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Hi everyone, it's Rich here! Thanks so much for all of the kind messages in the wake of our big announcement. It's been a bit overwhelming! I wish I had the time to respond to every message but they're coming at me from all angles - I feel great about the response to this new direction and am more convinced than ever that it was the right move to make.

I've managed to keep up with emails, some Discord messages and Patreon messages while my wife has been sharing some of the YouTube comments. From myself and the team, THANK YOU, it's such a huge relief to have crossed the final hurdle and to receive such a positive reception.

But you know what they say - #content never sleeps - and tomorrow morning, it'll be me, Oliver and Alex sitting down to record the latest episode of DF Direct Weekly. We're happy to take questions on the news but I also feel that maybe some kind of Supporter AMA might be in order once things have calmed down a bit. As I said in the video though, this is the beginning of the journey and the intention is to keep all Supporters up to speed on developments. Gamescom should certainly be interesting!

Going back to the Direct, we'll also be talking about the PlayStation 6 Orion rumours, while Oliver will be sharing his impressions of Apex Legends on Switch 2. Alex will get us up to speed on AMD's intriguing Dense Geometry Format, and sharing some thoughts on the Ashes of the Singularity 2 trailer. And we miiiight have something to say about that PlayStation multi-plat job ad circulating last week.

Is there any other news this week that has caught your eye, that you think we should be covering? I wish we had time to take a look at Maaafia: The Old Country, but unfortunately we never received any review code. I'll likely be buying it tomorrow. Beyond that, of course, we're really looking forward to your questions!

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Comments

Joe Esposito

Hello newly independent DF team! Now that you're running solo of outside control, what do each of you look forward to most as you enter this new chapter? Congratulations!

Natiq İsmayılzadə

Greetings from Baku! Do you think artificial intelligence will one day be used for game porting? For example, if we give AI all the information about a PS4 game and the device, can it port the game?

Jordan + Cinewhirl

Hi guys, I was wondering, what is the functional difference between the way you guys record frame rates (I think from the HDMI output) and the in built tools from GPU manufacturers that read from the GPU output? Is there ever a reason one is more or less accurate? Happy Digipendence day!

Mab7373822

Hi, just subscribed to Patreon in the wake of your wonderful news! My question is that Nintendo seems to be putting out a lot of customer surveys around their Switch 2 "cartridges". E.g. game key cards, codes in boxes, and actual game carts. What do we make of this? Are they actually going to change their mind on the spread of codes and key carts over actual carts? Or is this kind of survey just standard market research? Thanks.

Dexter

Hi everyone - just joined to support the new independent venture. Maybe I missed it but does Alex still plan to do an updated optimized settings video for Doom the Dark Ages with the path tracing feature they added after launch?

Jellyment

No question, just joining in on the congratulations on becoming fully independent! Well deserved

cosmicwaffle

Hi DF! What do you think Sony needs to do to make the rumored PlayStation handheld successful? How should they differentiate from other handhelds currently on the market?

1040STF

so..... I guess gone is the money to release Alex from his hostage situation, right? But I get that a choice had to be made. Too bad for him!

Question Generated By JensenGPT

Good afternoon, gentlemen. We know that PSSR is getting overhauled some time next year with the training data and neural network from FSR 4. How does the current version of PSSR stack up to FSR 4 as it is now? Comparing them now should give us somewhat of an idea how much of an improvement the overhauled PSSR should be.

Succulent Chinese Meal

Back in the day, tessellation used to cripple GPUs, just like current day ray tracing does. Currently, ray tracing generally reduces FPS by 40-50%. What do you think the performance hit needs to be reduced to, to become a “no brainer” feature? Take it sleazy!

Buzz Bee Spoke

Hello, digital founders. With all that overhead required and the performance diving that comes with ray tracing the question many ask themselves is if the cost is actually in proportion to the visual gain. But what I more specifically would like to ask is if the big performance costs that come with traced rays would not yield a better visual return in older or different rendering and lighting techniques. Cheers and chip chip. Enjoy your new found freedom digital boss men.

Perfect_Organism

Does this new found freedom allow for any more collaborations at all? Saw Daniel Owen on the Hardware Unboxed podcast recently and thought, damn, I’d love to see some of that ilk chatting with yourselves.

NobleHeroine

Hello, everyone. First time I've asked a question here. I'm excited! I've noticed something a little strange with my Switch 2. I've used both the included joycons and my older Switch 1 Pro controller with the system, and it feels like there's a slight increase in latency when using the switch 1 pro controller in wireless play. It's a small difference, but enough that I've noticed it in actual gameplay, specifically in Astral Chain and Splatoon 3. Its small enough that I'm not entirely sure I'm not imagining it. If you could take a look at this with proper tools, I would greatly appreciate it.

