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Digital Foundry: Assassin creed origins Xbox one x tech first look.

Fair enough, modify the question to: Is there any game that doesn't have plenty of performance headroom on a Ps4 already made the jump to 4k on Pro?
To the extent that we can make the determination, the answer to this question is definitely yes.

Either way it was also only a part of my point. I said a jump of this magnitude hasn't happened yet on Pro on its own, let alone increasing the settings from the xbone build, and on top of that likely increasing the framerate as well (game was essentially locked on the demos, and the past AC were anything but smooth on any console even dating back to 360).
We do not know what settings, if any, are increased above the standard Xbox One version. The sheer increase in resolution alone will cause apparent gains in AF, AA, motion blur, etc. even if the settings remain the same. Without seeing the two versions in direct comparison, Digital Foundry is just guessing. Regarding framerate, as as with resolution we don't have an actual comparison. While Xbox One has had problems with unstable framerates in past AC games (though your claim generalizing to "any console" is wrong), that doesn't necessarily mean standard Origins runs poorly. This, along with other reasons, makes it quite premature to make conclusions.

Not surprised to see all the shots fired in this thread lol, come on people, how many times did we discuss what was expected? games running 1080p on Xbox One would certainly run native 4K on Scorpio, whereas games at 900p like Ryse with much more ambitious engines would more than likely be running checkerboard.
That isn't what Microsoft expected, though. Just a couple months ago, here's what they said to Digital Foundry:

Richard Leadbetter said:
Microsoft says that while the porting work will be more involved, [900p games] too should hit native 4K. However, just like PS4 Pro, the GPU has hardware support for checkerboarding and other pixel-efficient techniques, which Microsoft expects to see rolled out on the small amount of games on Xbox One that drop beneath 900p.
So they predicted that only sub-900p games would need to use CBR on One X.
 

Meccs

Member
I don't understand why they won't ditch the Animus crap?! Let me be a Pirate, Assassin, whatever. Just tell a good story without that animus crap. I hated every second outside the animus in all the AC games. Period. It pulls you out of the world... literally too.
 
1080PR

Only this time it's worse as they're pushing the X as ”true 4K".

The thing is every game revealed are all doing 4K in some form or another. They checkerboard up to it? So what? Native? Even better. They still more or less look the same.

If the end result is nearly indistinguishable by the large majority of gamers, including the people that frequent forums like these, I don't see what the downside is to taking advantage of the technique, especially if it allows a dev to get more done with their game visually.

This stuff, while useful to know, isn't any serious problem or dilemma for Microsoft. It's only going to matter most to people who were likely never planning to support the system in the first place, and whose main engagement with the platform will be bashing it on forums and social media. Assassin's Creed Origins looks as good or better than any game equivalent game I've ever seen running on a high end gaming PC, and I played it this past E3 on Xbox One X. The biggest caveat anyone should have about the game looking so good is the fact it was running on a more powerful dev kit, but I don't know, and no questions to my knowledge were ever asked by any games media as to how big a difference there would be when the game ran on retail hardware. A dev overseeing the dev kits did tell me that it would look exactly the same, and would likely run better since the game was still alpha and Microsoft were still making improvements to the development kit.
 

onQ123

Member
The thing is every game revealed are all doing 4K in some form or another. They checkerboard up to it? So what? Native? Even better. They still more or less look the same.

If the end result is nearly indistinguishable by the large majority of gamers, including the people that frequent forums like these, I don't see what the downside is to taking advantage of the technique, especially if it allows a dev to get more done with their game visually.

This stuff, while useful to know, isn't any serious problem or dilemma for Microsoft. It's only going to matter most to people who were likely never planning to support the system in the first place, and whose main engagement with the platform will be bashing it on forums and social media. Assassin's Creed Origins looks as good or better than any game equivalent game I've ever seen running on a high end gaming PC, and I played it this past E3 on Xbox One X. The biggest caveat anyone should have about the game looking so good is the fact it was running on a more powerful dev kit, but I don't know, and no questions to my knowledge were ever asked by any games media as to how big a difference there would be when the game ran on retail hardware. A dev overseeing the dev kits did tell me that it would look exactly the same, and would likely run better since the game was still alpha and Microsoft were still making improvements to the development kit.

ARK isn't 4K
 
Well, what people buy consoles for anyway.....I guess they're pretty much about the games. Though MS have been all about the TV functionality, UHD bluray of late ;)

This cracks me up.. really? Sony offers a cable TV alternative service on the PS platform... How are they not focused on TV? Also, the inclusion of a 4k Blu-ray player is also significant, as this is a common complaint against the PS Pro. I enjoy my Pro, but it does have it's flaws as well.

