DF Direct Weekly

[@twocityfoodies8476]

The reason games like Uncharted 4 still look better than many games today is that artistry trumps raw power almost every time. The tricks Naughty Dog, Santa Monica, Guerilla, and Sucker Punch can pull off in their engines is pure "movie magic". It is likely why they stick with in-house technology over Unreal every time.

[@steveafanador6441]

Facts 👌👌

[@marsovac]

R U serious? It looks bad now. Lighting is crap, just look at the fake reflection in the boat at the beginning of the game. Character models are devoid of features (basically GTA5 level). What is good is model animations. But clearly a PS4 last gen game.

[@DSkiter]

@@marsovac huh?

[@TheBuffig]

@@marsovac Uncharted 4 looks bad? Wow

[@GeraltOfArabia]

This is one thing I like about the PlayStation studios. They release their games on consoles first, then on PC. They make sure they optimized them well. RockStar did the same with Read Dead Redemption 2. But CDPR always wants to release their games at once on all platforms. They also had an in-house engine, the Red engine. But like they released Cyberpunk 2077 on google Stadia and current gen hardware when they both came out just a couple of months before the game released. I don't know why folks at CDPR always do that. Like you'll see them do the same with the Witcher 4 and then scour all the platforms to address bugs and players reports.

[@p5rsona]

100% agree with John, uncharted 4 is STILL better looking than almost every game that comes out to this day.

[@X5J2UY]

Yeah, I replayed the remaster for PS5 last year (and for the first time on an OLED TV) and that game blew my mind with the visuals. TLOU2 looks more natural and realistic in some ways, but Uncharted 4 is so varied and colorful that it really pops on a quality TV screen.

[@Decenium]

this actually happens with a lot of games, look at Red Faction, I used to think that every game basically set a new standard fro the industry as a whole....but nope...they did it great and then the rest just continued on, Physics, AI, you can name the games that were so progressive in those areas and you know what? they still are 10-15-20 years later.....sadly

[@p5rsona]

@@X5J2UY yeah tlou2 is in some ways above but its the overall locations, the incredible vistas you are treated to that i have yet to see in any other game that just blows me away every time to be playing in. its the greatest game i have ever played

[@paperenoch]

That field in Scotland in the beginning of 4- I think about that all the time lol

[@ChaseSchleich]

It just depends what you're looking at. When you're in the woods being hunted by Seraphites in TLOU 2, the grass, trees, and leaves look real, but when you're looking out into the open world of Uncharted 4, those brighter more vibrant colors make that world pop in ways TLOU can't touch. Then there's games like Alan Wake 2 that has shadows and lighting that takes its graphics to another level. The fact that Uncharted 4 is as old as it is though and was made for those shit Jaguar CPU's and still managed to do what they did is insane. I still hold out hope that an Uncharted 5 is in production at some random Sony studio. I want to see what Uncharted could look like with current gen tech.

[@sampson3121]

Every time a Sony 1st party game is shown people always say this won't look like that when they game launches. The game launches and it looks better

[@mr_StevenS]

Remember Sony E3 2005? Pepperidge farm remembers. Uncharted 4 reveal teaser was also better than the final game. Sony is not as bad as Ubisoft, but downgrades happen to everyone.

[@blue_ish4499]

@@mr_StevenS you forgot killzone shadow fall too

[@thedude8128]

Richard legitimately has the funniest banter for a tech content creator Everyone else like Linus try to be funny but they just come off as nerds trying to be cool

[@thehilariousninja]

It's called being British

[@DUDEDUDE33]

Richard sassy boy

[@duckhive]

he's Bri'ish

[@tcg2717]

Just good ol' Bri' ish humour.

[@maynardburger]

Richard is just casually funny, while Linus is literally sitting there at night writing jokes for the script. And isn't great at it.

[@theharvardyard2356]

Kind of a breath of fresh air to have two hours of discussion and no mention of the culture war stuff that's surrounding lots of this stuff online, lol

[@zedrake]

There’s plenty of spaces out there where incel nonsense isn’t discussed and it’s delightful

[@PookaBot]

Absolutely, I'm just so weary of it.

[@nicr1159]

Agreed, its all tedious ragebaiting to pull in children

[@listenkids]

because they're normal people

[@CondorCalabasas]

Only because Alex wasn't on.

[@MurCurieux]

UE5 on console is so flawed. I would take Decima any day every day.

[@afaqfakki6930]

UE takes the realism of gameplay away. I don't how to describe it

[@hihihi1q23]

UE5 on PS5 pro seems to be okay, but on the base consoles it's definitely problematic.

[@mjc0961]

UE5 in general is flawed. It's no better on PC, hashtag stutter struggle. Even in Fortnite. You'd think Epic's game on Epic's engine would be the best example of the engine at work but even they don't care about getting the game to run properly.

[@NeovanGoth]

UE5 just like UE4 has the typical issues of a do-it-all-engine, which at this time is more like a complete game operating system. On one hand the flexibility is nice, as it allows even smaller studios to create a wide variety of games with a lot of qualities that would be far above typical budgets, but on the other hand this flexibility also brings inefficiencies with it that are between hard and impossible to overcome. An engine made for a specific game (or at least genre of game) will always run better, but starting from scratch requires tremendous effort nowadays, with rendering being only one small part. An amusing side-fact btw is that UE started as exactly that and early third party games using UE were basically just reskinned Unreal and ran absolutely perfectly. The same with the first Quake engines, and even the Build Engine (which actually delivers to this day!). I kinda miss that.

[@stephenhall2980]

Or,indeed,capcom's RE engine.

[@arcipesfik3630]

Hangar 13 is indeed partly based in Czech Republic. The former studio was Illusion Softworks, which turned into 2k Czech for Mafia 2. Now the original developers can be found partly in Hangar 13 and Warhorse Studios (KCD2).

[@xannari3961]

kind of odd to hear John talk negatively about the state of physical movies when a lot of people into movies regard this as a golden era for bluray/uhd. Almost all releases now have much higher quality packaging compared to the blue plastic box 10 years ago. There are also numerous smaller publishers out there putting in a lot of effort with new scans, custom artwork, tons of special features - these are people who really care about this stuff and do a lot of work to get things right. Owning/collecting blurays is becoming a niche hobby, sure, but the actual state of new releases and back-catalogue releases is really good.

[@vincevirtua]

Quality-wise for sure. Certainly not for the added value side though. Physical media extra’s (docs, commentaries, art media) have really dipped in general for all but the real enthusiast labels, which are expensive.

[@kevclark8661]

shame the movies are all terrible

[@vincentemond5620]

When masterpieces like Les Ordres and La Maman et la Putain are coming out on Blu-Ray, it really is the golden age.

[@joefawley9264]

Never been happier to be purchasing physical media

[@luism8130]

@@kevclark8661That’s my issue, I haven’t felt the need to own any of these terrible movies that have been released the last 5 years or so. I own my classics I’m happy with them. My collection is complete from my point of view.

[@MsModestyBlaise]

1:35:02 I don’t think Olie is aware of the amount of physical media HMV alone turnover each and every week. The Oxford street store was finely reopened by the demand of physical media and their online store I’m told has massive turn over. Even vinyl has come back out of nowhere. Furthermore, we have an increasing number of U.K. boutique blu-Ray labels producing a healthy number of both Blu-Ray and UHD discs each and every month. Physical media isn’t going away, it’s just adapting.

