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Hello there, and welcome to the latest Call For Questions post as we "prep" for the next edition of DF Direct. And here's what we're going to be doing. First of all, I've had to take some time recently to look after my elderly parents, so I'm running well behind on my ROG Xbox Ally X review (Microsoft didn't send the non-X). I'll have initial impressions, benchmarks vs (R)OG Ally and some gameplay tests to show what Z2 Extreme can do.

Oliver will be joining us to demonstrate what the gigantic Black Myth Wukong patch does for the PlayStation 5, while Alex will be tackling a pretty big topic based on audience feedback to his Nvidia GeForce 7800 GTX retrospective: do older games stutter less than modern games? My early take on this from my own experiences is "probably yes, but older PC titles were hardly stutter-free" but let's see what Alex says, eh?

Other stuff? We'll take a look at the next-gen Xbox and PS6 rumours that have most recently circulated and see if we have anything to say about that, but beyond this - the stage is yours. What sort of topics would you like us to discuss and of course, crucially, what questions do you have for the team?

Just so we're clear, it'll be Rich (ie me), Oliver and Alex at the mics for tomorrow's taping and the deadline for your submissions is 8am BST Friday. Thanks in advance for your valuable inputs!

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Comments

Buzz Bee Spoke

If you guys had to make a video game (Mark Cerny is forcing you to) what kind of game would it be? Digital Foundry studios

CrispyNougat

It would be called stutter struggle. And it would run flawlessly

1040STF

This week we lost Tomonobu Itagaki at 58, way too young. He was the great creator of the Dead or Alive serie and the modern Ninja Gaiden. His good-bye note on his facebook page was heartbreaking as the hommage Katshuiro Harada, Tekken's producer, posted on his side. Could you share your best Itagaki memory if you have any? A game or an anecdot for exemple...

Nick Antrobus

Would be nice to call out burger Becky’s cancer diagnosis and treatment as she is a legend in the industry

1040STF

Nah, you would have to defeat all stutters to make the game runs great. With a sword and a bazooka.

Marcus

Hiya foundrymen! How do you feel about the recently leaked budgets for Pokémon games? This came out of the big “terraleak” and has caused quite a stir. It’s apparently without the marketing budget, but it does seem like game freak are able to keep the production costs of these games down probably in part due to lower Japanese salaries but also because they are imitating relatively small scale games with relatively few employees that still sell well. Meanwhile, companies like Ubisoft are having quite literally thousands of people working on the next assassin’s creed and there is this idea that games have gotten more and more expensive to develop and how that’s the problem for the Industry. What do you think?

Wolf0202

Hi DF Team! Gamers Nexus dropped a video talking about benchmarking game performance via Animation Errors. What appears to be another way of measuring smoothness via latency between the animation vs the frame on screen. It looks similar to the animation quirks Alex found in Silent Hill 2 Remake. Thanks to DF I am more aware of Frame time/pacing versus raw FPS. Is Animation Error something the team would be interested in? Would love to hear your thoughts. I would love to hear your thoughts gents. Thank you for all your hard work as always!

GreenSwede

Greetings! A perhaps quick question: do you think that today's PC ports with hard caps of 60 FPS is fine/reasonable or have we moved past that initial milestone? Is higher framerates (120+ FPS) something that PC gamers should expect going forward or are there some game genres that down-prioritizes the importance of higher framerates? The main reason I ask this is because of Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds running into issues if the framerate deviates away from its locked 30 and 60 FPS modes. I'm curious to hear your thoughts. Cheers!

DudleyTheGentleman

Hello honorable DF Directors! This question is specifically for Alex. What were your specific take aways from Sony x AMD's recent "Project Amethyst" technologies? Are you thoroughly underwhelmed, whelmed, or overwhelmed? Lastly, what are the longer term implications of AMD focusing on CNNs vs Nvidia's transition to Transformer models?

Snorlax cat

do you think the devs of bmw went back to the ps360 gen to improve input latency? is that really enough to justify such a stark cut? I value the option because I am not good with souls like games but still, it is baffling I would much rather take a really low res.

