Graphics Tech: Exclusive vs. 3rd Party

Focusing in a single platform means in most cases a more optimized game that end looking better.

Trying to optimize games for two or more platforms are expensive and take longer time... that means the overall result won't reach the same level of a more focused single platform game.

There are exceptions but they are very few.

nelsonroyale said:

I mean being pendatic even Nasa's calculations are approximations....just far more accurate

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Absolutely. Computers do not possess the ability to fully simulate reality. My point, however, is that if there's an argument to be made about who's using the most complex/advanced rendering technology, video game developers aren't even in the discussion.

chandoog said:

Please PM me those pictures then.

While you're at it, please PM me your promised Detroit level in UE4 too.

thanks :)



Not just this thread, most of the OP's post history too.

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The thing is of course UE4 could replicate suit materials from Spider-Man, and that's not even to say that UE couldn't product great results as an engine. But IamthatIam... is saying that UE4 and tech is just as capable across any real metric (in the gaming space)... because he can import or run... similar suit materials... in what likely isn't even... a gameplay setting... on equivalent specs...?

It's complete nonsense in so far as being a point that in any way supports what the OP was trying to say.

RE and DMCV are top tier technically as is Frostbite. UE4 is used in Gears 5 which is top tier as well.

VFX_Veteran said:

This is a completely flawed assumption. No evidence of this at all.

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Other than constant historical examples?

Right now God of War is the best looking game for consoles. 2nd is Uncharted. Ryse held the title of best looking XBox One game for quite some time.

You can say the same for literally every generation. Exclusive games almost always are the best graphical showcases for a system.

This is because developers are able to focus on one platform and use every trick in the book. The reason why God of War looks so incredible is due to them crafting the visuals solely around the Playstation 4's strengths and weaknesses, to a point where no developer would have the time/patience to do so if the game would be a multiplatform release.

You guys are focusing too much on Sony Studios but the way I see it, Playground Games and Turn 10 are among the best studios with their Forza Games. What they did with the Xbox One hardware is just voodoo. To this day I still don't understand how they managed to use 4X MSAA in FH3. I have a GTX 760 and FX6300 (more powerful than Xbox or ps4) and no way I could do that.

The same with Forza 7: 1080p 60 FPS with MSAA on Xbox One and 4k60 on the X is incredible. I can't hit 1080p 60 on my pc no matter what, even if I try to make the game look as awful as Outrun. Hopefully they bring that console optimization to PC this time.

I'm more impressed by Infamous Second Son than God of War. That game was released really early on the console's lifecycle and looks great, really nice textures, and draw distance as well. Not sure if it even runs at 60 FPS with the Pro. That's incredible for an open world game. In contrast, the 35 FOV in God of War and Horizon helps a lot saving performance.

JusDoIt said:

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Pretty much this. Duder keeps ignoring everyone's posts.

MegaMix said:

Pretty much this. Duder keeps ignoring everyone's posts.

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And actual statements from devs.

I like how OP has no actual logic or evidence backing the claim, yet gets pedantic about people who bring reasonable arguments against them and dismisses them. Bad take, bad thread.

Guys, unless you have proof that first party developers have proprietary tech that third party developers have no access to, you can't convince the OP to change his mind because that is what he wants. That is why screenshots are not allowed because he cares more about the underlying tech than how the game looks.

nynt9 said:

I like how OP has no actual logic or evidence backing the claim, yet gets pedantic about people who bring reasonable arguments against them and dismisses them. Bad take, bad thread.

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Yep.

In the end, focusing to single platform, if nothing else, has historically shown (comparatively) better attention to performance due to budget and time being allocated to a single platform. Of course there are exceptions and it also comes down to said budget, skill and time at hand. Best examples last gen in favour would have been the Uncharted games and GoW and on the flip side Demon's Souls (which aside from visual and performance is a cornerstone project).

Just out of curiosity, in addition to determining the amount of effort I want to put into a reply, can you share your qualifications to make such a claim?

