Xbox Series S Hitting VRAM Limits, 8 GB is the Magic Number

[Bomby569]

Devs are absolutely garbage these days. "Optimization" is a foreign concept

don't say that, their hands are tied, they can't possible do any better, there's reasons and stuff, we just don't understand.
Ungrateful gamers should just eat the crap they release and be grateful

 

[watzupken]

I feel Xbox series S is not a console that is meant for people looking for a "future proof" gaming system. The specs relative to the Series X says it all. Having said that, the VRAM limit is something that developers can work around. Of course something has got to give, but I believe it can be done. In this case. Borderland 3 is not a resource intensive game on PC, and I don't see why the game is struggling on the Series S. I do agree that the Quick Resume feature may be the culprit since the data needs to be stored in the RAM in order to resume so quickly. It is a great feature, but comes with its drawback.

 

[Psyclown]

I can't wait for the VRAM wars. It has begun.

 

[A&P211]

Well... this is really the PC situation isn't it guys?

Let's face it, we have two same gen consoles with different specs, and VRAM is the killing blow for performance. Forget linear perf loss, it just kills it.
Water is also wet, the age of 8GB is finito

But do pray those devs are going to fix all the things. Some will, some won't, many will compromise heavily in the future.


If you're content sitting there staring at a screen 8hrs per day you damn sure are lazy. 99% of IT is lazy as fuck

A specific type of lazy, though You can't see brains sweat

People who work in front of screens will also sweat, I'm a air frame and power plant mechanic, aka aviation mechanic. Sometimes I will have sit for hours in front of the screen to understand what parts I have to repair or replace on a 777/787/757 airplane.

 

[Punkenjoy]

I mean....
Series S might have less memory, but it has enough amount of memory to drive Borderlands 3, either there is an issue with the game or with the Xbox system on Series S.

If this issue is related to the game, it makes things much more ridiculous, I've seen some devs complaining about how limiting the Series S can be for the newer gen of games, but I end up not understanding how limiting it is.

1. VRAM? Just give the Series S worse quality on the textures, we have these options on PC, Series S can definitely get lower textures as well so that games can fit inside the budget.
2. CPU is the same, so it can power the same worlds, engines, physics, and logic.
3. Series S lacks graphical power. Well, it's true, but just like PC, it just needs to deliver a more reduced settings version for Series S, worse AO, worse shadows, worse distance, worse textures, worse GI, or any other demanding option available alongside worse resolutions.

The only way I see Series S being a big issue, is if a dev team like A4Games wants to continue the trend of going full RTGI for their games, Series S (which already suffers so much with Metro Exodus RT Edition), might suffer even more and creating a fallback version is not an option, or simply Star Wars Jedi Survivor which only delivers decent reflections if RT is enabled (also on PC) with no decent SSR as a fallback, it forces people to use RT because reflections without it seems just broken because devs only cared about RT which is enabled on all graphics settings on both bigger consoles, but the truth is, consoles could easily have much better reflections without RT, they simply didn't cared in the first place because it's much more easier to just enable RT..... "It just works"

From what I heard, This issue is probably someone that had to much games on quick resumes.

If there was really an issue with that specific game, it would have been know by now.

 

[LabRat 891]

Is that error message real? If so, this was literally an expected outcome.
That is indeed, one way, to sell Series Xs

 

[TumbleGeorge]

Well there's working hard and there's working smart. I wouldn't say it's lazy to do it either way, even if one requires more effort for often less product.

The lack of real knowledge and skills is due to the automation of many of the activities and guess what, again from laziness. So, sweating already occurs at a negligible load, from which programmers 30 years ago would not even "out of breath".

 

[R-T-B]

again from laziness

I'm not sure not wanting to work as hard and figuring out a solution that makes you not have to work as hard is "laziness" as much as "cleverness."

real knowledge and skills

Who decides what is "real knowledge" anyways? I would die on a desert island but that doesn't matter one bit in todays society.

 

[Deleted member 185088]

Problem probably comes form higher resolution textures, just use lowe resolution textures and remove some textures.

The problem is whether it's worth it as Microsoft seems obsessed with rubbish than selling their consoles or making games, 2 years after the launch of the Series X still no Forza Motorsport, Gears or Halo.

 

[R-T-B]

Problem probably comes form higher resolution textures, just use lowe resolution textures and remove some textures.

Just go back to monke, eh? (kidding, sorta).

Nah the problem is a lack of use of available tech. Texture compression has come a long ways and a lot of the engine formats are still using shit like dds.

 

[wolf]

Couldn't resist joining into the VRAM boogeyman narrative hey?

Yet Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom is able to launch, running on the modern equivalent of a potato compared to an Xbox Series or midrange PC, without hitches, stuttering, texture streaming issues and so on.

Do VRAM requirements go up over time? Yes
Should games crash, hitch, stutter, or have overarchingly bad performance in a certain metric, on all hardware, that is in any way related to an 8GB VRAM buffer? no.

Anyone with an <8GB card should not expect any of those issues, period. What they can perhaps expect is lower texture quality relative to a setup with more VRAM.

