Red Dead Redemption 2 DF Analysis (Read OP)

Me_Marcadet · Oct 28, 2018

Fastidioso said:
I don't buy game just to try what it's better or worse.

But graphics is a very subjective matter. We have a lot of very experienced users in this thread with high end TVs who won't agree on what's going on and what's better or worse.
If you want to know what's better, the only way is to try yourself.

Even with framerate and resolution who are based on hard data, you can still chose the lower numbers because of preference.
Like some people chose a perfectly stable 30 fps over a fluctuating 50~60 fps.
People in this very thread are chosing to play in 1920*1080 over 1920*2160.

We are dealing with fine tuning, every versions and every set up will give you an amazing looking game. The rest is a matter of opinion and personal taste.

K' Dash · Oct 28, 2018

Gemüsepizza said:
Might need to take a break from the game. After putting in my contacts this morning, playing this game on PS4 Pro literally gives me a headache. The combination of the aggressive TAA, strange CB and 30fps is tiring to my eyes, everything is so goddamn blurry. And I already turned off HDR. I hope there will be a patch soon.

This is my experience as well, my vision feels very tired in a short amount of time playing :/

Tyaren · Oct 28, 2018

Cyborg said:
Where do I do that? Ive already done missions. Can it still be turned on?

No worries. ;) What I meant was you have to turn it on before you boot up the game. Go to the system setting, look for audio and video output and in the video options check supersampling. Then boot up the game, the PS4 Pro will tell you that supersampling is enabled in a notification and it'll supersample. You'll have a smoother, less dithered and shimmery image.

Vashetti · Oct 28, 2018

Dark1x said:
Yeah but it's not super easy to tell always. This doesn't seem to downscale, though.

I'm kinda stunned by how important 1080p is for Pro owners. I'll try to keep that in mind and mention it next time. It's not something that I'd ever use hence I didn't really give it second thought. For you guys, though, I'll think about it.

I'm a Pro owner on a 1080p display, there are lots of us. It's disappointing how testing for supersampling has been left by the wayside at DF since Sony implemented the feature. Especially as many of us believe the Sony implementation is worse than developer-implemented supersampling.

EvilBoris · Oct 28, 2018

Dragonzdogma said:
Thank you for all your hard work.

Could you please include the tv that was used whenever you guys revisit RDR2 HDR analysis?

I have a ks8000( & a PS4 pro) tv and I've yet to buy the game unless (hopefully ) it gets patched or you guys make a video covering HDR.

I actually have a Ks8000 too, however the analysis'' takes data direct from the console output, before it hits the display, so that actually has no bearing on my results as such. I spend most of the time poring over individual pixel values and trying to reverse grade the game to understand what the various brightness controls actually do to the image.
Dark1x has a LG C8 I think

TooBusyLookinGud · Oct 28, 2018

dedhead54 said:
On my KS8000 and XB1X, the HDR seems fine to me. I have the in game HDR slider at 200, my TV's settings are the same they've always been for my X and Pro(sharpness 0, backlight 20, smart LED high, etc) and the game looks pretty great. I turned HDR off on the XB1X to see what it would look like and it did not look better IMO. The colors and lighting looked way less natural (it was day time in-game when I compared).

I think the problem is with the Pro version and certain TVs. I'm not seeing it on my X/B6 OLED combo.

Tyaren · Oct 28, 2018

Vashetti said:
I'm a Pro owner on a 1080p display, there are lots of us. It's disappointing how testing for supersampling has been left by the wayside at DF since Sony implemented the feature. Especially as many of us believe the Sony implementation is worse than developer-implemented supersampling.

This. It's really disappointing.
NX Gamer will have a look at it in his video later today though. :)

dedhead54 · Oct 28, 2018

DumpsterJuice said:
I think the problem is with the Pro version and certain TVs. I'm not seeing it on my X/B6 OLED combo.

Ah. Should've read more of the thread, I guess. Guess I will see semi soon unless they patch it, as I will be playing the PS4 version on my Pro for Online when that comes out.