I'm guessing with the name VFX Veteran you work in the industry? Can you share some insight as to what you do to potentially help shed some light as to whether or not your knowledgeable about what your debating or just an enthusiast who reads blogs. Might help or hurt your thread, but at least people may take you a little more serious.

Coma Ecliptic said:

Just out of curiosity, in addition to determining the amount of effort I want to put into a reply, can you share your qualifications to make such a claim?

I'm guessing with the name VFX Veteran you work in the industry? Can you share some insight as to what you do to potentially help shed some light as to whether or not your knowledgeable about what your debating or just an enthusiast who reads blogs. Might help or hurt your thread, but at least people may take you a little more serious.

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He said he use to work on offline cgi and is now developing a game. Dont know if he ever gave any more details

This thread is highly revealing of how susceptible people are to above-average art direction in games with limited scope. The fanboyism runs deep.

Makes any and all technical threads about real-time graphics more tiresome than they should be. Shit, just look at all the talk about the Nvidia ray tracing demos. Downplaying left and right. Obnoxious as hell.

Folks, God of War is not a counter-example. It does not do anything technologically that a 3rd-party cannot or has not done. It's just really strong artistically. Unfortunately, I guess most just don't have the wherewithal or the ability to make that distinction. Oh, well. C'est la vie.

VFX_Veteran said:

I currently work at here on AR/VR applications in Unity, OpenGL, and UE4.

I seriously doubt this will make a difference with how people view me on these boards. Having an unpopular opinion doesn't bode well here.

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You should probably get verified and you never know, it might help. I doubt it though because you don't really help yourself by presenting arguments that aren't logically sound. You tend to jump to conclusions and you don't really structure your arguments well. Furthermore, you're seemingly unaware of your inherent biases. Finally, the tone of your previous statements suggest that you're not really interested in an intellectually honest discussion/debate. Then again, that's just my take on the matter. My perception may be skewed, who knows....

martincrimson87 said:

You guys are focusing too much on Sony Studios but the way I see it, Playground Games and Turn 10 are among the best studios with their Forza Games. What they did with the Xbox One hardware is just voodoo. To this day I still don't understand how they managed to use 4X MSAA in FH3. I have a GTX 760 and FX6300 (more powerful than Xbox or ps4) and no way I could do that.

The same with Forza 7: 1080p 60 FPS with MSAA on Xbox One and 4k60 on the X is incredible. I can't hit 1080p 60 on my pc no matter what, even if I try to make the game look as awful as Outrun. Hopefully they bring that console optimization to PC this time.

I'm more impressed by Infamous Second Son than God of War. That game was released really early on the console's lifecycle and looks great, really nice textures, and draw distance as well. Not sure if it even runs at 60 FPS with the Pro. That's incredible for an open world game. In contrast, the 35 FOV in God of War and Horizon helps a lot saving performance.

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I believe Forza 7 uses a type of FXAA on both Xbox's & FH3 uses forward rendering, so the 4xMSAA isn't actually impressive, which i learned the other day because i assumed it was deferred rendering. Also it's not really Console optimisation at all in this case, it's Kelper hardware (your 760) being pretty bad at DX12 games, a 7870 has no problem doing 1080p/60fps in Forza 7 & that GPU was a competitor to the 760 back in the day.

Wouldn't exclusives naturally look better due to being designed around specific hardware? It gives them an edge 3rd party games don't have.

Then again, I might have no idea what I'm talking about.

I think the point being made isn't that exclusives can't look pretty, but that being exclusive doesn't have a bearing on whether something is pretty.

Also that people are letting their fanboyism clouds their judgment.

VFX_Veteran said:

Reality:

There is no such enhanced technology because most hardware dev kits have moved away from low-level access. There is no real tech introduced in any console generation (ala this current generation is proof). The PC paves the way for new tech and the console follows suite ~2 generations behind. We oftentimes mistake incredible art direction for technology as is the case for many of these console exclusives.

