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[adamsapple]

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Thanks to a brand new Enhanced Edition we're now able to enjoy Hellblade 2 at 60fps on console - addressing a criticism of the original release. This upgrade lands on Xbox Series X, and also coincides with the game's debut for PS5 consoles - where PS5 Pro in particular stands out for its offering of two upscaling modes. We test every mode and platform here - plus Steam Deck - with extra insight into how it was all achieved courtesy of a trip to Ninja Theory's studio.

00:00 Introduction
02:02 PS5/Series X 60FPS Mode Comparison
08:38 PS5/Series X 60FPS Frame-Rate Test
11:17 PS5 Pro Upgrades
14:30 PSSR vs TSR Upscaler Comparison
16:10 Steam Deck Tested
20:24 Verdict!

 

[RedC]

Patiently waiting for the adamsapple summary

 

[Punished Miku]

Patiently waiting for the adamsapple summary

The 60 fps mode seems pretty good. Minimal loss. That's really all I wanted to know.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

That 60 FPS mode defeats the purpose of a game that the only thing it has going for it is its visual fidelity.

 

[adamsapple]

- New update adds 60fps mode to Series X as well as launching with this update on PS5/Pro.
- PS5 Pro allows switching between PSSR and UE5's built-in TSR up-scaling
- The game is now official Steam Deck supported as well

- The 60FPS performance mode works really well across the board with only minor drops observed, with PS5 Pro having the least of them.
- The appreciable visible difference between the 30 and 60fps modes is rather small.
- The biggest difference is change in DRS. Series X goes from 1600p to 1080 with DRS mostly staying close to higher bounds (1593p in Quality and 1069 in Perf.)
- Things like foliage do lose some clarity at range along with some extra visual noise on things like Senua's hair
- TSR upscale to 1440p in Performance mode and 2160p in Quality mode

- Base PS5's DRS range is often lower than Series X with Quality being 1432p (vs 1593p) and Performance being 989p (vs. 1069p)
- The final TSR resolve targets the same max resolutions (2160p in Quality and 1440p in Performance)

- Performance mode retains all of UE5's features (Lumen, Nanite, VSM) with making only granular changes to their coverage
- Some other post process elements like Depth of Field and some screen space fog are lowered in quality in Performance mode

- Engine level animation rigging and mesh changes that had to be made for Performance mode also rolled into Quality mode
- DF says that while the reduced milisecond budget would make things like pop-in more obvious, it was hard to catch it in their testing
- 'Too many tweaks to mention but the key point is that 60fps works and it works well'
- Sudden change in lighting which can cause DRS to stress can see a single digit frame drop or two during game play with SX seeing this a bit more
- Other than that some minor traversal hitching observed during traversal between areas

PS5 Pro:
- Quality and Performance mode with the choice of choosing PSSR or UE5's TSR mode
- DRS ranges are higher on Pro with Perf mode now targeting 1200p (vs 1080p on PS5/SX) with average of 1166p
- Quality mode runs at 1700p DRS with average of 1696p at 30fps
- Both modes reconstruct to 4K
- Rocks, foliage etc are better defined on PS5 Pro compared to base PS5
- Variable Rate Shading is introduced on PS5 Pro
- Shadow quality and DoF runs at higher pre-sets on Pro's performance mode vs base PS5
- PSSR was back-ported from future UE5 versions as it does not natively support the version this game was made on
- DF's preferred up-scaler is TSR as PSSR can show noise and artifacts in specular highlights
- PSSR can show better coverage when moving
- Though the heavy post process often makes them hard to differentiate
- PS5 Pro does not have the occasional odd drops that PS5/SX have with only one drop seen in DF's testing

Steam Deck:
- The update makes the game run better at 30fps, makes it kind of like a portable Series S version.
- Low settings at 768p with TSR up-scaling makes the game run at a practically solid 30fps with only minor drops
- Some optimizations were made at reducing settings that won't be obvious to players
- 20% improvement and reduction in stutter observed in some areas where other areas show slighter boosts to 7%
- Stuttering still remains in some places.
- DF recommends using 30fps lock with TSR up-scaling to maintain a steady 30 versus running the game unlocked

PC:
- PC's 'very high' setting preset essentially improves all the effects one rung above they were.
- DF did not go into it much.

