Current Generation Games Analysis Technical Discussion [2022] [XBSX|S, PS5, PC]

[Dictator]

Perhaps it's because Metro has no time of day so lighting doesn't change as much which makes it performant, while Lumen changes its lighting constantly? That's the only reason I could think of.

Metro has a time of day changing all the time! Have you played the game? All the "open-world-lite" areas have the sun moving, day, night, and even weather changing the skybox.

 

[betternatethanlever]

Ah, explains perfectly. So direct light shadows are still using shadow maps. I think this works extremely well with RTGI especially if it saves on performance. I wonder if the new Avatar game is going for a similar approach but they did state that the shadows and reflections are supposed to be RT only as well. Very curious to see how that turns out.

I also wonder if that will remain the norm for future RT GI games. Lighting will be fully RT while shadows from direct lights will still use rasterized shadow maps.

Metro has a time of day changing all the time! Have you played the game? All the "open-world-lite" areas have the sun moving, day, night, and even weather changing the skybox.

Yes Exodus is a very beautiful with a fully dynamic time of day which further complements the ray traced global illumination system. It's also a very fun game, really recommend playing.

 

[trinibwoy]

Ah, explains perfectly. So direct light shadows are still using shadow maps. I think this works extremely well with RTGI especially if it saves on performance. I wonder if the new Avatar game is going for a similar approach but they did state that the shadows and reflections are supposed to be RT only as well. Very curious to see how that turns out.

I also wonder if that will remain the norm for future RT GI games. Lighting will be fully RT while shadows from direct lights will still use rasterized shadow maps.

I wouldn’t say that. Modern RTGI techniques scale very well with more lights. Rasterized shadow maps do not scale at all. You could have a situation where your RTGI subsystem is handling indirect light and shadow from lots of light sources but those same light sources aren’t casting direct shadows. Shadow maps days are numbered. Rasterization will soon be relegated to GBuffer and depth passes for primary visibility with everything else being RT.

 

[betternatethanlever]

I wouldn’t say that. Modern RTGI techniques scale very well with more lights. Rasterized shadow maps do not scale at all. You could have a situation where your RTGI subsystem is handling indirect light and shadow from lots of light sources but those same light sources aren’t casting direct shadows. Shadow maps days are numbered. Rasterization will soon be relegated to GBuffer and depth passes for primary visibility with everything else being RT.

Wouldn't say that about what? In any case, if consoles are unable to do fully ray traced lighting and shadows then developers will have to compromise and I kind of doubt they'll be making two different versions of a game to accommodate enthusiast grade PC hardware just like it's happened in earlier generations.

 

[Remij]

So some people were talking about that comparison that Sony made of Spider-Man streaming in data on PS4 Pro vs their prototype running on PS5 with the SSD, and it got me curious. Here's the vid on the off chance anyone hasn't seen it yet.

So I downloaded a trainer for Spider-Man on PC, which has a speed toggle and multiplier to try it out. I put the speed to 3.5x and went back in. The game was on Max settings except SSAO instead of HBAO+, and RT settings were both high, and object count was 10. I'm running a full Gen4 SSD WD SN850 7GB/s.

And wow Spider-man is just FLYING wicked fast haha... buuuuut it exhibited the exact same behavior of the PS4 Pro in that video. I'd start moving really quickly and the game would completely halt, and you'd see it load in textures, update lighting, and reflections... then continue... then halt, and so on..

Then I disabled RT, because I remembered their prototype likely was all at the exact same settings as the PS4 Pro... and wow.. you can just fly through the city incredibly fast... absolutely no loading or streaming issues what so ever. Turning on a dime and going in any direction for blocks, moving incredible quick.. and it's seamless and smooth as hell. And I'm quite conscious of the fact that I need to swing low to the ground as well as it has to load in all that ground level detail.

