How close can current gen consoles get to the cryengine2 tech demos?

[....]

The most impressive thing I would say is the number of independent objects, physics(destructible environments, wind, etc), and lighting.

LINK To related post with pictures and video links on another forum

How close do you guys think the xbox 360 and ps3 can get to these demos?

Is memory enough or is it an insurmountable limitation?(we saw pretty big worlds on ps2 with 100s of objects.) Is it cpu processing power that would be the limiting factor? Or would it be the gpus(even with aggressive LOD.)?

While I'd say they're impressive, it didn't seem to me like they were something beyond the grasp of the current generation of consoles, but that's my humble opinion. Plenty of people here, have access to the hardware, and have seen behind closed doors software, and would have a more accurate assessment.

 

[Blazkowicz]

these flash videos are extremely cpu hungry, it's a slideshow most of the time on that 1GHz machine. at least I get the full experience that way .

more seriously I think the consoles wouldn't have a problem with the dozens of flying "opengl teapots". (their CPU are apt and that doesn't take much ram).

for the rest I guess ram then GPU power would be the problem but I'll let others comment on that.

 

[kyetech]

bloody hell, that bravia advert is ridiculous. Awesome realtime CG. brilliant.

EDIT: although there a few teapots that popin / pop out of view which looks a bit wrong. But apart from that. its really good. Prob the most photrealistic realtime I have seen.

 

[sunscar]

these flash videos are extremely cpu hungry, it's a slideshow most of the time on that 1GHz machine. at least I get the full experience that way .

more seriously I think the consoles wouldn't have a problem with the dozens of flying "opengl teapots". (their CPU are apt and that doesn't take much ram).

for the rest I guess ram then GPU power would be the problem but I'll let others comment on that.

Gonna say ditto to this. From the perspective of physics, I think either systems CPU would make child's play of this.
Visually you'd have problems, though. Flexibility isn't necessarliy the issue, or anything, but raw draw performance and somewhat severe memory limmitations would make it a real pain.

 

[Geoson]

The real drawback to consoles is the lack of RAM...and also the lack of raw power in the GPUs...their CPUs are fine. But the lack of RAM is a bigger issue. Cervat Yerli already said the only thing preventing consoles from running Crysis port is the lack of RAM.

 

[Neb]

The real drawback to consoles is the lack of RAM...and also the lack of raw power in the GPUs...their CPUs are fine. But the lack of RAM is a bigger issue. Cervat Yerli already said the only thing preventing consoles from running Crysis port is the lack of RAM.

But take note that he means running it, not running it at full quality. As has been said in several different interviews they would have to scale down the IQ to for rendering perfomance.

As for this techdemo which really is a level and that is playable, I doubt the consoles would be able to do any of that at even half IQ except for physics.

http://www.crymod.com/thread.php?threadid=19173

Description
Quite a bit is known about the video demonstration Crytek has released at the GDC. The video is not pre-rendered and shows off the physics capabilities of the CryENGINE2 in realtime. The engine can handle several hundred "teapots" at once including dynamic shadows which you can see ingame.

The video is based on a level that has been created especially for this showcase. It also can be played live at the Crytek booth on the machines that are provided there. This provides full interaction with the level itself while the physics demonstration is proceding.


Video Demonstration
The whole playable level has been captured in realtime and was then put in the loop with a few other engine demonstrations on the big flat screen at the Crytek booth. From there it has been recorded in low/medium quality by a user from GameTrailers.com.

 

[groper]

PGR 4 (photomode ?)
I believe that the first platform to bring this level of graphics in a free-roaming/gta-style game will be Xbox3. :smile:

 

[RavenFox]

Have you played Prologues London Track?

 

[Jedi2016]

But take note that he means running it, not running it at full quality. As has been said in several different interviews they would have to scale down the IQ to for rendering performance.

I don't doubt that. But I've gotten the impression from interviews and such that Crytek doesn't seem to think the game is worth playing unless you're playing it at max settings. That whenever they talk about "running" the game, they're really saying "running at full quality", even though they're not saying the words.

Case in point, my own computer. Athlon XP 2600, 2GB RAM, Radeon 9600 256MB video, WinXP Pro. It's well below the minimum specs for this game, especially in the CPU. But it CAN run the game at Low settings (I've tried the demo). But Crytek would take one look at my specs and say that it couldn't "run" the game at all.

