Saying KZ2 has graphics even close to the league of Crysis maxed out is laughable. Consoles look horrible in comparison to anything on the PC, and the console's idea of 'AA' is a sorry joke.
Originally posted by: HOOfan 1
You really think Killzone 2 looks THAT good? I don't see it at all. They are good graphics, no better than Gears of War, and certainly not as good as Crysis at Very High settings. I've heard reviewers ding it for some low res textures.
The complaints about Crysis come from people who turn the "shader" up. My 8800GTX can run that game at maximum settings except the shader. Turning shader from medium to very high cuts the frame rate in half.The complaints about Crysis engine performance come from the urge to play at resolutions 1680x1050 or higher.
Originally posted by: ShawnD1
Now the question is "given my system specs, did I do it right?". I really don't know. I don't know what kind of effects cause big performance hits, so I just dick around with a few things and hope it works. The above settings for Fallout 3 seem to work really good, but I don't know if they're the best settings. When they made that game for Xbox and PS3, they tested the hell out of it to figure out exactly which settings should be on or off to give the best performance and appearance for that specific hardware configuration.
edit
The complaints about Crysis come from people who turn the "shader" up. My 8800GTX can run that game at maximum settings except the shader. Turning shader from medium to very high cuts the frame rate in half.The complaints about Crysis engine performance come from the urge to play at resolutions 1680x1050 or higher.
Originally posted by: Grooveriding
Saying KZ2 has graphics even close to the league of Crysis maxed out is laughable. Consoles look horrible in comparison to anything on the PC, and the console's idea of 'AA' is a sorry joke.
Originally posted by: frythecpuofbender
Regarding FALLOUT 3:
I'd rather have the options to make it look better than PS3 and XBOX360 than to have everything forced to MEDIUM so that it looks exactly like the console versions.
Sure sometimes the ADVANCED GRAPHICS options in games can be a bit overwhelming at first, but there are lots of tweak guides out there that have comparisons what setting corresponds to e.g. PS3 quality level.
I agree that it would be easier to just have a "PS3 level" slider there.
Obviously fixed hardware has a huge advantage an over open platform
This is a myth console gamers like to spread. Yes, it is easier or faster to develop for a fixed platform because you know your target. However, the supposed hardware optimization for the fixed hardware consoles generally appears to be nothing more than reduced resolutions, reduced texture sizes, or reduced effects. These are all 'optimizations' that PC gamers refer to as "turning down the eye candy", which really means "making the game look like crap".
Heh ya I've heard the Wrath updates bring even the fastest rigs to their knees, but from what I've read its not so much a graphics limitation, but more of a CPU/netcode bottleneck. WAR suffered similarly in crowded areas and PVP.
I agree, but again, if you're able to crank up those games on the PC, they're absolutely going to put their console counterparts to shame. Which is why I'm confused by your statements about them looking mediocre or whatever on the PC.
A Kuros or any other plasma isn't going to compensate for whatever corners were cut on the console version with HDR, texture quality, post-processing or whatever else is contributing to the noticeable difference in color saturation and contrast.
This is easily confirmed when using a higher quality source input, like connecting a PC to the same LCD or playing a Blu-Ray disc. Simply put, the deficiency is clearly the source and not the output in the case of the consoles.
I don't think there's any doubt Crysis' commercial succcess was greatly crippled by its steep hardware requirements and negative, but completely justified reputation of being a complete hardware pig.
Honestly, comparing KZ2 and Crysis isn't even close in this regard, but its a common design trick to extract performance. Heavy use of Depth of Field/Field of View to blur or reduce details on the periphery are also heavily used. Fog, smoke along with heavy use of distant imposters, low-detail mock-ups, and structural facades are all common techniques to populate a scene while reducing hardware requirements.
And just to clarify, I don't mind it at all, I actually prefer it in many cases as it results in a more cinematic and immersive feel. Just saying you can't really compare it to something like Crysis where everything is detailed as far as you can see and fully interactive and rendered at any relative distance.
Yes, the console is more efficient and makes better use of the hardware than the PC, but not to the extent that developers and console manufacturers what you to believe.
Sure, consoles are more efficient than PCs, but what do you expect JC (or any dev) to say who is targeting the console market?
You could look at this two ways (either is valid IMO): PC devs are sucking, or that there is no such thing as a "PC dev" anymore. They are now just "game devs" that write games that will run acceptably while providing the same content on a number of platforms.