Now, of course this is expected. The game isn't demanding that much from I/O any given second.. but it's interesting to see just how BRUTAL ray-tracing is to this aspect. It simply cannot update the BVH quick enough to move through the environment at that clip.. And at least with how things are implemented in this game, it causes the entire thing to halt, and resume constantly. So then that makes me question what would ultimately be possible on PS5? Obviously they will never make a Spider-man game where you're moving this quick through the world.. it's just absurd.. but you're definitely going to be running into processing limits at some point regardless.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

So then that makes me question what would ultimately be possible on PS5? Obviously they will never make a Spider-man game where you're moving this quick through the world.. it's just absurd.. but you're definitely going to be running into processing limits at some point regardless.

It's the same thing developers have had to deal with since digital gaming came into existence. A careful balance of graphics features and fidelity at one end of the spectrum and speed and performance at the other. Obviously you can do a lot more per frame if you move through an environment slowly while you have to be much more careful if you move through the environment quickly. But even moving at slow speeds, developers still must balance the level and amount of graphical features and effects versus how the engine performs at any given time interval.

So whether it's Spider-Man or if it's some indie walking simulator, developers are always having to contend with that issue.

Doesn't even matter how powerful the hardware is or how many resources you have, as long as it's finite then this balancing act will always exist because some developer/level designer/artist somewhere will always want to put in more and more objects/textures/graphical effects/etc.

Regards,
SB

 

[PSman1700]

So some people were talking about that comparison that Sony made of Spider-Man streaming in data on PS4 Pro vs their prototype running on PS5 with the SSD, and it got me curious. Here's the vid on the off chance anyone hasn't seen it yet.

So I downloaded a trainer for Spider-Man on PC, which has a speed toggle and multiplier to try it out. I put the speed to 3.5x and went back in. The game was on Max settings except SSAO instead of HBAO+, and RT settings were both high, and object count was 10. I'm running a full Gen4 SSD WD SN850 7GB/s.

And wow Spider-man is just FLYING wicked fast haha... buuuuut it exhibited the exact same behavior of the PS4 Pro in that video. I'd start moving really quickly and the game would completely halt, and you'd see it load in textures, update lighting, and reflections... then continue... then halt, and so on..

Then I disabled RT, because I remembered their prototype likely was all at the exact same settings as the PS4 Pro... and wow.. you can just fly through the city incredibly fast... absolutely no loading or streaming issues what so ever. Turning on a dime and going in any direction for blocks, moving incredible quick.. and it's seamless and smooth as hell. And I'm quite conscious of the fact that I need to swing low to the ground as well as it has to load in all that ground level detail.

Now, of course this is expected. The game isn't demanding that much from I/O any given second.. but it's interesting to see just how BRUTAL ray-tracing is to this aspect. It simply cannot update the BVH quick enough to move through the environment at that clip.. And at least with how things are implemented in this game, it causes the entire thing to halt, and resume constantly. So then that makes me question what would ultimately be possible on PS5? Obviously they will never make a Spider-man game where you're moving this quick through the world.. it's just absurd.. but you're definitely going to be running into processing limits at some point regardless.

its a GPU/CPU limitation (BVH building at those speeds). The SSD doesnt help there, at all.

 

[JPT]

its a GPU/CPU limitation (BVH building at those speeds). The SSD doesnt help there, at all.

I assume there could be a fancy balancing act, where you "turn off" raytracing when the things hit a certain speed.
Its' not something you would notice swinging through NYC at 500 mph anyway.

 

[PSman1700]

I assume there could be a fancy balancing act, where you "turn off" raytracing when the things hit a certain speed.
Its' not something you would notice swinging through NYC at 500 mph anyway.

They'd probably have to turn off some more things as GPU/CPU and even ram will be stressed when your streaming in that much data to render and process at those kind of speeds.

 

[trinibwoy]

Wouldn't say that about what? In any case, if consoles are unable to do fully ray traced lighting and shadows then developers will have to compromise and I kind of doubt they'll be making two different versions of a game to accommodate enthusiast grade PC hardware just like it's happened in earlier generations.

