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Digital Foundry’s Kena: Bridge of Spirits Tech Review

Fake

Member
Digital Foundry have been way too lean with the latest shitty PC ports, Deathloop is unacceptable and they should emphasize that stronger, especially the stuttering that happens every 600 frames after loading some areas. Kena stutters violently while running across the mpa and loading new areas, and suffers from what seems to be Shader Compilation issues, and the resolution setting doesn't always work as intended. There is nothing great about the PC port of Kena, it's less than the minimum we should expect in 2021 and DF keeps giving them a pass.

I prefer to believe those people don't play games.

I respect for example John, but I don't need his veredict over Quake Remastered for PS4. He said the game runs fine, but is not true. I have the QuakeGL on my old crap notebook and Quake Remastered for base PS4 and the remastered runs not ideal on PS4. Everytime a blast produce a light, the framerate drops, not to mention the control problem.


So, IMO people sometimes people defend DF just for defend. Is not like I'm a DF fanboy or hater, is just I can test here if their statment are true or not.
Crysis remastered was a crime against nature, but they keep saying 'Crytek' would fix. Nothing since launch.
 

GymWolf

Member
NXGamer NXGamer got resolution lows of 1800p.
How could DF and NXG have such different results?
Y2NcHvQ.png



Does NXG have an overclocked PS5 (I jest I jest)
Its just odd to see them have such different numbers....usually pixel counters are pretty close if not exact matches for each other.

P.S Even before doing the full analysis Alex posted screenshots of Performance mode showing resolutions lower than 1800p.
ps5_perf.00_03_58_22.zujw0.png
jason-momoa-this-is-going-to-be-good.gif
 

Shmunter

Member
this seems like a very logical explanation

I don't know. In the same video Dictator show how easy is to put DRS and TAUU on pc just transfering some files config in the right folder....

Here it is…

“Based on the public information released to date by Ubisoft, it's probably the case that HRAA requires extremely low-level access to the GPU - DirectX 11 alone probably isn't up to the task.”

It was an AA technique, not DRS. But in saying that, temporal solutions such as these share many of the same fundamentals for upscale/reconstruction and possibly other related techniques.

 

Kenpachii

Member
He probably just assumed it, or maybe he made a screenshot a milisecond after he found the dip where resolution took a jump upwards.
 

NXGamer

Member
Hopefully NXGamer NXGamer will do another video with a PC comparison. Whatever DF are saying about how great the PC version is, There are people with big PC builds (like 2080ti OC + CPU 5ghz) who prefer playing on PS5 because the game stutters too much on their PC.
I do not have the PC version, we only got code a couple of days before launch. My counts were done at the start of the game and it uses TAAU, so reconstructs the image back. From those early counts that was what I got.

The thing is the game uses a reconstruction from a lower bounds on PS5, I have got 1080p levels which I think is the actual basis the game is using. I have another video on my channel coming up soon where I have had a few days now to play it further and test more sections.
 
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BlackTron

Member
Any impressions on how this runs on base PS4? I was thinking about getting this for someone but they're still on an old PS4...there seem to be some games getting left in the dust on the base system so I'm a bit leery.
 

Fake

Member
I do not have the PC version, we only got code a couple of days before launch. My counts were done at the start of the game and it uses TAAU, so reconstructs the image back. From those early counts that was what I got.

The thing is the game uses a reconstruction from a lower bounds on PS5, I have got 1080p levels which I think is the actual basis the game is using. I have another video on my channel coming up soon where I have had a few days now to play it further and test more sections.

Thanks for clean this up. Don't take the hate serious my friend. Those things happen more offen than people here can't imagine. Even DF have problem pixel counting games like Far Cry 5 and Rainbow Six Siege.
 

hlm666

Member
Any impressions on how this runs on base PS4? I was thinking about getting this for someone but they're still on an old PS4...there seem to be some games getting left in the dust on the base system so I'm a bit leery.
It's on par with your typical ue4 game on ps4, if your friend has played any ue4 engine based game on ps4 and had no issues with it, they should be able to enjoy it. Well as long as they are into the type of game kena is.
 

BlackTron

Member
It's on par with your typical ue4 game on ps4, if your friend has played any ue4 engine based game on ps4 and had no issues with it, they should be able to enjoy it. Well as long as they are into the type of game kena is.

I need to dig more but so far the only other impression I have found is on Reddit where the guy said it kept crashing to the point it was unplayable. Yeah I'm gonna watch this more carefully before making a decision lol.
 

hlm666

Member
I need to dig more but so far the only other impression I have found is on Reddit where the guy said it kept crashing to the point it was unplayable. Yeah I'm gonna watch this more carefully before making a decision lol.
Sounds like something that's more to do with his ps4 than the game, if it had crashing because of faults with the software we would be seeing alot more complaints about it.
 

BlackTron

Member
Sounds like something that's more to do with his ps4 than the game, if it had crashing because of faults with the software we would be seeing alot more complaints about it.

Makes sense but it's still enough for me to take a deeper look at it.

Did you play it on a base PS4? Or see someone else's impression? I mean I'm looking for real data not just an assumption based on its game engine...
 
I do not have the PC version, we only got code a couple of days before launch. My counts were done at the start of the game and it uses TAAU, so reconstructs the image back. From those early counts that was what I got.

The thing is the game uses a reconstruction from a lower bounds on PS5, I have got 1080p levels which I think is the actual basis the game is using. I have another video on my channel coming up soon where I have had a few days now to play it further and test more sections.

Thanks for listening to the feedback and providing an update.

