What happens after this generation ends?

[Zelex]

Is it just me or has Redmond been a ghost town recently. The only word out of there is Halo 3.... Surely there is something else going on?

 

I'm betting that late last year they started development on the Xbox 360^2 and have since started bigger production work on it. After the release of Halo 3, their resources will start throwing their weight internally to the next generation platform in a big way.

 

Predictions for the XBox next:

1) Fully networked dashboard. The barrier between yourself and other people will have new groundbreaking innovations which will help make the system both feel more personal and more social.

2) 12 General Purpose Processors: Why 12? Why not 16? Because as die size increases, manufacturing process errors becomes a big huge problem. This is because the reliability of a system is defined by the multiplication of the reliability of each of its parts. In other words, although each processor in the 16 has a 90% probability (grossly overestimated!!) of being a working processor, a 16 processor system has a probability as a whole of .9*.9*.9*.9*.9*.9*.9*.9*.9*.9*.9*.9*.9*.9*.9*.9 or .9^16 or 18.5%. Whereas potentially having 4 processors as redundant, gives a yield of 28.25%! Although these numbers seem small, relatively speaking you have an additional yield of about 50% more working processors. Therefore the approach would be to make 16 and treat 4 as redundant to increase yield.

3) 192 GPU Processing Threads: The GPU threads will be made to be even more general purpose, but the biggest improvement here will be the asynchrony of the system as a whole. Very few operations will require the GPU to stop and flush its cores current processing workloads. This will be accomplished by sending up state packets through the pipeline along with normal rendering data. Parallelism limits here will eventually be reached because, if you are rendering to a texture, and you subsequently need to use that texture the previous operations must be finished before the next operations can begin. Although I do think these limits are another generation away from being hit on a massive scale, there is still much to be gained in the meantime from exploiting this parallelism.

4) 4gb of memory. There is going to be much more data necessary to drive those 12 processors efficiently. Even with 4gb, this is going to seem small when you start considering that texture sizes will also increase. Nevertheless, breaking the 4gb barrier on consoles is something that will probably be done two generations from now. Although bandwidth will improve here, latency will commonly be the determining factor in everyday calculations.

5) With all of this graphics prowess, perceived gameplay quality will still only marginally improve from previous console generations.

6) Animation at this point will be at a very high quality. People will actually start moving and responding to the world like real people in every situation. Previous generation games will also have great animation quality, but this console generation will set a standard and raise the bar.

7) Physics will become a more and more important part of gameplay. The motif that HalfLife 2 started will be echoed and amplified in the next generation.

8) Novel input mechanisms. Speech recognition will be common place in some game types. Gone will be the days of "Choose between the following options to speak", you will actually start talking to people and it will try to discern meaning from what you said. This is going to be bad news for the people who loved Blue Dragon 1 & 2 and are mute.

9) Every game will be a MMO. Ok maybe not, there will still be a few "classic" single player titles, but the majority of titles in the future will be networked in some way. The lines between a MMO and a regular game will blur in the next generation and be almost completely eliminated the generation after.

[EnemaEms]

Yes, and they will release it early to a big flop. Lets be honest. I have said it a million times. This gen came too early. You can tell by console sales. PS2 and Wii are leading the sales charts. If MS doesn't let the 360 hang around for another 5 years. They will be making a huge mistake.

 

-Dean-

[Camp]

[Romier S]

9) Every game will be a MMO. Ok maybe not, there will still be a few "classic" single player titles, but the majority of titles in the future will be networked in some way. The lines between a MMO and a regular game will blur in the next generation and be almost completely eliminated the generation after.

Count me out of next to next generation gaming then;) . I've no interest in being online with hundreds/thousands of people 100% of the time. I also have no interest in seeing the "classic" single player game disappear. If anything I'd like to see the way in which stories are told in gaming evolve and deepen. Perhaps in some cases that may involve a networked environment but it's not all I ever want to play. Just my two cents as far as that bulletpoint is concerned.

 

Is it just me or has Redmond been a ghost town recently.

Are we talking in terms of driving technology to the next step or actual game releases? I ask because your post is extremely tech driven. If we're talking game releases, I would propose that Microsoft Game Studios has one of the most steady game release schedules this year.

 

Yes, and they will release it early to a big flop. Lets be honest. I have said it a million times. This gen came too early. You can tell by console sales. PS2 and Wii are leading the sales charts.

