After years of Rumors that Xbox Series X would have a smaller, cheaper, and less powerful sibling codenamed ‘Lockhart’, Xbox Series S came was finally announced last month.
The rumors were true as a difference in the GPU was observed when the official specs for both the series X and S were released. Xbox Series X features 12 TFLOPS of computing power while the Xbox Series S only features 4 TFLOPS. It’s not a major issue as the 1440p is being targeted while some will run games at 1080p instead of UltraHD. However, Xbox Series S features 10GB of Ram compared to the 16GB of RAM of Series X’s, and the Series S also features a CPU with a lower clock (about 200 MHz).
Due to this, some developers criticized Microsoft’s move with the Xbox Series S. Billy Khan, Id Software’s Lead Engine Programmer said that the RAM shortcoming is difficult to compensate for.
Founder and CEO of Quantic Dream, David Cage also expressed his disapproval for the existence of Xbox Series S in an interview. He said:
“ Many developers prefer consoles to PC because on consoles you only have to deal with one hardware, whereas on PC there are so many configurations, graphic cards, drivers, controllers, etc. that makes the development much more complex. When a manufacturer offers two consoles with different specs, there is a strong chance that most developers will focus on the lower-end version to avoid doing two different versions. I must confess that I am really not a big fan of this situation. I think it is confusing for developers, but also for players, and although I can understand the commercial reasons behind this choice (a difference of €200 on the street price) I think the situation is questionable. Regarding Quantic Dream, as we develop our own technology and engines, we are determined to optimize our titles for each platform. Being now a PC developer, we are implementing scalable features based on the platform, which is very helpful to highlight what the hardware has best to offer.”