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[Kikorin]

Just finished Alan Wake 2 on PS5 (fidelty mode) and looks absolutely incredible. Some jankiness here and there and reflection sometimes are not that hot, but I'm super impressed. Considering this has been made on a relatively small budget for an AAA game, I'd love to see Remedy have an occasion to go all-in with a 100+ million dollar game. Control 2 is confirmed to have a budget similar to Alaw Wake 2 (50$ million), but will be a good step-up from 30$ million of the first one. Same for Max Payne 1/2 remake that they said will have a similar budget to other AAA Remedy games.

 

[PeteBull]

we all saw demo running on PS5 dev-kit, that was stable no dips bellow 30 fps that indicates that demo could run above 30 fps if unlocked, and it was around 1440p the flying section was all real-time except you can't control character because devs hasn't enough time to code what's happens if you fly outside of level area or crash somewhere, i really don't know why you think PS5 couldn't run same as it was on dev-kit, they are same spec.

When/where plz, gimme the link, bro, i try to keep myself up to date with everything but only mere mortal here so could miss it

 

[SimTourist]

AFOP the details are incredible for the size of the world

Face looks okay, but those body textures are some xbox 360 era shit.

 

[SlimySnake]

Got new PC up and running. A 13900k+4090 so been maxing out everything.

My thoughts so far....

CP2077 OD =
The most incredible lighting Ive seen period. Holy shit I was not prepared for this native on big screen right in front of me. In particularly the attention to shader nuance CDR put time in on really pays off here with the way it interacts with the pathtraced lighting. Just unmatched. If the NPCs could just get an upgrade to the level of main characters this game would be near perfect for the time being.

AWII =
The opening with the guy crawling out of the lake had me for a breif moment thinking it was Live action. Super smart the way Remedy juxstaposes live action moments flicking on screen with in game elements "inviteing" our brain to superimpose the extra details and micro animations onto your character here and there. Im not quite as impressed by AWII as alot of people here. It just still looks too often gamey to me. Something about the lack of SSS and what I feel is some lackluster shaders on the characters. Infact I dont agree with the notion there characters (outside of stairing at the backs during gameplay) look too hot. I think they sometimes look worse the QB and Control characters. The super High quality facial exspressions during actual gameplay is much appreciated and should be mandatory in all AAA games by now. I think the main reason people see this as being as realistic looking as they do has a whole lot to do with Remedy Filmic color grading "matching" our Fincher cinematic frame expectations. Just like the CA, Film Grain, and shaky cam from Unrecord.

Robocop =
Alex's model often looks photoreal. Almost every other character looks like dogshit and there animations are clear as day still placeholders and both look far worse than they did in Terminator Resistence....what gives? I think most of the enviroments including the Interiors look great even if sometimes a little PS4 quality. The outdoor areas with Nanite speak for themselves and look fantastic. The game while not even close to as fun as I was mislead into believing does represent a good template for modding in your own Cyberpunk Game (Next Gen Perfect Dark ect...) hope someone considers this. Shit grab an Uzi and just mute Robo's walking sound and your 99% there.

Sw Jedi Survivor =
Honestly even though the assets still look lacking, the art style change seems cartoonier than before, and enviroments at least in Coruscant are too blocky I was pleasently suprised at how much better it looks than Fallen Order. I know alot of that has to do with the fact that FO had a clearly gutted budget at times and this seems more polished by far but everthing fromt the ground textures to the lighting seem super cranked up. Not to the level you would expect from a generational leap but a whole lot better than YT could possibpe represent. The lighting inparticular seems to be way improved with Kal looking great pretty much 100% of the time. If they just implement Nanite fully with VSM and upgrade there character rendering and art style a little the sequel can be a true graphics contender. Very pleasently suprised indeed.

Congrats!

Keep playing AW2, it keeps getting better and better.

I was also very pleasently surprised by Star Wars. The big open world areas dont look that great, but the indoor areas look phenomenal. Really great asset quality and lighting.

 

[solidus12]

The last of us Part 2 remastered puts most current gen games to shame; it's funny considering it is just a resolution bump.

 

[SlimySnake]

Just finished Alan Wake 2 on PS5 (fidelty mode) and looks absolutely incredible. Some jankiness here and there and reflection sometimes are not that hot, but I'm super impressed. Considering this has been made on a relatively small budget for an AAA game, I'd love to see Remedy have an occasion to go all-in with a 100+ million dollar game. Control 2 is confirmed to have a budget similar to Alaw Wake 2 (50$ million), but will be a good step-up from 30$ million of the first one. Same for Max Payne 1/2 remake that they said will have a similar budget to other AAA Remedy games.

I mean AW2 looks a generation ahead of Spiderman 2 and thats a $300 million game. I dont think budget=graphics like everyone associates with nowadays. Look at robocop and that UE5 game i posted on the last page made by two guys.

I think Remedy had their A team working on this for 4 years, and they have around a total of 400 developers. 4 years, 300 full time devs, and a next gen base of 1296p 30 fps is basically the reason why the game looks next gen. Insomniac targeted native 4k 30 fps with ray tracing on top, and paid for it despite a bigger budget. Same goes for Avatar. Massive is 800 devs but split into two teams and both of their games look a generation ahead of Spiderman 2.

Besides, The graphics teams over at ND and insomniac probably total like 30 people max. The rest of the people are designers and artists who basically are at the mercy of the graphics programming team. now that Remedy's initial investment into the Northlight engine is done, their artists and designer can go in and start remaking Max Payne 2 at AW2 levels of fidelity. I am guessing their programmers will still need to add support for destruction and physics that both Max Payne and Control need so further engine optimizations will be needed but i highly doubt they need to go and double the budget or double the size of team to make that happen.

 

[SlimySnake]

The last of us Part 2 remastered puts most current gen games to shame; it's funny considering it is just a resolution bump.

there have only been a handful next gen only games released though. almost everything until mid 2023 was cross gen.

Id still rank a lot of games ahead of TLOU2 remaster even after playing it all weekend. In terms of cutscenes and setpieces, it is still up there in a league of its own but during gameplay, the lighting fidelity and level of detail during gameplay has been topped by many games this gen. Not to mention its not doing anything next gen in terms of ssd setpieces or ray tracing like Insomniac has done.

Here are all the games id rank above TLOU2. A game i consider to be THE best looking game of the PS4 gen (not counting cross gen games).

