Richard Leadbetter (Digital Foundry): Why the return of 30fps console games is inevitable

[Darth Vader]

I hope people now understand that there is a lack of bandwidth for the consoles this generation (similar to the last). The games tax the hardware significantly where even the highest end GPUs need DLSS in order to perform well. I said before that the consoles were maxed out already 2yrs in and that things won't get drastically different going forward. People who thought they would get games looking like UE5 demo running at 4k/60FPS will be sorely disappointed. Given the time frame in-between sequels, we won't be seeing significant jumps in graphics with 4k/60FPS until next generation (i.e. PS6, XSX 2).

To address this, sorry mate, but I call bullshit. Never has a console generation been maxed out in two years, and this won't be the one to start that trend.

You have no idea what the rendering is doing in Plague that's way more expensive than what R&C is doing. Most people judge R&C based off of colored lights in the scene and the excellent level design. That doent' speak at all to the tech that went into the graphics engine. And the RT used in the game is a low resolution reflection pass. They don't use any of the more expensive techniques in RT like lighting, shadowing and AO with GI. We need to stop judging a game simply by how artsy it is. Plague is a way more complicated game visually.

Most people judge R&C because it looks very good. It doesn't matter if ambient occlusion has or hasn't global illumination, it matters that it looks way beyond what last gen was capable of.

The problem is that if devs kept things locked to 60fps, you won't get anything looking better than last-gen.

Bullshit. The Last of Us Part 1 looks better than Part 2 in many aspects and it runs at 1440p 60fps (rock solid). Fluid simulations, physics based objects, shadows, even texture quality, all is improved. The only thing that looks the same are enemy models.

These consoles are plenty capable of 1440p and even 4k at 60fps with higher standards of quality than next gen. If people want a massive leap in visual fidelity they will need to accept 1440p 30fps, but that they can't do better than last gen at 60fps is just nonsense.

 

[ethomaz]

I hope people now understand that there is a lack of bandwidth for the consoles this generation (similar to the last). The games tax the hardware significantly where even the highest end GPUs need DLSS in order to perform well. I said before that the consoles were maxed out already 2yrs in and that things won't get drastically different going forward. People who thought they would get games looking like UE5 demo running at 4k/60FPS will be sorely disappointed. Given the time frame in-between sequels, we won't be seeing significant jumps in graphics with 4k/60FPS until next generation (i.e. PS6, XSX 2).

I disagree about consoles being maxed out.
We didn’t even passed the cross-gen period yet… só games made only for next-grn are to come to max consoles yet.

And like every generation only games near the end of the generation really are close to max out the console.

 

[Shmunter]

My backlog of 60fps will last me through to the next next gen. Stick the 30 in your pipe and smoke it.

 

[Deleted member 13]

What last gen game has ray tracing?

Metro Exodus, CoD, Control, Doom Eternal, etc..

 

[Darth Vader]

Metro Exodus, CoD, Control, Doom Eternal, etc..

Do those run on last gen consoles with Ray Tracing? Incredible stuff.
PC is generation agnostic.

 

[Deleted member 13]

If it's using DLSS, it isn't rendering in 4K either.

Yup. That's why I said even the highend GPUs struggle.

 

[Deleted member 13]

Do those run on last gen consoles with Ray Tracing? Incredible stuff.
PC is generation agnostic.

Completely my point. But some people like to include the PC when talking about the "best graphics of all-time".

 

[kaluas]

Metro Exodus, CoD, Control, Doom Eternal, etc..

None of those. "Last Gen" is used for consoles. "Last gen games" mean 8th gen games on 8th gen hw. 8th gen hw didn't have RT, this is a really wrong statement from the start.

 

[ethomaz]

Metro Exodus, CoD, Control, Doom Eternal, etc..

Neither of these games have RT in last gen consoles.
In fact the Metro Exodus full RTGI only exists on next-gen consoles and even the first RT version only runs with RT in next-gen consoles.

I believe Crysis Remaster is the only game with some very limited software RT in last-gen consoles.
Perhaps it is the only example.

 

[Deleted member 13]

Respect your pro pc gamer point of view (though quite gloaty) however what you say here is hardly rocket science. Nobody buys a console expecting 4k 60fps from every game or for it to be even close to what high end pc's can achieve. You're comparing devices constrained by cost, heat, silicon, physical size and technology advancing every 3-5 years to devices with non of these constraints and gpu power only limited by the budget of the user.

On the contrary, we see that kind of talk all the time actually. The PC gets dumped into the console warrior arguments all the time. Just wait for someone to claim GoW:R looks better than any PC title at MAX settings in November to prove my point.

If consoles were like pc's then this would probably be true. However like all past consoles having a closed hardware standard allows teams to get to a great deal more performance out of it by the end of a generation than they could at the start of it. Not to mention we're still waiting for current gen games that fulfil the early promises.

But they are like PCs. Even though they are closed systems, they still have hardware that any PC developer can pick up and start developing on. Last gen's PS4 and the last games (i.e. TLOU 2, UC4, etc.) of that gen didn't look significantly better or run faster than the earlier games (i.e. The Order, DriveClub, Killzone, etc..).

 

[Deleted member 13]

None of those. "Last Gen" is used for consoles. "Last gen games" mean 8th gen games on 8th gen hw. 8th gen hw didn't have RT, this is a really wrong statement from the start.

Since when did we declare what 'last-gen' means with regards to the PC? The games were developed during that time. We can't ignore the PC development. If we all agree to exclude it out of conversation from ALL aspects of gaming, then let us do so.. as long as we don't drag it into a conversation about superior graphics.

