[VFX_Veteran]

All:

I thought I would start this thread since we don't have one of our own. Hopefully we can all be able to discuss graphical features in the various engines and for all the games in this current generation. Some of you have good questions about features and I'd love for you to share them here.

 

[VFX_Veteran]

For this gen so far, which game would you guys put at the top of the list of most incredible looking and most advanced graphics features that you've seen?

For me it is Black Myth. While I don't have the game yet, I've seen a lot of footage on it and it's pushing the fidelity this gen. The particle physics is amazing and reminds me of the Batman Arkham series of games using the ray-marched volumetric smoke. The environments look amazing and the hair is probably the most accurate so far using self-shadowing and at least 2 lobes of specular lighting. The goal would be 4 specular lobes one day.

Big shout out to Hellblade 2 for it's amazing character rendering.

Both games using Unreal Engine.

 

[Hostile_18]

For me I want one big thing that isn't easily marketable.

I want locations not movie sets. I don't want cushions and curtains made of concrete, I don't want tables that never budge and items that never move, glass that never shatters etc.

I'd also like improved character models. Location wise I'd say were close to photo realistic, but model wise we still have a long way to go.

More controversially I'd personally drop RT support. It's just too expensive and not worth the trade off. Games like Mafia Remake have amazing screen space reflections at such a low cost. That should be the tech we are advancing.

 

[regawdless]

All:

I thought I would start this thread since we don't have one of our own. Hopefully we can all be able to discuss graphical features in the various engines and for all the games in this current generation. Some of you have good questions about features and I'd love for you to share them here.

With assets getting increasingly detailed and large, I think asset streaming will remain somewhat challenging. We see UE5 struggling with that, and I'm curious if you see a fix for that or if you believe it'll get worse.

Also, with RT getting more common, CPUs will get stressed more because RT is often rough for CPUs. I wonder if you see any advancements in physics for next gen (fluid simulation, cloth simulation, environmental deformation, destruction etc.)?

That's actually more important to me than any other advancements for next gen.

 

[Franky Family]

@VFX_Veteran take note of Mario & Luigi: Brothership and get back to me when you understand the sheer explosive power that Luigi possesses, has possessed, since 1983

 

[Relativ9]

For me I want one big thing that isn't easily marketable.

I want locations not movie sets. I don't want cushions and curtains made of concrete, I don't want tables that never budge and items that never move, glass that never shatters etc.

I'd also like improved character models. Location wise I'd say were close to photo realistic, but model wise we still have a long way to go.

More controversially I'd personally drop RT support. It's just too expensive and not worth the trade off. Games like Mafia Remake have amazing screen space reflections at such a low cost. That should be the tech we are advancing.

Ray traced reflections are like most basic use of RT though, what will really be a game changer is true realtime ray traced global illumination (that's actually good. UE5s Lumen is attempting to do this but I'm not sure how much of a performance hit it is.

 

[Hostile_18]

Ray traced reflections are like most basic use of RT though, what will really be a game changer is true realtime ray traced global illumination (that's actually good. UE5s Lumen is attempting to do this but I'm not sure how much of a performance hit it is.

Even the most advanced lighting is still only advanced lighting to me. I'd rather put that power to so many other things. AI, Physics, Graphical Effects, Framerate etc.

 

[Amorous Biscuit]

Even the most advanced lighting is still only advanced lighting to me. I'd rather put that power to so many other things. AI, Physics, Graphical Effects, Framerate etc.

This is the same for me, whilst lighting, reflections and bounces all add to the immersion I'd rather see efforts made toward greater enhancement in physics simulation, be it cloth physics, bodies of water, realistic damage modelling and others. I get this is also likely as computationally expensive as fully Path Traced RT with GI but I'd find better simulation aspects like those to be vastly more immersive than how many bounces light has off certain surfaces.

I think it speaks to how we're reaching or have perhaps already reached diminishing returns on actual rendered materials and graphics that developers choose to chase lighting for more "realistic" presentation but realism is pretty boring when the world lacks any interactivity.

 

[regawdless]

Even the most advanced lighting is still only advanced lighting to me. I'd rather put that power to so many other things. AI, Physics, Graphical Effects, Framerate etc.

This is the same for me, whilst lighting, reflections and bounces all add to the immersion I'd rather see efforts made toward greater enhancement in physics simulation, be it cloth physics, bodies of water, realistic damage modelling and others. I get this is also likely as computationally expensive as fully Path Traced RT with GI but I'd find better simulation aspects like those to be vastly more immersive than how many bounces light has off certain surfaces.