Bad Hunter

Hello, dudes. Would you all recommend someone first getting into PC handhelds get a Steam Deck OLED or the ROG Xbox Ally X? Both devices seem compelling in different ways. For a first time purchase, will the extra price of the Ally X provide a more future-proof device? As these two devices are branded by big names (Steam vs Xbox), it feels like a question many may ask this holiday.

Peter Karadimas

Hello Gents, How viable is desktop PC gaming on SteamOS or Bazzite? Are there performance gains to be had, and what are the main limiting factors holding it back from being a true windows competitor?

Tim Rodie

Three wise men of Foundryland. I’m having a LAN party to celebrate my fourth decade - a great excuse to get the old gang back together to rekindle our pre-parenthood lives. Did you guys have LAN parties back in the day, and if so, what were your favourite LAN games? This may be a stealth call for a Codename Eagle retrospective. Maybe.

Deadeyes

How much RAM would the next gen consoles need to have to make you really worry about the longevity of 16GB cards?

AshesBoomstick

Hello, kindly DF compatriots! With the advent of Windows 11 going full-on malware mode these days with their latest "user convenience features!" spyware requirements and lockdowns to preventing installation without a Microsoft account, and so on... the other side of this coin is how much Linux has started to push forward distros that are focused on providing viable gaming alternatives. For years, people have been saying that Linux will start to gain a larger footprint for users, but it still remains less user-friendly for casual PC users. With all that said, do you feel that now is a better time than ever for gamers to try and experiment with Linux as a potential test bed compared to the recent past? We now have Ubuntu Gaming, CachyOS, Bazzite and other distros that are trying to provide decent Linux gaming in a Microsoft Windows-based world. Finally, Steam OS seems to be assisting with that push to better compatibility if one chooses to dip their toes into the Linux backbone. Thoughts?

Mike M

Hi guys, Will future hardware fix #StutterStruggle ? As an older gamer, due to the infinite struggles of work and family, I don't get much time to game so I'm currently stuck in the past!.... The dog and I curated a list of games we wanted to play through and sorted by release date. We're currently in 2017. I believe around this time was the onset of stutter struggle? Is near future high end hardware likely to alleviate this problem? By the time we get around to playing some of the more problematic games there will be at least a couple of new CPU generations and an Rtx 6090. And by the time we reach current date (2025) it will probably be at least 2030 on everyone else's calendar.

Deadeyes

Hope you don't mind me weighing in: Hard framerate caps are just a bad way of making games in the modern era. Tying game logic to framerates is also a bad way to make games (often the reason for locked framerates) It's vestigial from the olden days and should be avoided when possible.

Deadeyes

You can make pretty cheap games if you half-ass it lmao

BespokeEP

Maybe they can all say "yeeeeeeessss Rich" in perfect harmony

Deadeyes

I actually kinda love the idea of a game with a lot of meta/4th wall awareness that has a boss that uses (developer intentional) stutters as a weapon against you.

Mario M8ker Boi

Hello Free People of DF Country ! I happen to have a question I couldn't find an answer about : as PC gaming now fully moved to digital stores (Steam, EGS, GoG...), games published digitally some years ago had minimum specs of their time. years passing by, this game can be updated to keep working on newer hardware. But can a game running smoothly on some PCs some years ago run bad after updates as developers considered this same hardware "obsolete" ? Or are their policies on those digital stores preventing this from happening ? In shorter terms : Can we fear some kind of "digital planned obsolescence" ? Cheers

Eric Hurst

There seems to be many people, both critics and readers, who are surprised by the fact that the Xbox Ally/X cannot play “Xbox” games, meaning digital console games. This got me thinking: is Microsoft trying to “quiet quit” the console industry? They seem to be unable or unwilling to give a straight answer to the question of their commitment to consoles. Do you think they’re afraid of losing their current SeriesX/S customers if they announce too soon that they’re straying too far from the console path? I’m betting that their next “console” will absolutely be a Windows 11 machine first, but Microsoft will reveal that fact at the absolute last possible second to avoid alienating even more people, if that’s even possible. Thank you all, as usual.

