Having two different configurations of assets requires making a system that can switch between them, separate deployments for them, some way to actually fetch the asset pack by the users, testing to make sure both configurations work correctly, actually deploying the separate asset pack during an update, and then spending time fixing bugs that inevitably come up with any added complexity.
Could they do it? Absolutely. Should they do it? Probably.
Would there be no downside, no tradeoff? Claiming so is plainly ridiculous.
Lol except that were talking images here, not domain specific matrices or something.
The complexity it’d take to optimise an engine for a SPECIFIC image size would be orders of magnitude harder than using any preexisting tools that support all images.
Its like rationalising why you can’t go in an area of a map cause the devs didnt test every single possible renderable frame in that area - sure its possible, but you’d be laughed out of every meeting for even suggesting it.
Also gotta ask, do you think updates have to redownload every single file of the game? Else why would they redeploy static images every update? (Because arguably the most common optimisations on the web exist for this exact situation, not having to resend large media files)
Oh yeah?
What’s the tradeoff for not making 4k textured an optional download?
Theyre chasing a pixel fidelity higher than most peoples TVs at the cost of everyone’s disk space
Having two different configurations of assets requires making a system that can switch between them, separate deployments for them, some way to actually fetch the asset pack by the users, testing to make sure both configurations work correctly, actually deploying the separate asset pack during an update, and then spending time fixing bugs that inevitably come up with any added complexity.
Could they do it? Absolutely. Should they do it? Probably.
Would there be no downside, no tradeoff? Claiming so is plainly ridiculous.
Lol except that were talking images here, not domain specific matrices or something.
The complexity it’d take to optimise an engine for a SPECIFIC image size would be orders of magnitude harder than using any preexisting tools that support all images.
Its like rationalising why you can’t go in an area of a map cause the devs didnt test every single possible renderable frame in that area - sure its possible, but you’d be laughed out of every meeting for even suggesting it.
Also gotta ask, do you think updates have to redownload every single file of the game? Else why would they redeploy static images every update? (Because arguably the most common optimisations on the web exist for this exact situation, not having to resend large media files)
Don’t they already have to switch between assets to fit in lower-end sized VRAM?
Higher-ups noticed gamers think “realistic” = “good” and blame developers instead of executives for the resulting problems.