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[Gauis]

I don't really have time to break the whole thing down, but for one, the fact that they didn't reach out to any of the parties involved is a major flaw. As a general rule, when writing about a person or company, it is a journalist's responsibility to give that person or company an opportunity to comment. Here, we have an article directly attacking multiple people and companies that does no such thing.

There's also the puerile language ("What follows is an inexplicably odd (or perhaps normal, if you're used to the Doritocracy)"), the fact that he takes quotes from just about every article (including Kotaku's) out of context, and perhaps worst of all, the unfounded accusations:


If a writer working for me wrote a line like the bolded they would no longer be working for me. To make an accusation like that with no evidence or sourcing is just straight-up unacceptable.

Why don't you get out of internet forums then and show the gaming community the proud journalist that you think you're and encourage others to do the same? All I see you do here is desperately try to protect your field from the backslash that you and your colleges created. Independently of the fact that there are good game jornos, the public notion is that gaming journalism is a joke, a PR machine for publishers and developers. If you're on the inside and can't provide ideas at least just stop defending others for pure corporativism.

 

[CamHostage]

Film, music and sports journalism are all pretty important to their fields. Stuff like ESPN, Rolling Stone and TMZ all feed into peoples' desires to know about what goes into making their favorite stars, analyzing performances or speculation. They can also break news that people want to know before teams or studios comment or voice the concerns of fans to people of importance.
There's also important work that can be done in the field such as "League of Denial" about the NFL's cover-up of concussion damage or Jimmy Savile's rampant and damaging pedophilia.

I think something important to consider when comparing game journalism to other fields of press is that journalism for most of those businesses cover live stories or current events. When the Red Sox win the World Series, that's your story of the day. When Ender's Game take the weekend box office, that's the first story coming out of the weekend. Gaming of course has some of that basic news, but the biggest headlines in a gaming magazine or website is material that has been known to 200 people in a game studio for some time before. "Next Call of Duty Announced" is not declaring something that is new, it's an announcement of a project some two years into development.

This is how product coverage, and particularly tech product coverage, works. Product journalists are not embedded in the labs leaking out bits of info every step of the way. They do dig in looking for scoops where they can, but their interest (and the interest of their readership) spins up when a project becomes a viable product readying itself for market.

So the question comes in, when is this "news" that isn't news ready for a newspaper? Unfortunately, that isn't really something a journalist can control: until a product is out in the public, the designer/producer/manufacturer has rightful ownership of access to that product. A journalist can dig in deep, can pressure a contact for scoops, but unless they do not care about putting hands on a product until it is shipped and legally purchasable (or unless they don't care about the lawsuits that their friendly contacts face for breaking a binding contract and allowing unofficial access to a whole team of people's creation... and that's if they can even get a deepthroat in a company, the vast majority of game developers aren't that stupid,) they must agree to the terms of the company granting them early access.

Sometimes those terms are unreasonable and irresponsible, true, but I think most journalists would agree that this is a rarity rather than a regularity. (And by the way, in some of the cases where bullshit was pulled, the shenanigans have been outed via blogs and "leaks" and other fatbabies message exchanges. ... and one very public firing scandal too, although that was more about a breakdown in appropriate management handling than publisher chicanery. I don't think Gerstmann would be working alongside GameSpot now if he believed his current bosses would fail so hard to back him up in a fight. That situation could have been professionally handled so differently and I can't believe anybody at Eidos - certainly not the creatives who actually made and cared about their game - really meant for things to go so far no matter how much ad revenue was involved.) Even those rare cases, such as the GTA and MGS4 embargoes, those are situations a journalist can prepare themselves for as best as possible; you know going in that you're being "handled", and your credibility is on the line if you don't come away from that situation with professional handling.