Let's try a thought experiment. Let's say you buy Fallout 3 and you know absolutely nothing about video quality settings. You're using an old 7950GT video card which exceeds the game's requirements, but is nowhere near top of the line. At high settings, the game runs like shit. What do you? Being that you know absolutely nothing, you put it to medium settings. The game still runs like shit. You set it to low and now the game is playable but looks worse than Doom 3 which came out 4 years ago. Your conclusion would be that this game is horrible and it's poorly programmed and that PC games have stupid requirements.
That's basically what this thread is about, isn't it?
The OP incorrectly but understandably assumed that Crysis needs the most ridiculous hardware to run properly
So true... there is also the fact that consoles are simply not fixed hardware.
They are all simply equivalent in performance
Hmm, I seem to remember the Crytek devs saying Crysis won?t be on consoles because they don?t have enough power to run it.Originally posted by: BenSkywalker
That's a quote from a guy that actually has a little bit of time writing code, maybe he's even a bit better then you at it.
In what will come as no surprise, the PC shames both consoles in the image-quality comparison. Everything from the textures to the antialiasing to the reflections looks better on the PC. Foliage, piping, and far-off buildings look far superior on the PC due to transparency antialiasing effects. Even draw distance is better on the PC, as the rocks and a fence near the burned-out bus aren't even visible on the consoles.
Once again, the PC is the overall champ here. A high-end video card goes a long way when it comes to running a game at insanely high resolutions with detailed textures and superior antialiasing. Objects in the seating area and the sheets of paper in the middle of the room get blurrier and blurrier as you switch between the platforms. Even the text readout that's practically in front of your character's face looks better on the PC.
When your character gets pulled up from the water at the start of the level in the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions of the game, he remains stationary. In the PC version, the waves actively push your character around, making screenshots more difficult to capture.
Even with all the problems, GTAIV looks better on the PC by a wide margin. The PC's high resolution and draw-distance levels keep higher-quality textures, lighting, and transparency effects visible farther into the distance.
What resolution does Killzone 2 actually render at? I'm not talking about the output resolution - which is often meaningless since many PS3/360 titles upscale from lower than 720p ? but rather the internal render resolution.
Hmm, I seem to remember the Crytek devs saying Crysis won?t be on consoles because they don?t have enough power to run it.
As for console games, in general the PC beats them hands-down, and we?ve seen this time & time again
At the moment, no video card has enough RAM to load up high-quality textures with high resolutions at maximum-quality settings.
Has this actually been confirmed by the developer? Again, there are a huge amount of PS3/360 games that claim "720p" but actually run far lower.Originally posted by: BenSkywalker
1280x720 unless you are using a display that can only run 1080i/p(which honestly, I didn't know existed) at which point it renders 960x1080- scaling causes issues with the game.
Ports, as in console games ported to the PC? Yes, in most cases.Those are ports, and most of the differences they list come down to simply using more RAM and fillrate/bandwidth.
That, and larger draw distances, which is a big one. You?ll repeatedly see such comparisons mentioning the PC can see things the consoles aren?t even rendering.Instead, we are given the option to increase resolution/AA and maybe use even larger textures and that is it.
Thanks. We don?t always agree (in fact we almost never do), but I still value your opinion.Edit- BTW- Kick ass job on the IQ comparison article, very thorough and very nicely done- kills any of the IQ 'comparisons' I've seen at any of the major sites
Has this actually been confirmed by the developer?
But let's assume it is 720p. That would mean the 1280x1024 Crysis benchmarks you linked to have ~42 % pixels than Killzone 2.
Does Killzone have the same draw distances as Crysis?
Does Killzone have the same level of vegetation as Crysis?
Does a typical Killzone scene render 1 million polygons like Crysis?
I know still screenshots don?t always do a game justice, but those Killzone screenshots look absolutely woeful.
That?s the point - the PC still comes out ahead despite running sub-optimal code originally designed for consoles.
That, and larger draw distances, which is a big one. You?ll repeatedly see such comparisons mentioning the PC can see things the consoles aren?t even rendering.
The graphics in GT5: Prologue are even better than Crysis -- they're stunningly realistic.