Me_Marcadet · Oct 28, 2018

P40L0 said:
If you have an LG OLED, set the game HDR Brightness to 350, and apply those settings both for Console and TV: https://www.resetera.com/posts/13529172/

The game looks great also in HDR if everything is setup correctly.

I don't agree with your settings, why setdynamic contrast to medium, it should be turned off or on low.
Brightness at 50 is not ideal for this game. Try to lower it and see for yourself.

Deleted member 19924 · Oct 28, 2018

The way the morning sun reflects off grassy grounds and through Morgan's hair is particularly amazing in this game.

Deleted member 4976 · Oct 28, 2018

Ugh, HDR. I mostly really like it during the day time. But night time is so bright versus SDR that it makes it hard to use.

Fahro · Oct 28, 2018

Dark1x said:
Yeah but it's not super easy to tell always. This doesn't seem to downscale, though.

I'm kinda stunned by how important 1080p is for Pro owners. I'll try to keep that in mind and mention it next time. It's not something that I'd ever use hence I didn't really give it second thought. For you guys, though, I'll think about it.

Yeah, it really is. A lot of PS4 pro gamers still play on 1080p.

I personally play on a projector because size matters and no OLED can beat the experience of playing on an 120 inch screen

Too bad that the cheapest native 4K projector (a model from Sony) costs 5000€ :(

Hopefully It will be more affordable till next gen

Thanks for your awesome work!

Hey Please · Oct 28, 2018

Gamersyde posted some videos of HDR mode on their website and it's not flattering.

I know that the devs are crunched to bits but hopefully they'll address the rather poor implementation of HDR and reconstruction method on Pro in the near future.

BladeX · Oct 28, 2018

This thread has confused me as fuck lol. I saw posts claiming that if you force 1080p on a 4k screen the games becomes sharper. I tested this and noticed worse results than the 2160p resolution...

Honestly i think there is a ton of placebo involved here.

At the moment i have equally big grips with performance. Its really all over the place... Saint dennis crawls everytime there is more than 2 cars on screen... when the tram passes by it drops as well. Its a mess. I dont know but i feel that this whole thing is due to the marketing crap we have to endure. Be it parity be it 4k...

Instead of toning down the gfx fidelity or the resolution they just prefer to release the game with such bad performance. I literally would prefer if the pro version was 1440p and not 2160p for marketing reasons. And i would prefer it if they tonned down the gfx fidelity compared to the X. I dont get why they try to have parity when it is not possible.

When i see a game receive 97 metacritic i am sorry but i expect the best. I am baffled as to how every single damn time Rockstar's shortcomings on these things are excused...

Reviewers were going apeshit (exaggeration obviously) because Horizon had bad lipsync and grass did not react. But here almost no reviewer has issues with such bad performance and bad IQ... no mention at all...

I am honestly disappointed. And knowing R* they wont give a shit about it.

Jazzwhiz32 · Oct 28, 2018

Dark1x said:
Still not that sharp. All of our capture was done with HDR disabled. I'll have to check this out, though. I only played the Pro version with HDR disabled.

What makes even stranger is that on the One X that I'm playing it on, standard mode looks better than the HDR mode. This certainly isn't the case with any other game. It seems washed out. Even in God of War, Forza, etc. with the same settings, it looks fantastic. Genuinely curious why HDR seems tricky with this game. It's not just Pro having issues as they're present on the X too.

P40L0 · Oct 28, 2018

Me_Marcadet said:
I don't agree with your settings, why setdynamic contrast to medium, it should be turned off or on low.
Brightness at 50 is not ideal for this game. Try to lower it and see for yourself.

Once both the Console and the TV are setup and calibrated correctly you should never need to change them again on a game by game basis, that's why also in-game SDR and now HDR brightness settings exist: to adjust for the variable brightness/contrast implementations by game developers (if needed).

ghostcrew · Oct 28, 2018

Just popping in to say that I think this looks gorgeous on my HDR TV too. No obvious problems that are jumping out at me. Samsung NU8000. Xbox One X. Game looks absolutely stunning and the brightness/contrast looks fine.

