities are all wildly different, so I don't think you should just drop a "generation" tag just because of a processor architecture.

gartenriese

How was your meeting with IGN? I hope nobody got laid off!

Someguyperson

Yes, it seems like they gave up on it before it even came out. It was a baffling marketing decision, but that same level of investment (nearly nothing) made the Portal sell extremely well, so I'm not sure what Sony's execs are thinking right now.

Someguyperson

I think it's an art & accessibility issue. I hope game devs look at the PC mods for their games to see what they can add themselves to improve the experience. I remember one of the most popular Monster Hunter World mods just put a lightshaft on each item you could pick up and it made the experience so much better because you could actually see the things you wanted to pick up. I think the push for more accessibility features has pushed devs to think about these things and make the experience easier for a lot of people in modern games.

Kaveh Ghorbati

(Please credit as Local Bookstore) You guys ever dream a videogame that you wish existed? Almost a decade ago I dreamt two indie devs were showing me a game where you platform through a castle collecting lanterns, and it slowly illuminated the level, it looked so relaxing, I wish it was real

Skyepod

Hello DF, I asked about the Intel issue that crashes when playing games with the UE engine, this issue concerns the power limit being too large or allowing the 13k or 14k processor to reach the temp limit constantly which might cause UE games to crash. I experienced this issue on my Alienware M18 laptop which I customized with 13980HK and 4090 mobile version, I bought it in November 2023 and everything was great, until last April it crashed in every UE game, even non-UE like Horizon Forbidden West, I bought the laptop because I'm a gamers and workers often go abroad and game in the afternoon until evening after work. Maybe it would be good for DF to do a deep dive on this because in my opinion you are very qualified to do a deep dive on this. Intel's statement is not firm and the motherboard vendor to carry out bios updates for the Intel profile baseline is very unclear for each brand because variaty of result in performance. Because now I go home and work basically here, I have rebuilt the PC with an Intel 14700k and 4080 super, I haven't experienced any crashes at the moment, but I don't know if the whole time I use it, I will experience the same thing. I really want DF to do this deep dive. because this concerns stability in the game itself. Thanks Keep up the great work guys.

Rich

To a certain extent this is a good thing, as it's part of reality. It's hard to find needles out of haystacks in real life, it should be difficult in games that approach photorealism too.

top.dps.delivery

Sure, but in real life you don't need that needle to progress to the next day lol.

Rich

It was too expensive no matter what Sony did after release. You can't have a peripheral that costs MORE than the base product you're buying it for!! Sony should have released a cheaper LCD model amd followed up with OLED after.

Rich

Nobody would call any of those platforms "next gen" either lol

Ryan Luker

A while back, Nintendo applied for some trademarks that included a dual screen switch looking successor [0]. It got me thinking about if the rumoured switch 2 "attach" (potential name leak here [1]) might be a detachable dual screen device machine? The era of dual GPU PCs has long since past (SLI / Crossfire) but I wonder if the Switch 2 could bring back some of this to give the docked mode a more powerful dual GPU SLI mode? (Costs might be too extreme though as you essentially need to double everything, heh) Random related side question, what ever happened to SLI / Crossfire in modern PC gaming? [1]: https://www.reddit.com/r/GamingLeaksAndRumours/comments/1bb2kwm/the_next_nintendo_console_may_be_called_the/ [2]: https://gbatemp.net/threads/nintendo-applied-for-patent-of-a-new-dual-screen-console.642226/

Nostra

What's the state of Linux AAA gaming when it comes to desktop environment?

Daniel Tobin

Hi DF team! As a self-proclaimed lover of both LCD screens and game streaming, I was hoping John could offer some best practices and settings for Quest 3 Air Link. While latency and stuttering are not an issue, image quality is. Darker scenes, especially in a game like Beat Saber, can turn into mush over the Air Link. I've tried increasing the bitrate but that made little to no difference to my eyes. Is there any hope for us wireless warriors or are confounding cables the only way to stop the smear? Thanks!