Originally posted by: BenSkywalker
When has Carmack ever cared about being friendly on a political basis to the platforms he is supporting or not? If you won't take Carmack's word for it, I really don't know what to say. Play GTA4 on a PC with a 256MB 7900GT and 256MB system RAM and see how it does, maybe that would drive home the point?
You could look at this two ways (either is valid IMO): PC devs are sucking, or that there is no such thing as a "PC dev" anymore. They are now just "game devs" that write games that will run acceptably while providing the same content on a number of platforms.
It's the PC exclusives I'm talking about. Hell, lately it seems like most of the better looking PC games are ports, why aren't the PC exclusive titles dominating?
Originally posted by: BenSkywalker
Yeah, those screenshots are bad, these are better but still scaled. One of the downsides to doing direct comparisons is we can't do a framebuffer dump on consoles
Right, but its not really pushing graphics card sales, which again, kills about half the PC sales demographic off the top.Originally posted by: BenSkywalker
Absolutely, I was just pointing out that despite what many people think, WoW is actually a rather brutal system killer at this point.
I don't disagree PC exclusives are lacking. I agree that the majority of games with high quality visuals nowadays tend to be console ports. We've already touched on that a bit with many PC pioneers like Carmack and Sweeney, and more recently Yertli stating they plan to focus on console development going forward. The financial considerations of producing a high visual quality PC exclusive simply don't make sense anymore. I'd say Nitro put it pretty well, there aren't PC devs anymore, there's just game devs.It's the exclusives I'm talking about. Given that we know the ports easily run much faster on the PC, why aren't PC exclusive games looking easily superior to the console exclusives? Honestly, the fact that I have to use Crysis, a game that came out in '07, as a comparison speaks quite poorly about the state of PC engine utilization by itself.
I'd disagree, especially if the image on the CRT was a low contrast image and the image on the LCD was a high contrast image.Contrast in particular a TNT1 hooked up to a high quality CRT will simply obliterate quad SLI or Crossfire setups on a LCD, that is what I was getting at.
I'm not really following what you're saying here. PC games still look fantastic on CRTs and Plasmas, there wasn't some dramatic shift that changed that with LCDs.What I am getting at is due to the direction the PC market went, exclusively moving with LCD technology, they can not compete with higher end console setups in terms of color or contrast. Yes, you can hook a PC up to a plasma, although that removes pixel density advantages that help mask a lot of issues with PC visuals.
Only after a huge influx in hardware to satisfy its incredible hardware requirements with the release of the 8800GT and 3870. Crysis sold <100k units before Christmas (considering only $300-$600 G80s could run it well, this wasn't surprising), both of those mainstream parts were released in November for $200-$300, sold like crazy over the holidays and ultimately translated into sales for Crysis hitting 1,000,000 at the end of January. I think Crysis may ultimately become the de facto case study for why PC exclusives that rely on high visual production values simply don't make sense anymore.Crysis made a huge profit.
Again, what are you basing this on? The canned fly-by demo? That certainly does show excessive texture pop-in and blatant LOD adjustments, especially given the default texture streaming settings but that's certainly not reflective of actual gameplay as you'll never move that fast at such a wide FOV to cause such pop-in. Its much less noticeable in actual gameplay and all the base world geometry is still there. For example, if you're running along and see a clear skyline, you won't suddenly see a mountain pop up out of nowhere (or through the fog in KZ2) once it reaches whatever set view/occlusion distance for distant objects. You also won't see low-res 2D mock-ups or distant impostors like you see in many games.Geometric LOD adjustments popping up all over the screen, clearly visible and distracting foliage draw in and very obvious LOD adjustments there, heavy utilization of alpha textures with occlusion culling to give the impression of dense screen population- all over the place in Crysis. Not knocking them in the least, that's how you handle an engine of that complexity(except the geometry LOD issue, that really does look like absolute ass).
1) Refers to physics, I don't disagree that software ragdoll effects are largely overdone but they could certainly be worst. Its fully destructible environments and use of physics elsewhere are arguably the best done in software on any gaming platform.It really isn't. The above mentioned points along with 1) overdone IK(200lb guys don't go flailing when shot by a 7.62mm round), 2)inferior weapon models, and a 3) less robust particle system is where I see KZ2 showing clear advantages over Crysis. Crysis has its' own elements where I think it has a clear overall advantage, but when taken as a whole- I see them as pretty much a wash.
Originally posted by: thilan29
KZ2 is rendered at a fairly low resolution isn't it?