As for AC... It seems a bit ridiculous to criticize MS over what a third party developer does to optimize their game on the XBX. High PC settings, stable 30fps, and checkerboard rendering in an alpha build seems pretty good to me. One would think the performance is only going to improve as they optimize the game.
 
ARK isn't 4K

Only such title to my knowledge. And when you consider they practically doubled the framerate from 30 to 60fps, that's not bad at all. Particularly when you factor in all the exaggeration that such a thing would never be possible due to the CPU. It won't be the norm, but anyone that said it couldn't happen have been proven wrong before the system has even properly released.

Now, I'm certain at some point in the future (possibly even this year, or next year) you'll see more games that don't even checkerboard up to 2160p or 4K and instead opt for 1800p or some other resolution close to that mark. All resolutions where games should, and likely will, still look plenty fantastic regardless. So at the end of the day I still think they're accomplishing the goal of getting in the range of performance you see from a $1,000 PC in a $500 package. Toss in one of the lesser stated facts of E3 and Xbox One X, that the console appears to be easily running with solid performance quite a few games at high PC graphics settings with the highest quality textures, in addition to doing some version of a 4K framebuffer, and I would say Microsoft, if nothing else, should have zero concerns about the power of the box they're putting out there. Add further yet to this the fact that the XDK is apparently still set to undergo major improvements that will benefit games, and I see nothing but reasons to be excited. The biggest thing any Xbox fan should concern themselves about after E3 is "okay, this is all looking good, but where are those new and big AAA platform exclusives?"

And even if they did show those, I personally never expected that we'd be hit with a shocker like a 2017 release date. So we'll see what they do or show from now through gamescom, and on to the next E3. However, if we still hear nothing even at next e3 about anything at all, perhaps then we can run around with our hair on fire. :D

This cracks me up.. really? Sony offers a cable TV alternative service on the PS platform... How are they not focused on TV? Also, the inclusion of a 4k Blu-ray player is also significant, as this is a common complaint against the PS Pro. I enjoy my Pro, but it does have it's flaws as well.

As for AC... It seems a bit ridiculous to criticize MS over what a third party developer does to optimize their game on the XBX. High PC settings, stable 30fps, and checkerboard rendering in an alpha build seems pretty good to me. One would think the performance is only going to improve as they optimize the game.

nail on head my friend. nail on head.
 

thelastword

Banned
This cracks me up.. really? Sony offers a cable TV alternative service on the PS platform... How are they not focused on TV? Also, the inclusion of a 4k Blu-ray player is also significant, as this is a common complaint against the PS Pro. I enjoy my Pro, but it does have it's flaws as well.

As for AC... It seems a bit ridiculous to criticize MS over what a third party developer does to optimize their game on the XBX. High PC settings, stable 30fps, and checkerboard rendering in an alpha build seems pretty good to me. One would think the performance is only going to improve as they optimize the game.
Yeah, Sony offers the best IPTV service right now, but you don't need specific hardware and inputs to run it, as Ethernet ports has been standard on consoles for more than a decade.....OTOH, Media and TV was a big pitch from MS, especially with Kinect integration..as they used voiceovers to put the xbox on, change channels, snap, skype etc...all in one fell swoop.. It was all the media/journalists spoke about prior to XB1's launch, but the execution was so poor, people got tired of trying it and it failed...Usually gimmicks never last much beyond the first hour or first day or so anyway and MS backtracked from there...


As for AC, I have no problems with AC using checkerboarded....I have a problem with Phil Spencer saying that the XBONEX was a "TRUE 4k" console and that those checkerboarded methods the other console is using is not going to be the way of the XBONEX....which proved false very quickly...
 

SRTtoZ

Member
t10JTWm.jpg


They forgot "Almost 4K" .



For $100 more than the PS4 Pro and achieving 4K via the same techniques st the same performance, I'd say this is not worth the premium. Not fine for that price.

This isn't related to Scorpio right? Cringy if true.
 

Aceofspades

Banned
Reality started to hit...I have said it multiple times.. X is marginal improvement over Pro (similar to what PS4 was to X1) . Its crazy to me that MS is charging $500 for it,they just overclocked the exact APU on the Pro and added fancy cooling.
 

RoboPlato

I'd be in the dick
Wish PC games would adopt checkerboard I think it's really cool.
Insomniac's temporal injection is really impressive too. I expect stuff like that and adaptive resolution to be common even into next gen, especially for games targeting 60fps. They provide such a huge benefit to image quality and allow for much more efficient use of limited resources in consoles.
 

KageMaru

Member
Reality started to hit...I have said it multiple times.. X is marginal improvement over Pro (similar to what PS4 was to X1) . Its crazy to me that MS is charging $500 for it,they just overclocked the exact APU on the Pro and added fancy cooling.

