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Crysis 2 DirectX11 Tessellation Pack/High Res Texture Pack [Update: released]

Luigiv said:
GPU equals RAM now?

The 7600 has 256MB of main memory. Both consoles have 512 between the GPU/CPU, and consoles don't have to deal with OS bloat and multitasking. The system reqs for Crysis on PC are 256mb video card and 1GB system memory, but this is factoring those things in.

The notion that Crysis 1 style levels are "impossible" with 256+256MB of memory is total garbage. It WILL run. I reiterate: the only question is how good it will look while it runs, and how many sacrifices they have to make to get it to run.
 

Deadbeat

Banned
ThoseDeafMutes said:
I reiterate: the only question is how good it will look while it runs, and how many sacrifices they have to make to get it to run.
Congrats on coming to the conclusion that everyone else has already reached in this thread.
 

gunbo13

Member
ThoseDeafMutes said:
The 7600 has 256MB of main memory. Both consoles have 512 between the GPU/CPU, and consoles don't have to deal with OS bloat and multitasking. The system reqs for Crysis on PC are 256mb video card and 1GB system memory, but this is factoring those things in.

The notion that Crysis 1 style levels are "impossible" with 256+256MB of memory is total garbage. It WILL run. I reiterate: the only question is how good it will look while it runs, and how many sacrifices they have to make to get it to run.
Probably medium quality settings, heavily tweaked LoD, shortened draw distance, and lowered physics. Either that or the game runs at 5fps. But considering Crysis 2 on 360 hit the mid-teens, which I still can't believe, who knows.

Will this stay?


It's fun to dream.
 

Luigiv

Member
dragonelite said:
Time will tell.
...

:|

... That's just stupid.

Do you even understand by what I mean by streaming? Because to me that comment just screams "Oh shit, I'm in way over my head and have no idea how to argue back. Quick, I need to post some irreverent nonsense".

I'll spell it out for you.

A streaming environment is not entirely loaded into RAM. Only a little bit more then what you can see and interact with is. as you move through the environment, parts you've left behind are erased from RAM and parts up ahead are being loaded in and only this part of the level actually loaded into the ram is populated with functioning AI. This is how Sandbox games like JC2 work.

In Crysis, environments are loaded in the good all fashion way. The entire level all at once. This point is fundamental to how Crysis plays because it means that the entire level can be fully populated with functioning AI the entire time. Enemies positioned at the very end of the map are right there from the beginning and going through their own AI routines as you make your way over there. The maps alone take up over 700MB and the AI use up even more.

And no, you can't just make the levels start streaming without completely rebuilding (and completely butchering) the game.

ThoseDeafMutes said:
The 7600 has 256MB of main memory. Both consoles have 512 between the GPU/CPU, and consoles don't have to deal with OS bloat and multitasking. The system reqs for Crysis on PC are 256mb video card and 1GB system memory, but this is factoring those things in.

The notion that Crysis 1 style levels are "impossible" with 256+256MB of memory is total garbage. It WILL run. I reiterate: the only question is how good it will look while it runs, and how many sacrifices they have to make to get it to run.
You really suck at maths. Let me help.

In the format, Minimum required system RAM - Typical OS and Background application bloat = #

XP: 1GB - 200MB = 800MB
Vista: 1.5GB - 700MB = 800MB
PS3: 256MB - 64MB = 192MB
 

BlackDove

Banned
CryEngine 3 doesn't seem to load the whole thing at once.

Crysis 2's maps, as corridord' as they are, aren't even fully loaded in the game I don't think.

The game will generally load the upcoming area when the suit gives you the new "tactical options available" soundbite. Until that happens you can't see any enemies (and generally no terrain) beyond where you are.

That's my assumption anyway, from playing the game.

If you divvy up Crysis 1 that way (I don't know how, maybe some LOD5 backgrounds for the far away areas, as the problem is that you're supposed to see to the other end of the island), shouldn't it be theoretically possible?
 

NBtoaster

Member
Luigiv said:
...
Enemies positioned at the very end of the map are right there from the beginning and going through their own AI routines as you make your way over there. The maps alone take up over 700MB and the AI use up even more.
And no, you can't just make the levels start streaming without completely rebuilding (and completely butchering) the game.

I doubt that actually happens as it's just a waste. Unless you can interact with them there's no point. They're probably triggered to spawn in like every other game.