That time period, from announcement to release, is very complicated and delicate. The stakes are incredibly high for a publisher, and the coverage calendar is carefully coordinated to maximize interest without risking overexposure or fatigue (or in a case like Watch.Dogs, running too long a campaign and having your product virtually forgotten about as new contenders enter the fray.) A publisher is within its rights to maintain control of access to product not available to the public. And obviously, it is in that company's best interest to maintain that control all the way to launch day. But while it'd be plenty easy and legal for any game company - especially the majors with AAA sequels - to follow Apple's approach and hold off all access until the day the damned thing ships, no game company does this. GTA 4&5 had bad reviews out before they shipped. Call of Duty doesn't have reviews up yet but people have played it and said what's good and bad about it. Madden doesn't just ship every year with just an advertising campaign and a history of programmed pre-orders to sell it. Half-Life 3 won't (probably?) show up on Steam without some gameplay impressions out there beforehand. If a company did that, they'd be in their right (and even more scary, if a company refused access to every outlet but its own Facebook and community portals, that's be their exclusive right to the message until launch day... we're moving in that direction, people, the press has its issues but the alternative is more control and manipulation, not less, and that alternative has existed as an option since Nintendo Power launched.) A company has no real responsibility but to its shareholders/stakeholders.

But they don't shut everything down. Crazily enough, these companies choose to face the press. You may believe that they do this because they have the press in pocket, but in reality, there's no weapon great enough to truly tame the press.

Except, I'd go a stage further: Control of access *wouldn't* matter if the mass market of readers of game journalism didn't set so much store from it. If sites that gave reviews two weeks after release were as profitable as those that had one a week before launch.

Access is powerful because we - and that's the collective we, not the direct we - regard it as such. The solution to this problem is kinda reliant on changing the mentality of the audience for games journalism, and that's... nontrivial.

It's not on journalists side, it's not on publisher side - it's on our side. But to change it would require changing the practices of a crowd.

Boy, this post connects for me. Not many journalists I've seen besides jschreier are posting on this thread (haven't read all 30 pages, I admit,) but I'm sure tons are trolling it, thinking to themselves, "it'd sure be nice if GAF somehow came up with the right answer to all of this..." But the challenges of "fixing" gaming press are ingrained in every aspect of the gaming market. And nobody is innocent in the grand conspiracy of hype.

What's important (and why I wanted to comment in this thread... personally, I believe "Resolutiongate" is overblown, nobody even owns an Xbox One or PS4, so information is well and good, but it's a little early to stage a witchhunt leading to a pyre built of first-gen titles) is that we continue to chase solutions. I feel like trying to change the way the massive outlets do things the traditional way, while a good exercise (and if you go back, things have changed greatly over the years,) isn't going to be the solution. What gaming press needs more of is the alternative press, the good writers and video bloggers who are championed for doing things differently, in order to bring balance to the force. It's really hard to do (because money/interest has just not been there for gaming's outside-the-mainstream voices... also, because these are games, damn it, and even the coolest heads in gaming coverage let their passions overwhelm their senses sometimes,) but we need to encourage it.

 

[jschreier]

Why don't you get out of internet forums then and show the gaming community the proud journalist that you think you're and encourage others to do the same? All I see you do here is desperately try to protect your field from the backslash that you and your colleges created. Independently of the fact that there are good game jornos, the public notion is that gaming journalism is a joke, a PR machine for publishers and developers. If you're on the inside and can't provide ideas at least just stop defending others for pure corporativism.

Feel free to check out my work at www.kotaku.com.

 

[Feorax]

long post

I agree with a number of the points you've raised, but then nothing serves to explain my post a little further back where IGN took an original story and flat out lied about the contents to make it seem like it's not such a big deal.

We've had examples of Marcus Beer, Adam Sessler and now IGN deliberately lying and spreading FUD on top of the stuff we get from Microsoft. At what point does it become ok to hold certain journalists (by all means not all) accountable for spreading misinformation?

 

[Phades]

they do.

Ps4 is high tier. Xbox one is mid tier. Wii u is low tier.

