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Vapourware Microsoft want to get into PC gaming again

CrimsonAngel

Prophet
Joined
Oct 2, 2007
Messages
2,258
Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong
So they ain't doing any thing important and that is there big news.
 

Infinitron

I post news
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Messages
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Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Extra Win 10 Reveals: Free Offer, DX12, More Xbox Games

Our roving reporter at the big Windows 10 event in Redmond is currently playing with Microsoft’s newly-announced holo-goggles, more on which soon, but she has been able to send back to useful bonus info about Win 10 and games in the meantime – including whether DirectX 12 is exclusive to the new OS, how this ‘upgrade to Win 10 free for a year’ offer works and whether there’ll be keyboard/mouse support for streamed Xbox One games.

So DirectX 12 will, we’re told, only work with Windows 10. That’s a bummer for people who don’t want to upgrade from Win 7 or 8, but sugaring that pill slightly is the newly-revealed free upgrade to Win 10. But it’s only free if you upgrade during the first year following Win 10’s launch. As far as our correspondent has been able to establish, so long as you upgrade within that first year, Win 10 is yours for free forever, rather than that it starts shouting at you to pay a year later. Update: Microsoft have explained the upgrade offer a little more here.

We’ve also been informed that DirectX 12 will require a new graphics card in order to take advantage of everything it’s got to offer, though some existing cards will be able to get some benefit from it. “To get the full benefits of DX12, the answer is yes,” Mike Ybarra, Partner Director of Program Management, Xbox Platform told us. “There will be DX 11.1 cards that take advantage of a lot of the driver and software tech that we’re bringing in Windows 10, but if you want the full benefits of DX12, you’re going to need a DX12 card.“That’s a bit of a stinker – early word had it that current DX11 boards would do just fine. We don’t know the full story there yet though – trying to find out more about that ASAP.

As for the Xbox One game streaming to W10 PCs and tablets, sadly controls cannot be translated to mouse and keyboard, so an Xbox controller will be required. Given an Xbox One is also required, I guess you’re going to have that controller anyway if you’re using this feature.

Also, we’re told that more Xbox One games will be coming to PC in addition to the already-announced Fable Legends, but no names or dates on that yet.

Finally, despite the telltale presence of Steam icon next to the Xbox one during the MS demo, there is apparently no special Steam integration in Windows 10.

We’ll have more about Win 10 and the hologoggles tomorrow, all being well.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
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Messages
97,236
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Is Windows 10 Good For PC Gamers Or XBone Owners?

windows10xbox.jpg


“It’s time for us to talk about gaming in Windows,” promised Head of Xbox Phil Spencer in December. A little over a month later, Microsoft has finally stepped up to the plate with a slew of big announcements about Windows 10, Xbox and PC gaming delivered at its Redmond campus yesterday morning.

The big news for gamers—aside from holograms—is that Windows 10 will not only support multiplayer gaming between Xbox One and PC, but allow you to stream Xbox One games locally to PCs or tablets.

Which is all well and good for Xbox fans, but where does that leave PC gamers, especially ones who don’t particularly care about Xbox?


“It’s a good question,” said Spencer. “I didn’t want to make today’s presentation all about ‘Hey Xbox One owners, aren’t you glad Windows 10 exists!’ The first thing I was trying to do is just look at some of the social capability we’ve created on console and bring it in a self-contained way to Windows. So any of the things we talked about around Xbox Live on Windows don’t require Xbox One at all.”

w101.jpg


Those features include a new game DVR that will allow users to record, edit and share game footage with friends, as well as the option to retroactively capture the last 30 seconds of gameplay. The Xbox app will be built into Windows 10—by default, it’ll be in the start menu—and allow players to access their Xbox Live messages, friends lists and activity feed on any device running the new OS; you can even receive notifications. “Gaming has become a much more social activity,” said Spencer during the announcement.