[@ScyrousFX]

This is absolutely false. Physical media for video content has been on the decline for almost two decades now ever since streaming became a thing. Niche markets will always remain, but those numbers are largely insignificant. Companies like LG are removing physical media support for a reason. It's not worth it anymore.

[@wayn3h]

​@@ScyrousFX you're arguing against something he never said. smh

[@oliverdavis4642]

​@@wayn3hneither of them are probably business analysts tbf

[@seek6044]

​@@wayn3hYou are right, it's a strawman.

[@seek6044]

​@@oliverdavis4642what's more important is to substantiate the argument.

[@apfelingo]

36:48 Maybe I misunderstood what Oliver was saying, but It Takes Two sold over 20 Mio copies. That doesn't scream limited audience to me.

[@hollyc5417]

He’s assuming everyone is a lonely friendless goblin with no significant other or friends to play games with.

[@BlackParade01]

It Takes Two sold well but co-op games generally sell worse It Takes Two gave a free copy with every game sold, so that your friend could play for free.

[@adamageli]

@@BlackParade01 Even with that considered, 10 million is still a huge number of sales for a game of that kind. Definitely huge untapped potential in the co-op market.

[@yonkocommander5531]

@@adamageli especially since no other developer is pushing co op games like they are

[@Drawica]

​@hollyc5417 that's large assumption on your part

[@Cinnabuns2009]

Please don't be gullible consumers peeps. When companies say they're losing money, that's corporate speak for "they're not making as much money as they'd like to" "they're not making the margin they'd like to make. They're making money. They're just losing that extra 20%-50% margin they'd like to have captured. Manufacturers in particular generally mark stuff up 50%-200% when they sell to other companies because they have the capability to actually produce the thing in the first place. In Intel's case, they could be making much more money allocating the same wafers to processors than GPUs. So in that sense, they're "losing money". Losing money and not profitable are not the same thing.

[@12coco100]

So losing money is code word for "losing projected profits/potential margin" while it sounds like the poor company is struggling to stay open. Reminds me of some propaganda put out by the media and united healthcare inc.

[@postjm9]

1:33:01 I remain really unhappy with the sound quality from streaming, which is why I still buy some discs. I'd rather have the option on streaming to get a lower quality video stream and more audio bitrate, if it has to be a tradeoff (I'm on a 1Gb fiber connection.) But I'm also not happy to pay $40 for a new UHD blu ray.

[@TheDarksideFNothing]

I'm sure bitrate has much more to do with the cost of them sending it vs the bandwidth they expect you to have to receive it. Especially given the vast majority of people are fine with it how it is and many wouldn't even notice if they degraded it more. Streaming movies/shows as a model makes a lot of sense, but not if you're sensitive to compression artifacts both video and audio.

[@rg975]

I’m in the same boat. I try to stick with Apple TV because their bitrate tends to be better than most, but it still can’t compare to a properly mastered 4k disc. If the movie is good enough, I’ll always get a physical version of it

[@joefawley9264]

@@postjm9 my movie collection makes streaming truly feel like a waste of money

[@postjm9]

Even if I could get a less compressed signal with fewer channels, I'd prefer that to an "Atmos" track that sounds like mush.

[@wayne1da121]

I accidentally found the difference in audio quality when one day I streamed the Matrix and ran the DVD at the same time, flicking between the two on the auxiliary. Once I heard the huge difference, I went back to old school. Cancelled all my streaming apart from amazon as that's where I buy the majority of my Blu ray and 4k discs from

[@aribig4709]

Finally some great Intergalactic analysis without clickbait and useless talking about Jordan's design.

[@matinprsd]

His name is Jordan?!???

[@ODIOPOWER]

@@matinprsd yep, they even use a typical male name, Ahahaha! The game will flop so hard, poor ND, how they ain't sow that coming ?!

[@ViperGTS737]

To be fair, it was a cringe fest, almost like they want us to not be interested in the game

[@ThanosDidTheRightThing]

@@ODIOPOWER Yea man the The Last of Us 2 flopped so hard….. Selling over 10 million units. 🌝

[@DD-fs9xt]

Yeah how dare people talk about the look of the product they're trying to sell us No talking about stuff, Just buy and consoom.

[@stewardappiagyei6982]

I love that we went from wondering if Hellblade 2 was CGI cause the rocks were too round, to now using it as a benchmark to tell if other game graphics are feasible. It's truly an amazing time for real-time graphics!

[@cube2fox]

If Hellblade II isn't getting their graphics of the year award I will be very surprised.

[@paulyboy29]

i still mostly play nintendo 64 games

[@Youtube-Censorship-Police]

hellblade 2 only works because it's basically the order: 1886,but with less action. everything else would cripple the current gen consoles.

[@DEVILTAZ35]

@@KZbin-Censorship-Policenot really it was just built smartly with consoles in mind. There are areas where you can go way off the path to find secrets. I have 1000 in both Hellblade games and enjoyed them both. Incredible acting and art direction with the most realistic looking water in any game. In the right hands so much can be done with the consoles when you consider somehow Hellblade 2 runs on Series S.

[@DEVILTAZ35]

@@paulyboy29you can play them on series X in dev mode too lol. GameCube as well.

The Witcher 4 developers confirmed in interviews that they used game assets to render the trailer.

[@HansWurst-ht3jh]

That is actually really cool, as long as everyone remembers, that that does not mean, the actual game will look like this trailer. Especially on current gen consoles.

[@X5J2UY]

True. But PLEASE keep in mind that using game assets does not equate to the same quality of a whole game. Once you add skill moves, NPCs, actual architecture and way more things, the overall visual quality will drop. Than add to that how they will have to make those games playable on console. But it's definitely going to be a looker. Just like Witcher 3 and CP2077 on PC at release

[@mamuf]

Yeah, game assets here probably means the high-definition assets that are used in cut-scenes as opposed to normal gameplay. Which is still impressive, but it may simply be that cut-scenes will be locked to 30 FPS on consoles as usual (if the game itself even plays on higher FPS in the first place).

[@zerosam5541]

@@mamuf you won't see those high quality asset on console or on a rtx 5090 beucase cinmatic game trailers dont represent the actual game

[@linkenski]

*On the most expensive PC ever built with an unreleased GPU. The game will not look like this, I guarantee that. They have to make some form of parity for older hardware.

[@icristian6707]

So... We wanted region free discs They are available for few years already Some big manufacturers decided to stop making players On the other side: Streaming is preffered by majority It is region locked and content varies within same continent What the f...?

[@joefawley9264]

Streaming is one of the biggest scams in entertainment. Paying monthly for a collection I have no choice or interest in?

[@GaliosUA]

@@joefawley9264 Streaming is just a replacement for cable, with the same payment scheme.

[@AlmostLikeHuman]

​@@joefawley9264that only applies if you actually pay for your streaming service of choice. Yarr, matey

[@turrican4d599]

@@joefawley9264 I don't understand people!

[@joefawley9264]

Streaming straight up sucks. Im not paying monthly for movies i cant choose. I'd rather use that money on quality physical media.