This gen came to expensive. I don't disagree that we got here earlier than needed. The original Xbox and the PS2 still had another solid year of life left to them but here we are. The problem is, and not to turn this into another sales discussion because we've been over this previously, but both thier successors are just too damn expensive.

[foogledricks]

I don't like this thread. I'm a forward looking person, especially about technology. But Jesus. Also, I think Microsoft is and should be putting all their efforts into the 360. It's just friggin ramping up. They have said all along that it is a priority for them to make the 360 mainstream, and that starts with price. They have positioned themselves to make some aggressive price cuts in the next couple of years. And they're looking forward to it. They WANT to have a $199 console ASAP so they can make tons of money on software and the marketplace.

 

Unlike with the Xbox 1, getting out early with the 360 means leaving money on the table. Whereas with the Xbox they were bleeding cash.

[Josh]

I still await Velocity Girl's arrival. She will turn it all around.

 

I think it's way too early for any of this speculation, but I agree with Dean that this gen came too early, at least from Microsoft. There are rumors that they originally thought about releasing a new Xbox every two years. Thankfully that didn't happen, but I wouldn't be surprised to see a major 360 price drop along with news of a new Xbox this holiday season.

[ColdForged]

Animation at this point will be at a very high quality.

 

I don't see it. Well, let me rephrase. I do see it but not because of 12 cores and over a hundred GPU threads. The technical ability to support something is only a small part of the equation. With game publishers already complaining -- rightly -- about the incredible cost of developing games for this generation of systems, they're not going to be chomping at the bit to spend more trying to produce more varied animations when the existing ones serve.

[kelley]

ColdForged, every time new hardware comes out game developers are complaining about increased production time and cost, then by the time the generation is ending they are complaining about the systems not being powerful enough for them realize their complete vision.

 

I don't think Zelex's idea for the next Xbox is too far off, 12 processors isn't a big deal, its hard today to find a PC that has less then 2 CPUs in it and starting later this year Intel and AMD want you to have four. When the 360 came out with its 3 CPUs dual-core CPUs was just getting ready to come out of the gate that following January from Intel.

 

nVidia is already claiming 1T Flop performance from their G90 part, that is amazing performance out of a GPU, or a GPGPU as they are liking to call them these days. The current king of the field is the nVidia 8800GTX that is about 7 months old and it has in it 128 Stream Processors...I'm willing to bet the G90 has atleast 192 Stream Processors in it.

 

I'd have 4GB of memory in all my machines if a) Windows XP didn't waste it and the Intel chipset in my MacBook Pro supported more then 3GB. I don't think 4GB is far fetched at all. I'd imagine if MS keeps the schedule they are running right now they'd be looking at using DDR3 for this next box, which has some really high latency right now.

 

I think we've been seeing marginal gameplay improvements for a while now. RR7 plays just like RR at its core for example, its just a lot prettier. While we do get some games that think out of the box, how many times are those game successful? Not too often.

 

When you've got a large majority of the games coming out using the same engine the way to stand out is always going to be with your art skills, animation being a key one of those.

 

From a technology standpoint, I find it really interesting to watch the flop of the PPUs on the PC market. I can't wait to see the Euphoria stuff coming out of LucasArts and how they use it.

 

If every console next gen is controlled with waggle then I fucking quit console gaming. Not even six months after getting a Wii I'm already bored out of my mind with the waggle.

 

I don't think next gen is going to be the place where all games are MMO like connected, broadband penetration in the US is still crap and the US telcos and cable cos show no sign of really being in a hurry, except Verizon in certain areas.

 

And they'll both be far behind the Nintendo DS Super Lite Edition.

 

Is it just me or has Redmond been a ghost town recently.

They are working on the Ultra Cool Xbox 360 Waggle Wand Hipster Edition.

[ColdForged]

ColdForged, every time new hardware comes out game developers are complaining about increased production time and cost, then by the time the generation is ending they are complaining about the systems not being powerful enough for them realize their complete vision.

 

True enough. I guess the moral of the story is that developers are just whiny bitches .

[General Zot]

MS won't release another console early, and it has nothing to do with games or the industry. Their ace in the hole OS (Vista) is kicking them in the ass right now and might fail outright. They are in no position to rock the boat until that thing starts selling better.

 

X360 is here to stay. The rest of this thread is just thinly veiled MS bashing IMHO. Why are we talking about this?