I think the problem of porting the game (or just the engine, for that matter) will come in the optimization part of it. I've heard people say (and I don't know how accurate this is) that Crytek's code is messy and nowhere near optimized, and that's for the PC, hence the ungodly system requirements to run the game at full spec. I think that the performance on consoles will be surprisingly good, assuming that they're able to fully optimize the code to run on the hardware. The specific hardware... not just something they can port back and forth between the Xbox and Playstation, but engines that are specifically coded for one console or the other, so finely-tuned that it can't be ported.

Sure, they might have to drop a few of the nitpicky features like God rays or object motion blur, but all in all, I think the game/engine has a good chance of looking VERY good on consoles, better than most people think it will. Call it a hunch, since I don't know much about the technology. But I have the feeling we still haven't seen what these consoles are really capable of.

 

[FutureCTO]

PGR 4 (photomode ?)
I believe that the first platform to bring this level of graphics in a free-roaming/gta-style game will be Xbox3. :smile:

I honestly believe this will be possible on the PS3 by April 2009.
Just use an HDMI 1.3a cable and enable "Deep Color" on the PS3.

The picture is 800px by 460px, so long as the native rendering resolution is close,
I am rather strongly confident the PS3 could manage near identical image quality results.
No need to wait another generation, 2009 on the PS3 should be more than enough.

 

[digitalwanderer]

Nope, PS3 can't do it...they suck, didn't you hear? :|

 

[Rys]

Just use an HDMI 1.3a cable and enable "Deep Color" on the PS3.

Because the PS3 has native 12-bit per component processing?

 

[Neb]

PGR 4 (photomode ?)
I believe that the first platform to bring this level of graphics in a free-roaming/gta-style game will be Xbox3. :smile:

http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/373/dsc00221zl8ae7.jpg

http://img523.imageshack.us/img523/3845/dsc00222zp9nl0.jpg

It is really near already for the PC, the demo is a playable level. As for PGR4 photomode it looks good but *yawn* please move the sun lightsource over the sky... ... what didn't the shadows move at all, static!? (joke)

What Im trying to say is it is not only about looking realistic, like straping high-res photos on simple meshes, it is more, it is about dynamic solutions not simple static/limited solutions. :smile:

 

[FutureCTO]

Great question.

The reason I mention that has to do with the RSX having 128-bit pixel precision supporting High Dynamic Range lighting. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSX_'Reality_Synthesizer'
The car image above displays an excellent range of lighting glare on the sides of buildings and the car's accurate interior reflection.
I can't say too much about the cars shadow on the street but the shadowing on the car looks very good.
So I do not know for certain, but High Dynamic Range lighting could be part of rendering this image.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_dynamic_range_rendering

Now the "Deep Color" setting is important for High Dynamic Range output and should instead be on by default.
Otherwise RSX output thru HDMI is transmitted using Limited sRGB or less than 24bit (8bit per) color values.
SEE REFERENCE: http://manuals.playstation.net/document/en/ps3/current/settings/rgbfullrange.html
But when Full Range & "Deep Color" is enabled, RSX output is transmitted using xvYCC or up to 36bit (12bit per) color values.
Providing video signal support for High Dynamic Range content on your Display.

It wasn't until PS3 update 1.80 May 22, 2007 that they added the in between options.
[RGB Full Range (HDMI)] has been added as an option under [Display Settings].
[Y Pb/Cb Pr/Cr Super White (HDMI)] has been added as an option under [Display Settings].

I can attest to the difference based on a side by side photo comparison using a Blu-Ray movie on the PS3.
When "Deep Color" was enabled the quality of an HDTV image was easily noticed to be magnitudes better.
Plus an intelligent friends testimonial about Deep Color and Full RGB setting's affect on playing a game called Folklore.

xvYCC or Extended-gamut YCC is a color space used in the video electronics of flat panel television sets, supporting 1.8 times as many colors as the sRGB color space.[1] xvYCC was specified by the IEC in October 2005 and published in January 2006 as IEC 61966-2-4.

xvYCC uses the full range of values (1 to 254 in an 8-bit space) to represent colors. In BT.601 and BT.709, RGB colors are represented only by 8-bit values from 16 to 235. This limited range was established to allow for undershoot and overshoot, attributes of analog TV signaling. With digital TV signaling, there is no undershoot or overshoot, and the values from 1-15 and 235-254 can be used to represent real colors. In order to maintain backward-compatibility with earlier standards, the red (R), green (G), blue (B) and white standard colors are still calculated at the same indices in the color space. The wider ranges of digital values allow representation of deeper greens, deeper reds, and deeper blues - and of course intermediate colors previously beyond the boundary limit in the CCIR 601 color space.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XvYCC