 

[roosnam1980]

all round really impressive optimisations by ninja theory.

 

[analog_future]

Might have to revisit this on PC with my 5090 now that you can push the game's visuals even farther

 

[RedC]

Looks like I'll be getting the PS5 version when it goes on a deep sale to play the performance mode on PS5 Pro.

 

[adamsapple]

all round really impressive optimisations by ninja theory.

They really did.

All the UE5 key features are here, DF say differences aren't really noticeable outside of 3x zoom and the game is practically locked 60 barring the occasional traversal stutter that even the mightiest of PC's also have.

Ninja Theory have put out the most impressive UE5 game, again.

 

[Darsxx82]

A commendable effort the way they've achieved a 60fps (very real 60fps) while keeping the visual experience almost intact and difficult to grasp.

Beyond the small reduction in IQ (mitigated by so many post-processing effects), the other "tweaks" are difficult to notice except for 1v1 captures and zoom.

Hopefully, this HB2 example is a sign of the improvement in optimization that UE5 has seen recently and is reflected in upcoming UE5-based games, both large and small.

 

[Black_Stride]

Still weird seeing Microsoft Corporation on the Playstation Dashboard


P.S
What is the Playstation 5 Dashboard official name?

 

[Bojji]

Pro is getting some nice improvements here:

- some quality settings used in performance mode
- higher average resolution and performance
- Reconstruction to 4k instead of 1440p on base consoles

I think NT did a good job here.

 

[Fafalada]

Steamdeck looks like watching one of those XVid DVD rips from the early 00s.
I'm not even saying that in a bad way - it's just - uncanny from the noise to blocking artifacts...

Also I don't get the upscaler recommendation.
In every shot the voice-over is comparing them - TSR is noticeably more artifact-ridden/noisy, and obviously less clear in motion. Is the 'screenshot' image quality of games really that valuable to DF?

 

[acm2000]

loved the game, a great piece of interactive cinema and thus i almost feel like 30fps actually better suits the game, will playthrough at 60fps at some point just to see the difference.

 

[viveks86]

Hopefully, this HB2 example is a sign of the improvement in optimization that UE5 has seen recently and is reflected in upcoming UE5-based games, both large and small.

The crazy part is it isn't. They actually back ported features from later versions into their base UE version, which is still much older. So I wonder if any of the engine optimizations made it through or if this all just dev ingenuity and hard work to make it run almost perfectly.

 

[Zuzu]

Pro is pushing approximately 39% more pixels on average in performance mode and approx 40% more pixels in quality mode over base PS5. And it's upscaling to 4k in both modes with some higher settings in performance mode on top of that.

It also runs at a better frame rate in performance mode compared to base consoles.

 

[R3TRO]

Almost want to replay it but my GP expired and I'd rather wait for a Steam sale.

 

[Negotiator101]

They really did.

All the UE5 key features are here, DF say differences aren't really noticeable outside of 3x zoom and the game is practically locked 60 barring the occasional traversal stutter that even the mightiest of PC's also have.
W
Ninja Theory have put out the most impressive UE5 game, again.

Yeah incredible looking game, looking forward to the new Gears to see UE5 pushed even further.

 

[Bojji]

A big resolution advantage on Pro over base PS5 in this game. It's pushing approximately 72% more pixels on average in performance mode and approx 71% more pixels in quality mode over base PS5. And it's upscaling to 4k in both modes with some higher settings in performance mode on top of that.

It also runs at a better frame rate in performance mode compared to base consoles.

VRS probably helps Pro achieving higher res. Same thing for Series X vs. PS5.

 

[FalconPunch]

They really did.

All the UE5 key features are here, DF say differences aren't really noticeable outside of 3x zoom and the game is practically locked 60 barring the occasional traversal stutter that even the mightiest of PC's also have.

Ninja Theory have put out the most impressive UE5 game, again.

A very generous use of the word game.... Is hellblade 2 a game? Many would argue otherwise.

 

[viveks86]

Pro is getting some nice improvements here:

- some quality settings used in performance mode
- higher average resolution and performance
- Reconstruction to 4k instead of 1440p on base consoles

I think NT did a good job here.