Eh? Not really. PC is high tier. PS4 and Xbox are mid tier luxury. WiiU is mid tier economy. Ooya is low end economy. Smartphones/tablets are public transportation.

 

[plagiarize]

If a writer working for me wrote a line like the bolded they would no longer be working for me. To make an accusation like that with no evidence or sourcing is just straight-up unacceptable.

I'd love to see you address the other half of that statement though. I mean, yes, you feel personally slighted as a member of the press, at assertions that all of the press are corrupt, of course you do. we get that. I'm sure most of us can empathize with it. You've defended yourself and your site well...

But I'd love to see you address the general picture. You don't have to call out specific sites, just talk to the general coverage of this. The editorial line of other major sites is clearly one Kotaku isn't sharing.

Why do you think that is? Why do you think other sites are addressing this the way they are? Again, without naming names, who do you think they are writing this coverage for? What's their target audiences do you think?

I think you think your site is better than the general being picture painted here. I hesitate to tell you that I agree, because I don't want to sound like I'm pandering. You've explained why Kotaku doesn't fit the general picture.

But do you disagree with the general picture that those of us that *aren't* saying all journalists are on the take are describing? If you think we have the wrong idea of it, how do you see it? etc etc.

You've defended your own integrity plenty. Do you or do you not agree with the assertion that overriding editorial tone on this is overly one sided, and in downplaying it, seemingly not looking out for readers?

I don't expect you'll feel comfortable answering this. I've tried very carefully to put this post together in a way that doesn't make it look like I'm trying to get you to start insulting specific targets, leading to you upsetting peers you have to work with on occasions, etc etc... I'll understand. Even a confirmation of that being the case would be nice though.

I presume Kotaku is trying to show more integrity, because it thinks that the average standard isn't good enough, but its a presumption.

 

[Glass Shark]

Why would it be too late? Apologising about this on a 'GAF thread is one thing but it sounds like you misinformed your readership on this issue. Wouldn't making this right actually involve communicating that to them rather than unburdening your soul on some forum thread? Again, forgive me if I am missing the context on this.

I haven't posted an article about it, so my idiotic ramblings were thankfully confined to this thread. I'm more strongly considering an article about it now, but my biggest concern was that we're less than two weeks away from PS4 launch, so many consumers might have already made up their mind.

 

[Marc]

It's pretty sad considering that there are so many large media sites, yet none of them want to take on this responsibility.

You can tell they are worried about stepping out of line for what might happen, breaking rank is not an easy feat. The whole resolution factor is a big crack in that perception though. Speaking to people at work today about it, and most people understand 1080p>720p.

Although funnily enough I saw a ton of Xbox One adverts for both Call of Duty and Battlefield today on the news ad breaks. No "*Caution - Users may be required to stand back further for optimal performance" sadly.

 

[Gauis]

Feel free to check out my work at www.kotaku.com.

Do I eat shit?

But seriously, Kotaku recently left my bookmarks after many years there. Too many "quality" ""journalism"".

 

[Jabba]

Interestingly enough, that's exactly my setup. Thanks for the tip.

Thanks for all the kind words about my post, everyone. I still feel pretty bad that I was so boneheaded about this before. I appreciate the chance to make it right. I just wish I hadn't ignored this issue so long, because it would make a great article and now I wonder whether it's too late.

Never too late Josh. Just do an article on your findings and show how/why you came to your conclusions. Also suggest people actually try what you did if they have the right setup.

@JScheier

If I was a game journas, I'd be pissed about the same things as you, but also, how did we get scooped/beaten or why did we overlook something a hack as you infer, got there before we did.
If I was writing I would try to set up a dual piece IF possible, I know there are restrictions and contracts with your respective sites, with Josh if Josh was game.(may not at all be possible), I've read one of your articles on OS X1, great btw and obviously Josh can write. Joint articles by you and Josh. You guys would kill it.

