Digital Foundry Article Technical Discussion Archive [2011]

[Ruskie]

The whole "360 is not being pushed hard" theory has been debunked. Halo: Reach, among other games, has proved that. They're even using tesselation on the 360. When the devs did the DF interview, all these things were abundantly clear. There is nothing like a nebulous theoretical/potential performance pipe dream.

I would like to see more than Sony 1st party studios being open with what they are doing/achieving on these systems. Show the SPU and GPU usage and what it's being used for. In my experience, the more open you are; the more honest you're trying to be.

Personally, if the interviewer knows that some people like to brush certain information off with "that screenshots mean nothing" or "it's just art" type statements; I think the interviewer should ask for all the details (without breaking NDA of course).

I loved the tech based article and I hope Grandmaster can take some of these question/statement posts to GG, as a tech follow-up. A clarification article for the technically inclined. Is this even possible?

Whats exactly problem with Reach tech?
From what i played Reach,it has,hands down best particle effects this gen,they are razor sharp,I was enjoying looking at them sparking.
There is camer/object motion blur,there is HDR lighting,SSAO,lighting looks really great and character models(Spartan) and textures(as well as AF) are up there with best.Word is quite expansive and its not as restricting like 90% of other shooters.

Problem with Reach is the fact that its artstyle is not something you would describe "in your face".I thought that in lot of instances Black Ops looked better than Reach.Alot of it goes to the fact that Reach world is very very clean,with not much smoke,gritty foggy artistic look is not present and then you get the feeling world is just a tad to "clean".

I think Laa Yosh posted Reach A.I characters and proved that they are really detailedly textured,if not more so than KZ3s characters.But when you play it Reach characters just don't have that "wow" look to them.KZ3s on other hand looked much better,as did(IMO) Black Ops and I'm sure not many people would agree that Black Ops has finer detail on characters.

If you are going to argue game look it would be smarter to look at tech featuring rather than "IMO this looks nicer".

Anyway...I'm ranting here and I sense my try for explanation will go to recycle bin once AL sees it so I'll leave it at this:smile:

Here is a little video from Reach which I would argue looks as good as any other shooter out here.

 

[Tea2]

Whats exactly problem with Reach tech?

It seems that it fell prey to the "if it isn't 720p, it doesn't count" brigade

As for the rest of your post I mostly agree. I respect Bungie and their games for the general approach they take, tackling issues that most console developers tend to avoid. That Reach manages to do what it does on a hardware from 2005 and still look so good is definitely a great achievement. It might not result in MAXIMUM EYE CANDY per frame like some other titles (and you've mentioned that as well), but it's hard not to be impressed.

 

[hoho]

While I agree that explosions and some other effects look awesome in Reach the environmental detail in that video seems to be an order of magnitude lower than some of the other new titles shown at GDC

 

[assurdum]

A lot of game use low buffer, even Halo Reach... I just saying to no understand what have exactly so impressed crysis 2 even sometimes on 360... the game shows few enemies, noticeable pop in & pop up, preminent jaggies; but consider the low res isn't so low it's just more acceptable than the ps3 version. From what we have seen now, I don't think it's wrong to have some doubts & skepticism. I will be pretty happy to change my opinion when the demo coming out on the ps3. My question remain: is it really so impossible to the other engine doing the same with the same amount of draw pixels? It's just my doubt.

 

[AlNom]

I just saying to no understood what have exactly so impressed crysis 2 even on 360...

It's all centered around their real-time GI solution, particularly considering how ancient the consoles are. Of course, in screenshots it's going to be hard to grasp the implication of it because it's about manipulating the lighting in real-time.

 

[assurdum]

It's all centered around their real-time GI solution, particularly considering how ancient the consoles are. Of course, in screenshots it's going to be hard to grasp the implication of it because it's about manipulating the lighting in real-time.

Ok, however, I'm just said my opinion, I'm not tries to blame the work of crytek.

 

[Ruskie]

Ok, however, I'm just said my opinion, I'm not tries to blame the work of crytek.

If you are judging by MP,don't,SP is where its at.Those are two different teams working on it and from what I have seen(comparing PC SP to PC MP) its night and day difference.

There are alot of things that Crysis 2 does very good on consoles and smartest thing to do is to wait for DF comparison

 

[Tea2]

While I agree that explosions and some other effects look awesome in Reach the environmental detail in that video seems to be an order of magnitude lower than some of the other new titles shown at GDC

Well, in that particular level you land on a beach, fight your way into a military base, board a space shuttle, go into space (switch to a completely different control scheme, gameplay mechanic and environment) enter a dogfight with enemy spaceships, board a cruiser for some more on-foot, zero-G combat, all with no pauses for loading and no prerendered cutscenes to mask it, with co-op support and while being recorded for future viewing in theater mode. Sure, we can point to some aspects being on a lower level than some of the latest and upcoming games but that doesn't make the game unimpressive from technical standpoint, at least for me it doesn't.