[Magness]

My impression was that Vista was doing fine...? I thought there was a press release or something that MS already sold through more copies of Vista than there are Mac's and Linux machines combined. To be fair, maybe I misread it, or its counting OEM's or something "not quite units sold"...

 

Anyway, my guess is that snakefish (and others) are right, MS won't release their next console early and it is looking like the 360 will have a 5yr lifespan. Thats good as far as I'm concerned - especially given the costs associated with this generation of consoles. (As my wallet cry's)

[Christopher]

I think it's way too early for any of this speculation, but I agree with Dean that this gen came too early, at least from Microsoft. There are rumors that they originally thought about releasing a new Xbox every two years. Thankfully that didn't happen, but I wouldn't be surprised to see a major 360 price drop along with news of a new Xbox this holiday season.

 

That is quite the assessment of what is wrong this generation. It really is amazing how Sony continues to hit home runs while MS struggles to even get to the plate.

 

Chris

[Romier S]

The rest of this thread is just thinly veiled MS bashing IMHO. Why are we talking about this?

We're on a discussion forum?

 

Seriously though, I don't know if the intention is specifically to bash Microsoft. At the same time I also don't see much in the original post that warrants Microsoft's mention as none of it is terribly Microsoft-centric. Any console manufacturer is facing the same R&D issues in the future so I see no reason to single Redmond out here?

 

I think the intention is simply to present some possibilities and a wishlist of what Zelex would like to see next generation from Microsoft. Of course we're going to need to broaden that if we're to have a useful discussion on it. My only issue with that is that THIS generation has barely begun! Considering we're still seeing continual updates to the current consoles that improve functionality and developers are only just diving into development there's just so much to swallow right now I don't even want to start thinking the insanity that next generation will bring.

 

Also, please let's forego the need to add the typical console wars flavor of discussion in this thread. I'm changing the thread title to redirect the focus of the thread to something more useful.

[dogbert]

With game publishers already complaining -- rightly -- about the incredible cost of developing games for this generation of systems, they're not going to be chomping at the bit to spend more trying to produce more varied animations when the existing ones serve.

 

Simulation is your friend. Keyframe the animations that must be exact or are complicated behaviours, and simulate or synthesise the animations that can be procedural.

 

A fully featured character in a modern videogame will feature 100s, sometimes 1000s of hand generated animations. Animation creation is a huge, huge bottleneck. In the VFX industry, I've seen quotes of an average 1 minute of finished animation per week per animator. The games industry isn't that bad, but it's still a massive bottleneck that needs solving if we want games featuring characters with rich physical interactions.

[Magness]

That is quite the assessment of what is wrong this generation. It really is amazing how Sony continues to hit home runs while MS struggles to even get to the plate.

 

Chris

 

Heheh

 

Moving on... So, if we're right and this will be a 5yr cycle that puts the launch of the next gen consoles in late 2010 at the earliest right? Given the already large Direct Download business on all 3 current gen consoles and the ever growing (rapid) availability of broadband I think its a foregone conclusion that all of the future systems will/should be HDD based and not optical media based. My only issue with this is that it probably means NO backwards compatibility if this proves true... At least it would seem far more likely that we will all have to re-download a new digital version of our favorite last gen/current gen games (if they are even offered).

 

Not that big a deal I guess and of course this is all guesswork at this point but, these topics are kind of fun to discuss. I like to go back and see who "guessed right"... We had a similiar thread if I recall correctly on whether the 360 would or wouldn't come with a HDD - funny in hindsight

[PackFan]

My impression was that Vista was doing fine...? I thought there was a press release or something that MS already sold through more copies of Vista than there are Mac's and Linux machines combined. To be fair, maybe I misread it, or its counting OEM's or something "not quite units sold"...

 

Anyway, my guess is that snakefish (and others) are right, MS won't release their next console early and it is looking like the 360 will have a 5yr lifespan. Thats good as far as I'm concerned - especially given the costs associated with this generation of consoles. (As my wallet cry's)

 

I've been happy enough with Vista - until the update came out earlier this week to "fix" potential issues with Vista and ipods. It screwed up my ipod! It told me I had to reformat my ipod - and then it still didn't work. I had to roll back my computer to before the update, and it worked fine...

[Josh]

That is quite the assessment of what is wrong this generation. It really is amazing how Sony continues to hit home runs while MS struggles to even get to the plate.

