Digital Foundry: Hands-on with the Halo 5 beta

S

Summer Haze

Banned
In terms of overall optimisation, there's still the best part of a year left to significantly improve matters before the Autumn release. In a series first, Halo 5 is launching with 60fps set as its target frame-rate from the get-go. It's an ambitious objective given the push for a visual overhaul too, and right now it mostly hits the mark. However, dips to the low end of 50fps are an issue with too many enemy Spartans on-screen - especially noticeable on the winding Regret stage. Meanwhile, tearing is introduced during these drops too, cutting into the top third of the screen, though hard to notice given that this is above its HUD (which, curiously, is also rendered at 720p).
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That we're seeing frame-rate drops at all could be construed as a bit a of a worry, particularly given that we're only playing on medium-sized, vehicle-free, 4v4 slayer matches - where 16-player (or higher) big team battles are on the fans' checklist for the final product. Indeed, bearing in mind the 720p resolution, the appearance of any frame-rate problems at all is rather surprising. Well, in mitigation, it's important to stress that we are dealing with pre-production code here, and based on our observations, the idea that the GPU is to blame for the frame-rate dips may be off-beam.
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Looking at the performance videos on a frame-by-frame basis, it seems that various glitches can kick in at any moment - and don't necessarily seem to be caused by intense GPU work. We'd hazard a guess that the artificial drop to 720p has indeed removed the graphics hardware as an obstacle to the game's target 60fps for the most part, and that other bottlenecks and glitches in the work-in-progress pipeline are causing many of the issues in the beta code. For example, we see frame-rate drops caused by even simple actions like reloading and walking immediately after a respawn. Even picking up a gun and firing for the first time can produce performance dips. Other times, drops occur on a seemingly random basis, with no visible evidence of what might be the cause. All of these issues should hopefully be resolved by launch.
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More at the link

I wasn't sure about which parts of the article to pick out and embed in the thread, and it's pretty in-depth hands-on and I didn't wanna post too many. My apologies if I chose shitty ones. :P
 
It's a missed opportunity to go all out - to press the reset button not just on the rendering tech, but on the core gameplay. However, the sense remains very much one of evolution rather than revolution. While it has tinkered with the combat move-set for the better, 343 Industries is seemingly opting for the safe road on the technical front, layering new effects over an otherwise familiar core design. On this trajectory, Halo 5 is set to fall into ranks with several major Xbox One and PS4 titles of the last year - such as Assassin's Creed Unity or FIFA 15 - where the new hardware is mostly used to bolster the visual sheen, rather than radically develop new gameplay ideas.
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I don't understand this. 343 isn't trying to create a new game and slap the Halo name on it, it wants to evolve the old game and give fans what they want, not something new, and DF is criticizing them for it.

Edit: Also might want to quote more than just stuff about the framerate OP, there's some other stuff in there too.
 
I thought the analysis was a little harsh. A year~ out, early arena beta and 60fps which it seems to do well at hitting (in this early stage).

60fps is obviously going to affect other things and it does well at getting to the frame-rate. 720p obviously an early in development thing, theres lot of progress to make but thats to expected with the time left they have.
 
Steverulez said:
I thought the analysis was a little harsh. A year~ out, early arena beta and 60fps which it seems to do well at hitting (in this early stage).

60fps is obviously going to affect other things and it does well at getting to the frame-rate. 720p obviously an early in development thing, theres lot of progress to make but thats to expected with the time left they have.
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Yeah, a lot of the article focuses on "WTF this isn't solid 60" and "343 should've reset everything instead of carrying physics and the like from last gen."

This is the reason that when we get betas and alphas released before the game they're basically just demos for the game rather than real betas. Even those who know better complain that the game isn't fully polished.

Although this does provide a counterargument for those who claim that DF is biased towards MS.
 
Halo only 720p a year prior to release.
Uncharted only 30FPS a year prior to release.

I hope and I'm pretty sure that both will hit their 1080p 60FPS target come launch.

I don't think these super early tech preview have much substance, unfinished code is unfinished.
 
Not even solid 60 fps at 720p.

I know that the game is still way early but this is giving me flashbacks of TitanFall.

Hopefully it can atleast run at 900p and and rather solid 60 fps at launch.
 
1.21Gigawatts said:
Halo only 720p a year prior to release.
Uncharted only 30FPS a year prior to release.

I hope and I'm pretty sure that both will hit their 1080p 60FPS target come launch.

I don't think these super early tech preview have much substance, unfinished code is unfinished.
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Here's hoping both devs hit their targets.
 
Drops? Glad I'm not one to notice such things. Game is fast and smooth to me.

We're still quite some time away from release, so I'm hoping every mode can maintain 60fps at at least 900p.
 
DarkLordMalik said:
Not even solid 60 fps at 720p.

I know that the game is still way early but this is giving me flashbacks of TitanFall.

