Frostbite 3 vs CryEngine 3

[Carfax83]

Now that Battlefield 4 has been out for a while, how do you think the Frostbite 3 engine stacks up against CryEngine 3 in terms of visuals and performance?

I played the Battlefield 4 single player campaign yesterday, and while I wasn't overly impressed with the first level, as I progressed through the game, I began to see that the Frostbite 3 engine is certainly capable of generating some spectacular images and set pieces.

Although the single player campaign probably isn't the best way to judge the full capabilities of the engine as DICE obviously didn't put much effort into it, it still makes enough of an impression to form a valid opinion...

In the end though, I think CryEngine 3 is the better engine overall. No game that I've yet seen manages to surpass Crysis 3 in the graphics department, and when it comes to performance, CryEngine 3 has the edge on Frostbite 3 as well.

Playing the BF4 single player campaign, there was activity on all 12 threads on my CPU, but one thread always had a higher load than the others. With Crysis 3, the load balance is much more even, and as a result, Crysis 3 fully loads both my GPUs to 99% and object pop in is less noticeable as the CPU can feed the GPUs instructions faster..

I'm sure BF4's performance will increase over time as patches and driver updates roll out, but it's a shame that we won't really get to see what the engine is fully capable of doing until perhaps Dragon Age 3 Inquisition comes out..

 

[VulgarDisplay]

I'm playing the single player in BF4 right now and I still haven't bought crysis 3 yet. My observations compared to Crysis2 are that both games have CRAP models that aren't part of the main story line.

NPC's and vehicles in both games look like complete trash if they are not a main character. That is really annoying because it totally breaks the immersion. Look at a gloriously detailed character and then turn left and see Generic Civilian Model 1 with horrible textures and a blob looking appearance and the immersion is immediately ruined.

It's just crazy to me that they can't up the production value of those aspects of the games, but I'm sure it's completely tied to money.

Crysis 2 had a much better single player campaign than BF4 and BF3 in terms of story. I'm way off topic here, but DICE should never make a single player game again. They are horrible at it. BF4 is actually worse than 3. I can't believe they regressed considering how I thought the only thing they could do after BF3 single player was improve because it was so bad.

They should stick to the comedic single player of Bad Company. I don't understand why they can make those games entertaining and decent, but their main franchise is just horrible. The dialogue,. story, and acting is so bad in all their games but I think Bad Company's saving grace is that the ridiculous story and bad acting/characters are the punchline. When they take themselves seriously I'm waiting for the punchline that never comes and I shake my head thinking that they seriously thought they had something good in this game because they never made fun of how horrible it all is.

 

[Grooveriding]

Frostbite 3.

CE3 and FB3 are the best engines out currently, but FB3 takes the edge in my opinion. Paracel Island is gorgeous in multiplayer! I don't know about the single player and I'll likely never try it to be honest.

Frostbite 3 is an engine that is not just focused on amazing visuals, but also its ability to scale and the scope of what it can provide. Using the same hardware set CE3 is amazing as well but could never provide the experience of BF4 multiplayer, your system would choke and die. Whereas FB3 scales and still performs well even with a huge map with 64 player characters interacting in the same environment with vehicles and destruction. It's really impressive.

DICE has said they are focused on making FB3 able to scale for what is available now and into the future as hardware improves. This is why you see it taking full advantage of hexcore CPUs, powerful GPUs and memory etc.

In general I also feel DICE just makes far more impressive games taken as an entire package. Crytek does gorgeous single player games well but they have abysmal multiplayer and always have. Also the scale of their games is getting much smaller, just look at the difference in level size of Crysis/Warhead vs Crysis 2 and 3.

 

[Phynaz]

Can you really decide which engine is better based upon one game from each?

 

[5150Joker]

All I know is BF4 is full of bugs and the netcode is terrible. So if this is what DICE can do, its a poor showing.

 

[VulgarDisplay]

All I know is BF4 is full of bugs and the netcode is terrible. So if this is what DICE can do, its a poor showing.

I think the netcode problems are entirely due to ridiculously overloaded server hardware.

Even in BF3 one Chicago server for me could be far better than another. For instance, the iO Metro server played like a LAN for me at 16ms ping while the BBF server had a 1-2 second delay in my game at the same ping.

In BF4 I've experienced the exact same thing. Some servers play amazing and others I can't buy a kill even though I maintain like a 23-24% accuracy with fully auto guns which is borderline aimbotting.