Of course, while some players will rejoice at this sort of integration, others remain skeptical. After the presentation, a reporter asked Spencer whether Xbox gaming and PC gaming can really coexist—and whether Microsoft has an incentive to push Xbox games over PC games,

“I think that’s a fair perception,” said Spencer. “But success of Windows 10 is critically important to this company and gaming will be a very important part of success for Windows 10. I love the Xbox business that we run; I love the console. But if you look at the scale inside of Microsoft of the Xbox One console [versus] Windows, I don’t think anybody would think the console somehow outweighs what we do there… I look at the opportunity to make Windows gaming and Xbox gaming symbiotic with one another and try to grow the number of people who are connected and the amount of content that’s available on both platforms… and I think we’ll be able to thread the needle and do both.”

fablelegends.jpg


The first question from many players—especially gamers nonplussed at the idea of streaming from lower-end hardware to a high-end PC—is whether Microsoft plans to support streaming in the opposite direction, from PC to Xbox. Spencer says it’s “something that we’re really looking at. If you think about [our] vision, that my games are my games wherever I am and I can play with whoever I want to play with—we’ll want to have solutions.”

The much-ballyhooed corporate synergy may also mean that more will be released on PC as well. During the event, Spencer announced that the previously Xbox-exclusive game Fables Legends would offer cross-play on PC and Xbox One and be released simultaneously on both platforms. “[Fable Legends] is just the first of our first-party games that will be coming to Windows 10, and we’ll have more to announce,” said Spencer.

One sticking point, however, may be the peripherals necessary for streaming. When Xbox games are played on PC, players will need to use a controller rather than a keyboard and mouse. Spencer says he knows that some players might not be thrilled at the idea of wiring a controller to their PC, but “there are technologies out there that will allow us to wirelessly bind a controller to a PC, and we will get there.”

windows10snapto.jpg


Mike Ybarra, Partner Director of Program Management, said they’re aiming for streaming to run at 1080p and 60 fps—it’s currently running at 720p and 30 fps in testing labs—but warns that your mileage may vary depending on bandwidth speeds. “Certainly our goal is to be as low-latency as possible, especially for frames per second,” said Ybarra. “It’ll largely depend on the scenario in which someone’s trying to play it.”

Microsoft also revealed more details about the long-awaited DirectX 12, which will ship with Windows 10. It’s been over five years since DirectX 11 came out, a development gap that has allowed competitors AMD to step in with Mantle, an API that offered game developers much more direct control and better support for multiple cores. DirectX 12 aims to do the same, offering up to 50 percent better performance. Spencer also announced that Unity has adopted DirectX 12, joining Unreal Engine 4, and that DirectX 12 will cut the power consumption of DirectX 11 in half, making it easier for mobile devices to run high-end games.

There is one downside, however: DirectX 12 won’t be compatible with earlier versions of Windows, and if you want to enjoy everything it has to offer, you’ll need to upgrade to a new graphics card. “There will be DX 11.1 cards that take advantage of a lot of the driver and software tech that we’re bringing in Windows 10, but if you want the full benefits of DX 12, you’re going to need a DX 12 card,” said Ybarra.

But hey, at least Windows 10 is free?

Windows 10 Is Free
Microsoft has a lot riding on Windows 10 after the lackluster response to Windows 8, and it’s making a big and persuasive push for both Windows 7 and Windows 8 users to rally towards the Windows 10 banner. Not only are they integrating features that try to offer the best of both worlds—like a resurrected start menu that can appear as either a single column or full-screen—but they’re offering free upgrades to Windows 10 for both Windows 7 and 8 users for a full year after its release.

Windows 10 has a few other tricks up their sleeves as well: all windows apps will be universal across PC, mobile devices, and Xbox One; Microsoft’s personal digital assistant, Cortana, will be built into Windows search; and Microsoft Office will be bundled with the new OS for phones and tablets. Also, continuing their tradition of naming software after Halo references, Microsoft announced a new browser called Project Spartan, whose features include Cortana integration, making notes directly on webpages, an offline reading mode, and best of all, not being Internet Explorer.

From a financial perspective—as well as in response to the streaming services already offered by Playstation 4 and Steam—the decision to offer streaming between Xbox and PC makes a lot of sense. Indeed, almost everything that Spencer said about their decisions around gaming made sense. After all, why wouldn’t they want to aggregate their Xbox and PC gaming audiences into one giant pool of social engagement? Microsoft wants to make their gaming community bigger and more cohesive, and if that’s what you’re looking for, then excellent news: today is your day. But if it isn’t, or you’re a PC fan looking for specific and immediate enhancements and initiatives that don’t involve Xbox, there’s not too much to be excited about right now beyond DirectX 12.

w102.jpg


So where does that leave PC gamers? For the moment, it leaves them largely where they were before, except snuggled much closer to Xbox. That could change, of course, if Microsoft indeed finds new ways to make good on its oft-promised love to PC gamers, but that’s a song Microsoft has been singing for a long time, and actions will speak far louder than words.

