*spin* another 60 vs 30 framerate argument

[milk]

It is not just latency. It is increased temporal resolution as well.

Again, Temporal-AntiAliasing helps on that front. Not perfect,but pretty good.

PS. I mean actual temporal-antialiasing as temporaly correct motion blur, and not the badly named TXAA post process SPATIAL antialiasing algo from nvidia.

 

[Laa-Yosh]

Thread is going in circles...

 

[AlphaWolf]

Thread is going in circles...

Is it going at 30 or 60?

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Thread is going in circles...

They all do. And we've had the same discussion before too.

 

[Davros]

Is it going at 30 or 60?

360

 

[Cheezdoodles]

I´d guess you probably like the feeling of improved controls you get when you play 60fps games, when the actual improvement is little. Not negligible sure, but marginal as it is just a water drop on a bucket full of latency.

As I said before improved responsiveness AND quicker reaction because things show up on screen faster.

http://www.eurogamer.net/videos/modern-warfare-3-battlefield-3-input-lag-tests-video

As the video in the link shows, you get about 3 frames worth of imput lag (on the best case scenario that you are playing on a zero lag display) So if the game was caped at 30fps, the added lag would be a 7th of the total lag. On DF´s monitor, where they have another 3 frames of aditional display lag, that would be less.

Note that you said "a couple of frames " at 30 fps. A couple is atleast 3. Which would be 6 frames at 60 fps. Which is quite alot before adding display lag than the lag of 3 frames on a x360 in cod.. I don't play bf3 much due to the framerate and unresponsiveness due to input lag

I'm surprised that they didn't just use a 1 ms latency CRT tv for their test.

Also it's from the single player which is slower than mp

 

[Shifty Geezer]

A couple is atleast 3.

A couple is 2, although I doubt milk was being that accurate.

I'm surprised that they didn't just use a 1 ms latency CRT tv for their test.

I guess after calibrating their display lag, they could factor out its impact. Saves on having to change monitor.

Also it's from the single player which is slower than mp

That's part of the experience though for a lot of games. If Joe Gamer is playing mostly single player, and 30 fps isn't going to adversely affect his ability to shoot dumb bots, controller latency isn't an issue. Devs clearly feel this way and happily add several frames of processing and input latency.

 

[Davros]

How about a fish eye lens mode? A button that instead of looking behind you, bends the screen to magnify the center area and compress or warp the border, so the info is there, just no flat z transform.

No, then the distance to your braking point would look nearer than it actually is and you'd end up braking too early

 

[owen]

Its the framerate. COD looks worst than every other AAA FPS, (even in screen shots) but people still buy it on the Wii, or PS360 because its a fast paced twitch shooter with minimum lag. Its almost like playing the original unreal tournament. People are still playing old COD games online. Even the worst COD games will outlast Insomniacs attempts at multiplayer. In SP 30 fps is passable but not optimal - people will play your game once and never play it again. In MP you either adapt to the lag or you just stop playing the game altogether.

Halving the framerate to get a prettier bullshot instead of making a better game is probably why the games are taking so long to make.

But I digress; trends in the industry are trends. I guess devs do what they think is best or what they are forced to do

COD's not a fair reference unless we know the major reason for anyone buying it is the framerate. As there are lots of competing factors, including popularity, it's hard to prove that it's for the 60 fps that most people buy it. I certainly know kids who have bought it with no regard for the framerate just because it's the hot game. A look at the dearth of 60 fps games suggests that the market in general isn't in favour, otherwise surely developers would see a connection between framerate and sales and push for higher framerates. Instead, we hear the opposite with the likes of Insomniac going on record that 60 fps harms more than helps. Short of selling two versions of a game, 60 fps simplified visuals and 30 fps extra sauce, I don't know that a comparison can be made. I'd really like to see a developer provide the option in game to switch modes, and see whether Joe Public chooses 30 fps or 60.

 

[milk]

As I said before improved responsiveness AND quicker reaction because things show up on screen faster.