This is wrong on multiple levels. The Pro is a great console but the X is not the same just over clocked.
 
Reality started to hit...I have said it multiple times.. X is marginal improvement over Pro (similar to what PS4 was to X1) . Its crazy to me that MS is charging $500 for it,they just overclocked the exact APU on the Pro and added fancy cooling.

Look I know console wars and all but can we not embarrass ourselves.
 

onQ123

Member
Reality started to hit...I have said it multiple times.. X is marginal improvement over Pro (similar to what PS4 was to X1) . Its crazy to me that MS is charging $500 for it,they just overclocked the exact APU on the Pro and added fancy cooling.

This is wrong on multiple levels. The Pro is a great console but the X is not the same just over clocked.

Look I know console wars and all but can we not embarrass ourselves.

He left out the extra 4GB of GDDR5 but PS4 Pro & Xbox One X are pretty close in hardware 36 CUs vs 40 CUs it really is the higher clock rate that pulls Xbox One X away from Pro. PS4 had 6 more CUs than Xbox One & it was only ~500 gflops apart but Xbox One X is almost 2 tflops over PS4 Pro with just 4 more CUs because of the higher clock rate.
 
Reality started to hit...I have said it multiple times.. X is marginal improvement over Pro (similar to what PS4 was to X1) . Its crazy to me that MS is charging $500 for it,they just overclocked the exact APU on the Pro and added fancy cooling.

Tell me this is a joke

Edit: beaten
 

Lady Gaia

Member
Wish PC games would adopt checkerboard I think it's really cool.

As I understand it, there are too many issues with GPUs and drivers that don’t allow developers to reliably specify MSAA subpixel sample locations. It’s much more straightforward when you’ve got fixed hardware specs that had CBR in mind.

Fair enough, modify the question to: Is there any game that doesn't have plenty of performance headroom on a Ps4 already made the jump to 4k on Pro?

Native 4k? Almost certainly not. Geometry rendering or checkerboard rendering? Definitely. Horizon Zero Dawn pushes the PS4 plenty hard and renders at 2160c on Pro.
 
Probably been said.
Could the whole true 4k think be these fact that X will be the only console capable of 4k games and Blu-ray?
Not every game is going to be 4k, just like pro
 

KageMaru

Member
He left out the extra 4GB of GDDR5 but PS4 Pro & Xbox One X are pretty close in hardware 36 CUs vs 40 CUs it really is the higher clock rate that pulls Xbox One X away from Pro. PS4 had 6 more CUs than Xbox One & it was only ~500 gflops apart but Xbox One X is almost 2 tflops over PS4 Pro with just 4 more CUs because of the higher clock rate.

I know what the differences are and I think his comment was silly. I considered the gap between the PS4 and XBO notable and that's even more so with the Pro and X. Not only is there 4GB of extra memory but by focusing on faster clocks, that should increase the vertex and pixel rate, increase ALU performance, increase drawcall efficiency throughout the pipeline, etc. on top of the higher flop count.
 

dex3108

Member
Wish PC games would adopt checkerboard I think it's really cool.

Well Watch_Dogs 2 and Rainbow Six Siege kinda do support it on PC. Option is called Temporal Filtering and with that option on game is rendering at half of the set resolution and then it is used checkerboard method to achieve full resolution. I think that there is chance that AC Origins will support it on PC too.
 
Yeah, Sony offers the best IPTV service right now, but you don't need specific hardware and inputs to run it, as Ethernet ports has been standard on consoles for more than a decade.....OTOH, Media and TV was a big pitch from MS, especially with Kinect integration..as they used voiceovers to put the xbox on, change channels, snap, skype etc...all in one fell swoop.. It was all the media/journalists spoke about prior to XB1's launch, but the execution was so poor, people got tired of trying it and it failed...Usually gimmicks never last much beyond the first hour or first day or so anyway and MS backtracked from there...


As for AC, I have no problems with AC using checkerboarded....I have a problem with Phil Spencer saying that the XBONEX was a "TRUE 4k" console and that those checkerboarded methods the other console is using is not going to be the way of the XBONEX....which proved false very quickly...

Microsoft has never, to my knowledge, drawn a line in the sand in any shape or form that suggested they would never utilize such techniques on Xbox One X. The primary commitment was that games being made by Microsoft, that they're launching in the scorpio time-frame, they will make sure they can natively render at 4K.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech...0709313&PID=6149513&SID=ita1plmcu100ag8y00dth

Loftis says Microsoft is already exploring virtual reality options and games for Xbox, which will support VR with Scorpio, as well as prepping titles for the boost in visual quality. "Any games we're making that we're launching in the Scorpio time frame, we're making sure they can natively render at 4K."