[@samgoff5289]

$40 minimum per movie compared to $15 a month? lol most people prefer to just stream to get rid of the hassle that comes with buying and storing all the individual movies

[@joefawley9264]

@samgoff5289 hassle? Just place it on a shelf 🤣. And I get my movies for $20 or less. Even 4k. And I get a movie that I love and build a collection that streaming can only dream of. Meanwhile, you have to pay $15-30 a month PER SERVICE for lesser quality, lesser options, and what? 5 interesting releases a year at best across all services. That's a lot of money to support garbage haha. Straight to streaming is like the modern straight to DVD. Watch with caution.

[@joefawley9264]

@samgoff5289 and if I want to save money for a few months, I don't have to spend a dime and continue watching my movies. Maybe I'll even let the internet go out, who cares

[@Gravy1255]

​@samgoff5289 most movies are $30 or less. I just bought lotr 4k trilogy with both editions all in 1 for $50 on sale normally $90. You are full of crap. Alien conclusions is $30, godzilla is $30....

[@lgolem09l]

I have already lost several Blu-rays to decay. I'm not gonna invest in more digital products with an expiration date, if I can buy them on iTunes with in extremely high quality

[@drober8588]

00:11 "Geoffcon 1" 😂😂😂

[@goldie819]

During the production of Cyberpunk they put a ton of work into an E3 demo to make one short segment look as impressive as possible, to the detriment of the rest of the game. In the end product, that meant that a single mission at the start of the game had a couple moments that were much higher-fidelity than the rest of the game (mostly in terms of animation and extra details like waving away the old woman opening her apartment door). The rest of the game didn't have things like that. I sure hope they aren't pulling a repeat with Witcher 4.

[@evalangley3985]

The game was absolutely stunning. It is one of my favorite game of all time, so I don't share the same view as you do. They botched their launch because they released the game on 5 platforms at the same time. This is really what was the problem. All the rest is just noise and hear-say.

[@phant0mdummy]

This could be the biggest hand wave of all time.

[@goldie819]

@@evalangley3985 Me pointing out one shortcoming of the game doesn't mean the game wasn't stunning or I didn't like it. I'm still playing and modding tf out of it now. What I described is literally one aspect of what went wrong during development--as described by the developers themselves. The push for the E3 demo came from executives. You can find the story online. It is not "hear-say" [sic].

[@adamadam6351]

True! It's one of my top, favorite games of all time for sure but the game is a bit underwhelming after those initial missions where the level of polish and 'extra-ness' is just so, so good.

[@accidentcellar6307]

Only naive fools get carried away by shiny E3 game demos. Although E3 doesn't exist anymore, the point still stands. Don't be fool by promotional gameplay nor pre-release graphics. They almost always lie to you, and they almost always get downgraded.

[@chrisbullock6477]

I love it when Richard let's them know who's been around longer and the adult in the room. They just have to smile and take it.

[@drober8588]

28:18 Hair artifacting, what hair? 😅

[@TheNerd]

01:30:30 I mean pretty much the default way of watching Anime is "greyish" or illegal websites, because A LOT of Anime can not be streamed on a legal platform, mostly because of some sort of licensing issue or no platform has interesting in obtaining them.

[@unnoticedhero1]

That and some publishers that do release physical media in the states like Aniplex charge extremely high prices for stuff that other companies would charge $25-50 for. I'm not paying $200 for Fate Stay Night Unlimited Blade Works, which was more like $300-400 when they had the box set split into 2 sets originally.

[@iris4547]

licencing should never be the consumers problem. media not available in my region or in the correct format or at the right price is not my concern. you provide it at a reasonable price in a decent proper format or you are actively telling me to pirate it which i will do with no sympathy.

[@SITSIndustries]

1:33:16 "Rich says in-the-here-and-now" drinking game

[@purebaldness]

Or if you _really_ want to risk it "Rich says the-concept-of..." drinking game

[@bl1nddd]

wait is it just me or its freakin Lalo Salamanca on one of the pictures on the wall, in this Intergalactic game trailer?

[@Packin-Heat.]

Yeah that's him. I think he's the antagonist.

[@yonkocommander5531]

@Packin-Heat. kumail nanjiani is also there, looks like the 5 aces are the antagonists

[@rohanlowe]

Re: blu-ray drives and extinction of media. I found one of my favourite music tracks has been redacted on streaming services as if it never existed. no doubt due to licensing problem with a sample. it had me doubting my memory till i consulted my CD. It sucks. movies will go the same way and kids who never had physical media will only have piracy to validate thier memories.

[@mrotter3029]

​@@yonkocommander5531 doubt it since you play as one of them

[@yonkocommander5531]

@it’s the consumer who’s pushing that, why would I release a new Disk man in 2024 when I know nono e is buying CDs anymore?

[@Ironspartan11]

I still don't understand why Xbox didn't switch Halo over to IDTech instead of Unreal 5. You could make a lot of arguments that most of the Halo gameplay mechanics are shared with Doom already. And then Xbox would have the advantage of being able to customize the engine if needed. 1:43:20

[@NeovanGoth]

Simple: Resources. There are plenty of people out there with experience with UE, but only very few with experience with id tech.

[@Ironspartan11]

@NeovanGoth fair point. I just hate the idea of Halo fading into the background with every other unreal shooter. Seems like such a disservice.

[@M3RMA1D3N]

@@Ironspartan11I think it’s a wait and see sort of thing. There actually have been some decent UE5 implementations, even on console, and I think it has much less of a problem with having that ‘Unreal look and feel’ than UE4 and 3 did. Given the super long history Halo devs have with working with their own engine, I’m sure they didn’t make this change lightly.

[@noobsaibot2255]

CDPR said the assets are from the game during the interview, they did a prerender as a visual target

[@NeovanGoth]

Important point. IMO it's perfectly fine to do offline renderings of a visual target, as long as it is in-engine and doesn't show something completely undoable, like a sophisticated fluid simulation that even with all the optimization in the world couldn't run in real-time on whatever the target hardware is. I just hope that CDPR learned from the trailer debacle with Witcher III, which set expectations that just weren't possible to meet in the end.

[@froggydarren]

The witcher 3 reveal makes me wildly optimistic it will turn out anything like the reveal considering how big of a downgrade it eventually was

[@theisaacpigg27_32]

@@froggydarren You're optimistic because a previous reveal ended up being a downgrade? I don't see the logic there

[@sleepyjordan887]

@@theisaacpigg27_32definitely meant pessimistic

[@scottspiegel9078]

Dude youre kidding right? The witcher 3 reveal is INSANELY close to the final product. Like insanely close. ​@@froggydarren

[@Zendien]

The Intergalactic trailer had the rt noise so it wasn't "perfect" :D .... was pretty noticable on the bottom frame of the mirror and I didn't really look for it anywhere else

[@rd-um4sp]

you don't need to "get on with the times", John. Some of us do care about preservation and we need to keep banging that drum.

[@robertlawrence9000]

1:21:10 No No No Oliver! Stop trying to tell the developers to rip off customers and stop calling customers stupid! These games launch full price on consoles so stop trying to convince studios from giving customers more options on console. Even doing that hurts future systems playing games in backwards compatibility mode! Also saying to not implement PSSR isn't good when they just need to make sure the game uses it correctly in the first place.

[@samgee500]

It's not about being able to implement it correctly but being able to implement the latest versions because right now most engine builds are limited to particular outdated versions of pssr and there apparently isn't an easy way to just swap it out for a newer version. It should be as simple as clicking a check mark with no validation required. Unfortunately according to certain developers this is far from the case. I think the burden should be on Sony to keep the latest version of pssr updated in every game released for the console.

