Consumers looking to buy a brand new $599 4K Ultra High Definition Blu ray player may want to wait a couple of months and buy a new $K Blu ray capable gaming console for $100 less industry insiders have suggested.
Recently both Microsoft and Sony announced new consoles with 4K Blu ray players built in, with one TV manufacturer admitting that the idea “sounds good”.
According to retailers margins are “very slim” when it comes to console gaming machines, despite this both the struggling Microsoft and Sony with their new VR goggles, are set to go head to head later this year in a battle to try and get consumers to upgrade their consoles.
Microsoft has confirmed the new, slimmer Xbox One S is carrying a little more oomph under the hood than its 2013 counterpart, but this does not mean that consumers will buy it as Sony continues to steal share from the US software Company.
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Announced at E3 2016 on Monday, the new console has some “additional processing power” to go along with the 4K Blu-Ray player, 2TB hard drive and 40% slimmer body.
The extra CPU and GPU power is for the new range of HDR games, such as Gears of War 4. For non-HDR games, the console uses the same chipset powering the original Xbox One.
“We have the same SOC architecture as Xbox One today,” a Microsoft spokesperson told The Verge.
“For games that want to take advantage of HDR, we gave developers access to a small amount of additional processing power.”
The news came via Polygon in an interview with the head of Coalition studios Rod Ferguson.
Ferguson claimed his engineers have been able to, as Polygon puts it, “leverage the additional power to reduce the frequency of the frame rate or resolution penalties.”
Despite the enhanced version for Xbox One S gamers, Ferguson wasn’t able to confirm a 4K version of the game will be released for 2017’s ‘Project Scorpio.’
He added: “We have to look at what the engine can do with the power that Scorpio has.
“Because we’re mastering at 4K, it’s not about assets or art. It’s about getting the milliseconds down in terms of getting the game to 4K at 60 or 30 [fps] depending on single-player or multiplayer.”
The Xbox One S will be released in August.
Meanwhile Sony has pledged not to implement a two-class system for PlayStation gamers who remain concerned the new Neo console will render their original PS4 obsolete.
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Speaking to TIME at E3 2016, SIE Worldwide Studios Chairman Shawn Layden said the high-end PS4 will not ‘create haves and have-nots.’
Instead, Layden says, the new 4K enabled console codenamed Neo will offer the “same experience” as the PS4 only with enhancements in resolution in graphics.
So, essentially, not the same experience then?
When asked whether consoles were becoming like smartphones with new machines bought more regularly, Layden said that’s not on the agenda, a stance shared by Xbox counterpart Phil Spencer.
“Phil and I are in agreement on that, he said. “With this move towards a high-end PS4, it’s not to bifurcate the market. We’re not creating haves and have-nots. There’s only going to be one game on sale, and it will play on both [consoles]. You’ll have the same experience, but one will be delivered at a higher resolution, with an enhanced graphical experience, but everything else is going to be exactly as you’d expect.”
Layden also commented on PlayStation VR and the range of titles and experiences coming to what he described as a “new platform for entertainment” rather than a PS4 peripheral.
“And as we step into that frontier, we’re not entirely sure what’s going to work best. So we’re trying many different experiences against that, dozens of different approaches.
“And over time, as we’ve seen with almost any form of entertainment, it will coalesce around half a dozen or so experiences that work well in that medium.
“It probably won’t be until the second wave or third wave of titles until you see stuff that can only occur in VR.”
