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DigitalFoundry: Destiny 2 PS4 First Look + Frame-Rate Test

nOoblet16

Member
Generally most of the Simulation still runs on every client.

This is often referred to as Client Side Simulation and its the reason when you press "Forward" you move instantly and don't have to wait for a response from a server. Because you too are running the physics and can simulate what will probably happen.

Thats not to say there aren't some pieces that can be offloaded but lots of stuff still runs on the client in modern MP games.
Yes you are correct, Bungie's older games used to have this where even your movement was running on the host, so you'd be skating everywhere due to lag lol.

AI however, I don't really see it running on every client.
 

Zarth

Member
Yes you are correct, Bungie's older games used to have this where even your movement was running on the host, so you'd be skating everywhere due to lag lol.

AI however, I don't really see it running on every client.

AI is super tricky and really depends on how you build it.

If your AI is deterministic it may make more sense to run it on all clients than to replicate it across the network.

AI overhead was given as the reason For Honor could not run on Dedicated Servers which is very plausible with the # of AI entities they have at once.
 

RoboPlato

I'd be in the dick
Wouldn't say a clear upgrade but it is an upgrade. That FOV though.
I think it's clear but it could be bigger. Still, the areas that are improved (materials, particles, post processing) are the key things I look at when judging visuals and are what I think are most important to Destiny's art style so there is some subjectivity involved.

FoV is actually wider than the first game. That said, I still want to push for an FoV slider on consoles.
 

nOoblet16

Member
What I dislike is Bungie makes it sound like their Activity Host system prevents them from having Dedicated Servers but theres really no good reason they give for that. It sounds like the Physics Host could just as easily be Dedicated as what they do now. Their excuse is "We have to run half a million PS3" executables is more like them saying "We didn't build a proper Dedicated Server".

I like the Activity Host system (though its led to some exploits like Network Pull Crota) but I'd prefer Dedicated Servers. Their answer here really seems to be more like "We're not willing to spend that much on the datacenters, look our datacenters right now can run way more people!"
It's true. They make so much money that they can afford the dedicated servers but I don't think Activision wants to shell out any money on dedicated servers if they can get away with a cheap option.
 

ethomaz

Banned
It's crazy how much a bias can influence the subjective perception of graphics. Battlefront looks photorealistic at times while Destiny 2 by comparison looks to be full of low res models and textures yet you'll still find people who think Destiny 2 look better.

I think Battlefront easily fits in the top 10 best looking PS4 games so I'm baffled when someone says they think Destiny 2 looks better. Just compare the rocks on Tatooine with the rocks in Destiny 2. Looks like a generation of difference.

I think Destiny 2 looks fine btw.
I don't find Destiny 2 a looker... there are a lot of games that looks better than it but Battlefront is not one of them... sorry... Battlefront is not a looker even... I found it pretty generic.

Edit - To be fair aí found games using the same engine generic too... Battlefield 4 for example.
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1wW2Kv1AhA

This vid seems to compare a lot of the animations/effects which have been re-used too.

Seems like they haven't utilised the extra juice well.

00ZCUJC.gif
 

Felspawn

Member
If it's a completely and utterly locked 30fps with no frame pacing issues then I'm fine with it, especially if everyone else is playing the same way
 

FLAguy954

Junior Member
Hopefully DF can put an end to people saying it looks identical to the first game when it's a clear upgrade.

It may be a clear upgrade to the first game but it is definitely graphically underwhelming compared to the competition.

I'll be eventually picking up the PC version though so image quality won't be an issue.
 

KageMaru

Member
I don't think it makes sense to compare Destiny 2 with games like Battlefront, especially on the textures. Battlefront (and BF1) use photogrammetry technology to create the texture work and it's really impressive. Bungie doesn't have the ability to use this technique since the worlds, enemies, and other objects don't exist in the real world.

I think Destiny 2 is a step up over the first game but the presentation is very uneven.
 

nOoblet16

Member
Dude has no idea what he's talking about. Even a zero-work ping is considered within Xbox Live certification standards at 150ms, and to do cloud physics and AI you'd need to be sub 16ms every single frame. I'd fire someone who pushed for a solution like this in a heartbeat.

You can hide that latency but you pay for it with lag. Having ten frames of input lag would be flat out unacceptable.
You don't need 16ms or even 32ms response time from AI though. Why would you want something like that, especially considering due to the nature of encounters in games AI reactions are already delayed and not instantaneous.

Also the dude that you say no idea worked on Titanfall's network and that game uses the cloud for AI. So he should have some idea atleast.
 
People thought Fallout 4 was barely upgraded visually from 3, so I'm not surprised that they can't see the difference from Destiny 1 to 2.
 
The fact that they mention that the tools are a lot easier to create/change content makes me happy. Hopefully it helps push out content faster, and allows them to change/switch up encounters in strikes and such to keep them fresh.
 