[@maynardburger]

The whole point of PS5 Pro was to remove that 'fear of missing out' in terms of deciding whether to prioritize performance or visuals at the expense of the other. PS5 Pro was supposed to offer Quality mode visuals with Performance mode framerates. Best of both worlds, so nobody felt like they were compromising. But if you're just adding a bunch of options back into the mix, you're right back to the same problem with base PS5 - people feeling like they have to compromise and 'miss out' on something.

[@urmomma2688]

​@@maynardburgerYou think they should just take away options from the players who want a 30 fps mode?

[@ZoeyYasuda]

I think Oliver's point is that for a console experience, the best choice should be honed in by devs. Otherwise your console is just a restricted PC.

[@robertlawrence9000]

@ZoeyYasuda It's fine to have quick recommended settings but they should still give all settings pretty much like what PC has on console too. Let the user decide on what to turn on and off in the settings. Let the user have the ability to adjust different quality settings of graphics features, even if it's not possible to get good performance cranking the settings up. That way it makes it easier for future consoles that can play these past generations of games.

[@TheAmazingSpiderGuy_99]

Yeah I have no faith in CDPR making this game run well on a console. They have to prove that first after Cyberpunk.

[@TheAmazingSpiderGuy_99]

21:36 You’re going off of a lot of poor UE5 efforts. The hardware is absolutely fine in both PS5 and Series X, are they native 4K, path tracing machines? Heck no, but a lot of games are not designed or optimised for this generation of console hardware, they’re targeting mid-high end PCs instead. If the target was consoles first we wouldn’t get such poor results constantly with image quality. These consoles are not infinitely capable by any stretch but they’ve been sorely underutilised and have painted a picture that they aren’t good enough. I don’t enjoy Naughty Dog games these days but one thing they’re going to do is put most devs to shame with this game’s fidelity on a console. Take Uncharted 4 as an example of even a base PS4 game putting most devs to shame. Indiana Jones is also another game that is fully utilising these consoles. The game has ray-tracing and is 1800p at 60fps. The PC version is then scaling up rather than the console version having awful image quality and no ray-tracing.

[@iris4547]

what world do you live in? games are console first, sloppy pc port second. just these days the initial console release is also sloppy with no time spent optomising, relying on low resolution upscaling to do the heavy lifting.

[@iconicg7159]

Yea this generation the consoles from XSS, PS5 & PS5 pro aren’t really the issue and I’d really say it’s the devs instead this time around.

[@TheAmazingSpiderGuy_99]

@ Series S’ memory is a bit of a problem but that’s really the only major deficiency.

[@pensologohesito]

Unfortunately most public don’t get why a game or movie disappearing and not being available to watch or play is bad. Most will just play for entertainment and to pass time, and they don’t understand the artistic value of things and why to preserve them. To many, it’s just a passing thing. And they will even pay for it again if they want to watch it, and to many companies that’s even better. And unfortunately, I wouldn’t say the average consumer is getting smarter.

[@vintatsh]

Little bit too early to say but feels like the game industry is finally moving in the right direction again. Revival of old IPs, long awaited sequels and even new IP. Old school fun games and single-player games instead of live service junk. Also Astro Bot sweeping the board with awards was a feel-good moment and the cherry-on-top was Swen Vinckes speech at the end. I have some hope again, let's see everyone deliver.

[@ScyrousFX]

Ironically, the game ''catly'' was also part of that same show. You know, the AI slop that is certain to be a crypto or NFT scam, considering the background of the creator. I'm not holding my breath.

[@maynardburger]

I think you're noticing a blip rather than seeing that the trend is very clearly still heavily towards live service slop and lots of safe, uncreative choices in the AAA space. The industry is gonna be dire in 10 years.

[@vintatsh]

​@@maynardburger I can't say I disagree with you, I'm still fairly pessimistic myself about the industry and specifically the players who just seem to eat everything up these companies throw at them, Marvel Rivals as the most recent example. But chasing "the next big live service thing" is not sustainable long term for most companies and at some point even the most successful franchise won't be able to cover the exploding AAA budgets anymore. I think we will start to see a lot of smaller games with AA budgets new or old IP, a more frequent release schedule and more creative freedom like AstroBot, Okami, Onimusha, Screamer, Turok, Ninja Gaiden alongside your Witcher 4, Mafia, Intergalactic and live service games to support it all. I think there will always be something for everyone in that case.

[@stephensanders2104]

I CAN'T WAIT FOR Mafia: The Old Country

[@Klarden]

Hangar 13 has previously voiced troubles with their in-house engine during GDC talks, if I remember correctly. As while it did have a lot of benefits, it also led to a lot of overhead with asset management and engineers were constantly swamped with requests from the design side, never able to keep up. So I'm not surprised they've decided to switch to something that requires less maintenance

[@cube2fox]

They probably had to fire most of the old engine devs then, because UE isn't cheap either (5% of worldwide gross revenue)

[@youngknight5589]

@@cube2foxwell they were hit with massive layoffs after Mafia IIIs launch and their big game cancellation. Also parts of Mafia III development ran into issues because documentation was messy

[@zeroone8800]

I think the issue with the UHD Blu-ray players is some of them cannot handle the highest data rates that the discs require. When they struggle with me, it is always at the highest bitrate sections of the encode. Edit: This is terrible standardization. If they can't read the discs that have the official TM logo on them, then the players should not be allowed to be marketed with the offical logo.

[@yonkocommander5531]

​ I used to not believe in streaming until I saw a Mad Max streaming in kaleidescape with noticeably better quality than a UHD Blue ray, the technology is there, it's just too expensive at the moment.

[@joeykeilholz925]

Damn, another reason to get them "digitally".

[@rg975]

1:49:41 I think just adding the ability to uncap frame rate or set custom caps in CP2077 would make Pro owners happy, they don’t have to get too fancy. In fact, I feel as if 90% of games could just do that. Minimal engineering for an increase in fidelity sounds like a no-brainer!

[@Kritikal_G]

Wish you guys included pvp games in your coverage more. Would be interested in analysis of the wave of UE5 pvp games recently: Marvel Rivals, Off the Grid, etc., etc. Especially because a lot of pc gamers have been mad at them for "bad optimization".

[@Ajax-0137]

I'll always buy discs as long as their being made. The digital only future is dystopic!

[@joefawley9264]

@@Ajax-0137 why anyone would support all digital is beyond me.

[@bdgrey]

@@joefawley9264 Lots of reasons: 1. Don't want a bunch of discs taking up space in my house 2. People who rarely play a game more than once have little reason to want to hold onto them, unless you're a collector I guess. 3. Disc gets scratched or lost, no more game 4. Optical drives are mechanical, which means they will eventually break. Mine did on PS4 and I had my copy of Skyrim stuck in there for 2 1/2 years before it just randomly popped out one day. I couldn't play Skyrim the entire time it was in there and it refused to take any discs after it popped out. 5. Don't have to drive somewhere or wait for a delivery to play a game. Just pay for it, download, and it's ready to go in 20 minutes or less.

[@joefawley9264]

@@bdgrey that's selfish thinking. So because you don't care for physical you want it to go away for everyone else? Physical media is cheaper, more convenient, and I replay my game collection spanning back to the Sega Genesis. I can also purchase games removed from the digital store front. Even an all digital gamer likes you benefit from the existence of physical games. The digital storefront must compete with the used (and new) physical market place since it's almost always cheaper. Once physical goes away, you only have one place to purchase games. Do you trust these gaming companies to be competitive when there is no competition? Less options leads nowhere good.