As well as some online Forum blurbs about the effects of Full RGB
http://boardsus.playstation.com/playstation/board/message?board.id=ps3&thread.id=1551009
http://forum.teamxbox.com/showthread.php?t=529981

If you are using S-Video or Composite turn "On" -- Cross Color Reduction Filter.
http://manuals.playstation.net/document/en/ps3/current/settings/crosscolor.html

Q. What functionality was added to each version of HDMI?

HDMI 1.3:
* Deep Color: HDMI 1.3 supports 10-bit, 12-bit and 16-bit (RGB or YCbCr) color depths, up from the 8-bit depths in previous versions of the HDMI specification, for stunning rendering of over one billion colors in unprecedented detail.
* Broader Color Space: HDMI 1.3 adds support for “x.v.Color™” (which is the consumer name describing the IEC 61966-2-4 xvYCC color standard), which removes current color space limitations and enables the display of any color viewable by the human eye.
* New HD lossless audio formats: In addition to HDMI’s current ability to support high-bandwidth uncompressed digital audio and all currently-available compressed formats (such as Dolby® Digital and DTS®), HDMI 1.3 adds additional support for new lossless compressed digital audio formats Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio™.

http://www.hdmi.org/learningcenter/faq.aspx

One of the things about many online comparisons such as GameSpot is that they only compare using default settings.
So they do not use HDMI or enable Full RGB & Deep Color output, which greatly affects the color/lighting range being displayed.

Notes:
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1558,1975596,00.asp?kc=ETRSS02129TX1K0000532
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SRGB_color_space
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XvYCC
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_Color
http://uk.playstation.com/help-support/ps3/guides/detail/item65498/Update-features-(ver-1-80)/

Additionally there is some information I come across from time to time illustrating the graphical limits of the PS3 to still be levels above what we have seen so far. Deciding that the PS3 sucks because of the first crappy 1.2 runtime and initial color output were limited games (Fall of Man, MotorStorm) to less than 8bit is a premature impression of limits that have been quickly overcome by updates and revisions. Thankfully the PS3 includes a hard disk drive by default to accommodate a long list of advances or software changes in its life. As well as a true multi-core processor to accommodate porting or true multi-thread PC games in the future.

Now maybe you see why Microsoft went back and added HDMI to all their units after release, even after dismissing Sony for using it on the PS3 as just a movie thing. Even if Xbox360 had better pixel shading than the PS3, they would have had lower quality color output than the PS3. PS3 supports a higher color range via HDMI output of x.v.Color than what YPbPr Component video can support. Additional HDMI represents a pure digital transfer. Where YPbPr is a Digital Signal to Analog output to Digital Display.

Yadda, Yadda, Yadda...
I still believe the above image is easily possible for the PS3.
Just one car. In one city scape. The only challenge is texture, lighting, and pixel shading.
The vertex and geometry rendering could easily be done today.

 

[archangelmorph]

What Im trying to say is it is not only about looking realistic, like straping high-res photos on simple meshes, it is more, it is about dynamic solutions not simple static/limited solutions. :smile:

That my friend depends entirely on the game design/technical focus..

 

[Blazkowicz]

so all that HDMI 1.3 fluff is about restoring the usual color range we had on our VGA monitors back on our 386. the support for higher precision is interesting but irrelevant if the nvidia GPU can't do it (I think R5xx supports 10 bit per component output? and Matrox Parhelia. note that "10bit RAMDAC" usually means gamma correction is done with 10bit precision but the output is still 8bit).
Still a big deal. Though you got to have good black levels as well.

I'm also wondering, would you get the full RGB range with a X360 with VGA cable? it would also be interesting to know if some HDTVs can work at 10bit with a VGA signal. one more option, so you can benefit of that higher precision on your PC whether you use VGA and CRT, VGA and the latest 10bit monitor, HDMI 1.3 or display port with the latest monitor etc.

the discussion might be drifting though.

 

[Blazkowicz]

so, why care about those things while I'm viewing the images on a X terminal and it looks fine. It's photo mode, so they can stream higher res textures (unless they aren't doing it), ,different lighting, use longer shaders, render four images in FP16 render targets and combine them (4x rotated grid supersampling), apply post-processing without the real time constraint..

you could have photo modes in more games, one might be needed in Crysis so modest people can get something looking really good once in a while

still I can comment on that game : Mafia 2 could be something looking like it regarding environments, but with free roaming. you'd probably need a photo mode to get it looking that good though.

