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How do you decide? I have heard there are issues with the Xbox one, what exactly is wrong with it and will it get fixed?
:cheers:
:cheers:
professorhat said:There aren't really issues with the Xbox One, it's just that it's slightly harder to develop for due to a difference in the graphics chip and the type of RAM used, which gives the PS4 a slight edge in performance. This means games that have been rushed out to meet the launch window are seeing a difference whereby developers have usually been able to get the game running at 60 frames per second (fps) and at 1080p resolution on PS4, whereas the Xbox One resolution has been dropped down to 900p or 720p on the Xbox One to keep the 60 fps count.
This has almost always been for first person shooters (FPS), where the frames per second count is all important. If FPS games aren't your thing, it doesn't really matter. If FPS games are your thing, most (honest) people say the difference is slight at most. And expect these shortcomings to be developed round once developers have had more time to get to know Xbox One and also aren't working to a tight deadline from Microsoft (as has already been announced for Wolfenstein: The New Order which is confirmed as 1080p and 60fps on both consoles).
The other key differences are as follows:
Kinect
Xbox One comes with the Kinect camera which currently gives you some voice control functions and the ability to Skype. You'll also soon be able to broadcast yourself playing games via a service called Twitch (you can do this already with PS4 if you have the PS Camera). There will be no doubt be some Wii Sports clone to come along at some point as well. Otherwise, it's pretty redundant. The argument is, by including it in with Xbox One, developers know that everyone has it and will more inclined to develop games for it. The smart money says, MS will release a version of the console without it some time this year, and with a significant price drop to more directly compete with PS4 - if this happens, then of course that idea goes out the window. Nevertheless, it's one of the key differentiators since, although PS4 has a camera you can buy, it isn't mandatory and isn't quite as good as Kinect at recognising voice commands (though I've found it works just fine for me).
Games
Some are Xbox One exclusive (e.g. Dead Rising 3, Forza 5 and Titanfall probably being the key titles, plus Gears of War will no doubt make an appearance and there will be a few Halo games coming down the line), others are PS4 exclusive (e.g. DriveClub, Killzone: Shadow Fall and inFamous Second Son, with The Order: 1886 being the one wetting a lot of appetites down the line, plus another Uncharted game). If there are any of these you have to have, then that pretty much makes your decision for you since these are exclusives to that console (though strictly speaking Titanfall will also be available for PC and Xbox 360).
In terms of Indie titles, Sony currently has the edge since it enabled developers to publish their own games without a publisher from the beginning. This won a lot of love from small developers, and means there are far more Indie games currently in development for the PS4 compared to the Xbox One. Microsoft have recently u-turned on their decision to require a publisher, and have also made dev kits substantially cheaper for indie developers, so this could change. However, from what I've read, many cheaper, independent (and often more innovative compared to their AAA brethren) games are heading to PS4 as a result that aren't currently going to Xbox One. Another reason for this is the ease of porting games from the huge indie PC market to the PS4 compared to doing this for Xbox One. This was one of the major factors that personally made me decide to go with PS4.
Non-Gaming Entertainment
In theory, Xbox One has the edge here. It has been marketed by Microsoft as an all-in-one living room solution. It has an HDMI input port to allow you to hook up your existing Sky / cable / freeview TV box into the Xbox One, and then be able to control this via the Kinect voice interface (though voice control won't work for any UK TV services at the moment and no word when this will come in, or what boxes they will support - I'd be surprised if it's anything more than Sky). The Xbox One can also "snap" together two things on the screen at once, meaning you can be playing a game and have the TV showing in the corner. When a program starts, you can pause your game and snap to the TV using the Kinect. If adverts start, you can switch back to the game until they end. Or you could continue playing (albeit in a much smaller window on the screen) whilst someone else watches Eastenders. From what I've heard, this "snap" function does work very well. PS4 owners can kind of keep playing whilst the TV is use for other things, but would have to invest in a PS Vita (see Remote Play below).
That's pretty much all that sets them apart in this area though - both have TV and music "apps" that can be downloaded - Xbox One has YouTube and Now TV whilst PS4 doesn't yet, whereas PS4 has BBC iPlayer which Xbox One doesn't - no doubt they'll all be coming to both sometime soon, so I wouldn't base any decision on this. Both have things like Netflix and Amazon Instant Prime streaming and both have access to their respective manufacturers' movie / music rental / streaming services i.e. Microsoft's Xbox Video and Xbox Music services, and Sony's Music Unlimited and Video Unlimited. It should be noted, in order to access any of the online streaming services on Xbox One, you have to have an Xbox Live Gold membership (£40 per year) - they are freely available without PS Plus on PS4. This is an area where both consoles are likely to developed a lot more over the next few years.
Xbox Live Gold vs Playstation Plus
These are the online subscriptions for the two consoles. Both cost £40 per year RRP, and both give you access to play online game saves (i.e. it will automatically upload your games saves to the cloud, so if your console hard drive dies, you won't lose these). Currently, with PS Plus, you also get access to the Instant Game Collection - this is at least one free game released every month and most subscribers agree is reason enough to get a PS Plus subscription since for £40, you'll get a minimum of 12 free games (and good games too - Resogun was available at launch and was one of the most highly rated PS4 games). The same PS Plus subscription also gets you free games on the PS3 and the PS Vita as well, making it an absolute bargain if you own one or both of these systems. There are also games that are discounted every month for all three systems if you have a PS Plus subscription.
Again, Microsoft is catching up and has introduced its Games with Gold programme, which does currently offer free games for Xbox 360 owners - the same is apparently "coming fairly soon" for the Xbox One owners.