[@joefawley9264]

@@bdgrey I wish my downloads were ready in 20 mins 🤣 and I get compliments on my collection all the time. I think it's beautiful. Doesn't feel like it's "taking up space" what would I put there instead?

[@bdgrey]

@@joefawley9264 Huh? When did I say, "I want physical copies to go away?" Never said that. You asked why anyone would support digital media, so I answered. And yes, gaming companies will still be competitive no matter what. It's not "physical media vs digital media". It's, hundreds of publishers vs hundreds of publishers. Digital storefronts don't base their pricing on physical copies at GameStop or eBay. They base their pricing on how many units they've sold this quarter vs last quarter. If sales are falling, prices will lower. Again, I don't care about playing old games. You do, and that's fine.

[@ignaspincevicius3134]

Maybe the only technology nVidia is showcasing with the Witcher 4 trailer is stutter-free experience on UE5 🙃

[@M3RMA1D3N]

There are a few games in UE5 I’ve played where this isn’t a huge issue. Remnant 2 and Infinity Nikki come to mind.

[@maynardburger]

@@M3RMA1D3N It's no surprise that games pushing less complex visuals and shaders have less shader compilation and streaming/traversal stutter.

[@Shantara11]

1:52:05 A multi-billion dollar mega corp is the last entity you should be concerned about. Consider a possibility that nVidia is massively overcharging the customers for their GPUs compared to the manufacturing cost. Intel is temporarily trading larger margins to capture the market segment, and would be happy to increase them as soon as their goal is achieved

[@dradis1]

Well, the only companies making the products that enable our gaming hobby are multi-billion dollar companies. People are concerned about their hobby, so they are going to be concerned about the companies to some degree.

[@codymuller5744]

The whole "in-game engine footage running on unreleased hardware" on pre-rendered scenes is deliberately misleading language meant to confuse the uninformed lol

[@theotheronethere4391]

43:04, Illusion Software was the original developer for Mafia 1 and 2. Was purchased by 2K in 2008 and became 2K Czech. 2K opened a studio based out of California (Hanger 13) to handle future Mafia games. Some of the 2K Czech people went to Hanger 13, many were layoff (many of which went on to found Warhorse Studios) and ultimately Hanger 13 merged with 2K Czech. But a big reason why they moved to UE5 was that Hanger 13 was having trouble working with the Illusion/Fusion Engine developed by 2K Czech. Some of it was simply literally language related (Illusion being all Czech wrote everything using Czech, which the English-speaking Hanger 13 had trouble reading), but that resulted in very buggy releases for ME 3 and ME DE across all platforms.

[@HueyTheDoctor]

The number of times John gets things wrong or has irrational thinking about something is astounding. Oliver pointed out that Mafia is using UE5, John says no way not possible, Richard does a five second google search and proves Oliver right. This happens constantly.

[@12coco100]

Know any other times johns been wrong I'm just interested for some tea

[@ppevader-u2t]

​@@12coco100 you want tea? Do you know the reviewer ACG? I use to listen to his podcast he use to call international podcast (awful group) and back in the early episodes he called DF a joke and awful. He would talk about how he knew more than them. He said they have no credibility because at the time they didn't test games on multiple Xbox consoles or multiple ps4s (for whatever reason he thought that was important.) Fast forward to several years later he had John on amd praised how amazing DF has always been. On that podcast John really let his colors fly. He has a huge superiority complex to the avg gamer and how 99% of gamers have no clue what looks good. ACG also usually talks massive shit about gamers. These guys are complete pricks outside of reviews and analysis.

[@jonathantodd9906]

Re: 4k media and blu ray players So I recently got back into collecting physyical media and 4k blu rays. I can attest to the fact that blu ray players are struggling playing 4k media. I have an LG player and almost every brand new 4k disc I play starts skipping when I get close to the end of the movie so I have to take it out and clean it to fix it. Very embarrassing when I have somebody over to watch a brand new movie and I have to stop it half way through to fix it every time... it does not do this with regular blu rays or dvd's. Another issue I have with this industry is that often new releases are produced in "limited" quantities where there will only be so many made and then no more after that, ever. So if you are a collector who may be not able to buy everything you want when it comes out like me, if you choose to wait you will probably not be able to get it because it will sell out and go on the aftermarket for hundreds of dollars. Pricing in general is an issue. Unless it's a special collector's edition most movies should not be priced more than $50 for a 4k release and most shouldn't be more than $30 but, Disney, for example, just released Willow as a 2 disc limited steelbook and started the listing at a whopping $65.00 for one movie! It went down to $46 when it relased but that's still an insane cost.

[@chrissyboy7047]

You need to get a panasonic or sony player. Ive had both and never had any problems at all with discs skipping or freezing except for one which had visible damage. It must be different in the US but here in the UK, unless you want a special edition then the films are pretty much always available. I agree that some do sell out pretty quick and dont seem to come into stock but that is definitely a minority of films. Disney do rip you off to be fair. Here in the UK a single season of the Mandalorian is £45 in a steelbool. I just picked up the maverick collectors edition with both films in for little more than that. Lol

[@ShanGamer1981]

ps5 is my 4k player, series x would freeze on my movies like the prestige , my physical buying has went into 20 fold this year

[@urmasterjohn]

Your mistake sadly was not buying Panasonic.

[@chrissyboy7047]

@@ShanGamer1981 same here. It all started with the Series X for me too. I used to get a random black screen while watching a film. Still had audio but no picture. Gave up in the end and bought a standalone player. Since the Xbox Ive started collecting again and now have more films than I intended to buy. Lol

[@F2002]

I think I'm Blu-rays they really messed up by being clear on that if you buy 4K disc you get that one Blu-ray and a digital copy for a same price as you'll see on digital store

[@blaketastic]

28:16 i know how they got rid of the hair artifacts

[@Hangar181982]

We need a fully ray-traced remaster of the best fighting game ever made - the original Soulcalibur. The sound effects, voices, and music were perfect as is. Petition to Namco, let’s get it started. 👍👍👍

[@TheNerd]

01:05:00 Classic Square PC port. Almost all Square PC ports are a mess and you need to mod the game to make it somewhat playable. Which is why i bought FF7R - 2... for the PS5 instead waiting for the PC Version. It's going to have some very annoying issues while looking very similar. FF15 (granted different engine) was a mess and it took me a day to mod the game into "yeah, playable".

[@psvg.donnie]

One small caveat to the games/bluray topic -- We've lost access (digitally) to a lot of sports games this generation. Many past games are being delisted when the newer years game drops. So if you want to go back for any reason (rosters, file size, nostalgia, etc) you have to have a disc copy if you didn't go digital when you could.

[@DJIronChef]

...FLUTE GUY!!!!!!!!!

[@DanielHebell]

About the polished Naughty Dog trailer: I really do wonder why some studios - like ND - keep managing to put out good games without any major failures, while other developers seem to struggle with the polishing process or keeping their promises at all. Is it "just" phenomenal staff? Or is there more to it? /ShowerThoughtEnd

[@arthurmorgan332]

Naughty Dog takes around 6 years to release one game, that's why. They work like Rockstar but with a smaller team and on a smaller game world.