Matt

Just finished the (wonderful) Wheel World. The performance really sucked at times for something that doesn’t appear extremely taxing, a little bit like the similar looking Sable a couple of years ago. What is it about this particular art style that is so demanding? Or are these games just poorly optimised

Macky Dee

[Bill Pullman voice] Congrats on your DF Independence Day - always great to see media thriving independently. Will there be any Eurogamer relationship in the future, and if not will Will and Tom be fully moving over to indie DF? Though totally understand things are likely still in flux :)

Andrew Barker

Howdy fellas, With the new independent spirit running through DF and the expansion of retro content could we see more modern retro handhelds get reviews? Ambernic and Ayaneo ect have been releasing many innovative products recently and I would love to hear more in-depth content on the hardware from your good selfs. Cheers.

Ian

Greetings foundryers - congratulations on your independence - what an amazing achievement. I’m interested in what you think the switch 2 borderlands 4 port will end up like? We know it’s ‘mostly’ 30FPS but it’s the first big UE5 title going across (almost) day and date and the PC minimum reqs are high with an RTX2070. I can buy it elsewhere but very tempted for a game like this for portable play - so any thoughts?

Snorlax cat

Hello to The Digital Founders of the Declaration of Digital Foundry Independence! Congratulations! I have a question on the upcoming and contentious Star Wars Outlaws port to Switch 2. Do you think it is using DLSS lite? In that case do you think it will denoise the very paired back RTGI competently?

BirchTree

Hello! I absolutely love the work you all do and am so happy for you embarking on this new era. I’m curious if there are any benefits of being owned by someone else that you’ll miss now that you’re indie? Things like cross-promotion or technical infrastructure that you need to handle yourself? Cheers!

StaticSignal

Greetings newly independent gentlemen! In all my years of PC Gaming, no graphics option has seen more variety than Anti-aliasing! At one point the NVCPL had a huge array of niche AA algorithms to choose from, though most are now absent. Which niche AA algorithm was your favourite? Were any of them truly useful? Thanks and have a great one!

RAVE_DAM0S

Hi Foundry of Digital Freedom! We supporters unite in celebration of your newfound independence. And wish you the utmost well being and excellence beyond. Platitudes aside, you've fielded many many supporter questions over the years. What are some of your favorites/unique over the years? What makes one question so compelling over others? Cheers mates!

HelloIAmJack

Hi Digital Foundry! Congratulations on the independence, I’ve just signed up to support your new freedom and wish you guys all the best for the future. I’ve often chatted with friends about how we love watching DF content, but can sometimes get a bit lost with all of the gaming/tech terminology used. I can of course look up these terms and concepts online but would love some content from yourselves directly explaining these things, perhaps as short form videos or reels aimed at those who want to build up a better understanding of how things work. Perhaps this might not appeal to those already well-versed in tech/gaming, but I’d imagine there are lots of folks like myself who have a lot of respect for the DF team’s knowledge and enjoy picking bits up from your videos.

Joseph Caruso

Howdy independent gentlemen, is there any videogame visual technology that you can admit is impressive but you don't personally care for? For example, I often find it jarring when 2D characters have too many frames of animation, especially their idle animation, but it's technically more impressive than characters that rely on fewer key animations.

André

Nintendo had its Indie World presentation today, but nothing too special in there I guess. Btw, just signed up for the supporters program when I heard of your newfound independence.

Bassers

The very best of afternoons to you (independent) gentleman! I was very interested / impressed with John stating his gaming setup enable all systems to run on all screens. As a fellow retro enthusiast with 20 odd systems I would love to explore this - any chance John could give a quick run down on the key components he has used to achieve this slice of paradise?

andre surles

Independence! - Video Suggestions and #content Dedicated DF Retro Channel Special Guests/Holidays DF Plays - group gaming DF Settings Videos DF Sponsored Videos DF Consulting DF Revisited DF Industry Interviews

DyeHardX86

Front and Center Congrats on achieving Sovereignty! See a lot of gamers dismayed at the apparent lack of ambition from Sony in architecting the PS6 after Kepler_L2 has reported it COULD be similar to the RX9070XT If this were the case is this enough of a leap? and can it be priced to sell in the 10s of Millions as pundits surmise? Suggesting it could well land near the sweet spot for consoles? $500? Thank you all for the Hard Work and I look forward to continue supporting Digital Foundry.

FrametimeSommelier

Hi DF Crew, in a past DF Direct, Alex speculated that the next PlayStation might target RTX 4080 level performance. Recent leaks suggest a 3x boost in rasterization and 5-10x in ray tracing over the PS5. This seems to align with a 4080 in raster but possibly pushes RT closer to 4090 territory. Another insider compares PS6 to an RX 9070 XT, and Xbox "magnus" to RTX 5080 levels. Does this sound plausible to you? As A PC gamer, I'm hoping for the higher end since stronger console hardware sets better baseline for PC gaming in the years ahead.