 

Chris

 

That statement had nothing to do with Sony, and I had no intention of indirectly bringing them into this. The truth is that the 360 just isn't on pace to do anything spectacular (that does not insinuate, in any way, any other console's progress, so please don't put words in my mouth).

 

The 360's progress looks remarkably similar to the original Xbox's. Some solid shooters, mediocre RPGs and adventures, great racing games, and an amazing online service. We will once again see a spike with the Halo release and then a slow drift into whatever MS puts out next.

 

The PS3's progress looks remarkable similar to the PS2's sans price. Lots of crappy first-gen titles and lots of hype about upcoming titles. Sales are flat, even dwindling, though, and a supply excess surely has Sony freaking out. As for this generation ending, Sony has said time and again that they plan on getting a looooong life out of the PS3. I expect another MS and probably even Nintendo console before the PS3 gets replaced.

[dogbert]

That statement had nothing to do with Sony, and I had no intention of indirectly bringing them into this.

 

So let's not descend into the tired console wars & ignore the rest of your post while we talk about future tech possibilities rather than PS3 vs 360, k?

[EnemaEms]

Not sure if console wars was brought up in his post. I think it was a very accurate look at economic facts.

 

-Dean-

[Romier S]

Not sure if console wars was brought up in his post. I think it was a very accurate look at economic facts.

Which has absolutely nothing to do with the point of this thread which is to discuss technology and the progress it will make in the next generation. I've already asked to keep the sales and console wars shit out and yet here we are. You want to talk about why Microsoft's next console might fail in light of being released to quickly to the market in 2010? Fair game. Dull speculation, but fair game. You want to talk about advances in animation or AI that we may see in the next 5-10 years? Fair game. You want to talk about sales? There's any number of NPD threads to go on and on about that in. Outside of the discussion of whether the PS3 happens to be around for 10 years it has no place here.

 

I'm not going to ask again, move on with the actual subject matter of the thread or I'm closing it or worse if necessary.

[EnemaEms]

Wouldn't talking about MS/Sony/Nintendo's plans for this gen help understand how the next gen might turn out? Sony has talked about going disc-less, MS hasn't said much, and Nintendo might hit half the power of the 360.

 

Gauging how this gen goes, will determine what happens next. If the PS3 is a flop, will Sony get a new console out faster than they wanted too? And if they do, that will totally change what will happen with the tech and software that will go into the box. Not trying to step on toes, just my interpretation of the thread topic.

 

-Dean-

[AlbertA]

Lack of sleep? I get cranky too, but eventually it gets better...

 

Which has absolutely nothing to do with the point of this thread which is to discuss technology and the progress it will make in the next generation. I've already asked to keep the sales and console wars shit out and yet here we are. You want to talk about why Microsoft's next console might fail in light of being released to quickly to the market in 2010? Fair game. Dull speculation, but fair game. You want to talk about advances in animation or AI that we may see in the next 5-10 years? Fair game. You want to talk about sales? There's any number of NPD threads to go on and on about that in. Outside of the discussion of whether the PS3 happens to be around for 10 years it has no place here.

 

I'm not going to ask again, move on with the actual subject matter of the thread or I'm closing it or worse if necessary.

[Zelex]

Wouldn't talking about MS/Sony/Nintendo's plans for this gen help understand how the next gen might turn out? Sony has talked about going disc-less, MS hasn't said much, and Nintendo might hit half the power of the 360.

 

Gauging how this gen goes, will determine what happens next. If the PS3 is a flop, will Sony get a new console out faster than they wanted too? And if they do, that will totally change what will happen with the tech and software that will go into the box. Not trying to step on toes, just my interpretation of the thread topic.

 

-Dean-

 

I don't think discless will be a viable option in the future for AAA games. Next generation, more than ever will need the 25gb to 50gb storage per game. Downloading that much content is probably beyond the scope of what people will be willing to wait for.

[dogbert]

I don't think discless will be a viable option in the future for AAA games. Next generation, more than ever will need the 25gb to 50gb storage per game. Downloading that much content is probably beyond the scope of what people will be willing to wait for.

 

I don't think we'll be discless either, but I can certainly see games that are that big and downloadable - few games need access to all that data at one time, and it would be relatively easy to stream it in the background to the device ahead of demand... Guild Wars is a great example of this model working already.

[General Zot]

We're on a discussion forum?

 

E tu brute...