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Far Cry 4 (PS4) God Rays Removed in Latest Patch (Why Ubi??)

seat

Member

Why call it something that makes sense to everyone instead of something that makes sense to only a few? Everyone knows what a sunbeam is. I haven't played Far Cry 4 yet and didn't know what a "god ray" was until I clicked this thread. I honestly thought it was a some sort of giant stingray I hadn't heard about that was removed from the game. I was excited to learn about a new animal I hadn't heard about before and then immediately felt let down. Some of us don't spend a lot of time admiring Thomas Kinkade paintings, but I digress.

Edit:
Googled it. Now THAT'S a goddamn God Ray.
 

Crossing Eden

Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
Seriously, that is the question. After Unity, why wouldn't it be questioned though? Ubi took a huge hit with gamers that are now going to question their motives/integrity with every game, fair or not fair, that is the way it is going to be for awhile now, regardless, because they open stated they were using Parity between the console versions.
Ubisoft released many different games this year looks better on ps4 than on xb1, one game out of a bunch being the same on both IQ wise does not mean that there is some grand conspiracy and every game should be questioned. Especially not questioning whether or not Microsoft was involved when the effect was advertised via partnership with a completely different company.
 

Paganmoon

Member
Wonder why it wasn't mentioned by DF, how did they manage to miss that PS4 has that effect while missing from the XB1? it's not such a minor thing, but to find a scene where the game runs in -1 fps on PS4 compared to the XB1 (while most of the time it runs better in PS4 as well) they managed to find without any problem...

DF's always been a bit of hit and miss at times tbh.
 
If it's to prevent the game from doing this then that's probably okay.
This happened to me while climbing a tower on PS4. Looked like God was dumping a bucket of paint on the game.

FC4_zps424237c2.jpg

This is a common bug in Ubisoft's games from my experience on PC. From Splinter Cell: Blacklist to AC3 and FC3
 

psychotron

Member
Can't one simply play offline to avoid the update?

Why should you have to? If it were admittedly a glitch they were working on, I could see doing that to pass the time until a fix comes, but without a statement from them saying such, you'd be sacrificing co-op the entire game.
 

Labadal

Member
Why should you have to? If it were admittedly a glitch they were working on, I could see doing that to pass the time until a fix comes, but without a statement from them saying such, you'd be sacrificing co-op the entire game.

I'm not saying one should have to, but it is a way to ignore the update.

I am in no way defending Ubisoft. I'm just saying one can avoid the update or if the game lets you, decline when the update prompt appears.
 
Have they not even commented on this yet? This is potentially a huge precedent for tampering with our games and downgrading them after our purchase made upon certain expectations.
 

WaffleTaco

Wants to outlaw technological innovation.
Have they not even commented on this yet? This is potentially a huge precedent for tampering with our games and downgrading them after our purchase made upon certain expectations.
Unless it was an exclusive to Nivida and was put in by accident? If it's true it sucks, and is entirely their fault, but what can you really do at this point?
 

psychotron

Member
so what's the word ? Ubisoft needs to be chewed out for doing this. Hate this kind of stealthy shit..

Nothing yet. Is there a direct way to contact people at Digital Foundry to see if they'll update their analysis? That exposure could help.
 
I bought the game once the patch was available, so I never noticed this. It must be a bug, but even if it's not, people skipping a GREAT game just because some sunbeam effect is missing, and I say this a someone who despise everything Ubisoft sans Far Cry and Rayman, is fucking crazy. Yes, I understand that the big picture is about Ubi and not a fucking godray effect, but you get my point.
 

Hugstable

Banned
I bought the game once the patch was available, so I never noticed this. It must be a bug, but even if it's not, people skipping a GREAT game just because some sunbeam effect is missing, and I say this a someone who despise everything Ubisoft sans Far Cry and Rayman, is fucking crazy. Yes, I understand that the big picture is about Ubi and not a fucking godray effect, but you get my point.

It is pretty crazy, especially considering how good Far Cry 4 actually is. It's shady as hell yes, but the only people that it would really affect are those of us who have already played the game and saw them. They are a cool effect, but it's not something that's gonna directly affect my enjoyment of the game and make me call it shitty just cause it's not there. Anyone who passes up on this game just because of the God Rays is really missing out and doing themselves a disservice, especially if they had interest in the game before.
 

WaffleTaco

Wants to outlaw technological innovation.
These were simple rays though
Well if we are calling them God Rays, than technically they might not be allowed to use them.

http://www.geforce.com/whats-new/guides/far-cry-4-graphics-performance-and-tweaking-guide
Far Cry 4 PC-Exclusive Graphics Enhancements

Playing Far Cry 4 on a high-end PC gives you the power and performance to use Far Cry 4's many PC-exclusive features, effects and technologies, which include NVIDIA HBAO+, NVIDIA PCSS, NVIDIA TXAA, NVIDIA Godrays, and NVIDIA HairWorks.
 