Wouldn’t say that shadow maps work really well with RTGI. But yes compromises must be made given performance limits.

 

[Remij]

I assume there could be a fancy balancing act, where you "turn off" raytracing when the things hit a certain speed.
Its' not something you would notice swinging through NYC at 500 mph anyway.

That's essentially what happens. You start moving quickly you get to the point where it requires further processing, it pauses, loads in all the details, updates lighting, and during that time the reflections fall back to the standard cubemaps, until the updated BVH is processed and then finally updated. It happens within a few seconds of the pause, and then continues.

If you change the RT Geometry detail setting during gameplay, you can go back in, and start running around while it's updating the BVH structure in the background, then it will phase in with no pausing or freezing at all as you're playing. I was kinda hoping that same behavior would happen when flying through the world really quickly... but unfortunately it freezes.. so it must be a combination of issues, as textures and lighting also stream in. Without RT on though, everything is always loaded, and ready to go, even at that high speed.

Not much can really be definitively said about it.. just thought it was kinda interesting to test. It likely speaks more to the way the game was programmed than any hard technical limit. This game was never designed to be moving at that clip, and with RT like that in the first place. Just a fun little thing to test out.

 

[JPT]

This game was never designed to be moving at that clip, and with RT like that in the first place. Just a fun little thing to test out.

Yes, but if they wanted to support that speed, as there already is dynamic resolution solutions, more dynamic / scaling solutions for other parts of the engine (which probably is there) but in this case specifically for RT, might be a way to go

 

[Deleted member 11852]

That's essentially what happens. You start moving quickly you get to the point where it requires further processing, it pauses, loads in all the details, updates lighting, and during that time the reflections fall back to the standard cubemaps, until the updated BVH is processed and then finally updated. It happens within a few seconds of the pause, and then continues.

There's lot of things you can with the basic game as well. If you're moving really fast through a city, you probably don't want to be running all physics and animation at 60fps, maybe dial back on all sorts of geometry detail as well because it takes a while for the man eye to resolve visual detail and the quicker you are moving, the less that becomes a problem.

 

[Remij]

Yes, but if they wanted to support that speed, as there already is dynamic resolution solutions, more dynamic / scaling solutions for other parts of the engine (which probably is there) but in this case specifically for RT, might be a way to go

There's lot of things you can with the basic game as well. If you're moving really fast through a city, you probably don't want to be running all physics and animation at 60fps, maybe dial back on all sorts of geometry detail as well because it takes a while for the man eye to resolve visual detail and the quicker you are moving, the less that becomes a problem.

Yep. That's basically what I mean. The game wasn't ever really designed with that granularity in mind. Character movement speed was always very controlled around the PS4's storage speed.. with little reasons to make any other concessions after they hit their target.

 

[Dampf]

Lies Of P on Steam

Inspired by the familiar story of Pinocchio, Lies of P is an action souls-like game set in a dark Belle Époque world. Guide Pinocchio on his unrelenting journey to become human.

store.steampowered.com

Lies of P, recommended GPU requirements are 2060/ RX 6700

It's finally happing. High settings and better probably use Raytracing by default in this game, which is why the 6700 and 2060 are put equal here.

 

[Jupiter]

After playing Cyberpunk 2077 recently almost all other games look like old-generation graphics to me. Cyberpunk 2077 offers raytracing for global illumination, global light sources, local light sources and reflections and all that in very high quality. In addition, the conventional graphic calculations are good too. However, raytracing takes it to a new level for me. Compared to Cyberpunk 2077 even the raytracing in many other games is only second or third class. The reflections in Spiderman or Resident Evil are very noisy/pixelated. Let's see when a game can surpass Cyberpunk 2077 graphically.

