A reader is convinced that the difference in graphics between the next gen consoles will be just as small as it is for the current gen.
Another generation, another round of gamers making fanciful assertions about their most adored platform’s latest iteration. War… war never changes.
Since the unveiling of the specifications for the Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5, legions of self-professed hardware experts have taken to the comment sections, firing shots and smuggling their questionable insights into the public realm.
My experience suggests that most people don’t understand the significance of any area of console architecture. The subject is undeniably esoteric, but information can be found quite easily in many tech-focused YouTube channels. Fortunately, despite having no observable evidence to compare the new PlayStation and Xbox’s performance, there is a well-overlooked clue in the current generation that even the least tech savvy gamer can grasp.
Side-by-side video analysis of games on different platforms are everywhere in 2020, although they often don’t reveal any newsworthy disparities. The vast majority of comparisons done with Xbox One and PlayStation 4 on the same title reveal that Sony’s platform has an edge. On well-made games however, it is only slight.
A good example of this would be the stunning Metal Gear Solid 5, where both console versions maintain identical detail, 60fps, and no noticeable texture pop-in for either. The only difference is the Xbox One version runs at a native 900p whereas the PlayStation 4 version runs at 1080p. Increases in screen resolution are evidently producing diminishing returns, and these two versions are incredibly similar. But isn’t that bizarre? If you were to judge these consoles by their technical specifications alone, then you’d surely be expecting much more exaggerated outcomes.
The difference in the two console’s CPU is apparently negligible, and there’s nothing to show for the Xbox’s slight advantage. There’s a common fallacy made by gamers that GPU performance can be absolutely measured by any of the associated metrics; to apply the same broken logic to the generation in question, it would appear that the PlayStation 4 has 50% extra horsepower in this area.
On top of that the DDR3 RAM in the Xbox One has a bandwidth twice as slow as the GDDR5 in the PlayStation 4. There is the infamous 32MB ESRAM to consider, but this comparatively small additional cache surely does little in ameliorating the disparity with the PlayStation 4 RAM.
With these huge advantages on paper, where exactly is the PlayStation 4’s real-world extra performance capabilities? Slightly improved resolution? Slightly less frame rate drops? It’s another example of diminishing returns, and that trend extends even further towards 4K gaming.
The next generation console specs on paper (perhaps with the exception of the SSDs) reveals a profoundly smaller disparity in the PlayStation 5 and Xbox One than their older respective iterations. Sony and Microsoft have boasted their consoles are capable of 8K and can deliver as much as 120 frames per second on 4K gaming, although the general standard to aim for will surely be 4K/60fps.
Multiplatform games are typically designed for the lowest common denominator, but by these claims that factor is irrelevant. Presuming both consoles can maintain what they aim for, there will be no visibly discernible difference between the two on multiplatform games beyond what can be scrupulously scrutinised by video analysis. They are simply engineered too similarly for a level of resolution where differences are ever more than slight.
The unique advantages of either hardware will no doubt be exploited in first party titles, and for me personally, those titles have always been the selling point.
By reader Twig Lebowski
The reader’s feature does not necessary represent the views of GameCentral or Metro.
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