SuperGario

The warmest of salutations gentlemen. I've been keenly awaiting the performance statistics from the Z2 extreme handhelds, having seen some initial benchmarks of the horribly coloured (and named) MSI Claw 8 BZ2EM, I have to say, I am entirely underwhelmed, with performance trailing behind the Intel 140V IGPU and only a marginal improvement on Z1 Handhelds. Do you think the new Asus/Xbox branded handhelds will stretch the legs of the Z2E and finally allow us to understand the "Xbox vision" or flop so hard as to cause another existential crisis in Redmond?

Dubuc Nathan

Hi there! Very often when we hear about a new breakthrough in the PC GPU space, we hear Nvidia or AMD partnered very closely with Microsoft for implementation in DirectX. Isn't the fact that Vulkan is never mentioned in those conversations quite problematic for the openness of the PC platform? I'm personally very attached to open-source and I sometimes play my games on Linux, and seeing Vulkan being seemingly so often forgotten about in these conversations makes me scared that key future GPU features might be stuck on Windows/DirectX. What are your thoughts?

Kaveh PG

Happy DF Independence Day! One of the first videos I ever watched by you guys was the "RDR2 every setting explained" video and I've been learning more about real time graphics every video since. Have you guys ever considered doing more videos about the proverbial "settings" and how different engines handle the same techniques? Like most people online I like to think I know everything, but I always find something new when I go back to the basics.

Tim Rodie

Hello wonderful gentlemen. Firstly, congrats on your independence (I’ve just joined the Patreon after 10 years of following you… sorry). Questions: who’s going to be HR, who’s going to run payroll and crucially, who’s going to get the fire marshal high-vis tabard?

Kaveh PG

Hey DF, do 120hz televisions have any way to fight the "quadruple image effect" of 30fps? I think it's looking worse than the Switch 2 examples 😬😬😬

Allan Lindqvist

Can you give us some dirt on IGN now that you're free?

Peter Karadimas

Happy Independence Day DF crew! Now that you guys are completely in charge of your own destiny, what’s your general view on sponsored content with the YouTube channel going forward? You stated in the past you won’t be doing content like the Nintendo ad, but what are your thoughts on things like sponsored deep dives and partnership content with publishers?

QuadrupleSchmadruple

Hey crew, congrats again. One of the best things to come of the Switch 2 release is the new Pro Controller. Enthusiastically I went to buy it and just as unenthusiastically I have realized it doesn't work with Windows. I'm baffled. What advantage is there for Nintendo to not make it compatible? If it was compatible they would sell the controller even to non-Switch 2-owners. Is there hope it will be compatible with future firmware updates?

Diego ElRey

Hello, congrats on becoming Digital Freemen! I have seen alternatives to gaming on Windows being mentioned in the last few directs. The question I have is what would that mean for modding? A lot of games require a mod manager, if not other programs, usually based in Windows to use mods, make mods, break mods down, etc. What would the solution be if mods are important to you? Or is it best left for those looking for the vanilla experience?

FrametimeSommelier

Following up on the most recent DF Direct Special and Retro DF discussion, I wanted to share a nostalgic request. I'd love to see you revisit the golden era of computer gaming from the late '80s to the early '90s. That is when I first got into gaming, and i have such fond memories of reading reviews that compared titles across platforms like the C64, Amiga, Atari ST, and early PCs. I had an Amiga myself, as did many of my friends, though some kids were gaming on their dad's 386 or 486 machines. The differences in graphics and sound between platforms were striking, and a Retro DF deep dive into those cross-platform comparisons would be both entertaining and meaningful, especially for those of us who lived through it (hey, Rich, that's you, right?). Thanks for all the great content you've been putting out and all best wishes for the new independent endeavors.

Max Stoler

Salutations and good day, Mark Cerny was taken a bit by surprise in the rapid adoption of Tay tracing. With the PlayStation 6 Robin chip (or if that's the handheld then whatever the PS6 chip will be) it appears to have gen on gen rasterized improvements but we know Ray tracing performance will be crucial. So a few questions, what is the minimum performance bump on RT needed to make it 60fps viable and do you think there will be three iterations of a PS6, a $500 base, a $600 disc and even a pro at launch at $700?

Andrew Barker

Howdy Fellas, Will we no longer see DF stuff on Eurogamer? I always thought what you brought to that site was wonderful for both as DF added technical cache and Eurogamer gave you guys great exposure to the general gaming audience. Do you think it would be worth doing some kind of deal to keep posting some stuff there? I feel it's important to get people who are just casually interested in your content into the wide end of the funnel to learn more and become fans. You have spoken about taking on more technically minded staff to expand your coverage, which is great, but one thing I feel would help would be someone who is strong at presenting the technicalities to a broader audience who could confidently do things like crossover content with other channels and welcome in the noobs. Congrats on Independence and a bright future.

Peter

Hello DF Crew, and congratulations on your newfound Independence! A lot of talk this week around next gen HW, multiplatform support etc. I do wonder if, internally at Sony, they are now perceiving Xbox more akin to how they view PC and less of a competitor in the console space. I wouldn't be surprised if their support of Xbox platforms mimics that of PC in the not so distant future. Curious to hear your thoughts on this Have a wonderful week!