 

[blackwhiskers]

where's the option "neither, both are good"?

pure graphics-wise, crysis 3 has a lead over bf3/4, imo, but then again I haven't seen anything like bf3/4 multiplayer on cryengine, so who knows whether it can pull off the same massive scale frostbite games can have.

 

[flopper]

All I know is BF4 is full of bugs and the netcode is terrible. So if this is what DICE can do, its a poor showing.

problem they have Bf4 isnt the battlefield experience I grow up with for 10 years.
its a call of duty clone.
add bad netcode and time to kill way to fast and the way they measure things what happens, its just another anoying game from dice to play.

no matter how good it looks, gameplay kills it.

 

[hyrule4927]

We need an "I am not going to pretend that I actually have enough experience with game engine design to express an educated opinion on this matter" option. Otherwise all we are really determining is whether people have a better perception of Crysis 3 or BF4.

 

[Carfax83]

Frostbite 3 is an engine that is not just focused on amazing visuals, but also its ability to scale and the scope of what it can provide. Using the same hardware set CE3 is amazing as well but could never provide the experience of BF4 multiplayer, your system would choke and die. Whereas FB3 scales and still performs well even with a huge map with 64 player characters interacting in the same environment with vehicles and destruction. It's really impressive.

I agree that the greatest strength of the FB 3.0 engine is it's ability to render large scale environments and interaction..

That's why I was surprised at how poorly it was using my hardware in comparison to Crysis 3. I monitored my CPU, GPU and RAM usage during the single player campaign, and this is what I found:

1) All threads were utilized, but were uneven in load. One thread saw 70%+ utilization on a regular basis, but most of the others were stuck at anywhere from 10 to 40%..

2) GPU Utilization was anywhere from the 50s to the 80s for the majority of the time with spikes into the 90s. VRAM usage maxed out at 2.2 GB.

3) RAM usage topped out at 2.8GB, which is still well under the 32 bit threshold despite using the 64 bit client.

Now compared to Crysis 3:

1) More even CPU load across all threads.. No one thread was loaded more than the others.

2) GPU utilization was steady at 99% on both GPUs, and VRAM usage topped out at 2.2GB.

3) RAM usage remains under 2GB.

That's what I used to form my opinion. It definitely seems as though CryEngine 3 has superior CPU and GPU utilization, and as a result, object pop in is not very noticeable.

In the BF4 single player campaign, object pop in could be glaring at times, even though all settings were on Ultra with the exception of MSAA which was at 2x, and FOV was set to 90.

DICE has said they are focused on making FB3 able to scale for what is available now and into the future as hardware improves. This is why you see it taking full advantage of hexcore CPUs, powerful GPUs and memory etc.

Do you see full GPU utilization in the multiplayer campaigns?

That's often a sign of how well the engine is utilizing the CPU.

Also the scale of their games is getting much smaller, just look at the difference in level size of Crysis/Warhead vs Crysis 2 and 3.

Yeah but that's a developer design decision (due to the consoles), and not a technical limitation of the engine.. CryEngine 3 is superior in every respect to the original CryEngine, and if that engine could make the huge environments in Crysis, then CryEngine 3 should be capable of doing much more.

 

[Carfax83]

Can you really decide which engine is better based upon one game from each?

You can't make a final decision, but you can give your opinion..

 

[Carfax83]

We need an "I am not going to pretend that I actually have enough experience with game engine design to express an educated opinion on this matter" option. Otherwise all we are really determining is whether people have a better perception of Crysis 3 or BF4.

People talk about things on this forum without fully understanding them all the time. Just because you don't have deep understanding of something, doesn't mean you can't offer an opinion.

For example, while I have not the foggiest clue about how to design a 3D engine, I formed my opinion about the CryEngine 3 and Frostbite 3 on how well Crysis 3 and Battlefield 4 SP utilized my hardware.

Hardware utilization is a critical function of a 3D engine, and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to monitor CPU, GPU and RAM usage during a game..

 

[blackened23]

I sunk over 600 hours into bf3 so of course i'm going to like frostbite 3 better. The focus with BF4 is different than crysis 3 - crysis 3 is a single player game first and MP game a distant 27th. In other words, MP in crysis 3 is hilarious, horrible joke. BF4 is designed from the ground up for multiplayer - having TONS of players, chaos and objects flying around everywhere all at once. Having played crysis 3, cryengine 3 isn't designed as well for that specific type of gameplay. It looks utterly fantastic in single player, but for MP? It doesn't do the same things which Frostbite 3 does.