Siris Gadson

Ello lads. Always a pleasure tuning in. Long time supporter, first time question asker here: When you spoke on the topic of Hellblade 2, there was a segment where we mentioned the scope in terms of the sheer amount of artistry and crafting for that type of experience not necessarily being feasible in a say 20+ hour experience likely due to budgetary reasons. Given the success stories from platforms like Kickstarter and Steam Early Access, how receptive do you think the gaming community or industry would be to a more widespread method of contributing to development costs via donations or some other crowdfunding source? One of the points mentioned repeatedly over the past few years is the rising costs of games vs the stagnation of game pricing that is only just starting to raise with the new console generation. Do you think this would help ease some of the scenarios where studios create good or even great games that just fail to hit commercially ultimately as they wouldn’t be 100% reliant on investor or publisher funding for survival. First thing that comes to mind is something like Star Citizen. In a way, I feel like this is the one of the alternative goals of things like preorders but that’s so stigmatized now that I the public might be slightly receptive if developers simply reached out to ask to contribute in a more transparent fashion.

Travesty Stutter

Hi DF gang! The recent rumors of Steam being in talks to sell out to those dang corpos over at Microsoft seem incredible (in the literal sense) for several reasons: - the rumors comes without evidence and from a source with no prior validated leaks of this type - 16 billion $s seems way too low a price for Steam in a world where Bethesda is 8 billion $s and Activision is 69 billion $s - I cannot imagine the various governing bodies allowing Microsoft to buy into an effective monopoly in PC gaming when Microsoft met such staunch resistance to the Activision purchase All that being said, let us have a thought experiment and imagine that the rumor bears out as true. What ramifications do you gents think this would have on the PC and wider gaming landscapes? More importantly: would Microsoft be more likely to allow my children to inherit my single most valuable asset after I'm worm food: my Steam library of course.

Perfect_Organism

Alright let’s get down to brass tacks, what are you all ordering for dinner in London?

zurce

Have you considered making a switch to Linux? With distros like Bazzite or Chimera OS , everything but specific anti cheats and HDR (on Nvidia ) are fully functional and in some cases (ROG ally) better performance With Microsoft obssesed with AI and the steam os experience offering console like support , is this the moment where Linux gaming is viable ? It will be interesting a video of you folks trying to make it work

Perfect_Organism

Are there any rendering techniques in animated films (i.e Shrek the Third) that you’re anxiously waiting to trickle into gaming?

Anxiously Chrono Triggered

Hi DF crew! With FSR3 in Immortals working better than expected on consoles do you think we’ll see an influx of games that already support AMD frame generation technique on PC to consoles? Titles that have decent frame rates like TLOU Part I or Starfield could only get better with a good FSR3 implementation. What do you think? Cheers!

Simplex

Please mention that prices on Steam in Poland are one of the highest in the world because of Valve's outdated exchange rate . #PolishOurPrices

AfreemTheDream

When are you gents gonna FINALLY kick off the DF Live tour?? Travel to different cities doing live takes on gaming news, taking questions from the audience for the Q&A segment at the end, blasting the Basement Theme from Resident Evil: Director's Cut as John's walk-out music, etc.

The Knight Who Says Ni!

Hey DF! Has the team had a look at Microsoft’s new up scaler "Automatic Super Resolution"? It would be interesting to hear how it compares to other software and hardware based up scales.

Ryan Luker

Someone took the Steamdeck OS recovery image and tinkered with it to be more desktop friendly? https://github.com/HoloISO/releases AFAIK, it has only great support for AMD atm but Valve seems to be up to something with nvidia support as it was detected recently in some github commits. Outside of steam, the proton eco-system is doing really well on Linux (herioc launcher, bottles, etc) and most games work well. Biggest issue atm is a lot of anti cheat require ring 0 kernel access to operate and thus support for Linux there is quite poor.

Ryan Luker

If the new consoles are still selling for a near loss, then maybe it is more profitable to try to wring out a few more bucks from the xbox-one / ps4 crowd (we heard recently that half of Sony's PSN are still on the previous generation)?

