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Graphical Fidelity I Expect This Gen

I think av
I very much enjoy your posts but what is it exactly that you want?

We all know that AAA games are currently costing $100-$300 million depending on whether they take 3 years or 5 years to develop. At this stage I'm convinced everyone in the industry got together circa 2020 in private and said "okay if we go to the next step visually we're talking 7 year development cycles and $300-$500 million dev costs" so publishers and devs came to the conclusion that slightly better than the very best looking PS4/XBO games at closer to 4k and at 60fps instead of 30fps was the best direction to take at this current time and with the hardware power on offer. The SSD's meaning much faster loading was also a massive leap over last gen and a major selling point. Sony also have their controller and PSVR2 as additional selling points.

This is why we're seeing such a mixed bag when it comes to AAA visual and some being disappointed and it usually comes down to budget and the time they're given versus the hardware not being capable. It's also why certain games look incredibly impressive one second and decidedly last gen the next like Plague Tale 2, Dead Island 2, Calisto Protocol, Jedi Survivor and FFXVI from recent times.

I don't know about the rest of you but if we were guaranteed that games will look like FFXVI, Jedi Survivor, Ratchet, Forza Horizon 5 and Returnal but they came out every 3 years and wouldn't sink a dev studio if they undersold I'd take it in a heartbeat (over getting ever so slightly closer to an overall unattainable level of visual fidelity anyway) CGI. The next crop of current gen games already look better than those above with the likes of Starfield, Fable, Forza Motorsport, Hellblade II, Star Wars Outlaws, Assassin's Creed Mirage, Alan Wake II and Spider-Man 2. I'm sure the next Horizon, God of War and TLOU III from Sony will also be a further visual improvement.

Console VR Gen 2 is also exciting in it's own "next gen" way pushing PS4.5 level visuals instead of PS3 level visuals.

People really, really don't like hearing this but the largest visual leap in the coming years will probably come from next gen Nintendo published games imo because the leap in hardware between Switch and Switch 2 will be so ginormous (made even bigger with the use of DLSS). Luigi's Mansion 4, Mario Kart 9, Super Mario Odyssey 2, Xenoblade 4 and the next Zelda will look ridiculous using PBR, RT and DLSS on a GPU baseline of 1.5tflops instead of 200gflops. Nintendo's art direction and PS4 Pro level visuals / iq will certainly be a sight to behold but I expect the same old "doesn't count as it's cartoony!" excuses to discount them just like Ratchet PS5 goti

I think avatar didn't get downgraded the lighting looks brighter than reveal trailer and gameplay overview is ps5 tends to looks worse than pc we have to wait for pc gameplay to check whether it's downgraded
 
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I very much enjoy your posts but what is it exactly that you want?

We all know that AAA games are currently costing $100-$300 million depending on whether they take 3 years or 5 years to develop. At this stage I'm convinced everyone in the industry got together circa 2020 in private and said "okay if we go to the next step visually we're talking 7 year development cycles and $300-$500 million dev costs" so publishers and devs came to the conclusion that slightly better than the very best looking PS4/XBO games at closer to 4k and at 60fps instead of 30fps was the best direction to take at this current time and with the hardware power on offer. The SSD's meaning much faster loading was also a massive leap over last gen and a major selling point. Sony also have their controller and PSVR2 as additional selling points.

This is why we're seeing such a mixed bag when it comes to AAA visual and some being disappointed and it usually comes down to budget and the time they're given versus the hardware not being capable. It's also why certain games look incredibly impressive one second and decidedly last gen the next like Plague Tale 2, Dead Island 2, Calisto Protocol, Jedi Survivor and FFXVI from recent times.

I don't know about the rest of you but if we were guaranteed that games will look like FFXVI, Jedi Survivor, Ratchet, Forza Horizon 5 and Returnal but they came out every 3 years and wouldn't sink a dev studio if they undersold I'd take it in a heartbeat (over getting ever so slightly closer to an overall unattainable level of visual fidelity anyway) CGI. The next crop of current gen games already look better than those above with the likes of Starfield, Fable, Forza Motorsport, Hellblade II, Star Wars Outlaws, Assassin's Creed Mirage, Alan Wake II and Spider-Man 2. I'm sure the next Horizon, God of War and TLOU III from Sony will also be a further visual improvement.

Console VR Gen 2 is also exciting in it's own "next gen" way pushing PS4.5 level visuals instead of PS3 level visuals.