Notice what you don't see there? You don't see a commitment that every game ever launched on the console will be Native 4K, or even that every game that comes directly from Microsoft will always be native 4K. And Microsoft, for more than a year now, through Phil Spencer and through others, has made clear that developers were not required to go for native 4K, and were free to use the available power however they saw fit to do so. And, surprise! That's what developers are doing.

So what you're left with is you have an issue with Microsoft calling it a true 4K system? Based on early reports so far, a lot of games are in fact running at 4K on the system, even if some are doing so through checkerboarding. You're still getting the same number of pixels on screen, albeit in a less resource intensive manner, but at the end of the day you're getting results that are nearly imperceptible from the real thing by the large majority of gamers. You have places like digital foundry having to zoom in something in the order of 300% just to spot that this is going on? Let's be real. Unless all of this stuff ends up proving false come release, Xbox One X is a system that can play xbox one's most visually impressive games in addition to major visual improvements at 4K resolution, and even at a NATIVE 4K resolution. How can I say this? Because it already is.

Isn't Gears 4 one of the most visually impressive titles on Xbox One right now? Well, according to this link

https://gearsofwar.com/en-gb/community/gears-4-xbox-one-x

it's going to be running 4K native on Xbox One X with updated, higher resolution textures across characters and environments, with newly added real-time dynamic shadows and even improved lighting. If one of the most impressive looking games on the current Xbox One, period, will be able to run at native 4K with major visual enhancements layered on top, love it or hate it, Xbox One X is a legit 4K gaming console. That was always the goal. To take xbox One games and be able to run them on X at 4K. if some developers decide they don't want to do native 4K and instead do checkerboard 4K, but still arrive at the same number of pixels utilizing a clever resource saving trick, who cares. it still looks amazing. Look at Forza 7. The game looks flat out sick. It looks incredible. Just look at the thing, especially if you haven't seen it in HDR. Have you seen high quality vids of Assassin's Creed running on Xbox One X? Of course you have. It looks fucking incredible, does it not? Does it somehow NOT look 4K to you? Because it sure as hell looks 4K to me, although even if it wasn't very few would even be able to tell in the first place lol. Going a step further, does Assassin's Creed Origins NOT look like a game that's clearly running on a high end PC rig of today? Because that's sure as hell how good it looks.

So, take issue with whatever messaging of the console that you want. Take issue with Microsoft having the "audacity" to place the characters 4K right on the chip, take issue with any number of Microsoft related messaging on the console, but guess what? The console is actually doing in many cases what they say it can do. As an example of why it's senseless to trip all over them for calling it 4K, even Sony calls PS4 Pro a 4K gaming system. You realize this, right? There are even cases where games on PS4 Pro are described as having a "4K Mode," but in reality are neither native 4K, nor are they even checkerboarding up to a proper 4K resolution. Some games "4K mode" is actually 1800p checkerboard, and in some cases even lower than that. GTS', a great looking game, but a great looking game whose "4K mode" is in the end not actually sporting an end result image that resolves to 3840x2160 pixels. At the end of the day who cares so long as the game looks amazing, am I right? God of War is not likely to be native 4K, and possibly not even checkerboard 4K even on PS4 Pro, but we all still know it's going to look amazing. So why are we getting caught up in the whole resolution trap when Xbox, again, has been saying for a whole year they are not mandating 4K for games, and devs can do whatever they want with the hardware?

Know what Microsoft didn't say once in the original Scorpio announce video?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F1dRgWpGePs

They didn't say "Native 4K" They said "handle 4K resolutions" "True 4K resolution" "4K gaming"

Shocking though it may be "handle 4K resolutions" can also mean checkerboarding to 4K. "4K gaming" can also mean checkerboarding to 4K, or even 4K with dynamic scaling. Who ever said it had to be true 100% of the time? And if you want to stress the true 4K part, they have some mighty impressive looking games at Native 4K as well, one of which just so happens to be one of the most visually impressive xbox one titles currently, which is Gears of War 4. We know not every game is going to pump out native 4k on the system, but let's also not act as if the only thing pushing 4K on Xbox One X is solitaire. :)
 

Hoo-doo

Banned
Nothing wrong with checkerboard 4K. I hope the True 4K crowd will recognize that soon.

These discussions might become less ridiculous when they do.

True, but maybe Microsoft shouldn't have hinged the entire selling point of the XB1X on 'uncompromised, true 4K'.
 
He left out the extra 4GB of GDDR5 but PS4 Pro & Xbox One X are pretty close in hardware 36 CUs vs 40 CUs it really is the higher clock rate that pulls Xbox One X away from Pro. PS4 had 6 more CUs than Xbox One & it was only ~500 gflops apart but Xbox One X is almost 2 tflops over PS4 Pro with just 4 more CUs because of the higher clock rate.