I'm not talking about sharing Josh's own revelations, that certainly belongs to him.

Maybe a dumb idea but at least you'll be on record as to pointing out the facts on if this is an issue for each individual consumer.


Later on in the gen powergulf persists and it comes up later as a problem, You can just point to the joint article you did with Josh. Of course you could write your own. lol

 

[Feorax]

I haven't posted an article about it, so my idiotic ramblings were thankfully confined to this thread. I'm more strongly considering an article about it now, but my biggest concern was that we're less than two weeks away from PS4 launch, so many consumers might have already made up their mind.

For launch maybe, but there are still people who will want to give their next purchase some thought over christmas and heading into the new year.

Besides which, you seem to effectively have a monopoly on a great article, since apparently not many others want to risk it for the clicks. I say go nuts.

 

[evilromero]

I'm not buying any news systems this year but I think I'm one of the few who doesn't care about resolution. It was never a selling point for me.

 

[plagiarize]

Never too late Josh. Just do an article on your findings and show how/why you came to your conclusions. Also suggest people actually try what you did if they have the right setup.

I like these ideas. Help people get a grip on how significant the difference is *to them*. some people have already made up their minds, but I still see comments and posts from people wondering how big a deal it is.

I enjoyed Josh's ramblings, and I thought it was a really big thing for him to put that kind of effort into even just a post on GAF, especially after being taken to task by a few of us here.

 

[Ploid 3.0]

I have zero problem with the power difference between the Xbox One and the PS4.

Not even a tiny care.

If power were all that mattered I wouldn't buy either console. My gaming Rig is more than double the "powaaaar" of the PS4. Does that stop me from considering it or liking things that are coming to it. NO

Does the X1 having even lesser hardware stop me from considering it or liking what's coming to it. NO

I absolutely can not stand the people that think every article should attack one system or another over their capabilities. Sure a mention of resolution or framerate is fine, but there seem to be those that want something torn down and bashed/destroyed over the difference. So tired of those people.

I care about power, I have the gaming PC, but I need a console because not all games come to PC. To me it's a good thing that PS4 is powerful because I like the games Sony make, especially GT. Since getting a gaming PC my consoles have been getting dusty. I came back to console for Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3, playstation all stars, and GTA5. There are a ton of games that don't show up on PC, especially Japan dev games.

 

[Faustek]

Well..from pc perspective the difference is pretty small. Especially in case of BF4 where PS4 fails to reach 1080p. From PC perspective both next-gen console versions are blurry and dissapointing.

Then they should be as merciless against the current "loser" and not play Dr.Snugglepuff.

 

[Ploid 3.0]

The last half hour has provided the perfect example of why people are so fucking annoyed.

Original Eurogamer article:

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-11-04-xbox-one-resolutiongate-call-of-duty-ghosts-dev-infinity-ward-responds



Within half an hour, IGN post their take on it:

http://uk.ign.com/articles/2013/11/04/why-is-call-of-duty-ghosts-is-720p-on-xbox-one-and-1080p-on-playstation



I mean, seriously, what the fuck?

It's like some journalists have fear of Microsoft. That's the only way I can explain their actions. haha

 

[robertsan21]

Josh speaks the truth!

Oh well if Xboned users like to lie to themselves let them do it. The truth will be out there as soon as these things launches and I know the MS community will be spreading hate towards the console when everything thats coming out is far more superior on the PS4.

 

[Phades]

Meanwhile, in the real world, where different reporters have different opinions and perspectives

Full stop. Unless it is an editorial, there should be no opinion injected within the article. Part of the problem is the forced need for the reader to render the fact from crap and the backlash you are viewing is a byproduct of this, because it is becoming more common to see crap based opinions instead of fact.

 

[DBT85]

Well done Josh R Holloway.