Ryan Luker

Canada will welcome your USD at our local Best Buy (unless we follow suit or the GPUs don't enter via the port of vancouver heh).

Eric Hurst

Greetings DF. While Sony has made clear their intentions to put the PSVR2 headset on PC, do you think we’ll actually see more support of PSVR2 on PS5 or is Sony signaling to people that PSVR2 is better suited for PC players, where there is already a well established VR games library? Is Sony just not willing to provide the support to have the accessory succeed on their own platform? Also, do you think we will see PSVR2 exclusive games like Horizon Call of the Mountain come to PC?

lbb12

Hello Rich and DF Team! At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I don't know anyone else who can answer this question more reliably than you guys, so that is why I won't give up in my question being answered... I was hoping by the time a game like Metro Exodus and NVIDIA's open sourcing PhysX awhile ago (as well as continual extinction of dev support for it) that an AMD GPU user/based console would allow the use of its features by now, or am I wrong? Will we ever see a PhysX enhanced title run with those features turned ON for AMD someday (patched-in/updated to run)? Maybe a 'PhysX wrapper' (remember 3DFx Glide Wrappers for non-3DFx card owners?) As mentioned previously, the Batman Arkham series of games are a great example of a title that just seems lacking without the PhysX features, but complete with it (lookup 'Zogrim' on Youtube for best examples). I sincerely appreciate your input 😄👍

RAVE_DAM0S

Hola gents! Looking at recent history, there are a litany of examples of platform holders offering tools to create better games. They are everywhere RTX Remix can; enhance textures with Al, replace game assets, inject ray tracing. DirectX includes Auto HDR and VRS. Everywhere we look we can find upscaling & frame generation solutions - a literal feast of visual features. And a good time to be a gamer. #NoDoubt With so much attention on visual beauty, my question is a pivot to other aspects of gaming - physics and sound for instance. What non-visual awesomeness is on the horizon for us gluttonous gamers who wish to continue this epic feast of features. Good day! And good eating to you lot!

SirLankyIII

Hi Gents, I've recently moved from a Q-LED tv to a QD-OLED for my big screen pc gaming and i've been introduced to the scourge that is VRR flicker. I know most of you have been using OLEDs for a while, so how do you deal with it? My own research points to it just being a case of "deal with it" and fortunately it's only been a big deal in one game so far (stellaris) where it's like a constant strobe light. Turning VRR off solves it obviously, but that's not ideal for most games. Cheers for your time, and good luck with the meetings this week!

FrametimeSommelier

Hi DF Crew. I have a hypothetical question: If Hellblade 2 had arrived in late 2023 and had made the cut for Digital Foundry Graphics of the Year video, how would you guys have ranked it in comparison to your 2023 Graphics Top 3?

FrametimeSommelier

I have a question for Alex. What the heck is Frame Gen "Auto" setting in the PC version of Hellblade 2? I cannot see any difference between FG On and Auto. What's its purpose?

yogi

Is there any specific content that's exclusively in the patreon that you'd recommend checking out? I thought the ori 4k 120 video is great and I was wondering what else I should search for specifically

David Laszlo

Hey DF, Given that FSR3 is the best if you have a 120hz / VRR display. Do you think it will accelerate the toggles to allow unlocked framerates / 40fps settings? I feel like these options were neglected (Especially on xbox/3rd Party side). One of the biggest features of the current gen consoles are not utilized currently except on Sony 1st Party games.

Douglas Fowler

Hello DF Gents, has anyone had a chance to look at 3DS emulation on the Quest 3? I’m curious about your thoughts on how the 3D representation compares to actually native hardware. Presumably the 3D can be more accurate and have greater clarity that on the autostereoscopic LCD on the 3DS. I’m also curious which 3DS games you’d like to revisit in this manner.