People really, really don't like hearing this but the largest visual leap in the coming years will probably come from next gen Nintendo published games imo because the leap in hardware between Switch and Switch 2 will be so ginormous (made even bigger with the use of DLSS). Luigi's Mansion 4, Mario Kart 9, Super Mario Odyssey 2, Xenoblade 4 and the next Zelda will look ridiculous using PBR, RT and DLSS on a GPU baseline of 1.5tflops instead of 200gflops. Nintendo's art direction and PS4 Pro level visuals / iq will certainly be a sight to behold but I expect the same old "doesn't count as it's cartoony!" excuses to discount them just like Ratchet PS5 goti
I don't think avatar frontiers of Pandora downgraded we have to wait for pc gameplay footage which tends to look better than consoles, and the game lighting got brighter in overview over first look trailer
 
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GymWolf

Gold Member
The fact that you can't see it is what's unbelievable. Plenty of people have said the same. The less eye catching lighting in the first shot actually brings out a lot more of the detail. The fact that you think that in this particular shot ND went and upgraded the model while in the rest of the game they look identical to Part 2 is just a head scratcher. There are plenty of videos comparing the two games that prove that they're basically using the same assets with some difference in lighting choices. These very shots have been posted in this thread before and got similar responses as mine, so really we're just going around in circles at this point. Even DF and NX Gamer have stated that the two games are basically running on same tech, so I'm not sure what else you need to convince you.
The flashilight, it's the damn flashlight.
 

Edder1

Member
If avatar ships 30fps only and ND next game does 60fps you can bet avatar will crush whatever ND puts out. Linear or otherwise.
ND has a massive reputation to protect as a studio that pushes visuals to their max so 30fps is most likely. Factions will probably be 60fps because it's multiplayer, but it will be very surprising if TLOU3 isn't 30fps. There's no way a game will be a graphical benchmark on consoles while it also has 60fps option. The amount of outcry regarding Spiderman 2 just proves that console gamers care more about visual upgrades than 60fps.
 
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rofif

Can’t Git Gud
It's the same damn engine. That particular shot they changed to have different lighting for what was a flashback sequence in the sequel. But that lighting is present in several scenes in TLOU2.

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What I wanted them to do was go back and get the bullshot character model they created for Joel, and put that in the remake. But they couldnt even do that. This was obviously a fake cg character model they created speficically for that trailer to fool people into thinking joel was in the sequel, but I would've loved to have seen this level of fidelity in the PS5 only remake.

dfd1bd0d52c8e253ecb947388a45339ba93007bc.gif


We got this which is ok, but nothing like that above.

0045ad5d39e85e2fbb23ab2c30d1fd6b9f2d3c3e.gif
I honestly think tlou2 still looks better at least in some parts
 

Hudo

Member
Dunno, man. This "gen" has been kind to me so far:

Age of Empires 2 DE:
ss_f270aa4e146459dc8bvgf4l.jpg


Command & Conquer Remastered Collection:
ss_5fff8207ed5ffdfef6xkfsn.jpg


WarCraft III: Reforged:
yr5gomk05dp21smfjj.jpg
 

sinnergy

Member
The only thing that came close for me was a little slice Coalition made for their UE5 test (fully real time running on Series X). I'll be surprised if this demo isn't surpassed in the next couple of years.
It takes time , reworking the engine , creating Hollywood assets (detail) couple of years , 4 - 6
 
I agree with you on Nintendo. Luigi's Mansion and especially Zelda Links Awakening look kinda stunning. Amazing asset quality too. If we can get that in a big AAA title from Nintendo then sure, it will definitely impress people.

I think games taking forever to make is mostly due to everyone's insistence on making 50-100 hour games. It has not much to do with graphics. Just look at zelda. took 6 years and looks like a PS3 game. We went from linear 8-10 hour games to open world 20-30 hour games to all of a sudden 50-100 hours with likely 200 hours of content. I spent 145 glorious hours in Zelda and still have loads of content left. It's so dumb because they are training players to expect more.

But i agree, I dont see that changing so we will just have to wait until 2026-2027 to see next games from our favorite studios like ND, SSM, Rockstar and GG. until then ubisoft and other b tier devs like insomniac will have to do. I am pretty happy with Avatar despite the downgrade. Star wars looks amazing. Fable looks stunning. Starfield is very impressive and will turn heads when it launches just like FF16 is doing right now.

I was ready to quit gaming or at least the forums after the disastrous Sony conference; spiderman 2 truly broke me, but microsoft and ubisoft gave me some hope. Honestly, 2023 has been quite spectacular so far and even last gen games like hogwarts, re4 and zelda have really impressed from a gameplay perspective. star wars, final fantasy have some great visual highs with setpieces i honestly dont see being done on last gen consoles at this level of fidelity.

