Call of Duty 4: Modern combat trailer up

[Betanumerical]

You mean the one with the rainbow colours? I thought that turned out to be the user's TV causing a problem (and being 'enhanced' by the camera). I may not have seen the one you're talking about, but they all look identical to me.

I was just thinking about something, the picture of the gun is from 1080P mode. Wouldn't the upscaling (is it pixel doubling, nearest neighbor, what is it?.) from the ps3 cause more jaggies?.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

The texels on the X360 shot are larger than 1 pixel, so scaling the image down 50% and then resizing will not scale the actual texels to 1/4th resolution. I'm not sure if I can express it well enough in english...

That's true, and something I didn't take into account. A quick experiment shows a scaled texture can look okay at perhaps less than 2:1, and then a quarter resolution can look totally texellated, so a standard quarter resolution texture could be the culprit. Is that still the only option? Is it not possible to use multiple half (area-wise) textures rather than one quarter resolution texture? GPU's aren't still locked into ^2 dimensions are they? Even then, using anamorphic scaling you could have a 2:1 X:Y scale say, so it's only double pixel in one dimension.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

You mean the one with the rainbow colours? I thought that turned out to be the user's TV causing a problem (and being 'enhanced' by the camera). I may not have seen the one you're talking about, but they all look identical to me.

Yes, the rainbow coloured one. Ignoring the colours, the texels were a lot larger. That said, I think Laa-Yosh's point puts paid to my theory there. It could just be 1/4 resolution but because the map was already originally < 1:1 texel: pixel mapping, that doubling of texel size in both directions just emphasized the shortcomings not apparent in the higher-resolution map.

 

[AlNom]

Ah... I see. Good to clarify.

Is it not possible to use multiple half (area-wise) textures rather than one quarter resolution texture?

Wouldn't that be the same argument as using many textures to skin a character model than using a single UV-map? i.e. more work for the artists.

With heavy streaming, I would think a single large texture would have better transfer speed than multiple ones. It's either multiple mini-textures being loaded sequentially or an entire section being loaded in MIP levels. It's a trade-off I suppose.

 

[djskribbles]

this is what i see from the comparison shots anyway... 360 version has better wall textures. PS3 version better ground textures (or at least they look better), better AF and the guns themselves look slightly more detailed and sharper.

 

[Laa-Yosh]

Again, the gun can look sharper just because of using different settings on the TV, or even a difference in the focus of the guy's camera.

 

[patsu]

An InfinityWard developer (Calen) is trying to tame the texture polices over at GAF. I supposed someone can summarize his repsonses here. I don't have enough expertise, and besides, I already have the game

The thread is full of noise. So I suggest going directly to his post history here: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/search.php?searchid=1817964
and work from here ... if you're interested that is.

 

[AlNom]

Your link doesn't work btw.

These are the only relevant "technical" issues he addressed:
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=8417899&postcount=331

Tradeoff example: Shadow filtering. We use different techniques on PS3 and 360 to filter shadow edges, which gives them a bit of a different look. I think it's a matter of taste as to which way looks better, but we did it that way because it was the most efficient way to do it on both platforms that yielded a look that was good enough.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=8546469&postcount=3032

The shadow resolution is identical on both consoles. This is a fact. Like I said in my example waaaay back when, they're filtered differently and IMO the PS3's version looks better in more situations.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=8546573&postcount=3036

Actually, look at the shadows below each gun and you can CLEARLY see that the resolution is different between them.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=8546632&postcount=3044

Except that it isn't different resolutions. The PS3 filtering makes larger, smoother steps with more individual shades in them. If the 360 shot was clearer, you could see that the filtering makes more steps but they're not blended, such that you can see individual blocks of changing color as opposed to a smooth gradient.

The PS3 shadows look softer, in motion, which I personally prefer. The maps themselves are the same size, memory cost, etc. etc.

 

[AlNom]

At first I thought he was a little whack based on the above photo, but then I recalled Halo 2, where in the elevator at the end of the first level, you'd see the shadow buffer'd shadowmap of yourself, which would share an identical description of "more steps but they're not blended."

