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Digital Foundry || Hitman 3 Tech Review: Next-Gen Enhancements + The Glacier Engine Evolved

ILikeFeet

ILikeFeet

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Oct 25, 2017
61,987


Hitman 3 not only sees developer IO Interactive add and improve its excellent Glacier Engine, but it also sees the series debut on next-gen consoles... and not only that, the entirety of the Hitman trilogy is brought to the new consoles, with superior features and performance compared to backwards compatibility versions of the existing games. Here's John Linneman with the full breakdown of this exciting new game.
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different than the other DF thread, this is a more technical look at the game

written article
www.eurogamer.net

Hitman 3 tech review: the Glacier Engine shines on next-gen consoles

Traditionally, the cross-gen period - the awkward transition from one set of consoles to the next - hasn't really worke…
www.eurogamer.net www.eurogamer.net
 
S1kkZ

S1kkZ

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Oct 27, 2017
4,386
hate the new trees. they add a lot of pop-in that was not there before. i hope they can fix it.
 
PucePikmin

PucePikmin

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Apr 26, 2018
3,737
Somewhat mixed bag visually -- character models are still pretty dated, but depending on the stage, very nice atmospheric environments. One of the best uses of HDR I've seen to date. Chongqing and Berlin are real standouts.

I'd love to see IO Interactive tackle an Alan-Wake-style horror game/thriller -- I think they'd hit it out of the park.
 
Belvedere

Belvedere

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Oct 27, 2017
2,682
PucePikmin said:
Somewhat mixed bag visually -- character models are still pretty dated, but depending on the stage, very nice atmospheric environments. One of the best uses of HDR I've seen to date. Chongqing and Berlin are real standouts.

I'd love to see IO Interactive tackle an Alan-Wake-style horror game/thriller -- I think they'd hit it out of the park.
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Yeah. The image quality is great but the character models (and certain environment models) look dated.

Cross-gen is still pretty apparent here.
 
Blackthorn

Blackthorn

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Oct 26, 2017
2,315
London
PucePikmin said:
Somewhat mixed bag visually -- character models are still pretty dated, but depending on the stage, very nice atmospheric environments. One of the best uses of HDR I've seen to date. Chongqing and Berlin are real standouts.
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Can only comment on the HDR from 2 as I don't have 3, but it's always been my recommendation if someone asks what games show off HDR.

I find it makes the lighting and contrast look so true to life that it manages to trick the brain into accepting the reality of the scene, despite shortcomings elsewhere in their engine.

Overall it complements their pursuit of a realistic rather than filmic picture, and I consider modern Hitman some of the few games that effectively achieve such an aesthetic. Even if they're surpassed by more advanced engines on paper I can't think of any games off the top of my head that better achieve such realism at an art level.
 
Gestault

Gestault

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Oct 26, 2017
13,343
The 1X version seems underutilized this time around, but these results are nice overall. I wonder if it was a choice between optimizing on the Series S vs. the 1X, just due to the number of SKUs they're dealing with. The legacy content on top of the new game almost definitely makes their testing daunting, so that would make sense.
 
Stacey

Stacey

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Feb 8, 2020
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Said it in the other thread.

How on Earth has the PS4 Pro got better visuals and performs the same as the series S?
 
cabelhigh

cabelhigh

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Nov 2, 2017
1,722
Game looks absolutely absurd at high settings. Character models dont bother me much, the environments are next to none
 
s y

s y

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Nov 8, 2017
10,422
Belvedere said:
Yeah. The image quality is great but the character models (and certain environment models) look dated.

Cross-gen is still pretty apparent here.
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Character models arent really a tech issue more so a staff, budget and time issue I'd imagine. There are multiple last gen games with far better character models, in open world and linear titles.
 
ghostcrew

ghostcrew

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Oct 27, 2017
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Stacey said:
Said it in the other thread.

How on Earth has the PS4 Pro got better visuals and performs the same as the series S?
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Video says that they're surprisingly comparable but the Pro has more framerate drops than the S (when in the 60fps mode - which is the only option on Series S).

Same resolution at 60fps. Pro has higher shadow quality but has drops in places where the S doesn't.

Really impressive showing for the PS4 Pro.
 
ghostcrew

ghostcrew

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Oct 27, 2017
30,336
Was looking forward to seeing the next gen engine enhancements side by side with the Hitman/Hitman 2 footage.

Subtle changes for sure. But that SSR is a great upgrade. That floor when he walks into the fashion show area in Paris is loooovely.

Echo the person above who said the new trees look like a downgrade though. The pop in and, even when they're fully in, the look more video-gamey and sparse than the older trees. Weird choice, assume it was for performance. There are a lot of trees in many Hitman stages and I'm sure that was an easy change to make if it gave a sigficant performance boost.
 
