The Xbox Series S, Microsoft’s budget-friendly gaming console, has been the subject of both praise and criticism since its launch. While lauded for its affordability and compact design, the console has faced scrutiny from developers and gamers alike for its performance limitations.
RPG Site boss Alex Donaldson recently expressed concerns about the Series S during Gamescom, stating that developers “absolutely despise” the console. He urged Xbox to consider policies to ensure compatibility between the Series S and Series X and even pondered the possibility of Series X exclusive features or games.
Donaldson fears that the alternative might lead to Sony gaining more ‘defacto’ exclusives, as developers may choose to skip Xbox entirely rather than deal with the Series S. He emphasized that Xbox lacks the market share to be unskippable, a sentiment that resonates with the broader development community.
The Xbox Series S is comparable in hardware to the Xbox Series X but with less processing power. It runs the same CPU with slightly slower clock frequencies and uses a slower GPU. With 10 GB of RAM and a 512 GB SSD storage unit, it is designed to render games at 1440p, with support for a 4K upscaler, at 60 frames per second. It starts at $299.99 and supports native 4K resolution output for selected games.
The Series S’s capacity to play modern games has been questioned due to issues such as the Cyberpunk 2077 patch 1.5, which limited players to 30 fps in 1440p resolution, and reactions from developers like TechlandGames.
In March 2023, Remedy, the developer of Control, stated that the system with the lowest specs (the Series S) dictates the features used in games, as optimization is not as simple as lowering resolution and texture quality.
By May 2023, gamers reported a VRAM limitation issue with the Series S, leading to memory shortages in running modern games. Microsoft’s Matt Booty responded by encouraging developers to plan for optimization, while also clarifying that Microsoft will stick to the console despite previous reports of developers looking to drop support.