I don't see how making Crysis steamable will ruin the game. Probably make it better, with less load time..
 

Luigiv

Member
BlackDove said:
CryEngine 3 doesn't seem to load the whole thing at once.

Crysis 2's maps, as corridord' as they are, aren't even fully loaded in the game I don't think.

The game will generally load the upcoming area when the suit gives you the new "tactical options available" soundbite. Until that happens you can't see any enemies (and generally no terrain) beyond where you are.

That's my assumption anyway, from playing the game.

If you divvy up Crysis 1 that way (I don't know how, maybe some LOD5 backgrounds for the far away areas, as the problem is that you're supposed to see to the other end of the island), shouldn't it be theoretically possible?
No, because that doesn't solve the AI problem.
 
Luigiv said:
...

:|

... That's just stupid.

Do you even understand by what I mean by streaming? Because to me that comment just screams "Oh shit, I'm in way over my head and have no idea how to argue back. Quick, I need to post some irreverent nonsense".

I'll spell it out for you.

A streaming environment is not entirely loaded into RAM. Only a little bit more then what you can see and interact with is. as you move through the environment, parts you've left behind are erased from RAM and parts up ahead are being loaded in and only this part of the level actually loaded into the ram is populated with functioning AI. This is how Sandbox games like JC2 work.

In Crysis, environments are loaded in the good all fashion way. The entire level all at once. This point is fundamental to how Crysis plays because it means that the entire level can be fully populated with functioning AI the entire time. Enemies positioned at the very end of the map are right there from the beginning and going through their own AI routines as you make your way over there. The maps alone take up over 700MB and the AI use up even more.

And no, you can't just make the levels start streaming without completely rebuilding (and completely butchering) the game.

Yes i know what streaming does.

And why wouldn't they do it for the console port.
They just need to have a list of significant objects(building and army equipment) the player has destroyed.

Keep a list of actions the player has done like player destroyed radio tower B tell that to the newly loaded Ai make them do some radio chat stuff about it. no need for the Ai at the end of the level to run all the time waste of resources for consoles.

So instead of loading in the level as one chunk of 700mb break it into i dont know 250mb parts with a list of each parts object that are destroyed. So you dont have to load in the destroyed vehicle.

Im pretty sure if crytek wants to do a crysis 1 port they will find a way to do it. And make it a pearl on consoles(expecting high pc graphics setting is your own fault)
 

Deadbeat

Banned
Luigiv said:
XP: 1GB - 200MB = 800MB
Vista: 1.5GB - 700MB = 800MB
PS3: 256MB - 64MB = 192MB
OSes such as Windows Vista/7 are designed to cache tons of stuff in ram as a way of loading programs faster. If something requires all the space windows will dump it to make room. So even Vista taking over half a gig would be reduced substantially if required to do so. Its a dumb argument people perpetuate to somehow rationalize the horribly low level of ram on consoles.

OS footprint is always a dumb argument on PC because even if an OS took 2 gigs on a 4 gig system, I still have many times more memory than the ps3/360. This generation's consoles are woefully inadequate in this area of hardware. Hell the Wii U might be as well but who knows about that yet.

edit: also Crysis 1 had texture streaming as well.
 

BlackDove

Banned
Also a few fun facts about Crysis 1 that are coming back to me now.

The AI was not in the level if it was at 250-300 meters away and more. You would not be able to see the NPC's. Only as you came closer, would they appear. They also seemed to be invulnerable while at far distances, a "bug" I'm sure that was frequently encountered by those of us who sniped. Once you got in close range though, they became killable.

IIRC when you run the binoc's over the terrain, anything beyond 250-300 meters will be set to "infinity" for some reason. Probably because the geometry isn't there, even though it appears as such.

Anyway, Crysis 1 was smoke and mirrors as well. While the assets were all loaded during the level-load, and kept in RAM, the actual persistence of the levels... I wouldn't say they were all there.
 

gunbo13

Member
BlackDove said:
Anyway, Crysis 1 was smoke and mirrors as well. While the assets were all loaded during the level-load, and kept in RAM, the actual persistence of the levels... I wouldn't say they were all there.
Not smoke and mirrors; that's game design. I'm not sure how this got to a level where everything in the level was in scope as that makes no sense. I don't think anyone will argue that Crysis had a small draw leading to a cramped feeling even in the sandbox. The scope was matched with the incredible amount of detail shown on screen. You don't need to delve into all this activity happening off screen. Looking at the game from what is shown on screen is enough.
 