[@jjbr77]

I actually disagree at the idea that last of Us part 3 will be 2030 or later. Naughty dog has multiple teams working on multiple projects. They are walking and chewing gum....

[@danbooke2001]

I am thoroughly convinced that DF are just using made up words to sound smart. DF: "Silicone digital round smoothing seems a little off, but only to the well trained eye." Me: "Ah, yes, I see how this could be an issue. 🤔🧐"

[@HEADSHOTPROLOL]

Gendesign was easily the highlight imo

[@Frojj]

Definitely! I can't wait to hear more from genDesign!

[@Dezzyyx]

only one that caught my eye, looks super interesting and beautiful, wish i could wishlist right away

[@KREEPYKRAWLLY]

"50 seconds"...it gave me goosebumps

[@cube2fox]

Hardly "easily" given that Witcher 4 there.

[@IIBabakII]

My guy, Witcher 4 may be good, but genDesign are pushing the medium of gaming. Im gonna bet you haven't played their previous titles?

[@SimplyMavAgain]

Riches point on Content Removal for movies goes even further. There are no alternatives to Blu-rays. Digital versions of games, while they can also be removed, are feature complete whether you get them physical or digital. But i have yet to see a digital rental of a movie that comes with bonus material and begind the scenes content. There simply is nothing that offers a remotely similar experience to physical movies. The interactive part has always been removed in streaming.

[@stealthhunter6998]

Split fiction is how I wish everyone announced their games. Cinematics, gameplay, show us the mission variety a bit and game mechanic ideas. Sold me instantly but being from the it takes 2 devs I was already sold (still watch reviews ofc but this studio seems to be very confident in their product to advertise it like that). If I see a cinematic trailer and I’m not interested in its art direction and see no gameplay while skipping through it, I just skip it entirely.

[@raymax_1071]

Uncharted 4 looking way better than most games nowadays (when ran in today's hardware though) talks way more about Naughty Dog's work in creating some of the more realistic and spectacular looking games ever than it does about the state of the industry. The standard is way higher now but ND was always some steps ahead.

[@nismodragon]

I waited years for 4k TV's to hit a good price/quality point. I'll be damned if I have to resort to streaming now. My latest 4K UHD BD pickup was Deadpool and Wolverine, and that was constantly selling out for about a month or so. The whole point of resolution upgrades is to experience higher fidelity media.

[@turrican4d599]

Most people seem to be blind when it commes to image quality. They buy an expensive OLED TV in 83" and then resort to streaming movies coveres in compression artifacts?! Mind blown!

[@TheSliderW]

Another issue with digital only games on consoles is the fact they are locked to your account on that specific generation of console. Going from PS5 to PS6 for example there is no warranty your games will follow unlike on PC where hardware doesn't matter (edit : but you might still have compat issues that can usually be solved). You either keep your console or accept your games are lost when you decide to sell the console to make space for the new one.

[@ppevader-u2t]

Yea digital works great on pc with multiple stores and launchers. That's why I hate fellow pc people crying and wanting only steam. No that is why we get so many great sales. So many stores and sales always happening somewhere from Steam to Epic to Ubisoft or EA and then websites like green man, gog, gamersgate. It sucks ass on consoles with 1 damn store. 😒 plus on pc if a game gets removed you can almost guruantee there will be a cracked version you can find someone uploads like the OG Silent Hill 2. Pc gaming has its headache inducing moments, but that is not one of them. Plus I have a hdd full of emulators from NES to ps3. I have dipped in and out of console gaming but have had a pc to play on for 20 years now. Nothing like it.

[@TheSliderW]

@@ppevader-u2t Yeah, we've been slowly moving to digital as well. I have 30+ years worth of hardware filling up boxes in my basement. Mostly computers and consoles with their peripherals and games but we're slowly selling them off to make space. I've had this moment when I was dumpster diving and I met a woman who had her car full of old but valuable tech for any retro enthusiast. She was here to clear space in the garage after her husband died a few months before and none of the kids or herself cared about that or wanted to look into his old stuff. I felt quite sad at the prospect of these Amigas, Commodores and boxes of floppies being dumped but I also forbade myself to take them in. I helped her organise things and distribute them to local collectors. Made me realise the weight of our legacy. I don't want my wife to go through this as well, hence the downsizing, and emulation has been so good these days that we already have rebuilt most of our physical library in digital form. Anyway. Kudos for going digital in a "No, I own this" kinda way ; )

[@JUANMAS7ER]

They forgot the massive downgrade in visuals Witcher 3 had it seems...better wait for a gameplay trailer.

[@GLADIATOR-ud6gw]

I honestly am mind blown it's about to be 2025 and we are still playing games at 720p on what was mean to be 4k gaming consoles

[@gothpunkboy89]

People focus on resolution as if that is the begin and end all. You really should fire up a PS3 or 360 and compare how games look

[@maynardburger]

That's.....not really accurate at all. An embarrassing comment to be making in a comment section for a DF video, who all know much better than to fall for this kind of misleading claim and ignoring all context behind it. In the age of reconstruction, the base resolution used is much less important than what the actual perceptual output is.

[@12coco100]

​@@maynardburger Would you play games on 1440p output with performance level upscaling? How about 480p upscaling to 1440p? It uses UPSCALING, so that means it looks fine right?

[@Jun123]

"How do you fix the PSSR issues in your game?" "Oh, you can shut it off."

[@speedracer2please]

Don't forget Uncharted's greatest secret weapons- Unfathomable budgets and employee abuse

[@EastyyBlogspot]

Virtua fighter i always did feel the hit detection was next level like john said things did not clip through as much like arms and legs though juggling did sometimes feel odd, though fighting games have moved quite a lot and virtua fighter i hope they can compete

[@cube2fox]

Hopefully they finally cut back on characters constantly sliding around on the ground without moving their legs. It looks bad with those otherwise hyper realistic character models. That was always a major problem in games like Tekken and they seem to have zero interest in fixing that. John and other reviewers didn't even mention it in their reviews, probably because they are so used to it. (I think the fix solution should be easy with inverse kinematics but I wouldn't know.)

[@G0ku737]

Just imagine „CES 2025: Jensen on stage announcing the RTX 5090 and saying, 'Remember the trailer for Witcher 4 at the Game Awards?' - 'It was actually rendered in real-time with DLSS 4 on this GPU.' I'm just wondering why they would even tell everyone it was rendered on an unannounced GPU, because any GPU could render this trailer-it would only take longer... at least if it’s one from the last few generations."

[@NeovanGoth]

Yeah it's an extremely weird move. Perhaps to spark some hype before the official announcement? As if that would be necessary. 😅

[@G0ku737]

@ Sure maybe their intention was hype…marketing is not always following logical paths… but still weird. A rendered trailer has nothing more to say besides that the GPU can render…

[@ppevader-u2t]

Yall obviously have never been involved in marketing. It is to build hype and talk you dufus

[@mrdol]

How on earth ppl could be bashing the Intergalactic trailer?! It looks absolutely AWESOME. Im sooo happy when world-class developers are allowed to make a new IP instead of miliking their iconic franchise until it completly runs dry and everyone is sick of it (looking at AC series). Im glad CDPR did Cyberpunk instead of jumping straight to Witcher4. Cyberpunk turned out to be fantastic all things considered. Let Naughty Dog cook. And if you don't like that trailer just because of the looks or the gender of the main protagonist ... then you need some help mate.