Cyberpunk
Demon Souls
Ratchet Rift Apart
Horizon FW
Spiderman 2
Alan Wake 2
FF16
Starfield
Avatar

GOW Ragnorak and Star Wars id put on par with TLOU2. They are far too inconsistent but when they look their best, they look better than the best of TLOU2.

 

[yamaci17]

Played through several cyberpunk missions instead of just driving around to see some interiors in action, and i couldn’t find anything completely dark and poorly out like those raveon screenshots. Not saying there aren’t other areas like that, but i didn’t see Anything that wasnt properly illuminated.

Now the difference between pt and standard lighting wasnt always transformative, but there is definitely proper light bounce everywhere. The subway entrance was the biggest difference with blue lights completely changing the look of the subway stations, but diners and indoor ripper rooms look fairly similar.

The biggest thing i noticed is that PT feels like it is CG in motion. Hard to describe it because the difference in stills is so small but when you are moving it feels like a movie and not just because i can only run it at 30 fps cinematic framerate.

P.s they must have improved performance since the dlc came out because i can now run it at a locked 30 fps with pt on albeit on medium settings even during firefights.

I know what u mean
i have captured a short video of moving cars. it looks semi-cgi to me for some reason. but video still doesn't do it justice somehow. it really looks weirdly CG like in actual scenario. I feel this happens more frequently in phantom liberty location than main game. I feel like tonemapping and color profile of dogtown allows for a more CG-like look



idk if it is revelant to this topic but ssd streaming seems to do heavy lifting on pc for alan wake 2 which impressed me a lot. i had to reduce polling time of hwinfo otherwise I was getting low ssd speed readouts (in the range of 200-400 mb/s). turns out game reads in quick bursts that go upwards of 1.5 gb/s at times on my 2.2 gb/s lowend ssd even. ray tracing (no path) enabled and medium texture cache is used (console equivalent). towards the end game decided to discard some of the high quality textures it was able to load however (case board and the paper and mousepad on the desk). rest of the textures remained consistent. this happens specifically if u switch between alan and saga or move between different regions in one session. they're not even using directstorage! this only has room to improve and nothing less!



regardless, overall consistency of textures I got made me happy and hopeful for the next 2 years or so with my 8 GB VRAM. I didn't try avatar but I also heard some good things about its texture streamer. they will do a GDC talk about vram optimization too. I think I will endure till the gta 6 in 2027. Lumen+ue5's decent texture streaming capabilities are already a guaranteed win for 8-10 GB cards (as long as you don't try to overallocate vram budgets much more than your vram would be capable of which is why reviewers on youtube keep seeing lowres textures on hogwarts legacy whereas I never seen in my own gameplay with my tuned settings)

Schedule | GDC 2024 | Advanced Graphics Summit: DX12 Memory Management in Snowdrop on PC (With Introduction from Summit Advisor Julien Merceron)

GDC is the game industry's premier professional event, championing game developers and the advancement of their craft. March 18-22, 2024.

schedule.gdconf.com

it is insane to me I can enjoy 1440p dlss balanced (looks much better than native 1080p and nearly 1200p i'd say), ray tracing and decentish textures on such a small limited vram buffer. path tracing in bright falls is altogether a limitation by 3070's power. i need 1440p dlss performance to hit barely above 30 fps and still drop below that at times. 1080p dlss quality or 1080p %75 scaling usually fares better but with much worse image quality than 1440p dlss performance. I eventually started switching between them. I feel like direct lighting also does a lot of good. But indirect is gorgeous at times too. i usually enable indirect lighting in alan's world because that tends to run better with dlss set to balanced (stays upwards of 30 fps)

Imgsli

overall this was a fantastic experience for me. I never expected this kind of an experience out of my 3.5 yrs old upper midrange GPU, especially with limited vram buffer. it managed to outshine cyberpunk thanks to its more limited world but I don't care, it just looked better even without full path tracing

some aw2 shots from me

we're really close to realism..

a lot of games can do this kind of stuff but never fails to impress me

reflection looks weirdly life like

some high quality garbage. look at all the shadows that are being cast!

 

[yamaci17]

They definitely improved the in game character models in the remaster.

they didn't, it is the magic of 4k allowing a more sharper output:

Imgsli

take a look at this comparison. would you say settings are different? only difference is the output resolution. model was always the same and always been there, you only got lower quality look due to lower resolution buffer. it is just 4k allowing the model to shine.

replay the same scene in performance mode and compare to ps4 pro. if you find differences, then I will believe you. if it is performance mode and if it looks better than ps4 pro, maybe then I can believe you too.

here's how joel looks at 4k output versus 1440p output. these are %150 same textures and models. only difference is resolution output. 1440p should only be used for vram constrained cards and it still is a huge compromise. you only get semi nextgen experience (lower quality assets) if you're outputting to 1440p no matter your system is. no matter your settings are.

naughty dog used 1440p buffers on ps4 pro for last of us 2. no idea why. they should've went wih 4k/temporal upscaling or 4k buffer + checkerboard. maybe their performance budget didn't allow them to. but finally we were able to see what game looks like at 4k output.

as I said, this kind of image quality doesn't even need 4K native rendering. they could've used an internal resolution of 1080p and keep the native 4K buffer and 4K one would still look better exactly like the above. I still question why would they target 1440p output on PS5. no idea. TV users probably won't notice so that is what they must be targeting. from my monitor up close, I see huge difference between these modes.

practically 1440p muddies details that was always there. and there's no solution to this other than targeting 4k at all costs (native or upscaled)

 

[SlimySnake]

here's how joel looks at 4k output versus 1440p output. these are %150 same textures and models. only difference is resolution output. 1440p should only be used for vram constrained cards and it still is a huge compromise. you only get semi nextgen experience (lower quality assets) if you're outputting to 1440p no matter your system is. no matter your settings are.

naughty dog used 1440p buffers on ps4 pro for last of us 2. no idea why. they should've went wih 4k/temporal upscaling or 4k buffer + checkerboard. maybe their performance budget didn't allow them to. but finally we were able to see what game looks like at 4k output.

as I said, this kind of image quality doesn't even need 4K native rendering. they could've used an internal resolution of 1080p and keep the native 4K buffer and 4K one would still look better exactly like the above. I still question why would they target 1440p output on PS5. no idea. TV users probably won't notice so that is what they must be targeting. from my monitor up close, I see huge difference between these modes.

practically 1440p muddies details that was always there. and there's no solution to this other than targeting 4k at all costs (native or upscaled)

What about DLSS or FSR Quality modes? Do they reduce the textures and models to 1440p quality? I thought they kept 4k textures and reduced the resolution of everything else to gain performance, but having played some of these games in native res, I no longer believe that DLSS even in Quality mode is a better solution. it looks softer to me though not as soft as 1440p.