200 mhz on amd gpu is pretty significant. Plus it has a higher memory bandwidth.
 
True, but maybe Microsoft shouldn't have hinged the entire selling point of the XB1X on 'uncompromised, true 4K'.

They didn't. It's what you hinged the entire selling point of the Xbox One X on. And in that video every person was speaking for themselves, and for their own teams, not for the entirety of Xbox One X. They hinged it on delivering the world's most powerful console. Silly question, but do you know of a more powerful console? And when you say uncompromised true 4K, I assume you're indrectly referring to the person who said uncompressed pixels in the scorpio reveal?

Well, you might be pleased to know that same guy so heavily mocked is successfully leading the technical charge for Turn 10, and has put those "fully uncompressed pixels" where his mouth is by delivering a stunning Forza 7 in native 4K, with day and night transitions, full weather, with HDR support as a cherry on top. Microsoft promised the most powerful console ever made, a console that would be able to play games at 4K resolution, but that devs would be free to use that power however they please.

Nearly everything on the console that we know about is hitting 4K or checkerboarding up to 4K, with as of now a single exception in Ark -- which instead decided to focus on 1080p at 60fps, something many gamers on this forum said they wanted. Hell, I've said this quite a few times also. I'm still of the personal opinion that all this resolution stuff is ridiculous especially if I can't tell and the game looks unbelievable anyway. But the thing that many said could not possibly be done with a 6 teraflop GPU kinda is being done? Since when were console developers not allowed to pull tricks? I thought smart development was all about finding clever ways to trick gamers into believing something that really isn't happening at all actually is.

200 mhz on amd gpu is pretty significant. Plus it has a higher memory bandwidth.

Yep, that memory bandwidth is a very big deal that shouldn't be overlooked at all.
 

Matt

Member
They didn't. It's what you hinged the entire selling point of the Xbox One X on. And in that video every person was speaking for themselves, and for their own teams, not for the entirety of Xbox One X. They hinged it on delivering the world's most powerful console. Silly question, but do you know of a more powerful console? And when you say uncompromised true 4K, I assume you're indrectly referring to the person who said uncompressed pixels in the scorpio reveal?

Well, you might be pleased to know that same guy so heavily mocked is successfully leading the technical charge for Turn 10, and has put those "fully uncompressed pixels" where his mouth is by delivering a stunning Forza 7 in native 4K, with day and night transitions, full weather, with HDR support as a cherry on top. Microsoft promised the most powerful console ever made, a console that would be able to play games at 4K resolution, but that devs would be free to use that power however they please.

Nearly everything on the console that we know about is hitting 4K or checkerboarding up to 4K, with as of now a single exception in Ark -- which instead decided to focus on 1080p at 60fps, something many gamers on this forum said they wanted. Hell, I've said this quite a few times also. I'm still of the personal opinion that all this resolution stuff is ridiculous especially if I can't tell and the game looks unbelievable anyway. But the thing that many said could not possibly be done with a 6 teraflop GPU kinda is being done? Since when were console developers not allowed to pull tricks? I thought smart development was all about finding clever ways to trick gamers into believing something that really isn't happening at all actually is.



Yep, that memory bandwidth is a very big deal that shouldn't be overlooked at all.
Phil Spencer said:
This is a true 4K console. If you just look at the specs of what this box is, it's in a different league than any other console that's out there. When I think about techniques to somehow manufacture a 4K screen like what some other consoles try to do, this is different than that.

Look, obviously not mandating native 4K is the right thing to do. I hold nothing against the developers doing it, nor the X for requiring it. But MS has deliberately painted a picture that simply isn't true.

Which, fine, that's PR and Marketing. But we should be looking past that.
 

KageMaru

Member
True, but maybe Microsoft shouldn't have hinged the entire selling point of the XB1X on 'uncompromised, true 4K'.

The "uncompressed" comment, which I've mocked in the past, has been revealed to be taken out of context by MS' marketing team. Really when your competitor has been advertising their 4K console for more than half a year, you have to figure out some way to communicate that your product is more capable. They even outlined what they mean when they say true 4K console at E3:

gcPrKA9.jpg
 

Sony

Nintendo
PS4 Pro is designed to Checkerboard current gen titles to 4K.
Xbone One X is designed to run current gen quality games in 4K native. That was the goal of Scorpio. And it can. If you increase the res to 4k AND add bells and whistles, the it's outside of the scope of One X to run native.
 
Look, obviously not mandating native 4K is the right thing to do. I hold nothing against the developers doing it, nor the X for requiring it. But MS has deliberately painted a picture that simply isn't true.

