Tech you miss/ new tech trends you hate - ok boomers

[Gamepad]

What happened to. Putting in a game. Turning the console on. And playing the fucking game. Why do we need to install shit that is on the disc/game card/whatever.

Limits on how fast you can stream and/or decompress data from the disc. Better devs (e.g. Naughty Dogs) do spend the time to properly plan ahead and make sure the game can run off the disc entirely. Others don't, or bite more than they can chew and couldn't do it even if they wanted to.

That's why I kinda laugh at the next gen consoles tauting SSDs. Not only is it not new, but you can bet your ass that'll just push devs even more to do required installs. Why bother with that slow as mollasses BD drive when you got an SSD? Nevermind how big those will actually be, with games requiring upwards of 100gb now. Some fanboys going on about how they'll stick in NVMes, even though when I opened up my PS4, what I found was a white label drive. So much for "cutting-edge next-gen", they aren't going to stick a 2TB drive in them and still be affordable to you, kiddo.

I 'member the old Neogaf days with Sony drones praising the PS4 and how the sky's the limit with its specs. Heck, remember those demos? You could take those, replace the "Not in-engine footage" fineprint with "Rendered with real-time raytracing", slap a PS5/Series X logo at the end of them, and people would still eat it up as the hot next-gen crap even if the rest hasn't changed.

The fact that they even focused on named specs is silly and sticks out from the last generation. "The PS5/Series X got a Navi GPU in it!11!1". Neat, Big Navi is around the corner, your console is still at least 9 months away from release, and it's already outdated.

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

Limits on how fast you can stream and/or decompress data from the disc. Better devs (e.g. Naughty Dogs) do spend the time to properly plan ahead and make sure the game can run off the disc entirely. Others don't, or bite more than they can chew and couldn't do it even if they wanted to.

That's why I kinda laugh at the next gen consoles tauting SSDs. Not only is it not new, but you can bet your ass that'll just push devs even more to do required installs. Why bother with that slow as mollasses BD drive when you got an SSD? Nevermind how big those will actually be, with games requiring upwards of 100gb now.

Playing from disc is never coming back, it's not feasible anymore.

 

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Limits on how fast you can stream and/or decompress data from the disc. Better devs (e.g. Naughty Dogs) do spend the time to properly plan ahead and make sure the game can run off the disc entirely. Others don't, or bite more than they can chew and couldn't do it even if they wanted to.

In 1993, Cyan released Myst, a game for which they had had to manually optomise file layout to ensure snappy performance on a 1x CDROM drive despite not actually having the ability to produce test CDs themselves. This process sounds barely more interesting than playing the actual game, but hey.. they got it done.

In 2020, as you say, it ain't happening.

That's why I kinda laugh at the next gen consoles tauting SSDs. Not only is it not new, but you can bet your ass that'll just push devs even more to do required installs. Why bother with that slow as mollasses BD drive when you got an SSD? Nevermind how big those will actually be, with games requiring upwards of 100gb now. Some fanboys going on about how they'll stick in NVMes, even though when I opened up my PS4, what I found was a white label drive. So much for "cutting-edge next-gen", they aren't going to stick a 2TB drive in them and still be affordable to you, kiddo.

This is fine. Sure, the base model console might only get a 256gb SSD, but that's just more opportunity to sell higher margin models with larger drives.

 

[Gamepad]

This is fine. Sure, the base model console might only get a 256gb SSD, but that's just more opportunity to sell higher margin models with larger drives.

Considering the smallest models for both last-gen consoles are 500gb, that's one hell of a downgrade considering how quick it is to fill up those drives these days. Even worse considering how much they're pushing the whole 4k gaming thing.

Even I'm a bit more optimistic and expecting them to stick a really cheap 2.5" 500gb SSD in those at least. Or SATA M.2s. They're not going to shell out extra for PCIe circuitry in them.

 

[Glad I couldn't help]

Why do new consoles have to be bloated with a bunch of useless features not related to playing video games anyway? What happened to. Putting in a game. Turning the console on. And playing the fucking game. Why do we need to install shit that is on the disc/game card/whatever.

