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Digital Foundry: A Plague Tale Requiem: A Stunning Tech Showcase on PS5/Xbox Series X/S - DF Tech Review

Stuart360

Member
PC version suffers from asset streaming stutter:

Here's unlocked framerate:


and here 's RTSS locked at 59.938:


Asset loading stutter is clear and it shows in the frametime graph, in both locked and unlocked options.

I wouldnt say one stutter in the same place means the PC version suffers from asset streaming problems. I mean i didnt really notice any in my playthrough. And loading stutter arent usually in the same place, they are usually random.

Its certainly nothing like Unreal Engine.
 
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DaGwaphics

Member
Theoretically PS5 could be seeing upwards a 2% GPU perf drop providing more power to the CPU, but that would reduce the MHz difference CPU-wise to something even smaller, and the GPU would still be performing at slightly over 10 TF.

Not the way the PS5 works from what I've read. The power exchange system allows the clocks on the GPU and CPU to operate at higher peak clocks than they would have without it, but never boosts the clocks beyond the numbers specified on the spec sheet. It's not something that functions like a turbo boost on PC. Because of the power exchange feature, the CPU intensive areas could be creating more distance between the GPUs (even if only by a 2% like you said), which could also contribute to the drops in those areas.

This game is brutal on GPUs, look at what it is doing to PC parts. The XSX GPU has statistical advantages over the PS5 (as does the PS5 GPU over the XSX in different areas). This game likely just leans on the GPU compute giving the XSX an advantage. The XSS has a completely different resolution/settings target, so, isn't really part of a direct comparison to PS5. With that said, it is certainly possible, I would say likely, that they go back and tweak the settings on the PS5 SKU to get a more stable result. That will make the FPS comparable but than you'll technically have the PS5 running a slightly lower spec.
 
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FukuDaruma

Member
Yes, the DF crew mentioned this in their latest DF Direct as well, they said that whenever you turn the camera there's stutter.

That happened to me also. You can clearly see it here:



But then I discovered it was because I was locking the frametimes to 16.666ms with RTSS, and this particular game doesn't like that for some reason.
 

FukuDaruma

Member
I wouldnt say one stutter in the same place means the PC version suffers from asset streaming problems. I mean i didnt really notice any in my playthrough. And loading stutter arent usually in the same place, they are usually random.

Its certainly nothing like Unreal Engine.

This is just a sample. It's not one stutter in the same place, it stutters always when loading a new area.
 

M1chl

Currently Gif and Meme Champion
I mean I am almost at the end, it's okay and stuff, however I don't think that custom Engine is worth it for what the game does.

First the game does not look as good as One X version of the previous one, I am comparing it to that one, because that one also ran on 30hz, it's blurrier and I think it overall looked more polished.

Pushing CPU hard, what does it mean? All cores? Single core? I don't have it install on my machine, because I sold 3090 and waiting on 4090, which should be here soon. Why would it push hard CPU when game isn't that interactive (meaning physics when you just walking and even with rats setpieces, everything is just so basic...)

Making rats more like that one by one, is a bitch and I don't really understand how Series are better than PS5, since we know that DirectX has issues with instancing ton of moving interactive parts, was it fixed or something, did I miss the news? I am rocking August GDK (S|X licence included) in work and so far there hasn't been release anything they talked about on that dev conference. But then again it's a mess, as normally MS works are.

From my perspective as sort of software engineer, those swarms of rats would be better done, just by some moving mesh and just 2 or so layers of rats, effect would be the same and demand on HW would be much lower. For those interactive sections, you would just make pools of rats which can move by player interaction and that other "fluff" would be just a non-interactive instance, which would shake, few KB worth of animation data, which would only suck GPU power to draw it.

HOWEVER, I am not claiming to be some sort of genius, I am just an informed dev....who worked at something which had to use ton of tricks to be able to run on Xbone and PS4.


I am not impressed, Asobo did killer job Flight Sim, which is using Forza Tech, which I can't see them being really familiar with it, since they just made Flight Sim on it, probably whole MS behind your ass works wonders.