Dark1x · Oct 28, 2018

Vashetti said:
I'm a Pro owner on a 1080p display, there are lots of us. It's disappointing how testing for supersampling has been left by the wayside at DF since Sony implemented the feature. Especially as many of us believe the Sony implementation is worse than developer-implemented supersampling.

I can't test the system level feature but I'll try to see if games downsample or not going forward.

chandoog · Oct 28, 2018

BladeX said:
This thread has confused me as fuck lol. I saw posts claiming that if you force 1080p on a 4k screen the games becomes sharper. I tested this and noticed worse results than the 2160p resolution...

Honestly i think there is a ton of placebo involved here.

Yes, most of that is placebo. Also, someone earlier said "yo guys, delete your entire game and install it again without patch 1.02, it's a lot sharper". That's placebo too.

Honestly, I don't know what people are expecting. The Pro version is respectably in-line with the consoles power levels. Also, anyone showing those one, two pictures of foreground elements looking 'sharper' on base consoles, aren't factoring in that the Pro has such a huge resolution advantage over the output of the base PS4, everything at a medium distance onward would look better because it's resolving a lot more pixels.

Me_Marcadet · Oct 28, 2018

P40L0 said:
Once both the Console and the TV are setup and calibrated correctly you should never need to change them again on a game by game basis, that's why also in-game SDR and now HDR brightness settings exist: to adjust for the variable brightness/contrast implementations by game developers (if needed).

I know all that, I'm an experienced user. I even bought a HD fury Linker to inject Metadata and get more out of my TV.

Still, with how tricky HDR is, you'll have to make some adjustments on a game by game basis.
Usually I just change the Metadata injection profile, but with this game and higher than usual black level, lowering it via the brightness slider helps. I don't have any authority to tell anyone that it is the proper way to play the game, but it clearly potentially fix issues many experience.

I didn't play too much with brightness at 45 to see if there's any downside yet.
I'm hoping other experienced users will try this and give some feedback.

Vashetti · Oct 28, 2018

Dark1x said:
I can't test the system level feature but I'll try to see if games downsample or not going forward.

Appreciated!

Dark1x · Oct 28, 2018

This game doesn't seem to downsample, by the way. I think folks know that by now.

Macaco5 · Oct 28, 2018

BladeX said:
At the moment i have equally big grips with performance. Its really all over the place... Saint dennis crawls everytime there is more than 2 cars on screen... when the tram passes by it drops as well. Its a mess. I dont know but i feel that this whole thing is due to the marketing crap we have to endure. Be it parity be it 4k...

Instead of toning down the gfx fidelity or the resolution they just prefer to release the game with such bad performance. I literally would prefer if the pro version was 1440p and not 2160p for marketing reasons. And i would prefer it if they tonned down the gfx fidelity compared to the X. I dont get why they try to have parity when it is not possible.

*MINOR INTRO SPOILERS BELOW*

I'm on x version and I have to say I was pretty disappointed with the framerate in the prologue (everything in the snow). Something that wasn't really covered in the df video is the frame rate during this section, especially when walking around the little village before the thaw.

Regular drops in the village and during the shootout with the o'Driscolls got me wondering whether it wasn't as smooth as DF made out.

Thankfully this is mostly ironed out now I am in the game proper. Seems the snow caused a few problems for the gpu. Wonder if the pro faired similar there?

More Human than Human · Oct 28, 2018

I honestly can't tell much of difference between the game ss and and system level supersampling. The game IQ is super clean in both. Difference is if you disable the system supersampling, a sharpness setting will become available in the display menu.

Is there any difference beside resolution/performance between ps4 pro and ps4 amateur? Motion blur, ambient occlusion, af, etc?

Jacob4815 · Oct 28, 2018

Dark1x said:
I can't test the system level feature but I'll try to see if games downsample or not going forward.

Yes thanks! I think that the system supersampling doesn't work well as the native downsampling in the games. Very little differences but sometime I can see them. I would like to switch off the system option but we users don't know anymore what games have native downsampling or not. If you guys will help us it will be great.

