Why Didn't Console Gamers Care About Framerate Before This Gen?

[rantanamo]

This was something picked up from competitive PC gamers that others have picked up. When the powerful cards like RIVA TNT showed up, you would heat about it occasionally. But a couple of things happened around the same time. When the 8800 cards hit, LCD monitors doing 1080p and Crysis. You could even go back to the improvements the 8800 Nvidia cards had on the original far cry, that started the talk. But fps for Crysis became the benchmark. How smooth the AAA was. Bump mapping. Last also became a big deal as more people went from CRT to LCD. This marked the beginning of competitive gaming with what I would call modern graphic cards. Yes, even back to DOOM3 and Unreal you had the talk, but console gamers didn't catch onto that until late PS3. I remember when these arguments started popping up at work. It was definitely Crysis era. Maybe not until the last 2-3 years, when the general public realized how powerful the GTX cards were compared to the second variants of the Nextgen consoles did this become a thing. I think the YouTube/twitch set were there ones pushing this, then the trade mags/sites, then the general public.

Though a lot of people kind of dismissed the RTX cards initially, Ray tracing might be that next talking point. Seems to be a thing now, to add Ray tracing to even past titles and brag how good it is. That's happening just as 8k and OLED are maturing. Higher contest coppern based OLED and micro LED might be the place that battle kicks into gear on the PC,.

 

[Geek Nasty]

nikka wut? This must be some console gamer bullshyt, framerate is so key to PC players lots of games have utilities that let you display it.

It's a must on FPSs. I'd say framerate has been a focus for 20 years

 

[Rell84shots]

of course we cared about frame rate, especially around the 32 bit era.
and using a rare game as an example when rare games are notorious for frame rate issues

Bruh we me and my friends were talking about getting games in school we weren't sitting around saying " I want to get it but the framerate sucks". Only hardcore gamers care about that goofy shyt, most gamers just want a game that's fun to play.

 

[el_oh_el]

My favorite genre of game are racing games, I've long cared about it. Both PS4/XB1 have weak GPUs so having sub 30fps games are a normal occurrence. However, games that lower latency times in controller response mitigate some of the issues from the 30fps games that we see out there.

That's why Criterion are masterful at this.
Hot Pursuit cuts pad lag to new lows • Eurogamer.net

Input lag tested: COD vs Battlefield - which is the most responsive FPS? • Eurogamer.net

Current-Gen Tests Input Lag Target Frame-Rate
Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare 39.3ms 60fps
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Remastered 40.3ms 60fps
Battlefield 1 56.1ms 60fps
Halo 5 63.0ms 60fps
Battlefield 4 63.7ms 60fps
Titanfall 2 71.8ms 60fps
Overwatch 76.8ms 60fps
Doom 2016 86.8ms 60fps
Killzone Shadowfall Multiplayer 89.8ms 60fps
Killzone Shadowfall Single-Player 110.0ms 30fps

Since COD4, it's always been the shooter that controlled the tightest.

The best 30fps game out there now in regards to this are the Forza Horizon games. Latency is low on those. Wipeout/F-Zero can never reach full potential on 30fps for example. Frame rate does matter. People just put graphics and geometry ahead of it usually.

Damn, interesting stats. Cant really shyt on COD when they manage to have latency better than all the other FPS on the market. Crazy

 

[Killigraphy]

It never really mattered obviously......playing Mario RPG, FF7, and GTA I was never like; "Aw man, this framerate is garbo". Introduce an industry standard and the neophytes will try to tackle it. The truth is, no game needs to be 60FPS, or even HDR, your eyeballs won't care and your brain, less so. Now the case for OLED vs everything, I understand, the pixels can be turned off - for a truer black, but lets be honest...would you notice? would it even matter?

 

[Kaydigi]

Bruh we me and my friends were talking about getting games in school we weren't sitting around saying " I want to get it but the framerate sucks". Only hardcore gamers care about that goofy shyt, most gamers just want a game that's fun to play.

Some switch ports are unplayable due to the frame rates. Bullshyt overcooked 1 couldn’t even keep a stable frame rate on the switch. I had to buy the PS4 version aftwards and finish it there.

 

[MeachTheMonster]

It never really mattered obviously......playing Mario RPG, FF7, and GTA I was never like; "Aw man, this framerate is garbo". Introduce an industry standard and the neophytes will try to tackle it. The truth is, no game needs to be 60FPS, or even HDR, your eyeballs won't care and your brain, less so. Now the case for OLED vs everything, I understand, the pixels can be turned off - for a truer black, but lets be honest...would you notice? would it even matter?

HDR is one of the biggest graphical improvements in a long time.

On PC adjusting settings between mid-max I can’t see much of a difference. HDR on and Off is night and day and you can instantly tell which games are doing it right.

OLED is like an extreme example of what HDR does.

 

[Killigraphy]

HDR is one of the biggest graphical improvements in a long time.

On PC adjusting settings between mid-max I can’t see much of a difference. HDR on and Off is night and day and you can instantly tell which games are doing it right.

OLED is like an extreme example of what HDR does.

You missed my point entirely, but yes I agree with this new point you brought up.

 

[MeachTheMonster]

You missed my point entirely, but yes I agree with this new point you brought up.

No I got your point. HDR is not essential, and most people don’t even have a tv that can take advantage of it.

I was just saying that I do think it’s more recognizable/impactful than many of the other recent graphical improvements.

 

[bogey_j]

of course we cared about frame rate, especially around the 32 bit era.
and using a rare game as an example when rare games are notorious for frame rate issues

point is Rare games still got 10/10 reviews, major critical and commercial success, and gamers loved them even though their games ran at like 10 fps. framerate didn't matter much back then to console gamers and reviewers weren't docking points for poor performance as long as everything else was high-quality. nowadays you have clowns saying they won't buy a certain game if it's not 60 fps

somewhere along the way a flip switched and now console gamers suddenly care about 60fps

 

[mr.africa]

point is Rare games still got 10/10 reviews, major critical and commercial success, and gamers loved them even though their games ran at like 10 fps. framerate didn't matter much back then to console gamers and reviewers weren't docking points for poor performance as long as everything else was high-quality. nowadays you have clowns saying they won't buy a certain game if it's not 60 fps

somewhere along the way a flip switched and now console gamers suddenly care about 60fps

ok, i get what you are saying

 

[Zebruh]

Because this gen showed them what they didn't know they needed in their life.

 

[The Guru]

Average gamer didn't care about frame rate when the previous console generation came out. Probably barely knew about it.

 

[Fatboi1]

That’s how they made it. You can’t “shoot for” 60 and fail.

60 has to be your design philosophy from the jump.

They had already developed a PS4 game using their engine, they knew 60 was NEVER in the cards for UC4.

They just had to pretend it was after all this 60fps talk and that lying ass reveal trailer they put out

If you actually played it you'd know 60fps was just difficult for the single player since you know it is much more demanding and on a bigger scale than the actual 60fps that was achieved in the multiplayer. One look at the MP and you can see the impact that would've been done had they tried to make the whole campaign 60fps. Smaller size maps, less graphical fidelity, worse animations, lower resolution among other things.

 

[MeachTheMonster]

If you actually played it you'd know 60fps was just difficult for the single player since you know it is much more demanding and on a bigger scale than the actual 60fps that was achieved in the multiplayer. One look at the MP and you can see the impact that would've been done had they tried to make the whole campaign 60fps. Smaller size maps, less graphical fidelity, worse animations, lower resolution among other things.

What I’m saying is, this wasn’t a surprise for them. You don’t get that far into making a game and just figure this out