Digital Foundry Article Technical Discussion Archive [2015]

[Recop]

The Order 1886 is 1920x800/30fps and still very impressive.

Resolution and framerate are only a part of the technological package.

Battlefront is certainly more demanding than Plants vs Zombies which runs at 1080p/60fps on PS4 (with the same engine).

And Plants vs Zombies is certainly less demanding than Uncharted 4 (1080p/30fps).

But since i'm not a developer, i could be wrong though.

 

[function]

The things is that 60 fps games don't get a pass on the quality of screenshots just because they're doing twice the work.

All the games that have excited the plebs this generation have been 30 fps, and games like Halo 5 and Forza 6 have been targeted for not "looking as good" as some 30 fps games.

60 fps is the hard road, for sure. It's why it's so often the road not taken.

 

[function]

If the games have the same scope, sure, which never happens between 30 and 60fps games.

What are you thinking of in terms of 'scope'?

There are 60 fps games that have larger worlds, more players, more content, more detailed user level editing/building tools, etc than some competing 30 fps titles.

 

[Recop]

The things is that 60 fps games don't get a pass on the quality of screenshots just because they're doing twice the work.

All the games that have excited the plebs this generation have been 30 fps, and games like Halo 5 and Forza 6 have been targeted for not "looking as good" as some 30 fps games.

60 fps is the hard road, for sure. It's why it's so often the road not taken.

If i understood forumaccount correctly, it's harder only if you're able to run the same content at 60fps.

For instance, if Drive Club can run at 60fps without any downgrade, then it's harder.

But if to reach that target they remove the dynamic weather, "the scope" isn't the same anymore.

 

[function]

If i understood forumaccount correctly, it's harder only if you're able to run the same content at 60fps.

For instance, if Drive Club can run at 60fps without any downgrade, then it's harder.

But if to reach that target they remove the dynamic weather, "the scope" isn't the same anymore.

Not all 30 fps driving games have dynamic weather. With a 60 fps game you have to get (almost) everything to fit within half the update interval. With 30 fps you don't have to make (almost) everything do double the work.

Think of the tremendous looking Uncharted 4. They had to accept that they couldn't hit the 60 fps that they wanted to for single player. No doubt they've used the extra time to improve the visuals as much as they can, but it seems unlikely that the "scope" of everything "doubled" (if you can even apply a uniform multiplier to something like "scope"!).

 

[Billy Idol]

Yes. But if 900p @ 60 fps is embarassing, then most released games are techlologically embarassing, since 1080p @ 30 fps is considerably less technologically challenging than 900p @ 60 fps.

Oh, I see what you mean and I never have thought about it that way...

 

[Clukos]

Not all 30 fps driving games have dynamic weather. With a 60 fps game you have to get (almost) everything to fit within half the update interval. With 30 fps you don't have to make (almost) everything do double the work.

Think of the tremendous looking Uncharted 4. They had to accept that they couldn't hit the 60 fps that they wanted to for single player. No doubt they've used the extra time to improve the visuals as much as they can, but it seems unlikely that the "scope" of everything "doubled" (if you can even apply a uniform multiplier to something like "scope"!).

Scope = Original_design/Target_framerate?

Joking aside, the lead game designer at ND said in a stream (i think it was the stream where they showcased Sams Pursuit demo) that if they wanted to hit 60 for single player they would basically have to remove entire levels because they would need too much time to get performance up to par and that would mean they wouldn't be able to hit their deadlines. That could either mean removing parts of the story, advanced physics or anything else to hit that target framerate. Which in effect lowers the "scope" of the game.

 

[Recop]

Not all 30 fps driving games have dynamic weather. With a 60 fps game you have to get (almost) everything to fit within half the update interval. With 30 fps you don't have to make (almost) everything do double the work.

Think of the tremendous looking Uncharted 4. They had to accept that they couldn't hit the 60 fps that they wanted to for single player. No doubt they've used the extra time to improve the visuals as much as they can, but it seems unlikely that the "scope" of everything "doubled" (if you can even apply a uniform multiplier to something like "scope"!).

I think this doesn't work like that. On PC, you should compare the framerate between low and ultra settings for a same game.

60fps means a lof of compromises which aren't usually made at 30fps.

 

[Davros]

Ive asked this several times but never really received an answer why does it have to be 60 or 30 why cant it be something else ?

if they wanted to hit 60 for single player they would basically have to remove entire levels because they would need too much time to get performance up to par and that would mean they wouldn't be able to hit their deadlines.

that quote is also saying 60fps is possible if they had more time.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Ive asked this several times but never really received an answer...

Every time it's the same answer. If your framerate isn't a factor of your display refresh, you get irregular frame pacing and judder. That's why nVidia invented G-Sync and AMD produced FreeSync, to allow for even paced frames at non-60 fps factors (and in tearing cases to shift pacing a bit, replacing tearing with very subtle judder but not jarring whole frame intervals).

 

[Recop]

that quote is also saying 60fps is possible if they had more time.

Anyway, they won't say the PS4 can't run the game at 60fps. They won't say anything that can hurt Sony.

So, it's difficult to really know.