ParityBit · Oct 28, 2018

Anyone have a TCL P605? What settings are you using? (For the TV and SDR/HDR)?

EDIT: I am using an Xbox One X.

K' Dash · Oct 28, 2018

HDR is a fucking mess, not only in this game unfortunately...

Deleted member 4976 · Oct 28, 2018

ParityBit said:
Anyone have a TCL P605? What settings are you using? (For the TV and SDR/HDR)?

EDIT: I am using an Xbox One X.

I'm following the rtings.com settings with 2.2 gamma.

For HDR, setting it to 300 in game produces a good natural look during the day however nights are brighter than SDR.

For SDR, I just left it at defaults.

Ponchito · Oct 28, 2018

K' Dash said:
HDR is a fucking mess, not only in this game unfortunately...

I don't see an issue with HDR. It actually looks pretty great. Reminds of me GT Sport.

Game isn't supposed to look overly saturated and vibrant.

Sunlight, moonlight, dawns and sunrises look fantastic, light through trees create and awesome HDR picture.

My TV is LCD, I left the default 100 HDR brightness value in the options.

solis74 · Oct 28, 2018

Spider-Man said:
No issues with HDR here on X. Looks gorgeous.

ditto!

Psychotron · Oct 28, 2018

TemplarDante said:
Fact is.
1) you guys didnt pick up on this.
2) it shouldn't be the case, and it should be addressed by Rockstar.

Guy made two half hour long videos examining four different systems, pointing out tons of things many people would never notice. Stop being a dick because he didn't do everything in his power to solve why the Pro looks worse in certain circumstances.

345 · Oct 28, 2018

i have a mid-range LG LED TV and the game is basically unviewable in HDR at anything below 300. it doesn't look too bad if i crank the brightness up, but i can't help thinking i'm not seeing it as intended given the ~100 guideline given.

to be clear, my TV isn't ultra-high end, but i know what i'm looking for with HDR and stuff like spiderman and god of war looks great. something's going on.

i haven't tried playing without HDR yet but it might be the way to go.

Miggytronz · Oct 28, 2018

I think a lot of folks here can agree 300 on LCD is the sweet spot. If you want to stick to using HDR. PRO and X.

Macaco5 · Oct 28, 2018

EvilBoris said:
It's probabably the game loading in your own preference setting, which is perhaps lower than the internal default.
Also that logo will literally be the brightest thing you can possibly see in the game.

That would make sense although it's one helluva drop. Makes me think I should raise my settings a bit.

ParityBit · Oct 28, 2018

Primethius said:
I'm following the rtings.com settings with 2.2 gamma.

For HDR, setting it to 300 in game produces a good natural look during the day however nights are brighter than SDR.

For SDR, I just left it at defaults.

Did you change the balance and stuff using their values? Even if they say it may be correct for your TV?

BFIB · Oct 28, 2018

I must be getting old man eyes because I think it looks great on the Pro.

tyfon · Oct 28, 2018

BFIB said:
I must be getting old man eyes because I think it looks great on the Pro.

It really does, I'm also "old" but I have 20/20 vision, and sitting 1.5 meter from a 65" 4k tv it's (as I've previously written) the best looking 3rd party game I've played on the system.

They could have done the foliage/AA stuff better but all in all after 20 hours in-game I'm having a blast and I picking my jaw of the floor as I see new things and areas.

Wackamole · Oct 28, 2018

BFIB said:
I must be getting old man eyes because I think it looks great on the Pro.

Same here but can you post your equipment and settings?
4K screen or 1080p screen, HDR on or off, Supersampling on or off? Thanx.

RoninStrife · Oct 28, 2018

DumpsterJuice said:
Why are you being so mean towards them? They had a lot to process in very little time to get this to us day one, perhaps they made a mistake. I'm sure they would have reported it if they came across the issue.

What they do is not easy work. I'm a software engineer that works very closely with 3rd party's pertaining to our graphics driver code, so I know it's hard.

I wasnt being mean, Im sorry it came across that way. Its just that apart from. the praising and glowing near perfect (and in many a case perfect) reviews, reviewerscant pick up on discrepancies like these. I expected DF to have. Im sorry I came across in a mean tone, wasnot my intention. Truth be told, its Rockstar Im mad at.