 

[Gediminas]

Yup. That's why I said even the highend GPUs struggle.

Gotham Knights and Plague were aiming for high resolution, but they both run bad on beefy PC's, so it's more of a development issue than hardware issue.

''Plague runs great on my PC. It's not a consistent 60FPS but it's not a showstopper either. My observed variation is between 50-60FPS at 4k using DLSS with MAX settings.''


so which is it? Runs Great or Struggle? you sound like Phil snake oil salesman.

 

[Deleted member 13]

Most people judge R&C because it looks very good. It doesn't matter if ambient occlusion has or hasn't global illumination, it matters that it looks way beyond what last gen was capable of.

We simply can NOT have a conversation on what looks good to people's eyes and call it an objective evaluation. That's impossible. We are trying to quantify graphics on a technical level. My point still stands that the tech used in Plaque is extremely advanced for the way it looks. I can quantify that by calling out the algorithms and techniques used as to the reason for why it looks good. A subjective comment has no such quantification and thus can never be judged to be superior tech-wise.

Bullshit. The Last of Us Part 1 looks better than Part 2 in many aspects and it runs at 1440p 60fps (rock solid). Fluid simulations, physics based objects, shadows, even texture quality, all is improved. The only thing that looks the same are enemy models.

Again, the problem with these kinds of arguments dude is that you are constantly trying to use the subjective term "looks better" to quantify techniques and algorithms used in a game without knowing the specifics of the graphics pipeline. You have never been told that TLOU 1 uses the same exact graphics algorithms for Part 2. How can you prove your claim of 'looking better' by finding out what was the max texture resolution? How much of the fluid sim was used in Part 1 compared to Part 2? What about the material shader additions of TLOU 2 to TLOU 1? Which one was more expensive due to taking more samples in texture space, etc..?

 

[Deleted member 13]

''Plague runs great on my PC. It's not a consistent 60FPS but it's not a showstopper either. My observed variation is between 50-60FPS at 4k using DLSS with MAX settings.''


so which is it? Runs Great or Struggle? you sound like Phil snake oil salesman.

It runs great (i.e. > 50FPS) compared to 30FPS but isn't locked at 60FPS.

 

[ethomaz]

''Plague runs great on my PC. It's not a consistent 60FPS but it's not a showstopper either. My observed variation is between 50-60FPS at 4k using DLSS with MAX settings.''


so which is it? Runs Great or Struggle? you sound like Phil snake oil salesman.

It doesn't run great even on PC if you target minimum 60fps... it is a CPU and GPU bound game.
The good news is that the new RTX 4090 combined to a top-dog CPU can run it over 60fps in 4K.... there is a jump from avg. 50fps with RTX 3090 to avg. 90fps with RTX 4090.

This games shows how the jump from RTX 3090 to RTX 4090 is bigger than previous generations.

 

[Deleted member 13]

I disagree about consoles being maxed out.
We didn’t even passed the cross-gen period yet… só games made only for next-grn are to come to max consoles yet.

Cross-gen isn't a limitation from the development pipelines team. Again you are thinking that just because the developers have to deal with the PS4 that they can't make better looking games with the PS5 although you will praise R&C on the PS5 as being the graphics next-gen game out due strictly to how it looks as opposed to the graphics technques it used. Are you guys claiming that Insomniac can do better than R&C with their next title and they need more time to write an optimized RT reflection function so that it's less costly later than now? How do you know what the developer has or hasn't done? I mean, really?

And like every generation only games near the end of the generation really are close to max out the console.

So you are convinced that last generation's PS4 TLOU 2 looked a big leap over The Order or Driveclub or UC4? I find that hard to believe that you guys believe that.

 

[ethomaz]

So you are convinced that last generation's PS4 TLOU 2 looked a big leap over The Order or Driveclub or UC4? I find that hard to believe that you guys believe that.

Yes... plus GTS looks better than DriveClub even being 60fps.
TLOU2 looks way better than Ucharted 4... it is not even comparable.

And The Order even if you ignore the lower resolution got beat by games like God of War, The Last of Us, GoT, etc... did you play The Order on PS4? I did. Maybe that is the question I need to do... did you play these games on PS4? I did for all of them.

And don't come with PS4 Pro that is a very subutilized machine because they focused on base PS4... they didn't even try to maxed out PS4 Pro.

 

[Deleted member 13]

Yes... plus GTS looks better than DriveClub.

I completely disagree. There is no way that any game at the end of last gen looks significantly better than earlier gen games. And I can quantify it with exactly the graphics techniques used. Can you refute me with graphics techniques used to support your claim? I had the PS4 the entire generation and there is nothing more advanced that these companies used other than more key frames in animation (which isn't costly since they are baked into the game engine).

 

[ethomaz]

I completely disagree. There is no way that any game at the end of last gen looks significantly better than earlier gen games. And I can quantify it with exactly the graphics techniques used. Can you refute me with graphics techniques used to support your claim? I had the PS4 the entire generation and there is nothing more advanced that these companies used other than more key frames in animation (which isn't costly since they are baked into the game engine).

I can refuse you with pics of these games on PS4.
You blind you mind with tech but what really tells the look and quality of graphics of a game is what you see on screen.

 

[Deleted member 13]

I can refuse you with pics of these games on PS4.

Not good enough.. sorry.

Let's start with lighting. GI probe lookup tables for computing indirect lighting. Was this changed at the end of last gen to be better in any way? Did the developer get to the point of mastering the hardware such that they could use MORE GI probes or maybe even dynamic building of the GI data structure on-the-fly when the sun/moon move every second due to the earth's rotation?