Miscellaneous
Size - the PS4 is substantially smaller and lighter than the Xbox One. It also has the power supply unit built into the console, so just a figure 8 power cable is needed. The Xbox One is quite bulky in comparison and the power supply unit sits outside the console, so has to be factored into the positioning on your rack.
Controller - most people that have played the Xbox 360 know the controller was much, much better than the PS3 controller. Sony have learnt their lesson, and the PS4 controller is now much more comfortable to use. Every one will still have their own preference, but they are now at least comparable. The Sony controller also has a touchpad and light bar built in, plus a 3.5mm input to plug any headphones into for gaming on the quiet or chat during online play. It has a built-in battery and charges via an included micro USB cable. The Xbox One controller is fairly similar to the Xbox 360 controller - though the triggers now have a rumble effect. It still requires a proprietary set of headphones (though an adapter is on its way) and it still requires batteries or a play and charge kit to be purchased.
Remote Play - PS4 owners who also have a PS Vita can directly control their PS4 via Remote Play. This requires the Vita to be paired with the PS4, and also requires a pretty decent connection. I have done this and it works perfectly in the house e.g. for playing PS4 games in bed. I've not yet had a chance to try it from outside my house, but I know others have tried it and done it successfully. There's no equivalent to this on the Xbox One and not likely to be any time soon unless Microsoft release an Xbox portable gaming device down the line.
Upgradeability - Strictly speaking, neither console is upgradeable and isn't really meant to be - that's one of the major pluses of consoles, since everybody is on a level playing field. However, it's worth noting hard drives - both consoles come with 500 GB, but with every game having to be installed, and these installs ranging from 10 to 50 GB, 500 GB isn't going to last long. The PS4 internal hard drive can be upgraded (and this is supported by Sony and won't affect your warranty) with any hard disk that meets the specs i.e. you're not tied into buying one from Sony. The Xbox One hard drive can't be upgraded at all at this time i.e. there isn't even an "official" upgrade path. Microsoft are due to enable external USB hard drives so they can be used for this purpose - while this does solve the problem, it does also mean one of your USB ports is being used up permanently, and an external drive also needs to find a place on your rack (alongside that external power supply unit). If you're a neat freak, this may well scare you away.
Backward Compatibility - Neither console will natively play older consoles' games (it's just not technically possible), but Sony has announced Playstation Now, a cloud-based streaming service that will let you play older PS1, PS2 and PS3 games on the PS Vita and PS4. This is likely to be another subscription service (i.e. an extra cost on top of the PS Plus subscription), though no firm details on that yet. Microsoft has nothing announced on this front as yet, but with their cloud pedigree and the vast sums of money that Microsoft has at its disposal, expect it to be only a matter of time.
Friends - No matter which console takes your fancy overall, if you really love playing online over and above everything else, it's worth checking out what system your friends have (if any). Obviously PS4 owners and Xbox One owners can't play each other on different systems, so if a few of your friends already own one system and you want to be able to join in on their gaming sessions, that's probably one of the biggest influences.
This is pretty much as comprehensive list as I can think of right now - if I do think of more, I'll post again and welcome others to correct / disagree with me if I've missed something
manicm said:The Xbox One is no harder to develop for than the PS4 - they're share essentially the same architecture except for memory where the 2 differ slightly. They both share the same AMD CPU and GPU basically. It's just that MS employs different, slower memory and developers require a slightly different approach.
professorhat said:Sony have said stock issues are likely to continue until April, so I wouldn't expect to see any decent deals before then, since retailers just won't have the units to ship.
The inFamous: Second Son bundle at £384.99 (Zavvi and Game) seems to be the best deal around at the moment (assuming that game interests you of course!).
gel said:The controllers on the Xbox One seem a lot cheaper than the Playstation 4, does anyone know a good deal on a controller for the PS4?
professorhat said:Very true landzw - one of the key things is what exclusive games are coming out for the console. If you're a Forza, Gears of War or Halo fan, then you know you're going to need an Xbox One as they're very unlikely to see time of day on PS4. If you prefer Gran Turismo, inFamous or Uncharted, then PS4 is the one for you. For the cross platform games, you're going to be happy whichever system you have.
gel said:The controllers on the Xbox One seem a lot cheaper than the Playstation 4, does anyone know a good deal on a controller for the PS4?
Afraid I can't see any cheaper than £50 at short glance. However, don't forget to factor in the price of a play and charge kit for the Xbox One controller (unless you're prepared to buy lots of batteries or already have some re-chargeable ones). How many controllers do you think you will need? Very few games nowadays have more than one player on screen at once (I think COD: Ghosts is the only one in my collection).
professorhat said:There's some Amazon warehouse deals on the Gamer pack (the one I originally got) - with it you get Killzone, the PS camera and two controllers for £463.
professorhat said:Worth noting with those packages that, unless you want the camera, you're actually better off just getting the regular console, Killzone and an extra controller separately (which would be about £445 from what I can gather and would also be brand new rather than used).
The games I have and a rating on how good I think they are as follows:
Mainstream Releases
Killzone: Shadow Fall 7/10
Assassins Creed IV Black Flag 9/10
Need for Speed: Rivals 6/10
Call of Duty: Ghosts 7/10
Tomb Raider: Definitive Edition 8/10
Indie Games
Resogun 9.5/10
Contrast 7/10
Don't Starve 5/10
Outlast Not played this yet!
I may well pick up Rayman: Legends as that's got some very good reviews and is available for only £22 at Amazon at the moment. I've also got inFamous: Second Son, Watchdogs, Alien:Isolation and Destiny on pre-order.
theflyingwasp said:I expect most gamers will eventually own both consoles anyway.
bigboss said:theflyingwasp said:I expect most gamers will eventually own both consoles anyway.
Why?
bigboss said:theflyingwasp said:I expect most gamers will eventually own both consoles anyway.
Why?