The methods to blend more nicely low rez buffers are pretty well known ,but i don't think PD could afford the extra cost.
Digital Foundry Article Technical Discussion Archive [2011]
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Really? What game is using it? I know that games has different resolutions for different particles, but didnt saw a game that blend two different resolutions on occluded geometry.
Lucid_Dreamer
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To be fair, he only said the technique was known. He didn't say it was used in games before.
I agree. The article was one of the best I've read from DF! Why aren't there anywhere near the amount of people commenting on this one as other DF tech articles? Also, I didn't know their physics implementation was that resource intensive on the SPUs. That's a hell of a lot of physics!
ShadowRunner
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Its interesting that mention they dont do much graphics related tasks on SPUs also. There is this idea going around that SPUs are really only currently put to good use used in PS3 games to help out a mediocre GPU. Here is a good example of an awesome looking game that is using SPUs primarily for non gpu related tasks.
Infamous 2 would definitely benefit from the low res buffer up sampler.... Recent trailer on PSN show tons of nasty jaggies with the special effects, the game doesn't seems to have any AA either. The demo of MS3 was pretty impressive, I actually though they were using full res particles compare to the previous games, although they are not the most detail one.
Lucid_Dreamer
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Exactly! I have to admit I believed the SPUs were doing heavy lifting, when I found out the resolution and features. I guess all those people were wrong about the RSX, too. Apparently, it's more about having the knowledge/design skills than anything else.
I'd say it's more about the resource demands of a particular game than anything. You can't just say, "Motorstorm Apocalypse does this and this and this with the GPU, so other games should be able to as well."
Lucid_Dreamer
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I think that's a smoke screen excuse. Smart design skills and/or better knowledge of how to use the hardware seems to allow for MS:A performance. It has more effects going on than Split/Second at much higher resolution (1280x1080); with more vehicles and 4-player split-screen. Plus, there is S3D (1024x720 times 2). Most, if not all, of this is done with the GPU. That's a powerful piece of evidence, right there.
Why is that?
I think Turok is spot on. Different games have different requirements and do things in different ways to fulfill those requirements. It sounds like Motorstorm Apocalypse has found a great balance of the available resources, but that doesn't mean that other games will be able to the same.
Are you know saying that all of these great developers that were using the SPUs to offset tasks of the GPU were just plain wrong about the capabilities of RSX? Or that only Evolution were able to get how to use this "powerful piece of hardware" and that all others were inept?
I know Heavy Rain does it.
There is clearly something wrong with the 1080p Motorstorm pics as posted in the DF article. While the resolution of the pics themselves are 1920x1080, the content looks like SD upscaled
http://images.eurogamer.net/assets/articles//a/1/3/4/5/5/3/5/1080p_001.bmp.jpg
http://images.eurogamer.net/assets/articles//a/1/3/4/5/5/3/5/1080p_002.bmp.jpg
Those look just awful, a blurry mess. What do you think DF have done wrong in capturing those?
{Edit: Could it be due to a vid being captured at 1080p, being downscaled (as that seems to be the max res of the player at EG) to 720p, the images being taken from the vid and then upscaled to 1080p? Logical conclusion?]
http://images.eurogamer.net/assets/articles//a/1/3/4/5/5/3/5/1080p_001.bmp.jpg
http://images.eurogamer.net/assets/articles//a/1/3/4/5/5/3/5/1080p_002.bmp.jpg
Those look just awful, a blurry mess. What do you think DF have done wrong in capturing those?
{Edit: Could it be due to a vid being captured at 1080p, being downscaled (as that seems to be the max res of the player at EG) to 720p, the images being taken from the vid and then upscaled to 1080p? Logical conclusion?]
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forumaccount
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It's about picking a set of tradeoffs you feel is acceptable for your game. Just because someone chose a set of tradeoffs that allowed them to do something impressive doesn't mean that somehow the hardware is actually more powerful than everyone originally thought.
ShadowRunner
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I dont know, i think RSX is a mediocre GPU. My point was more that SPUs can and are put to use outside of graphics tasks, when it is often suggested they are not. Its not like we didnt know it already but its nice to have a recent example where devs have said so directly. Something to bring up when the 'cell is only useful because of a bad GPU' comments that frequently come up.
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The Lucasarts presentation on DLAA includes a short mention of the XGPU being about 1.2-1.5 times faster than the RSX, depending on the actual task. As far as I know it's the first time there's been any actual info on the issue. While it isn't backed up with any measurements, the thorough and in-depth nature of the document suggests that it is still based on actual, real data.
I personally give the guy more credit than to any enthusiast forum poster with no coding or hw experience at all...
Oh and this of course doesn't mean
I personally give the guy more credit than to any enthusiast forum poster with no coding or hw experience at all...
Oh and this of course doesn't mean
dragonelite
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So anyone read more about this other mlaa gpu implementation.
This methode is also in GPU pro 2 one of them works at lionhead.
http://www.iryoku.com/mlaa/
This methode is also in GPU pro 2 one of them works at lionhead.
http://www.iryoku.com/mlaa/
Lucid_Dreamer
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The second sentence, in my post, is the key. There are guidelines and techniques for getting the best performance from these consoles. If you follow them closely, when designing the game, I believe you should get 1st party results.
Like I said before, look at S/S and MS:A. I don't see any part of the S/S experience that isn't, at the very least, equaled in MS:A. Do you?
Lucid_Dreamer
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I thought that test was between the XGPU and 5 SPUs with the SPUs being around 1.4 times faster. I must have overlooked or forgotten the RSX part.
If that was the case then why does the text rendering look so sharp?
The HUD can be render in 1080p.
I don't know exactly about these particular pictures, but in general the HUD is rendered at full resolution, and the game engine renders at 1280x1080p max, dropping down to, say, 960 x 1080p or worse at those instances where the load on the engine becomes too much. If I remember correctly from the article is that there are built in conditions that the engine assumes will cause a spike (like a camera shift). I don't know about these particular shots, but they could be taken at such a moment (e.g. a 'focus' moment that highlights a big event - these are opt-in by the way, thankfully by pressing triangle when prompted).
by pressing triangle when prompted).- Status
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