Edit: Also motion blur is ugly as fuck, not sure what happened but especially in those cutscenes, it sometimes look like an aura around character, it looks ugly. Not sure whats up, per object motion blur was solved in Unreal 3.5, so why are we, more than 10 years from that point struggling to make it like it was done for example in Gears of War 3 or Uncharted 3....
 
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Hoddi

Member
Pushing CPU hard, what does it mean? All cores? Single core? I don't have it install on my machine, because I sold 3090 and waiting on 4090, which should be here soon. Why would it push hard CPU when game isn't that interactive (meaning physics when you just walking and even with rats setpieces, everything is just so basic...)
The game is almost entirely GPU bound even at 720p on a 2080Ti. My 9900k was hitting 120fps+ at this res so that's not the issue.

On a side note, I don't think it's running at 900p on the S. I grabbed a couple of comparison shots and it looks identical to the 1080p shot on my PC. Hard to say for sure though.
 

adamsapple

Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
The game is almost entirely GPU bound even at 720p on a 2080Ti. My 9900k was hitting 120fps+ at this res so that's not the issue.

On a side note, I don't think it's running at 900p on the S. I grabbed a couple of comparison shots and it looks identical to the 1080p shot on my PC. Hard to say for sure though.

VGtech's analysis also had Series S at 900p with a temporal solution being used to up-scale to 1080p. The temporal solution seems to be good if it looks the same as native 1080p.
 

lh032

I cry about Xbox and hate PlayStation.
tbf, asobo is a close partner of Microsoft, i believe they have more understanding on the series hardware

I find it weird that, the PS5 fps is lower than Series X, so why not slightly reduce the resolution, the number of rats or overall visual settings on the PS5? for some reason PS5 has the exact same setting as Series X? seems like a lazy port to me.
 
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M1chl

Currently Gif and Meme Champion
The game is almost entirely GPU bound even at 720p on a 2080Ti. My 9900k was hitting 120fps+ at this res so that's not the issue.

On a side note, I don't think it's running at 900p on the S. I grabbed a couple of comparison shots and it looks identical to the 1080p shot on my PC. Hard to say for sure though.
I was just basing that question with what they've said in the video (rather what was posted in summary), since I have now PC without GPU, because we are TIER 3 country probably when it comes to Nvidia.
 

Hoddi

Member
VGtech's analysis also had Series S at 900p with a temporal solution being used to up-scale to 1080p. The temporal solution seems to be good if it looks the same as native 1080p.
I don't want to put my foot in my mouth but I always take those analyses with a grain of salt. There's a lot of guesswork involved when you're just looking at a screenshot.
 

Hoddi

Member
I was just basing that question with what they've said in the video (rather what was posted in summary), since I have now PC without GPU, because we are TIER 3 country probably when it comes to Nvidia.
Ya, I've some seen people wondering if it was due to the CPU but it doesn't really look like it. I think I read somewhere that the last game treated the rat swarms as GPU particles and I'd imagine the same was true for this game.

I'm just guessing but using fluid simulation to do a rat swarm sounds pretty damn cool.
 
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Hugare

Member
I'm playing it right now, and this is the only game that I've played that makes my 3060 goes full throttle. It has 130w and the game uses 99% of that all the time. Not even Cyberpunk uses this much.

And please people, turn off motion blur and chromatic aberration.

I usually dont disable motion blur because it helps with the fluidity, however, motion blur kills image quality in this game. It's essential. And chromatic aberration makes everything look like a blurry mess.

Honestly, the graphics presented during the initial few hours doesnt justify how heavy the game is. Artistically it looks great, character models were greatly improved from the first game, but animations are really janky, and voice acting is subpar (was also bad during the first game, but I gave it a pass due to its AA nature). Dialogue is also pretty bad.

It looks superb on sreenshots, but in movement it looks really old gen, imo
 
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GametimeUK

Member
I really want to play this game, but it seems my 2080, PS5 and Series X are not able to run this well enough which is disappointing. It will have to wait until I upgrade my PC.

It's a shame the 40fps mode doesn't run well as I'd probably have just played on Series X via gamepass if that was the case.

