ZOTAC NVIDIA: Why 3 discs for RAGE

Why 3 discs for RAGE
Anyone have any idea why there are 3 disks for RAGE? I really not understand what to do with 3 disks for the game. I heard that it is just about 15-20 hours in length and nothing that I've seen looks spectacular enough for the need of 3 discs. What is the reason for this? Why do they need all that extra space?

#2
02-10-2011
Chakradevroy
Member

Join Date: May 2011
Posts: 1,590
Re: Why 3 discs for RAGE
The game uses a new unique proprietary technology called texture virtualization or "mega textures" - the reason for this nickname is because a texture can be SO large it's a "texture island" it's not a small image that you have in DDS format and stamp the same square on whenever you want dirt for example. This is all handmade - it's a continuous texture. Everything in the world is unique - there is no repeating texture pattern when you look at the game. And I think 20 hours of gameplay isn't "just" as far as I am concerned, this is not a RPG when everything is repeating for 70 hrs, and the wastelands are obviously VAST amounts of terrain that this game covers. 25 GB is not even large - This game is internally at about ~125 GB large and the studio needed a number of different compression solutions to make it into 22 GB on X360 - it was no easy feat. 3 Discs is rather small - the texture quality isn't anything special at this level - the game was originally planned to be 50 GB on PS3's Bluray.

#3
02-10-2011
chitti r
Member

Join Date: Jul 2011
Posts: 97
Re: Why 3 discs for RAGE
I install all my games on my Xbox. How am I going to do this? Does that mean I will have to install all 3 separate discs?

#4
02-10-2011
GaganGang
Member

Join Date: May 2011
Posts: 1,536
Re: Why 3 discs for RAGE
No, you don't have to install all the 3 DVDs - you can install only one.
Disc 1 = Wasteland 1 Single player
Disc 2 = wasteland 2 single player
Disc 3 = multiplayer

When you're done everything in wasteland 1 - you can delete and install disc 2. You can play this game no matter installations but the texture loading will be quite noticeable - (time it takes to load textures fully - between those times it's a blurry low-res texture). That's the major problem with consoles - loading the textures, since this technology relies on streaming them real-time only on what you can see in the current screen to be able to cap at 60 fps. You don't need to install all games - those games don't really get much needed improvements or warranted - faster level load times maybe but those games don't even have such a level of strain on the system, you may uninstall unimportant games off because Rage really needs it. Those retail games you have DVDs for shouldn't need installed - instead keep the digital ones obviously.

#5
02-10-2011
MACALL
Member

Join Date: Jun 2011
Posts: 1,245
Re: Why 3 discs for RAGE
DVD's really can't hold that much info 4.5 GB for a single layer disk 9 GB for a dual layer, it’s a simple matter of being unable to compress the game down to that small of a size. As for why it’s that big as others have said it’s a combination of the new tech and a huge world.

#6
02-10-2011
Irene-I
Member

Join Date: Jul 2011
Posts: 1,496
Re: Why 3 discs for RAGE
Its 2 discs for the single player (was originally going to be 6 or something, all the same quest content but they condensed all that into smaller space). 3rd Disc is just multiplayer based stuff. So Disc 3: Only for multiplayer that’s the racing and the co-op stuff. Disc 1-2 is the single player thing, also I think the quote for 'time' was main story was 15 hours, extra side-stuff can add 20-25. A lot of people have been taking that as meaning, at max, the games 25 hours long. I think they mean 'add' 20 hours, so more like 35-40 hours long if you really plot around and do everything you can.

#7
02-10-2011
DougWison
Member

Join Date: Jul 2011
Posts: 1,457
Re: Why 3 discs for RAGE
Ultimately a games as long as you make it last when it comes to one like this with freedom of wandering around and stuff to engineer/explore. I'd imagine though that 'side stuff' makes up half the game, so if mains 15, it would make sense side to add another 15 if not more, RPG or not.

#8
02-10-2011
Ashley Parker
Member

Join Date: Jul 2011
Posts: 1,422
Re: Why 3 discs for RAGE
These compressions are so sophisticated that's why it takes so much processing power to install - having a faster HDD may not increase installations much. The console's CPU is the limit, and PS3 has a faster CPU. However PS3 installation is 8 GB only - you can't install all 3 DVDs , it's for cache file , it a different system than in x360, it's using it half like it was memory, and the other half for some texture data so it makes at least some speed up. Obviously PS3 is in a lesser position since it does not have full installation, it actually works like that when you play for first time it gets loaded from Bluray but also copied to HDD , the next time that same texture is called it gets read from HDD for faster load. What is the most important factor that ruins the IDTech5 technology is the seek time - the time it takes for the Bluray drive to actually find where data needed is on the disc is highest from all platforms, all those milliseconds make up time that you see blurry texture on screen.

#9
06-10-2011
Shae
Member

Join Date: Jul 2011
Posts: 1,600
Re: Why 3 discs for RAGE
The PS3's Bluray could contain higher-quality (less compressed) texture data but it appears that the texture compression is a one-size-fits-all situation so that it fits on DVD, with textures being more compressed than they need to be on PS3. Carmack even mentioned that he would have liked to have made the PS3 version with higher quality textures but it would have taken some extra time (and I bet Microsoft weren't going to stand for that).