The Game Technology discussion thread *Read first post before posting*

[makattack]

30%!

Does that mean Xbox 360 could have true S3D, without going to SD resolution?

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-05-23-full-stereoscopic-3d-hitting-xbox-360

Apparently coming... I suppose they may officially announce it today.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Let's not get confused here! An HDMI update isn't related to all developers dropping DirectX and writing raw assembler to max out the console! The cost of using DX isn't so much measured in performance, but cost to actually make the game. DX and the associated development environment are praised by developers because the enable developers to make the game and have it work well, instead of having to wrestle with low level code. Similarly devs on PS3 will use high-level as much as possible code as they can and only delve into the lower levels if they must or have a particular interest - and when they must use it to get good performance from PS3, they are annoyed at the added workload!

 

[Boxercide]

No S3D announcement from MS. I'd be one of the people without an HDMI 360 mentioned in the article.

 

[AlNom]

Maybe it's coming with the Fall update? Halo Anniversary with S3D? *shrug*

 

[Laa-Yosh]

Well initially I would've said that this game's a perfect candidate for S3D, but its graphics are actually quite detailed...

 

[SedentaryJourney]

Thank you beat me

(((((Interference)))
And yes there many talks and papers about 30% or even more performance gain if codding "on the metal".. and i see recently presentation(pdf) on Frostbite 2 engine says almost same thing.

Which presentation was this and does it mention the 360 specifically? Very curious about the 360 version.

 

[(((interference)))]

I guess what he is saying is that judging by the fact that they have been coding on the metal for the PS3 and not for the 360 while both are getting similar results on screen then the 360 might have been getting much better results if they could get that additional performance

Yes, exactly - look at the stuff Sony's first parties do on PS3 by being able to code to the metal.

IMO while the Direct X API will be fine for the majority of developers there will definintely be some who are willing to spend the extra time on low level coding to get better results - so MS should offer the option to developers.

 

[ShadowRunner]

Id say its the optimising of high level code to specific hardware that gives the most benefit for consoles over PC, rather than just the ability to code to metal, though the two concepts are often talked about as if they are one and the same.

 

[assurdum]

Be careful at some declarations... the things are not that simple & not means exactly what appears in a first glance... we talking when we'll see something of more concrete, but there are a lot of variables to talk of effective 30% & more new 'performance' to release... we need to consider a lot of more things.

 

[Heinrich4]

Which presentation was this and does it mention the 360 specifically? Very curious about the 360 version.

Here about culling presentation page 14 and ahead;


http://www.slideshare.net/DICEStudi...ata-oriented-design-in-practice?from=ss_embed

Is there some mention about performance gain coded diretly(cell /SPUs avoid branchs page 56 etc) :

http://www.slideshare.net/DICEStudio/spubased-deferred-shading-in-battlefield-3-for-playstation-3

 

[Heinrich4]

Be careful at some declarations... the things are not that simple & not means exactly what appears in a first glance... we talking when we'll see something of more concrete, but there are a lot of variables to talk of effective 30% & more new 'performance' to release... we need to consider a lot of more things.

You're right, I want to apologize about 30% in absolute terms, will not always gain of this magnitude,depends on hardware and software optimizations, in fact there many variables, it will not always need to "low level code" (larger complexity, extra work, extra time, extra expense) in-ers hardware able to perform (execution units, branch predition etc.) with great performance in high-level language, but for ps3 perhaps required such effort, see presentations on Dice Frostbite 2 (SPA-SPU Assembler) * Insomniac (on RSX).

* Here and in your site http://www.videogamer.com/ps3/ratch...somniac_now_we_can_perform_tricks_on_ps3.html

 

[kagemaru]

Honestly I took that whole 30% extra performance comment as a sly joke, and some people are debating it?

It's not going to happen, but even if one of these systems was magically proven to be 30% more power than the other, would it really be a big deal?

 

[zed]

I think the ~30% is in a best case scenario (though Im sure you could have cases wheres is more than double) but in an actual game the % increase is always far less than quoted numbers.
Also the flipside is, xbox360 is considered the easier console to program for (which is very beneficial) now if you start using a lowlevel language the ease of programming decreases

 

[assurdum]

Resistance 3 appears to be 960x704.
...

A question: the so low resolution could to depend in someway of 3D?Sound pretty bizzarre the same res at 2D mode...

Mod: Wrong place to ask! This one's for analysis. Ask your question in the game tech thread.

 

[AlNom]

Ah... moved it here.

Good question. I wouldn't think they would tie the 3D res to the 2D one. There must be something else going on with them as they aren't performing the lighting calcs with multisampling. I did notice the framerate was pretty unstable at E3 - it wasn't locked to 30fps, and did seem pretty smooth at times with no action (possibly 60).

 

[N_B]

The framerate is an almost completely solid 30fps in the demo:

 

[AlNom]

Guess the E3 one was old.

 

[Ruskie]

Didn't know where to put this...

Cryengine 3 Rendering Techniques

http://www.crytek.com/cryengine/presentations

Interesting bit :smile:

And, one final interesting bit – there’s still some room on GPU side to push on the x360  - we ended up being CPU bound on the X360 for most cases, particularly during heavy combats (physics/AI/etc)

Seemed like GPU wasn't as big of problem as CPU was.Hopefully they will do even better in 360 exclusive even though Crysis 2 was pretty amazing looking game on 360.

 

[Heinrich4]

Didn't know where to put this...

http://www.crytek.com/cryengine/presentations

Interesting bit :smile:



Seemed like GPU wasn't as big of problem as CPU was.Hopefully they will do even better in 360 exclusive even though Crysis 2 was pretty amazing looking game on 360.

Very interesting and match what Capcom said about Framework MT engine a few years ago that the Xenos GPU was able to play much of a G80/8800GTX could offer.


You could tell which link/presentation to this site specifically appears that information?

And in these presentations appears some information about the ps3?

I found this* information that I understand they dont use for their porposes SPUs in graphic aspect intensively for lack of memory space.

* It seens Crysis 2 in ps3 is RSX based:

"The SPUs do indeed allow for easing the workload for the RSX. We decided not to go too crazy in this direction as it requires render targets and assets to reside in main memory. We are able to run skinning for example on SPUs as well, but we could not afford the additional memory required in the end," Glück explains".


http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-the-making-of-crysis-2?page=2

 

[AlNom]

I presume the Gamefest (August 1) presentation.