Why some modern games are huge storage eaters

Posted on Monday, October 02 2017 @ 13:27 CEST by Thomas De Maesschalck
DigitalTrends explores why games are getting extremely large. When I was a young boy, there was a time that multiple games fit on a single floppy disk. As computing power and storage technology improved, games have become increasingly larger. What was an outlier yesterday becomes today's norm, and these days games that require over 100GB of disk space are a reality.

One reason why games are getting so large is because all the high-quality artwork that is present in AAA titles really takes up a lot of space. Games like Forza Motorsport 7 feature over 700 cars with unique artwork that has to look good at 4K resolutions, and a title like Titanfall has 35GB of audio files alone.

However, there are also some critics in the game dev industry who believe studios aren't doing enough to keep installers small. There's a sense that some game developers have forgotten how to develop smaller assets, as they assume that everyone has a huge storage disk and superfast broadband Internet.

Last decade, game developers still had to worry about how they could fit all the game assets on a CD or DVD. This is no longer the case due to digital distribution and this leads to complacency as developers aren't putting in their best effort to keep the size small.
There’s also a disconnect between developers and their audience. “Games are developed in big cities, by young people in tech-hubs where the studio has fiber, everyone has fiber, and the idea of download size mattering is laughable,” Harris said. “It’s not a concern they can identify with in any way. Plus, there are still some idiots who mock a game for being a small download size. Yes, that actually happens.”

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“That means leaving sound as Wav files instead of (way smaller) OGG files, using HD textures even for tiny elements that are never seen at full size…” lamented Harris. “[They also] leave mip-maps on when they won’t be used, always use 32-bit color when some textures are greyscale, and even ship audio for 10 different languages to everyone, regardless of region.”
You can read the piece over here.


About the Author

Thomas De Maesschalck

Thomas has been messing with computer since early childhood and firmly believes the Internet is the best thing since sliced bread. Enjoys playing with new tech, is fascinated by science, and passionate about financial markets. When not behind a computer, he can be found with running shoes on or lifting heavy weights in the weight room.



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