:goog_beaming_face:

I'm looking forward to that video.
 

hlm666

Member
Makes sense but it's still enough for me to take a deeper look at it.

Did you play it on a base PS4? Or see someone else's impression? I mean I'm looking for real data not just an assumption based on its game engine...
I watched the ps4 coverage in the video this thread is about.

edit: and that was ps4 pro, so your right to be looking for more info sorry.
 
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Black_Stride

do not tempt fate do not contrain Wonder Woman's thighs do not do not
Well maybe 1296p is not that common? Because Dictator just show the village hub area for such pixels counts. It's not the first time who uses the lower resolution to define the "more commons" resolutions on ps5, he is not new to such approximations. He did something similar for Metro but according to the VGTech YouTube channel stats the story was a bit different.

Alex said 1296p was the lower bound and theorized that it might drop as low as 1080p......NXG said the lower bound was 1800p.
If you find a resolution lower than 1800p anywhere then the lower bound couldnt possibly be 1800p.

Use the articles comparison tool and without even pixel counting just by eye and first glance looking at the Quality mode and performance mode you can clearly see that there is no way the performance mode is sitting around 1800p.
 
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Indeed. Just a bunch of guys saying you're wrong, DF can't be wrong... thats stuff. Just keep the good work.

To be fair this thread is pretty tame compared to some other NXGamer NXGamer threads that I've seen. At least I didn't see anyone call him a PlayStation shill in this one. I don't agree with that at all BTW as NXGamer NXGamer does good work.
 

Fake

Member
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Good point, but I guess that pinned thread about console warring the ADM created this week maybe make them less agressive this time.

edit: https://www.neogaf.com/threads/a-no...atform-warring-plaguing-many-threads.1619387/

Yes I did see that post and it's probably a reason why this thread is pretty tame. Like any comparison thread some of them do tend to get pretty nasty.

Anyways I like that NXGamer NXGamer communicates with us here. Hopefully we never lose that because he does provide us with additional information.
 

Armorian

Banned
You answered your own question. Because we are pushing 4K. Every generation we get more bandwidth, but resolution increases a lot, which requires more bandwidth.

Look at PS5. Many times, and this Kena is an example, PS5 is pushing 4 times the pixels of the PS4 version. Sometimes the difference is even bigger, having to push native 4K while PS4 is sub 900p (Guilty Gear Strive for instance). Unfortunately PS5 does not have x4 the bandwidth of PS4. So yes, that could become a problem if devs aren't careful.

AF doesn't use much memory bandwidth.
Consoles don't use 4K, except some simpler games.
RDNA2, uses a tile based renderer, that saves a lot of memory access. Something that GCN didn't use.
Sacrificing 5% resolution is well worth getting AF 16X.
The improvement in image quality with AF16X is much bigger than a bit of resolution.

So i did AF test in rise of the tomb raider, 5120x2160 resolution, v. high settings. RTX 3070 that has ~512GB BW so it's not that high for this resolution:

AFx16
uCM0unL.png


AFx8
5I6mngU.png


AFx4

MhGADTc.png



AFx2
df2xGkb.png


No AF/Trilinear
vPnlG8x.png


AFx2 is slighty better in performance than x4 but there is almost no performance difference between x4 and x16....

Last value is average performance from all the tests.

Really, devs are just fucking lazy in this aspect and both PS5 and XSX GPU are perfectly capable to run everything with x16, this was done in super high res that consoles won't have to render any game.
 
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Razvedka

Banned
Yeah its silly. Good thing its nothing to tweak the .ini file. The one that annoys me the most is developers not letting you adjust the resolution of raytraced reflections like Control or Cyberpunk. So much wasted performance.
I wonder if this isn't stipulated in part of a marketing agreement or similar such with Nvidia. E.g. Nvidia 'helps out' or 'markets your game' provided you do XYZ in your game to make their tech look better.
 

Mister Wolf

Member
I wonder if this isn't stipulated in part of a marketing agreement or similar such with Nvidia. E.g. Nvidia 'helps out' or 'markets your game' provided you do XYZ in your game to make their tech look better.

Its not that. Battlefield V one of the first RTX games on PC had multiple quality settings for RT reflections that adjusted their resolutions. The developers of Control and Cyberpunk just don't give a shit accept when it comes to consoles where the Control developer made the RT reflections half resolution and checkerboarded saving tons of performance. There is zero need for full resolution RT reflections. If given the option I would even go as low as quarter resolution every single time.
 
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TrebleShot

Member
Been playing this on and off and loving it. One thing I’ve noticed is the in game cinematics look cleaner and better than the pre rendered ones. Wish they were in engine.
 

DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
I do not have the PC version, we only got code a couple of days before launch. My counts were done at the start of the game and it uses TAAU, so reconstructs the image back. From those early counts that was what I got.

The thing is the game uses a reconstruction from a lower bounds on PS5, I have got 1080p levels which I think is the actual basis the game is using. I have another video on my channel coming up soon where I have had a few days now to play it further and test more sections.

1080p on ps5? So that is the lowest bounds? That's a huge difference between 1800p and 1080p or am I reading this wrong?
 

Armorian

Banned
AF topic again, I just watched TW3 pro upgrades video from DF and see this:



No problem upping AF to x16 on PS4 Pro along other improvements for massive difference. Fucking lazy devs...
 

GymWolf

Member
AF topic again, I just watched TW3 pro upgrades video from DF and see this:



No problem upping AF to x16 on PS4 Pro along other improvements for massive difference. Fucking lazy devs...

And the funny thing is that shitty anisotropic is more noticeable than any low res shadow, reflection or light system and super easily fixable and lighter compared to all those things.
 
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