Douglas Fowler

Hello DF Humans, after your recent coverage of FSR Frame Gen on immortals of Aveum it had me thinking can this technique be used on older games or is there some limitation that only modern titles can accommodate. I’d love to go back and play Beyond Good & Evil with Frame Gen up to 120 Hz or emulation of Tekken 3 on PS1 for example.

Leddy Metal

Hi DF Team! First time / long time... Given the news that the PS5 generation has been the most profitable generation to date (https://www.eurogamer.net/playstation-5-most-profitable-generation-to-date-sony-says) Despite only selling half the PS4 numbers so far. It's interesting that the more traditional models being used by Sony and Nintendo are flourishing, while MS pursuing what would appear to be the more future looking digital first/ GamePass / adorably all digital consoles is floundering. Is this yet more evidence of market rejection of a direction of travel away from ownership, standalone game releases and physical media in the console space?

Loneck

Question: Hello DF fighters, are you planning to do some retro content on Panzer Dragoon Saga? I think this game deserves some DF treatment. I know Rich did review in Sega Saturn Magazine so it would be interesting to hear his input on this game as well.

DaJaCo (Dan)

He must have wanted to read the text only after being advised to by everyone else - i.e. - indirectly.

DaJaCo (Dan)

GameGen - the whole game is generated in realtime; no development whatsoever.

DaJaCo (Dan)

Probably be a lot like Alan Wake 2 .. since that's basically Twin Peaks + RE4

VeryProfessionalDodo

Not DF, but VRR flicker tends to be more aggressive when the frame time spike is highest, and the average frame rates are lower. To mitigate this, and not disable VRR, you could always try to improve frame time health, but if you truly can’t (such is the case for shader compilation stutter), disabling VRR is the way to go. To be honest, if you cap a frame rate at a clean interval, you can get some great results. 40hz is an unsung hero if you don’t have VRR, but have a 120hz monitor for example.

Naryoril

Guten Tag DF Team You and other people always mention that GamePass is in serious trouble because it's not growing fast enough. But why does it need these huge growths? As a subscription service, it constantly generates money, so shouldn't it be fine as long as it doesn't shrink? Or has MS been making a deficit with it since the beginning and they finally want to earn money from it? If it were just the "economy needs to grow", then it wouldn't need the numbers MS seems to demand from it. Bid you farewell und ♪auf Wiedersehen♫

VeryProfessionalDodo

Hello gents! Curious to see your opinions on PS5 games being ported to PC. We have two arguments being made: on one side we have Hermen Hulst stating that shipping single player games on PC might attract PC users to PS5 (to play sequels, for example). On the other, we have Internet forum users stating that PC players would rather wait however long they have to wait, and would never buy a PlayStation just to play a specific game. In both scenarios, Sony makes money, whether by people buying a PS5, or people buying their games at a later date. However, there is a clear argument that losing exclusives detracts value from the platform, and that brings some risk. Just ask Nintendo, for better or worse, the most straight-forward (legal) way to play Mario or Zelda is if you pony up and buy a Switch, and that has been going swimmingly for them. Thoughts?

Snorlax cat

I am gonna lay the 2 issues Alan would raise: how was your business meeting with ign execs? Are you looking forward to do some collaboration with nx gamer who does ign reviews? you may have acknowledge some of his pixel counts of Arkham knight xbox one ver way back before the pandemic but he has not been on your radar nearly as much as other you talked about like VG or others

VeryProfessionalDodo

Unfortunately, according to capitalism, if it isn’t growing, that’s a liability to shareholders. Microsoft, being a public company, needs to maximise shareholder growth at all costs, regardless of whether it might compromise the sustainability of the endeavour long term.

Naryoril

That's what i meant with the last sentence. MS seems to demand way more growth than the usual rate of "the economy needs to grow", which is in the single digit percentages.

1040STF

Mario Kart 8 just celebrated its 10 years anniversary by still being number one of video games sales last week in France. I haven't checked for other countries, but that happens here since years almost every week without any major releases. What do you make of that?