In the final tally, there are a number of things to recommend Windows 10, including the impression that it really does fix a lot of what was wrong with Windows 8, as well as the hard-to-beat price of free. But let’s be real: Windows 10 is focused primarily on creating a larger, more socially cohesive Microsoft gaming ecosystem, not the specific desires of PC gamers. That doesn’t mean it won’t have anything to offer you, but if you’ve been waiting to see if Microsoft is finally ready to not only talk about PC gaming but deliver the goods, then Windows 10’s answer is still tantalizingly vague: maybe, but not yet.
 

abija

Prophet
Joined
May 21, 2011
Messages
2,892
They aim streaming at 1080p-60fps from a console that can hardly run any games like that? :D
 

LESS T_T

Arcane
Joined
Oct 5, 2012
Messages
13,582
Codex 2014
:necro:

They are going to support Steam and not intending to compete (for now): http://www.pcgamer.com/games-for-windows-wasnt-the-right-approach-says-microsoft/

Games for Windows "wasn't the right approach" says Microsoft

__p37_nkzcpy.878x0.Z-Z96KYq.jpg



Kevin Unangst, senior director for PC gaming in the Xbox group, was more forthright in his assessment of Games for Windows than expected when we caught up with him at Gamescom today.

"Games for Windows was a prior approach where it was more, at that time, like 'how do we take things?'" he said, "We knew we wanted to help make great multiplayer, we knew we wanted to bring things over... but it wasn't the right approach. It was the approach of 'let's just take those things and transplant them'."

With the launch of Windows 10 and a renewed push to unify Xbox and PC into one huge ecosystem, it's a busy time for Microsoft. PC gamers who had to put up with the old Games for Windows system have cause to be cynical, however. Will the refreshed Windows Store included with Windows 10 be any different, and is Microsoft planning to use the Windows userbase to challenge Steam?

No—at least not according to Unangst: "We are not intending to compete with Steam," he told me, "If anything, we want Steam to be even more successful—they've done great things for PC gamers in terms of having a single store.

"Over time do we want more developers to come over to our store and offer it in addition to Steam? Absolutely. Is competition good for people? Absolutely. But our goal right now isn't to do anything else other than support Steam and help it run great on Windows 10."

For more on Microsoft's approach to PC gaming, check out our interview with Phil Spencer conducted ahead of the inaugural PC Gaming Show.
 

Cadmus

Arcane
Joined
Dec 28, 2013
Messages
4,264
Fuck windows live and fuck steam, too.
Actually, it'd be better if Microsoft or some other retarded company would actually try to compete with Steam. Monopoly isn't funny and Steam will soon start fucking people over even more than now.
 

Outlander

Custom Tags Are For Fags.
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Messages
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Valley of Mines
Divinity: Original Sin Wasteland 2 Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
PC Gamer reports some games I never heard about and Quantum Break aren't coming to PC, like, at all:

http://www.pcgamer.com/why-scalebound-crackdown-3-and-quantum-break-arent-coming-to-pc/

Phil Spencer said:
In the case of things like Scalebound or Crackdown or Quantum Break, you know, just to be completely honest with you, we started those games before we really looked at expanding into Windows in the way that I wanted to bring as part of becoming head of Xbox.

I suppose Quantum Break will be available on PC further down the line just like Alan Wake was.
 

A horse of course

Guest
B-but we're getting Halo Wars 2 guys. PC Gamers were clamouring for the sequel to a console-exclusive RTS built for gamepads. It's gonna be awesome like Supreme Commander 2.
 
Unwanted

a Goat

Unwanted
Dumbfuck Edgy Vatnik
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Albania
B-but we're getting Halo Wars 2 guys. PC Gamers were clamouring for the sequel to a console-exclusive RTS built for gamepads. It's gonna be awesome like Supreme Commander 2.
Don't even start it.

YAY AWESOME RTS FRANCHISE WILL BE REVIVED, STAY TUNED


IT'S HALO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Microsoft is sad now. Their new browser is called "Spartan", their voice control shit is called "Cortana" what next, their CEO will change his name to "Master Chief"?
 