Which, fine, that's PR and Marketing. But we should be looking past that.

I still don't think their overall message has been such. However, as you just pointed out to me, if there were indeed cases (and by that quote it appears there were) where Xbox inferred that checkerboarding was somehow not the real deal or inferior, and that Scorpio would somehow be a machine that would never have to resort to such methods ever, then it goes without saying a little bit of flack or humbling of sorts is certainly in order.

That said, it's clear they are moving away from that, and have found a perhaps more accurate form of messaging. And as Kagemaru pointed out, you could say Microsoft has more clearly defined (or redefined) what they mean when they say 4K. The console, by all observation, does seem to be meeting that threshold laid down. If a game is getting 3840x2160 via checkerboarding, they're still doing 8+ million pixels on screen. I mean, we can call it cheating, or not native 4K (which we all will) and I'm totally in favor of calling each game out for what it actually is. But, honestly, when a game looks as great (and many people STILL have not seen AC Origins running on Xbox One X in HDR) as AC Origins does on this console, I find it difficult to view it like they didn't deliver with Xbox One X.

Forget resolution for a moment and lets focus on everything else. This game is a serious stunner on xbox one x. If xbox one x didn't exist, and we all saw the footage that's available out there, we would all say it was running on a souped up, expensive PC because that's honestly how it looks.

PS4 Pro is designed to Checkerboard current gen titles to 4K.
Xbone One X is designed to run current gen quality games in 4K native. That was the goal of Scorpio. And it can. If you increase the res to 4k AND add bells and whistles, the it's outside of the scope of One X to run native.

Not so. Xbox One X is doing just that for Gears of War 4, which is one of the best looking current gen quality games. 4K native with added bells and whistles such as dynamic shadows, greatly improved textures across all characters and environments, as well as enhanced lighting and effects. But I'll post direct quotes, cause they go even further than that.

https://gearsofwar.com/en-gb/community/gears-4-xbox-one-x

Mike Rayner: The first and probably most noticeable improvement is, of course, that we render the game at native 4K resolution. Not only does that mean a 4x increase in our native rendering resolution compared to 1080p on Xbox One, but it also means much higher resolution textures across the board – from characters to environments, visual effects, everything! Bringing that incredible level fidelity to the console for the first time, which so far has really been limited to top-spec PC rigs, has been incredibly exciting for us.

We've worked on bringing a number of additional technical improvements that really bring our world to life more than ever before that are exclusive to Xbox One X. We have fully dynamic shadows now – so for example, if a tree is blowing in the wind, on the ground you'll see that shadow of that tree dynamically move as you'd expect it to. We've also enhanced the detail in these shadows so they'll look crisper and more detailed. The new Shadow improvements really add a lot to the feel of our environments.

One of the things you were probably gawping at (while you were busy dying, let's not forget) in the Outsider Village are our real time light shafts – sometimes referred to as ‘God Rays'. You'll now see shafts of sunlight or moonlight poking through statues, moving helicopter blades, the branches of trees and so on as they would in real life. It's one of my personal favorite features because it's just so visually eye catching and atmospheric.

We also have other features like improved reflections, longer draw distances and higher poly counts to further bump up the fidelity of our world.

One of the bigger technical accomplishments on Xbox One running Native 4K on Xbox One X with a not so insignificant number of serious bells and whistles added on top. So it certainly isn't out of the scope of the system to do if devs are proving it can be done.
 

xabbott

Member
Look, obviously not mandating native 4K is the right thing to do. I hold nothing against the developers doing it, nor the X for requiring it. But MS has deliberately painted a picture that simply isn't true.

Which, fine, that's PR and Marketing. But we should be looking past that.

I think most people are looking past it. But I'm sure every game that isn't native 4k will have comments about this marketing.

I'm sure even Phil being shown Gears, Forza, etc in 4k made him feel pretty confident about the console capabilities.
 

Matt

Member
I still don't think their overall message has been such. However, as you just pointed out to me, if there were indeed cases (and by that quote it appears there were) where Xbox inferred that checkerboarding was somehow not the real deal or inferior, and that Scorpio would somehow be a machine that would never have to resort to such methods ever, then it goes without saying a little bit of flack or humbling of sorts is certainly in order.

That said, it's clear they are moving away from that, and have found a perhaps more accurate form of messaging. And as Kagemaru pointed out, you could say Microsoft has more clearly defined (or redefined) what they mean when they say 4K. The console, by all observation, does seem to be meeting that threshold laid down. If a game is getting 3840x2160 via checkerboarding, they're still doing 8+ million pixels on screen. I mean, we can call it cheating, or not native 4K (which we all will) and I'm totally in favor of calling each game out for what it actually is. But, honestly, when a game looks as great (and many people STILL have not seen AC Origins running on Xbox One X in HDR) as AC Origins does on this console, I find it difficult to view it like they didn't deliver with Xbox One X.