Also, I'd have to agree with the above poster mentioning the game design makes a big difference. Again, BF4 is geared to competetition while Crysis 3 is designed to look pretty in single player. These are only single game representations of the engine. I mean, you can look at other cryengine 3 implementations such as Ryse, and it looks like garbage. That is partially attributable to the XB1 of course, but still. The design and focus of the game changes everything. Cryengine 3 can't do what frostbite 3 can in 64 player multiplayer. Not even close. And that is what BF4 is designed from the ground up for, and cryengine 3 isn't - crysis 3 multiplayer is basically a joke. But it's a great looking first person SP game.

Basically you're comparing apples to cantelopes here. You can't do a proper comparison like this because the focus of the games are completely different. Nobody gives a flying EF about single player in BF4. That's not what the game is about. It's about competition. Like Fighting games - Street Fighter IV AE - it's all about competition. Again, Cryengine can't hold a candle to frostbite 3 in huge MP battles. The engine isn't designed for such - it is only designed to look pretty in single player with borderline gameplay.

 

[HeXen]

CE3 has nice water light refraction on the walls as you move through the water as well as cloud shadows casting moments of shadow on the environment. Lots of very nice effects that I have yet to see any other game do. (Stalker 1 has some cloud shadows pass on the ground but arn't real time afiak)

FB3 has great sunlight that blends with the environment to have that slight photo look to some of the textures. Nice godray's through trees but CE3 is nice as well. The water in both is excellent but when I was in spectator mode for BF4, I think the water looks better as in more realistic.

In reality though it's really more about art direction. What the engine can do is up to the developer to take advantage of and BF4 really isn't that type of game to require full use. I think we have yet to see the fullest potential of FB3 but I believe it's been done in some of Crytek's tech demo's but in an actual game had to be dumbed down a bit.

 

[Carfax83]

The bottom line is cryengine 3 can't hold a candle to what Frostbite 3 does in massive multiplayer battles. And that's what BF4 is designed for, as mentioned. Looking gorgeous in SP isn't the main goal, although it does look very good anyway.

I'd have to disagree with you blackened. All these major engines, like Frostbite 3, CryEngine 3, Disrupt, Unreal Engine 4 etcetera have one thing in common.....they are ALL scalable, and flexible in nature.

They are like that because it makes it easier to license the engine to other developers.. For example, CryEngine 3 is also being used to make Star Citizen, a massive space simulator game with online and offline components.

And Frostbite 3 is being used to make Dragon Age 3 Inquisition, a third person party based RPG game..

Anyway, I don't see any reason why CryEngine 3 couldn't be used to make a game similar to BF4.

From my experience, CryEngine 3 has one thing going for it that Frostbite 3 does not, it has superior hardware utilization. If you've played Crysis 3 and BF4, tell me which one had higher CPU and GPU utilization?

Hardware utilization is a critical function of a 3D engine, because that's where your performance is made..

 

[blackened23]

You paid for BF4 right? Go load up a 64 player map, go to the middle of the action and then tell us your utilization. Should be 99% GPU across the board. CPU utilization will also be extremely high.

Crysis 3 has great utilization in SP and is terrible in MP. Hell nobody EVEN PLAYS crysis 3 MP anymore. It's a joke. Two years from now, BF4 will have sold 30 million copies and will still have tons of people playing MP. Crysis 3 MP? (crickets). That's what BF4 is about - BF4 isn't designed for single player and the map designs in SP aren't designed to push graphical boundaries. Period.

I'm not trying to be facetious or anything but when you're specifically comparing crysis 3 and BF4, the only games which we can compare at this point - the focus of both games are wildly different. What makes a good engine for MP isn't what makes a good engine for SP. Once we get more examples of both of these engines being used, we'll get a better idea of where things stand, you know? It's just too early to make this call. What we can say is that crysis 3 looks better in many ways in SP, while BF4 is much more versatile and better in large MP battles.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

So it's an apples to oranges comparison?

Crysis 3 vs BF4 MP (Beta) hands down Crysis 3 was better than BF4 in terms of visual quality.

Both were very taxing on my system, both made my cpu turn on all cylinders (car reference) and both made me actually glad to have crossfire.

Crysis 3 is a single player game, BF4 is mulitplayer.

Apples to Oranges?

 

[blackened23]

Well of course you'd say that. SO you loved BF3 with it being the continual benchmark game of choice - but now apparently have a new found love for COD Ghosts and suddenly, hate BF4. You loved Black Ops II, right? Yeah, no?