As a "next gen" only title it is interesting to see the Series X power translate into the additional performance on this game. There seems to be a lot more headroom on the 30fps mode and it stays closer to the 40fps line more than the PS5. I mean you'd expect this since on paper it is the more powerful machine, but it doesn't always end up this way. I wonder if this is something we will see more of?

Looks good on either console if 30fps is your thing. I look forward to playing this one sometime in the near future (hopefully).
 
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modiz

Member
The game is almost entirely GPU bound even at 720p on a 2080Ti. My 9900k was hitting 120fps+ at this res so that's not the issue.

On a side note, I don't think it's running at 900p on the S. I grabbed a couple of comparison shots and it looks identical to the 1080p shot on my PC. Hard to say for sure though.
VGTech says they reconstruct to 1080p and they are better at pixel counting than DF, always have been.
 

Fredrik

Member
If it’s a rats versus frames scenario then their priorities are clearly wrong. Why 300,000 rats? Why not go with 100,000? Or 10,000?
Runs well on my PC but seems extremely power hungry. It does look good though.
 

adamsapple

Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
So, this means that the PS4 would melt trying to run this?

It's 1440p, without RT, and drops to mid 20s on PS5.

So .. yeah PS4 would need to be a drastically cut down version.

Like Shadow of War PS3 levels cut.
 

DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
I wonder if this is a game where the ps5 clocks are messing with this certain type of game and asobo not having as much experience with it is showing. Like maybe managing the power balance between the cpu and gpu on a game that stresses both components is having the ps5 struggle?

I am probably far off but it seems interesting for a game that we know if pushing both cpu and gpu to act worse on thr Sony system than the specs point to.

CPU and gpu not being balanced by the dev and ultimately being starved for power?

Just a thought.

Has NXGamer done a comparison in this game, interested to see his take on PC vs ps5.
 

GymWolf

Member
How many rats per frame are being pushed in those games compared to this?
The game run like crap even without rats on screen, a dude in the last page said that his pc doesn't even get stressed by the rats but mostly by large areas with many npcs.
 
tbf, asobo is a close partner of Microsoft, i believe they have more understanding on the series hardware

I find it weird that, the PS5 fps is lower than Series X, so why not slightly reduce the resolution, the number of rats or overall visual settings on the PS5? for some reason PS5 has the exact same setting as Series X? seems like a lazy port to me.
They are going for parity but unfortunately the weaker console will suffer because of that. Probably should have gone for DRS on the PS5 and maybe the Series X as well.
 
The game run like crap even without rats on screen, a dude in the last page said that his pc doesn't even get stressed by the rats but mostly by large areas with many npcs.
It's the environments that are the real showcase here anyway. Incredible detail, large with a huge draw distance it's obviously going to be taxing on the GPU.
 

GymWolf

Member
It's the environments that are the real showcase here anyway. Incredible detail, large with a huge draw distance it's obviously going to be taxing on the GPU.
Unless they are way more detailed and with more npcs around than hfw, it is still strange to have such meh performances.
 
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RoboFu

One of the green rats
Jesus Christ, anything to console war, huh?

It's obvious that the optimizations on console-side were focused on Series systems. Remember, Microsoft redesigned the XDK into the GDK which features the exact same API toolset between Xbox platforms and PC due to DX12 Ultimate support.

Plague Tale: Requiem might be an UE5 game but it's also chiefly designed with DX12U, which makes sense because Flight Simulator (also from Asobo) targeted the same (which aided in the eventual Series X and Series S ports). That would mean, considering Asobo's size and what platforms they were already focusing on for the past couple of years, that their pipeline for software optimization on Xbox Series is likely more developed than their software optimization pipeline for PlayStation 5, which does not use DX12U.

Most likely the PS5 version just has less optimizations and the game itself is designed in a way where having fixed function graphics pipeline advantages (such as higher pixel fillrates and a faster GPU) is not as immediately beneficial. The game is leveraging more compute load, and the team probably focused on optimizing that to Series platforms with the DX12U API tools their pipeline is probably already quite mature.