2024 looks kinda barren so you'll probably see me bitching again, but i am content for now. we might actually see some new reveals next year from sony like death stranding 2 so at least we will have those instead of actual game releases.


For what its worth, DF did some pixel counts and its FSR 2 4k quality so a 1440p internal resolution. Surprising for a game so reliant upon ray tracing running on an AMD GPU. FSR 2 has an overhead so it might actually run at 1620p or above if they ran it natively.
Yeah the public now expect 40 hour games when it comes to action adventure along with many RPGtropes which is why even the likes of God of War have had things like coloured loot, talent points and xp added when they're meant to be more than ever about the narrative and combat feel...

For SM2 I think Insomniac have earned our benefit of the doubt tbh because without them the first two years of this gen would have been much, much worse than it already was. Playing SM Remastered, Miles and Ratchet made me feel I hadn't wasted $500 when it comes to my PS5. They'll show SM2 again in the month before launch and if it still looks as underwhelming I'll be there with you with my pitchfork haha but I expect it to look much, much better than it did a month ago and they still have another 14 weeks to polish from last Friday (on top of the build we saw in early June being from March or April if history is any indication on E3 demos).

Believe me they heard the criticisms online despite the enthusiast press licking their asses on twitter about it looking like the second coming but they know and will want to have with no doubts the best looking game of the year with SM2 which will be hard to do in a year of Jedi Survivor, FFXVI, Alan Wake 2, Forza Motorsport, 2077: Phantom Liberty, AC Mirage, Silent Hill and Starfield. Don't count them out yet :p
 
Luigi's Mansion is the most impressive Switch game imo. The fact that they're doing that level of fidelity and animations on PS3 level hardware at 60fps nonetheless is just remarkable. The animations especially are Pixar level and should not be allowed to exist on such weak hardware. Nintendo really have some super talent working there, really gonna be interesting how far they can push next Switch.
Not that it matters but LM3 was 30fps not 60fps but it was one of the few impressive looking first party published games that ran at full 1080p 90% of the time when docked. Most first party published Nintendo games target dynamic 900p when docked and very rarely hit it due to the slow ass memory bandwidth meaning 720p is the norm when docked in most visually taxing games.

The next Switch can't get here soon enough. I'm far more excited for that than a PS5 Pro tbh if only because it means that I can play modern games in handheld mode above 540p/25fps :p
 

alloush

Member
Honestly seeing this gif having just rewatched the UE5 demo posted above which has the same setting made HFW look hella cartoony in comparison and made me realize how none of today’s games are even close to these demos graphically and to photorealism in general and how we still have some work to do to get there.

It is amazing how we think some games look really good until something more advanced graphically comes along which makes said games pale in comparison.


UE5 demo in question:
 

Edder1

Member
Not that it matters but LM3 was 30fps not 60fps but it was one of the few impressive looking first party published games that ran at full 1080p 90% of the time when docked. Most first party published Nintendo games target dynamic 900p when docked and very rarely hit it due to the slow ass memory bandwidth meaning 720p is the norm when docked in most visually taxing games.

The next Switch can't get here soon enough. I'm far more excited for that than a PS5 Pro tbh if only because it means that I can play modern games in handheld mode above 540p/25fps :p
Damn you're right, it was 30fps. Being able to play it at 60 on PC made me forget about the framerate on target hardware, lol.
 

Edder1

Member
Honestly seeing this gif having just rewatched the UE5 demo posted above which has the same setting made HFW look hella cartoony in comparison and made me realize how none of today’s games are even close to these demos graphically and to photorealism in general and how we still have some work to do to get there.
The biggest difference between HFW and that UE5 demo is the lighting and level of geometry. The lighting is what makes the biggest difference to visuals and HFW lighting is held back by the fact that it had to run on PS4 as well. Asset quality is also higher in UE5 demo, but HFW assets still hold up pretty well.
 

alloush

Member
The biggest difference between HFW and that UE5 demo is the lighting and level of geometry. The lighting is what makes the biggest difference to visuals and HFW lighting is held back by the fact that it had to run on PS4 as well. Asset quality is also higher in UE5 demo, but HFW assets still hold up pretty well.
Yeah for sure, the HFW assets hold up very well but to me it's not just the lighting, it is the fidelity itself, it looks more realistic than HFW which looks cartoony in comparison. Games still look cartoony and this is where The Matrix demo blew me away the fact it looked realistic or close to realism. We don't notice this with games until better looking games come out which render those old games cartoony, and then it is rinse and repeat until we reach photorealism.
 