 

[HeXen]

I base an engine on what I have seen it do in terms of effects, graphics and performance, not the gameplay.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

Well of course you'd say that. It is interesting that you loved BF3 with it being the continual benchmark game of choice - but now apparently have a new found love for COD Ghosts and hate BF4. You loved Black Ops II, right? Yeah, no?

lol wut?

I don't own any Call of Duty game, and I didn't enjoy the business model of BF3 which is why I won't be picking up BF4 until it lands in the sub $20 bargain bin.

Map packs, premium and all the other money grabs from a series that has turned into another Madden for EA, I don't like these things.

Of course none of that has any effect on my opinion of the graphics, with Crysis 3 I ran it maxed out with SMAA x2 MGPU. With BF4 Beta I ran it maxed out with 200% res scaling.

I'm not saying BF4 has bad graphics, only that between the two I liked Crysis 3 better from a visual fidelity and artistic standpoint.

 

[blackened23]

Well, crysis 3 sp is fine for graphics. You won't find me ever bad mouthing the graphics in crysis 3, they're amazing. But once you get into a hairy 64 player MP battle things change. Anyway, we still haven't seen the full potential of either of these engines, and game direction/design certainly changes the graphical fidelity. Crysis 3 simply focuses on SP while BF4 doesn't.

 

[Mastercommander]

They should stick to the comedic single player of Bad Company. I don't understand why they can make those games entertaining and decent, but their main franchise is just horrible. The dialogue,. story, and acting is so bad in all their games but I think Bad Company's saving grace is that the ridiculous story and bad acting/characters are the punchline. When they take themselves seriously I'm waiting for the punchline that never comes and I shake my head thinking that they seriously thought they had something good in this game because they never made fun of how horrible it all is.

Agreed, though BF4 has some great set piece action scenes, the "serious" stories of BF3/4 were ridiculous, and obviously geared toward a neocon worldview

I'm a warlike fellow and for that reason I know not to get involved in retarded wars

Literally the first line someone says in the opening of BF3 is that we should invade Iran

 

[Carfax83]

You paid for BF4 right? Go load up a 64 player map, go to the middle of the action and then tell us your utilization. Should be 99% GPU across the board. CPU utilization will also be extremely high.

I did, but I beat the single player campaign and uninstalled it and applied for the refund from EA.. Honestly I bought it just to see how it performed and how it looked as I'm a graphics whore, and I never play online.

Anyway, even if the GPU and CPU utilization is higher in multiplayer, and I agree that it would be, it still doesn't make a good argument that Frostbite 3 utilizes hardware to the extent that CryEngine 3 does.

The single player campaign featured larger areas, and more battles than anything in Crysis 3, but with lower CPU and GPU utilization.. That's what I'm getting at.

I noticed several instances of glaring object pop in in the single player campaign. Object pop in is symptomatic of poor CPU utilization. If the CPU can't send draw commands to the GPU fast enough, then the GPU can't quickly render objects and you get object pop in and lower frame rates.

In fact, the single player campaign in BF3 had less pop in I'm certain, so I don't know what happened with the BF4 campaign. I'm pretty sure it's CPU related though, as I did notice that one thread was front loaded more than any other.. Crysis 3's object pop in by comparison is much harder to detect, which I think is due to how the engine uses the CPU more efficiently.

Possibly these problems may get sorted out with patch and driver updates..

That's what BF4 is about - BF4 isn't designed for single player and the map designs in SP aren't designed to push graphical boundaries. Period.

The campaign maps may not rival the multiplayer maps, but they are still pretty big (especially compared to Crysis 3) with lots of activity during battles.; especially Tashgar. And they looked great for the most part.

I'm not trying to be facetious or anything but when you're specifically comparing crysis 3 and BF4, the only games which we can compare at this point - the focus of both games are wildly different. What makes a good engine for MP isn't what makes a good engine for SP. Once we get more examples of both of these engines being used, we'll get a better idea of where things stand, you know? It's just too early to make this call. What we can say is that crysis 3 looks better in many ways in SP, while BF4 is much more versatile and better in large MP battles.

I know we can never get a good comparison as the data just isn't there right now.. This thread is really just about opinions and experiences, and not really a serious discussion..

 

[Rvenger]

Moving over to PC Gaming since this discussion is about game engines.


-VC&G Moderator Rvenger

 

[CuriousMike]

but I beat the single player campaign and uninstalled it and applied for the refund from EA..

You completed the game, and then asked for your money back?
Is that part of EA's new gaming guarantee they talked about a few months back?

That's like the Costco of gaming - buy it, use the shit out of it, then get all your money back.

I wonder if the rest of the world has Costco-like return policies.