CABBAC

Good morrow people of the country of Digitalfoundarius! Has anyone identified who this mysterious Strix Halo person is yet? Could he potentially save the video game industry from its impending doom or will he destroy the world like fellow oddly named rich man Elon Musk?

Chicken Point

Hello! Do you think there is room for Sony to innovate with the PS6 controller in terms of new features? As in, do you think there are novel features they could add that could significantly enhance gaming experiences? Or, maybe you think it's pointless to add new features beyond those of the DualSense, and the only worthwhile changes would be improvements to longevity/reliability etc? While the adaptive triggers aren't my cup of tea, I love the haptics, especially when combined with the built-in speaker. So, I would like to see extensions of those features at least. Best wishes, Glen

eggsfordays

Hi DF! What do you think are the odds of Microsofts releasing a next-gen device that plays both Xbox and PC games? And how would that affect exclusives (e.g. Alan Wake 2 on EGS)? I'd pay a premium for such a device next to the TV, as I very much prefer Microsofts hardware design and more open approach to gaming with Xbox (compared to Sony). Cheers and keep up the good work!

Bulbous_Bow

Thinking about PSSR, it seems that the trend in games that handle it well vs poorly has little to do with features of such games such as: whether they have ray tracing or not, whether they have dense foliage or not, or even the native resolution from which they are upscaled. Titles such as diverse as gran turismo, stellar blade, horizon, demon’s souls, ratchet & clank and final fantasy have all made excellent use of the technology and are broadly issues free. Ghost of Tsushima even allows dense foliage and ray tracing at 60fps and a perceptible 4k. Instead, issues tend to arise far more for consistently when a game simply fails to be published by Sony (FFVIIRebirth perhaps being the exception that proves the rule (although even that is an exclusive)?) Silent Hill F being the latest example. I wonder what accounts for this? Presumably Sony are not, Nintendo style, holding back the latest dev kits (or learnings) from major 3rd party developers. Meanwhile is there perhaps a long term issue here where, if the PS6 defaults to use the PS5 Pro mode in backwards compatibility, we could end up with the scenario that games such as Silent Hill F actually run better on the base machine than on all future hardware?

Rolodzeo

Hello binary forgers! I'm wondering if the "next" generation will be a battle fought in the handheld space: Steam Deck, Switch 2, the rumored Playstation handheld and now the ROG X Ally Xbox X Series Asus X are fighting for our time and money (not to mention many other devices already present in the market). Are traditional consoles slowly fading away in favour of mobile devices and/or PC? Is this hybrid future the next logical step? Or is it just the market filling a space that was under Nintendo's boots for way too long? Should be Nintendo even concerned about it or its IPs are more than enough to make this attempt a hopeless effort? Thanks for your time!

Crashsune

It wouldn't be unfair to say that Xbox and Microsoft, post Activision Blizzard acquisition/merger, has been a complete disaster. Mass layoffs, cancelations, entire studio shut downs, massive console price hikes plus an unprecedented gamepass price increase. All that combined with the reality of near *decade* long development cycles from AAA games and the often unexciting creative decisions going into AAA owing to the vast levels of time and monetary investment required to get these games made, resulting in them needing to "play it safe", makes AAA gaming, along with console gaming in general (Aside from Nintendo!) look less appealing than ever. At the same time, it feels like Indie games (And even the forever games like Fortnite and Roblox) are reaching new record player counts and thriving more than ever, with this years releases of Silksong, Blue Prince, Hades II and Monster Train 2 and so many more. My question is what in the world does AAA need to do in order to get things back on track? Nothing about this feels sustainable, and I fear console gaming will be a thing of the past outside of Nintendo after the release of this upcoming console generation.

RL

I'm wondering about Alex's thoughts on this past weekend's CitezenCon direct. What they showed in the technology part was astounding.