Forget resolution for a moment and lets focus on everything else. This game is a serious stunner on xbox one x. If xbox one x didn't exist, and we all saw the footage that's available out there, we would all say it was running on a souped up, expensive PC because that's honestly how it looks.
That quote is from a little over a week ago.

Doesn't really seem to be a change in messaging.

But yeah, the X is a powerful console that will run very good looking games. The fact that it can't run all current gen titles at native 4K isn't a damning fact, or a sign of poor work on MS's part. It's simply the limits of current technology for a console.
 
That quote is from a little over a week ago.

Doesn't really seem to be a change in messaging.

But yeah, the X is a powerful console that will run very good looking games. The fact that it can't run all current gen titles at native 4K isn't a damning fact, or a sign of poor work on MS's part. It's simply the limits of current technology for a console.

Well, fair enough. And at the end of the day Microsoft can only really control what they themselves are doing. Other developers will do whatever works for them. And we know that Microsoft will, of course, eventually also delve below the native 4K mark with their own titles, because it's just a wise decision when the situation calls for it. All considered they've really got a pretty capable system on their hands within the space of what's possible currently with a console at a console pricepoint. Not easy putting together something that offers all the same for the asking price.
 

Swass

Member
Nothing wrong with checkerboard 4K. I hope the True 4K crowd will recognize that soon.

These discussions might become less ridiculous when they do.

I don't think people care so much that it is true 4k, but rather that Microsoft is marketing the Xbox X as "True 4k." This company never learns and just can't quit with these deceptive marketing ploys.

edit: oops, a little late to the thread and shouldn't be replying to first page posts.
 

Matt

Member
Well, fair enough. And at the end of the day Microsoft can only really control what they themselves are doing. Other developers will do whatever works for them. All considered they've really got a pretty capable system on their hands within the space of what's possible currently with a console at a console pricepoint. Not easy putting together something that offers all the same for the asking price.
And Crackdown 3 runs at an adaptive resolution in MP. So not even all of MS's games keep this standard.

Which, I want to make clear again, is fine. Ruffian isn't doing anything wrong, nor is the X a bad system for this. The only thing that actually bothers me here is the bad mouthing of these techniques by MS, while they are employing them. "True 4K" is a marketing buzz term that means nothing for the X, and it shouldn't be parroted by anyone.
 
And Crackdown 3 runs at an adaptive resolution in MP. So not even all of MS's games keep this standard.

Which, I want to make clear again, is fine. Ruffian isn't doing anything wrong, nor is the X a bad system for this. The only thing that actually bothers me here is the bad mouthing of these techniques by MS, while they are employing them. "True 4K" is a marketing buzz term that means nothing for the X, and it shouldn't be parroted by anyone.

Well, as we all know by now, marketing gonna market lol. That said, for the games where devs truly are hitting a real native 4K without any tricks, and have a fantastic looking game to show for it, it's a really nice testament to the system, and of course to the talented devs that made it happen. In such cases, it's hard for Microsoft to not get their neck up and be proud of what the console can do on some of their major titles. And, of course, as you said, there's nothing wrong with games using checkerboarding, especially when the end result has been known to look quite good and hard to discern from the real thing.

With crackdown 3's mp destruction, I'd honestly be surprised if it didn't have to adapt to what was going on. If it's still like it was back then, that's a whole hell of a lot of destruction. Apparently the campaign hits the mark though, I believe. And, honestly, I still need to see that campaign properly, showing the player completive objectives. I need to see SOME story lol.
 

Nutter

Member
It may not matter to many, but having a UHD drive does drive up the cost. If the console is supposed to be a 4k console (native, Checkerboard, w/e) it should come with a UHD drive, which the Pro does not. Does it justify the extra $100 all by itself? No. The extra horsepower and ram along side it does.
 
Yeah, Sony offers the best IPTV service right now, but you don't need specific hardware and inputs to run it, as Ethernet ports has been standard on consoles for more than a decade.....OTOH, Media and TV was a big pitch from MS, especially with Kinect integration..as they used voiceovers to put the xbox on, change channels, snap, skype etc...all in one fell swoop.. It was all the media/journalists spoke about prior to XB1's launch, but the execution was so poor, people got tired of trying it and it failed...Usually gimmicks never last much beyond the first hour or first day or so anyway and MS backtracked from there...


As for AC, I have no problems with AC using checkerboarded....I have a problem with Phil Spencer saying that the XBONEX was a "TRUE 4k" console and that those checkerboarded methods the other console is using is not going to be the way of the XBONEX....which proved false very quickly...