Boring! You have become boring after buying the Pro

F Feel Like I'm On 42 , tell Bojji he is wrong!

 

[kevboard]

it's the perfect game for UE5.

super slow, full with blurring post processing effects, so reconstruction artifacts aren't all that visible. linear, so I/O stutters aren't an issue. almost nothing is interactive, so the CPU isn't overly stressed.

 

[omegasc]

They really did.

All the UE5 key features are here, DF say differences aren't really noticeable outside of 3x zoom and the game is practically locked 60 barring the occasional traversal stutter that even the mightiest of PC's also have.

Ninja Theory have put out the most impressive UE5 game, again.

Not sure about the bolded, since PS5 Pro does not have that.
It's a very impressive impressive job for sure. Though it shows it's still not that simple to upgrade an UE5 version, even on the same generation. I recall Square doing the same for UE4 on FF7R to get the SSD improvements on PS5, but I thought - or I just wished - it would be easier to do in this case.

 

[Fafalada]

almost nothing is interactive, so the CPU isn't overly stressed.

It is notable how in a semi-interactive cut-scene player they still had to do so much work on CPU optimisations to reach 60.

But hey - at least this perfect tech really 'pushes' the hardware right?

 

[Darsxx82]

The crazy part is it isn't. They actually back ported features from later versions into their base UE version, which is still much older. So I wonder if any of the engine optimizations made it through or if this all just dev ingenuity and hard work to make it run almost perfectly.

Yes, it's probably more that since the game is based on an older version of UE5.
On the other hand, performance and optimization improvements often come from the ingenuity and work of developers, and then those improvements are made available to others at events like GDC... Hopefully, some of that will be exported.

 

[Zuzu]

VRS probably helps Pro achieving higher res. Same thing for Series X

Sorry I did the maths wrong. It's actually approx 39% resolution increase in performance mode and 40% in quality mode. I'll fix up my post.

 

[viveks86]

and then those improvements are made available to others at events like GDC..

I see the title already:

"How we made this donkey run like a thoroughbred"

 

[Ozriel]

That 60 FPS mode defeats the purpose of a game that the only thing it has going for it is its visual fidelity.

Digital foundry summary says otherwise.

Poor you

 

[adamsapple]

Pro is getting some nice improvements here:

- some quality settings used in performance mode
- higher average resolution and performance
- Reconstruction to 4k instead of 1440p on base consoles

I think NT did a good job here.

I miss all those Pro bashing threads

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

Digital foundry summary says otherwise.

Poor you

Don't you have eyes? The image is too damn blurry for a game that is trying to be photorealistic, and the lighting implementation at 60 FPS on the base consoles is lackluster for this supposed selling point.

Oh, are DF's words going to make this "game" skyrocket in sales now? Is Digital Foundry going to save Ninja Theory from being shut down by your daddy Phil Spencer?

"but but digital foundry says" .....

 

[Bojji]

Boring! You have become boring after buying the Pro

F Feel Like I'm On 42 , tell Bojji he is wrong!

I miss all those Pro bashing threads

I feel offended

My posts from few days ago:

This is pretty much the same when DF tested many games at launch, ~30% seems to be the average and nowhere near promised ~45%. Pro seems entirely memory speed limited (memory speed uplift is ~30%).

Console is ubalanced as fuck, that 67% bigger GPU is sleeping...

Exactly, and it even had more memory and much higher memory bandwidth to be able to do that.

Sony "forgot" about those little things when making PS4 Pro and PS5 Pro, both consoles produce worse results than what their GPUs are capable off.

Don't play dumb. This game is GPU limited and you are ONLY getting ~30% more performance on average, Cerny said - 45% and GPU is 67% bigger.

In CPU limited games you get just few % more:

 

[viveks86]

Also I don't get the upscaler recommendation.
In every shot the voice-over is comparing them - TSR is noticeably more artifact-ridden/noisy, and obviously less clear in motion. Is the 'screenshot' image quality of games really that valuable to DF?

Yeah that conclusion made no sense to me with the evidence shown. I see the specular aliasing, but the noisiness is definitely more with TSR.