Jagster

Bespoke Experts of Digital Visual Analysis, What is the breaking point? Between $80 games, a new $1000 portable PC handheld, and next gen consoles possibly ascending to the $700+ range, at what point is gaming as a hobby going to become far too boutique and luxurious that it casts out a wide swath of various customer bases? I am fortunate to be able to largely afford gaming in the manner I engage with it, but I still feel trepidation that it's ultimately going to continually become less and less consumer friendly.

scud

Hey chaps, I've currently got both a PS5 and an Xbox Series X and have been thinking about whether I'd buy both when the next gen hits. Given that most Xbox games will likely be coming to Playstation, even if I were to get both, I reckon I'd definitely start with a PS6 first. It got me wondering what would get me to buy a next gen Xbox, and I think there are only a few things that would do it: 1. Steam being fully integrated into the Xbox 2. A really significant performance benefit over the PS6 (unlikely) 3. The next Elder Scrolls being exclusive (also pretty unlikely) If you were just consumers and didn't need all the platforms for DF business, what would you need to see to invest in both, and what cards do you think Microsoft is planning on playing? Cheers!

Joe Esposito

Hello DF Direct-ors! We just got news of the loss of Tomonobu Itagaki, one of the more provocative auteurs in the gaming space. That brought to mind that I know a lot of names from previous generations that fit within a narrow band of creators with big personalities attached to landmark games. Who are those personalties of today? It feels like the ability to be an "outlaw auteur" is slowly being bled from an industry focused on shareholders and profitability over players and creativity. Will the Itagakis of the future be strictly within the independent space or can you imagine innovative firebrands thriving under the AAA banner?

Ian

The Rog Xbox ASUS Ally thing or whatever it’s called is the same price as the outgoing Ally X. £799. Which for a pc handheld seems reasonable. But that’s a small enthusiast market. The legion go 2 is even more expensive, For most people isn’t it a case that gaming handhelds are now about as expensive as a more versatile gaming laptop. Are handhelds in danger of hurting their own recent resurgence over their cost?

Neotokyo

Greetings digital technomancers, i recently got an oled monitor ( an alienware 27 inch 1440p 360 hz) and have noticed specifcally in dying light the beast a wierd artifact of having a checkerboard pattern over the whole display with dark areas and especially during the nighttime sections, reading up on it it could have something to do with vrr being engaged and oleds being funky with it. In your experiences have any of you gents experienced any quirks with oled displays?

Darryl Stewart

Hi Team Can you recall any content you’ve produced that had surprisingly more views and engagement than you were expecting? Looking back at these cases, did you identify latent interest in a particular topic that was stronger than you had thought before the engagement revealed it to you?

Someguyperson

Do you have any thoughts on Gamers Nexus's exposé on benchmarking animation error? It seems that this would really help situations like the infamous "Koboh Run" in Jedi Survivor. GN just asks you to link to their video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDnXe6N8h_c

Someguyperson

Family comes first Rich. I hope things aren't too bad with your parents. It unfortunately never gets easier at this point, but I think you have a good bit of moral support around here.

speedlemur

Frametime foremen - What can we look forward to in technical advancements in a world where Moore's law is dead, cross-gen is lasting a full console generation, and handhelds are so popular? I fear having to cater to the PS5 & handhelds will hold back many PS6 era games. Is there any hope for those of us who still want better graphics?

Jonathan Hamilton

If you could pick one retro console to get a miraculous revival and receive 30 new games next year, which would you pick? For me, it's the PlayStation 3. I don't think that system got many titles that made the most of its architecture and would love to see what developers could do with it today.

Xbox Ally Has Gone ROGue!

Yeesssssss Fellas, as much as I love PC handhelds I am so bummed out by the increasingly large bulk of every new devices and the endless pursuit of "one more 5 percent performance edge". Do you think it's possible and technically feasible that any of the major players in the field could release something in the similar performance profile with Steam Deck, but size-wise similar to a original Switch or even Switch Lite and also priced in the ~500 USD ballpark? Aya Neo Air was an amazing device back in the day but we never heard about any update on that device to bring the performance up. GPD Win4 has that PSP-esque design but it's very pricy.

Pol Kallamata

I suspect this is the case as well. My assumption is that if they were to outright admit that there won't be a console next generation it would kill spending from their existing user base as many gamers would not want to keep building up a software library that won't be supported in the future. Muddying the waters by calling Windows PC devices Xboxs and saying that they're committed to next generation hardware let's them string a large part of this audience along for the next couple of years and also claim that they never technically lied when the rug finally gets pulled. Its a pretty cynical way to treat your remaining core fanbase tbh...