I've aknowleged framerates improve the delay of things showing up on the screen. Nobody would deny that. You keep reeinterating a point that nobody is denying.

Now as a developer wanting to sell a game to the bigger amount of people possible. Would you rather sacrifice half of your graphics processing performance for a 20% reduction of lag for the end user?

Even if I was making the game for myself, I would choose the graphics, but that's because I simply don't like twitch game design so much. I find it cheap but that's just personal.

 

[Cyan]

You haven't ever played any racing sims, have you?

The jump from Forza (30Hz) to Forza 2 was huge, not because of the increased resolution, but because of the full framerate in Forza 2.

Cheers

Yes, I think 60 fps in a racing game is basically a must.

The differences between 30 fps and 60 fps are pretty apparent, as you can see in this webpage:

http://boallen.com/fps-compare.html

EA are saying that they will aim for 1080p 60 fps in the next generation.

http://money.msn.com/business-news/article.aspx?feed=SALP&date=20130226&id=16169872

The console technology, itself. Is a gigantic leap for our industry. Any which way you look at the specifications, it is a step function over what exists today. I won't go into the nitty-gritty of every component, but if you look at it in an aggregate basis, the new consoles are between 8 and 10x the power of the current generation. So what does this mean to a company like EA? It means really 3 things: first, we no longer have to constrain our games or ration and compute our graphics, our memory or bandwidth. We can let the games really flourish, 1080p, 60 frames a second, character physics on a much broader canvas, color saturation, lighting, particle effects. There will be a level of gameplay experience that is unprecedented, not been imagined before. So it's going to create playing conditions for our gamers that'll be just phenomenal

 

[Cyan]

You can definitely feel the difference between 60fps and 30 fps shooters or 60fps and 30 fps racers, action games, fighting games etc.

I think the best compromise given next gen performance levels is for games to go for 30 fps with minimal response times, like NFS Hot Pursuit.

That will mean response times are only 25% slower (83 vs 66 ms) than 60 fps titles while still having twice the time to render the frame.
That represents the best trade off.

How exactly did Criterion manage to do this? Is it just optimising each stage of their gameplay and rendering pipeline to get the minimum lag possible at 30 fps?

Yes, either that...having a game running at 30 fps with almost perfect response, or programming the game to run at a constant 60 fps.

Having the framerate jumping between 30 and 60fps is in my opinion worse than a solid 30fps. Imho, having 60fps is only important if it can be kept consistent.

I have played games on PC that bump from 30, 30 something to ~60 fps, and the game smoothers. but when this happens, the game lags for about ~0.2 sec (it freezes in the blink of an eye, but still noticeable)

 

[Orion]

Yes, I think 60 fps in a racing game is basically a must.

The differences between 30 fps and 60 fps are pretty apparent, as you can see in this webpage:

http://boallen.com/fps-compare.html

Actually the 15fps example doesn't look that bad, i would've guessed it'd look worse.

The 30fps vs 60fps comparison doesn't show that much of a boost in smoothness.

And I like the quote from the link

By not showing enough visual information, we force the brain into filling in the gaps... it draws you in even more. It's part of how you let go to the point where you can laugh or cry or feel tense or afraid or elated.

 

[KongRudi]

That's a good quote:
So from that I gather it's due to my big(!) brain, I can find graphical showcase at 30 FPS to be better than smoother but not so graphic showcase 60 FPS games.
So all the people whining about how my favourites games suck, due to not beeing 60 FPS, just have a smaller and less effective brain.

 

[Cheezdoodles]

That's part of the experience though for a lot of games. If Joe Gamer is playing mostly single player, and 30 fps isn't going to adversely affect his ability to shoot dumb bots, controller latency isn't an issue. Devs clearly feel this way and happily add several frames of processing and input latency.

