Digital Foundry Article Technical Discussion Archive [2014]

[nightshade]

Battlefield 4 ?

EDIT: Black Flag should count too as it had a 1080p vs 900 difference, so that satisfies one of the conditions out of those two.

Wolfenstein is dynamic 1080p on both although Xbox One drops a little bit more than PS4.

 

[Karamazov]

the most important thing to retain is that both consoles have shown a big generationnal leap in their games compared to last gen in this first year, and the best is yet to come.

 

[Nesh]

the most important thing to retain is that both consoles have shown a big generationnal leap in their games compared to last gen in this first year, and the best is yet to come.

Personally I wouldnt say that.

 

[DavidGraham]

Battlefield 4 ?

EDIT: Black Flag should count too as it had a 1080p vs 900 difference, so that satisfies one of the conditions out of those two.

Wolfenstein is dynamic 1080p on both although Xbox One drops a little bit more than PS4.

Actually, I counted 19 titles in 2014 alone, DF must have missed the count, adding 2013 games raises the count to 22:
Battlefield 4
Assassin's Creed 4 Black Flag
Call Of Duty Ghosts

EDIT: Well, they didn't analyze Golf Club, and they could indeed consider Wolfenstein as an equal on both consoles (I disagree). If so, then that indeed makes the count 20.

 

[-tkf-]

I imagine they said exactly the same thing last gen. And the gen before that...

Furthermore, at the end of last gen, what were the major gameplay differences that next-gen tech provided versus PS2? That'd be a more informative comparison on what a new generation of hardware could mean in the long run.

Online gaming?
There weren't any revolution that I can think of. But the last few games did raise the bar, last of us and gta5.

Imho vr is the only thing that can change gaming as we know it.

 

[joker454]

Imho vr is the only thing that can change gaming as we know it.

I would say distributed computing, ie making cloud and online a requirement, would change gaming as we know it. That's the only way they can get enough computing power into these small low wattage affordable boxes to be able to try new things and move forward with new broader ideas beyond the scope of what a single box can ever hope to do.

 

[-tkf-]

I would say distributed computing, ie making cloud and online a requirement, would change gaming as we know it. That's the only way they can get enough computing power into these small low wattage affordable boxes to be able to try new things and move forward with new broader ideas beyond the scope of what a single box can ever hope to do.

Yeah, that might happen, but are there any new ideas on the way? Have we seen anything that should make us believe that it would actually happen? The game i play the most right now, is Destiny, it's a PS3/360 game :-/

 

[Phil]

Furthermore, at the end of last gen, what were the major gameplay differences that next-gen tech provided versus PS2?

I think there were a few; As others have mentioned; Online gaming was perhaps the biggest change vs. PS2. If we are looking at gameplay differences, perhaps games like Motorstorm that emphasized on terrain transformation (the mud) stuff that impacted handling, which I think wasn't seen before on PS2. Then of course anything motion related, due to the fact that the consoles a generation before lacked any type of motion sensors. Then we've had more terrain destruction (to a limited degree) in games like BF that I think weren't really present in the generation before. Sure, to a degree, even those things would have been possible on older hardware to a degree, but at a lot more tradeoffs.

But yeah - personally, I think the biggest changes to games have been perhaps going from 2d (SNES) to 3d (PS), then from 3d pixelated graphics to substantially nicer and more consistent graphics (PS2). Then from PS2 to PS3, we've had the increase to HD resolution, better sound and much better image quality. PS3 to PS4 - well, not much apart from cleaner graphics... and quieter consoles.

 

[TheWretched]

There's been more change than that.

Just the rise of indie games on consoles is the biggest change. Not that this makes it "next-gen" compared to PS2, but just the availability of obscure games made it worth it. It's been on PC since the dawn of gaming, yes, but never on consoles (bad argument, but still).

3D gaming (also available on PC a long time) also wasn't really an option before, except for just some special cases (Outrun 3D on SMS for example).

Gameplay wise... I guess we've seen "it all" already. It's like in movies. But movies aren't all the same, and neither are games. It's the combinations what makes them different from the old games. Huge sprawling worlds with active AI, day to night transitions and actual consequences from your doing. That's not been on PS2 or earlier. Fallout New Vegas did that. All parts were done before, but not in combination. It'd be hard to do on a 32MB console.

Sony, as well as MS, tried doing some camera stuff. I really loved the "Eyedentify" teaser at the first PS3 E3. Sadly, it was never more than a tech demo. Making the player actual part of the game.

 

[Nesh]

I personally believe that the gameplay jump from PS2 to PS360 was drastic. Worlds became significantly more interactive, AI was drastically improved, physics became a lot more realistic. In addition performance drastically refined the old gameplay.
Just by thinking of all the Uncharted games, thats a next gen jump in all fronts.
KZ2's AI and animations was a whole new world compared to any FPS we got the generation before it.
Bioshock refined the FPS experience and blended beautifully visuals and gameplay that the gen before it wouldnt be able to
perform adequately in order to offer a solid experience. The elemental forces finally could have been presented and interacted with in a manner that they could play a significant role on the gameplay mechanics (ice, fire, electricity, wind, water etc)
Gran Turismo 5 brought us realism that was totally impossible on the PS2. Not just in the visual department but on the gameplay too. The physics, weather conditions, day time transitions were a huge leap from the older games.
The visuals themselves in the transition to PS360 made the games a whole lot more immersive which impacted the gameplay experience. For example Bioshock wouldnt have been possible to convince the underwater, claustrophobic atmosphere on a PS2

I can name more examples but the list would be too big and I am bored.