Alan Wake 2, Forza and Star Wars all look significantly sharper and better in the native 4k modes than they do in DLSS quality.

 

[yamaci17]

What about DLSS or FSR Quality modes? Do they reduce the textures and models to 1440p quality? I thought they kept 4k textures and reduced the resolution of everything else to gain performance, but having played some of these games in native res, I no longer believe that DLSS even in Quality mode is a better solution. it looks softer to me though not as soft as 1440p.

Alan Wake 2, Forza and Star Wars all look significantly sharper and better in the native 4k modes than they do in DLSS quality.

dlss/fsr regardless of the mode will always retain native resolution worth of textures. the reason I got lower res textures here and there is because of the VRAM pressure, not related to DLSS/internal resolution. the reductions weren't necessarily horrible (like what happens in forspoken) but a downgrade regardless. it is really smart optimization that allows you to play at settings that are not meant for your GPU (lol)

yeah dlss and stuff, no matter what, are still a compromise. but in some cases it could be that sharpening is enabled for non-DLSS native modes and no sharpening enabled for DLSS modes. did you choose DLAA as your native 4k in alan wake 2? or did you choose fsr 2 or leave it at fsr 2? if you left it at FSR 2 while running the game native, the game applies FSR's sharpening

I can say though even 4K DLSS performance looks leaps and bounds better than native 1440p in most cases. So I'd say even though they're not a better solution, let's admit, they're still great at they do. I find 1440p dlss balanced to appear clean enough that it does not take the joy out of the game and stable, minimal artifacts etc. when I see at PS5 1440p fsr balanced output... it is a comical difference. it is where I came to appreciate DLSS even further. I think at 4K you can get away with FSR, TSR and anything but DLSS truly shines at 1440p output. it is really soft though, not gonna lie.

I mean imagine how many satisfied millions of players out there playing at 1440p output. And you have the potential to get better quality and tad bit of more performance at DLSS performance mode at 4K. When you think from that perspective, it is still crazy to have DLSS in your arsenal. if you're more inclined to play native 4K, you should give DLSSTweaks a try. Maybe use %75-80 scaling. I'm sure 4K DLSS %75 scaling would almost ALMOST match native exactly like you would want it to. I will admit "quality" mode being %67 scaling is a bit weird. We need a %75 scaling between quality and DLAA modes... that would push internal resolution to 1620p from 1440p. so %25 more pixels to work with

"What about DLSS or FSR Quality modes? Do they reduce the textures and models to 1440p quality? I "

didn't you see my comparison above though? I have compared TLOu part 1 on PC at native 1440p versus 4K DLSS performance . 4K DLSS performance still retains better "texture quality" appearance. I won't say better texture quality because I still believe textures, at their core, are still same. they just appear... more detailed.

 

[SlimySnake]

dlss/fsr regardless of the mode will always retain native resolution worth of textures. the reason I got lower res textures here and there is because of the VRAM pressure, not related to DLSS/internal resolution. the reductions weren't necessarily horrible (like what happens in forspoken) but a downgrade regardless. it is really smart optimization that allows you to play at settings that are not meant for your GPU (lol)

yeah dlss and stuff, no matter what, are still a compromise. but in some cases it could be that sharpening is enabled for non-DLSS native modes and no sharpening enabled for DLSS modes. did you choose DLAA as your native 4k in alan wake 2? or did you choose fsr 2 or leave it at fsr 2? if you left it at FSR 2 while running the game native, the game applies FSR's sharpening

I can say though even 4K DLSS performance looks leaps and bounds better than native 1440p in most cases. So I'd say even though they're not a better solution, let's admit, they're still great at they do. I find 1440p dlss balanced to appear clean enough that it does not take the joy out of the game and stable, minimal artifacts etc. when I see at PS5 1440p fsr balanced output... it is a comical difference. it is where I came to appreciate DLSS even further. I think at 4K you can get away with FSR, TSR and anything but DLSS truly shines at 1440p output. it is really soft though, not gonna lie.

I mean imagine how many satisfied millions of players out there playing at 1440p output. And you have the potential to get better quality and tad bit of more performance at DLSS performance mode at 4K. When you think from that perspective, it is still crazy to have DLSS in your arsenal. if you're more inclined to play native 4K, you should give DLSSTweaks a try. Maybe use %75-80 scaling. I'm sure 4K DLSS %75 scaling would almost ALMOST match native exactly like you would want it to. I will admit "quality" mode being %67 scaling is a bit weird. We need a %75 scaling between quality and DLAA modes... that would push internal resolution to 1620p from 1440p. so %25 more pixels to work with

"What about DLSS or FSR Quality modes? Do they reduce the textures and models to 1440p quality? I "

didn't you see my comparison above though? I have compared TLOu part 1 on PC at native 1440p versus 4K DLSS performance . 4K DLSS performance still retains better "texture quality" appearance. I won't say better texture quality because I still believe textures, at their core, are still same. they just appear... more detailed.

I had DLAA on in both AW2 and Forza, but no DLAA in Star Wars.

 

[yamaci17]

I had DLAA on in both AW2 and Forza, but no DLAA in Star Wars.

I see. putting DLAA against dlss quality changes things a bit (no problems though, it is only natural that you use it). dlss quality tends to match native taa implementations most of the time. but dlaa vs. dlss quality is not something reviewers usually talk about. I'm now actually surprised there's not a dedicated DLAA video by Digital foundry. one part of could be that it exposes dlss quality for what it is. so while nvidia provides the mode (and probably thinks 1080p or 1440p users would usually use it), they don't market it much themselves.

so in that respect,

native taa 4k = 10 points of visual fidelity
native dlaa 4k = 12 points of visual fidelity
4k dlss quality = 8-10 points of visual fidelity (depending on implementation)

I can see why dlaa is not being a focus. because then it would level the playground against dlss quality. but you discovered it yourself anyways. DLAA truly brings the best out of "native" resolution. i won't say it is an unfair comparison. it is perfectly fair to compare them. in other words: dlss quality is not a compromise against TAA in most cases but is a compromise when you apply DLAA at native resolution

 

[Feel Like I'm On 42]

Imagine how it would have looked if the remaster wasn't a fraud.