Really... You're still talking about Kinect functionality and one guide as being a huge Xbox focus... Lol.. Kinect is all but dead and one guide is just a feature. This my friend is reaching...

MS is doing a spectacular job of listening to their fan base. They've redesigned the hub in the XB1, focused on backwards compatiblity, introduces play anywhere, dropped Kinect support, included a 4K BR drive (which lot of people want), and now introduced completely new hardware. They just need to get their first party stuff together, and included more diverse games.

Regardless of what Phil said... They can not control the 3rd party developers.. Sony is in the same boat with games that don't have 4k or performance improvements on the PS Pro.

On top of this AC is an ALPHA build... Who know what it will be running at by the end of development? This to me is a problem with sites doing tech reviews on alpha build of games... It is never representative of the finally product, yet many act like it is.
 

Sony

Nintendo
Not so. Xbox One X is doing just that for Gears of War 4, which is one of the best looking current gen quality games. 4K native with added bells and whistles such as dynamic shadows, greatly improved textures across all characters and environments, as well as enhanced lighting and effects. But I'll post direct quotes, cause they go even further than that.

In any case: Xbox One X is designed to run Xbox One/PS4 quality games in 4K native. That's the essence of its True4K claim.
 

Ushay

Member
What developers do with the power envelop is their choice entirely, it's good that both Sony and MS haven't mandated this.

Why has this use become such a point of contention? And it's always, always the same individuals raising these points, sometimes GAF feels more like a political maze on which platform is the most righteous than a means to discuss video games (which are supposed to bring joy and pleasure).

I'd appreciate more actual developers commenting on the hardware, than armchair generals. I've yet to hear any devs say this hardware is inadequate, inefficient or doesn't meet their targets.

Anyway I'm going back to playing games.
 

DenogginizerOS

BenjaminBirdie's Thomas Jefferson
As a 1080P OLED owner, I am very excited about how much better many of the games I own for XB1 will run and look on X1X. While I do not debate 4K looks better than 1080P, the idea of AC or any other game, unreleased or not, looking much better on an X1X over an XB1 or perhaps even a Pro is a big deal to me.
 
True, but maybe Microsoft shouldn't have hinged the entire selling point of the XB1X on 'uncompromised, true 4K'.
I don't think people care so much that it is true 4k, but rather that Microsoft is marketing the Xbox X as "True 4k." This company never learns and just can't quit with these deceptive marketing ploys.

edit: oops, a little late to the thread and shouldn't be replying to first page posts.

I don't care about Microsoft's marketing; I was talking about the posters on GAF pretending checkerboard 4K is a cardinal sin.

That said, it does take the wind out of MS's True 4K sails significantly. Makes all that talk a little (very) silly in retrospect.

Thing is though, it's better for the community and the quality of the discussion not to dwell on that too much.
 

Theorry

Member
I always thought the "true 4K" claim was about that the X can run games at "real 4k". Compared to the Xbox One S with its "upscaled 4K" narrative they always talked about. So that a difference is known between the two consoles. Think alot of people thought (or wanted) it to be a jab towards PS4 Pro.
 

AerialAir

Banned
As for AC... It seems a bit ridiculous to criticize MS over what a third party developer does to optimize their game on the XBX. High PC settings, stable 30fps, and checkerboard rendering in an alpha build seems pretty good to me. One would think the performance is only going to improve as they optimize the game.

Ah, all that Scorpio power won't even let us choose between 1080p60 and 4K30. This is why I still think power is and always has been irrelevant when it comes down to choosing a console. That's why the Wii and the 3DS vastly outsold the competition with less than great hardware.
 

gamz

Member
Ah, all that Scorpio power won't even let us choose between 1080p60 and 4K30. This is why I still think power is and always has been irrelevant when it comes down to choosing a console. That's why the Wii and the 3DS vastly outsold the competition with less than great hardware.

Can't compare Nintendo with Sony and MS. Sony and MS has always been about power and pushing the limits of console gaming. So it does matter. If it didn't matter why did Sony come out with the pro to begin with. Why were they called the PS4 the most powerful console etc...
 

MilkyJoe

Member
You realize you will see every game in 4K as your output right?

Jolly good.



It's nice that this thread gets bumped, so you can click on it to see if there are any new screens or info and it's just pages of tantrums over whether or not the 1X can do 4K and ignoring the fact that 4K was never mandated. It's amazing that people would rather appear thick than just accept it and go do something else.



Time for some AC again. Cant wait.

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I don't like ass creed, but the Eygpt setting has me interested, might be one of those ones I buy just to go for a look around...
 
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