Here's a video of that mission, the "transition" to space starts at around 10 minute mark. Might want to turn off the "commentary" though

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mi1lIaBpdcI

 

[patsu]

IJust fyi, most games have some form of course occlusion culling, that's not a new thing. The way KZ3 does it is unique in that they did it via software spu resterizer but it's not a new idea.

Yes, the SPUs can work in parallel with the GPU. The overall performance should be better (The PS3 may be handling more than one frame at the same time). So… looking only at the RSX output number is missing quite a big chunk of activities going on inside PS3.

The KZ3 implementation is not the first SPU instance. I think the Battlefield 2 presentation in 2010 also mentioned that they have SPU and GPU occlusion culling in place. Not sure about the parameters though (I think the BF2 presentation mentioned the distance applied for the occlusion, I didn't see the KZ3 parameters).

If the SPUs are so effective at these type of operations then surely it would make sense for Sony to use an upgraded CELL for PS4.
It would be a shame got all of these dev tools to go to waste.

It's a fairly good start with real results. They can probably get away with modern GPU SKUs these days, but the CPU + GPU combo approach is intriguing nonetheless. I think in NGP, the NEON media engine and the GPU can share memory too ? Not sure if they have DMA + local store/cache in place though.

 

[MJP]

Yes, the SPUs can work in parallel with the GPU. The overall performance should be better (The PS3 may be handling more than one frame at the same time).

The KZ3 implementation is not the first SPU instance. I think the Battlefield 2 presentation in 2010 also mentioned that they have SPU and GPU occlusion culling in place. Not sure about the parameters though (I think the BF2 presentation mentioned the distance applied for the occlusion, I didn't see the KZ3 parameters).

Yeah they've had occlusion via software rasterization in Frostbite for a while now. It's not all that different from how KZ3 does it.

 

[patsu]

Yap, it would be down to implementation/optimization details, integration with other subsystems, and what else can be built on top (later) ? Do you know if they are applied to maps of similar size/scale ?

 

[Nesh]

They're not? Some people go crazy over KZ3, not sure where are you getting this "not praised as much" bit.
And what are the other games you had in mind ? I think most technically impressve console games get their fair share of spotlight, here and on DF.

I dont mean comments such as "this looks awesome". I mean from a technical point of view some of areas that havent been touched as much as others.

As a tech forum, we should be more concerned with the actual tech, not just praising things. Now that we have these technical exposés, isn't that enough?

Not to single you out, but I mean, how many bloody times do I have to reiterate that these are technical forums. Save the opinionated praise for the games threads or other forums. Once in awhile I'd actually like to read something in the Tech Forums that relates to the word. :/

I understand what you are saying, but I cant help it but notice in this very thread that technical achievements such as multiple light sources and large scale for some games have been touched as a technical achievement and how they did it while the same hasnt been touched as much for Killzone 3. Mostly its "sacrifices" have been touched in a relatively unhealthy discussion to such an extend that it even spawned its own thread

 

[joker454]

I understand what you are saying, but I cant help it but notice in this very thread that technical achievements such as multiple light sources and large scale for some games have been touched as a technical achievement and how they did it while the same hasnt been touched for Killzone 3 as much. Mostly its "sacrifices" have been touched to such an extend that it even spawned its own thread

Most of the stuff in KZ3 isn't new anymore. Multiple light sources, semi large scale, ragdoll, ai, etc, many games have all that kind of stuff now at similar levels. Other stuff like it's lighting are old school, aa solution only partially effective, etc. So while as a package it's nice, it's not new. The way they went about implementing those features is definitely of interest, as in how they used spu and gpu behind the scenes, but ultimately the results on screen are stuff that can be seen in other games. Hence the muted excitement, at least from me anyways.

What Crysys 2 and Battlefield 3 are doing to me are the new hotness, namely realtime gi. Combined with a qualtiy hdr pipeline and large scale destrucibility it will give us stuff we haven't seen before. Hence why there is intense interest around those two, there's nothing like them out there currently. Add to the fact that their tech will likely be used in many games makes me and others salivate in anticipation.