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Edder1

Member
Yeah for sure, the HFW assets hold up very well but to me it's not just the lighting, it is the fidelity itself, it looks more realistic than HFW which looks cartoony in comparison. Games still look cartoony and this is where The Matrix demo blew me away the fact it looked realistic or close to realism. We don't notice this with games until better looking games come out which render those old games cartoony, and then it is rinse and repeat until we reach photorealism.
The cartoony look that HFW has is very much intentional by the devs as Horizon series aims for more stylised look. The main reason they do this is because they don't have the hardware to push photorealism and by going with stylised visuals they make sure visuals impress and hold up better.

You're right though, Matrix demo is the first time we saw graphics mimick photorealism and actually hold up somewhat. I still think games that go for photorealism this gen will show their age quickly once PS6 rolls around as photorealistic graphics age the worst. Current gen hardware still isn't powerful enough to do photorealism, but for the first time it's capable of at least mimicking it. Tim Sweeny said you need around 40tflops GPU to do photorealism and we should be there by next gen. Hopefully we're all alive by then, lol.
 
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The cartoony look that HFW has is very much intentional by the devs as Horizon series aims for more stylised look. The main reason they do this is because they don't have the hardware to push photorealism and by going with stylised visuals they make sure visuals impress and hold up better.

This is not entirely true. A game like Death Stranding, does a good job at trying to aim for photo-realism, this was the vision of Kojima and subsequently the art directors.

I think we need to realise that games by their nature are born out of art, simply trying to aim for photo-realism is a narrow minded goal for the future of graphics. Look at the new Avatar game, I would hardly call it photorealistic but it's still very impressive on a technical level through things like lighting, foliage and animations.

Horizon would look very boring visually had it aimed for photorealistic visuals, the colour pallet would take a huge hit and the game would lose a lot of what made it beautiful. I know people criticise its lighting, and i agree it can be inconsistent but if they implement a solution like ray-traced global illumination, it will dramatically change the games visuals, even on the developer scale, the art design will have to be reworked.
 

Edder1

Member
This is not entirely true. A game like Death Stranding, does a good job at trying to aim for photo-realism, this was the vision of Kojima and subsequently the art directors.
The reason Kojima can go for photorealism on the same engine imo is because he has very little going on in the world and on the map. Horizon is a very dense game with many NPCs and map full of assets and geometry. If Death Stranding had as many fully modelled NPCs and world geometry then I think photorealism that the game was going for would be of far lesser quality and just wouldn't hold up as it does. And then there's a fact that the photorealistic look of DS just ages poorly in comparison, just look at how DS2 is already making DS graphics look dated.
 
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Piggoro

Member
Guess we will see once frontiers of Pandora gets here.
I still can't see Next Gen in Frontiers of Pandora. Some elements/shot get close'ish to Horizon level but some old, junky and pretty last gen (especially shooting in the human base area). Am I just spoiled or missing something?
 

ChiefDada

Gold Member
Yeah for sure, the HFW assets hold up very well but to me it's not just the lighting, it is the fidelity itself, it looks more realistic than HFW which looks cartoony in comparison. Games still look cartoony and this is where The Matrix demo blew me away the fact it looked realistic or close to realism. We don't notice this with games until better looking games come out which render those old games cartoony, and then it is rinse and repeat until we reach photorealism.

Trust me, it's because of the lighting. If Horizon had RT based lighting, it would be the best looking game. The geometry is excellent, the animation is very good and I would say second only to ND/TLOU, textures and NPCs are first class as well. Lighting is the only major visual limitation for Horizon to overcome.

I played GoW Ragnarok, HFW - Burning Shores, TLOU 1&2 all over the past 2 days. They will all look pretty bad from a AAA fidelity standpoint by the end of 2024.

Horizon would look very boring visually had it aimed for photorealistic visuals, the colour pallet would take a huge hit and the game would lose a lot of what made it beautiful. I know people criticise its lighting, and i agree it can be inconsistent but if they implement a solution like ray-traced global illumination, it will dramatically change the games visuals, even on the developer scale, the art design will have to be reworked.

I agree with the ideology for most of what you're saying EXCEPT I don't think we're asking for photorealism at the expense of artistic vision. An example of that would be that one trending ue5 game with the cop chasing the perp using the shaky cam. I'm on record saying I do NOT want my games to look like that. We want realistic light within the artistic vision. Thankfully we have an idea of what Horizon can look like with photorealistic lighting implemented within the Horizon artistic vision. Call me crazy but I believe we get there this gen for sure.