Astral Rag

Arcane
Joined
Feb 1, 2012
Messages
7,771
Microsoft needs to stop forcing console-like restrictions on Windows Store PC games
With the upcoming Quantum Break a Windows Store exclusive, users are up in arms.
by Mark Walton (UK) - Feb 29, 2016 3:15pm CET


With the news that Remedy Entertainment's upcoming Xbox One and PC exclusive Quantum Break would only be available for Windows 10 via the Windows Store, and only run under DirectX 12, there's been something of an uproar in the PC gaming community. Along with lamenting the cessation of support for the likes of Windows 7, of course—a sadly inevitable decision given Microsoft's aggressive push of its latest OS—there's also some incredibly steep recommended system requirements, which call for a Core i7, Nvidia GTX 980 Ti or AMD Fury X, and 16GB of system memory.

But the biggest problem stems from Microsoft's distribution method of choice: the Windows Store. The Windows Store is Microsoft's own platform for selling apps and games directly to consumers, which some may remember Valve's Gabe Newell calling "a catastrophe for everyone in the PC space" when it debuted with Windows 8 back in 2012. Steam OS arrived just a year later. Games and apps sold through the Windows Store differ from those sold on the likes of Steam and GOG in that they're built as a Universal Windows Platform (UWP) app, rather than as a standard desktop app.

That's fine for downloading the likes of Candy Crush, Minecraft: Pocket Edition, and Dropbox—even if the latter has some issues—but UWP apps have some limitations that dramatically affect top-tier PC games. Square Enix's Rise of the Tomb Raider recently debuted on PC both on Steam and on the Windows Store. Those that forked over for the Windows Store version were disappointed to find a host of limitations, including not being able to turn v-sync off, no SLI or Crossfire support, and no .exe file that can be loaded into Steam for use with its overlays or Big Picture mode.

The latter also means that players aren't able to override the game's v-sync or SLI/Crossfire settings using the Nvidia Control Panel or Catalyst Control Centre. Other issues include locked game files (which limits modding), being forced to play in borderless full-screen mode, FPS overlays like Fraps refusing to work, and mouse software that creates custom binds for each game not working. The Steam version of the game, which costs the same, supports nearly all of those features.

Nixxes—the porting studio responsible for the PC version of the game—confirmed on Steam that not being able to disable v-sync is a limitation of the UWP framework, not its port. Indeed, many of the issues are intrinsic to the design and ostensible purpose of UWP. Apps built for UWP can target a number of devices, including desktop PCs, mobiles, or even IoT gear. But many of those devices are designed to run heavily sandboxed apps—mobile especially—and this limitation has been extended to PC.

Microsoft's UWP guidelines do state that developers are able to target a single platform like the PC, but the limitations remain. For its part, Microsoft has begun to respond to the concerns of PC gamers. Just this weekend, Microsoft's head of Xbox Phil Spencer took to Twitter in response to a Howtogeek article about the Windows Store issues, saying: "We know lists like this include features PC gamers want to see from us, we appreciate the feedback and have plans to improve."

More recently, Microsoft's Mike Ybarra spoke up and directly addressed criticism over v-sync, saying that "SLI and Crossfire work, games just need to support it just as always. We will fix vsync." Given that Microsoft has been bullish about supporting PC gaming in the past, it's galling to see v-sync being forced on. And while those players do at least have the option to buy the Steam version of most games, including Rise of the Tomb Raider, the same won't be true of Quantum Break.

"We weren't fully committed as a company, and I've said that before. We made commitments to developers and consumers that I don't feel we lived up to. The key difference now is that the Xbox team is driving the Windows and console gaming efforts as one connected ecosystem." Spencer explained back in June 2015. "I can tell you definitively that our team has never committed more resources to making Windows better for game developers and gamers, and that means any gamer on Windows 10, regardless of storefront or device."

Unfortunately for Spencer, not only has the PC as gaming platform seen little improvement from Microsoft—bar DirectX 12—but the company's one-platform-fits-all approach simply isn't going to fly on PC. The PC community has its own rules and expectations. Forcing console-like restrictions on a group that values freedom was never going to end well. And now, with those people backed into a corner with Quantum Break—one of this year's most highly anticipated games—the backlash is only going to get bigger.
 

