Hi Dean,
I believe it's the rather weak graphics card and slower RAM that causes bottlenecks as devs have to try and get portions into the esRAM which is faster than DDR5 potentially but only 32MB in size.
As a result if you stress the graphics too much you get a horrible experience like screen tear and stuttering framrates.
The devs realised this and lowered the resolution to enable the game to run smoothly. This is why Titanfall is 792p not 1080p.
There were a lot of jokes about an Xbox 720P before the One came out and as a result MS desperately want games above 720p even if not by much!
There could still be some great exclusive games for the One but it's hardware is not very impressive at all!
I am not an Xbox fan but I thought the 360 was a solid system but the lack of a BD drive was a show stopper. I also don't like the way Microsoft sold different SKU's with or without the hard drives, and also sell the remotes with just alkaline batteries and then you have to buy the recharger kit, and then required the Xbox Gold membership for things you got free on the PS3. It just seemed they tried to nickel and dime people to death. I don't even want to get into the RROD problem especially on the early models.
However, the 360 was a solid console especially being only the 2nd console for Microsoft. I was really surprised that they tried the DRM and no used games which cost them a lot of customers even though they later retracted it.
Thanks for your response. It sounds like by having the esRAM (which is essentially a buffer) of only 32MB, that is the bottleneck. If they would have made 256MB or bigger then it probably would have improved performance greatly. I doo not believe the Xbone will age well because Microsoft has already said their racing game used 100A% of the systems capabilities. I assume Sony games will keep looking better as developers figure out how to program for it more efficiently. It sounds like the Xbone is going to have very little wiggle room to improve upon graphics. They will have some good exclusives but not nearly as many as Sony.
I think it is going to be hard for Microsoft to pick up new buyers for the Xbone as they will probably only be selling to the hardcore Xbox fanboys. I think it is a no brainer for anyone who does their due diligence in researching the consoles that the PS4 has the most for the money by far.
Nintendo struck lightning in a bottle last generation by creating a new casual gamer market. The problem is that the Wii U is closer to the PS3/360 in capabilities and I think they will be competing more against smart phones and tablets for the casual gamer market.
They will be people that buy the Wii U just for Zelda, Mario, and company but Nintendo keeps recycling the same games each generation. I believe it took the PS4 something like 2 months to outsell the Wii U sales in a year.
Dean