Peter

Hello DF Crew and congratulations on your newfound Independence! If you could pick one game to replay again, having had all your memory of said game erased, what would it be? Have a lovely week chaps!

wildwildwesty

Ahoy hoy independent Founders! Could you expand more on the job descriptions for “The New Alex” and other roles that you seek in this next chapter for DF? As a PC gaming enthusiast it would be a dream to give up my corporate tech job, join you on your journey, and turn this hobby in to a fully fledged career. Yet I appreciate the essential skills in media creation that you’d require to produce the very best content for the discerning DF audience. On top of the criteria you seek for applicants, what do you feel are the qualities DF can offer as an employer? Thanks!

Ali Antiasing

Greetings, free folk of DF. Is there a particular game sound that sits forever in your brain? 20 years later my nightmares still feature the glorious sounds of F.E.A.R. combat - mostly the HV penetrator (sfw), dual pistols and dropkicks into my face.

Joshua Turner

Just want to say congrats to you guys. Happy to be a supporter.

Kyrith

Congrats on the unshackling, DF! Anywho: if the UI for the new wave of living room Windows Xbox's is bad, they will fail. Full stop. Windows' Gaming UI is bad and has been bad for *years.* Everyone hates it -- this is the one thing gamers agree on. Genuinely abysmal. Do we have any reason to suspect Microsoft is capable of making it good? Or is this all just doomed before it even starts?

Tdot’s Finest82

Hello DF crew! Congrats on your new-found freedom. Exciting times ahead. My question is in relation to gaming laptops. Outside of a sponsored video almost 5 years ago (that I can remember) when Rich compared a 3070 laptop to an Xbox Series X, the channel is largely bereft of laptop coverage. Is this not an exciting segment for the team? I know desktops are the bees knees but I have a 4080 laptop that runs Cyberpunk with Path Tracing at 1440p in the 70-90fps range on DLSS Balanced and Frame Gen on. That’s pretty good, given the size of the GPU and CPU, in my opinion. Are there any plans for laptop coverage in the future or is there just not enough interest or time to do so?

Kyrith

Hey, DF! Been wondering this for a while: What is the actual difference between RTAO and RTGI? Both bounce rays around to create accurate, indirect shadows. Is it just that GI includes color, or is there a more fundamental difference?

KABL00M UK

Hello there DF crew, Congratulations and celebrations on the independence!!! Seeing the lack of first/third party exclusives for switch 2 at launch, and the wealth of devs just shoe-horning titles that are maybe a bridge too far on to the platform as quick as possible... Do you think that gaming as a whole is losing some of the creativity and innovation brought about when specifically developing for very power limited, bespoke consoles/hardware? Love to you all and keep that excellent content flowing gents.

Björn Müller

Hey, DF. How you are put in the right settings for a game that you want to play? do you just put it on ultra and only change it when it stutters? Or do you always run around for 2 hours with a FPS counter to find the right settings? Thanks :)

Peter Kotelnikov

Love you guys !! Integrity, honesty and dedication to what we love will prevail over anything!! 😍

Deadeyes

One of the big downsides to screen space effects is how they break down near the edge of the frame. Shouldn't it be possible to just render a little extra off the edges to fix that problem? Why have we never seen this done? Seems like you could even render at half or quarter res to save performance foveated rendering style and it would still be considerably less distracting than just having reflections or shadows disappear at the edge of the screen.

Deadeyes

In case you don't get a proper response I thought I would share. Check out Alex's optimized settings for Dying Light 2. That game has both and you can see side by side what they do. Not a technical deep dive explanation, but should help with some insight. Seems like RTGI doesn't do finer detail occlusion as well as RTAO, but RTAO only does the occlusion, can't spread light.

Deadeyes

In case they don't respond: most mods I've seen have a manual install option. It's just a pain. I wonder if that would work on Linux or if you'd need specific versions of the mods for the different OS. Never thought to check if Vortex has a Linux version.

Bulbous_Bow

Bravo and congratulations on your independence! The source of the new Xbox and PS6 rumours, MLiD, suggested that the Xbox may be targeting 5080 levels performance and the PS6 around 20-30% below this. He speculates that both consoles should be sufficient to max out 4K 120hz TVs with a good level of ray tracing support (obviously factoring in upscaling). I’m curious: would this accord with your experience of this class of hardware? And do you think it likely that the Xbox can justify the cost of the extra silicon (never mind that it might not be subsidised) with a qualitatively better experience?

Deadeyes

Check out the gulikit KK3 Pro. Imo better than the Switch Pro controller and is compatible with switch, PC, Android, and more. Has hall effect sticks and triggers.

Deadeyes

I'd love more of these too!

Deadeyes

Don't forget vs PS5 it will have DRAMATICALLY better RT and will have fully baked upscaling on the level of FSR4. Between those it's going to end up feeling like a much bigger leap than it looks like on paper.

