Surprising literally no one, Microsoft are planning to unveil Project Scorpio and what it truly means for the future of the platform at E3 this year, their press conference planned for Sunday 11th June at 2PM PT, which works out as 10PM in the UK.
We already know the overarching vision for Project Scorpio, as Microsoft follow Sony in releasing a more powerful iteration of their console, targeting 4K gaming in the process. The company have been pretty confident in stating that they’re gunning for true 4K gaming, without resorting to tricks like checker boarding as the PS4 Pro does. Given the variation that we see with PS4 Pro compatible games, it will be fascinating to see how comprehensively Microsoft can deliver on that plan.
To be fair, they could have held the Scorpio unveil at another time in the year, but E3 makes the most sense by far, having already announced the project at E3 last year. Here’s hoping it also comes alongside a raft of major new and returning exclusives.
via Twitter
The Lone Steven
My initial reaction when reading this was “Wasn’t this done last year?” but maybe i’m thinking of a newer version of the X1. I swear i’ve seen adverts for it. Maybe the X1 slim?
As for Scorpio, erm.. MS, you need to kick it up several notches. Get tons of exclusives, intergrate Windows and your products with it(entertainment wise), maybe, offer, say, Skype, Minecraft, a few other things as part of the Gold package along with keeping up the BC program. Kinda have no reason to invest in the X1 and I want to have a hard time deciding which console to get. Let me shout “It is TEARING ME APHART!” in a bid to be very dramatic but come off as narm.
Oh and stop the timed exclusive crap. It only pisses off people and damages the product. I mean this in general. Timed stuff is crap.
Stefan L
They announced it, stated their overarching vision for what it would do, but this year is when they actually reveal specs, show it in action, and so on.
NotSmartEnough
It will be interesting to see what Scorpio really is. There have been some fairly solid rumours pointing to the CPU being an upclocked Jaguar, rather than Zen. It seems that Scorpio may be coming a bit too early for Zen, so CPU is still going to be a limiting factor.
Big differences are the GPU and 12gb RAM, along with the removal of the fast ESRAM. We might see better textures than Pro can manage, but it seems that Microsoft are pushing checkerboarding techniques, so native 4k may still be the exception for 3rd party titles.
It will also be interesting to see what they’ve got to say on VR, given that they removed the reference to it from the Scorpio page. Will it be supported from launch, or come later? I don’t think anyone’s going to bet on an Oculus partnership now!
Avenger
I’d be surprised if Oculus is involved in Xbox VR, I would bet Microsoft’s VR sets filling that space.
The post-E3 report didn’t push checkerboarding as such, but advised it as an option to give developers flexibility in how they budget resources. It’s the biggest moot point of these mid-gen console upgrades, developers can use the extra power however they like. I’d hope developers plump for native 4k, just because it looks amazing. Forza Motorsport 7 is rumoured to have achieved it on Scorpio, but we’ll wait and see.
Stefan L
Well Zen is out in March, well before the GPU they’re meant to be using is out in the middle of the year. If MS wanted Zen, they’d have been able to get involved with it during its development, with an eye to this end of 2017 release window that they have. That said, an upclocked version of Jaguar wouldn’t be the end of the world.
Sammy
It would be for all the people who want stable 60 fps ;) Unless they gave that CPU a huge, “bigboy” overclock (probably not possible in a console with its limited space and cooling).
TrumpyMx
The bigger problem of course, is people want to hand with whatever their friends have, and that’s PS4. Making a £500 console that’s just a gaming PC with no upgrade options isn’t going to solve that.
If you have the money to spend on Scorpio, you might as well buy a gaming PC.