Pol Kallamata

Now that Microsoft is working towards improving the experience of Windows for dedicated gaming devices through the Xbox ROG Ally series and its work on future living room hardware, what improvements would Valve need to make to Steam OS to maintain its edge in the portable gaming PC space? Furthermore, what technical / UI issues do you believe Valve need to address to make Steam OS a truly viable alternative for the broad PC gaming audience?

Jordan + Cinewhirl

Do you think Nintendo should release a cheaper version of the Switch 2, that is a docked only mini console? For people that only play in docked mode, it could surely be a cheap compact little unit.

tod weitzel

How soon after the PS6 lands will people demand to know what's in the PS7?

Alan

Hi guys, As nice as Project Amethyst and the Magnus Chip sound, how much are the PS6 and NextBox going to cost? Usually, consoles have to make do with previous-generation PC components, but it seems this coming generation they will feature current-generation, and custom technology to boot. Some leaks suggest the NextBox is going to be one thousand bucks!

Xbox Ally Has Gone ROGue!

Do you think because that Xbox Ally systems are the only Xbox-branded systems that can take advantage of PC Game Pass, which is almost half the price of Ultimate, it makes them, especially the Ally X, a legit good deal as game pass machine?

Graham Bruno

Cordial salutations gentlemen, As Microsoft boldly declares that everything with more processing power than a smart fridge is now an Xbox - I'd like to ask for your perspective on what seems to be the widest Rubicon they've still to cross - Xbox console games running locally on PC. Do you think the biggest obstacles Microsoft need to overcome to realise this are technical or contractual? My own impressions are that with enough oomph - the various generations of console should be playable using emulation & translation layers. Are game makers content to say "okay - a PC and Xbox are one and the same now" and allow the console version of their games to play on PC without a fuss or will Microsoft need to stuff their mouths with gold to make this happen? Would value your thoughts on this - and thanks as ever for the great work and insights!

RAVE_DAM0S

Gentlemen of the Foundry de Digital Freedom, At the heart of Orion and Magnus, how do Sony and Xbox truly differ in their partnerships with AMD? From what I’ve gathered, the perception is that Sony’s engineers are deep in the trenches co-developing PS6 hardware, while Xbox leans more heavily on AMD’s designs and simply brands the result as "Xbox" silicon, like the ROG Xbox Ally X. Is that perception fair, or is there more happening behind the scenes than most of us realize? Or could it be that Xbox’s design is more AMD-driven by necessity, as part of their push toward a hybrid PC future? I ask as a Series X owner who’s watched Xbox’s more ambitious, bespoke engineering efforts (like SFS, DirectML, Mesh Shaders, and 40+ INT8 TOPS) fall into the category of mostly untapped potential. Regards, Humble Seeker of Truth

spud19870

Hey Digital Foundry Guru's With the consistent issue around getting Switch 2 dev kits for developers, do you take any creedence in a recent article (https://tinyurl.com/4fkuju6a) that part of the reason is to stop poor quality games making it onto the E-store? Switch 1 had quite a number of shovelware titles on the E-store and still does. What do you make of this and recent rumours that around 95% of Indie developers have allegedly not been able to get dev kits? Thank you for all the work you all do - it has helped get me through the night feeds with our now 4 month old!

David Gorra

Hi DF gents. I often ask myself this question ever since buying a 5090. Is a 4k 240hz oled monitor worth it for the smoothness or is the immersion of 42 inch oled tv but at 120-144hz too good to pass on ? What do you guys prefer ? I wish a 42 inch 240hz tv would come out but I doubt that will happen anytime soon!! Thank you and keep up the awesome work !

Chicken Point

Hope you don't mind if I contribute my opinion! I have extremely low credence in the hypothesis regarding the shortage of Switch 2 dev kits. Consider: 1. Shovelware games are not demanding of hardware, so they don't really need a dev kit. Moreover, the developers of such games don't care whether they run satisfactorily. 2. Nintendo is denying dev kits to developers who have a proven track record of releasing excellent games. "Let's not give dev kits to excellent developers, in the hope that this will prevent shovelware devs -- who are happy to publish on our platform without even testing with a dev kit -- from publishing on our platform." I don't see any reason to believe it!