Astral Rag

Arcane
Joined
Feb 1, 2012
Messages
7,771
It looks like Forza is heading to PC
Free-to-play, stripped down Forza 6 coming to Windows 10 this spring.
By Martin Robinson Published 01/03/2016

Microsoft is bringing its Forza Motorsport series to the PC later this year, with a stripped back free-to-play version of last year's instalment, dubbed Forza Motorsport 6: Apex, coming to Windows 10 this spring.

The news comes via a leaked report by The Seattle Times from a recent Microsoft event in San Francisco - the embargo on which was due to be lifted this afternoon. The emphasis of the show was the positioning of the Xbox brand on PC, a vision Phil Spencer laid out at last year's GDC and one that's been reaffirmed with the recent news that former Xbox One exclusive Quantum Break is now to launch on PC as well.

Forza Motorsport 6: Apex would be the latest extension of that philosophy, as Microsoft brings its own big-name products to its own store on PC as it competes against Valve's popular Steam shopfront.

Microsoft and Forza developer Turn 10 Studios had previously shown Forza Motorsport 5 running on PC in a DX12 showcase at GDC in 2014, though this would mark the first time the series has been available to the public on the platform. It seems likely that this afternoon's embargo lift will also bring news of Forza Motorsport 6's latest expansion, a Porsche-themed pack that leaked early last month and was noted for release later today.

dat passion for PC gaming
 

tormund

Arcane
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Aug 15, 2015
Messages
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Location
Penetrating the underrail
That PC port of Gears of War "HD" re-release (unsurprisingly) turned out to be a complete disaster.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonev...-disaster-for-amd-radeon-gamers/#47d914237e7e
Gears of War: Ultimate Edition on PC releases today exclusively to the Windows 10 Store. It should have been another prominent feather in Microsoft's DirectX 12 cap. Instead, it’s one of the most disastrous PC game launches in years, and many AMD Radeon owners are advised to steer completely clear during the game’s launch window!


I haven't noticed this thread when I posted it, but this post about Gears Of War re-release I made in the Quantum Break thread some time ago would be more at home here:
Related to Windows Store, this is just too hilarious not to share: http://www.dsogaming.com/news/gears...revealed-dx12-only-8gb-ram-quad-core-minimum/
Here are the PC requirements for Gears of War: Ultimate Edition:

MINIMUM SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS

  • OS: 64 bit Windows 10 – version 1511
  • Processor: Intel Core i5 @ 2.7Ghz or AMD FX 6-core
  • Memory: 8 GB RAM (2 GB VRAM)
  • Graphics: Geforce GTX 650 Ti or Radeon R7 260x
  • Hard Drive: 60 GB available space
  • DirectX 12
RECOMMENDED SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS FOR 1920X1080P

  • OS: 64 bit Windows 10 – version 1511
  • Processor: Intel Core i5 @3.5GHz+ or AMD FX 8-core
  • Memory: 16 GB RAM (4 GB VRAM)
  • Graphics: GeForce GTX 970 or Radeon R9 290X
  • Hard Drive: 60 GB available space
  • DirectX 12
RECOMMENDED SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS FOR 4K

  • OS: 64 bit Windows 10 – version 1511
  • Processor: Intel Core i7 @ 4Ghz or AMD FX 8-core
  • Memory: 16 GB RAM (6+ GB VRAM)
  • Graphics: Geforce GTX 980 Ti or Radeon R9 390X
  • Hard Drive: SSD + 60 GB available space
  • DirectX 12
Look at those hardware requirements. Now look at the screenshots from Ultimate Edition. If that is not enough, compare them to random HQ screenshots from original Gears of War PC port.:lol:
 

pippin

Guest
There was an image showcasing the original plans for the AoE series. AoE 1 to 3 happened pretty much as planned, but 4 to 6 were meant to explore other eras of history. Kind of like Empire Earth. AoE 6 was futuristic and featured a guy who looked a lot like the Halo space marine.
 

DeepOcean

Arcane
Joined
Nov 8, 2012
Messages
7,394
I like Microsoft trying to compete with Steam, the problem is that I trust Microsoft even less than I trust Valve.
 

sullynathan

Arcane
Joined
Dec 22, 2015
Messages
6,473
Location
Not Europe
Why the fuck are the requirements for Gears Ultimate so high when it runs on Gears 1 engine? Fuck you Microsoft.
 

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