Jhonathan Campos

Hi guys, would you be willing to analyze audio quality in games more? I’m baffled by the low amount of lossless audio in games. I believe analyzing this would bring more attention to the topic. It’s do behind compared to movies in bluray.

Spodlude

Now that you're independent, is it likely you'll ever host some kind of supporter meet and greet or something of the like?

Spodlude

Will the DF gents be meeting up in person to celebrate their new venture with a bottle of champagne? this would make great content! You could do a shot every time one of you says bespoke!

QuadrupleSchmadruple

Thanks for the suggestions, but I already bought the 8bitdo ultimate bluetooth controller some time ago, so it's not like I'm lacking a proper controller for PC. It's just I have a Switch 2 as well and wanted the Pro 2 anyway, just would have been nice to use it on PC too because I like it a lot

Spodlude

Richard, now that you're fully in charge how do you think you'll be able to lead better?

tod weitzel

In the search for new business opportunities, has Digital Foundry considered using its considerable expertise at image analysis to enter the lucrative market of conspiracy theories, such as the Zapruder film, proving the earth is flat, the moon not being real, or mountains being tree trunks left over from when aliens chopped them all down?

sj33 (Jake)

Hi all, John plays many games in Japanese, and I’ve recently come to think that language and linguistics is maybe one of the most neglected elements of games in terms of immersion. A lot of focus is placed on a game’s visuals - accurate shadows, lighting, reflections etc., maybe even the game’s ambiance or musical score to some degree. Yet something as fundamental as characters speaking a language or dialect that matches their location is often dismissed, with everyone speaking English even when it makes no sense. A classic example for me is Shenmue 2, mostly set in Hong Kong but no version of the game features the townsfolk speaking Cantonese - it’s either perfect English or Japanese. For me, this is far more immersion-breaking than if a character’s face has accurate self-shadows. Thoughts?

FrametimeSommelier

More from the rumor mill: Word is that AMD's upcoming Zen 6 Ryzen CPU's (Olympic Ridge) might hit clock speeds of 7Ghz or beyond. So Alex, how high does your heartbeat spike at the thought of that? Could this be the chip that finally lets us run the Oblivion Remaster without a single stutter? Or are we just indulging in some wishful, overly optimistic speculation? Also, assuming that AMD is able to achieve these kind of clock speeds, would it be fair to say that it's probably not in combination with 3D V-cash?

Thumbs

Congrats! Looking forward to all your future 'content' from the year of our lord 2025 onwards.

AfreemTheDream

Greetings, Foundrymen! Happy Liberation Day! OK, back to business: with the rumored PS Sextuple specs showing a 3x bump in processing power over the base PS5, are you worried that we're not going to make it to the all-knowing, all-encompassing PS9 orb that was prophesied during the PS2 days? Cheers, and (seriously) congratulations on your freedom!

Saskira

Congratulations on being at the helm of your future! I actually unsubscribed recently because, sadly, I didn’t have the time to keep up with all your awesome videos — I think I still have the Christmas specials to watch! But I saw this and thought: you guys deserve the support, and I really value what you do. So, I’m putting my money where my values are. All the best — I’ll have to catch up soon!

DaJaCo (Dan)

Nintendo recently published some patents that look to be exactly this.

Skyrimfest 26 FPS Edition

Congratulations on becoming your own corporate overlords! Hopefully it gives you the freedom to take the channel in whatever direction you feel is right. But on that note, how do you feel about how reliant the tech world has become on YouTube - is there any viable alternative if the platform started to play rough(er) with content creators? Best of luck!

Deadeyes

Wonder if we will actually see it or if it's just a patent for patents sake

Mr Bespoke

Hi DF Gents! Now that Digital Foundry is now "completely Independent" will Alex be making an escape attempt from his undisclosed location and his captors? Thanks and keep up the awesome independent work!!

FrametimeSommelier

at least they allowed him to hang up some pictures :-)

DaJaCo (Dan)

Happy Half-Owned Being OVER Lads! The latest leaks and rumours surrounding the PS6 suggest there'll be "Orion" and one of his pet dogs "Canis" as the handheld APU. Estimates suggest Orion will be 3x PS5 raster, and Canis will be 0.5x PS5 raster.. SO - Could we have a situation where the tail is wagging the dog, or rather the dog wagging it's owner? Should Sony avoid this by only mandating support for PS5 games on the handheld, but allowing compatibility to be OPTIONAL for PS6 games. There would still be a massive incentive for developers to do a PS5 version of a game, to reach the home console install base, and additionally the new handheld.. Also, with it looking like the PS6 will be at least 10x PS5 for RT, wouldnt the "RT gulf" between the handheld and the home console be too vast to mandate compatibility?