This is even worse than nintendo remasters...

Add LoU2 "remaster" to that list ..they didn't advertised "resolution" they advertised a "host of graphical improvements".

 

[Feel Like I'm On 42]

Stop with this stupid argument. The near-universally agreed upon best looking games of last year, Alan Wake II, Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty, and Avatar, were all on Series S, and they bested PS5 exclusives like Final Fantasy XVI, Spider-man 2, and others.

Best looking games but NOT ON CONSOLE ...ONLy PC do they look better than those ps5 exclusives..except Avatar which looks great on console. Esp Alan Wake 2 which is ruined by it's image quality imo

 

[Feel Like I'm On 42]

Just finished Alan Wake 2 on PS5 (fidelty mode) and looks absolutely incredible. Some jankiness here and there and reflection sometimes are not that hot, but I'm super impressed. Considering this has been made on a relatively small budget for an AAA game, I'd love to see Remedy have an occasion to go all-in with a 100+ million dollar game. Control 2 is confirmed to have a budget similar to Alaw Wake 2 (50$ million), but will be a good step-up from 30$ million of the first one. Same for Max Payne 1/2 remake that they said will have a similar budget to other AAA Remedy games.

The aliasing didn't bother you in Alan Wake? I'm so disappointed by the image quality and artifacts

 

[SlimySnake]

Some more AW2 Path tracing vs standard rasterization comparisons. Basically comes down to RT shadows. I wish they had just had a separate RT shadows and reflections option. They all seem to be tied to the main Path tracing options.

 

[Feel Like I'm On 42]

they didn't, it is the magic of 4k allowing a more sharper output:

Imgsli

take a look at this comparison. would you say settings are different? only difference is the output resolution. model was always the same and always been there, you only got lower quality look due to lower resolution buffer. it is just 4k allowing the model to shine.

replay the same scene in performance mode and compare to ps4 pro. if you find differences, then I will believe you. if it is performance mode and if it looks better than ps4 pro, maybe then I can believe you too.

here's how joel looks at 4k output versus 1440p output. these are %150 same textures and models. only difference is resolution output. 1440p should only be used for vram constrained cards and it still is a huge compromise. you only get semi nextgen experience (lower quality assets) if you're outputting to 1440p no matter your system is. no matter your settings are.

naughty dog used 1440p buffers on ps4 pro for last of us 2. no idea why. they should've went wih 4k/temporal upscaling or 4k buffer + checkerboard. maybe their performance budget didn't allow them to. but finally we were able to see what game looks like at 4k output.

as I said, this kind of image quality doesn't even need 4K native rendering. they could've used an internal resolution of 1080p and keep the native 4K buffer and 4K one would still look better exactly like the above. I still question why would they target 1440p output on PS5. no idea. TV users probably won't notice so that is what they must be targeting. from my monitor up close, I see huge difference between these modes.

practically 1440p muddies details that was always there. and there's no solution to this other than targeting 4k at all costs (native or upscaled)

This a million times over. 1440p is a huge compromises. I lost hope seeing many console gamers being "happy with 1440p" throughout the generation.

 

[Alex11]

Got new PC up and running. A 13900k+4090 so been maxing out everything.

My thoughts so far....

CP2077 OD =
The most incredible lighting Ive seen period. Holy shit I was not prepared for this native on big screen right in front of me. In particularly the attention to shader nuance CDR put time in on really pays off here with the way it interacts with the pathtraced lighting. Just unmatched. If the NPCs could just get an upgrade to the level of main characters this game would be near perfect for the time being.

AWII =
The opening with the guy crawling out of the lake had me for a breif moment thinking it was Live action. Super smart the way Remedy juxstaposes live action moments flicking on screen with in game elements "inviteing" our brain to superimpose the extra details and micro animations onto your character here and there. Im not quite as impressed by AWII as alot of people here. It just still looks too often gamey to me. Something about the lack of SSS and what I feel is some lackluster shaders on the characters. Infact I dont agree with the notion there characters (outside of stairing at the backs during gameplay) look too hot. I think they sometimes look worse the QB and Control characters. The super High quality facial exspressions during actual gameplay is much appreciated and should be mandatory in all AAA games by now. I think the main reason people see this as being as realistic looking as they do has a whole lot to do with Remedy Filmic color grading "matching" our Fincher cinematic frame expectations. Just like the CA, Film Grain, and shaky cam from Unrecord.

Robocop =
Alex's model often looks photoreal. Almost every other character looks like dogshit and there animations are clear as day still placeholders and both look far worse than they did in Terminator Resistence....what gives? I think most of the enviroments including the Interiors look great even if sometimes a little PS4 quality. The outdoor areas with Nanite speak for themselves and look fantastic. The game while not even close to as fun as I was mislead into believing does represent a good template for modding in your own Cyberpunk Game (Next Gen Perfect Dark ect...) hope someone considers this. Shit grab an Uzi and just mute Robo's walking sound and your 99% there.

Sw Jedi Survivor =
Honestly even though the assets still look lacking, the art style change seems cartoonier than before, and enviroments at least in Coruscant are too blocky I was pleasently suprised at how much better it looks than Fallen Order. I know alot of that has to do with the fact that FO had a clearly gutted budget at times and this seems more polished by far but everthing fromt the ground textures to the lighting seem super cranked up. Not to the level you would expect from a generational leap but a whole lot better than YT could possibpe represent. The lighting inparticular seems to be way improved with Kal looking great pretty much 100% of the time. If they just implement Nanite fully with VSM and upgrade there character rendering and art style a little the sequel can be a true graphics contender. Very pleasently suprised indeed.

Nice to see appreciation for CP lighting, is really is the best, funny thing, prior to when it first released, I was skeptical, but when you play it and experience all the light bounces and all the soft and hard shadows interacting with one another, especially at 4K its just bonkers.
Yeah, it's far from perfect, as you mentioned it, some NPCs look poor, although the lighting still looks amazing on them, I think it's just how weird some of them look, bright colors or having some plastic implants.
What drags down CP for me is when you're away from the city, the draw distance is poor, and especially with those cardboard cars, Jesus, those look atrocious.