Luigiv said:
...

You really suck at maths. Let me help.

In the format, Minimum required system RAM - Typical OS and Background application bloat = #

XP: 1GB - 200MB = 800MB
Vista: 1.5GB - 700MB = 800MB
PS3: 256MB - 64MB = 192MB


I just double checked, when I was running Rainbow Six: Vegas 2 my memory usage was consistently at around ~750MB, with settings to low/medium @ 720p with no AA. Crysis hovers at around 800mb at all times, be that at the main menu screen or in game (the usage actually spiked when I lowered the settings for some reason). Arkham Asylum hovers at 650-700 during the game. Both AA and Vegas 2 have 1GB minimum requirements for XP. Crysis 2 has minimum requirements for 2GB, yet all games mentioned run on the PS3's 256MB of main memory without issues. Heck, GTAIV requires 1.5GB minimum for XP.

So in conclusion, your statements mean diddly squat. Not only does console OS have a far smaller footprint, the games are optimized to run on these platforms, and they use RAM that is considerably faster (XDR RAM in the case of the PS3), which partially negates the smaller quantity. I'm fully confident CryTek are capable of bringing the game to PS3/360 without compromising anything except visual quality.
 

hiverbon

Neo Member
Some elements of Crysis 1 maps were in memory, some weren't. The geometry will stream out automatically if the conditions met by occlusion and player distance were met. AI had a flag called "autodisable" that would automatically disable AI, probably based on the similar code to the asset streaming. However these could be turned on and off per AI instance in flowgraph if you wanted certain AI e.g. those piloting helicopters to be enabled at a great distance. Because the action bubbles of the levels in C1 were seperated mainly either by distance or occlusion, this system worked. Other things like terrain and most vegetation assets probably stayed in memory for the entire map.

C2 on the other hand was different, because the levels were smaller and often doubled back on themselves (they wouldn't re-use the same space but parts of the levels were very close). Because of this I believe they used a mixture of engine streaming and layer streaming. Layer streaming would hide/unhide certain layers as specified by designers (search for layerswitch flowgraph node in any of the c2 singleplayer maps) and probably prioritise the assets inside them for being unloaded from memory. They also seemed to switch to a new method of disabling AI (search for territories/waves in the c2 map flowgraphs), and I wouldn't be surprised if this system contributed to their memory management as well as just for organisation.
 

iNvid02

Member
wow, just booted it up with the updates and its like a veil was lifted, everything was so damn clear. i wish i had waited for this for my playthough.

i cant replay it just yet, already have games piling up but will definitely visit this again
 

MrBig

Member
I was sticking to 1.0, and when I updated to 1.9 a day or two ago there was no sound in teh menu and the campaign wouldn't load :(
 
Crysis 1 requires so much RAM because of its persistent world. It's true that AI is not activated until you enter the appropiate area triggers, but once it's on, it remains on until you killed them or finish the level.

Also, in terms of destructibility, all the trees/houses/etc... you destroy remain as you leave them as long as you're playing the level, there's no respawning like in Far Cry 2.
 

hiverbon

Neo Member
Metroid-Squadron said:
Crysis 1 requires so much RAM because of its persistent world. It's true that AI is not activated until you enter the appropiate area triggers, but once it's on, it remains on until you killed them or finish the level.


Once their initial scripting has been completed, and you move far enough away or put enough occlusion between you and them, they'll disable. If you then move close enough back to them, or get line of sight, they'll enable again. It keeps the persistent world but manages to reduce the amount of active AI by quite a bit.
 

BlackDove

Banned
hiverbon said:
Some elements of Crysis 1 maps were in memory, some weren't. The geometry will stream out automatically if the conditions met by occlusion and player distance were met. AI had a flag called "autodisable" that would automatically disable AI, probably based on the similar code to the asset streaming. However these could be turned on and off per AI instance in flowgraph if you wanted certain AI e.g. those piloting helicopters to be enabled at a great distance. Because the action bubbles of the levels in C1 were seperated mainly either by distance or occlusion, this system worked. Other things like terrain and most vegetation assets probably stayed in memory for the entire map.