 

rofif

Can’t Git Gud
This is not entirely true. A game like Death Stranding, does a good job at trying to aim for photo-realism, this was the vision of Kojima and subsequently the art directors.

I think we need to realise that games by their nature are born out of art, simply trying to aim for photo-realism is a narrow minded goal for the future of graphics. Look at the new Avatar game, I would hardly call it photorealistic but it's still very impressive on a technical level through things like lighting, foliage and animations.

Horizon would look very boring visually had it aimed for photorealistic visuals, the colour pallet would take a huge hit and the game would lose a lot of what made it beautiful. I know people criticise its lighting, and i agree it can be inconsistent but if they implement a solution like ray-traced global illumination, it will dramatically change the games visuals, even on the developer scale, the art design will have to be reworked.
Die hard man is my most realistic guy
 

Nubulax

Member
Honestly seeing this gif having just rewatched the UE5 demo posted above which has the same setting made HFW look hella cartoony in comparison and made me realize how none of today’s games are even close to these demos graphically and to photorealism in general and how we still have some work to do to get there.

It is amazing how we think some games look really good until something more advanced graphically comes along which makes said games pale in comparison.


UE5 demo in question:

Didnt they say that UE5 demo had 8k textures
 

Edder1

Member
Thankfully we have an idea of what Horizon can look like with photorealistic lighting implemented within the Horizon artistic vision. Call me crazy but I believe we get there this gen for sure.


The lighting, material quality and level of detail is well beyond even Matrix demo. It's CGI after all. Maybe we can get to 70-80% of that in cutscenes and that's about it imo. It just seems like something that is a generation away still.
 
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I still can't see Next Gen in Frontiers of Pandora. Some elements/shot get close'ish to Horizon level but some old, junky and pretty last gen (especially shooting in the human base area). Am I just spoiled or missing something?
Well there’s maybe like 1 or 2 games for next Gen tops that could “spoil” someone graphically speaking so I’m gonna go with “missing something”

The scale of the world combined with the detail of the world and the foliage density and lighting is simply next generation as fuck. Yeah some of the shooting parts looked like far cry but when the worst part of your game looks like far cry 5 maxed out on pc you’re doing something right
 
I still can't see Next Gen in Frontiers of Pandora. Some elements/shot get close'ish to Horizon level but some old, junky and pretty last gen (especially shooting in the human base area). Am I just spoiled or missing something?
Lol you serious frontiers of Pandora looks leap above horizon forbidden west interms of looks and details. Horizon looks souless compared to frontiers of Pandora world
 

SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
Yeah the public now expect 40 hour games when it comes to action adventure along with many RPGtropes which is why even the likes of God of War have had things like coloured loot, talent points and xp added when they're meant to be more than ever about the narrative and combat feel...

For SM2 I think Insomniac have earned our benefit of the doubt tbh because without them the first two years of this gen would have been much, much worse than it already was. Playing SM Remastered, Miles and Ratchet made me feel I hadn't wasted $500 when it comes to my PS5. They'll show SM2 again in the month before launch and if it still looks as underwhelming I'll be there with you with my pitchfork haha but I expect it to look much, much better than it did a month ago and they still have another 14 weeks to polish from last Friday (on top of the build we saw in early June being from March or April if history is any indication on E3 demos).

Believe me they heard the criticisms online despite the enthusiast press licking their asses on twitter about it looking like the second coming but they know and will want to have with no doubts the best looking game of the year with SM2 which will be hard to do in a year of Jedi Survivor, FFXVI, Alan Wake 2, Forza Motorsport, 2077: Phantom Liberty, AC Mirage, Silent Hill and Starfield. Don't count them out yet :p
If the final game looks like this bullshot they released then great. I really like the reflections in the windows here.

52923526115_02f051a257_h.jpg


The first shot of the trailer also look absolutely stunning and had a very next gen feel to it. Sadly the very next shot looked last gen as fuck so im not sure whats going on.

X1GIEN3.jpg

a8C2gR2.jpg


Then there is the actual asset quality in the game. It is honestly baffling how bad it looks. No amount of polish is going to give these textures a nanite look.