 

[Faustek]

It's like some journalists have fear of Microsoft. That's the only way I can explain their actions. haha

Never bothered with IGN but they have PS/MS journos pondering to each demographic? And is this the MS camp journos?

 

[Sethista]

I don't really have time to break the whole thing down, but for one, the fact that they didn't reach out to any of the parties involved is a major flaw. As a general rule, when writing about a person or company, it is a journalist's responsibility to give that person or company an opportunity to comment. Here, we have an article directly attacking multiple people and companies that does no such thing.

There's also the puerile language ("What follows is an inexplicably odd (or perhaps normal, if you're used to the Doritocracy)"), the fact that he takes quotes from just about every article (including Kotaku's) out of context, and perhaps worst of all, the unfounded accusations:



If a writer working for me wrote a line like the bolded they would no longer be working for me. To make an accusation like that with no evidence or sourcing is just straight-up unacceptable.

Look, im with you in the unfounded accusations, that was too much of the point they wanted to make. Its on of the reasons why I just used their article as a stepping stone to read other, more reliable articles. But in the article you wrote today for kotaku with tha mark rubin interview, your first phrase was

When word came out last month that upcoming dog simulator Call of Duty: Ghosts

. You don't consider this an example of puerile language?

It was great that the cinemablend article brought the doritocracy up. Very fitting, and it summarized their point. In your instance, what did the dog simulator pun accomplished? humor? I sure don't get it. But that's me.

 

[IvorB]

I haven't posted an article about it, so my idiotic ramblings were thankfully confined to this thread. I'm more strongly considering an article about it now, but my biggest concern was that we're less than two weeks away from PS4 launch, so many consumers might have already made up their mind.

Ah okay. Well still pretty interesting even without all the apology stuff and still within the "launch window".

 

[IvorB]

I'm not buying any news systems this year but I think I'm one of the few who doesn't care about resolution. It was never a selling point for me.

But the real issue is not the resolution that the games run at. The resolution deficit is simply a symptom of a wider issue. The issue is Xbone's game-running capability compared to its cheaper rival which the resolution deficit hints at.

 

[Moneal]

I haven't posted an article about it, so my idiotic ramblings were thankfully confined to this thread. I'm more strongly considering an article about it now, but my biggest concern was that we're less than two weeks away from PS4 launch, so many consumers might have already made up their mind.

you should definitely write an article about it. the thing about being only 2 weeks away from launch isn't really an issue, since most won't upgrade to next gen for a year or even longer.

 

[ymmv]

The last half hour has provided the perfect example of why people are so fucking annoyed.

Original Eurogamer article:

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-11-04-xbox-one-resolutiongate-call-of-duty-ghosts-dev-infinity-ward-responds

Within half an hour, IGN post their take on it:

http://uk.ign.com/articles/2013/11/04/why-is-call-of-duty-ghosts-is-720p-on-xbox-one-and-1080p-on-playstation

I mean, seriously, what the fuck?

IGN is not actually wrong. In computing terms architecture can be applied to both hardware and software. This is conspiracy stuff.

 

[Faustek]

IGN is not actually wrong. In computing terms architecture can be applied to both hardware and software. This is conspiracy stuff.

Mind quoting passage? Don't want to go there...

 

[Ravensmash]

Look, im with you in the unfounded accusations, that was too much of the point they wanted to make. Its on of the reasons why I just used their article as a stepping stone to read other, more reliable articles. But in the article you wrote today for kotaku with tha mark rubin interview, your first phrase was

. You don't consider this an example of puerile language?

It was great that the cinemablend article brought the doritocracy up. Very fitting, and it summarized their point. In your instance, what did the dog simulator pun accomplished? humor? I sure don't get it. But that's me.

I see nothing wrong with that example tbh, as a reader anyway.

It's adding a bit of personality to a news article. Some sites go for this (Kotaku) and others prefer a drier and more straight-up style.

Both can work if the overall content of the story is informative and well structured.

It got a chuckle out of me.