Octolimar

Ive been thinking about if the switch 2 having a 1080p is an overall positive or negative. The pros are that handheld can have better image quality depending on the game, but the cons include a hit to battery life, the potential for worse performance in games that target 1080p over a lower 720p, and worse scaling for lower res titles that output at 720p. However, the argument could also be made that by forcing developers to shoot for 1080p in handheld, it paves the way for a better 1080p+ resolution experience in docked play. What are your thoughts on this? Would a 720p120hz display have been a better choice? Or is it fine as is.

goregutz

Hi DF blokes. First of all, many felicitations over your independence. Can we mark today as the official DF independence day with its own bespoke rituals and customs? In any case, my question pertains to console exclusives in the next generation. In short, will they exist? Will Microsoft enable developers to release games specifically for their future Xbox hardware and not the larger PC audience. So that, for example, when GTA 7 comes out, I will still have the initial launch on PS6 and the next box or will it become a glorified PS exclusive? Curious to hear your thoughts. Cheers! 🥂

micnic

Hi GF. Joint Patreon the moment I saw the good news. Great stuff! Do you have any plans to extend the team specifically to cover additional topics? As someone who mainly plays VR nowadays, I would love to see someone having a technical deep dive comparable to your flat game coverage. But it should not be the existing core team, as you are already too busy. Best of luck for the future.

goregutz

Hi DF people! Intel just announced that it will drop MSAA support on celestial saying that modern upscalers and TAA make it obselete. Thought?

FrametimeSommelier

Sony executive Sadahhiko Haykawa recently said in a Q&A with investors: "In the gaming business, we are moving away from a hardware-centric business model toward a platform business that expands the community and increases engagement." That almost sounds like they've taken a big sip of Microsoft Gaming Division juice. What do you make of this, especially in light of that PlayStation multi-platform job listing?

BespokeEP

Full context helps. Not at all following MS, you also need to understand that Sony employees leaders of each division to run those division, he is the SVP of Sony, not PlayStation. He was responding to a question about what their plans were with recent investments in Bandai and Kadakowa, and how they are going to be investing in new and existing IP expansion across Sony Music, Pictures, and PlayStation to increase engagement. He even references that plans have not changed and they are still committed to this strategy. I don't know why people think he would be speaking cryptically... If Sony had any interest in bringing their Single player tent pole titles to Xbox, he would say those exact words.

Bulbous_Bow

On a point of clarification, Moore’s Law is Dead says in the recent episode of Broken Silicon that he has seen documentation suggesting PS6 RT performance will be 5 - 10x PS5 performance, not “at least 10x”

BespokeEP

A very scrumptious and delicious day to all. As the bespokest exclamation point to ever live, I would like to propose that you add a Alex inspired "Friend and Colleague" tier on Patreon for $5 more than the retro tier, for the people who have extra funds and want to help support this independent journey. It doesn't really even need an extra perk, but you could do a quarterly Q&A where all the "friends" get to ask a single question to the "colleagues" who are also friends and you film a segment similar to the direct Q&A. Baseball butt slaps for all Cheers!!!

Alan

Hi Guys, Sony CFO Lin Tao has said, "its live service shift is ‘not entirely going smoothly’ but pledges to carry on and learn from mistakes" and "Marathon is expected to release before March, and Bungie’s independence is ‘getting lighter". Of course the people working on Marathon want it to do well, but the negativity continues to swirl in the media, so can it become a success and what do you think they need to do?

Alan

Hi Guys, The workers have overthrown their corpo overlords! The truth is though times are getting tougher, too many people are trying to do the same thing, big tech sucking the life out of independents, people wanting content for free and now Ai. What can us viewers do other than Patreon? how many of the viewers are not subscribed, ideas for merch?

NobleHeroine

Honestly I'm kinda wondering about this too. Just, in general, if both the major "mainstream" console manufacturers are moving more towards a multiplatform publishing strategy, do video game consoles as a business make sense long term? Or are we facing some strange potentiality of Nintendo systems and PC's becoming the only gaming platform? Not that I think this is happening anytime soon, but it's hard to see how the current economic model functions with this.

VintageGamerNZ

Hi, DF Crew! As a new Switch 2 owner I've really been enjoying Nintendo's new console. Having not owned the previous Switch it's been fun exploring the back catalogue of games. However, one negative has been the atrocious HDR calibration tool on the console, which has been widely reported. It's AWFUL. I currently am reasonably happy with my settings, but there's always this thought in the back of my mind that it's not quite correct! Can you see Nintendo ever fixing the tool via a firmware update, or will they just rely on users having to resort to YouTube tutorials to get the best settings? Thanks, and congratulations on your newfound independence!

Wormy

Hello DF Team! Proud new supporter here. We have seen the capabilities of the Switch 2 and the qualities of Apple hardware. Do you think ARM can be the new default of all PC portable devices? If so, what do you think has to be adressed to reach there?