BiGBoSSMk23

A company being excited for their new game is a huge slap in the face to all the fans that liked their old games.
I honestly can't grasp how people don't see the upgrade. Could it have been more for a 30fps game? Probably. But it definitely drops many of the obvious last gen roots that D1 has and has quite good lighting and post processing with excellent particle work.

I think the point they're trying to make is that it's only adequate.

And adequate isn't an exciting word when you're looking at descriptors for a shiny new game.

For all the self-praise Bungie heads have been giving themselves in these past few days of exhuberant media coverage (moneyhats everywhere), there isn't anything on screen that makes you go "yeah, that can't be done at 60FPS."

The physics enabled object interactions during enemy kills etc, are standard Destiny 1 fare.

The bigger difference comes from lighting and texture work, which I think is GPU bound.

It's a very subtle jump in quality, making for a merely adequate jump in fifelity.
 

nOoblet16

Member
I think the point they're trying to make is that it's only adequate.

And adequate isn't an exciting word when you're looking at descriptors for a shiny new game.

For all the self-praise Bungie heads have been giving themselves in these past few days of exhuberant media coverage (moneyhats everywhere), there isn't anything on screen that makes you go "yeah, that can't be done at 60FPS."

The physics enabled object interactions during enemy kills etc, are standard Destiny 1 fare.

The bigger difference comes from lighting and texture work, which I think is GPU bound.

It's a very subtle jump in quality, making for a merely adequate jump in fifelity.
Yep there is, and they have already mentioned what it is. The AI and simulation. Unless you mean to say what's visible in a screenshot.
 

BiGBoSSMk23

A company being excited for their new game is a huge slap in the face to all the fans that liked their old games.
Yep there is, and they have already mentioned what it is. The AI and simulation. Unless you mean to say what's visible in a screenshot.

IIRC the AI in Destiny was only adequate as well.

Nothing Earth-shattering.

F.E.A.R. was doing similar things back in 2005 with enemies retreating, flanking and running for cover.

How can't these new CPU's handle that?

I never got the feeling I was fighting chess master level tacticians in Destiny, even when the Fallen would spawn a Servitor it was still pretty basic.
 

jett

D-Member
Okay I know this is probably an unpopular opinion but why would they change the way the guns and the player character handled and animated if that's like one of the only things people universally loved in the first game.

Why wouldn't they improve the animations? These are literally PS3-quality animations, since they look the same on Destiny PS3. Reusing the animations wholesale is no doubt part of why people look at this and think expansion pack.
 

Gator86

Member
Perfect video. No one can watch that video and say Destiny 2 looks a lot better than the original. Its the same game with some higher res textures and additional effects.

Honestly, if they removed the UI and no one said anything, I don't think I'd notice those were two separate games. That video was kind of low quality though.
 

ethomaz

Banned
You don't need 16ms or even 32ms response time from AI though. Why would you want something like that, especially considering due to the nature of encounters in games AI reactions are already delayed and not instantaneous.

Also the dude that you say no idea worked on Titanfall's network and that game uses the cloud for AI. So he should have some idea atleast.
Bots in Titanfall were only to fill the Titan bar... ridiculous dumb.

It is not a good example of AI offload.
 

gatti-man

Member
DF talked to a network specialist, who's also an ex developer from Respawn Entertainment and Sony, and he said Bungie could have offloaded some features of the games (physics, AI, etc...) to the cloud with dedicated servers and thus, Destiny 2 could have been 60fps (on PS4 Pro at least).

It's at around 5:50 in the video.

And that would have been so huge for Destiny 2. No dedis hurts way more than noupgrade gate we are currently talking about.
 

nOoblet16

Member
Bots in Titanfall were only to fill the Titan bar... ridiculous dumb.

It is not a good example of AI offload.
I know that but it does not really matter whether they were canon fodder or not, the complexity of the simulation can be changed and it's the cloud that will do all the heavily lifting. But what it shows is that it is possible to transfer this AI information through a network and have a response time that doesn't affect playability.

And as I have said before, it's not unlikely that Destiny isn't already doing this for AI but instead of offloading it to dedicated server it would be doing it to the host's machine. So the network iwould already be in play here. Plus the spawn timers and game scripts are already offloaded to Bungie's servers.
 

nOoblet16

Member
IIRC the AI in Destiny was only adequate as well.

Nothing Earth-shattering.

F.E.A.R. was doing similar things back in 2005 with enemies retreating, flanking and running for cover.

How can't these new CPU's handle that?

I never got the feeling I was fighting chess master level tacticians in Destiny, even when the Fallen would spawn a Servitor it was still pretty basic.
Cause the new CPUs are super shit. They are like $200 notebook level CPU from 2012.

Without dwelling too much into the differences/similarities between FEAR and Destiny or discussion about how complex the AI in Destiny is, you have to consider the fact that Destiny can have 10 times as many enemies as FEAR at one instance. So even if it's mediocre AI it's a lot of mediocre AI and that is what would make it a significant drain.
 

molnizzle

Member
We do though! Most videos get articles these days. Have been trying really hard to do both.