 

[CGNoire]

Nice to see appreciation for CP lighting, is really is the best, funny thing, prior to when it first released, I was skeptical, but when you play it and experience all the light bounces and all the soft and hard shadows interacting with one another, especially at 4K its just bonkers.
Yeah, it's far from perfect, as you mentioned it, some NPCs look poor, although the lighting still looks amazing on them, I think it's just how weird some of them look, bright colors or having some plastic implants.
What drags down CP for me is when you're away from the city, the draw distance is poor, and especially with those cardboard cars, Jesus, those look atrocious.

Yep when talking about Ultra High Quality Lighting and Shader work youve always got to see it in motion. The way the differenf specular responses glides across the different materials and the fact that dynamic objects no matter where in the scene have light properly showcasing there shader details even in shadow all with proper occulsion makes it all look offline prerendered and often even photoreal looking. Its da best. I hope therd UE5 sequel comes packed with a PT mode since UE already has some support for that. Fingers crossed.

 

[CGNoire]

but having played some of these games in native res, I no longer believe that DLSS even in Quality mode is a better solution. it looks softer to me though not as soft as 1440p.

This is my current experience as well and the reason I bought a 4090 this gen.

Some games seem to fair better than others in reguards to there DLSS Qualty mode but for the most part Native 4k just looks sharper. This was the case for me recently with StarWars. Native 4k was a noticeable imptovement in sharpness even when downsampling via DSR to my 1080p Plasma.

Like yamaci17 said the asset quality and textures sampling is tied to the rendering resolution on these titles. Its been that way for about the last decade in most AAA titles ive played. Especially in the last 6 years.

 

[Kikorin]

The aliasing didn't bother you in Alan Wake? I'm so disappointed by the image quality and artifacts

Sometimes IQ can be not that good, but the only place where I found aliasing and artifacts really distracting was entering the Parliament Tower. But honestly, I'm all-in to sacrifice IQ and resolution for incredible looking games like AW2.

Now I've started The Last of Us 2 Remastered (finally playing it) and even if animations are something else and unmatched in this generation, everything else is by far last-gen coming directly from Alan Wake 2. Obviously we can't compare since TLoU2 in a PS4 game, but if PS5 can't even make it works at 4K 60fps, is clear we need to drop resolution to have a true generational leap. That's also clear watching something like Spider-Man 2, that looks basically like a PS4 game outside of fast movement around the map.

I can't imagine how a 1440p, no RTX Naughty Dog game could looks on PS5, should be something unbeliveable.

 

[Represent.]

This is damn near thread worthy.

This is the best level of attention I have ever seen in a game.

The fucking blood splatter colors the rays of light - Never seen that shit in another game.

Its things like that that make this game a visual masterpiece

 

[alloush]

This is damn near thread worthy.

This is the best level of attention I have ever seen in a game.

The fucking blood splatter colors the rays of light - Never seen that shit in another game.

Its things like that that make this game a visual masterpiece

That is indeed impressive

 

[ckstine]

This is damn near thread worthy.

This is the best level of attention I have ever seen in a game.

The fucking blood splatter colors the rays of light - Never seen that shit in another game.

Its things like that that make this game a visual masterpiece

is the well really that dry that we are talking about a nearly 4 year old game's mediocre talents? pass. details don't equal fidelity. This is impressive from a detail perspective but so is tarkov and no one here is talking about that. and that is coming from someone who really enjoyed both of those games. it just doesn't impress me, and tbh, naughty dog hasn't impressed me since uncharted 4. that game in a lot of ways has aged better than tlou2. tlou2 just has that overly cinematic look too it that doesn't work for me. film grain, aberration, and motion blur won't hide your games blemishes, and when you turn them off in tlou2 it looks awful. i urge everyone to go play the first level of tlou2 right now, and tell me it impresses you. it shouldn't. things like snow have been done better in rdr, the lighting has been done sooo much better in games like afop, aw2, cp2077, and metro ee. the texture quality wasn't particularly impressive even by ps4 standards. the foliage is the only part where I would say it excels, and even then it has been bested. i will admit that from the art perspective and the level of immersion this game creates they did fucking amazing, but in terms of GRAPHICS, we really shouldn't even be talking about it anymore imo.

 

[Alex11]

is the well really that dry that we are talking about a nearly 4 year old game's mediocre talents? pass. details don't equal fidelity. This is impressive from a detail perspective but so is tarkov and no one here is talking about that. and that is coming from someone who really enjoyed both of those games. it just doesn't impress me, and tbh, naughty dog hasn't impressed me since uncharted 4. that game in a lot of ways has aged better than tlou2. tlou2 just has that overly cinematic look too it that doesn't work for me. film grain, aberration, and motion blur won't hide your games blemishes, and when you turn them off in tlou2 it looks awful. i urge everyone to go play the first level of tlou2 right now, and tell me it impresses you. it shouldn't. things like snow have been done better in rdr, the lighting has been done sooo much better in games like afop, aw2, cp2077, and metro ee. the texture quality wasn't particularly impressive even by ps4 standards. the foliage is the only part where I would say it excels, and even then it has been bested. i will admit that from the art perspective and the level of immersion this game creates they did fucking amazing, but in terms of GRAPHICS, we really shouldn't even be talking about it anymore imo.

Well, it really holds up well. I have compared it to Alan Wake 2, as they're both 3rd person with static time of day.
Of course AW2's lighting is better and probably some textures, but overall TLOU2 is much more polished. And IMO the forest areas are comparable, the cutscene faces are better in TLOU2, so it isn't that simple as black or white.

 

[HighPoly]

Alan Wake 2 running on PS5/Series X is impressive?

I'm asking because this game is only at it's best on PC...

So, I don't really know if we need all those assets running on consoles...
If developers emulate these things with some tricks... you know?

And again, nothing is better than high polygon count and amazing textures...

 

[Balducci30]

Alan Wake 2 running on PS5/Series X is impressive?

I'm asking because this game is only at it's best on PC...

So, I don't really know if we need all those assets running on consoles...
If developers emulate these things with some tricks... you know?

And again, nothing is better than high polygon count and amazing textures...