F055-B3-DE-9-B20-4223-8288-43014-D8-FACE8.jpg


Then there is this character model that will simply never get the next gen upgrade.

iggfgLz.jpg


Honestly, the more they will show of the game, the worst it will look. This was a curated vertical slice like those Days Gone, TLOU and Horizon FW E3 demos. The final game will probably look worse because the dirty little secret is that this is or was probably a PS4 title and they just couldnt go back and update the graphics in time. I would not be surprised if Sony pull a Horizon, Miles, GOW and GT7 and announce a PS4 version after announcing this as a PS5 game like they did with those games. Because there is literally no real upgrade here.

52923883568_afc7641a91_o.jpg


HrJZt3l.gif


HrJZDa2.gif


When you have jstevenson making excuses like watch on OLED and everything will look fine, you know there will not be a big upgrade coming. The original reveal trailer they 'captured' from a PS5 was clearly a lie and they are too chicken shit to admit that.

ScQMPEB.jpg


The first reveal trailer was shown 2 years ago. We already got the downgrade. The same downgrade we have seen time and time again from sony studios. TLOU2, Days Gone, HFW, fucking Ghost of Tsushima which for some bizarre reason flies under the radar. It's really disappointing to see this trend from studios that used to be very upfront about their games in the PS3 and early PS4 gen, but the trend does not point to the game receiving an upgrade. Expect it to look worse.
 

Piggoro

Member
Lol you serious frontiers of Pandora looks leap above horizon forbidden west interms of looks and details. Horizon looks souless compared to frontiers of Pandora world
Well, I guess there's something off with my eyes. I'm not trying to be a contrarian or concern-troll but I personally don't see any glaring improvements re: HFW. And I see a bunch of pretty ugly stuff here and there. Although, HFW also looks pretty uneven (interior lighting, etc).

Edit: I've just re-watched the world premiere trailer. It does look pretty meh for me: weird low-detailed character/NPC models, outright ugly stuff around human base interiors, all animations are really bad (no weight or physicality whatsoever), abysmal explosions, jungle and nature still look more cartoony and flat/artificial than nature in HZD.
 
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ChiefDada

Gold Member
Post processing is main visual pass feature missing from SM2. That's why the gameplay trailer often looks worse than SM Remastered and Miles Morales. It's not for me to defend insomniac but that's just what I see going on here. Ultimately they chose to show what they did so you guys aren't wrong to bash it. It's fair reaction until they show otherwise. I still think this will be the best looking game this year. As far as Avatar vs HFW, I also say wait because that trailer looked unfinished as well. Plenty vfx to clean up but I think there's enough evidence already on display to count on their lighting system being a much better solution for the environments than HFW.
 
Well, I guess there's something off with my eyes. I'm not trying to be a contrarian or concern-troll but I personally don't see any glaring improvements re: HFW. And I see a bunch of pretty ugly stuff here and there. Although, HFW also looks pretty uneven (interior lighting, etc).

Edit: I've just re-watched the world premiere trailer. It does look pretty meh for me: weird low-detailed character/NPC models, outright ugly stuff around human base interiors, all animations are really bad (no weight or physicality whatsoever), abysmal explosions, jungle and nature still look more cartoony and flat/artificial than nature in HZD.
You should check overview trailer and the npcs are varied more alive and the variety of vegetation is well above anything horizon done
 
Post processing is main visual pass feature missing from SM2. That's why the gameplay trailer often looks worse than SM Remastered and Miles Morales. It's not for me to defend insomniac but that's just what I see going on here. Ultimately they chose to show what they did so you guys aren't wrong to bash it. It's fair reaction until they show otherwise. I still think this will be the best looking game this year. As far as Avatar vs HFW, I also say wait because that trailer looked unfinished as well. Plenty vfx to clean up but I think there's enough evidence already on display to count on their lighting system being a much better solution for the environments than HFW.
Dude it won’t even be the best looking game the month it comes out lol
 
If the final game looks like this bullshot they released then great. I really like the reflections in the windows here.

52923526115_02f051a257_h.jpg


The first shot of the trailer also look absolutely stunning and had a very next gen feel to it. Sadly the very next shot looked last gen as fuck so im not sure whats going on.

X1GIEN3.jpg

a8C2gR2.jpg


Then there is the actual asset quality in the game. It is honestly baffling how bad it looks. No amount of polish is going to give these textures a nanite look.

F055-B3-DE-9-B20-4223-8288-43014-D8-FACE8.jpg


Then there is this character model that will simply never get the next gen upgrade.

iggfgLz.jpg


Honestly, the more they will show of the game, the worst it will look. This was a curated vertical slice like those Days Gone, TLOU and Horizon FW E3 demos. The final game will probably look worse because the dirty little secret is that this is or was probably a PS4 title and they just couldnt go back and update the graphics in time. I would not be surprised if Sony pull a Horizon, Miles, GOW and GT7 and announce a PS4 version after announcing this as a PS5 game like they did with those games. Because there is literally no real upgrade here.