It's really that simple.

 

[Vayra86]

Anyone with an <8GB card should not expect any of those issues, period. What they can perhaps expect is lower texture quality relative to a setup with more VRAM.

It's really that simple.

No its not that simple, because VRAM isn't just textures. It affects nearly everything in the scene.

Should devs cover all setups sure. Is this the standing practice? Most of the time, and in basic principle, yes, because that is how you get the biggest target audience. But you won't be running everything as it should, that is also a given, and not all things will be fixed or working as well as they were intended given the console spec, which is a fixed requirement you can target much more easily. Its an economical matter, too, which is often forgotten. We saw this extremely well with the release of Cyberpunk. The console release and its major draw / potential market definitely threw a wrench in whatever quality the PC release could have had. And note: even after that fiasco, CDPR made a shitload of money.

In the end we can whine all day about how things should be better but unless you are voting with your wallet, that's all it is: whine. And if you are voting with your wallet, perhaps that might skew things in favor of better optimization? Who knows, but until that moment arrived, you've been NOT playing things as you could have with a higher VRAM card. Who's winning and who's losing here?

 

[wolf]

No its not that simple, because VRAM isn't just textures.

It's the vast majority of what occupies it, if I'm not mistaken.

Should devs cover all setups sure. Is this the standing practice? Most of the time, and in basic principle, yes, because that is how you get the biggest target audience. But you won't be running everything as it should, that is also a given, and not all things will be fixed or working as well as they were intended given the console spec, which is a fixed requirement you can target much more easily. Its an economical matter, too, which is often forgotten. We saw this extremely well with the release of Cyberpunk. The console release and its major draw / potential market definitely threw a wrench in whatever quality the PC release could have had. And note: even after that fiasco, CDPR made a shitload of money.

What gets me is that for a PC port, all of the content is already made, all they need to really do is actually package and optimise it for a different platform that has a wide variety of configurations, a big task sure, but one where most of that PC release asking price could or should be going towards. So if they expect someone to pay full price for that release, I expect a very smooth experience, on anything from the min spec upwards, or revise the damn min spec. Framerates, quality settings etc are all negotiable based on the game, min and rec specs etc, but if the config it exceeds the min spec, it shouldn't have stutters, crashes and so on for large amounts of your customers. I don't feel like this is an excessive expectation at all.

In the end we can whine all day about how things should be better but unless you are voting with your wallet, that's all it is: whine. And if you are voting with your wallet, perhaps that might skew things in favor of better optimization? Who knows, but until that moment arrived, you've been NOT playing things as you could have with a higher VRAM card. Who's winning and who's losing here?

I'm voting with my wallet and tbh I don't think it has all that much to do with VRAM requirements, the amount of games that have launched that play crap/well under expectation on a 4090 is a number that should have never existed, and it seems to be more of a CPU limitation than VRAM, but VRAM is getting the attention because large amounts of it can mitigate some of poor optimisation issues. fwiw, if I had a 24 GB card I'd still be waiting till the game gets patched, as is becoming evident watching the patches drop, the only difference ultimately is texture quality, all of the other issues are fixed, patched, optimised etc.

So I stand by my statement, the way I see it, it is that simple. A AAA PC release that costs ~$70 USD should not suffer game/immersion breaking issues because the user has 8GB VRAM - other system issues, bottlenecks or min-maxing component errors of choice not withstanding. Those users should only expect texture quality and overall performance in line with their configuration. By the looks of it, after a handful of patches so far most 2023 releases have achieved exactly this, which means it was possible all along under altered timelines or circumstances, they just wanted, needed or otherwise managed to rely upon early adopters providing feedback, crash reports etc to get them there. And of course, when the negative press and bug repots die down, the patches do too, funny that.

 

[Vayra86]

It's the vast majority of what occupies it, if I'm not mistaken.

The gap between medium and ultra textures is often in the region of 1-2GB at best.
So its definitely not the vast majority being textures. Meshes, shaders, the whole shebang is in VRAM, and needs to be there for the game to run proper, or you'll be waiting on the slower part of the pipeline. Also note that 'textures' is a broad term. Every layer, material, etc. could be 'called' a texture.

As for the rest, I fully agree with how it should be and what we as customers should do with those games. At the same time I've gamed long enough to be realistic about it too, if you want eye candy, better align with mainstream spec or you're going to compromise more and earlier than you'd like. But that's still a difference from things running like absolute shit.

 

[wolf]

The gap between medium and ultra textures is often in the region of 1-2GB at best.

So how much are all of the textures then? feels impossible to say or would at least need to be per game.

This only solidifies what I think on this subject, more optimisation is needed, however that looks, whatever solutions can be found, PC releases don't have a single pool of unified memory, so perhaps the optimisation needs to focus on better utilisation of the entire system. perhaps that involves compromises or changes? figure it out devs. Again, gonna charge full price for a release on a given platform? optimise for that platform. Given ~80% of all PC gamers have 8GB or less, I believe it's absolutely necessary to make the game run well on 8GB VRAM systems, perhaps with lower quality, that's almost immaterial, just make the game run right, and set minimum specs that account for what your game needs to run right.