While I think there were consoles in the 16-bit era that tried to push the "multimedia" bandwagon, which mostly failed (e.g. 3DO, Phillips CD-i), it was the PS2/Xbox/Gamecube era when game console started the transition from "a specialized computer for playing video games" to "a literally retarded PC". I think it is because the consoles of the era got new non-video-game features like DVD playback and Internet connectivity, which required special built-in software to control. Additional, I think the complexity of video games and video game development probably reached the point where talking directly with the hardware as in previous generations because too much.

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

Considering the smallest models for both last-gen consoles are 500gb, that's one hell of a downgrade considering how quick it is to fill up those drives these days. Even worse considering how much they're pushing the whole 4k gaming thing.

Even I'm a bit more optimistic and expecting them to stick a really cheap 2.5" 500gb SSD in those at least. Or SATA M.2s. They're not going to shell out extra for PCIe circuitry in them.

Sony has said that their SSD is using PCIe 4.0, so they're not on a SATA bus. That makes sense, it's a much hyped feature of Zen 2 so why not take advantage of it? I also don't think board costs are anywhere near as high as a regular PC motherboard.

 

[Gamepad]

That would explain why they're struggling with cost again.

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

That would explain why they're struggling with cost again.

I don't think the interface is what driving up the cost, an NVME SSD would use much fewer traces than a single GDDR6 module and there will be 8 to 12 of those. They are reportedly trying to get a 2TB drive in there and that's where they are struggling. I figured they would go with a 250-500GB SSD acting as a cache for a large mechanical drive that stores everything. That's what they have to do anyway if they are going to support USB drives.

 

[LolNoIPLeaksEvenLMFAO]

The Wii is a weird, gimmicky console in general and I passed on it until it became very cheap on the secondary market. Nintendo loves their weird science experiments, at least I enjoy the gimmicks of the Switch despite its sad, sad battery life and horrendous ergonomics without third party attachments. Seriously, I could not believe how awkward the Switch was, going from a 3DS. It's got a fantastic, fantastic library of games but the console itself is not amazing...

I literally can’t play on the thing for more than 45mins with out my hands cramping. I was hoping they’d make a pro joycon so it didn’t feel like dog shit, but nope. So it’s mostly an at home console for me (any good suggestions for joycon grips?). The library is awesome though and I have a first run switch so that thing just plays pirated games.

The multimedia shit seemed to really come from first the ps2 being able to play DVDs and then seeing the Xbox hacked like crazy and being legit better modded you saw a lot of the same features you first saw on xbmc become real features but not as good because it’s Microsoft. Not saying Sony has done better, but Microsoft can’t not fuck shit up for some god damn reason.

Speaking of that - “app stores” becoming a thing on fucking every OS. It made sense to have repos on *nix stuff because too many people fear using a command line and most not shit ones would see a dependency missing and install that. I fucking hate windows 10 so god damn much.

Might sound insane, but I mostly have a slave OS that just runs VMs (also if I wanna play games I have pass thru so I get 98% of my GPU) and can load the VM drive into RAM for fucking insane load times which is nice. But I honestly prefer running OS X even with all its bullshit. I can at least install nix stuff on it and commercial software with out having to switch which is nice. Also I can run iOS virtualized inside that which I do have reasons for doing that I don’t wanna powerlevel on.

 

[Travis Touchdown Cumsock]

I literally can’t play on the thing for more than 45mins with out my hands cramping. I was hoping they’d make a pro joycon so it didn’t feel like dog shit, but nope. So it’s mostly an at home console for me (any good suggestions for joycon grips?). The library is awesome though and I have a first run switch so that thing just plays pirated games.

There's third-party attachments that make the joy-cons less awful to hold. An absolute godsend, because the terrible design of the system was making my hands hurt too. Many Switch power banks include some kind of joy-con grip, to make them less horrible.

