Larian is having trouble fitting Baldur’s Gate III on the Xbox Series S, the lower-priced and lower-powered console in Microsoft’s ninth-generation lineup.
I was looking up more information on why there’s such an issue getting BG3 on Xbox, and found this article with a lot more detail on the topic.
EDIT: The issue isn’t graphics or frame rate; it’s memory. The article goes into detail.
Okay so after seeing the bot TLDR and the other comments, I actually went and read the article. It’s a bit wishy washy as to why and mentions RAM could be the issue for S consoles.
When I read the headline I thought it meant it was also not viable for PCs either, which doesn’t seem to be the case at all. Most PCs have at least 16GB ram these days.
Why are people upset at all? I don’t get it. I actually think this is good, it will either force Microsoft to change their policy with consoles and/or release a line that can compete with PS. Or else. Meanwhile PC is still an option.
The 16GB number is a bit more complicated, because consoles share CPU and GPU RAM. 16GB can mean 8GB VRAM + 8GB RAM, or 4GB VRAM + 12GB RAM. I assume the console UI and kernel and such will take up 1GB (the Windows 10 minimum RAM spec). The game requires 4GB of VRAM on Steam (probably 1080p), which means consoles with 10GB of (V)RAM will have about 5GB of (V)RAM available, maybe more if the OS can minimize its RAM use.
That said, 10GB is still a LOT of RAM. Unlike with the PC version, console don’t need to swap memory back and forth all the time, so the RAM load should be significantly lower. The game is complex and difficult, but I don’t think it needs to be 16GB of (V)RAM complex and difficult.
I bet the less powerful console will get a version that’ll run eventually, but it’ll be a bit before the post-release optimization can be finished.
It’s been a while since I did Xbox memory mapping (One X) but IIRC there is approx 2GB of ram withheld by the system, and then an additional one or two can be recalled by the system for the purposes of running things like background downloads, party chat, video chat. That means that when your game goes to cert it’s checked to be performant under max OS load; so 6GB. This causes lots of issues (and is a pain as even MS’s analytics indicated this was a use case that appeared almost never. From what I have heard since, these TCRs/XRs/FTCs having changed much.
Also keep in mind that PC doesn’t have unified memory. So there’s usually at least 8GB of VRAM in addition to whatever amount of main memory you have.
I don’t think anyone is upset? Xbox players are of course disappointed because they want the game but Larian have been totally fair and upfront about everything.
Microsoft should really re-evaluate their policies here though I agree. I feel like split screen could be an exception to the rule specifically.
I think the wording “console exclusive” is becoming quite wide spread, but for the avoidance of doubt, in the headline, I’d have avoided it perhaps.