Do exclusive developers push visuals more than AAA developers?

[Shifty Geezer]

If poor framerate isn't connected with optimization, then does that mean that optimizing your rendering pipeline won't have an effect on framerate?

Correlation does not imply causation. Optimisation improves framerate, but that doesn't mean a low framerate is caused by poor optimisation. Heck, 100% perfect code utilising hardware 100% efficiently with just too much stuff happening will cause framerate issues.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

It's surely a combination of factors, but do any of these actually excuse the state of the titles?

This isn't the thread to discuss the choices being made regards release state of games. It's a thread to ascertain what, if anything, differs between 1st and 3rd party output. One can log as evidence 3rd party games having typically worse framerate. That doesn't itself prove that 1st arty devs are technically better.

 

[Clukos]

Correlation does not imply causation. Optimisation improves framerate, but that doesn't mean a low framerate is caused by poor optimisation. Heck, 100% perfect code utilising hardware 100% efficiently with just too much stuff happening will cause framerate issues.

Now that you say it like that maybe i phrased it in a way i didn't intend to. I wasn't trying to say that games performing comparably poorly are poorly optimized. I just believe that games should never rely solely on patches to improve performance or other features, DC is no exception. Players should be able to experience the game as it was intended, day one, not being made to wait 2 months for a fix to be released. And it seems as if it's easier to code for one platform, rather than three. Following this logic, it's easier to get acceptable performance in a first party title than it is for a multi-platform title. Which effectively means that first party developers have less trouble making the game work at acceptable levels, while also having more time to improve it.

This isn't the thread to discuss the choices being made regards release state of games. It's a thread to ascertain what, if anything, differs between 1st and 3rd party output. One can log as evidence 3rd party games having typically worse framerate. That doesn't itself prove that 1st arty devs are technically better.

I never said that, in my first post in this thread i am saying that first party devs often have resources available to them which are not as easily available to TP devs.

 

[Rikimaru]

I mean WHO even greenlit this?

 

[iroboto]

I agree that it's a business choice, as it is a business choice not to use expensive AA or AO techniques in your game to get better performance. My question is, why do multiplatform games tend to perform poorly in comparison to first party games day 1? It's surely a combination of factors, but do any of these actually excuse the state of the titles in question?

You need to really educate yourself about the industry and how things work. I would start here:
http://askagamedev.tumblr.com/post/89661347466/has-anyone-ever-managed-to-forge-a-career-in
The role of the Producer, I'm going to quote a small snippet of a very large post

You can definitely see the results when projects don’t have a strong producer influence. Any game that’s ever been delayed or been released with a lot of bugs are issues that tend to crop up when producers aren’t doing (or aren’t allowed to do) their jobs right. It’s up to them to set the schedule and road map, and up to them to budget and allocate time and manpower to cover the scope of the game. If the producers are overruled or aren’t allowed to rein in the developers, you tend to get things like feature creep, delays, bug infestations, and hellish crunch time near the end of the project.

His blog helps answers a lot of burning questions people have about working in the industry, like topics of DLC, Day One DLC, pre-order bonuses, roles in the game industry, etc. I would suggest reading it through it thoroughly.

You should also look at the number of multiplatform titles that were also able to ship, on time with very few issues, with all differing code bases. There are talented people in every studio, but exclusives are granted exceptions that some multi platforms publishers can't afford, and this mainly has to do with game companies needing to move from project to project, or people will start getting laid off. Not everyone in the company is needed at all stages of development, so in order to keep people employed, you need multiple projects on the go, which also means hard deadlines.

My question is, why do multiplatform games tend to perform poorly in comparison to first party games day 1? It's surely a combination of factors, but do any of these actually excuse the state of the titles in question?

I'll paraphrase your question and perhaps the answer becomes more obvious - why does a privileged studio often ship so much better than a non-privileged studio - surely it's a combination of factors (like exclusives are provided better marketing, hardware support, time, money...), but do any of these reasons actually excuse non-privileged studios from not being able to perform the same?

 

[NRP]

Good post, iroboto. That link was a good read. Thanks for that. I've always wondered what producers actually do.