DaJaCo (Dan)

Happy Half-Fortnight Lads! With rumours swirling that Assassin's Creed Shadows will be "Shadow Dropping" on switch 2 before the end of the year, Outlaws giving a good showing, and RE9 pulling no punches.. How long do you think we'll have to wait for a game that's "2-BIG-4-SWITCH-2" ? Perhaps Path Traced PS6 games? OR perhaps Sony's portable aspirations will be a veritable gift to Nintendo? If most games target Sony's home AND portable consoles.. Could the Switch 2 could outlive us all!?

DarkRod99

Hello DF crew, for the Xbox ROG Ally, my question will be regarding game support. Games will become more and more demanding, and dropping $1000 in a device that will where is really possible that it won't be able to run upcoming games very well, seems like a hard sell. Do you think this device has long legs? Or it will be the case that, probably in a few weeks, a AAA game that device won't be able to take in with good framerates?

Pol Arbequina

Good day gents! We've been talking quite a bit in recent times about the next Xbox leaning towards a modified PC for the living room. This week, with the release of the ROG Xbox Ally (X), we could be closer to seeing the vision Xbox has for it. And it has gotten me asking: why would people want that? I'm struggling to see how the average gamer would want to pop into the Windows desktop, at all, from the comfort of their couch. The enthusiasts would buy it, but I can't imagine that's a big enough audience. Surely there's got to be a different vision at play here. You cannot be asking people to fiddle with settings, compile their own shaders, having them update third-party drivers, etc. Maybe you can enlighten me though! Cheers!

ShyLink

Greetings Foundrymen! A question from last week about whether the PS5 Pro might outlive its 'amateur' sibling made me wonder if it's not as farfetched as it might seem. Consider the New 3DS: it had an (admittedly small) number of games that could not be played on base models. Fire Emblem Warriors was even simultaneously released on the Switch and New 3DS with no 'old' 3DS version to speak of. And what of the Gameboy Color? Although it was a true successor to the Gameboy, in some respects it functioned more like what we might think of as a "Pro" mid-gen refresh today. Many high profile GBC games, such as Pokemon Gold and Silver, shipped on "Dual Mode" cartridges that were fully playable on a standard GameBoy minus some bells and whistles (not something you can say about cross-gen titles today), before developers started making games GBC exclusive. As we head into new generation of consoles built around machine learning, is it truly beyond the realm of possibilty that the PS5 Pro might outlast it's machine lazy counterpart?

AMH

I don’t think Nintendo would ever make a docked-only Switch 2 — some families buy multiple Switches so each kid can have their own. The most reasonable assumption is them developing a switch 2 lite.

digitalfoundry

Big updates coming soon but in the meantime I refer you to this week's weekly update, which contains most of the answers you are looking for. GeForce Now may be some time.

DaJaCo (Dan)

It's tough isn't it, because real "enthusiasts" would probably want to build their own high spec device.. and those that want console level boot speed, convenience, integrated services, customised games, and exclusives.. aren't getting any of those either. It'll have to have some very compelling "middle of the road" attributes, and I'm not sure what they would be.

DaJaCo (Dan)

One element of nuance I would add to this discussion, is that the "shovelware reduction theory" needs to mention various reports that nintendo have encouraged many developers to release titles on Switch 1 instead of Switch 2 (rather than preventing release per se). So it seems more likely that nintendo want to protect the public image of the "Switch 2 hardware capabilities" by preventing every overlapping Switch 1 release from rebadging / rebranding as a Switch 2 game release, with perhaps minimal or non-existent porting / customisation work for Switch 2 hardware. Perhaps this is the reason, more so than "preventing shovelware" per se, as this would not be achieved if the game still releases as a Switch 1 title regardless.. it's still on the store.. it's just not associated with the public perceptions of the Switch 2. This makes more sense to me, whether you agree with the approach or not. It could simply be an effort to keep games that were developed for Switch 1 - on Switch 1.. rather than enabling an environment in which they all do a last minute port / rebadge for Switch 2.. which could damage perceptions around the critical launch window. Judging by the sales success. Nintendo seem to know what they are doing.

