Games and 2GB of RAM

We've entered the age of 64-bit computing. Well, at least most of the new computers have an OS and a processor that are capable of 64-bit computing, but nobody's using it.

And with 64-bit address space, we finally break through the memory limit to use 4GB (otherwise capped @ 3GB by Windows XP, for a somewhat related, somewhat unrelated reason) and 8GB and beyond.

But the performance reviews of games still show that 2GB is the sweet spot for price-vs-performance - games are still happy with 2GB of system ram and increasing further yields much less benefit.

Thinking about the 32-bit Win XP, a reason flashed across my mind.

Windows XP allows each process to use a maximum of 2GB of virtual address space.

And most games are written to be compatible with XP since a lot of people still use it.

So...... 2GB limit it is.

The good part is this shows that current-day programmers can still make efficient programs, if they want to, or have to now.

The bad part is this shows that games are super bloated.