C2 on the other hand was different, because the levels were smaller and often doubled back on themselves (they wouldn't re-use the same space but parts of the levels were very close). Because of this I believe they used a mixture of engine streaming and layer streaming. Layer streaming would hide/unhide certain layers as specified by designers (search for layerswitch flowgraph node in any of the c2 singleplayer maps) and probably prioritise the assets inside them for being unloaded from memory. They also seemed to switch to a new method of disabling AI (search for territories/waves in the c2 map flowgraphs), and I wouldn't be surprised if this system contributed to their memory management as well as just for organisation.

Yes, that technical explanation overlaps pretty much wholly with the experience as I remember it with C1 and C2.
 

EatChildren

Currently polling second in Australia's federal election (first in the Gold Coast), this feral may one day be your Bogan King.
So, after playing around with the engine, it seems Crytek still haven't implimented a means of easily building geometry into the level editor. Someone will have to correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like the engine still requires all interiors to be made as brushes seperately, exported, then imported into the engine for use.

It really sits totally opposite to Hammer/UE3 where you can simply craft the interior geometry in engine, and I'm guessing its why a lot a reluctant to use CryEngine 3 for work.
 
The PS3's GPU is the weaker of the two, and it's a slightly souped up 7600 GT.

No it isn't, it's a 7800GTX. Except with a 128 bit memory bus (but other mitigating factors to correct that).

RSX has 24 pixel shader pipes as does 7800 GTX, 7600GT has 12, aka half as much shader capability. Big difference.
 

eso76

Member
question about tessellation, i don't know where else i can ask.

so is tessellation more efficient than using real geometry ? how so ?
i am under the impression it's actually slower since it has to 'generate' and calculate additional geometry, which still needs to be rendered the traditional way afterwards ?
or am i missing something (likely) ?
 

Wazzim

Banned
The M.O.B said:
Check This, This is with everything maxed out at 1080P
crysis220180pbenchmarks.jpg


Your 460 is gonna average 22 fps, with a little tweaking I bet you could get a solid 30fps. If you turn some things off like Tessalation your fps could climb to around 45 fps.
I'm having much better performance with my 460 with everything on Extreme, FPS is mostly around 30-40. Are there any GPU heavy levels I can try out to really stress it and reach that 22 FPS?
 

Brofist

Member
Wazzim said:
I'm having much better performance with my 460 with everything on Extreme, FPS is mostly around 30-40. Are there any GPU heavy levels I can try out to really stress it and reach that 22 FPS?

Isn't that 22FPS number for Ultra setting? You could try that.

I'm getting right around that chart on Ultra with my 480, 35-40ish.
 

Wazzim

Banned
kpop100 said:
Isn't that 22FPS number for Ultra setting? You could try that.

I'm getting right around that chart on Ultra with my 480, 35-40ish.
Yeah that's with I meant, stupid names for graphical settings are stupid.
 

hiverbon

Neo Member
EatChildren said:
So, after playing around with the engine, it seems Crytek still haven't implimented a means of easily building geometry into the level editor. Someone will have to correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like the engine still requires all interiors to be made as brushes seperately, exported, then imported into the engine for use.

It really sits totally opposite to Hammer/UE3 where you can simply craft the interior geometry in engine, and I'm guessing its why a lot a reluctant to use CryEngine 3 for work.

You can actually build with solids, similar to world brushes in UE3/Source. (You can find them in the rollupbar -> objects tab -> solids). They aren't quite as flexible, and are fairly expensive en masse, but work well for blocking out maps (these can then be exported into Max/Maya/XSI and be properly exported back into the engine as assets). You'll notice most of the stock maps just use them as solid blockers to stop players escaping the world, and some other variation with a purple material which looks to be for their leaning from cover system.
 

subversus

I've done nothing with my life except eat and fap
EatChildren said:
So, after playing around with the engine, it seems Crytek still haven't implimented a means of easily building geometry into the level editor. Someone will have to correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like the engine still requires all interiors to be made as brushes seperately, exported, then imported into the engine for use.