I love the Habs

Hey guys, what is the main culprit for games taking longer to develop? Is it the pure graphical fidelity in newer games causing the dev time go up, or is it features like RT that take longer to implement? Or is it just that the scope of newer games is huge? Do you think game dev time should be shorter, and if you could wave your wand and make it happen, what would be needed to make game dev time shorter? I don't think it's a question of man power, since speaking as a software dev, throwing more devs at a problem never helps. One good dev is greater than 100 crappy ones. Curious about your thoughts

FrametimeSommelier

I asked the same question last week. Still waiting for input.

FrametimeSommelier

LOL....read the what he wrote under the call for questions request. It's already filmed ;-)

FrametimeSommelier

"I'm also happy to report that yesterday, John, Alex and I filmed DF InDirect #2 - the next episode of our Supporter-only show - and it should be with you soon... next week at the latest. "

nicklip__pt

Funny that you're so quick to correct me for not reading while completely missing all the other messages directly above you. You're as bad as me lol

Leftisthominid

Hello DF folks, how is your trip to London? How is it for Richard to be recording from a real place (as opposed to his UE5 powered Volume in his office)? When DF'ers meet up, do you play games together? Would Alex play a round of Mario Kart or Smash if that means playing on console hardware?

Leftisthominid

Would John et al. recommend getting a PSVR2 for PC VR or the Meta Quest instead? I am a big Horizon fan, so I would like to play Call of the Mountain, but I don't know if Sony would port that to Windows (but the PSVR2 would work on both Windows and PS5)

Mark Smith

What would the next level look like for you all in your eyes? Your daydream of what Digital Foundry would look like moving to what "The Next Level" would be to you all.

Saskira

Hi DF team, I hope your all well. I’m a little bit confused about CPU usage and DLSS presets. If performance mode (whilst my tv resolution is set to 4k) essentially upscales and renders 1080p -> 4K. Does that mean the CPU is taxed more because it has to render it at a lower res initially? Traditionally low res is more CPU bound if you have a super powerful GPU. My brain can’t make sense of it. Thanks, I hope you have a lovely dinner.

Jamie

Hi DF, While I have not downloaded it and do not intend to. I have to ask your thoughts on the Spiderman 2 Stolen PC build. This has been in development with Brazilian Devs and seems from YouTube videos to be very playable now and very very well done with the amount of work and work arounds to get the assets working that had to be taken from other games . I am very impressed with what these pirate devs have done. Thoughts on this and Is Alex little bit tempted to download this it to test it out. It even runs on the Steam Deck at 30fps. Thanks Jamie https://youtu.be/nVUIwUP2uAM?si=qzQAvFO0Oknb2LsJ

Mr Codders

Hello team! Different question that usual, but would you prefer to buy a "dumb" TV for cheaper? A TV without any operating system installed (Android TV, webOS etc). My relatives bought a Samsung Qled Smart TV costing over £800 and it's already laggy and unresponsive after 1 year of use. I've been using my Xbox for years to stream content and it hasn't slowed down yet! What are your thoughts?

Special Agent Cooper

Hi DF, it’s happening. Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is coming to gamepass day 1. A lot of people argue that the microtransactions are way more important for these games than the copy sales, but I for one am doubtful, because it’s not like it’s either or. COD historically has a pretty dedicated fanbase and a majority of the people surely would’ve purchased the game at full price AND engaged with microtransactions. I don’t know if the player base will grow enough to outweigh copy sales. If this goes bad I think the Call of Duty franchise has enough significance to single-handedly send gamepass the shadow realm for good. What do you think?

Alan

Hi Team, Thoughts on the Sony Direct? There were a lot of similar hacking/slashing type games imo, only Astrobot, Silent Hill 2 & Alien VR for me, I was a bit disappointed.

Xbox Ally Has Gone ROGue!

After watching the state of play this week, I have to ask: what do you think about Until Dawn "Remake"'s graphics? Personally, I don't know how to exactly describe it, but I feel this has a generic Unreal Engine looking to it, and the Decima original looks more special to me. Am I just having a filter myself or do you find similar result?