Gurish

Member
It is pretty crazy, especially considering how good Far Cry 4 actually is. It's shady as hell yes, but the only people that it would really affect are those of us who have already played the game and saw them. They are a cool effect, but it's not something that's gonna directly affect my enjoyment of the game and make me call it shitty just cause it's not there. Anyone who passes up on this game just because of the God Rays is really missing out and doing themselves a disservice, especially if they had interest in the game before.
And you can always play the game without the patch and enjoy the effect so I don't get what's the problem, I know Ubi are shady as hell for removing it, but in this case I think that not buying it because of this is too much.
 

cakely

Member
Put me in the camp of thinking the patch had a bug that accidentally removed the effect. I guess we'll know if they're not back in the next patch.
 

LAA

Member
Well if we are calling them God Rays, than technically they might not be allowed to use them.

http://www.geforce.com/whats-new/guides/far-cry-4-graphics-performance-and-tweaking-guide

Annoying if true. Shitty business practice too. NVidia really need to prove PC can output better graphics that badly?

An odd situation.

Have there been other cases of games having graphics patched OUT after release?

Oddly enough, I don't recall any. Only Ubisoft apparently downgrading the lighting in some areas in AC:Unity.
 

Kezen

Banned
Put me in the camp of thinking the patch had a bug that accidentally removed the effect. I guess we'll know if they're not back in the next patch.

I think so too. Ubisoft have no reason for removing effects when the game runs well enough.
 
Is there any tangible performance or stability issue without any of the patches? I'll delete and play the raw version to get the full visual experience as long as there isn't any weird trade offs.
 

Henrar

Member
Well if we are calling them God Rays, than technically they might not be allowed to use them.

http://www.geforce.com/whats-new/guides/far-cry-4-graphics-performance-and-tweaking-guide

Well, and few weeks ago we were discussing about console companies paying developers to cut features from PC version. Now it seems, that PC companies pay to include stuff in PC versions that are proven to run great on consoles. If it's not a bug on Ubisoft part, then it's a shitty business practice and it should be condemned.
 

Qassim

Member
Now it seems, that PC companies pay to include stuff in PC versions that are proven to run great on consoles.

I'm not sure where people are getting this from. The NVIDIA godrays are NVIDIA's enhanced godrays, they're not claiming exclusivity of godrays, their own enhanced version or others, even then NVIDIA's enhanced godrays run on AMD hardware on PC.
 

FlyinJ

Douchebag. Yes, me.
Here's my theory:

Ubisoft paid licensing for using third-party generated god rays for two weeks. The license expired, so they legally had to remove them from the game.

Works out great for them. All the reviews come out, they get applauded for their amazing graphics, then let all the licenses expire and they save some dough after the initial sales.
 

Kezen

Banned
I'm not sure where people are getting this from. The NVIDIA Godrays are NVIDIA's enhanced Godrays, they're not claiming exclusivity of them, they even run on AMD hardware on PC.

And most importantly they never were in any console versions, consoles had much simpler effects in place instead.
 

Qassim

Member
Here's my theory:

Ubisoft paid licensing for using third-party generated god rays for two weeks. The license expired, so they legally had to remove them from the game.

Works out great for them. All the reviews come out, they get applauded for their amazing graphics, then let all the licenses expire and they save some dough after the initial sales.

This forum produces some brilliant material.
 

demolitio

Member
They were originally put in the game by a man of faith, but after his grandma got run over by a reindeer, he became spiteful and angry and decided to denounce his faith, removing any signs of God in his work.
 

lucius

Member
So is there any way to go back to orginal game on the digital version?

I don't know if they update PS4 digital games on PSN
 

Kinthalis

Banned
Well, and few weeks ago we were discussing about console companies paying developers to cut features from PC version. Now it seems, that PC companies pay to include stuff in PC versions that are proven to run great on consoles. If it's not a bug on Ubisoft part, then it's a shitty business practice and it should be condemned.

The hell are oyu even getting this from?

The god rays on PC are NOT the godrays that were on consoles. Consoles obviously couldn't handle the enhanced and more demanding PC version. This has zero to do with Nvidia or the enhanced Godrays on PC.

This is just probably a bug.
 

TalonJH

Member
They were originally put in the game by a man of faith, but after his grandma got run over by a reindeer, he became spiteful and angry and decided to denounce his faith, removing any signs of God in his work.

But... “This game was developed by a multicultural team of various faiths and beliefs.” or is that only Assassins creed?

Atheists ruin everything.

Fav post of the day.
 

Kezen

Banned
The hell are oyu even getting this from?

The god rays on PC are NOT the godrays that were on consoles. Consoles obviously couldn't handle the enhanced and more demanding PC version. This has zero to do with Nvidia or the enhanced Godrays on PC.

This is just probably a bug.

Well to be fair the variant used on consoles is also available on PC (at least I think so), they are called volumetric fog. The PC has two god rays versions.

It should be noted that Gameworks is supported on consoles, Ubisoft could have implemented this tech but given that it's heavily optimized for Nvidia (rightly so) it's a poor fit for consoles.
 
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