Keep in mind a lot of earlier multiplats that had terrible Series X performance initially were patched and ended up performing better. There's literally no reason why that won't be the case when PS5 initially has the poorer showing in a multiplat. Considering the Series S version is apparently more stable than PS5 and runs closer to Series X, that should clue you in the lack of optimization in its current iteration specifically on PlayStation 5.

EDIT: Apparently this isn't an Unreal Engine game after all? OK then, never mind that part. Still though, I personally think performance issues at least on PS5 is likely due to Asobo's pipeline focused on GDK and DX12U API since they are designing their games for Xbox & PC platforms simultaneously.

nah, the XsX has a more powerful gpu but it’s more bandwidth constrained at higher FPS. PS5 has that high bandwidth advantage at higher frames being clocked higher. This game being locked to 30 fps negates that higher bandwidth advantage. At 30 fps the better gpu will show its strength.
 

yamaci17

Member
The game run like crap even without rats on screen, a dude in the last page said that his pc doesn't even get stressed by the rats but mostly by large areas with many npcs.
yeah rats are simply scapegoat. actually, gpu load with rats or without rats are similar. rats + fire + relatively larger spaces = cpu bound at 30-35 fps on a 3700x

normal places or relatively smaller places with 300k rats = cpu bound at 50-70 fps on a 3700x

in terms of gpu boundness, even when nothing going on, game still pushes my 3070 around 60-65 fps at 1440p. with rats + relatively smaller places, performance profile is the same.

so rats have nothing to do with it, in my experience

however I'm not going to say it is not justified. there's something special to this game in terms of fidelity: everything looks super detailed. that probably plays a factor on it demanding on GPU. and I have no complaints, personally. I like what I see.
 
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welshrat

Member
I don't get this, I am playing on gamepass on series X and although somewhat fun it is not a tech master piece in any sense of the word, in fact rather mediocre.
 
nah, the XsX has a more powerful gpu but it’s more bandwidth constrained at higher FPS. PS5 has that high bandwidth advantage at higher frames being clocked higher. This game being locked to 30 fps negates that higher bandwidth advantage. At 30 fps the better gpu will show its strength.

"Better" is relative, though, it's not an absolute. If, at the same 1440p upscaled to 4K output resolution, the game's optimized to leverage the full Series X GPU for certain compute tasks related to stuff like the rats, then fine, in this instance Series X's GPU is 'better'. Because to do the same on PS5, you'd need to either reduce the resolution, or simplify the compute for the rats.

But there's no realm where you can say Series X's GPU is outright better. It lacks cache scrubbers, and the caches themselves run slower due to the lower GPU clock. I think in general we'll see more trading blows between Series X and PS5's GPUs and we're never going to have a reality where one system is just consistently performing better than the other as a result, but some of us expected this before the gen even started.

Of course, API familiarity, overhead, and features can make differences as some teams become used to a way a certain SDK's API toolset handle certain calls over another's, which could come down to ease of engine compatibility. If Asobo continue a seemingly partnership with Microsoft doing more stuff like Flight Sim or other titles for IP they own that stay within the Windows PC & Xbox line of products exclusively, they will probably get more comfortable with DX12U's way of doing things and fit their engines to be very optimized for that, not to mention specific technical support they could get from Microsoft directly due to working so closely with them on those type of titles, the type of support maybe only actual internal teams would normally be privy to.
 

RoadHazard

Gold Member
I really don't agree with this being a technical showcase from what I've seen. It doesn't really look any better than many of the top last-gen games, and the performance is not good enough. 1440p and can't maintain 30fps? These consoles can do better. The PS5 version in particular I wouldn't play in its current state (I hate screen tearing so much).
 

adamsapple

Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
Man chapter 16 on pc with the rats is pretty damn impressive. Crazy

Yep.

I told y'all, the later chapters get absolutely nuts with the rat amount and destruction. This game wouldn't be possible on PS4/XBO without running in single digit frames in it's current state.
 