 

[Pbae]

I haven't posted an article about it, so my idiotic ramblings were thankfully confined to this thread. I'm more strongly considering an article about it now, but my biggest concern was that we're less than two weeks away from PS4 launch, so many consumers might have already made up their mind.

Hey Josh, I read what you wrote and I have to say it was a good read. And what others have said, I don't think it's too late. Good piece, and I hope you contribute to other topics on the forums.

 

[Ploid 3.0]

Never bothered with IGN but they have PS/MS journos pondering to each demographic? And is this the MS camp journos?

I think they do have Xbox, and PS teams at IGN. I have no idea which camp the link was to though. It kinda reminds me of how much of a hard time Angry Joe had when he wanted a interview with Major Nelson. He felt he had to adjust his questions or he'd be kicked to the side, and with the pretty soft ball questions he asked he felt he needed to apologize to Major Nelson's handler because he felt he betrayed her and she looked angry. I felt bad for Angry Joe, he thought he might have costed the lady her job or something too hah. The gaming press is a messy thing it seem. Angry Joe is blacklisted now probably.

 

[IvorB]

it's also shit "journalism" and does more harm than good. Yet apparently the loudest mewling is for something better. If this is what is considered better then so many are far too lost to try and have a reasonable and rational discussion with.



Number One is the biggest issue going. The mass that cry about the state of game journalism have no clue about the different journalism distinctions and they seem to be defensive of their ignorance which I guess is normal when you are confronted with facts.

Not to be rude but you seem quite defensive and angry yourself. What "journalism" distinctions"? Which "facts"?

 

[Faustek]

I think they do have Xbox, and PS teams at IGN. I have no idea which camp the link was to though. It kinda reminds me of how much of a hard time Angry Joe had when he wanted a interview with Major Nelson. He felt he had to adjust his questions or he'd be kicked to the side, and with the pretty soft ball questions he asked he felt he needed to apologize to Major Nelson's handler because he felt he betrayed her and she looked angry. I felt bad for Angry Joe, he thought he might have costed the lady her job or something too hah. The gaming press is a messy thing it seem. Angry Joe is blacklisted now probably.

That sound awful. Damn, blacklisted. Yepp something is rotten when people lose their jobs for asking questions.

Edit: holy crap I became a member? Why? How? I didn't write anything good :|

 

[Feorax]

IGN is not actually wrong. In computing terms architecture can be applied to both hardware and software. This is conspiracy stuff.

No "conspiracy" at all. Original article says "architecture is no issue", IGN article says "architecture is the problem".

You don't have to be biased to be shit at reporting. There is quite likely no worse way that IGN could have worded that, even if it's not at all what they meant.

 

[pa22word]

That being said, it is being upscaled to 1080p, so it is outputting 1080p on your TV, and for the most part the game does look really good. Some people actually think the textures look a little bit nicer maybe on Xbox than they do on PS4.

"You’ll hear a bunch of opinions back and forth, but that’s all they really are. They’re opinions.”

That is some pretty transparently embarrassing damage control.

 

[Glass Shark]

My awesome editors at Darkstation are in for me doing a feature about the resolution issues. I want to make sure it's top-notch, so it will likely take me a few more days of legwork.

 

[Feorax]

My awesome editors at Darkstation are in for me doing a feature about the resolution issues. I want to make sure it's top-notch, so it will likely take me a few more days of legwork.

Awesome. Take as long as you need, I look forward to reading it.

 

[Faustek]

Not going to say this was spot on, but today's Jimquizition was spoton..

 

[inm8num2]

Kum & Go knows their target audience well.

 

[NervousXtian]

Sorry if you've already addressed this -- but would you fire Arthur Gies for breaking an NDA as he did as well?

Do you know what Gies said to him? Serious question.