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There is a new generation of specs to develop against with a new console generation - so not entirely true. But this basically allows for more to be done graphically (or gameplay wise). This generation a lot of advances in lighting has been seen due to increased memory, for instance.

PC doesn't necessarily pave the way for new technology unless that is the base platform that is being developed for. It's a fallacy to assume that because it runs bad on anything but the best PC specs, that it's a showcase of technology.

A multi-platform developer has to work to make their work viable on now 4 machine bases ( in order of Xbox One, PS4 , PS4 Pro, Xbox One X) that are fairly different in terms of 'power'. A larger studio will tend to have better access to internal support from the platform holder so they can incorporate anything that might help them (after all, in the best interest for platform holders to have at the very least graphics and feature parity - something we didn't see between GameCube / PS2 and Xbox)

But yes, often most players will assume art direction == graphics / technology.

SolVanderlyn said:

Wouldn't exclusives naturally look better due to being designed around specific hardware? It gives them an edge 3rd party games don't have.

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Not necessarily. PC makes the advantages of specific to some degree irrelevant because you can brute force everything. For instance, no matter how good a PS4 exclusive is, it's not going to have shadow quality as good as a multiplatform game.

VFX_Veteran said:

Screenshots are bogus and only apply to subjective opinions.

We've reached 5 pages of attacking me as having unfounded evidence to back up my claim and yet I haven't seen a single post that has evidence contrary to mine except what gaming sites have mentioned or what a developer (which I am as well) claims.

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Ok, so you quoted me but I don't see why? Did I get something wrong? Like I said you never wanted screenshots because you care more about the underlying tech than how the game looks since as you said, "Screenshots are bogus and only apply to subjective opinions." You dismissed every other posts saying that art direction is what makes the difference for them so the only other thing remaining is the underlying tech.

The same game can have the same underlying graphics tech but different art direction and some people will prefer one, both or neither.

You want an objective take on the matter but for the most part what looks good is subjective. You want evidence contrary to yours but dismisses gaming sites and even what another developer claims, so if a developer claim is not enough for you then how can posts from people who are not in the industry carry more weight?

The problem with your argument - and I knew you were going to do this - is focusing only on technology. Sony games aren't above everything else from a tech standpoint, and anybody who would say that is dumb.

The reasons people generally see a lot of PS4-exclusive games as the best looking titles are that some Sony studios focus on THREE aspects to create the best LOOKING (not best TECHNICALLY) game they can:

-Tech
-Art
-Image quality

They're better than pretty much everyone at finding the best balance of these three facets.

kaf said:

PC doesn't necessarily pave the way for new technology unless that is the base platform that is being developed for. It's a fallacy to assume that because it runs bad on anything but the best PC specs, that it's a showcase of technology.

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New graphical features typically appear in PC games or PC versions of multiplatform titles first, before appearing in console versions as the hardware advances. For instance, games like Crysis 3, Doom 2016, each new Call of Duty and Battlefield title -- these games are or were the bleeding edge of rendering technology -- but quite importantly they all have features that only appear in the PC versions. Ray tracing is like ambient occlusion. Very expensive, but Crysis 1 introduced screen space ambient occlusion to gaming, and several years later consoles started adopting it.

Look at how PC versions of Square Enix games introduce hair and cloth rendering technology that is basically a generation beyond what you see in console games. Deus Ex: Mankind Divided allows players to enable very expensive cloth physics so that Jensen's coat collar doesn't clip incorrectly. In a decade that'll be commonplace, but it's available on PC now. Similarly, the hair technology TressFX is quite a bit more advanced than the stuff you find in games like Horizon: Zero Dawn where they had to take console limitations into account. The thing about PC is that developers have the freedom to pioneer expensive rendering technology that is exclusive to the PC version. It can be several years before consoles can compete, even with remarkably good console hardware that we have now, GPU-wise.

VFX_Veteran said:

I disagree.