 

[Nesh]

Most of the stuff in KZ3 isn't new anymore. Multiple light sources, semi large scale, ragdoll, ai, etc, many games have all that kind of stuff now at similar levels. Other stuff like it's lighting are old school, aa solution only partially effective, etc. So while as a package it's nice, it's not new. The way they went about implementing those features is definitely of interest, as in how they used spu and gpu behind the scenes, but ultimately the results on screen are stuff that can be seen in other games. Hence the muted excitement, at least from me anyways.

What Crysys 2 and Battlefield 3 are doing to me are the new hotness, namely realtime gi. Combined with a qualtiy hdr pipeline and large scale destrucibility it will give us stuff we haven't seen before. Hence why there is intense interest around those two, there's nothing like them out there currently. Add to the fact that their tech will likely be used in many games makes me and others salivate in anticipation.

Usually other games do some of the things that K3 does just as well, others may be missing or not look as good.
Rarely do we see a package that does everything so well(including subtle effects such as wind affecting the direction of the fire and its fading).

Cant comment on Crysis 2 or Battlefield 3 since I dont have any experience with those except the multiplayer demo of C2 which isnt any indication of the game's actual quality.

Halo Reach on the contrary got more look to its technical merits even though it also does more of the same plus less than what other games appear to do.

For example I am curious to see how did they fake the look of HDR effects, how did they implement some of the special effects, how did they manage to achieve such a large scale environment with the impression of such complex geometry? Is it a result of smart use of assets or is it the polygons? Clever LOD system? New approach? What about the particle system (like the snow flakes or ashes)? K3 appears to be lit with more colors. How was the deferred rendering method improved and what changes have been made to the amount of light sources at any given scene? The world is also not completely static unlike the case of other games where everything appears to be completely static. There is impressive shadowing from moving objects casted to the environment and the shadows of the characters appear to be very smooth. The list can go on. This is a much bigger step up from what I expected since K2. You get my point why I wanted to read more.

 

[Tea2]

I just lurk in a few other forums for sheer entertainment, and this kind of thought process comes up again and again.

Yep. A little unhealthy atmosphere I might add, lots of competent and impressive tech getting 'stigmatized' on the forums because of that. Seems that anything but absolute 1:1 parity is a disgrace.

Now for a completely unrelated question: what was the first game on the consoles that featured per object motion blur? Was it Dead Rising? I recall that fast moving objects in that game look "different" but back then I wasn't interested in tech behind it to make that connection. Was that omb debut?

 

[AlNom]

what was the first game on the consoles that featured per object motion blur?

Perfect Dark Zero. * It would actually be really interesting to revisit the launch titles, particularly PDZ and Kameo, because it seems a lot of folks have forgotten (me included) just what sorts of effects were used to pimp the jump to next-gen. Kameo had all sorts of particle effects and crowd rendering. PDZ itself was a custom deferred renderer as well.

*edit: They kept the effect pretty tightly close to the player view though and people didn't tend to move fast in the game either. You should be able to spot it during cut-scenes more easily in youtube vids if you freeze-frame it.


edit 9001:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1DnskTSsFU (HD capture available)

At various spots throughout the cut-scenes you can actually make it out more easily and see that they blur it quite convincingly or at least, you don't get the multiple ghosting effect that you typically see these days due to lower sampling. But then, it is of course a heavily upgraded Gamecube/Xbox game so they could afford a lot of over-the-top things.

 

[kagemaru]

Now for a completely unrelated question: what was the first game on the consoles that featured per object motion blur? Was it Dead Rising? I recall that fast moving objects in that game look "different" but back then I wasn't interested in tech behind it to make that connection. Was that omb debut?

IIRC Perfect Dark Zero was the first console game. :smile:

Edit:

Damn you Al for beating me

 

[L. Scofield]

Now for a completely unrelated question: what was the first game on the consoles that featured per object motion blur? Was it Dead Rising? I recall that fast moving objects in that game look "different" but back then I wasn't interested in tech behind it to make that connection. Was that omb debut?

Last gen Shadow of the Colossus used it.

 

[Tea2]

Oh wow, didn't realize Perfect Dark Z had it already Kinda ironic considering how omb seems to be one of 'those' features getting so much attention as it appears in AAA games these days.

Shadow of the Colossus as well - that game seems to be one of those 'transitional' titles, still on old hardware but giving us a taste of things to come in the future. Kind of like Cryengine 3 and Frostbite 2 do right now I suppose.

As far as Final Fantasy spells are concerned, they've always been sweet eye candy. Excellent stuff. Square guys are experts at making stuff explode in spectacular and colorful manner.

Final Fantasy XII on PS2, just for reference

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IPhIgwIJHQQ&feature=related

 

[MJP]

Last gen Shadow of the Colossus used it.

They didn't use object motion blur, just a very simple form of camera motion blur.