Would you sacrifice graphical quality to return to plug and play?

The success of the Nintendo Switch has got me thinking about how consoles at the end of the last generation and the beginning of this one sacrificed a huge benefit, just popping a game in and starting to play, for prettier graphics.

So it is a pretty simple question really, would you give up the looks of the games we have today on the Xbox for the speed and convenience of just popping in a disc or cartridge? Games on the Switch still do look pretty good, so would it be a sacrifice worth
making?

:)

 

1080p

I'm pretty sure that most devs already want to put out the game they can, but I think trying to force a graphical standard would only lead to a lower quality gameplay, Dead Rising 3, as stated, is a prime example of that, I would gladly sacrifice graphics
for better gameplay.

 

Getting this game in weeks some questions

^

Agreed.

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I'll sacrifice a little graphical fidelity to preserve the life of my console, personally.

 

Ok, I think you've got slightly confused about what has caused the games to be installed on consoles.

Both the PS4 and Xbox One use Blu Ray discs, when both consoles launched the Blu Ray drives were not good enough to stream the amount of data that was required for modern games, though I do believe modern Blu Ray drives have become faster and could possibly
handle the transfer rates required.

So, both Microsoft and Sony decided to install games to internal hard drives, this meant that the transfer rates were faster, and also load times were improved.

Could Microsoft release an Xbox One that didn't need all games to be installed today? probably, but that would mean a completely different OS for just that console. Plus it would possibly mean load times would increase (but possibly not, not sure on that
one)

At the end of the day most if not all games I own I buy digitally, so the pain of installing a game is negated.

 

The PS3 had several games that ran from the disc only, so it is quite possible to play games from a blu-ray as they have a higher data transfer rate than DVD. The problem comes from how that data is read. DVD has a variable speed while blu-ray is constant,
meaning that unlike DVD which can jump back and forth as needed blu-ray goes from beginning to end non-stop, meaning that areas of data would need to be duplicated on the disc, pretty much killing the space advantage over DVD.

So no, I'm not confused on what caused consoles games to require installation and so the question remains. Would people sacrifice graphical quality for the return of plug and play.

 

In short...no. It isn't all about graphics for me though. Take G.T.A. V. First bought it on the 360, played it for a couple hours, and didn't like it. Why? It seemed "dead" to me. First thing I did was hop in a car to explore and ended up going off a cliff
to a beach area. Car wrecked in water, so I start walking along the shore and steep mountain walls to find another vehicle to get me back. Walked around for 5 minutes and nothing is appearing; no people, A.T.V.s, boats/jet skis, etc.. Finally found something
to get me back, though the game seemed to have a problem "populating" for the 2 hours it was played. Rented the X Box One version, and it definitely seemed more "alive" for me; bought that version and put in many hours. Same experience I had with the Switch
and Breath Of The Wild; game seemed dead.

The graphics seemed decent on the Switch (Owned one for a little over a week before taking back.), though it seemed game content was sacrificed to make it look as good as it did.

Give me raw power. Lol. Heck, had a X Box One X for 2 weeks, before buying a 4k T.V., and thought the shorter load times was worth the extra cost. I'm 98% digital now, so the convenience of "popping in a disc or cartridge" is a non-issue for me; games install
while I'm at work, then everything is instant.

My ranting for the day.

Peace, J.R.

 

As long as the game itself is good, I really couldn't care if the graphics are super awesome or I had to wait to start playing.

 

I believe this was also the reason why many PS3 hand to have a mandatory install to the hard drive. Even with duplicated data, the loading and streaming speeds just wouldn't have been good enough playing some more demanding games entirely from the blu-ray
disc.

 

It's a refreshing change to see someone use this forum for a good discussion, these are rare here. The old forums were good for these, now users either put support questions here or just use this section to have a moan.

 

MPO kind of falls along the same lines as D33dles'. I see little to no "convenience" to "just popping in a disc or cartridge". My wife and I game share, buying 2 discs just to play 1 game together = silly in that respect. Since I've gone pretty much all
digital, what wait is there? For a game to download? Non issue since I can preorder any game and it'll be ready on release date.

On the rare occasions that I want to wait until I see how others like a game before I decide to purchase, I'm usually looking on the internet for others' opinions about the game before I decide to get it anyway and can make my purchase right from there...
which is typically plenty long enough before I start gaming that it has already downloaded by the time I turn it on.

The way I see it, discs and cartridges are the inconvenience.

 

Whats a Nintendo Switch?? Never heard of it. Is it some american or japanese thingy/company?

I still have my xbox 360 slim console from late 2010 still working fine. Met a lot of fun people around my age on it and yoi dont have to install games to play em. And 360 is the only 7th gen console that has voice and picture messaging and party chat. PS3
DOESNT have party chat, they have a dumbed down version called game chat or private chat being only able to talk with one person at a time or be in the same game lobby to chat communally. Xbox ones ui is yuck xbox 360s ui is A LOT more simpler less buttons
and none of this windows 10 stuff. Windows 10 on pc can multitask multiple windows microsoft took the snap feature away for xbox so now you can only do one thing no multitask.

 

Having recently converted to the other side of the console fence - despite YEARS of Xbox "exclusivity" and a shelf full of Xbox Day One games - there's such a thing as preloading on the other system. Like you said, if it's the digital edition it can be ready
at midnight on launch day, but then there's the rather curious case of games which 'auto-install' within seconds! For example, when I inserted the Gravity Rush Remastered game disc, it was ready to play instantly. I checked the info panel and it said the file
size was 9.0GB. Really? That's PLUG & PLAY, isn't it?

Or take the case of Gravity Rush 2. Again, I inserted the retail disc and the file size was 18GB, however once again it was apparently "installed" and ready to play within seconds! The game I'm currently playing (Tales of Berseria) was bought from the PS
store and required a period of preloading - although it's partitioned so it's not like I had to wait HOURS for the full game (some 12GB) to install. There's no way I'd sacrifice modern conventions for the convenience of faster loading or impoverished visuals
because at the end of the day you wait months, if not years, for the game of your choice. What's a few more minutes when the end result brings so much pleasure?

 

I didn't mention digital in my initial post simply because it is a feature that every current system has and providing that your internet speeds support that method of distribution, then I would completely agree that for convenience it can't be beat.

However the primary distribution method for games is still physical media, so that is the delivery method that I chose to focus on.

For me I would be quite happy to give up graphical detail for just being able pop a game in and play. And indeed there is no reason there could not be a High Resolution graphics pack as a download option. Solid state media is swiftly dropping in price and I
could genuinely see a future where our games on on that format again.

It wouldn't have had as much impact as you think, the RAM would have been the limiting factor as it would be with games that were installed. Developers had to account for the RAM on the 360 and PS3 whether the game ran from disc or was installed.

It's the same sort reason that while having a game on a SSD will help with initial loading times, you won't actually see much if any difference when in game because it is loading into the RAM first.

 

I would rather have better graphics than plug ‘n play, but in early 2015 I went digital only so it’s not an issue for me. I haven’t used a disc in years.