I think it speaks to how we're reaching or have perhaps already reached diminishing returns on actual rendered materials and graphics that developers choose to chase lighting for more "realistic" presentation but realism is pretty boring when the world lacks any interactivity.

For interactivity and physics, I think RTGI is the basis for that to work well. Lighting is the first step, then environments and physics.

Believable RTGI is very important, makes it all look so much more natural. More important than texture quality or object density, huge impact on the overall presentation. The way maxed out Metro Exodus used it with the day and night cycle, was pretty damn transformative. Even in "unrealistic" games like Jusant, the Lumen lighting added a lot.

Cloth physics are pretty nice in some games already, to get that really right with total accuracy and no clipping is crazy expensive and I'm not sure that's the best way to spend compute power.

I think the next step should be environmental deformation and interactivity, but it can only happen when RTGI is already established, or it would look weird. Imagine blowing a hole in a wall, but no light coming it. Imagine having all kinds of moving objects that you can manipulate but they glow and stick out because of rasterized lighting. Imagine fire burning down a structure but the environment not properly reacting to the flames, not casting proper shadows, the area not being illuminated well.

Nah man, I want both, RTGI and physics.

 

[VFX_Veteran]

With assets getting increasingly detailed and large, I think asset streaming will remain somewhat challenging. We see UE5 struggling with that, and I'm curious if you see a fix for that or if you believe it'll get worse.

Also, with RT getting more common, CPUs will get stressed more because RT is often rough for CPUs. I wonder if you see any advancements in physics for next gen (fluid simulation, cloth simulation, environmental deformation, destruction etc.)?

That's actually more important to me than any other advancements for next gen.

If you are doing RT on the CPU-side, then you are doing something very wrong! All the expensive code for RT is done on the GPU. The CPU should become less of a factor as more of the engine's cycles get shifted to the GPU. I have a lowly 3950 and I still get 60FPS at 4k. The CPU just handles basic gameplay, sound, collisions, etc.. Wanting 4k as a framebuffer immediately makes the game GPU limited.

 

[VFX_Veteran]

Ray traced reflections are like most basic use of RT though, what will really be a game changer is true realtime ray traced global illumination (that's actually good. UE5s Lumen is attempting to do this but I'm not sure how much of a performance hit it is.

This right here. Game devs need to move completely away from bake-lighting. It's wrong and looks horrible.

UE5's hardware implementation of Lumen does use hardware GI -- which is what we all want. Software Lumen is too slow.

 

[VFX_Veteran]

I'm trying to come up with a reason to NOT declare SH2 has top dog spot for graphics this year. I need to play more Wukong. What other games have a stellar graphics feature list in 2024?

 

[regawdless]

I'm trying to come up with a reason to NOT declare SH2 has top dog spot for graphics this year. I need to play more Wukong. What other games have a stellar graphics feature list in 2024?

I think the only other ones are Hellblade 2 and Star Wars Outlaws. Wukong seems to be a strong contender this year, but SH2 looks pretty sexy.... After modding it to improve the DLSS with the current version that eliminates the smear, modded reflections to be high quality etc.

 

[VFX_Veteran]

I think the only other ones are Hellblade 2 and Star Wars Outlaws. Wukong seems to be a strong contender this year, but SH2 looks pretty sexy.... After modding it to improve the DLSS with the current version that eliminates the smear, modded reflections to be high quality etc.

Hellblade 2 looks very good but I need to see more. I do notice the Nanite tech in the game though. I think it's still too early to call. I don't have Outlaws yet. Waiting for a sale.

 

[Amorous Biscuit]

Hellblade 2 looks very good but I need to see more. I do notice the Nanite tech in the game though. I think it's still too early to call. I don't have Outlaws yet. Waiting for a sale.

It's 25 quid on CD Keys if you don't mind using Ubisoft's launcher. No doubt it'll be on Steam next year for around the same price.

Edit: Ignore me, the 25 quid version is UK and EU. Not US. US is £35.

 

[regawdless]

I think the focus should be to bring more interactivity to this interactive medium in general.

When there's an explosion, the environment needs to react. Stuff needs to fly around, grass and vegetation need to react to the shockwave, the clothes of the character need to react, smoke needs to react in a realistic way etc.

Dragon's Dogma 2 was a good example of how effective that can be. Just a small thing like the grass reacting to the wings of a dragon felt so epic and great.

We're already in a good place regarding image quality with PSSR and the Pro, also most Quality modes on the PS5 Amateur. Now add some life to the games, please.