52923883568_afc7641a91_o.jpg


HrJZt3l.gif


HrJZDa2.gif


When you have jstevenson making excuses like watch on OLED and everything will look fine, you know there will not be a big upgrade coming. The original reveal trailer they 'captured' from a PS5 was clearly a lie and they are too chicken shit to admit that.

ScQMPEB.jpg


The first reveal trailer was shown 2 years ago. We already got the downgrade. The same downgrade we have seen time and time again from sony studios. TLOU2, Days Gone, HFW, fucking Ghost of Tsushima which for some bizarre reason flies under the radar. It's really disappointing to see this trend from studios that used to be very upfront about their games in the PS3 and early PS4 gen, but the trend does not point to the game receiving an upgrade. Expect it to look worse.
Jesus everytime I think “was the gaming community too hard on SP2?” I see bits from that demo and think nah they weren’t fucking hard enough on SP2

Jesus Christ they DOWNGRADED their ocean simulation and asset from the PS4 game. They used the EXACT same explosion VFX package as the PS4 game. The lighting, the textures, even the goddamn animations (Spider-Man levitating slide like Michael Jackson when he does the O evade + that henchmen that couldn’t even make it to the other end of the house like it seemed like he was supposed to with the new web grab)

I genuinely cannot believe a first party flagship blockbuster AAA playstation game came out the gate like that after that dogshit showcase and no footage for 2 years. Starfield is how you show off a premium exclusive title. God Spider-Man 2 almost broke me as well slimy snake thanks for reminding me
 

alloush

Member
The cartoony look that HFW has is very much intentional by the devs as Horizon series aims for more stylised look. The main reason they do this is because they don't have the hardware to push photorealism and by going with stylised visuals they make sure visuals impress and hold up better.

You're right though, Matrix demo is the first time we saw graphics mimick photorealism and actually hold up somewhat. I still think games that go for photorealism this gen will show their age quickly once PS6 rolls around as photorealistic graphics age the worst. Current gen hardware still isn't powerful enough to do photorealism, but for the first time it's capable of at least mimicking it. Tim Sweeny said you need around 40tflops GPU to do photorealism and we should be there by next gen. Hopefully we're all alive by then, lol.
I wholeheartedly agree. I do think it is due to hardware limitation it does not look as good as the UE5 demo and that's the first thing I said in my post that we are still a ways away from reaching that realism in games found in demos. However The Matrix demo was a playable demo which gives me hope that this gen can at least get us close to The Matrix demo graphically which would be a huge leap in my opinion.

As for Tim Sweeny's remarks regarding photorealism, we do have now ~40 tflops GPU's in the market today. By the time PS6 rolls out it should well exceed that number. So going by what he said the PS6 should easily do photorealism.

Trust me, it's because of the lighting. If Horizon had RT based lighting, it would be the best looking game. The geometry is excellent, the animation is very good and I would say second only to ND/TLOU, textures and NPCs are first class as well. Lighting is the only major visual limitation for Horizon to overcome.

I played GoW Ragnarok, HFW - Burning Shores, TLOU 1&2 all over the past 2 days. They will all look pretty bad from a AAA fidelity standpoint by the end of 2024.



I agree with the ideology for most of what you're saying EXCEPT I don't think we're asking for photorealism at the expense of artistic vision. An example of that would be that one trending ue5 game with the cop chasing the perp using the shaky cam. I'm on record saying I do NOT want my games to look like that. We want realistic light within the artistic vision. Thankfully we have an idea of what Horizon can look like with photorealistic lighting implemented within the Horizon artistic vision. Call me crazy but I believe we get there this gen for sure.


I agree, lighting makes a world of difference but I think it is a matter of more than just lighting. It is lighting, textures, geometry, animations, physics among other things that make up the entire graphical fidelity of a game which made the demo look much more realistic. I'd argue about HFW's animations though, the fact you can roll on the ground upwards on a mountain is surely not realistic:messenger_winking_tongue:.

Having said that, if Horizon 3 does end up looking like that cinematic trailer that you posted then it would be the best looking game ever made (unless something even better looking came out which I doubt this gen). The cinematic trailer is the kinda graphics I want from this gen but not sure it is possible but at the same time I feel if that's the maximum we can get from the PS6 then I would be disappointed. I dunno if I am being unrealistic with my high standards and expectations lol after all I am not very technical.