Why don't you get out of internet forums then and show the gaming community the proud journalist that you think you're and encourage others to do the same? All I see you do here is desperately try to protect your field from the backslash that you and your colleges created. Independently of the fact that there are good game jornos, the public notion is that gaming journalism is a joke, a PR machine for publishers and developers. If you're on the inside and can't provide ideas at least just stop defending others for pure corporativism.

Do I eat shit?

But seriously, Kotaku recently left my bookmarks after many years there. Too many "quality" ""journalism"".

You seriously think that's the appropriate way to address someone who has come to the forum to discuss these issues? There's a way to disagree with someone with out be condescending and rude.

 

[Bobby Roberts]

I don't really have time to break the whole thing down, but for one, the fact that they didn't reach out to any of the parties involved is a major flaw. As a general rule, when writing about a person or company, it is a journalist's responsibility to give that person or company an opportunity to comment. Here, we have an article directly attacking multiple people and companies that does no such thing.

It's an editorial piece, not legitimate news reportage. Dude at CinemaBlend was under no more obligation to reach out to parties before commenting on them than Andy Rooney, or Keith Olbermann, or Bill O'Reilly.

One of my bigger annoyances with gaming press is the sense that a lot of people working within it aren't familiar with the form(s) they're supposed to be practicing. Almost everyone involved seems to be just sorta figuring it out as they go, and have been for the past two-and-a-half decades.

 

[Jabba]

My awesome editors at Darkstation are in for me doing a feature about the resolution issues. I want to make sure it's top-notch, so it will likely take me a few more days of legwork.

Great Josh, bookmarked Darkstation just a minute ago. I looked at the staff. Noticed people actually have jobs on your site. lol.

Really want to read the piece.

 

[brain_stew]

Josh, just saw your post on the matter. Very good work. Obviously the games are still enjoyable and playable, but the difference is there and I'm glad you did some tests to see it.

I'm curious, do you know if it was your GPU or your monitor doing the upscaling? The interesting wrinkle here is upscaler quality. When we have the XB1 in our hands, I'm curious if any of the issues that plague some upscalers will be present; I kind of doubt they will. Latency is the big one that many TV upscalers throw into the mix, which can actively harm gameplay.

Every AMD and Nvidia GPU supports hardware upscaling so it is important that this is used in any comparison. It does beef to be enabled through your drivers first though

 

[ymmv]

No "conspiracy" at all. Original article says "architecture is no issue", IGN article says "architecture is the problem".

You don't have to be biased to be shit at reporting. There is quite likely no worse way that IGN could have worded that, even if it's not at all what they meant.

The quote was:

So to do PC, current-gen two SKUs and next-gen two SKUs, was a massive challenge. Working with the theoretical hardware would have been a disaster if... honestly, the hardest thing to deal with is not the architecture. It's the OS (operating system) of the systems. That's the thing that comes on the latest. T

The way I'm reading it, he says the hardware (architecture) wasn't the biggest issue, it was the OS.

 

[ymmv]

Has this been posted yet?

A video report on IGN about COD in 720p on the X1. They have a few quotes by Rubin and - color me surprised - they downplay the difference:

Rubin said it was their priority to nail down a game than ran at 60 frames per second. He doesn't feel the resolution difference is a big concern. He emphasised that the game is still being upscaled to 1080p on the Xbox One. Some people actually think the textures look a bit nicer on the Xbox. You'll hear a bunch of opinions back and forth, but that's all they're really are. They're opinion."

 

[Glass Shark]

Seems like this thread has died, but I wanted to let anyone know who comes by that I've submitted my feature to Darkstation, so it should be published within the next few days. It's long, about 2500 words... I cover the earliest rumors of performance differences before the consoles were originally announced up until what we know now.

Nothing earth-shattering that hasn't been uncovered before, but it's a single well-sourced article that outlines the differences at a trusted source of gaming information that comes to the conclusion that yes, the PS4 is more powerful and no, we shouldn't downplay the performance difference or discredit people who care about graphics.