[@desertfish74]

I identify as non buynary if they mess with the protagonist like that. It’s Abby 2.0 all over again. No thanks. I won’t be able to look at that cave troll for 50 hours.

[@Ol_eg]

@@desertfish74I’m sorry, but the only “cave troll” here is you

[@JDisclmd]

@@desertfish74 cry about it. u werent gonna buy it either way. ks

[@cube2fox]

What's the problem with people wanting to play as an attractive character? Why do they "need some help mate"? It's just their preference. (Cyberpunk 2077 was a different thing, it had character creation.)

[@JDisclmd]

@@cube2fox because the characters looks should support the story and shouldnt be made different just for the sake of it. A pretty and skinny lady doesnt fit whatsoever. This looks like a military woman. Not a Barbie doll. As it should. And she looks more than fine. Shes way above average too. Lets be fr its just cuz she shaved her hair off. She literally has hair on the poster in the trailer. She clearly shaved it off for a reason

[@comeontars]

I think DF should make an addendum video on the current state of TAA. there is a growing sentiment it is ruining the current batch of games that strictly only work with it possibly indefinitely

[@cube2fox]

Alex made a video about TAA & co. He was very positive about it.

[@accidentcellar6307]

@@cube2fox Look at the videos from Threat Interactive. They are the very opposite, and I believe them over Alex.

[@Joostinonline]

Do you think they need one more recent than the one 10 months ago?

[@cube2fox]

@accidentcellar6307 They should battle it out

[@maynardburger]

There is a growing sentiment among idiot, ignorant gamers about something they dont understand at all, sure. Just because lots of people think something doesn't mean there is automatic merit to it.

[@AndreThompson925]

Naughty Dog and Machinegames have completely captured my imagination. When I'm home, I'm raiding tombs and punching not-cees and when im in my car I'm bumping that banger of a song from Pet Shop Boys (It's a Sin). The Geoff Awards awards were absolutely amazing. 2025 and beyond is looking GREAT for gamers.

[@RealJeffTidwell]

Getting queue-DOS for punching not-cees in the here and now, exclamation point?

[@bes5164]

I love these long videos! Interesting and also it also helps me to not think about my loud tinnitus.

[@LRon-ef7ni]

People are complaining about all the remakes and remasters ND had been spitting out. ND unveils a brand new ip and game, and people are still complaining. I think Intergalactic looks dope

[@eq7161]

​@@GolfWhisky so does your rebuttal lol

[@mahdi7211]

@@GolfWhisky so what are your logical argument about the game being bad? i want to hear it

[@mahdi7211]

@@GolfWhisky for example, having different food doesnt nessesarily mean its bad or good, but if that different food is from gordon ramsay, you will try it, cuz you know its gonna be good despite the food may not seem appealing at the first glace.

[@mahdi7211]

@@GolfWhisky anything have its own flaws, there is no perfect thing and games are the same. also you have flaws too you say there is better first person shooters than uncharted. well, uncharted is not a first person shooter

[@maynardburger]

Lots of right wing idiots complaining and trying to manufacture outrage about it. That's all. Nobody else is complaining.

[@MrSnaztastic]

The movie industry messed up with 4K Blu Ray by requiring hardware-level copy protection for playback on PC, it's not like optical drives were flying off shelves to begin with and this was just pouring salt in the wound. Intel stopped including support for this after a certain point, so now you REQUIRE old hardware (or turn to piracy). I'm really hoping Sony doesn't go fully disc-less with next gen, as much as I hate using the PS5 as a player.

[@garuna5688]

Guys please talk about Black Ops 6. DLSS is completely broken in that game for a lot of people. General performance is also really bad. We need your analysis of why this is and your suggestions!

[@RaceSimCentral]

@1:10:30 Screamer went to Titus, not EA, when EA bought VIE. Interplay acquired those assets. Milestone (Screamer developer) are under Embracer, as were Volition. Volition (Deep Silver, THQ, basically Embracer) owned Interplay. I'd assume Milestone had this planned since about 2018.

[@RuslanZinovyev]

Thank you for your opinion and comments about new naughty dog game gents, finally I found someone who is also excited as I am after this presentation.

[@elyssa.c90]

Well, when you have to *actively look for someone* who likes what a beloved company like ND puts out, you're gonna have to ask yourself if there isn't truth to the criticism. I agree that the internet is quick to shit on things, but just waving everything through because it's Naughty Dog, is doing yourself a disservice. What happened with a big IP from a big studio could clearly be seen with Dragon Age Veilguard.

[@zaltmanbleroze]

Actually there are plenty of other channels that like it and enough of people in comments as well. I guess it's 50/50. I am looking forward to it too. But i need a gameplay trailer and need to see the world more. Also you shouldn't care what others say, for me it has never been a deciding factor to buy a game.just because of other gamer's opinion.

[@iris4547]

isnt naughty dog the horrible company that gave us the nightmare last of us 2? with the dudechick? and now the new game has the dudechick as the main character? no thanks.

[@Ol_eg]

@@iris4547muscle woman = dude chick?

[@LKAsdfghjkl]

1:33:00 Nintendo is traditional because it makes money out of the cartridges. A minimum of 5$ up to 10$ depending on the memory space

[@BygoneUser1]

Yesterday was my birthday and I was all alone in a city I've come to hate... But I still had my hunky foundrymen to keep me warm inside and feel a certain kind of way. Anyway, I thought the Geoffies were okay this year but I don't know if I agreed with the Geoffy winners per say... But hey, it is what it is.

[@th3sci3ntist]

worth noting that for The Witcher 4, the project leads stated the trailer was made using game assets on the friends per second podcast

[@nicr1159]

This channel is such an oasis amongst all the culture war bullshit, and hey you actually know your tech as well. keep it up guys👍

[@M3RMA1D3N]

Agreed. They know better than to let that stupidity permeate their excellent work.

[@joefawley9264]

@nicr1159 they spread their own propaganda unfortunately

[@cosmosofinfinity]

@joefawley9264 Like WHAT? Give us a propaganda timestamp for this video

[@goldie819]

23:33 The shadow for the upper shelf here does have peter panning btw. It's possible that the shadows on the pinboard mentioned earlier are using some kind of (pardon my language) bespoke effect to achieve that level of detail.

[@josephs9600]

Take this with a grain of salt, but i was always under the impression that naughty dog achieves their visuals through a lot of behind the scenes smoke and mirrors, as opposed to dynamic stuff. Every scene is completely authored and if you peak behind the curtain it all falls aparts.

[@mechanicalmonk2020]

Yes that's... how games are made.

[@592Johno]

Bro said a bunch of nothing

[@Frytech]

At 15:07 about Intergalactic: I just thought of it, they’ve probably decided to shave Main Character’s head so they don’t have to deal with Hair Simulation 😂 Hair usually looks the worst even in the bestest of games, and it can be very computation intensive, like that Hairwork option in Witcher 3, while still looking “not real life”. I think ND legit decided to remove that problem altogether by simply making the character bold :)

[@MGTOW89]

I don't think your theory is correct, cause they still gonna render npcs' hair... well, unless they make all the npcs in the game bold too, which is very unlikely.

[@Frytech]

@ I mean, it’s obviously just a tongue and cheek joke. But also, you’re kinda staring at your character all the time and it’s up close, so you notice all those details, while NPCs… not so much, you just fighting them at a fast pace and some distance.