 

[Laa-Yosh]

Who's he trying to fool? The shadow resolution difference is more than obvious, just look at the shadow of the trigger, there's not enough detail on the right side image.

It also makes a lot of sense, using half res shadow maps frees up 75% of the memory and it's one of the most logical feature cuts on the PS3, next to lowering texture resolution.

 

[AlNom]

Yea, the resolution issue is whack. There's a lot more detail on the 360 side for the gun. Since I don't have the game I can't decide which is better in motion, but all signs point to the one that shows more resemblance to the object in question. The PS3 shadow there reminds me of Pandora Tomorrow. :s

 

[PARANOiA]

Surely we can get framebuffer grabs from both versions, since the game is on shelves. All this analysis done on camera photos seems a bit over the top.

 

[djskribbles]

Again, the gun can look sharper just because of using different settings on the TV, or even a difference in the focus of the guy's camera.

but its not just the one shot, look at the other comparison shots when they're holding pistols, where they're looking at the ground and when they have the SMG's. i guess you could still be right about different settings on the TV.

its relatively easy to spot isolated cases where one version looks better than the other. but my guess is there are many tradeoffs throughout the game so it will be very difficult to say which is definitively better. better textures here, better filtering there, sharper models there, better shadows here etc.

 

[D3B]

That G36 pic was made to look bad, the PS3 pic was captured when the gun is glowing.

 

[Mize]

Can ANYONE validate these photos from ONE poster? I'm going to go buy the frickin' game for this!

 

[snakejoe]

Those pics are all come from here

http://s153.photobucket.com/albums/s231/zhangy2003/?start=0

 

[Neb]

Who's he trying to fool? The shadow resolution difference is more than obvious, just look at the shadow of the trigger, there's not enough detail on the right side image.

It also makes a lot of sense, using half res shadow maps frees up 75% of the memory and it's one of the most logical feature cuts on the PS3, next to lowering texture resolution.

Indeed anyone saying they are the same should launch a PC game and play with the shadow resolutions and see what happens! I was just thinking about the triggers to, a thing caused by low-res shadowmaps that makes the shadow not be high-res enough to display the proper form of the object.

 

[Neb]

That G36 pic was made to look bad, the PS3 pic was captured when the gun is glowing.

Forget the weapons in that comparision screenshot, focus instead on the shadows becouse that is why it was made.

 

[RobertR1]

Finally got around to playing the SP. Playing on the next to hardest difficulty and I think I'm almost at the end of ActI.

The grahics and presentation are pure bad ass. If it takes a drop in resolution to make a game look and play this good, then I'm all for it! The thing that impressed me was the top notch framerate with just loads and loads of action at once. Just incredible really. The presentation has some issues. It's like someone wanted to see just how many enemies they can put in each area. The game gets you at a high level of tension when you're in an encounter but it just never lets up. Then you simply lose that rush. IW should keep you at peaks at the end of a battle not be wishing "when the f do they stop coming out....?"

Gameplay. It's a shooter and doesn't try to be "cute" with anything. What you can expect form a top notch shooter, that's what you'll get.

Story. F'in lame as can be so far! I'm not into it at all

AI. Nothing amazing but it works to keep the game moving along. They're stupidly accurate tossing nades through small holes btw. Oh and friendly AI loves to block doors or get infront when you're trying to run away from nades. Rainbox six still had some of the best squad AI and control to date.

The SP so far, I'd give an 8/10. I was going to give it a 9 but the lack of Co-op in a squad based game is just retarded.

MP is ofcourse 10/10.

Overall 9/10.

 

[-tkf-]

Your link doesn't work btw.

These are the only relevant "technical" issues he addressed:

So a guy that actually worked on the game and wrote actual code for the SPU as well dimisses the pictures.

Not that it matters of course, the story is out, the PS3 version is inferrior and it´s all based on top notch quality photos taken by "someone" of his tv with top grade photo gear.