Digital Foundry Article Technical Discussion Archive [2014]

[AlNom]

I think we've had enough arguments about 30fps things.

 

[Xbat]

Having someone comment on your work before it's done is pretty much the most common thing ever in creative lines of work. People judge movies by their trailers, and whoever does anything for the movie (or game) has his work reviewed pretty much 24/7 before it's being green-lit too.

Yes but games also have a technical aspect to them. Like test driving a Ferrari but the new engine is not done so its using an older engine in the meantime,looks beautiful but performance isnt up to scratch. It would be disingenuous to comment about its performance.

Sorry for going ot I will stop now.

 

[ultragpu]

So everything that's shown at E3 for Far Cry 4 was all on PS4 at 1792x1008p /30. Not bad, considering at no point did I spot any blurriness of an upscaled image. I honestly thought it's 1080p native.
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2014-hands-on-with-far-cry-4

Though asked about the technical aspects of the game, it's still too early for the team to commit to a lock on metrics. Resolution remains a moving target, it seems, as it strives to optimise between visual quality and performance on PS4. Nevertheless, based on the in-engine cut-scene shown at Ubisoft's conference - introducing our antagonist Pagan Min - we determine that horizontal resolution is currently in the region of 1792 pixels. Assuming a similar ratio on the vertical, that would translate to the game operating at 1008p.

I have good faith they'll hit 1920x1080 by release.

 

[Globalisateur]

Well, Ubisoft Montreal 3D Tech lead Michal Drobot recently said that FC4 (the gameplay E3 video) runs at 1080p on PS4.

Apparently DF counted 1008p on a cinematic, maybe they reduced the resolution for the cinematics in order that it runs perfectly locked during the vsynced locked cutscenes. It wouldn't be the first time.

That's strange that they firmly announce a gameplay resolution just based on one cinematic. Didn't they already reviewed games such as Tomb Raider XB1 and Wolfenstein were the cinematics resolution were often lower compared to the gameplay?

 

[ultragpu]

Maybe the stage demo was a different build than the show floor build? Does even tech lead make mistakes like this?

 

[Globalisateur]

Maybe the stage demo was a different build than the show floor build? Does even tech lead make mistakes like this?

Yes you are definitely right. Apparently they had different builds for E3. But the game is confirmed to be using temporal supersampling AA (he called it "fancy AA" lol) on the showfloor build even if that "fancy" AA was missing on the E3 stage gameplay.

And apparently the game looks even better now than at E3!

After AC4, Watch_dogs and now Far Cry 4 all using morphological TAA I guess we can safely say no more shi*** FXAA on all AAA Ubisoft 30fps games on consoles confirmed! Only customized SMAA TAA! So glad!

 

[ultragpu]

Yes you are definitely right. Apparently they had different builds for E3. But the game is confirmed to be using temporal supersampling AA (he called it "fancy AA" lol) on the showfloor build even if that "fancy" AA was missing on the E3 stage gameplay.

And apparently the game looks even better now than at E3!

After AC4, Watch_dogs and now Far Cry 4 all using morphological TAA I guess we can safely say no more shi*** FXAA on all AAA Ubisoft 30fps games on consoles confirmed! Only customized SMAA TAA! So glad!

Very good to hear, maybe DF should update their article on a show floor demo. Can you link me to the sources by any chance?

 

[Globalisateur]

Very good to hear, maybe DF should update their article on a show floor demo. Can you link me to the sources by any chance?

My sources are only the recent tweets from 3D tech lead of Ubisoft Montreal, Michal Drobot:

https://twitter.com/MichalDrobot/with_replies

 

[Shortbread]

So everything that's shown at E3 for Far Cry 4 was all on PS4 at 1792x1008p /30. Not bad, considering at no point did I spot any blurriness of an upscaled image. I honestly thought it's 1080p native.
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2014-hands-on-with-far-cry-4

I have good faith they'll hit 1920x1080 by release.

DF insightful as usual... but from what I heard, the cinematic/cutscene parts use a higher AA solution, while the actual gameplay falls back on a lower AA sample. DF may want to actually pixel count actual gameplay though.

 

[Strange]

Isn't it not uncommon that devs showcase relatively earlier builds in shows?

It may be the case that they're showing something a couple of months/weeks ago, thus the discrepancy.