Athanasius19

Hey DF, new subscriber here and relatively new to PC gaming. The low resolutions on consoles was difficult for me to accept. Anyways, my question is: Are frame-time spikes/stuttering just a normal thing in PC games? I have vysnc and gsync both enable in NVCP, 165hz monitor that I cap to 90fps with rtss (I find 90fps to be the sweet spot). In Spiderman for example, while swinging in the city, I notice very small frame-time spikes that manifest as stutter on the screen and it's very distracting. This also happens in Miles Morales, God of War, RE2 and RE4 etc. Is this just the nature of PC gaming? Why wouldn't gsync hide these? I'm using like 50-60% GPU and CPU utilization. PC Specs: Ryzen 5 5600x, RTX 4080s, 32gb 3600mhz RAM, NVME SSD. Both Drive and GPU are plugged into Gen 4 PCIe. Side Note: I really wish Alex would do a pc settings for gaming video. For ex: Gsync on/off, Vsync on/off, should you cap framerates etc...

Mr Bespoke

Hi DF just wondering did you guys split the bill or did you all do a runner and/or did John and Alex get any pick ups whilst in Londinium? Thanks and keep up the great work!

cardinalwhale

Hey guys! Seems like Sony is doubling down on PSN integration for games on PC, and God of War Ragnarok will require an account. That means I can't buy Ragnarok on PC due to region lock, since I live in a country which isn't supported by PSN. Do you think it's a good idea at all to lock a chunk of the audience out of a game? I can't think of a single reason why it couldn't be optional for a single player game. In comparison Hellblade II was just released and didn't require any Xbox Live integration on Steam. And all the other games from Sony before Helldivers 2 I can still buy.

HimmelFlugzeug

A new Astro Bot game, finally! I'm not surprised but at the same time very disappointed it's not coming to PSVR 2. Do you also think development must have shifted from VR to pancake mode sometime throughout those years after Sony decided to put more and more nails on PSVR 2's coffin, this being the final one (despite those two third-party games that were shown)?

Abhi

I know John tweeted about his thoughts but I'd be interested in hearing the whole crew's take on Jacob Navok's twitter threads about the economics of AAA dev/publishing, with a focus on Square. I found it really interesting in terms of how much player behavior has changed and how that affects traditional AAA releases. It's leading to me think that AAA games should cost more, at least in the US. It's just unfortunate to know games like FF16 & FF7R have a difficult time justifying their creation & budget

FrostyGraybob

Hey gents, I recently was reflecting on the state of the PS3 and 360 generation and the sorry state of performance many games were left in. In a generation defined by sub 30fps, screen tearing, and input lag, what do you guys think are the best, most technically standout games of the generation that pushed the hardware of its time, while hitting its frame rate target 99% of the time. No horrible drops, no unsightly screen tearing. They can be exclusives or multiplats. I recently was suprised looking back at the orginal dead space on xbox 360 how stable it was. Perhaps this is a topic for a future DF Retro?

Samson

Hey DF BoYz!! Look! I just wanna know, on a scale from 1-10, how giddy is John about Sony finally announcing a premium Astro Bot platformer. The world is healing!

Garrett Chriswell

My question is whether you guys think the PSVR2 makes sense on the PC platform. At its current cost its about the same price as a quest 3. That includes an entire platform with its purchase and exclusive titles. Could you speak on the technical details of the headsets what features could it brings limitations and what your assessment is. I have a quest 3 now and it works decently well. I am hoping for a quest pro 2 with Wifi 7 to improve the wireless latency and bandwidth. I wonder what you guys are thinking not sure how heavy you are into this space.

RAVE_DAM0S

Giddy is such the right word here. Astro Bot looks so so #good.

Samson

I don’t buy physical copies, mostly because I primarily game on PC but I’m buying this one physical though! It just gives those cozy vibes from childhood days. I hope it sells well so that it becomes one of their most valuable IPs. We need Astro Bot Supremacy!