 

[PSman1700]

After playing Cyberpunk 2077 recently almost all other games look like old-generation graphics to me. Compared to Cyberpunk 2077 even the ray tracing in many other games is only second or third class. The reflections in Spiderman or Resident Evil are very pixelated. Let's see when a game can surpass Cyberpunk 2077 graphically.

On a higher-end system yea, its technically the most impressive title across all platforms. Viewing the city at night with the fog laying over it is jaw-dropping. The game has its weak-points that have this previous gen feel to it like every other game so far, but the in the grand scheme of things, its king for now.
Some scenes/screenshots are just amazing.

 

[Flappy Pannus]

After playing Cyberpunk 2077 recently almost all other games look like old-generation graphics to me. Cyberpunk 2077 offers raytracing for global illumination, global light sources, local light sources and reflections and all that in very high quality. In addition, the conventional graphic calculations are good too. However, raytracing takes it to a new level for me. Compared to Cyberpunk 2077 even the raytracing in many other games is only second or third class. The reflections in Spiderman or Resident Evil are very noisy/pixelated. Let's see when a game can surpass Cyberpunk 2077 graphically.

If anything Cyberpunk is a prime illustration for me how technology does not trump art quality. It has an extremely inconsistent presentation, you can have some superlative lighting for sure and carefully select some scenes that look pre-rendered at points, but then immediately transition to another scene that's marred by poor animation, textures, and model quality. It's all over the place.

Agreed at least though that Spiderman's reflections are noisier than most, not just compared to Cyberpunk. I think Nixxes commented that it's a game that's heavily tailored around Insomniac's temporal solution and they had some difficulty with implementing it for the various reconstruction methods the PC provides. RE goes without question of course, it's reflections have always been some of the worst, rt or not.

 

[PSman1700]

Agreed at least though that Spiderman's reflections are noisier than most, not just compared to Cyberpunk. I think Nixxes commented that it's a game that's heavily tailored around Insomniac's temporal solution and they had some difficulty with implementing it for the various reconstruction methods the PC provides. RE goes without question of course, it's reflections have always been some of the worst, rt or not.

Its not like the PS5 version of Spiderman's ray tracing is anything to write home about either. Its rt reflections are dead-simple.

 

[Jupiter]

If anything Cyberpunk is a prime illustration for me how technology does not trump art quality. It has an extremely inconsistent presentation, you can have some superlative lighting for sure and carefully select some scenes that look pre-rendered at points, but then immediately transition to another scene that's marred by poor animation, textures, and model quality. It's all over the place.

Agreed at least though that Spiderman's reflections are noisier than most, not just compared to Cyberpunk. I think Nixxes commented that it's a game that's heavily tailored around Insomniac's temporal solution and they had some difficulty with implementing it for the various reconstruction methods the PC provides. RE goes without question of course, it's reflections have always been some of the worst, rt or not.

The quality is not that inconsistent. You find the same thing in almost every game. Cyberpunk 2077 is even better than most games because many things still look sharp up close. In third-person games the objects would usually look worse at a short distance. For example, in RDR 2 almost everything looks blurred in the first-person perspective. The character faces in particular. RDR2 looks very good. No question about that. But while I thought "thats a beautiful landcape" while playing RDR2 I think "how awesome is that. How is that possible. That is the start of a new era" in Cyberpunk 2077.

Artistically the world of Cyberpunk 2077 is also breathtaking and dense. It's not just the technology.

On a higher-end system yea, its technically the most impressive title across all platforms. Viewing the city at night with the fog laying over it is jaw-dropping. The game has its weak-points that have this previous gen feel to it like every other game so far, but the in the grand scheme of things, its king for now.
Some scenes/screenshots are just amazing.

It has a few weaknesses like 2d cars at a distance, pop ups or some missing raytracing lokal shadows for some objects but problems exist in almost every game. What I would like are visable NPC masses when looking down from a skycraper. But the game is already CPU-heavy with raytracing. Apart from that I have rarely seen so many NPCs running around in a game like in Cyberpunk 2077.