 

[Clukos]

Any game can run at 60, of course it's improbable that you'll reach the same quality when running at 30. The good thing with Uncharted 4 is multiplayer will most probably run at 60 so we'll be able to compare between the two.

 

[Davros]

I bet if whatever game your discussing gets ported to p.c the devs will feel no need whatsoever to lock the framerate to some factor of 60

 

[Shortbread]

Face-Off: Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception on PS4

Image quality is also consistent with the rest of the collection. We see full 1080p with excellent post-process anti-aliasing employed, along with variable levels of texture filtering quality, seemingly deployed on a per-surface basis. On PS3, Uncharted 3 utilises a less refined post-process anti-aliasing solution that struggles with long edges and high contrast areas resulting in plenty of shimmering. The implementation on PS4 offers superior coverage with minimal sub-pixel pop from frame-to-frame.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I bet if whatever game your discussing gets ported to p.c the devs will feel no need whatsoever to lock the framerate to some factor of 60

PC has suffered from tearing and judder since forever for this reason. Back in the PS2 era and earlier, consoles provided a consistent QOS that PCs couldn't match. That became less important last gen with more prolific tearing and judder. At least by my estimation, although I certainly no games have always compromised frame stability for game design to some degree, and games like GOW on PS2 had horrific tearing at times. But there has been reason to target solid 60 or 30 fps, and a good reason not to stick at something like 40-45 fps in way a PC didn't care about simply because it is in the hands of the PC owner to chose the settings to hit the framerate and resolution they are comfortable with. It's quite frankly impossible to design for a solid 60 or 30 fps on PC!

 

[sebbbi]

Every time it's the same answer. If your framerate isn't a factor of your display refresh, you get irregular frame pacing and judder. That's why nVidia invented G-Sync and AMD produced FreeSync, to allow for even paced frames at non-60 fps factors (and in tearing cases to shift pacing a bit, replacing tearing with very subtle judder but not jarring whole frame intervals).

Exactly. G-sync is proprietary (some specific monitors only) and Freesync is a Displayport feature. HDMI standard doesn't have a similar feature yet. Thus the game consoles cannot support it. Hopefully flexible vsync support will be added to the next version of the HDMI standard. This would allow console games to output any frame rate without tearing and/or judder.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

PC has suffered from tearing and judder since forever for this reason. Back in the PS2 era and earlier, consoles provided a consistent QOS that PCs couldn't match. That became less important last gen with more prolific tearing and judder. At least by my estimation, although I certainly no games have always compromised frame stability for game design to some degree, and games like GOW on PS2 had horrific tearing at times. But there has been reason to target solid 60 or 30 fps, and a good reason not to stick at something like 40-45 fps in way a PC didn't care about simply because it is in the hands of the PC owner to chose the settings to hit the framerate and resolution they are comfortable with. It's quite frankly impossible to design for a solid 60 or 30 fps on PC!

Hmmm? Locked 60 was always an option for a PC gamer during the PS2 era. But unlike consoles players they also had the option to forgo any locked framerate if they desired. A few games even offered locked 30 fps gameplay. When I say locked I mean either frame limited or Vsync limited or both. With the option for double or triple buffering. This has basically existed since the advent of 3D accelerated gaming on PC, which is PS1 era.

Anything I played competitively (professionally) I either played at a locked 60, 75, or 85 (CRTs with variable max refresh depending on resolution) or unlocked at higher than 60 FPS. It's just that developers offered customizeable game settings and then left it up to the gamer to choose what level of performance they wanted at what level of IQ they wanted.

While many players tuned their games for consistent performance (like some but not all console games, some console games had performance issues on PS2), some would just crank everything to maximum and then complain about performance if it didn't operate smoothly.

I won't get into the whole semi-political debate about how games for PC are designed (or in most cases, "ported to") now days, but I'll just say I'm glad there are still some developers that follow that decades old design philosophy of allowing the gamer to choose the performance level and IQ they desire.

Regards,
SB

 

[Arwin]

Forgot to mention Project Cars on consoles which has a lot of graphics options, some of which affect the frame rate.

Reason for not locking on PC is that it is simply too hard to make the best possible balance between graphics and a stable frame rate on PC with so many different components to support in various combinations.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

DF: The Witcher 3 patch 1.10 gives PS4 the boost it's been waiting for
But Xbox One takes a hit*

*FFS, CDPR! ​

 

[Shortbread]

DF: The Witcher 3 patch 1.10 gives PS4 the boost it's been waiting for
But Xbox One takes a hit*

*FFS, CDPR! ​

The good news first. PS4 benefits hugely from the update, and our first stress-test in Crookback Bog shows the biggest gains in the shift to patch 1.10. This area's fog and water transparency effects push the engine hardest, and notoriously, prior versions of the game locked PS4 to the 20fps line here. But with everything updated fully, frame-rates now stick closer to the 30fps line across the entirety of our run. At points this gives The Witcher 3 a boost of 10fps overall on PS4, and it overtakes a fully-patched Xbox One version in direct comparison.

So all the talk (warrior noise) that PS4 edition should drop from 1080p to 900p (on matching XB1 performance) was a bunch of bull 'of course'. So, why in the hell did CDPR felt it was OK on capping the PS4 edition... for sh**s and giggles?