Pathetic job they've done on the pro, no forgiving that tbh, thousands of people working 8 years and what was important to them at the end were petty thingslike the "black bars" in cutscenes.

This, however, is enough to make me not buy their games on launch anymore.

BFIB · Oct 28, 2018

Wackamole said:
Same here but can you post your equipment and settings?
4K screen or 1080p screen, HDR on or off, Supersampling on or off? Thanx.

Sure.

TCL 55 6 series
HDR off
4K

I can post my advanced settings if you like.

Belvedere · Oct 28, 2018

BFIB said:
I must be getting old man eyes because I think it looks great on the Pro.

So did everyone else when the Pro trailer debuted. Also most of the fanboy reactions were a result of the comparison video which wasn't 4k anyway. Hilarious really.

Putty · Oct 28, 2018

Had half an hour on Pro. Can't see what the fuss is all about. 1080p set/SS on....think the image looks really nice and very jaggy free. Some terrific material shding on show. Snow deformation is lovely, really lovely.

Omnistalgic · Oct 28, 2018

Ok Pro and 4K set here...dunno what the big deal is, game looks great!

Wackamole · Oct 28, 2018

BFIB said:
Sure.

TCL 55 6 series
HDR off
4K

I can post my advanced settings if you like.

Thanx!

Nah we might get a better idea at what works well and what doesn't this way.

Wackamole · Oct 28, 2018

Omnistalgic said:
Ok Pro and 4K set here...dunno what the big deal is, game looks great!

Putty said:
Had half an hour on Pro. Can't see what the fuss is all about. 1080p set/SS on....think the image looks really nice and very jaggy free. Some terrific material shding on show. Snow deformation is lovely, really lovely.

HDR on or off?

Deleted member 679 · Oct 28, 2018

Does PS4 Pro manage a locked 30 at all times with supersampling off? I think I'd prefer that.

Dark1x · Oct 28, 2018

TemplarDante said:
I wasnt being mean, Im sorry it came across that way. Its just that apart from. the praising and glowing near perfect (and in many a case perfect) reviews, reviewerscant pick up on discrepancies like these. I expected DF to have. Im sorry I came across in a mean tone, wasnot my intention. Truth be told, its Rockstar Im mad at.

Pathetic job they've done on the pro, no forgiving that tbh, thousands of people working 8 years and what was important to them at the end were petty thingslike the "black bars" in cutscenes.

This, however, is enough to make me not buy their games on launch anymore.

Discrepancies like what? People saying the HDR mode is less sharp? I don't believe this is accurate and it's never ever been a thing in any game ever. I think it's chroma subsampling people are seeing. I think folks are upset by the poor image quality on Pro and digging deep looking for answers.

I don't think it looks bad, to be honest, so I'm surprised at the negativity.

Deleted member 4976 · Oct 28, 2018

ParityBit said:
Did you change the balance and stuff using their values? Even if they say it may be correct for your TV?

No, I left it at default

RoninStrife · Oct 28, 2018

To anyone with a Pro and 4k tv, simply try the game with HDR on.
Looks great, right?
Ok, switch off the console, disble HDR, play it again, and examine the TEXTURES.
Their clearer, sharper. Not sure what people saying "It looks great" are comparing. The textures are in question, and HDR is messed up and affecting them being blurrier than they should be.

HDR does NOT do that. It shouldn't ever do that.
Im on KS8000/PS4 Pro. And this issue is only affecting the PS4 Pro.

Me_Marcadet · Oct 28, 2018

Using the HDR calibration picture provided in the game, I've set the brightness at 47 on an LG OLED C7. Fiddling with the brightness seems to only affect the darker side of the picture. The right side isn't affected by the reduced brightness.

My general advice for proper HDR calibration with this game is to use the picture provided and change the brightness setting on the TV itself. You can then customize and decide where you want to crush details in the dark area.

The game is just lacking a brightness slider.

Red Dead Redemption 2 DF Analysis (Read OP)

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