Hopefully it can atleast run at 900p and and rather solid 60 fps at launch.
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Titanfall had a shitty dev process and problems in the beta that took place a few months before launch, and even many of those were fixed.

hammertomb said:
When does optimization occur in the dev process?
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At the very end.
 
Got to give 343 a break on this. Wait until they've shipped it.

They'll probably hit that weird 1080p but not 1080p resolution with the vertical or is it horizontal tweak.
 
1.21Gigawatts said:
Halo only 720p a year prior to release.
Uncharted only 30FPS a year prior to release.

I hope and I'm pretty sure that both will hit their 1080p 60FPS target come launch.

I don't think these super early tech preview have much substance, unfinished code is unfinished.
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No way H5 is going to run @ 1080p @ 60fps.
 
DarkLordMalik said:
Not even solid 60 fps at 720p.

I know that the game is still way early but this is giving me flashbacks of TitanFall.

Hopefully it can atleast run at 900p and and rather solid 60 fps at launch.
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What are the flashbacks for Titanfall? The beta for that was weeks before release when it would have been difficult to improve much
 
I wish Digital Foundry would stop trotting out that tired 'next gen gameplay' stuff. It's a nonsense phrase to begin with, and completely irrelevant to articles discussing a game's technical merits.
 
They'll get it to 1080p, cut down on some texture, and there will be drops in the final code but nothing too horrible.

The only thing I'm not very confident on is them getting it to 1080, but I think all of these things are very possible.
 
Eh, I wouldn't worry too much. Early build of COD:AW ran at under 900p and the frame rate was all over the place. Look at how the final build turned out.
 
1.21Gigawatts said:
Halo only 720p a year prior to release.
Uncharted only 30FPS a year prior to release.

I hope and I'm pretty sure that both will hit their 1080p 60FPS target come launch.

I don't think these super early tech preview have much substance, unfinished code is unfinished.
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Agreed.

Percy said:
Christ that sounds like a mess at this stage.
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Oh please. It's about a year from release. Look at the improvement from the Destiny XB1 beta to the full game and that was just 6 weeks. Halo 5's current state is hardly a mess at this point of development.
 
I wouldn't worry much. It's a very early stable code and they are using it to balance test. On the other hand i dont expect this game to look like a technical marvel at release
 
Steverulez said:
What are the flashbacks for Titanfall? The beta for that was weeks before release when it would have been difficult to improve much
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There was a E3 preview article as well, but I guess it wasn't really clear which hardware it ran on at E3.

In any case, I am not saying that the game won't run at >720p and 60 fps. There have been several important updates for the SDK that definitely paint a positive picture for the Xbox One. 343i are also technically competent and I remember how Halo 4 had locked 30 fps at 720p.
 
The game currently does not have SSR applied based upon glossiness and specular/fresnel stuff (you know, the PBS way(, rather it is just on a surface by artist decision (such as the VR map: trenches or something). I would imagine having constant SSR would be pretty taxing in a 60fps game.

Likewise there is no POM or particle shadows from what I saw during play as were foundin the MCC. The "volumetric lighting" are also just geometric or flat billboard textures eminating from lights, not dynamic volumes.

I do like the changes to shading and indirect lighting (the metallic sheen and baked indirect stuff is remarkably similar to everything I have seen in UE4 actually), but I hope that add some of the effects found in H2A.
 
jem0208 said:
Full year before release and mostly 60fps is a mess?

Right...
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Percy gonna Percy...

Campaign won't get shown until E3 stage demo I guess, if/when they do a second beta with vehicles etc, that will be a much better idea of what we can expect from it in the final stages.
 
One thing I didn't see noted here is that the Pelicans / Phantoms / other moving objects in the skybox are keyed at a lower rate and become a stuttery, blurry mess.
 
Jomjom said:
Just make it 674p or something like that and call it a day.
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image.php
 
hammertomb said:
When does optimization occur in the dev process?
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Depends what the issue is. Optimizations to prevent spikes and problem errors occur at the end. Optimizations to make the game playable on the platform happen throughout the process as it's hard to test/play the game unless you're hitting your target at least a decent amount of the time.

For example, if they're sticking to 60fps, they'll need to keep it running at sixty internally for testing purposes.
 
I doubt they're close to content complete let alone optimizing. They got a lot of time left though, something which is nice about having this beta nearly a year before launch.
 
VisceralBowl said:
One thing I didn't see noted here is that the Pelicans / Phantoms / other moving objects in the skybox are keyed at a lower rate and become a stuttery, blurry mess.
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Having not played the beta and just watched some videos, I'm not sure what you mean. Can you explain?

The game looks great for where it is in development and considering it is mostly 60 fps. I could see the campaign running at a full 1080p60 and the multiplayer running at a lesser resolution like Killzone Shadowfall does.
 
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