It's just not possible to have an article for every video, unfortunately.

Well... DF was a much more reliable resource when it wasn't possible to have a video for every article. For technical data I need to be able to skim, ctrl+F, look for bullet points, etc. I'm never gonna sit and watch a 10+ minute video if I'm looking specific details.

I'm sure the ad revenue is better with YouTube though, so do what you have to do, I guess. It's just disappointing to a longtime follower like me.

edit: I do appreciate the belated D2 article tho. =)
 

Xenoblade

Member
Vignette effect can suck my <>

Why developers somehow feel like this effect is in any way appealing is completely beyond me.
 

JB1981

Member
Perfect video. No one can watch that video and say Destiny 2 looks a lot better than the original. Its the same game with some higher res textures and additional effects.

Actually that video shows a discernible upgrade in graphics quality for D2
 

tuxfool

Banned
Dude has no idea what he's talking about. Even a zero-work ping is considered within Xbox Live certification standards at 150ms, and to do cloud physics and AI you'd need to be sub 16ms every single frame. I'd fire someone who pushed for a solution like this in a heartbeat.

You can hide that latency but you pay for it with lag. Having ten frames of input lag would be flat out unacceptable.

Actually no. What people mean to be physics is pretty standard simulation done server side on any game using authoritative dedicated servers. We aren't talking about extensive rigid body simulations or destruction, we are only talking about projectiles, player collision etc.

Lest we forget using a p2p system, your console is temporarily the host, which will have the exact same latency issues vis-a-vis what other players players see.

btw, this is his site http://gafferongames.com/, let me know if you still think he doesn't understand networked physics and netcode.
 

Zakalwe

Banned
Pretty much. Destiny 2 defenders need to take the L and just accept the game is not a massive jump visually.

When the footage in the video started, I was confused whether they were showing the original Destiny or the sequel. Even the animations are the same including the reload one.

Lolwtfisthis take the L?

Who cares if the visuals aren't cutting edge, as long as the artstyle and image quality are still good I don't care.

More stuff to /do/ in Destiny is what I want!
 

Charcoal

Member
Hopefully DF can put an end to people saying it looks identical to the first game when it's a clear upgrade.
Not really. All they said was that the engine can now make shiny surfaces look shiny, wet surfaces look wet, etc. They then spent the rest of the video talking about how they were disappointed that it's not 60fps or running on dedicated servers.
 
As someone who played the original extensively, it's barely an upgrade. The animations are identical to the original as well. It's more of a refinement. I guess now I understand why people call it a big expansion pack, because it is in some way.
 
Dont get why people dont see the difference., The lighting stands out right away from Destiny 1.
I don't think anyone (at least no one reasonable) is saying that there's no difference at all, more like that these improvements are not enough.

For instance, a refinement in the lighting model, shaders and a some new post processes are similar to the improvements of Odst over 3, as opposed to the work they done in reach.
 

Lady Gaia

Member
Actually no. What people mean to be physics is pretty standard simulation done server side on any game using authoritative dedicated servers.

It makes sense to use either authoritative servers or an elected host to resolve consensus problems that reconcile mutiple players' views of the world. That usually involves some revisionist history because the game clock keeps ticking, so it's important to keep the number of things that are inconsistent from the player's point of view to an absolute minimum. Player collision with world geometry and other physics simukations triggered by player interaction like fine-grained destruction of environments pretty much have to be done locally to keep it feeling responsive.

Big set pieces are a different story where you can hide latency behind a building developing cracks before dramatically crumbling, etc. Keep in mind that Destiny's approach here was a significant departure from tradition and that it was part of a partnership with Microsoft intended to highlight the appeal of their cloud offerings. I have a hard time seeing it as a decision driven solely by technical merit.

I'll concede that AI is an interesting middle ground where there are some things that can be relatively asynchronously. It's more the collective "physics and AI" that starts to feel oversold. Pathfinding and decision making in general can be decoupled from acting on those decisions. Of course that same argument also means you can run it all locally at a low priority that doesn't need to come to conclusions in lockstep with the frame clock, and therefore shouldn't be a 60fps vs. 30fps deciding factor.
 

RoboPlato

I'd be in the dick
The more I follow these discussions, the more I think it was a mistake to show a Vex area since those have more simple textures, terrain, and environmental detail. I realized just now that in watching the video again I've mostly been talking from the perspective of the Campaign mission they showed, which I thought was a significant leap, while most people are talking about the Strike.

This is the campaign mission:
CvZbqMp.jpg


This is the Strike:
34855597535_7283796fd5_h.jpg


So yeah, I hope there's more areas that look like the former and it makes more sense now as to where some of the complaints are coming from and why I couldn't wrap my head around it since I was using a different point of reference.
 
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