It’s very impressive but the shimmering takes away from the overall package

 

[FalconPunch]

AW image quality issues on consoles kills it for me. It's not good enough.

 

[Senua]

AW image quality issues on consoles kills it for me. It's not good enough.

Consoles need to git gudder upscaling tech

 

[yamaci17]

speaking of, it is insane how good characters look in game too, especially Ahti. this is not a cutscene!

 

[GymWolf]

Consoles need to git gudder upscaling tech

sony checkboard was way better than fsr2.

 

[Senua]

sony checkboard was way better than fsr2.

I just don't see how. Checkerboard pushed good results at "native 4k" checkerboard aka 1920x2160 (IIRC). Good luck running AW2 at that res on console. You'd have to render it at a significantly lower resolution which would very much show the limitations of checkerboard rendering. FSR2 isn't perfect by a long shot, but that and TSR for unreal games seem to be the best solution on consoles for now, which is why FSR is so widely used. These games are just heavy man. If we had more grunt in the consoles and could push a higher internal resolution with these methods they'd look a lot better. There's only so much you can do with 10tf in these graphically demanding games.

 

[Xtib81]

Speaking of fsr2, has anything been announced regarding fsr3 on consoles ?

 

[SlimySnake]

I just don't see how. Checkerboard pushed good results at "native 4k" checkerboard aka 1920x2160 (IIRC). Good luck running AW2 at that res on console. You'd have to render it at a significantly lower resolution which would very much show the limitations of checkerboard rendering. FSR2 isn't perfect by a long shot, but that and TSR for unreal games seem to be the best solution on consoles for now, which is why FSR is so widely used. These games are just heavy man. If we had more grunt in the consoles and could push a higher internal resolution with these methods they'd look a lot better. There's only so much you can do with 10tf in these graphically demanding games.

4kcb is basically doing half the pixels of an 8.2 million 4k buffer. So 4.1 million pixels. That looked excellent because it was using more raw pixel data than a 1440p resolution which had 3.6 million pixels. The problem with AW2 is that it is reconstructing from 2.8 million pixels. FSR2 balanced uses 1296p just like Horizon Forbidden's 1800p checkerboard solution which was literally fucking broken at launch due to the lower pixel count simply not being enough to render foliage without adding shimmering EVERYWHERE. it was literally the worst looking upscaling solution ive ever seen. AW2 is better thanks to FSR2 being more advanced but it still has the same shimmering issues when turning the camera.

GG had to go back and redesign their entire checkerboard solution and it took them almost 6 months to do so. Now it looks great. Remedy needs to do the same. AFAIK, GG had to feed it a lot more data when reconstructing the image, so maybe Remedy will have to do more work instead of just plugging into the FSR pipeline.

I think they should just do a 1440p native image like ND does and it will get rid of the awful shimmering and let the tvs upscale to 4k. Most tvs do a great job doing that. TLOU2 looks fine. FSR2 has a cost on the GPU of around 20% and i think with some settings downgrade they can get to 1440p.

 

[Represent.]

is the well really that dry that we are talking about a nearly 4 year old game's mediocre talents? pass. details don't equal fidelity. This is impressive from a detail perspective but so is tarkov and no one here is talking about that. and that is coming from someone who really enjoyed both of those games. it just doesn't impress me, and tbh, naughty dog hasn't impressed me since uncharted 4. that game in a lot of ways has aged better than tlou2. tlou2 just has that overly cinematic look too it that doesn't work for me. film grain, aberration, and motion blur won't hide your games blemishes, and when you turn them off in tlou2 it looks awful. i urge everyone to go play the first level of tlou2 right now, and tell me it impresses you. it shouldn't. things like snow have been done better in rdr, the lighting has been done sooo much better in games like afop, aw2, cp2077, and metro ee. the texture quality wasn't particularly impressive even by ps4 standards. the foliage is the only part where I would say it excels, and even then it has been bested. i will admit that from the art perspective and the level of immersion this game creates they did fucking amazing, but in terms of GRAPHICS, we really shouldn't even be talking about it anymore imo.

I would have agreed with you before TLOU 2 remastered.

But the remaster, it being in 4K, shows just how little progress we've made in the past 4 years. And how truly fucking impressive this game is as an entire package.

Im going to make the argument that while games like AW2 have surpassed it in terms of lighting and textures, They are still not as impressive as entire overall visual package.

The small little graphical details like the blood splatter in the rays of light, chunks of human flesh literally falling from the ceiling after you blow someone up, the absolutely fucking insane hit reaction, individual limbs reacting to getting shot, blown up, stabbed, bullet holes going through a mf's face and the exit wound being completely visible, all coupled with unrivaled animation/motion matching, etc, etc. All add up to make a huge difference that is frankly way more impactful than great lighting.

And thats entirely your fault for turning off things like CA and film grain in a dark and moody game like this and then complaining it looks bad. Those visual effects are there by default, they add to the visual presentation of the game and give it a cinematic look, which its supposed to have.

I still think its the best overall visual presentation ever. Not best graphics, which I get this thread is about, but still the best overall visual presentation.

The cutscenes haven't even come close to being matched. A generation ahead of any other game in existence. The animation is still a generation ahead of anything. Same goes for the gore and physics in combat. The in game character models are now just as good as any game this gen. Lighting has been surpassed. Indoor interiors have been surpassed. Textures and asset quality are easily still up to current gen standards in the remake thanks to 4K output. Not the best of the best (AW2, cyberpunk PC, etc) but better than many games this gen.

Here are some of my own screenshots highlighting just how goddamn good this game looks still

Here are some in game (not cutscene) character models. Some zoomed ALLL the way fucking in. This game is 4 years old.


This in game character model goes toe to toe with the very best of this gen. easily.

Zoomed in like 100x. Hair looks great. Forhead texture immaculate. Eyebrows incredible. Lips incredible. Again this is an ingame model on a 4 year old game

Zoomed in as far as I could. individual eye lashes. Immaculate forhead texture. Details in the eyes. You can see the reflection. Great lip texture.

surpassed on individual things, yes absolutely, but not as an entire overall package, imo

 

[SlimySnake]

speaking of, it is insane how good characters look in game too, especially Ahti. this is not a cutscene!