This gen though offered nothing of the sorts so far except a refined visual presentation. Even the most promising games announced so far dont clearly show a generational improvement of experience. Quantum Break is probably the only game for me that is closer to fulfilling that promise. Oh and one other game. Metal Gear Solid 5 ironically is crossgen yet it manages to convince me.

 

[Billy Idol]

I really think that No Man's Sky offers new gameplay and new tec we haven't had last gen...this game has amazing potential imo and is a pure this gen game [emoji41]

 

[iroboto]

I really think that No Man's Sky offers new gameplay and new tec we haven't had last gen...this game has amazing potential imo and is a pure this gen game [emoji41]

Closest game I've ever played to No Mans Sky was Eve Online. Before that was VGA Planets. Lol

 

[Billy Idol]

Closest game I've ever played to No Mans Sky was Eve Online. Before that was VGA Planets. Lol

What do you mean? I don't understand...Eve online is a completely different game/genre (and is on PC with monthly fees iirc) and I don't know VGA planets...

 

[iroboto]

What do you mean? I don't understand...Eve online is a completely different game/genre (and is on PC with monthly fees iirc) and I don't know VGA planets...

Referring to scope/idea. I would use Star Citizen as the closest example that I could to No Man's Sky, but it's not out yet. Eve isn't procedural generated, but you do fly a ships in a massive universe that has a theoretically infinite space. You can interact with planet denizens who play Dust. It's economic structure vast, it's fleet battles are unmatched in size and scope. VGA planets is a procedural generated game however, but it's a turn based space game with no real scope of planetside things except for mining and technology.

No Man's Sky biggest differentiation is it's ability to transition from world to off-world and back to on world seamlessly. It's not clear of the depth of which that exists however, I believe that Star Citizen has such a feature, but once again I'm not sure of the depth of that either.

But in reference to my post earlier, I was describing some games that had somewhat parallel gameplay to No Man's Sky in terms of scope.

 

[Laa-Yosh]

KZ2's AI and animations was a whole new world compared to any FPS we got the generation before it.

Hate to be the one to bring this up... That may be a big jump for the Playstation, but IMHO Halo CE was the big jump in FPS AI and it happened on the first Xbox. I don't mean to belittle KZ2, and yeah I haven't really played it, but there was precedent on consoles and I'm not sure if we've ever seen any similarly big jumps in other games since that one.

 

[Nesh]

Hate to be the one to bring this up... That may be a big jump for the Playstation, but IMHO Halo CE was the big jump in FPS AI and it happened on the first Xbox. I don't mean to belittle KZ2, and yeah I haven't really played it, but there was precedent on consoles and I'm not sure if we've ever seen any similarly big jumps in other games since that one.

I agree with what you say but I think we are are talking about 2 different things though.
You are referring to the biggest "jump" recorded in the FPS genre, while I am talking about the jump between the 7th and 8th generation. So yeah I agree that Halo was indeed a bigger step forward in its time than what KZ2 was in its own time, but still KZ2's was a significant one.

 

[Newguy]

Latest Assassin's Creed Unity patch boosts performance

"PS4 particularly benefiting [..] In particular, crowded scenes featuring hundreds of NPCs run a little more smoothly than before. While drops down to 20fps and the high teens still occur when the engine is heavily taxed, outside of these situations we see between a 2-5fps increase in performance in some scenes."

"Running through the side streets of Paris, performance treads more closely to the target 30fps, though drops in frame-rate still appear on a regular basis [..] Ultimately, the latest update doesn't give us anything like the near-solid 30fps update that one would expect from a current-generation game, but definitely presents us with a welcome improvement"

"The new patch also improves performance on the Xbox One game, although the difference isn't as noticeable as it is on PS4. The main boost in frame-rate occurs in crowded or high-detail areas where NPCs are found"

On what could have changed:

"after replaying several sections of the game and matching up footage with our previous captures, it's not exactly clear what has been adjusted. The level of detail across the NPCs and the environments appears to be the same, while level of detail (LOD) streaming doesn't seem any different. Some users have reported poorer NPC streaming with the new patch installed, but we couldn't replicate the issue."

"we're still a long way off the locked 30fps seen in Black Flag."

"a number of key bugs are also addressed: we didn't encounter characters falling through scenery and we didn't get stuck outside the world after dying or leaping to our death."

 

[Arwin]

I played an hour or so after the update, on PS4, and it's much better now, to the point where I'd have no hesitation to recommend the game to anyone (who hasn't already played a lot of AC games these last few years and/or likes graphics as much as gameplay and/or has a thing for historical Paris)

 

[Deleted member 11852]

I played an hour or so after the update, on PS4, and it's much better now, to the point where I'd have no hesitation to recommend the game to anyone (who hasn't already played a lot of AC games these last few years and/or likes graphics as much as gameplay and/or has a thing for historical Paris)

I'll definitely give this a shot when the next sale hits.

 

[Laa-Yosh]

Sorry, couldn't resist