I really don't agree with this being a technical showcase from what I've seen. It doesn't really look any better than many of the top last-gen games, and the performance is not good enough. 1440p and can't maintain 30fps? These consoles can do better. The PS5 version in particular I wouldn't play in its current state (I hate screen tearing so much).
You haven't played it I take it? It's got some of the most detailed environments I've seen. The lighting engine is top tier stuff, almost no pop in with huge draw distance. The only area it's not quite there is character models and animations but that's by no means bad.
 

RoadHazard

Gold Member
You haven't played it I take it? It's got some of the most detailed environments I've seen. The lighting engine is top tier stuff, almost no pop in with huge draw distance. The only area it's not quite there is character models and animations but that's by no means bad.

I don't need to play it to see how it looks. And it does look good, but not good enough to struggle maintaining 30fps at 1440p.
 

Gaiff

Member
The game doesn’t look that great it’s hard to understand how DF picks their champions.
It absolutely does. It's one of the better looking games out at the moment.
I really don't agree with this being a technical showcase from what I've seen. It doesn't really look any better than many of the top last-gen games, and the performance is not good enough. 1440p and can't maintain 30fps? These consoles can do better. The PS5 version in particular I wouldn't play in its current state (I hate screen tearing so much).
There's not a single last gen game that looks as good as this.
 
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RoadHazard

Gold Member
It absolutely does. It's one of the better looking games out at the moment.

There's not a single last gen game that looks as good as this.

There are several on PS4 that look about as good. Maybe this looks slightly better than any of them (in terms of environments, not character models), but good enough to run at 25fps at 1440p? No.
 
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RoadHazard

Gold Member
Not a single PS4 game looks as good as this. Don't be ridiculous.

Read my full post please. This game looks good, but not good enough to justify such poor performance at such a low resolution.

If it ran at 1440p60/4K30 it would be pretty impressive. As it is, not so much.
 
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Gaiff

Member
Read my full post please. This game looks good, but not good enough to justify such poor performance at such a low resolution.

If it ran at 1440p60/4K30 it would be pretty impressive. As it is, not so much.
It could certainly use more optimization. I just don't think using last-gen games as a basis for comparison makes sense.
Nah. The closest is TLOU Part 1 on PS5. The difference being that the environment in this game are much wider than anything in TLOU1.
Are you sure about this?
Yes. The best-looking PS4 game is TLOU Part 2 and it doesn't look as good as this.
 
It could certainly use more optimization. I just don't think using last-gen games as a basis for comparison makes sense.

Nah. The closest is TLOU Part 1 on PS5. The difference being that the environment in this game are much wider than anything in TLOU1.

Yes. The best-looking PS4 game is TLOU Part 2 and it doesn't look as good as this.

I’m not really seeing a massive improvement over TLOU2 on ps4 other than resolution
 

Gaiff

Member
I’m not really seeing a massive improvement over TLOU2 on ps4 other than resolution
It's not a massive improvement but it's certainly noticeable enough to make the comparisons inadmissible. TLOU2 for how good it looks still exhibits issues due to the PS4's aging hardware.
e8fBcCI.png

This for instance looks very much like a PS4 game to me. The furniture on the left side of the screen has an extremely blurry surface. This is taken from a DF video and they were using that shot to show how good the game looks. It looks good but the limitations are pretty glaring at times.

vRTeyzc.png

TLOU Part 1 on PS5 looks very much improved (though certainly not "a generation ahead"), especially in regard to the consistency of texture quality and shadow resolution. That game and Requiem are much more comparable but as I said, it's ultimately a PS3 game with level design and size made for a PS3. You won't see anything comparable to the heavier sections of Requiem when it comes to the number of elements on screen at once.

Returnal has a base resolution of 1080p on PS5, doesn't it?

I don't think Requiem does a particularly good job there either. It doesn't leverage the API of the consoles properly with painfully slow loading times. It becomes thread-bound on PC during intensive scenes and runs significantly better on NVIDIA hardware. There's no other game quite like it besides TLOU Part 1 on PS5. The only other one is Gotham Knights and it's just shit.

Could Requiem run better? Absolutely! Would I use TLOU2 as a basis? No.
 
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