 

[Clukos]

Yep, thanks for that, that was indeed a good read. This also explains why studios can sustain a certain level of quality across multiple platforms and in different game genres or why the opposite may happen. This is pretty much HRM at this point

 

[VFX_Veteran]

Basically, when you hear someone talking about the best game/dev ever, there's little to argue. That's their view and it's a view quite possibly completely true to the person saying it. There is no argument or trying to point out they're wrong because the opinion comes from their emotional response, which may well include platform bias (and platform bias isn't a sin). May as well try and argue who's the most beautiful woman/man in the world. The solution here is to learn to be comfortable with other people's POV. The only future for this discussion in this thread is if you and others provide breakdowns of game tech for specific titles to compare, in an attempt to determine if there's an 'objective' basis for people's preference to certain titles (is it overall feature quality score that matters, or highest score, and something else).

Which is exactly what I tried to do in a previous comment without going into too much detail. Basically I'd say it would take too long to judge a 1-10 scale for each graphical feature..

 

[psorcerer]

You can't prove to me with any exclusive game that it shows graphical superiority over multiplatform game engines.

I can compare games. And they clearly have "graphical superiority". Comparing engines is pointless.

 

[psorcerer]

AC could have launched with stable framerate

You cannot prove that. And the real facts on the field show us that multiplatform titles rarely, if ever, ship with a stable framerate.

Heck, 100% perfect code utilising hardware 100% efficiently with just too much stuff happening will cause framerate issues.

That's not how you define optimization. Optimization is done for specific hardware. You cannot write "100% perfect code" in vacuum. I.e. if "100% perfect code" does not lead to any bottleneck the framerate is infinity. Therefore there is no such thing as "100% perfect code" there is only a code that successfully leverages hardware for specific needs. And the better it leverages the hardware the better it is. And the needs usually include "stable framerate" (not on PC, but on consoles).

 

[VFX_Veteran]

1) No effect is perfect, all these AO, SSS hacks have flaws but it's better than nothing.
2) Still looks good but I guess you're right technically.
3) Yes it's in the gameplay, when he's stuck inside that flipped jeep. A default camera view is not most noticeable tho.
4) Sorry but neither Batman or SW got nothing on UC4's vehicle explosion, like by a wide margin.
5) If it looks good it looks good, fire certainly looks better in UC4 no regardless of sprites or fluid based. The Order does look comparable tho.
So you listed a whole bunch of games including TW3, The Order, Ryse, Batman etc to counter what UC4 one single game is doing, isn't that bit unfair? As I was saying earlier, UC4 has god tier balance, not only does it have a good variety of techniques but most of them are of good quality. Not a single game you listed has all those feats. Or another word, UC4 is the most well rounded game graphically speaking.

No it's not. I pointed out what UC4 had -- physics and animation. Everything else is par for the course compared to other games.

And that flames under the jeep is still an in-game cutscene. You can only move forward. I can almost guarantee the camera will be fix or have little wiggle room.

We'll just have to disagree on the explosions. Batman AK and SW:Battlefront appear to cause explosions at will (i.e. whenever you want). This demo appears to be a scene on rails (i.e. you can't turn around -- you are forced to keep moving forward).

 

[DrJay24]

This demo appears to be a scene on rails (i.e. you can't turn around -- you are forced to keep moving forward).

You realize that the demo started at the top of the hill in the town on foot?

 

[VFX_Veteran]

I can compare games. And they clearly have "graphical superiority". Comparing engines is pointless.

Go. I'm listening. Just keep it objective and not subjective.

 

[chris1515]

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2...he-witcher-3-graphics-downgrade-issue-head-on

Did the console versions restrict the PC version?

"If the consoles are not involved there is no Witcher 3 as it is," answers Marcin Iwinski, definitively. "We can lay it out that simply. We just cannot afford it, because consoles allow us to go higher in terms of the possible or achievable sales; have a higher budget for the game, and invest it all into developing this huge, gigantic world.

"Developing only for the PC: yes, probably we could get more [in terms of graphics] as there would be nothing else - they would be so focused, like if we would develop only on Xbox One or PlayStation 4. But then we cannot afford such a game."

CDPROJEKT said than if they developed an exclusive version of The Witcher 3 it would be better than the current version for each platform. An exclusive PS4 version would be better than a PS4 multi version, same thing for Xbox One or PC...

Edit: And the word they used is "focused" Multi platform is a compromise for all platform...

 

[Clukos]

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2...he-witcher-3-graphics-downgrade-issue-head-on

CDPROJEKT said than if they develop exclusive version of The Witcher 3 it will be better than the current version for each platform. An exclusive PS4 version will be better than a multi version, same thing for Xbox One or PC...