Pancracio17

Pancracio17

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Oct 29, 2017
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The new tree pop-in is pretty bad yeah. On another topic though, Hitman 3 was said to get an RTX patch right? I wonder if itll affect the older stages too.
 
dgrdsv

dgrdsv

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Oct 25, 2017
11,813
Not a fan of pop-in on the new foliage either.

Dark1x , any idea if VRS is in use on the new gen consoles? It seems to be enabled by default on PC.

Stacey said:
Said it in the other thread.

How on Earth has the PS4 Pro got better visuals and performs the same as the series S?
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After all the talk on how CPUs were the main limiting factor of performance on previous gen, right? I chuckled at this one, I'll admit.
There are some drops on Pro though which are absent on XSS pointing to XSS not really being stressed at running these settings.
 
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LebGuns

LebGuns

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Oct 25, 2017
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ghostcrew said:
Video says that they're surprisingly comparable but the Pro has more framerate drops than the S (when in the 60fps mode - which is the only option on Series S).

Same resolution at 60fps. Pro has higher shadow quality but has drops in places where the S doesn't.

Really impressive showing for the PS4 Pro.
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Interesting, makes me wonder if more optimization would have brought the PS5 to native 4K. Isn't the power differential like 2.4x between the Pro and PS5? Shouldn't that be enough to push 1080p 60 to 2160p 60?
 
arsene_P5

arsene_P5

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LebGuns said:
Interesting, makes me wonder if more optimization would have brought the PS5 to native 4K. Isn't the power differential like 2.4x between the Pro and PS5? Shouldn't that be enough to push 1080p 60 to 2160p 60?
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PS5 runs higher settings and this doesn't scale linear anyways. Furthermore PS4 Pro drops frames in the 60FPS mode rather often.
 
dgrdsv

dgrdsv

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Oct 25, 2017
11,813
LebGuns said:
Interesting, makes me wonder if more optimization would have brought the PS5 to native 4K. Isn't the power differential like 2.4x between the Pro and PS5? Shouldn't that be enough to push 1080p 60 to 2160p 60?
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If by "optimizations" you mean "rendering at lower settings than PS4Pro" then sure, most likely.
Considering that PS5 is the only one which doesn't drop frames at all it's also fairly likely that their resolution target for PS5 could've been a bit higher, like 2000p or so instead of 1800p.
 
DuvalDevil

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Nov 18, 2020
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Do I get the upgraded visuals for Hitman 2 without buying Hitman 3 and entering thr game within Hitman 3s menu? Im afraid I dont understand how it works :/
 
Dictator

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Oct 26, 2017
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dgrdsv said:
Not a fan of pop-in on the new foliage either.

Dark1x , any idea if VRS is in use on the new gen consoles? It seems to be enabled by default on PC.


After all the talk on how CPUs were the main limiting factor of performance on previous gen, right? I chuckled at this one, I'll admit.
There are some drops on Pro though which are absent on XSS pointing to XSS not really being stressed at running these settings.
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I am pretty Sure it is vrs tier1 on PC - as it applies rather uniformly to objects. Quality is more or less sky Box only, performance is nearly all floor and Walls regardless of how well lit they are.
PS5 does not support vrs, so it is not on there and I think IO would have told us if they had it on on xbox series consoles. I think it is just an Intel sponsorship implementation, like gears tactics originally.
 
dgrdsv

dgrdsv

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Oct 25, 2017
11,813
Dictator said:
I am pretty Sure it is vrs tier1 on PC - as it applies rather uniformly to objects. Quality is more or less sky Box only, performance is nearly all floor and Walls regardless of how well lit they are.
PS5 does not support vrs, so it is not on there and I think IO would have told us if they had it on on xbox series consoles. I think it is just an Intel sponsorship implementation, like gears tactics originally.
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Thanks, I had a feeling that it would be this way considering the game has partnered with Intel.
 
dgrdsv

dgrdsv

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Oct 25, 2017
11,813
Dictator said:
Gladly - maybe they will change it to Tier 2 eventually like gears tactics did. That would be nice.
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Yeah, not a good look for VRS at the moment:

Screenshot-2021-01-22-145751.png

www.computerbase.de

Hitman 3 im Technik-Test

Mit Hitman 3 geht der Berufsmörder in eine neue Runde. ComputerBase hat sich die Technik der PC-Version inklusive Benchmarks angesehen.
www.computerbase.de www.computerbase.de
 
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ILikeFeet

ILikeFeet

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Oct 25, 2017
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posting this here because I don't think we need a third hitman DF thread

 
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