However, you made the point that a console game can (and does) offer the same or equivalent visuals as the top PC game. You can twist it anyway you want to, but they don't.
You already know the answer to this. It's because consoles drive game development now.
But none of that makes my point any less valid, that a PC version of a console port will always look vastly superior than the console version.
I'd disagree, especially if the image on the CRT was a low contrast image and the image on the LCD was a high contrast image.
Anyways, my point was that the PC versions are going to produce better colors than the console versions
Only after a huge influx in hardware to satisfy its incredible hardware requirements with the release of the 8800GT and 3870. Crysis sold <100k units before Christmas
I think Crysis may ultimately become the de facto case study for why PC exclusives that rely on high visual production values simply don't make sense anymore.
Again, what are you basing this on? The canned fly-by demo?
For example, if you're running along and see a clear skyline, you won't suddenly see a mountain pop up out of nowhere (or through the fog in KZ2)
You also won't see low-res 2D mock-ups or distant impostors like you see in many games.
Honestly, how can you even compare the resource management and view distance of Crysis to KZ2?
1) Refers to physics, I don't disagree that software ragdoll effects are largely overdone but they could certainly be worst. Its fully destructible environments and use of physics elsewhere are arguably the best done in software on any gaming platform.
3) Impossible for me to tell without seeing live footage, but I can see already KZ2 makes heavy use of fog and smoke to mask and populate the scene.
I found explosions, fire and smoke to all be extremely well done in Crysis
Crysis' water being superior to KZ2.
Oh yeah and those KZ2 shots aren't screenshots. They come from the fake realtime trailer from 2005 which they had to admit was prerendered target render quality. They never achieved this.
An exclusive means that they are paying a percent cut of every sale to MS / Sony (it is why it costs 60$ instead of 50$ per game) BUT... they also get bribed to begin with to MAKE it an exclusive.It's the exclusives I'm talking about. Given that we know the ports easily run much faster on the PC, why aren't PC exclusive games looking easily superior to the console exclusives? Honestly, the fact that I have to use Crysis, a game that came out in '07, as a comparison speaks quite poorly about the state of PC engine utilization by itself.
And what black sorcery prevents them from doing the same on a PC?They are identical on a functional basis, down to the bit of code that can be moved across any given bus at any given time. Check out how Cell's 'cache' works, devs use assembly level code to move data via DMA for vector based calcs, desptie multiple die shrinks any changes to performance would break code(it isn't just Cell, consoles in general use the same development approach).
Originally posted by: BenSkywalker
However, you made the point that a console game can (and does) offer the same or equivalent visuals as the top PC game. You can twist it anyway you want to, but they don't.
And why do you think it doesn't?
Actually I said none that I know of earlier but since you specified 4870X2 I'm going to assume there's some glaring render error you're referring to. Or its locked at 480i or whatever the original XBox version was locked to on the PC port, and yes I did have the original SC on the XBox.Originally posted by: BenSkywalker
You used always so I have to call you out on that one, Splinter Cell- Original XBox>4870x2.
But the images aren't identical, that's the whole point heh.Identical images of course.
You still don't seem to understand my point, I'm not arguing the merits of the final output hardware, I'm arguing the quality of the source hardware. Will the colors from a SNES look as good on a Kuros compared to a PS3 on an LCD? Of course not.Why do you think this? It isn't an issue that I have ever really had lengthy discussions about but consoles on a properly calibrated quality display obliterate the best current PC monitors by a rather huge margin- it really, truly, is not close. In theory PCs should be able to be comparable hooked up via HDMI, but IME they still fall well short. This honestly doesn't make a huge difference overall, but I haven't seen them as remotely close.
What's 5 million in revenue for a game that's been in production for 3 years? Its nothing, if Crysis sold 100k units in its first 6 months Crytek might not exist today. Luckily its sales rebounded with the strong sales of hardware capable of running it well, now just imagine what it might've done if that percentage of hardware was 50 or 75% of discrete GPUs and not just the top 10-15% at the time.That 100K was in the US and still represents $5Million in revenue, European sales numbers were higher.