Where we disagree though is that you do not want your games to look realistic and you hated that cop chasing shaky cam demo which I have loved honestly. When I watched it, that very high level of graphical fidelity lured me into thinking I was actually in the game, the immersion was unbelievable and it is thanks to graphics I felt this immersed honestly.

Didnt they say that UE5 demo had 8k textures
Honestly I am not sure but I do remember the textures had a high poly count so yeah that could be it.
 
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alloush

Member
Horizon would look very boring visually had it aimed for photorealistic visuals, the colour pallet would take a huge hit and the game would lose a lot of what made it beautiful. I know people criticise its lighting, and i agree it can be inconsistent but if they implement a solution like ray-traced global illumination, it will dramatically change the games visuals, even on the developer scale, the art design will have to be reworked.
How come it would look very boring? Imagine HFW looking like that UE5 demo, the desert in HFW looks like that desert in the UE5 demo. How is that boring? If anything that would be mind-blowing I'd probably never turn the game off lol.
 
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alloush

Member
If the final game looks like this bullshot they released then great. I really like the reflections in the windows here.

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The first shot of the trailer also look absolutely stunning and had a very next gen feel to it. Sadly the very next shot looked last gen as fuck so im not sure whats going on.

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Then there is the actual asset quality in the game. It is honestly baffling how bad it looks. No amount of polish is going to give these textures a nanite look.

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Then there is this character model that will simply never get the next gen upgrade.

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Honestly, the more they will show of the game, the worst it will look. This was a curated vertical slice like those Days Gone, TLOU and Horizon FW E3 demos. The final game will probably look worse because the dirty little secret is that this is or was probably a PS4 title and they just couldnt go back and update the graphics in time. I would not be surprised if Sony pull a Horizon, Miles, GOW and GT7 and announce a PS4 version after announcing this as a PS5 game like they did with those games. Because there is literally no real upgrade here.

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When you have jstevenson making excuses like watch on OLED and everything will look fine, you know there will not be a big upgrade coming. The original reveal trailer they 'captured' from a PS5 was clearly a lie and they are too chicken shit to admit that.

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The first reveal trailer was shown 2 years ago. We already got the downgrade. The same downgrade we have seen time and time again from sony studios. TLOU2, Days Gone, HFW, fucking Ghost of Tsushima which for some bizarre reason flies under the radar. It's really disappointing to see this trend from studios that used to be very upfront about their games in the PS3 and early PS4 gen, but the trend does not point to the game receiving an upgrade. Expect it to look worse.
Oh my God I am getting PTSDs man, why post this Slimy? Jesus, just when I thought it did not look as ugly as I thought it did you post these and I go "naaaah this game is fuuugly". I cannot believe there are actually people out there mainly on Twitter and YouTube praising this game's visuals. It's because of people like them we are getting sub-par garbage from devs. I swear there are some parts in the PS4 version that actually really look better than Spidey 2. Even if it was a cross-gen game how can some aspects of it look worse than the original? Baffling, absolutely fucking baffling.
 

Edder1

Member
As for Tim Sweeny's remarks regarding photorealism, we do have now ~40 tflops GPU's in the market today. By the time PS6 rolls out it should well exceed that number. So going by what he said the PS6 should easily do photorealism.
The thing about Teraflops is that from 30 series Nvidia GPUs onwards they're no longer 1:1 in relation to performance as they were before that. For example, 2080Ti is 13.5 tflops while 3070 that is identical to it in performance is 20.3 tflops. AMD GPUs are even more skewed in this regard as their new 7000 series GPUs have more tflops than Nvidia ones and yet are slower in performance. Before 30 series by Nvidia and 7000 by AMD teraflops were a valid way of measuring GPU across board. So really we need around 60+ tflops of current GPU power to have 40 tflops equivalent of RDNA2 GPUs in consoles, which means it's a GPU that has to be more powerful than RTX 4080 and RX 7900XTX. By the time next consoles arrive we should have GPUs of that calibre affordable enough for $500 consoles.

There's also a possibility of both Sony and Microsoft making an affordable console like Series S next gen, which would make all this irrelevant as the lowest common denominator would mean there'll be no such thing as photorealism. Microsoft has already done this and Jim Ryan mentioned that Sony thought about doing this, which means it could be on the cards by both manufacturers next gen. Hopefully it doesn't happen, but it most likely will going by how well Series S sells in comparison to X.
 
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