Tech - we've already proven that that's not the case

Image quality - what goes into defining image quality? To me, image quality means the quality of the techniques in rendering which include resolution both final render and texture. Neither of those two are in any consoles bag of tricks. A true 4k rendering with 2k texture maps will surely be a much cleaner image than an upscaled 4k render with 1k texture maps.

Art - agreed.

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And again you're looking at each facet in a vacuum.

Sony games don't have the best tech. They don't have the best image quality. The reason their games often get called the best looking is because they are so great at striking the perfect BALANCE between tech, art, and image quality. Some devs may go too hard into the tech, and the art or image quality suffers. Some may have amazing art but barebones tech. Some are good at all three together. But some Sony devs are masters at that balance.

VFX_Veteran said:

This is a bad thread. And not because of my post, but because of the swift dismissal of my opinions simply because they don't 'fit' the running agenda.

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Or perhaps it's because some of us recognise your username, know your preferences & history on this subject & think you've made the thread is bad faith since you're not looking for discussion only agreement that Ubi games r best, which was the schtick you got banned from Gaf for.

VanWinkle said:

And again you're looking at each facet in a vacuum.

Sony games don't have the best tech. They don't have the best image quality. The reason their games often get called the best looking is because they are so great at striking the perfect BALANCE between tech, art, and image quality. Some devs may go too hard into the tech and the art or image quality suffers. Some may have amazing art but barebones tech. Some are good at all three together. But some Sony devs are master at that balance.

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Sounds plausible to me.

Problems happen when folks keep quoting some near-mythological 1st-party "secret sauce" (a phrase which I use to refer to things like "coding to the metal" or "focusing on a single platform") as the reason for their visual success, despite the fact that technologically there's nothing really super special going on in these games. It'd be nice to see a lot less of that phraseology, and even less of the - implied or otherwise - assertion that only 1st-party games can ever achieve those kinds of visuals.

Dr. Caroll said:

Ray tracing is like ambient occlusion. Very expensive, but Crysis 1 introduced screen space ambient occlusion to gaming, and several years later consoles started adopting it..

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No, that is not how early it was. It was a difference of months rather than years and is something we saw a lot in PS3/360. And 10 years later, it is now more common to see real-time advances happening on all platforms.

Edit: Oh you know what, this looks like a bait thread started by the OP. I'm just going to ignore anything further, sorry.

VFX_Veteran said:

Disclaimer:

This is NOT a screenshot war thread. It's a technical thread that should be discussed with technical facts and features. So, posting a screenshot to prove a point is NOT the correct response.


Claim:

Based off of exclusive console titles (i.e. God of War, Gears, Uncharted, Spiderman, Detroit, etc..), people believe that they are so technically above 3rd party titles in technology, that they feel with each new iteration of tech, the bar will be raised significantly.

Fallacy:

Assuming developers that make exclusives have some secret skillset on making their games 'look' better than the rest of the pack due to low-level hardware access. There is literally not a single exclusive that does anything better than any other high profile 3rd party company. Dice, Ubisoft, iDSoftware, Epic, CDProject RED, etc.. all have extremely efficient graphics engines that are oftentimes more tech-savy than the exclusive company titles. It just doesn't get as much praise due to them strictly not making exclusive titles.

Reality:

There is no such enhanced technology because most hardware dev kits have moved away from low-level access. There is no real tech introduced in any console generation (ala this current generation is proof). The PC paves the way for new tech and the console follows suite ~2 generations behind. We oftentimes mistake incredible art direction for technology as is the case for many of these console exclusives.

Conclusion:

Don't expect a exclusive title to blow away 3rd party companies games simply because it's a game developer that makes exclusive games.

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You are confusing 1st party with exclusives cuase exclusives can be from 3rd party

But when it comes to hardware manufacturer, specially for nintendo, 1St party games stands out againt 3rd oarty

VFX_Veteran said:

I currently work at here on AR/VR applications in Unity, OpenGL, and UE4.