Remember that TLOU2 E3 2018 gif i kept posting of those NPC character models during gameplay? Thats what im seeing in AW2 during gameplay. They look like cutscene quality character models without you zooming into their face or cutting a realtime cutscene. It is so incredibly impressive to see such expressive and detail facial animations. That rose girl in the nursing home blew me away.

Well, it really holds up well. I have compared it to Alan Wake 2, as they're both 3rd person with static time of day.
Of course AW2's lighting is better and probably some textures, but overall TLOU2 is much more polished. And IMO the forest areas are comparable, the cutscene faces are better in TLOU2, so it isn't that simple as black or white.

I am glad that TLOU2 finally got a 4k patch because now we should be able to do 1:1 comparisons. I will see if i can capture some like to like areas. I think TLOU2 still looks great but ive been going back and forth between the two over the last couple of weeks, and AW2 is just leagues ahead in terms of lighting, asset quality, character models, and overall fidelity. It has that CG look even in non-RT modes while TLOU2 feels very much gamey.

I disagree that it looks worse than Uncharted 4 though. I think it looks leagues ahead of Uncharted 4 thanks to a massive increase in foliage and way better character model rendering and overall lighting.

 

[yamaci17]

Remember that TLOU2 E3 2018 gif i kept posting of those NPC character models during gameplay? Thats what im seeing in AW2 during gameplay. They look like cutscene quality character models without you zooming into their face or cutting a realtime cutscene. It is so incredibly impressive to see such expressive and detail facial animations. That rose girl in the nursing home blew me away.


I am glad that TLOU2 finally got a 4k patch because now we should be able to do 1:1 comparisons. I will see if i can capture some like to like areas. I think TLOU2 still looks great but ive been going back and forth between the two over the last couple of weeks, and AW2 is just leagues ahead in terms of lighting, asset quality, character models, and overall fidelity. It has that CG look even in non-RT modes while TLOU2 feels very much gamey.

I disagree that it looks worse than Uncharted 4 though. I think it looks leagues ahead of Uncharted 4 thanks to a massive increase in foliage and way better character model rendering and overall lighting.

rose is very expressive indeed lol

probably lives her life entirely as it is depicted in the books, so anything that says "she smiled from ear to ear" she takes it seriously lol

i remember taking her pics and was surprised how natural the flashlight was bouncing on people's faces

in comparison last of us is a bit more coarse



but nah man alan wake 2 definitely a league above tlou 2




mesh shaders carry alan wake 2 hard. though of course naughty dog will come up with better visuals when they fully use whatever ps5 is capable of

like look at this, it looks so gorgeous for some reason, I can't even quite explain it? I never had wow moments like this with last of us part 2 and its interiors. wow moments in last of us part 2 usually are from cutscenes (yes, cutscene wise alan wake 2 and tlou part 2 probably are near each other)

 

[rofif]

Some more AW2 Path tracing vs standard rasterization comparisons. Basically comes down to RT shadows. I wish they had just had a separate RT shadows and reflections option. They all seem to be tied to the main Path tracing options.

yeah this game RT makes small impact because it's all baked.
And wtf it runs so poorly on ps5 if it's all baked anyway?

TLOU part1 and 2 remaster are baked too. 4k40+ fps.
Obviously AW2 got better geometry but imo ND games got better baked in lighting, better dynamic lights from flashlight, better way how flashlight affects dust and particles... and of course better characters and animations.

yamaci17 showed picture of a mirror in AW2 and it's just a horrible blurry RT mirror. We had perfect planar or projection reflecitons in max payne 2 and half life 2 20 years ago. hell, I just replayed HL2 and it's water reflections are fantastic.
And not to mention... console versions of AW2 don't have any reflections. Just shoddy grainy ssr. simply YUCK.
The fact yamaci think it looks more realistic in the mirror is because it's blurry. That's the same effects as those UE5 bodycam games.

Some tlou2 remaster shots for the imagination (mind you, heavy compression from ps5)

And in-game model. Not the shite you people have been posting in last few months. Only the top shot is photo mode and all it does is camera position.

Don't disable film grain in tlou2. It makes it look more waxy.

Spoiler: grain

and Avatar doesn't stand anywhere near tlou1,2 or AW2... it's imo a joke it gets recognized so much for it's graphics.

 

[yamaci17]

yeah this game RT makes small impact because it's all baked.
And wtf it runs so poorly on ps5 if it's all baked anyway?

TLOU part1 and 2 remaster are baked too. 4k40+ fps.
Obviously AW2 got better geometry but imo ND games got better baked in lighting, better dynamic lights from flashlight, better way how flashlight affects dust and particles... and of course better characters and animations.

yamaci17 showed picture of a mirror in AW2 and it's just a horrible blurry RT mirror. We had perfect planar or projection reflecitons in max payne 2 and half life 2 20 years ago. hell, I just replayed HL2 and it's water reflections are fantastic.
And not to mention... console versions of AW2 don't have any reflections. Just shoddy grainy ssr. simply YUCK.
The fact yamaci think it looks more realistic in the mirror is because it's blurry. That's the same effects as those UE5 bodycam games.

Some tlou2 remaster shots for the imagination (mind you, heavy compression from ps5)

And in-game model. Not the shite you people have been posting in last few months. Only the top shot is photo mode and all it does is camera position.

Don't disable film grain in tlou2. It makes it look more waxy.

Spoiler: grain

and Avatar doesn't stand anywhere near tlou1,2 or AW2... it's imo a joke it gets recognized so much for it's graphics.

mirrors in aw 2 can be sharp. it looks like it is just how they're designed, to be not as reflective as you would imagine them to be

the crisp reflection is there with ray tracing, it just is apparent from specific certain angles. idk why they have done it that way

(look how crisp and clean reflection is in the non grainy part of the mirror)

and her in game model still looks worse than some npcs in alan wake 2 to me. i mean it is subjective, let's agree to disagree there lol


"yeah this game RT makes small impact because it's all baked.
And wtf it runs so poorly on ps5 if it's all baked anyway?"