 

[VFX_Veteran]

I think the focus should be to bring more interactivity to this interactive medium in general.

When there's an explosion, the environment needs to react. Stuff needs to fly around, grass and vegetation need to react to the shockwave, the clothes of the character need to react, smoke needs to react in a realistic way etc.

That would require a lot of collision detection and physics.. something that would be CPU heavy. I don't think we are there yet for migrating CPU-heavy things to the GPU.

Dragon's Dogma 2 was a good example of how effective that can be. Just a small thing like the grass reacting to the wings of a dragon felt so epic and great.

I plan on buying that in the near future.

We're already in a good place regarding image quality with PSSR and the Pro, also most Quality modes on the PS5 Amateur. Now add some life to the games, please.

 

[regawdless]

That would require a lot of collision detection and physics.. something that would be CPU heavy. I don't think we are there yet for migrating CPU-heavy things to the GPU.


I plan on buying that in the near future.

Yes and given the disproportional advancements when comparing GPUs and CPUs, it's one of the main challenges going forward IMO. Nvidia is aware of that and are working on their GPUs taking over more and more CPU related tasks from what I've read, but that'll take some more time. They did start tackle that with frame generation already though.

 

[VFX_Veteran]

DLSS is still the king but PSSR is a much better alternative to FSR.

 

[VFX_Veteran]

After playing several of the games that incorporate path-tracing and/or hardware Lumen, I've now come out with a clear winner for best graphics/look this generation for the PC.

Dragon's Dogma 2 - Path traced mode.

It is the closest thing to what I'm used to seeing in the film industry. It literally looks like an Arnold render. It's unfortunate that the game isn't denoised because it would be absolutely perfect implementation of PT.

While Alan Wake 2 and Cyberpunk 2077 use full path-tracing, they just don't have the artistic advantage that DD2 has. Also, Alan Wake 2 is constrained to a cloudy environment 100% of the time and it's location and environment aren't dynamic like DD2 is. Because of that, you can see more of how the path-tracing in DD2 can affect various different types of lighting settings.

Cyberpunk looks great but there is something about it that doesn't make it's full PT look top tier. I can't put my finger on it.

SH2, Black Myth, Hellblade 2 and Avatar all have full ray-tracing but they don't appear to be path-traced. Of that lot, I would give the nod to BM due to it's artistic direction and it's wider range of environment settings. SH2 is the most detailed of the 4 and it's use of hardware lumen is amazing. HB2 suffers from no path-tracing (even though it's fully RT) and so I can see inaccuracies of the lighting model compared to DD2PT for example. Nanite looks amazing though and the Meta humans can't be beat right now.

 

[regawdless]

After playing several of the games that incorporate path-tracing and/or hardware Lumen, I've now come out with a clear winner for best graphics/look this generation for the PC.

Dragon's Dogma 2 - Path traced mode.

It is the closest thing to what I'm used to seeing in the film industry. It literally looks like an Arnold render. It's unfortunate that the game isn't denoised because it would be absolutely perfect implementation of PT.

While Alan Wake 2 and Cyberpunk 2077 use full path-tracing, they just don't have the artistic advantage that DD2 has. Also, Alan Wake 2 is constrained to a cloudy environment 100% of the time and it's location and environment aren't dynamic like DD2 is. Because of that, you can see more of how the path-tracing in DD2 can affect various different types of lighting settings.

Cyberpunk looks great but there is something about it that doesn't make it's full PT look top tier. I can't put my finger on it.

Path traced mode for DD2 is very cool. Especially in interiors, there's barely any noise and it looks great. I did some comparisons in the DD2 OT back when I played the game. The world works so well with PT thanks to the colors and realistic art style.

Regarding Cyberpunk, the main issue with PT mode is that the game still uses a lot of fake light sources that often impact the scenes, and the art has this comic style touch that is kinda weird in some ways imo.
There's actually a mod that removes all the fake lights, making the game look a lot more realistic and better lit:

Comparison

 

[VFX_Veteran]

As you can see in those shots - path tracing is the best thing since sliced bread. The entire world looks significantly different than the non-PT games. It's not even close. I'm still trying to figure out if SH2 looks as good as AW2 with hardware Lumen (which I don't think is PT).

I went back and installed CP2077 only to notice what you mentioned here and it didn't look right so I uninstalled it. I really hope that Capcom puts in a denoiser for DD2 when the DLC comes out (it's rumored they are working on it). That game really needs more variety of monsters, less frequency of the same types and more story-driven quests. It could be a very good experience for me (more so than Elden Ring) if they did the DLC some justice.