I seriously doubt this will make a difference with how people view me on these boards. Having an unpopular opinion doesn't bode well here.

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it would probably help had you not called horizon the least impressive game of the year. you have also said sony 1st party developers are mediocre from a tech standpoint and only have great artists. its 1 thing to think their games arent the best, its another to make the above 2 claims

I think 1st party games do look better than 3rd party more often than not becusse those d3vs no there hardware better thsn most. Example, no one makes better looking Nintendo games on Nintendo hardware

Xenoblade X is literally, and without question, the most technically impressive game on the Wii U

i dont believe for a second that its simply a coincidence that it just so happens to also be exclusive to the platform and developed by a subsidiary of Nintendo

exclusive games generally have more development time to optimize for any one platform than games developed for multiple

and it is also reasonable to expect that a console maker who is publishing a game for their own system is going to try elevate the quality of the product just from a "seal of quality" attitude

i guarantee you that Dishonored 2 would not run like dogshit on PS4 like it currently does if it were commissioned by Sony

Mona said:

Xenoblade X is literally, and without question, the most technically impressive game on the Wii U

i dont believe for a second that its simply a coincidence that it just so happens to also be exclusive to the platform and developed by a subsidiary of Nintendo

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That has more to do with the fact nobody wanted to make Wii U games, to be honest. Crytek were considering porting Crysis 3 to the Wii U, but that fell through. In fact basically everyone except Ubisoft dropped the platform like a hot potato. The only way you were getting graphically ambitious titles on the Wii U was if Nintendo was literally paying you to do it.

VFX_Veteran said:

Art is clearly a factor in judging overall presentation of a game. But if we normalize all exclusives to art having the advantage, then what does that really say? That 1st party companies have better artists than 80% of all other companies out there? Surely that can't be true -- unless there is bias.

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That is where I think the problem/misunderstanding is. Not all exclusives have the art direction advantage otherwise every exclusive game will be lauded.

What else is there if all the tech utilized is available for every other developer? Art direction and how they utilize/implement the tech to complement the art direction the game is going for. That may seem like 1st party developers have better art directors but many indie games are praised for their art direction so it's really not about that.

What makes them garner more attention, in my opinion, is that 1st party games are supposed to be system sellers so they get more coverage than a game that will be available for all consoles/systems.

VFX_Veteran said:

I currently work at here on AR/VR applications in Unity, OpenGL, and UE4.

I seriously doubt this will make a difference with how people view me on these boards. Having an unpopular opinion doesn't bode well here.

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Read your opening post. Understand why people automatically have a hard time agreeing with you. Because simply that post is obnoxious and full of hyperbole. It's par for the course on message boards of course, but let's be real.

And frankly the appeal to authority is hard to swallow when it's clear you have an axe to grind.

Laiza said:

Sounds plausible to me.

Problems happen when folks keep quoting some near-mythological 1st-party "secret sauce" (a phrase which I use to refer to things like "coding to the metal" or "focusing on a single platform") as the reason for their visual success, despite the fact that technologically there's nothing really super special going on in these games. It'd be nice to see a lot less of that phraseology, and even less of the - implied or otherwise - assertion that only 1st-party games can ever achieve those kinds of visuals.

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Yeah that's where you lose me. You're over-correcting because certain people are getting under your skin. For instance, the motion blur in Spider-Man is fantastic. It especially can be called out compared to a regular PC game because PC games don't really need it to the level because they usually run with lower latency. I don't understand why people let other people's opinions get to them to the point where they are illogical themselves.

Dr. Caroll said:

That has more to do with the fact nobody wanted to make Wii U games, to be honest. Crytek were considering porting Crysis 3 to the Wii U, but that fell through. In fact basically everyone except Ubisoft dropped the platform like a hot potato. The only way you were getting graphically ambitious titles on the Wii U was if Nintendo was literally paying you to do it.

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that is still a valid variable for this discussion is it not?

it leads to the outcome of 1st party games having better tech than 3rd party games on the platform, whatever the reason may be

The OPs argument is so ridiculously confused and illogical...