 

[Vayra86]

So how much are all of the textures then? feels impossible to say or would at least need to be per game.

This only solidifies what I think on this subject, more optimisation is needed, however that looks, whatever solutions can be found, PC releases don't have a single pool of unified memory, so perhaps the optimisation needs to focus on better utilisation of the entire system. perhaps that involves compromises or changes? figure it out devs. Again, gonna charge full price for a release on a given platform? optimise for that platform. Given ~80% of all PC gamers have 8GB or less, I believe it's absolutely necessary to make the game run well on 8GB VRAM systems, perhaps with lower quality, that's almost immaterial, just make the game run right, and set minimum specs that account for what your game needs to run right.

That is kind of the point I'm trying to make. The baseline requirement is simply going up because of console capabilities. What you get on top with a higher quality pass of the same baseline is in fact marginal, and a quality reduction might not even be all that easy without damaging the scene irreparably.

This is also what @R-T-B is pointing out. Tooling isn't always there or as accessible as it should be given what assets in the game require. You can tweak everything, but if you have to find individual solutions for every bit of the game, you're likely quickly looking at a project that will never be done. That's where the economy comes into play. Will you do a potential Duke Nukem Forever scenario, or will you just release and see where it lands while fixing it later. After all, that console release you've got ready and waiting really can't and shouldn't wait...

 

[ixi]

DoN't YoU HaVe EnOuGh vRaM in GpU?

Haha, nice. Someone eff it up

 

[wolf]

That is kind of the point I'm trying to make. The baseline requirement is simply going up because of console capabilities. What you get on top with a higher quality pass of the same baseline is in fact marginal, and a quality reduction might not even be all that easy without damaging the scene irreparably.

Then we don't disagree? I've said and agree requirements go up, and that they should publish a min/rec etc specs that encompass what it takes to run the game at given targets, on a PC platform without issue. Game needs more? tell us, make your min spec for a good experience higher, they can't expect to try and reach the largest audience and then give many of them a substandard experience because it was never going to work and have us accept that. The recent patches of many releases tell me it was indeed possible to give buyers a working game.

I'll say it once more, I expect when paying full price for a game that I don't get shafted when my hardware is more than adequate according to them. I can certainly expect quality or FPS compromises relative to "turn all the dials to 11!!", but little to nothing widespread that is game/performance breaking.

 

[BorisDG]

"Zero Optimization" is the magic word... also "Cash Grab" is a magic one.

Absolutely. They are spoiled by the power they have been given and kinda skimp on optimization. Just look back in PS3/4 era.

 

[R-T-B]

we just don't understand.

Thanks for being honest.

As to the rest of your post, no one said nearly any of that.

 

[Aleksandar_038]

Developers are not a problem - big companies are. More, more, faster, faster - in that situation, there is not much choice for developers. Shortcuts generalized tools and MOAR VRAM.

 

[TumbleGeorge]

Developers are not a problem - big companies are. More, more, faster, faster - in that situation, there is not much choice for developers. Shortcuts generalized tools and MOAR VRAM.

Uh? When did it get faster? Some of the games have had their release deadlines pushed back by many months, even years. In my opinion, games are made significantly slower, although today there are ready-made movement codes applied with a click of the mouse, instead of writing code by hand for hours.

 

[Aleksandar_038]

Uh? When did it get faster? Some of the games have had their release deadlines pushed back by many months, even years. In my opinion, games are made significantly slower, although today there are ready-made movement codes applied with a click of the mouse, instead of writing code by hand for hours.

Given the complexity of today's software, yes, they are made much faster. You can't compare Dangerous Dave 2 or Supaplex complexity to Cyberpank or GTA 5...

After all, simply ask developers about deadlines and see for yourself. Crazy requirements with pompous deadlines, lack of almost any proper QA/QC are modus operandi for majority of game developers... or OS producers like Microsoft itself.

 

[A&P211]

The gap between medium and ultra textures is often in the region of 1-2GB at best.
So its definitely not the vast majority being textures. Meshes, shaders, the whole shebang is in VRAM, and needs to be there for the game to run proper, or you'll be waiting on the slower part of the pipeline. Also note that 'textures' is a broad term. Every layer, material, etc. could be 'called' a texture.

As for the rest, I fully agree with how it should be and what we as customers should do with those games. At the same time I've gamed long enough to be realistic about it too, if you want eye candy, better align with mainstream spec or you're going to compromise more and earlier than you'd like. But that's still a difference from things running like absolute shit.

I always thought the difference between medium and ultra would be in the region of 3-6gb, 1-2gb is not much.
My laptop with 8gb of vram might not be much for lots of today's newer games. Laptop GPUs have had 8gb since the days of the Nvidia 780m.

 

[Vayra86]

I always thought the difference between medium and ultra would be in the region of 3-6gb, 1-2gb is not much.
My laptop with 8gb of vram might not be much for lots of today's newer games. Laptop GPUs have had 8gb since the days of the Nvidia 780m.

It differs wildly per game, obviously it can be more.