[@ppevader-u2t]

No it isn't obviously a joke

[@kimmyksbro3116]

WHAT? 5060 is 8GB card Again Nvidia Keep your trash

[@maynardburger]

Still gonna sell like crazy and be a popular choice in tons of pre-builts. Nvidia has already won. Consumers complain, but still open their wallets anyways.

[@kimmyksbro3116]

@@maynardburger I know even 3050 are in prebuild gaming system today

[@EspHack]

yep, just looks like senua 2 at 16k, what really puts it apart is animation quality, games should focus on animations/sounds not being 3s loops, and colors looking realistic, more polygons do very little at this point

[@maynardburger]

Focusing on animations is a priority choice that comes at many other costs, though. Including many critical game design/gameplay aspects. It's not as simple as just saying, "Oh you should just make better animations". Hellblade's gameplay and systems and level design and all that is VERY simple stuff, and that was the cost of making the animations so good and diverse. As for 'colors looking realistic', I'm guess what you actually mean is making everything more saturated? Cuz I think it's been demonstrated that people tend to NOT like realistic colors. Even Naughty Dog games tend to use a level of stylized saturation to make their visuals pop a bit more.

[@EspHack]

@@maynardburger i dont mean gta v animations, just more of them, more granular, more responsive, and what makes paintings and drawings look fake is the simplistic color palette, same for games

[@TheBuffig]

Off topic, but I don't think DF have covered the Space Marine 2 Pro upgrade yet. To me it looks and plays far far better

[@fredericosei5617]

Really?! I've been waiting for an update before buying.

[@TheBuffig]

@fredericosei5617 Yeah. Before it looked like a muddy choppy mess. Now it's super smooth and wayyy sharper. I'm on a VRR screen, so that may help. It also is using PSSR, but in the case of SM2 it looks like a great implementation

[@fredericosei5617]

@@TheBuffig ooh I have the trial installed, will this update apply?

[@TheBuffig]

@@fredericosei5617 Not sure tbh. I don't see why not

[@Gman2002]

With discs, similar to game cartridges, the content remains unchanged even if licensing issues arise in the future. As long as the disc media and playback hardware are functional, you can own and play the media at any time, regardless of internet availability or unexpected restrictions.

[@jackcall3815]

Oliver, she totally did look like a WLF from TLOU2. I literally thought the same thing

[@maynardburger]

It's Lev all grown up!

[@NatrajChaturvedi]

Nobody else seems to feel it, even when steam prices for AAA games and Steam sales are not what they used to be but I hate that physical media has died on PC. Even if CD/DVD drives are dead, USB drives and sd cards have become so cheap that Publishers could have easily published games on those but why would they? The profit margins are much higher for them with digital sales and they can keep the prices high for a LONG time with digital sales whereas with physical copies, prices plumet for games on Playstation and Xbox after an appropriate time.

[@grggrgrgg]

These wizzards over at naughty dog could very well be cooking up a 3d world space radiance cascades lighting system.

[@samgee500]

Based take. There already exists an open source proof of concept. This is what should replace path tracing in most games since by the time path tracing becomes the standard even for low spec hardware someone will have figured out how to use bespoke AI algorithms to produce a far more realistic and optimized result using only the tensor processors instead of raw compute.

[@NeovanGoth]

@@samgee500There's nothing preventing you from combining path tracing for light simulation with neural rendering for the final image. I remember a video on the TwoMinutePapers channel about rendering materials this way: You do trace rays to construct the scene, but how exactly materials react to light is determined by neural networks trained on real-world images of said materials. Pretty fancy stuff. Another interesting use case for AI could be animations and behavior. Just imagine a Cyberpunk 2088 where NPCs not only have different looks, but where each NPC walks slightly different based on factors like weight, muscular strength, stress level, overall mood, and so on. Fixing the "animatronics problem" could do a lot to improve immersion.

[@zerosam5541]

@@NeovanGoth it sound like you are talking more about a movie then a game beucase a console needs to run all of that

[@NeovanGoth]

@@zerosam5541 While waiting 25 years for ray tracing to arrive in games, I became patient. ;) Just wait two console generations down the line and things can look very differently.

[@nightfall91]

I work in HMV and we sell way more vinyl and CD than movies. But there are still plenty of people buying dvd and bluray. Surprised how well 4k is doing actually.

[@MD-nf6sv]

The Witcher 4 trailer was made by Platige Image as far as I know (not CD Project themselves) so it could be a different version of UE5 of the game itself. Also Platige is a studio that has been working in prerendered stuff for as long as I know them, probably could have been a realtime capture but I assume the choice of was more because of their existing workflow rather than a technical one.

[@boskee]

It was made in-house, but Platige Image helped with the direction.

[@MD-nf6sv]

@@boskee That would suggest Platige just sent a director to CD Project but it looks like they did a lot more from their linkedIn post. Could you elaborate on how they collaborated and to what extent?

[@lukilladog]

No Henry Cavill in the game, no buy.

[@kaikiske7436]

Intergalactic looks absolutely incredible! Can’t wait fam, we’re doing this!

[@peite7878]

Do you think Ikumi Nakamura's studio UNSEEN will take a pause with their seemingly Live Service game and do contract work for Capcom/Clovers instead?

[@PookaBot]

I think CDPR said in the Skill Up interview that the assets in the Witcher 4 trailer were in game assets but they might change by release.

[@DoctorCyrax]

Onimusha had disappeared like Life with Louie's Hairline 🥴🥴

[@J.A.P_8950]

With the Blu-Ray issue. Isn't this the only way to get correct HDR metadata for movies? My understanding is streaming movies will always just default to your TVs auto tone mapping instead of the movies native mastered tone mapping....

[@yonkocommander5531]

​ @J.A.P_8950 I used to think that until I saw a Mad Max streaming in kaleidescape with noticeably better quality than a UHD Blue ray, the technology is there, it's just too expensive at the moment.

[@eraser2727]

For HDR content it is recommended to disable auto tone mapping, and have it enabled only for DV content.

[@J.A.P_8950]

@eraser2727 I guess I may have confused some ppl becuase it's really dependent on TV brand. For LG, it's DTM on or off. DTM off is always best for reproducing movies native HDR grading....But my original question was more along the lines of, the way LG implements its default tone mapping for DTM on or off. Either option will always default to 4000nits when "streaming" a movie. The only way to get correct maxCLL, maxFFTML, mastering....is by using a blu ray disc that has all those values hard-coded onto the disk.....if you just stream your movies, you don't get the mastered HDR metadata specifically graded for it....instead the TV will just default to its 4000nits tone curve for all streamed movies.

[@damiandekker474]

Can't wait for Split Fiction. Played both A Way Out and It Takes Two with my wife and had a blast.

[@TEk0n]

Intergalactic looks graphically impressive but artistically a bit uninspired if I’m being honest… feels way too guardians-inspired

[@gothpunkboy89]

It is funny you think guardians was original.

[@xtr.7662]

Nothing is original lil bro

[@maynardburger]

I'd agree if it weren't for the on-ground little half-gameplay bit we saw, that was definitely nothing like Guardians of the Galaxy. Very much looked like some darker sort of sci-fi fantasy setting.

[@mechanicalmonk2020]

It has literally none of the aesthetic from guardians. It's trying to ape anime.

[@turrican4d599]

We NEED Blu-rays and UHD discs!!!!!!!