[MajimasEyepatch]

> Vulkan is an example of how the AAA gaming industry is skewed towards rendering quality and appearance. AAA game studios justify their budget with those very advanced engines and content, but there is a growing market of 2D/low poly game, because players are tired and realized they want gameplay, not graphics.

I think the driver here is more likely the financial reality of game development. High-fidelity graphics are incredibly expensive, and small game studios simply cannot produce them on a realistic timeline and budget. Would consumers reject indie games with AAA-quality graphics? I think not. It's just that few such games exist because it's not financially viable, and there is a large enough market that is fine with more stylized, lower-fidelity graphics.

[jokoon]

Yes, I agree.

With current hardware and tools, it becomes much cheaper to reach graphics quality that is 10 or 15 years old, so such game would be just enough and be profitable enough.

I think that high quality rendering is reaching a tipping point where it's mostly of diminishing returns, this means AAA studios could differentiate with good graphics, but this becomes less and less true.

Gameplay matters, and the innovation is not the on the side of AAA studios.

[johnnyanmac]

gameplay matters, but graphics sell. Look no further at the modern state of hardcore reviewers and hyper nitpickers on social media. See how every switch game is criticized for not being 1080p60 on 2017 mobile hardware. People demand that kind of quality.

That's a loud minority, but it's not like the biggest games aren't selling more and more every year en large. So non-vocal gamers do seem to be drawn to it.

[_gabe_]

There’s a very big difference between ultra realistic PBR graphics and running games at 60 FPS at 1080p.

[johnnyanmac]

You think the people trashing the switch know any difference? That's my point.

[_gabe_]

They do know the difference[0][1][2]. I feel like gamers are notorious for complaining about fidelity issues and frame rate issues. I’m not sure why you would think they don’t understand the difference. The reason people complain about switch frame rates is because it’s often low fidelity games that still can’t hit a consistent 60 FPS.

[0]: https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/189706-nintendo-switch/...

[1]: https://www.nintendolife.com/forums/nintendo-switch/the_fram...

[2]: https://www.reddit.com/r/FortNiteBR/comments/gyn32c/seriousl...

[johnnyanmac]

"they" as in hardcore hobbyist with multi thousand dollar rigs who spend their time talking on old game forums. Sure, there's a minority that cares. But those gamers aren't why Fortnite sells like Fortnite. They aren't why the Switch is on pace to be the best selling console. They aren't why the indie market is viable as a potential livelihood if you get a bit lucky.

But this is all tangential. They may have all these fancy hardware but they either have no understanding of hardware, or are simply tonedeaf. If you're expecting the same specs out of a 2017 smartphone compared to a PS5, let alone a top end pc build, there's simply not much more I can say. Learn that a handheld has more considerations than a towering console when it comes to being a proper handheld. It's a 720p specc'd screen, of course any 3d game trying to be modern won't bother going higher.

I never saw people complaining about a 3ds not having ps4 performance, so this to me seem like a recent sense of entitlement or ignorance amongst said enthusiasts. The Switch doesn't have a GPU dock (which would cost more than the console itself, even if it didn't include a GPU), so just because you project it to a screen doesn't mean it's suddenly console hardware. You could project a PSP to a screen back in the day. Nintendo just made it work out of the box.