Microsoft: ‘Games should be defined by more than framerate and resolution’

Head of Microsoft Studios Phil Spencer has at last responded to the weeks of criticism being levelled at the Xbox One over its resolution support.

As well as high-profile examples such as Battlefield 4 and Call of Duty: Ghosts, many of Xbox One’s early titles including Dead Rising 3 and Ryse run at resolutions ranging between 720p and 900p – all of which fall short of ‘full HD’ 1080p.

None of which matters when talking about a user’s actual living room experience, Spencer argued.

"If people want to get hung up on the numbers, they can do that,” he told Revision 3, as reported by Eurogamer. But really what they should be looking at is what’s on screen, with the controller in their hands, and play[ing] the game.

"I’ll take Ryse as an example. We looked at Ryse at different resolutions with different graphic techniques and we made the decision along with Crytek that 900p/30fps with the techniques that we could employ around lighting, around anti-aliasing, the animation [for] everything that we wanted to run, that was the right answer. I think it’s the best-looking launch game out there.

"If they really care they can go play Forza at 1080p/60fps, a beautiful game. But games should be defined by more than their framerate and resolution.

I think this is an industry about fun and people should put the controller in their hand, or gesture, and play the games and decide what they like. I think that’s the soul of what this industry’s about."