Edit: And the word they used is "focused"

I guess that answers OP. And it makes sense too, allocation of the same resources on one platform yields better results than allocation in three. It doesn't only have to do with how good teams may be - even though it may be said that teams like CDPR and ND consistently produce great games - but also how focused is their project. ND recently announced that U4 will be delayed due to the increased scope of the project for example. This is probably what Ubisoft should have done with AC: Unity as well but that's history now, at least i got FC4 for free out of that debacle

 

[DrJay24]

Go. I'm listening. Just keep it objective and not subjective.

Says the guy an a self proclaimed mission to prove to those evil PS fanboys that Playstation exclusives do not look better. You have made up your mind. You even started a blog where your first article was to knock Driveclub's graphics down a notch to show those fanboys a thing or two. Of course you had several errors, two of which I pointed out

 

[chris1515]

UC4 or Horizon or Quantum Break or Star Citizen are impressive but I think the most interesting game from technical side is Dreams. I hope it is the first game of a serie and other will take this way of 100% software GPU rendering without using rasterizer polygon on all platform...

http://www.mediamolecule.com/about/team

They are 53 and have many programmer 16 more than artist but they have so much things to do with a complete new graphics pipeline, a new custom physics engine, new tools and so on. Use the DS4 and camera in a unique a way and VR. All of this in 1080p and 60 fps... I think it is an AA game not as expensive to make than AAA games but more expensive than the average indie games...

 

[pjbliverpool]

If it was the case, every high budget movie would have success linearly dependent on the budget used, but they are not.
Entertainment titles do not work like that. You either have a team of heroes, that win, or you don't. No amount of money can give you them.
The only difference between AAA game and AAA movie is that you absolutely must have "hero" programmers alongside "hero" artists/game designers/etc.
When producing a move the tech side is not that important, and it comes from the frame-rate difference: to make a frame that renders in 1 hour vs one that renders in 30 ms you will need people on the whole another level of tech excellence.

That's not what I meant by my statement - although I can see how it could have been interpreted that way. I meant that if you have an advantage in having to only code to a single API for an exclusive, you can directly counter that advantage (all other things being equal) with a larger budget/development team to pick up the extra work of targeting the second API. Obviously that only holds if the skill of the additional team members is equivalent to the existing ones.

My belief is that first party studios will always have an advantage just because they know the hardware better,.

There are plenty of very highly skilled and extremely knowledgeable devs out there, some of them are on this forum, I think you're doing them a disservice by assuming that they are fundamentally less skilled with or knowledgeable about a particular system.

 

[chris1515]

That's not what I meant by my statement - although I can see how it could have been interpreted that way. I meant that if you have an advantage in having to only code to a single API for an exclusive, you can directly counter that advantage (all other things being equal) with a larger budget/development team to pick up the extra work of targeting the second API. Obviously that only holds if the skill of the additional team members is equivalent to the existing ones.



There are plenty of very highly skilled and extremely knowledgeable devs out there, some of them are on this forum, I think you're doing them a disservice by assuming that they are fundamentally less skilled with or knowledgeable about a particular system.

I don't think it means muliplaform devs aren't skilled. It is just that exclusive studio can focus on one platform... The other need to share the effort on 3 platforms...

 

[pjbliverpool]

I've noticed some pc centric guys tend to focus on list wars where the more check boxes you tick no matter how insignificant they add to the overall visual, would be favored more.

And then.....

You seem to hold high esteem with ACU and Batman, well they aren't entirely comparable for the amount of resources they dedicate to different part of the engine. But character wise, Drake definitely looks above Arno and Batman, with the former uses SSS, SSS on hair, deformable muscle sim and possibly silhouette tessellation or just really high polys. Effects wise UC4 definitely takes this, better looking explosions, fire, mud, smoke and possibly snow. Physics goes to UC4 too since I've yet to see any game does so many breakable and moving objects affected by physics, Batman comes close tho. And yes physics and animation add to the visual presentation drastically, screenshot war is one thing, but in motion is another ballpark. The world of UC4 just feels more alive than The Order for example. And environment wise, UC4 has some of the best foliage in the business, that PSX demo showed a level of foliage density, texture res, foliage collision detection not seen in any open world game.