 

[ultragpu]

My sources are only the recent tweets from 3D tech lead of Ubisoft Montreal, Michal Drobot:

https://twitter.com/MichalDrobot/with_replies

Thanks, well hope he takes notice of DF and reconfirm with us.

 

[Blizzje]

Thanks, well hope he takes notice of DF and reconfirm with us.

To get the confirmation, can any of you take the time to ask him on Twitter? I've already done so and hope to receive an answer to clear this up. Usually he's very open about his coding.

 

[Blizzje]

Actually, what would we need to do a pixel count of the Far Cry 4 E3 gameplay ourselves? Any applications that allow for quick and dirty counts or is it a complicated process?

... getting kind of curious to see if there is a difference between cutscenes and actual gameplay.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Actually, what would we need to do a pixel count of the Far Cry 4 E3 gameplay ourselves?

We have a thread that does that, including a How To... http://forum.beyond3d.com/showthread.php?t=50676

However, the expert pixel counters tend to count for DF anyway AFAIK. It never hurts to have a few more eyes involved and DF aren't perfect, but by and large they're reliable and DF does all the hard work for us. eg. For the Uncharted 4 pixel count, someone had to go through frame-by-frame looking for a sharp edge to count.

 

[AlNom]

It never hurts to have a few more eyes involved and DF aren't perfect

Far Cry 4 included. Oops.

 

[Globalisateur]

EA sports UFC PS4 vs XB1

Very interestingly, I noticed that the framerates drops (or only torn frames) on the PS4 version are very often occuring every ~2 seconds repeatedly and they don't look dependant of the scene complexity: They can occur before the start of the match or when the fighers are doing nothing etc...

Also sometimes it a 31fps spike, not a torn frame/29fps drop.

It really looks like like it comes from a bad engine optimization...but only for the PS4 version. A lack of polish for this version, probably. I remember DF wrote XB1 Watch_dogs had more screen tearing because of lack of polish but here it really occurs randomly and not when the engine is heavily stressed like with Watch_dogs on XB1...

Anyway very surprising that DF didn't notice the often suspicious approximative regularity (every ~2 seconds) of the torn frames on the PS4 version.

 

[Npl]

sounds like memory relocations. Some standard C++ containers like deques can do this after a fixed amount of data, and you usually have pull your data through several of them. And to add some more substance - the implementation in Visual studio doesnt do this (well under common circumstances), while the gcc one does. No idea how the libraries from Sony deal with it, but if they are based on the "standard historical behavior" (like gcc) and the issue really is the standard C++ queues then you have cross-platform code that has periodical spikes on PS4 and none on Xbox/PC.

 

[Shortbread]

Does Assassin's Creed Unity feel like a generational leap?

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/d...sins-creed-unit-feel-like-a-generational-leap

This sense of familiarity is accentuated by the rigid geometry of the world, which you could argue doesn't feel that far removed from the capabilities of PS3, Xbox 360 or Wii U. This is still a world of crates, flagpoles and other objects that have been deliberately placed to aid Arno's fluid parkour navigation, and this recognisable visual language puts you in mind of older games no matter how beautiful the textures.

Once you go past that, however, Unity starts to impress. Running on a PC with similar specifications to Xbox One (or so we're told), and reputedly targeting full 1080p according to the Ubisoft staff on hand at the show (although we've been around the block enough times to take that with a pinch of salt), it's a wonderfully detailed game.

Given all these changes, though, how does performance hold up from the solid 30fps lock of Assassin's Creed 4? At this stage it's hard to say, particularly given that we're only seeing the game on a PC with unknown specs, even if we're told they're comparable to Xbox One. (PC won't quite replicate the ESRAM set-up unique to the console, it's worth noting, while the inexpensive Radeon R7 260X graphics card easily outpace Xbox One based on every title we've played, and it's hard to imagine the demo PC is using such limited hardware.) But there is currently no frame lock in evidence; v-sync is enabled, but we get a frame-rate that ranges from 20fps among busy crowds to around 50fps in the less demanding interiors. Optimisation will continue up to and perhaps even beyond release, of course, but this is still a little wobbly for our liking.

 

[shredenvain]

I dont get why they want to hit 60 fps for AC unity anyway.
Im sure it will look sleek but is it really needed?

 

[Shortbread]

I dont get why they want to hit 60 fps for AC unity anyway.
Im sure it will look sleek but is it really needed?

I’m more concerned with PS360 still being in the mix. This 3rd party cross-generational development stuff needs to end soon.