"Sony FP games don't have the best tech, because the PC -- which has more powerful hardware -- is able to support more demanding and higher quality rendering and graphics features than the PS4"

Errrr... what?..... Like... duh!... More performance is available on PC so more performance demanding features are available there. Doesn't stop people from being more impressed with PS4 first party games.

I'm at a loss to comprehend the point of this thread. The OP is arguing against a premise that nobody really thinks or cares about anyway.

Most games have no clue what technology is used to render the graphics of the games they play, and yet they still rate first party games graphics higher than the average third party game in the prevailing majority.

Op, why are you getting so worked up about other people's opinions on how games look? Why does it matter so much to you what games take the rendering technology crown?

TheThreadsThatBindUs said:

The OPs argument is so ridiculously confused and illogical...

"Sony FP games don't have the best tech, because the PC -- which has more powerful hardware -- is able to support more demanding and higher quality rendering and graphics features than the PS4"

Errrr... what?..... Like... duh!... More performance is available on PC so more performance demanding features are available there. Doesn't stop people from being more impressed with PS4 first party games.

I'm at a loss to comprehend the point of this thread. The OP is arguing against a premise that nobody really thinks or cares about anyway.

Most games have no clue what technology is used to render the graphics of the games they play, and yet they still rate first party games graphics higher than the average third party game in the prevailing majority.

Op, why are you getting so worked up about other people's opinions on how games look? Why does it matter so much to you what games take the rendering technology crown?

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I resigned myself to VFX Veteran being an anti-fanboy a long time ago. I was too predictable that he'd make a bait thread (and subsequently ignore many many posts that show the flaws in his logic) given that Spider-Man came out.

TheThreadsThatBindUs said:

The OPs argument is so ridiculously confused and illogical...

"Sony FP games don't have the best tech, because the PC -- which has more powerful hardware -- is able to support more demanding and higher quality rendering and graphics features than the PS4"

Errrr... what?..... Like... duh!... More performance is available on PC so more performance demanding features are available there. Doesn't stop people from being more impressed with PS4 first party games.

I'm at a loss to comprehend the point of this thread. The OP is arguing against a premise that nobody really thinks or cares about anyway.

Most games have no clue what technology is used to render the graphics of the games they play, and yet they still rate first party games graphics higher than the average third party game in the prevailing majority.

Op, why are you getting so worked up about other people's opinions on how games look? Why does it matter so much to you what games take the rendering technology crown?

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This really should have been the post to close this thread on.

TheRealDennis said:

You really think Uncharted 4 only had a budget of $50 million?

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Excluding marketing? Around that, yes. Naughty dog made 3 Uncharted games on a budget of less than $70m But Uncharted 4 probably cost a lot more due to the "development hell".
I don't believe most Sony first party games cost much more than $55m to make and i base that off of what Mark Cerny said about the games cost reaching "costs in excess of $50m" and you would probably not say that if the cost was actually $60m-70m+

OrdinaryPrime said:

Yeah that's where you lose me. You're over-correcting because certain people are getting under your skin. For instance, the motion blur in Spider-Man is fantastic. It especially can be called out compared to a regular PC game because PC games don't really need it to the level because they usually run with lower latency. I don't understand why people let other people's opinions get to them to the point where they are illogical themselves.

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You're reading into my statements things I am not actually saying.

Obviously any dev studio with a competent VFX team is capable of producing some standout work - however, within this specific context there is nothing special about that work within the boundaries of the game being a console-exclusive, as they likely could produce similar work regardless of platform. Basically, outside of some interesting compromises borne of the necessity to balance hardware with visual splendor, anything that's impressive from a forward-thinking perspective could very well have been produced on any equivalent or better hardware - the studio in question just so happens to be money-hatted by a console maker.

The point of contention here is whether or not exclusivity is important. From my experience and reading of the goings-on within modern game development, that answer is a resounding "no."