Bulbous_Bow

It wouldn’t be possible for publishers to release PS5 pro only games, although it is possible to imagine a world where DLSS/FSR4 becomes so ubiquitous that the original PS5 version of games, which can’t support this tech, increasingly look aged in comparison to the Pro versions

DaJaCo (Dan)

They really should do a Lite model as soon as possible / as soon as the die shrink makes it viable / affordable - because the Switch 2 really isn't particularly child friendly in terms of size, weight, detachable parts, drop resistance.. whereas the original switch lite was.. so it'd really open it up to a broader market.

Skyrimfest 26 FPS Edition

I asked a similar question last week and I think Rich sort of nailed it - it's up to MS to answer that question, because it's hard for anyone else to do so!

VeryProfessionalDodo

Could it be a mura issue? It's common with OLED displays, so that might be the cause there. I've also really disliked OLED VRR flicker, especially with stuttering in PC games (which is not too uncommon)

Chicken Point

Someone like me would want it! The long and short of it is that I want to play Steam games in my living room. If the device involves using Windows with substantial regularity, then I'm out. I am a console-only gamer -- I have zero interest in playing games on a PC. But, if they can pull off a console-esque experience, then I'm in.

Bulbous_Bow

I think pertinent to this question is the fact that it reportedly offers such a small performance bump over its predecessor ROG Ally and is effectively an RDNA 3 device with RDNA 5 steam deck 2, PS6 portable and other devices potentially on the horizon in the next 18-24 months. For a $1,000 investment it could start to look very dated and far quicker than console gamers in particular are used to

MattGPT

I bought the MSI MPG 321URX QD-OLED and I would say it is brilliant, the 240hz is nice and even though a lot of games on max settings do not exceed 120 fps it feels smoother than my 120hz OLED TV. I cannot give you a direct comparison as the TV is 65 inch but at my monitor viewing distance for my setup a TV would not work and it makes little sense to sit further away and use a TV. I would also say that if you do other work on your PC (other than say video editing) then the subpixel structure of a monitor is much better, text especially is much better defined on a monitor.

MattGPT

My (non-DF) understanding is that it is almost entirely contractual and if it were not for those issues they would have likely already done it. The split/shared RAM pool is a bit of an issue, but solvable if they wanted to do so (at least for higher end PCs).

MattGPT

What do you mean after the PS6 arrives?

Chicken Point

Hello! I'd like to make some remarks in response to your question. It's not anything that probably hadn't occurred to you already -- instead, it's just stuff I enjoy discussing! One thought is that yes, developers and publishers will always have an incentive to make games aimed at systems that lots of people own, rather than targeting systems that very few people own. You could think about this in terms of the weaker systems "holding back" the stronger ones. However, you could also think about it in terms of capitalism doing the "holding back": if we had communism and/or a guaranteed living wage, then developers could target whichever systems they wanted, since their livelihood wouldn't depend on selling any specific number of games. Or, another approach would be to have Universal Basic 5090s -- in that regime, developers could always target the 5090, since everybody owns one. The other thought I had is more optimistic and also more realistic. This is the idea that some graphics technologies are much harder to scale down to older/weaker systems. So, certain forms of ray tracing or machine learning. While many games will target older systems, some developers will start making games that heavily depend on these new hardware-based technologies. In those cases, the cost of porting those games to older hardware will be extremely high, and thus, some such games will skip older hardware. For games not based on those technologies, it will continue to make sense to port to older hardware. But, I can imagine quite a few developers getting excited about path tracing and machine learning, and the reduced workload they afford.

speedlemur

Thanks for your reply. Although I'm not a massive fan of capitalism I'm not sure I can see any other system creating such innovation faster. So while universal basic 5090 made me chuckle it is a tad unrealistic unfortunately.

speedlemur

About your latter point - let's assume we are just into the PS6 era. Most users have a base PS5 or weaker (handheld). Most devs look at the target market, and realise they need to cater to the majority for commercial success. Only the biggest studios like CD Projekt Red can afford to essentially create multiple versions of their game for different hardware. Hence my fear.