Digital Foundry Article Technical Discussion Archive [2011]

[Gitaroo]

witcher 2 is better than 99% of the multiplatform games I guess.

 

[BRiT]

Reminder, this is for TECHNICAL DISCUSSION of Digital Foundry Articles, do not turn this into a baseless VS thread based on subjective personal likes.

 

[Cyan]

3.5 GB installed on HDD for French version. Don't think that's be different for others languages?

As far as I know it's 3.5 GB - 3.8 GB depending on the language? If you have the HDD space it isn't much. I wonder why the PS3 and PC version are 5.5GB and 6GB respectively then. Maybe better sound and textures, I think.

This picture shows how much space it takes up, but it's a pre-release picture, maybe the size changed after the final version.

Lens of Truth have compared Skyrim. I see better shadows on the PS3 and better foliage on the 360, and couldn't discern the AA, HDR, etc.

http://www.lensoftruth.com/head2head-the-elder-scrolls-v-skyrim-screenshot-comparison/

 

[AlNom]

I see better shadows on the PS3

huh? I know, old argument, softer penumbra dither on 360, basic PCF on PS3, both equally shit in motion, (the analysis threads aren't supposed to be about your preferences). I can't say there's anything inherently wrong about the one screenshot showing the dithered penumbra on 360. It's just different, clearly softer. *shrug* If you want to get down into correctness, you'd kinda only get hard edged shadowing under intense light. The other comparison video actually showed the same type of shadowing upclose (really low res non-jittered PCF), so it looks like a pretty conscious decision if they switch to dither in the distance.

Odd that the PS3 is missing shadows in some spots.

Anyways, strange to see slight blurring across all the images on PS3. Maybe they are using a post-AA afterall, it does look pretty heavy on the texture blurring.

360 still seems to be 4xAA judging by the edge gradient on the container.

 

[CopyCat]

As far as I know it's 3.5 GB - 3.8 GB depending on the language? If you have the HDD space it isn't much. I wonder why the PS3 and PC version are 5.5GB and 6GB respectively then. Maybe better sound and textures, I think.

Here is a file size comparison between Xbox360 and PC:
http://h7.abload.de/img/unbenannt1arubd.jpg
The PS3 Version in comparison has:
Animations: 40.8MB
Interface: 32.9MB
Meshes: 906MB
Misc: 12.4MB
Shaders: 34.2MB
Sounds: 238MB
Textures: 988MB
Skyrim.esm: 340MB
the PS3 version is multilingual each with 1.74-1.98GB, 4 languages in total but English is missing in the EU version. Probably the same as Xbox360 and PC.

Meshes are bigger on the PS3 compared to the 360, Textures only a little bit. The rest pretty much the same with only slight differences.
All files together with one language is less than 5.5GB on the PS3. Probably additional space for a cache file?
And I wonder why especially Sounds is so much bigger on the PC.

 

[AlNom]

Meshes are bigger on the PS3 compared to the 360, Textures only a little bit. The rest pretty much the same with only slight differences.

Probably mainly compression format for meshes and textures (DXN, CTX for instance) or how the data was stored. I'm not really aware of much if any visual difference in terms of meshes, and we all know the texture bugs for displaying the higher LOD (they clearly exist on 360).

Shaders are bloated on PS3, even compared to PC.

And I wonder why especially Sounds is so much bigger on the PC.

Maybe just less compression. The 360 does have its own sound format + hardware decompression as well, and PS3 might do something funky with SPU decoding (allowing for higher compression).

 

[N_B]

The pc version could use that shadow dithering option. Shadows are very low res there as well and the hard edges are nasty..

 

[Arwin]

Maybe just less compression. The 360 does have its own sound format + hardware decompression as well, and PS3 might do something funky with SPU decoding (allowing for higher compression).

Didn't the RSX actually have Audio hardware as well? Or am I completely misremembering that? Not that I don't think the SPUs are up to the task, but that's partly why I was surprised when I learnt about the RSX having some Audio stuff included.

 

[Cyan]

huh? I know, old argument, softer penumbra dither on 360, basic PCF on PS3, both equally shit in motion, (the analysis threads aren't supposed to be about your preferences). I can't say there's anything inherently wrong about the one screenshot showing the dithered penumbra on 360. It's just different, clearly softer. *shrug* If you want to get down into correctness, you'd kinda only get hard edged shadowing under intense light. The other comparison video actually showed the same type of shadowing upclose (really low res non-jittered PCF), so it looks like a pretty conscious decision if they switch to dither in the distance.

Odd that the PS3 is missing shadows in some spots.