Joe gamer doesn't only play single player. Look at call of duty. They buy and play first and foremost for online gaming. I dunno how much blops 2 sold on ps3, but if I have people on my friendlist ranked in 13th million place, and Phil from this forum, with 1100 online kills is ranked in the 7th million place, I'd say there is a fair amount of online going on

Edit: Apparently in 2011, there was an average 40 million online players per month, playing cod across all console platforms. I'm quite sure blops 2 which AFAIK is the best selling game of this generation didn't push that number down. To give some perspective, the entire BF franchise has sold 26 million on consoles. The entire Halo franchise including Xbox 1 games has sold 50 million.. This has 40 million monthly gamers! Not sales, sales are 150 millionish

COD's not a fair reference unless we know the major reason for anyone buying it is the framerate. As there are lots of competing factors, including popularity, it's hard to prove that it's for the 60 fps that most people buy it. I certainly know kids who have bought it with no regard for the framerate just because it's the hot game. A look at the dearth of 60 fps games suggests that the market in general isn't in favour, otherwise surely developers would see a connection between framerate and sales and push for higher framerates. Instead, we hear the opposite with the likes of Insomniac going on record that 60 fps harms more than helps. Short of selling two versions of a game, 60 fps simplified visuals and 30 fps extra sauce, I don't know that a comparison can be made. I'd really like to see a developer provide the option in game to switch modes, and see whether Joe Public chooses 30 fps or 60.

Well, they certainly don't buy the game for its graphics as any other AAA franchise is pushing nicer graphics. Could I be because it has 60fps and the lowest input lag of the bunch? I think so. Remember that cod is bought for online gaming, not single player. The single player is usually what? 5 hours?

 

[Laa-Yosh]

If anyone's a Joe Average gamer from here it's me, and I've never played multiplayer in any of the CODs I've played with...

 

[Davros]

Neither have I


I did play bf2 online and it made me realise lifes too short to be dealing with idiots

 

[Cheezdoodles]

If anyone's a Joe Average gamer from here it's me, and I've never played multiplayer in any of the CODs I've played with...

If your implying that the average gamer doesn't play cod online, are you saying that the 13 million of the 15 million total copies sold of blops 2 all were bought by hardcore gamers?

Joe average, like 80% of all people that bought the 150 million copies of the cod franchise, played it online!

 

[owen]

So what we have here is the top selling games run 60 fps while the other games are trying to compete with prettier graphics? how is that working out for them?

It seems to be a long running trend with Sony/Playstation. Shadow of the colossi and Ico are two of my favorite playstation games but they have horrible frame rate, seemly because of the over emphasis on the pushing extra graphics. Are the devs pushing the playstation too hard or is it sony pushing them to do this?

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Joe gamer doesn't only play single player. Look at call of duty. They buy and play first and foremost for online gaming. I dunno how much blops 2 sold on ps3, but if I have people on my friendlist ranked in 13th million place, and Phil from this forum, with 1100 online kills is ranked in the 7th million place, I'd say there is a fair amount of online going on

We're not talking about just COD though, but all games being 30/60 Hz. I start that sentence with, "That's part of the experience though for a lot of games." I agree that most people (pretty much all) who bought COD bought it to play online and do play online. A fair number did so not because COD is 60 fps but because their mates were, so it's very hard to qualify how much of CODs success depends on 60 fps. For every other game, there's a mix of solo and online play. Uncharted was created for its solo performance. The target there for 30 fps adds to the visuals and doesn't take away from the control issues because the player's just shooting bots. Creating a 60 fps multiplayer experience would add a lot of work and damage the style, so it makes sense to just carry over the 30fps engine to multiplayer. Chances are most of those Uncharted players online aren't overly sensitive to higher latency controls.

COD isn't a good reference point. It's an outlier. We need to look at all games (Gears, Halo, Uncharted, Fifa, Final Fantasy, Borderlands, Sacred, Assassin's Creed, LBP, Battlefield, Tomb Raider, Dynasty Warriors, Bioshock, Sniper 2, Metal Gear, Asura's Wrath, etc.). A great many are solo only games or sold on their solo as much as their online, where the control latency of 30 fps doesn't really impact the player. Fluidity will help, but Joe (and Sally, and Frederick, and José) Gamer can get buy without that, while selling to them without the added eyecandy that twice the rendering time permits will be pretty hard for a lot of developers.