 

[Zefah]

There's actually a mod that removes all the fake lights, making the game look a lot more realistic and better lit:

Which mod would that be?

 

[regawdless]

Which mod would that be?

Disable Fake Lights with Path Tracing

Read the description

www.nexusmods.com

 

[Zefah]

Disable Fake Lights with Path Tracing

Read the description

www.nexusmods.com

Wow, that's awesome! Definitely noticed a few of those places in the game where the lighting looked off. I'll give this a try tomorrow.

 

[regawdless]

Wow, that's awesome! Definitely noticed a few of those places in the game where the lighting looked off. I'll give this a try tomorrow.

Curious about your impressions. Unfortunately, it gets messy when devs implement three different lighting solutions. Pretty crazy that they did that tbh. Raster, a bit RT, and full PT. That was a lot of work for them.

 

[VFX_Veteran]

If this path-traced mode had a denoising algorithm, it would be the best looking next-gen game to ever come out. I have a video of a troll that had fur on his body and every single hair fiber was path-traced and hit other hair fibers causing self-shadowed hair. It is the first implementation of fur that is the closest to FILM than ever was in any game so far (sorry R&C).

This mode is an excellent reference for the rasterized version of the game however, the lighting and materials aren't even close to the same illumination in rasterized mode with RTGI. That's because they still had to introduce tricks into the lighting pipeline to get performance. Today's GPUs simply aren't powerful enough to run at 60FPS. The tree leaves are also fully path-traced and brings the FPS down -- way down while in the forest.

Here's a clip that I made using Nvidia's toolset to get a video of the fur. You can compare this to any fur rendering you like and you will quickly see there isn't a single game that does hair properly except this game.

 

[VFX_Veteran]

Here is a very obvious comparison of how PT completely changes the entire look of a game using old rasterization techniques.

Indiana Jones Ray Tracing High vs Path Tracing MAX - Imgsli

The image on the left is just completely wrong in all aspects: shadows, direction of shadows, light bounce on to other objects, specular surfaces and how they reflect light intensities, etc..

 

[regawdless]

Here is a very obvious comparison of how PT completely changes the entire look of a game using old rasterization techniques.

Indiana Jones Ray Tracing High vs Path Tracing MAX - Imgsli

The image on the left is just completely wrong in all aspects: shadows, direction of shadows, light bounce on to other objects, specular surfaces and how they reflect light intensities, etc..

Damn. The difference is so big, the PT one just looks coherent, believable. Can't wait for it to be included in more games, especially stuff like Path of Exile 2, I'd actually expect it to be there. With all the spells, fire, effects causing the environment to light up appropriately. Which it doesn't do for some reason, it's so bad. Same for Diablo IV.

 

[Zefah]

Curious about your impressions. Unfortunately, it gets messy when devs implement three different lighting solutions. Pretty crazy that they did that tbh. Raster, a bit RT, and full PT. That was a lot of work for them.

Finally got around to installing and checking this out (so many contingincies!). It really does make a huge difference in some places. I continue to be wowed by just how damn good this game looks. With that said, the ghosting and time it takes to fill a scene with RT lighting, while still greatly improved with ray reconstruction, looks kind of bad coming straight from Indiana Jones. Makes Indiana Jones look all the more impressive. Both are incredible, but I think Indiana Jones has the decisive upper hand in path tracing implementation. Cyberpunk is still super impressive considering the density and scale of the world.

 

[regawdless]

Finally got around to installing and checking this out (so many contingincies!). It really does make a huge difference in some places. I continue to be wowed by just how damn good this game looks. With that said, the ghosting and time it takes to fill a scene with RT lighting, while still greatly improved with ray reconstruction, looks kind of bad coming straight from Indiana Jones. Makes Indiana Jones look all the more impressive. Both are incredible, but I think Indiana Jones has the decisive upper hand in path tracing implementation. Cyberpunk is still super impressive considering the density and scale of the world.

Next update for ray reconstruction will fix the ghosting and issue with straight lines, also reducing reaction times.

Looking forward to play Indiana Jones on the 5090 when it drops. I'm holding off until then.

 

[VFX_Veteran]

Next update for ray reconstruction will fix the ghosting and issue with straight lines, also reducing reaction times.

Looking forward to play Indiana Jones on the 5090 when it drops. I'm holding off until then.

I'm actually going to hold off on the 5090 for now. I'm not seeing the 4090 being pushed to the limits yet (with FG of course). Maybe in another year.