Wrath, Spore, COD5, COD4 and Crysis. I'm sure it closely mirrors total sales to-date.Care to name the last 5 PC games that turned more then $20 million in profit? It isn't easy
Again, I don't see it, but of course I use the tweaks and superior hardware available to me on the PC to reduce the likelihood of it. But as a sniper style player I'm sure you appreciate the fact you can actually see further than 30m in front of you instead of a billowing cloud of smoke.Walking close to the hills is enough- I'm a sniper style player as much as possible in Crysis, I stay off the roads as much as possible, you constantly see the geometric LOD issues popping up on both hills and even the larger rocks.
That's the point, you'd never see it as you can't investigate distant terrain if its off the beaten cart path.When does this ever happen in KZ2? Which level? I'll load it up and take a look, but I certainly didn't see anything resembling that in game.
I was clearly referring to world geometry. Alpha textures for foliage are a given as there's currently no other way to create the same effect with acceptable performance. Crysis uses 2d mock-ups to enhance actual 3D terrain, unlike KZ2 which looks like a few actors on a stage full of 2D mock-ups.Hehe, that is rather amusing. What would you call the foliage? Crysis uses 2D mock ups more then any game I am aware of in the history of gaming. Sure, it looks decent, but don't try and pass it off as something it isn't
Crysis pulls it off seamlessly on capable hardware, and that's also a rather important distinction. Also for GT5P is there actual opportunities for geometric LOD scaling or is it just a race track surrounded by a bunch of distant, flat textures? And the comment about the Crysis menu....is that a joke? Do you really think games are only loading up what's necessary to render their menu while you're in the menu? That's crazy, if a game wasn't loading up at least the most used textures to memory while sitting in a load screen I'd wonder why it wasn't. But then again PC gamers are used to those much faster load times compared to the consoles.Crysis fails to pull it off seamlessly, KZ2 doesn't. That is a rather important distinction. Come to think of it, I'm not recalling any sort of geometric LOD issues with GT5P either which does have comparable draw distances to Crysis, likely just down to superior resource management again. Oh, and comparing resource management- the menu in Crysis chews up more RAM then any of the consoles have- it isn't like its' hard to figure out it may not be the most streamlined piece of software in the world
Yep, but it still has more interactive objects than most games. Are those buildings destructible in KZ2?The physics in Crysis are OK, but very, very limited in scope. Try to knock down a tree and see what happens, heh. They have certain objects that are flagged to be destrctible in a somewhat more realistic fashion then most others, but it really isn't one of the strengths of the game at all.
I'm not just talking about the dynamic particle effects for volumetric fog and smoke, I'm also talking about the fog used to limit viewing distance. I see this in any of the outdoor and even some of the indoor screenshots, looks like the forecast is always "extremely hazy and overcast with low visibility" in the post-apocalyptic future.That comes across as rather amusing, I know you haven't played it yet- but the fog and smoke isn't there until the battle starts, it is one of the most impressive elements of KZ2 actually. How the dust and smoke gradually start building up all around during the battle(although it dies down fairly quickly if it doesn't keep getting stirred up). This is one area where I think KZ2 rather thoroughly spanks Crysis. Once the battle dies down, you can easily see into the distance without issue.
Again, I'd have to see them first-hand but I wouldn't doubt it as I found the GTA4 explosions to be very well done, even if they weren't as "accurate" as the particle effects in Crysis.KZ2 does them better- in some cases FAR better. One thing you may find some people lamenting is the flamethrower in KZ2, until you compare it to an actual flamethrower(which brings home how unrealistic the rest of the games are in that aspect).
I think that was a reply to someone else, but I havent' seen it yet in action, no.So you have never seen the game running then- good to know
An exclusive means that they are paying a percent cut of every sale to MS / Sony
And what black sorcery prevents them from doing the same on a PC?
What's 5 million in revenue for a game that's been in production for 3 years?
I'm not just talking about the dynamic particle effects for volumetric fog and smoke, I'm also talking about the fog used to limit viewing distance. I see this in any of the outdoor and even some of the indoor screenshots, looks like the forecast is always "extremely hazy and overcast with low visibility" in the post-apocalyptic future.
And regarding the 2D mockups in Crysis foilage: Are you serious?! of course the plant leaves have no polygon depth to them, that would be insanity and contrary to real-life (where leaves are pretty much flat too). But they have underlying 3d geometry that waves with the wind, is affected by the player's movements and bends with physical contact.
I found the foilage in Crysis near perfect. There was one or two tree sorts that couldn't be knocked down, but those were huge and had deep roots.