BespokeEP

Where are people getting Sony is going full multiplatform... Everything is going to Xbox day one from a response to a question about recent investments to Bandai and Kadakowa? If Sony was putting 1st party single player games on Xbox, you would know it, cause they would say exactly that

Nikhil Verma

Hello DF! I was curious about yours and especially Olver's thoughts on the new Google Genie 3 demo. It's quite impressive, there are some instances where people plugged in an image of themselves playing with Genie 3 and it was able to extrapolate a world from that.

Douglas Fowler

Hi DF Crew, In light of the exciting acquisition news, I’ve been revisiting your incredible back catalog of content. I’m curious — for all three of you — which games you’ve covered over the years ended up being the most surprising in terms of visuals and performance? Whether it was a title that far exceeded expectations or one that delivered something completely unexpected, I’d love to hear your picks.

BespokeEP

I don't think the handheld was ever intended on being a native PS6 device. I think Tom's source at AMD is just confusing it because it is a PS6 family device, but will only play PS4/5 native. Though it might be able to play some smaller PS6 titles natively, it will be marketed as cloud/remote play for PS6.

goregutz

Intel has announced XESS 2.1 with FG for everyone. Is this the FSR 3 killer we've been waiting for? Is there any point to it given all graphics card vendors now have their own bespoke solutions? (BTW, thanks Rich for introducing the word bespoke into my daily vocabulary. I use it naturally all the time now and my friends sometimes have no idea what I'm on about) Cheers.

stillinbrl

Hello all the way from Brazil! I remember a while ago Steam shared some information about the most used GPUs on their platform, and that laptops had an interesting number. Have you ever considered reviewing games on various laptops? How different of a workflow do you think it would be to produce such a video? Congratulations on your Independence Day! Much love from Brazil.

tod weitzel

Did I hear right that John is the HR Manager currently? What other job titles have been drawn by lots? Who is the facilities manager?

Joseph

Congrats on your Independance. Just signed up for DF Retro. Would love to see more videos on PlayStation 1 and Saturn:) Thanks.

ConcreteLlama

Wishing you a Merry Independence TIME_UNIT and a Happy rest of the year! So there have been some rumours about the PS6 being roughly equivalent to a 9070 XT and the next Xbox equivalent to a 5080. Is it just me or is that mildly disappointing? We were told to expect a massive generational leap, but... well, I have a 5080. I think it's great, and delivers far better performance than a Series X or PS5. But I would hardly call it a massive generational leap. The 5080 is high end now but it won't be by the time the consoles come out..

Jonathan Hamilton

Congratulations on your independence! In Oliver's Mac Studio video, he mentioned using AI to generate transcripts of DF videos. What other uses do you have for AI in production, now or in the future?

DaJaCo (Dan)

I know, this is my own speculation - the PS5 Pro is already 3 - 4x the PS5 in RT, and given that the raster uplift is small, i think the focus will heavily be on RT and upscaling, and possibly frame gen.. so i think 10x will be a given.

Anxiously Chrono Triggered

Dear DF, congrats on your independence! One question: is the poster upgrade in Alex’s basement the first visible sign of your newfound freedom… and were you finally able to pay the ransom?

Anxiously Chrono Triggered

Hi Rich & the Gang, does the latest move mean you’re be releasing a new merchandise? Like „7 August - DF Independence Day”?

Anxiously Chrono Triggered

Top of the morning to y’all! We all know Alex is a pizza fan — but what’s everyone else’s go-to food or drink when gaming? Or is it strictly coffee and tea to keep controllers grease-free?

digitalfoundry

IGN didn't want to continue Digital Foundry's run on Eurogamer - but we do control the content and per the video we put out yesterday, the plan is to deliver our own web presence in the fullness of time.

Gabriel Dobson

So excited for you guys!! Had to up my subscription tier to continue to support!

Anxiously Chrono Triggered

Hey DF crew, I noticed a change in the CRT setup behind John a couple of weeks ago — looks like a bigger consumer set. Which model is it? And what was going on the other day when you had the living room table set up for a bit of CRT surgery? Cheers!

DaJaCo (Dan)

I hope you are right, it just seems like a possible danger.. and even if sony don't mandate compatibility - it will keep the PS5 performance level on life support for a very long time.. which risks a never ending cross-gen situation.. I could see a lot of PS6 games basically being PS5 games with "a shed load of extra RT" and upscaling / possibly frame gen.

Anxiously Chrono Triggered

Hey Guys! With the new direction can we hope for more in-person meetings of the crew? Also, any chance for some live sessions? Cheers!

DaJaCo (Dan)

I think the job listing points towards Sony having some sort of multi-platform strategy, but i doubt it will take the same form as Microsoft's. They have expanded on PC.. and will probably grow that more.. and may strategically port the odd exclusive to switch 2 or Xbox once it has exhausted most of its sales potential on playstation platforms.. i.e. a year or two after release. This will allow them to boost the total profitability of a game without losing the major benefits of it being an exclusive for the first year or two. I don't think we will ever see day and date multi-platform releases from Sony, but I could be wrong. Just doesnt seem like the rash move they'd make.