1) mesh shaders (look how detailed even smallest of details are and how much they add to the visuals
2) "It looks like Alan Wake 2 uses a 'baked' or precalculated global illumination solution here alongside screen-space ambient occlusion to deal with indirect lighting, and the combination produces excellent results."

per DF. baked does not mean it will be light. maybe the more accurate baking is, the more computionally it is expensive to project and render with the baking applied? we don't exactly know. but I PERSONALLY think it justifies the performance cost all fronts. the game just looks phenomenal to me

 

[yamaci17]

waxy? faces dont look waxy to me with film grain disabled in last of us part or part 2
wdym waxy?


per chance do u have any setting related to film grain tweaked on ur screen? only other time i heard this term "waxy" was in the video above in its section about film grain. maybe u use film grain reducer or is it enabled by default or something? could be that adding film grain from game helps battling the anti noiser and brings the game to its natural look or something?

 

[rofif]

waxy? faces dont look waxy to me with film grain disabled in last of us part or part 2
wdym waxy?


per chance do u have any setting related to film grain tweaked on ur screen? only other time i heard this term "waxy" was in the video above in its section about film grain. maybe u use film grain reducer or is it enabled by default or something? could be that adding film grain from game helps battling the anti noiser and brings the game to its natural look or something?

my tv is set as a monitor - all ai stuff disabled. game mode. Not doing anything to the picture.

What I mean by waxy, is that i think tlou part1 and 2 are a bit too smooth andsilky without film grain. Their custom TAA is very heavy like you point in last sentence.
or maybe I am not used to the look. just an observation.

 

[Feel Like I'm On 42]

AW image quality issues on consoles kills it for me. It's not good enough.

I'm really mad at Remedy for not fixing the aliasing. Knowing how it destroys the otherwise great visuals should be enough incentive for them to want to fix it. Why doesn't SW Jedi Survivor, which also uses FSR2 at a similar native res in Quality mode, have nearly the same degree of bad iq/shimmering/aliasing?

If Remedy is such a talented dev when it comes to creating "the best graphics of 23", then why didn't they stick the landing by at least having a normal amount of fsr2 shimmering? It's abnormal to have THIS degree of it...they fucked up.

Nobody on console is asking or expecting to have the ultra/rt enabled experience you get on PC and in fact we know the console experience is already running a mix of lowered settings on other areas (aside from pt/rt), so I don't buy that the shimmering is "the cost of things". I think Remedy is just not a good dev when it comes to their treatmemt of consoles. AW2 hasn't received many patches and the ones it did receive didn't do jack to improve the issue. Control also ran like crap on the Xb1X.

 

[SlimySnake]

Nobody on console is asking or expecting to have the ultra/rt enabled experience you get on PC and in fact we know the console experience is already running a mix of lowered settings on other areas (aside from pt/rt), so I don't buy that the shimmering is "the cost of things". I think Remedy is just not a good dev when it comes to their treatmemt of consoles. AW2 hasn't received many patches and the ones it did receive didn't do jack to improve the issue. Control also ran like crap on the Xb1X.

You nailed it here. Remedy gives no fucks about consoles. Avatar came out the same time and looks marvelous on consoles.

I played Quantum Break on my og Xbox One and man that was a blurry looking game. i wouldnt be surprised if it was 720p. Control i played on PC but i remember how awful it ran on even the pro consoles.

 

[SlimySnake]

Some TLOU2 4k screenshots. Absolutely stunning art work. Still a bit gamey during day time, but looks perfect during cloudy conditions. Some last gen assets and foliage hurt the overall fidelity, but its crazy for a 1.8 tflops game.

 

[SlimySnake]

yeah this game RT makes small impact because it's all baked.

So does cyberpunk. The reason why it doesnt make a large difference is because the lighting isnt dynamic. its static time of day which is why those cyberpunk shots i post have no difference whatsoever while the shots turk posts which are taken during time of day transitions which are realtime in path traced mode and switch abruptly in baked lighting mode. hence, why i argue that PT and RTGI is a waste of resources in linear static time of day games.

And wtf it runs so poorly on ps5 if it's all baked anyway?

There is more to lighting than baking it in textures. You have volumetric effects, fog, and god rays. AW2 uses these to make each area feel thick and dripping with atmosphere. Their lighting solution is also got a cost of course and is of a higher quality than control and Quantum Break's. Insomniac did the same thing. Their day time lighting quality is substantially better than Spiderman 1.

These two gifs show off the volumetric effects.

 

[SlimySnake]

Foliage and lighting in this game is extraordinary. TLOU2 does come close in several foliage rich areas but the lighting and volumetric effects just take AW2 to another level.

 

[yamaci17]

Some TLOU2 4k screenshots. Absolutely stunning art work. Still a bit gamey during day time, but looks perfect during cloudy conditions. Some last gen assets and foliage hurt the overall fidelity, but its crazy for a 1.8 tflops game.

i tried it yesterday too and difference between 4k and 1440p modes are astounding on my 1080p screen. I can't quite understand how people with ACTUAL 4k screens report "i dont see much of a difference". I feel like I'm going crazy at this point

ellie so cute <3

i have ps4 pro version installed at the same time and will do some comparisons. it almost looks like perf mode looks exactly like ps4 pro mode. and the character model and everything is almost the same. 4k is just sharper and higher fidelity.

 

[yamaci17]

You nailed it here. Remedy gives no fucks about consoles. Avatar came out the same time and looks marvelous on consoles.

I played Quantum Break on my og Xbox One and man that was a blurry looking game. i wouldnt be surprised if it was 720p. Control i played on PC but i remember how awful it ran on even the pro consoles.

weren't u around back at quantum break release? it is probably the first big aaa game to use 1080p DLSS quality equivalent of upscaling



it literally has dedicated countless videos about it

though in that case not even a gtx 980 back then would run quantum break at native 1080p 60 fps.



now these are ultra settings but you get my point lol. game was tough to run. I still gave my old gtx 1080 quite the workout back when i played it in 2020. amazing game that too. visuals aged good. especially when u disable upscaling mode. but I could barely get 1080p locked 60 lol

remedy probably targets those people that watch from 2+ meter distance on their TV. no other explanation. us folks who play up close to the screen gets shafted. probably the gist of it. I mean this is the case for many other games too.

 

[Dunker99]

i tried it yesterday too and difference between 4k and 1440p modes are astounding on my 1080p screen. I can't quite understand how people with ACTUAL 4k screens report "i dont see much of a difference". I feel like I'm going crazy at this point

I feel the same about people who say they can’t notice much difference between 30fps & 60fps. It’s so utterly transformative to me, that I cannot fathom why anyone would choose 30 instead of 60. But that’s just my opinion.