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

I miss this:

The scroll wheel is clickable but it always feels awkward and the quick fluidity of combing left-middle or right-middle or left-right-middle is no longer there. It's a pain in the ass in programs that use combinations like that. That mouse, a bog-standard HP pack-in mouse, is listed at $80 on eBay.
I wouldn't mind if on modern mice they put the scroll wheel on the side for the thumb to use, clicking would probably be easier, tilt would be more comfortable if it was up-down instead of left-right. The thumb is used to joysticks.

edit: holy shit it's almost perfect

 

[ToroidalBoat]

Playing from disc is never coming back, it's not feasible anymore.

At least Nintendo still goes with physical media.

For now.

 

[Agent Abe Caprine]

At least Nintendo still goes with physical media.

For now.

Some games aren't entirely on the cartridge. The Resident Evil 7 Switch port requires a constant internet connection because the actual game is in the cloud. The cartridge is just a CD key erm cartridge key. Wolfenstein The New Colosuss requires additional downloads to play the game.

Haven't heard of any first party games requiring downloads or a constant internet connection.

 

[ToroidalBoat]

Some games aren't entirely on the cartridge.

That Fortnite game is one of those online only things too. I guess it depends on the company. Nintendo games don't need digital download or constant connection (yet AFAIK), and some games by other companies (like Civ 6) can be played completely offline as well. Like I said before, all online is bullshit because not everyone can get a reliable internet connection.

 

[Guts Gets Some]

There's third-party attachments that make the joy-cons less awful to hold. An absolute godsend, because the terrible design of the system was making my hands hurt too. Many Switch power banks include some kind of joy-con grip, to make them less horrible.

Have you tried these babies out?


My Switch got kinda stupid with the regular Joycons attaching, so now I use them exclusively wireless and I picked up this. They don't need to come off, and they are so nice to handle. Wow. And the best part is they have a little mappable trigger on the back.

The worst part is that they AREN'T wireless. Just imagine these being switchable, with just a little middle connector grip to make a full blown controller in your hands. I know that would limit portabability somewhat, but come on, the Switch is already far more portable than anything else for its power. It would be nice to have the option for total Joycon replacements.

My year has been a lot full of a lot of their shit, honestly. Nice to see I'm not alone!

 

[MrSugarcube]

I don't know if it got mentioned, but 5.25'' Drive Bays, mostly for getting hot swappable drives.
Why I haven't updated my Cooler Master HAF XB case yet.
If a more conventional modern case had it, I'd need to check them out.

 

[TaimuRadiu]

While I think there were consoles in the 16-bit era that tried to push the "multimedia" bandwagon, which mostly failed (e.g. 3DO, Phillips CD-i), it was the PS2/Xbox/Gamecube era when game console started the transition from "a specialized computer for playing video games" to "a literally exceptional PC". I think it is because the consoles of the era got new non-video-game features like DVD playback and Internet connectivity, which required special built-in software to control. Additional, I think the complexity of video games and video game development probably reached the point where talking directly with the hardware as in previous generations because too much.

This trend is by no means new. Have you ever heard of the Coleco Adam?

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

While I think there were consoles in the 16-bit era that tried to push the "multimedia" bandwagon, which mostly failed (e.g. 3DO, Phillips CD-i), it was the PS2/Xbox/Gamecube era when game console started the transition from "a specialized computer for playing video games" to "a literally exceptional PC". I think it is because the consoles of the era got new non-video-game features like DVD playback and Internet connectivity, which required special built-in software to control. Additional, I think the complexity of video games and video game development probably reached the point where talking directly with the hardware as in previous generations because too much.

The Xbox, through modding and XBMC, was the first home media device of its kind. Some graphics cards had TV output but it was always a pain in the ass, setting it up to work was a challenge and to change the video playing meant going back to the PC. The Xbox was a revolution/revelation. It was so good that something like it would be the future, it couldn't be ignored.

 

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I miss when there were benchmarks that openly admitted they were doing nothing at all.

 

[TaimuRadiu]

The Xbox, through modding and XBMC, was the first home media device of its kind. Some graphics cards had TV output but it was always a pain in the ass, setting it up to work was a challenge and to change the video playing meant going back to the PC. The Xbox was a revolution/revelation. It was so good that something like it would be the future, it couldn't be ignored.

I had a 1989 computer that had A/V out. It was pretty fun playing Maniac Mansion on the tube. (I got it in like 1997.)