I wish there was a frame rate unlock option so we can see with TSR and PSSR have comparable performance hit in UE5.

Good to see that the current PSSR is already performing this well with lumen and UE5. Next year's PSSR should become the defacto standard for UE5 games on Pro, at least until Epic inevitably comes up with their own ML based AA.

 

[Bojji]

Yeah that conclusion made no sense to me with the evidence shown. I see the specular aliasing, but the noisiness is definitely more with TSR.

I wish there was a frame rate unlock option so we can see with TSR and PSSR have comparable performance hit in UE5.

Good to see that the current PSSR is already performing this well with lumen and UE5. Next year's PSSR should become the defacto standard for UE5 games on Pro, at least until Epic inevitably comes up with their own ML based AA.

Hell is Us demo is full of PSSR noise.

Meanwhile Wukong was great with lumen + PSSR and Senua seems ok.

 

[viveks86]

I miss all those Pro bashing threads

Is... is that Sam from Game of Thrones?

 

[Ozriel]

Don't you have eyes? The image is too damn blurry for a game that is trying to be photorealistic, and the lighting implementation at 60 FPS on the base consoles is lackluster for this supposed selling point.

Oh, are DF's words going to make this "game" skyrocket in sales now? Is Digital Foundry going to save Ninja Theory from being shut down by your daddy Phil Spencer?

"but but digital foundry says" .....

 

[Polygonal_Sprite]

To take a game as nice looking as that from 30 with slight drops to 60 with slight drops really shows the improvements made to UE5 and the consoles SDK's in the past year. Great job.

Looking at the SD version I'm now expecting a Switch 2 version aswell.

 

[adamsapple]

Is... is that Sam from Game of Thrones?

Yessir, it's from when Emilia Clarke went on SNL IIRC.

I feel offended

My posts from few days ago:

That's my boy!

Don't you have eyes? The image is too damn blurry for a game that is trying to be photorealistic, and the lighting implementation at 60 FPS on the base consoles is lackluster for this supposed selling point.

Oh, are DF's words going to make this "game" skyrocket in sales now? Is Digital Foundry going to save Ninja Theory from being shut down by your daddy Phil Spencer?

"but but digital foundry says" .....

 

[BigLee74]

Trying to decide if it'll be worth a quick replay now it's 60fps. Probably not.

 

[mckmas8808]

To take a game as nice looking as that from 30 with slight drops to 60 with slight drops really shows the improvements made to UE5 and the consoles SDK's in the past year. Great job.

Looking at the SD version I'm now expecting a Switch 2 version aswell.

VERY VERY good.

 

[//DEVIL//]

Even if it runs at 120 fps, I still wont play it. I tried it on release date because of the graphics . 2 hours in and I gave up. the game is super boring and the puzzles are even more boring and annoying to finish.

good luck to anyone who wants to play it. hope you enjoy it. but 100% not for me

 

[Black_Stride]

PC gets native DualSense, DLSS4 and a Very High preset..........guess im gonna jump back in this weekend.

 

[Ozriel]

Even if it runs at 120 fps, I still wont play it. I tried it on release date because of the graphics . 2 hours in and I gave up. the game is super boring and the puzzles are even more boring and annoying to finish.

good luck to anyone who wants to play it. hope you enjoy it. but 100% not for me

Sir, this is a Digital Foundry thread

 

[Diego Brasil]

- New update adds 60fps mode to Series X as well as launching with this update on PS5/Pro.
- PS5 Pro allows switching between PSSR and UE5's built-in TSR up-scaling
- The game is now official Steam Deck supported as well

- The 60FPS performance mode works really well across the board with only minor drops observed, with PS5 Pro having the least of them.
- The appreciable visible difference between the 30 and 60fps modes is rather small.
- The biggest difference is change in DRS. Series X goes from 1600p to 1080 with DRS mostly staying close to higher bounds (1593p in Quality and 1069 in Perf.)
- Things like foliage do lose some clarity at range along with some extra visual noise on things like Senua's hair
- TSR upscale to 1440p in Performance mode and 2160p in Quality mode