Anyways, strange to see slight blurring across all the images on PS3. Maybe they are using a post-AA afterall, it does look pretty heavy on the texture blurring.

360 still seems to be 4xAA judging by the edge gradient on the container.

I noticed a difference in this picture, because the shadow of the 360 version looks very "piled up" while on the PS3 version it looks scattered, more real to me.

http://www.lensoftruth.com/wp-content/gallery/h2hssc_skyrim/h2h_lens_zoom_01.jpg

Also, watching the video N20 posted in the image framebuffer thread the shadows of the skellie look sharper to me on the PS3 version, although they are dynamic on the 360 -not on the PS3-. This is the video, for those interested:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o921p4TIzH4

I can recall you said time ago the game featured MSAAx4, and I am glad that it's almost 100% confirmed now. It's the exception that proves the rule nowadays, the good ol' MSAA, and multiplied by 4, is such a feat these days. Especially in an open game like this.

 

[Tea2]

Skyrim Face-Off
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-face-off-skyrim

 

[N2O]

here is Face off from eurogamer
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-face-off-skyrim

 

[Arwin]

here is Face off from eurogamer
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-face-off-skyrim

Speaking of controller response, it's worth mentioning that players of the PS3 version are reporting an increase in controller latency once save files reach a certain size (the established estimate being 5.5MB). This also proved to be an issue in previous Bethesda titles for the console, harking all the way back to the days of Oblivion, which makes it all the more surprising a patch hasn't come to save the day yet.

If this proves to be right, that's quite pathetic.

 

[Prophecy2k]

Getting it on PC it is then...

Honestly, Bethesda should have scrapped Gamebryo loooong ago. At this point their codebase is just an embarassing mess.

 

[Cyan]

Skyrim Face-Off
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-face-off-skyrim

From a technical point of view the article is top notch, as usual, but the conclusions aren't to my liking. I mean, I still think the PS3 version is the best version (concerning consoles) because it doesn't have tearing and because the texture bug isn't present in this iteration of the game. It doesn't look as blurry compared to the 360 version -only slightly, not much- as people initially thought, despite having a softer touch, similar to the PC version.

Skyrim on PC is easily the prettiest version of the game, and the enhanced visuals should make playing the game very enjoyable. The Xbox 360 version is surprisingly good when it works well, even slightly better than the PS3 when the quality of the content shows, but the texture bug is a really big issue which puts the 360 version behind.

That being said, I think this game is going to be the game of the year -only Zelda is a tough contender, and also U3, although to a lesser extent). It's my most anticipated game of the year too.

 

[Scott_Arm]

But you can avoid the texture issue by playing off the disc. Did they do their framerate testing on the 360 with the game installed, or off the disc?

Edit: They did the testing off disc for 360 because of the texture streaming bug.

 

[AlNom]

But you can avoid the texture issue by playing off the disc. Did they do their framerate testing on the 360 with the game installed, or off the disc?

Edit: They did the testing off disc for 360 because of the texture streaming bug.

Wonder what the stats are for users who actually use the installation feature or are even able to use it in the first place. MS tries to inform users in the guides, but I still find quite a few folks who don't even know it exists (and they have the HDD). Even my buddy who isn't incompetent with tech realizes the benefits of it, but doesn't do it often out of sheer laziness and impatience. XD

 

[Scott_Arm]

Wonder what the stats are for users who actually use the installation feature or are even able to use it in the first place. MS tries to inform users in the guides, but I still find quite a few folks who don't even know it exists (and they have the HDD). Even my buddy who isn't incompetent with tech realizes the benefits of it, but doesn't do it often out of sheer laziness and impatience. XD

I pretty much always install. Haven't had a chance to go back and check to see if there really are problems with having both the HD Textures and the Disc installed for Battlefield 3. The thread about that issue on the Battlefield forums is full of rampant stupids, so it's hard to know if the issue is real or not. I'm too lazy to experiment with that one.

 

[AlNom]

You'd think the game would just check if the folder location with the higher res stuff is present (which may include the lower res mipmaps and models) and just use that. Otherwise it uses the stock files. *shrug* hm...

 

[Laa-Yosh]

I still think Skyrim is quite lacking, especially on the art direction side (models, textures, lighting). Technically it's not bad, although I'd really like to see how an RPG would look on Rockstar's Rage engine from RDR/GTAV...

 

[Scott_Arm]

You'd think the game would just check if the folder location with the higher res stuff is present (which may include the lower res mipmaps and models) and just use that. Otherwise it just uses the stock files.

Some people are saying that if you install the HD assets and then install the disc, that some, but not all, of the HD assets will not load. The thing is, nobody has any reasonable comparison pics, or pics showing textures that didn't load.