DaJaCo (Dan)

Maybe, but it doesn't sound like the dev-kit situation has helped much!

StrokingKittens

Congratulations on your independence gents from a new supporter here.

NobleHeroine

Laptops are incredibly hard to test and get meaningful results from because systems with identical hardware can post entirely different results depending on cooling and power limits. It's less predictable than desktop systems.

peter O'Malley

Congrats team! I signed up to Patreon as soon as I watched your video so I can support you guys 😁

KABL00M UK

Oh 100% a contributing factor, no doubt. But look at stuff like the sound in the N64 port of RE2 or the seamless level loading in Soul Reaver on PS1. Developing with a ceiling in terms of power/memory led to some amazing innovation! Just feels like that's missing these days

Karl Wagner

Congrats on the announcement! I would expand on your 3 pillars with another 2 - the DF directs, where you guys provide some really insightful industry commentary and analysis, and education. One of the things I love about this channel is that even if I watch a review of some individual game, I’ll probably learn something interesting about the history of gaming, or technology, or something cool subculture I never knew existed, etc. Almost everything is educational not just editorial.

BespokeEP

Only if Will Smith joins the Patreon

BespokeEP

I just can't see Sony demanding that devs do the one thing every dev complained about this gen. Cerny spends a few years talking with devs all over the world before coming up with the final plan for next gen, I'm certain he would have asked how they feel about a lower spec PS6 handheld that they will be required to support and I'm sure the reaction was just a bunch of groans.

scud

Congrats on going Indie, guys! I have a quick non-related question, mostly for John, but curious what any of the crew would say. What would you guys want to see next from Nightdive Studios? I'd be incredibly happy to see them give the first two Thief games their treatment, but curious what's on your wishlist? Cheers, chaps. And keep on keepin' on!

Sean Eppel

Hey DF crew, congrats on the independence. Just subbed to support the team.

John

Same

DaJaCo (Dan)

I lean towards that perception too, and i hope so - but we've already seen the "low power mode", "stealth handheld" flag being added. Which suggests it will have a distinct profile from full fat PS5 - there is even the open question of how that will be treated relative to the PS5.. will PS5 games be mandated to support it on PS5 .. or will that be optional on PS5 too? I'm guessing it will be mandate on PS5 but optional for PS6 games. But who knows.. that's why i ask!

Snoopey0

Hey DF exclamation mark! Would you guys consider some kind of direct investment such as crowdcube for your supporters to put more money in the business and get back some kind of stake? I would love to invest as you guys are my favourite channel out there bar-none. You could of course be selling non-voting shares, so retain total creative control.

Bulbous_Bow

Unfortunately the original PS6 and Magnus leaks have been quite widely misquoted in the media and I see some of this misinformation spread here in the form of questions (not criticising my fellow patreons for believing what they’ve read of course). So if possible I thought I’d repeat some clarifications Tom made on today’s episode of Die Shrink (itself Patreon only), particularly on the PS6 RT performance, and hopefully before recording. I’m not typing it verbatim but here goes: PS6 5-10x RT of PS5 Per CU: RDNA3 50-80% faster than RDNA2 RDNA4 2x RDNA3 RDNA4 2-4 x RDNA 2 (PS5 Pro 2-4x PS5 (Pro has RDNA4 RT capability even if not full RDNA4 cores) Implies RDNA5 2-2.5x RT capabilities of RDNA4 Also implies if PS6 is close to a 9070 in raster, 2x that RT perf puts it over a 5080 (PS5 Pro is a 6800 with 9070 RT) Following this, Canis may have 2-3x RT perf PS5 Contention is that this sets it up to max out a 4K 120hz tv without hitting diminishing returns Magnus looks 30% more powerful across the board but likely to hit diminishing returns in terms of subjective experience His opinion is that Sony ambition is to hit a reasonable price point, particularly with canis to finally move people off PS4.

BespokeEP

I mean consoles have really hit the ceiling when it comes to resolution and TV's will limit frame rate, I mean HDMI 2.2 can go up to I think 4k at 240Hz while maintaining 4:4:4. But there are no HDMI 2.2 tv's yet so we have no idea what they might cost. Next gen the majority of gamers will likely have a 4k 120Hz tv, which PS6 will target, and even if Xbox can hit 4k 240, and someone actually had the tv capable of utilizing it, the difference between 240 and 120 is really small (around 2ms of latency) and you would really only notice a slight difference with keyboard and mouse. Not worth the extra cost at all in my opinion

ConcreteLlama

I think when people think of generational leaps they don't think in framerate but in visual fidelity. Also given Microsoft's more PC like approach next gen they do have the option of going balls to the wall, and I feel like those balls could hit that wall a little harder

Jeremy

Congrats DF - had to join the patreon for this independence celebration

Zebulon Pi

Hey guys! Subbed as soon as I got the announcement, congrats, and happy to support you guys! For my question: with your new-found independence, what are each of you most excited about doing that you were constrained from doing before? Congrats again!