- Base PS5's DRS range is often lower than Series X with Quality being 1432p (vs 1593p) and Performance being 989p (vs. 1069p)
- The final TSR resolve targets the same max resolutions (2160p in Quality and 1440p in Performance)

- Performance mode retains all of UE5's features (Lumen, Nanite, VSM) with making only granular changes to their coverage
- Some other post process elements like Depth of Field and some screen space fog are lowered in quality in Performance mode

- Engine level animation rigging and mesh changes that had to be made for Performance mode also rolled into Quality mode
- DF says that while the reduced milisecond budget would make things like pop-in more obvious, it was hard to catch it in their testing
- 'Too many tweaks to mention but the key point is that 60fps works and it works well'
- Sudden change in lighting which can cause DRS to stress can see a single digit frame drop or two during game play with SX seeing this a bit more
- Other than that some minor traversal hitching observed during traversal between areas

PS5 Pro:
- Quality and Performance mode with the choice of choosing PSSR or UE5's TSR mode
- DRS ranges are higher on Pro with Perf mode now targeting 1200p (vs 1080p on PS5/SX) with average of 1166p
- Quality mode runs at 1700p DRS with average of 1696p at 30fps
- Both modes reconstruct to 4K
- Rocks, foliage etc are better defined on PS5 Pro compared to base PS5
- Variable Rate Shading is introduced on PS5 Pro
- Shadow quality and DoF runs at higher pre-sets on Pro's performance mode vs base PS5
- PSSR was back-ported from future UE5 versions as it does not natively support the version this game was made on
- DF's preferred up-scaler is TSR as PSSR can show noise and artifacts in specular highlights
- Though the heavy post process often makes them hard to differentiate
- PS5 Pro does not have the occasional odd drops that PS5/SX have with only one drop seen in DF's testing

Steam Deck:
- The update makes the game run better at 30fps, makes it kind of like a portable Series S version.
- Low settings at 768p with TSR up-scaling makes the game run at a practically solid 30fps with only minor drops
- Some optimizations were made at reducing settings that won't be obvious to players
- 20% improvement and reduction in stutter observed in some areas where other areas show slighter boosts to 7%
- Stuttering still remains in some places.
- DF recommends using 30fps lock with TSR up-scaling to maintain a steady 30 versus running the game unlocked

PC:
- PC's 'very high' setting preset essentially improves all the effects one rung above they were.
- DF did not go into it much.

Your summary contains two important points that were not mentioned.


1 -Only one FPS drop was detected on the PS5 Pro. It's not that it has fewer drops... in fact, it only had one drop.


2- PSSR is better in motion than TSR. It's sharper in motion.

 

[Karim]

Prefer TSR over PSSR. The guy can't even spot PSSR in RE4 120fps mode until someone twitts to him about it. What a buffoon.

 

[Skifi28]

Really surprising they put so much effort on the pro version. Granted, some of the improvements are subtle given the nature of the game, but they're there regardless and the imqge quality impovement alone was quite obvious even in the youtube video.

 

[Karim]

Your summary contains two important points that were not mentioned.


1 -Only one FPS drop was detected on the PS5 Pro. It's not that it has fewer drops... in fact, it only had one drop.


2- PSSR is better in motion than TSR. It's sharper in motion.

 

[Diego Brasil]

create a caption
(legenda)

 

[adamsapple]

Your summary contains two important points that were not mentioned.


1 -Only one FPS drop was detected on the PS5 Pro. It's not that it has fewer drops... in fact, it only had one drop.


2- PSSR is better in motion than TSR. It's sharper in motion.

- PS5 Pro does not have the occasional odd drops that PS5/SX have with only one drop seen in DF's testing

 

[Karim]

create a caption
(legenda)

Not to change the matter of the subject, but it's more annoying DF when they talked to prefer whatever upscaler over PSR without provide a video comparison to show what exactly they have seen of worse in the PSSR. They did the same with Days Gone remaster. I would appreciate to see with my own eyes what is off indeed empties words as "preferred up-scaler is TSR as PSSR can show noise and artifacts in specular highlights". Can you show us please?

 

[Elios83]

Thank you Microsoft for delivering the definitive console version on PS5 Pro but I don't think the game is worth it unless on sale or on Plus.