It really sits totally opposite to Hammer/UE3 where you can simply craft the interior geometry in engine, and I'm guessing its why a lot a reluctant to use CryEngine 3 for work.

have you tried solids?
 

strata8

Member
EatChildren said:
So, after playing around with the engine, it seems Crytek still haven't implimented a means of easily building geometry into the level editor. Someone will have to correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like the engine still requires all interiors to be made as brushes seperately, exported, then imported into the engine for use.

It really sits totally opposite to Hammer/UE3 where you can simply craft the interior geometry in engine, and I'm guessing its why a lot a reluctant to use CryEngine 3 for work.
I know others have already mentioned it, but you can use solids. It's just like building geometry in Hammer/UE3 - there are boxes, cylinders, spheres, CSG operations, etc - except you don't need to compile anything (although it's not as advanced). You might have to manually add occluders, though.

They were completely broken in CE2/Sandbox 2 (only boxes and no CSG operations worked), which is why many haven't fully explored them yet.
 
EatChildren said:
So, after playing around with the engine, it seems Crytek still haven't implimented a means of easily building geometry into the level editor. Someone will have to correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like the engine still requires all interiors to be made as brushes seperately, exported, then imported into the engine for use.

It really sits totally opposite to Hammer/UE3 where you can simply craft the interior geometry in engine, and I'm guessing its why a lot a reluctant to use CryEngine 3 for work.

Solids, dood!

You can even select them for export and load them into your favorite modelling app, they're great for prototyping levels and geometry :D

They've even been optimized further, as you can now merge them into a single mesh in engine. Before, I don't think there was a way to do this, and every solid you made needed a drawcall to it.


They were completely broken in CE2/Sandbox 2 (only boxes and no CSG operations worked), which is why many haven't fully explored them yet.

Oh that's right, they were total shit before too :p

I guess solids had more of a use in making a city environment, so Crytek actually had to make them work if they wanted to use them themselves :lol
 
Playing through Crysis 2, for the first time. Getting good performance with the DX11 update on my 570SC. Really wish this:
crysis-2-ai.gif

wouldn't happen, though. Crysis 2's AI craps out more than any other game I've played, dudes just standing there doing nothing, all the time. It has to have happened at least 6 times, I've been playing for about 5 hours.

Other than that it's great, and it looks amazing. Some spots even look better than Battlefield 3 screens.
 

Sanjay

Member
Wazzim said:
I'm having much better performance with my 460 with everything on Extreme, FPS is mostly around 30-40. Are there any GPU heavy levels I can try out to really stress it and reach that 22 FPS?

SLI 460 works great. Never drops below 30 and avg round 45. More or less same results as the 580.
 

dark10x

Digital Foundry pixel pusher
DieH@rd said:
its a shame i have this annoying 1080p@24hz issue. Can anyone provide solution [for AMD users]?
I've found that enabling "GPU scaling" in the CCC fixes this issue (at least it has in every instance where I've used it).
 

Sem

Neo Member
having this small problem
in fact ive noticed this problem in many other games for years just never tried to solve it

its hard to explain so please watch this video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qEgeex9NkI (720p @ fullscreen is best)

look at the texture on the wall with the door as i move back and forth

now do i fix this

using a 570 and 275.33 drivers and all settings are on ultra this happens on both dx11 and dx9

im sure a control panel setting can fix this im just not sure what

remember i dont think its restricted to crysis 2 as ive seen similar things in other games

thanks
 

Sem

Neo Member
ok thanks

how do i change it

do i need a line in autoexec or change something in the nvcpl

its annoying as hell and really noticeable
 
I got Crysis 2 setup and I installed the DX11 and High Textures pack after checking out how the game looked. Before the patches, I was able to run at Ultra on 1920x1080 at a decent FPS, but when I switched on DX11 it chugged. :(

I set it to Extreme, though, and it ran better.
 

SoulClap

Member
dark10x said:
I've found that enabling "GPU scaling" in the CCC fixes this issue (at least it has in every instance where I've used it).

I have an AMD card and this solution didn't work unfortunately. I had to create a custom resolution.
 

Smokey

Member
I'm enjoying the game quite a bit since the patch. I started over around the time it was released and upped the difficulty. It's still dumb as hell, but I am enjoying it more. Maybe because I feel the game is more "complete" now or something.
 
AMD crossfire users - per CatalystCreator:

Make sure the PostMSAA setting is removed from the games autoexec.conf file - it's causing bad CF scaling.
 
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