 

[....]

I've the special making of like mgs2 dvd. There you can easily see the streets and buildings from the ending real-time cutscene. The quality is similar to what I saw on the videos from these cry engine demos. It seems optimized art assets can take you there on ps2 hardware.

 

[Carl B]

Now the "Deep Color" setting is important for High Dynamic Range output and should instead be on by default.
Otherwise RSX output thru HDMI is transmitted using Limited sRGB or less than 24bit (8bit per) color values.
SEE REFERENCE: http://manuals.playstation.net/document/en/ps3/current/settings/rgbfullrange.html
But when Full Range & "Deep Color" is enabled, RSX output is transmitted using xvYCC or up to 36bit (12bit per) color values.
Providing video signal support for High Dynamic Range content on your Display.

It wasn't until PS3 update 1.80 May 22, 2007 that they added the in between options.
[RGB Full Range (HDMI)] has been added as an option under [Display Settings].
[Y Pb/Cb Pr/Cr Super White (HDMI)] has been added as an option under [Display Settings].

I can attest to the difference based on a side by side photo comparison using a Blu-Ray movie on the PS3.
When "Deep Color" was enabled the quality of an HDTV image was easily noticed to be magnitudes better.
Plus an intelligent friends testimonial about Deep Color and Full RGB setting's affect on playing a game called Folklore.

The 'RGB Full' and 'Super White' settings on the PS3 have nothing directly to do with either Deep Color or xvYCC. Presently no Deep Color source exists, neither in game form or on Blu-ray (Deep Color is not supported in the spec), so in terms of the PS3's ability to handle Deep Color, it exists only in the theoretical. It's like having a 64-bit processor in a world of 32-bit code. Essentially the same is the case for xvYCC, with the exception of support provided on certain high-end HD camcorders. If one has one of these camcorders, a PS3 (or certain other Blu-ray players), and a TV that supports x.v.Color... then one will be able to enjoy video taking advantage of the expanded color range. But again, BD the movie spec does not support it.

So... this vein of discussion related to Deep Color, xvYCC, the question in the OP, HDMI, and PS3 vs 360 is a red herring in terms of analysis because in the present day both of these capabilities are non-factors. 'Full RGB' and 'Super White' apply to maximizing IQ when using certain monitors/TVs; no more, no less. How close devs are able to get to mimicking Crysis will be achieved soley on the backs of their own ingenuity and ability to squeeze these consoles, and not at all to do with any A/V bullet points.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Exactly. Those fantastic looking PGR4 shots aren't using Deep Color, 128bit HDR, or other highend AV specs. It's not like you can take PGR3, apply Deep Color and 128 bit and suddenly get photographic improvements. It's also irrelevant to the topic of handling CryEngine 2! The real issue here about CryEngine2 tech demos is the amount of assets throughput through the rendering pipeline. The specific cited example of the teapots in San Francisco is showing very long draw distances, something which the excellent looking and detailed GT5P London map doesn't have, so it's not quite comparable. Although having said that, the perspective quickly throws out all the detail in the distance. A bit of DOF and suddenly you don't need high quality assets for the buildings. You would need a a lighting model working over that entire scene though.

The reality of Crytek is that it can demand Gigs of RAM for assets, and you're not going to match that texture fidelity on consoles. A look at this road surface http://i30.tinypic.com/m92hdh.png shows quality the consoles just can't fit! A similar and fantastically looking engine may be possible but the quality of images would have to come from elsewhere to awesome texture resolutions on everything. Perhaps procedural synthesis could take some textures and apply some cracks and generate a road? I think we've seen so little of procedural synthesis though that devs must be more concerned leveraging processing elsewhere. It's interesting from the POV of a challenge, but still the most pointless of conversations! "Can a $300 console beat a $2000 PC in IQ?" Let's go visit car forums and
try talking about $5000 cars outdoing $40000 cars...

If people were serious about conversing about console performance, they'd take specific points of CryEngine and discuss possibilities, rather than just splashing up screenshots with no more argument than 'can't do it, can do it.'

As for the physics, they're pretty tame. The teapots are actually working on a sphere-model, bouncing like balls rather than teapots, which is the most efficient physics entity possible.