Crysis 2 Tessellation Article

[Keysplayr]

I agree and this point seems to have been repeatedly dismissed with a stock answer 'if you don't like poor implemetation of tessellation that hurts both architectures and consumers BUT hurts Nvidia users a bit less than AMD users then the solution is to buy Nvidia'.

I got a warning when I questioned why anyone would think this is a sensible or reasonable position
WTF kind of answer or philosophy is that.

Jacky, I believe you are speaking of post #221 in this thread? If so, that warning was probably for a character assassination attempt. You went after me and my ideals personally instead of just talking about the subject matter. I'm afraid if you're questioning that, then the warning fell on deaf ears?
You still haven't apologized for that by the way even after I referred you to my comment in post 217 which negated your whole rant. I'm not your enemy. I'm a guy with his own opinions and you have to respect that as we all should.

 

[formulav8]

NVidia should just be banned from being any kind of a game sponsor from now on!

But seriously its not surprising that yet another nvidia sponsored game treats nvidia better than the others. Thats why I didn't buy Hawx2 nor Batman, ect.. If the developers keep giving in to this stuff they will Not get my money. I can find other things to do besides buying and playing their games.

 

[Mistwalker]

Mistwalker, did you catch the comment somewhere in this thread, that the original Crysis also had these "throughout the map" unrendered water. I believe this is a side effect of there engine and probably a big reason why Crysis always seemed to crush even the highest powered GPU's. I don't know that it isn't a part of the game engine. If it is, I highly doubt this can be fixed with a patch.

I did see that, but my understanding is (and please correct me if I'm wrong) that because it wasn't rendered, the cards were smart enough not to bother processing the data. In the case of Crysis 2, the hardware is being instructed to tessellate the water even though it isn't visible (hence the large performance delta when nothing else is on the screen and you toggle tessellation by itself).

And my stance is "just because" we have the option to buy Nvidia hardware. I also said that we can also turn down, or turn off those features if you need to.

Well, you suggested buying Nvidia hardware if we don't like the tessellated performance hit (which is fine) and then stated there is in fact no problem (which I disagree with).

As for the option to manage those settings, I fully agree--it's great both card makers give that control to users. Though we might well lose it if SirPauly has his way...

The dreaded car analogy, I can see why they're hated on these forums. In your presented situation my argument would be that the rain was poorly formed on purpose to screw up all tires' handling more than necessary. Honestly it's great Nvidia cards manage the load better, but I still think it's unfortunate such a thing is necessary in the first place.

Sure, it helps to have those rain channel tires, but I'm still pointing my finger at the rain!

 

[96Firebird]

Still no proof of Nvidia having anything to do with the tessellation in Crysis 2? Alright, I'll be back in a couple of days to check again, continue to claim that they did...

 

[Keysplayr]

I did see that, but my understanding is (and please correct me if I'm wrong) that because it wasn't rendered, the cards were smart enough not to bother processing the data. In the case of Crysis 2, the hardware is being instructed to tessellate the water even though it isn't visible (hence the large performance delta when nothing else is on the screen and you toggle tessellation by itself).

Well, you suggested buying Nvidia hardware if we don't like the tessellated performance hit (which is fine) and then stated there is in fact no problem (which I disagree with).

As for the option to manage those settings, I fully agree--it's great both card makers give that control to users. Though we might well lose it if SirPauly has his way...

The dreaded car analogy, I can see why they're hated on these forums. In your presented situation my argument would be that the rain was poorly formed on purpose to screw up all tires' handling more than necessary. Honestly it's great Nvidia cards manage the load better, but I still think it's unfortunate such a thing is necessary in the first place.

Sure, it helps to have those rain channel tires, but I'm still pointing my finger at the rain!

The cards were "smart enough"?? No, it's that there wasn't tesselation in the original Crysis. Else we "may" have had the same dilemma at that time.
As for your reply on the car analogy, you're supposed to point your finger at the rain. The rain (tesselation) is what needs to be dealt with by the tires (tesselation hardware). And there are many arguments that could be presented, whether fallacial arguments or not. The question is whether they "should" be argued.

 

[SirPauly]

Of course you are entitled to your opinion, as I am free to disagree with it. I was just also remarking on the irony of you holding the developers' vision and pursuit of quality as sacrosanct in a thread where they have provably done so while needlessly throwing away performance.

You don't seem the type to ever compromise when it comes to image quality, but for many users (I would argue the vast majority) having an option other than simply buying new hardware is important. Choice is good.

No, your statements regarding Nvidia's superior tessellation performance are all true. And frankly it's perfectly fine it's so, AMD hedged their bets on tessellation, and when push comes to shove Nvidia's cards simply outclass them--so in a sense, you saying we can always just buy an Nvidia card if we care is accurate.

The problem is, you are willing to stop there. This:

Your stance that there is no problem just because we have the option to buy Nvidia hardware is where I say you miss the point. It's great when there's a value add offered by one company, but we shouldn't thank them for or be content with sloppy implementation.

If a title was inexplicably limited to 1920x1080 resolution due to poor development, it would be blasted by a lot of the PC gaming community. If it was then additionally limited to 1600x1050 on Nvidia hardware only, do you really think "well, just buy AMD cards if you care" would equate to a "solution"? That isn't added value, it's one company just suffering less from poor work.

The problem here is the tessellation as implemented by Crytek was demonstrably shoddy coding that hurts performance far more than necessary on both architectures. The fact that Nvidia cards suffer less is no reason not to point at the developer and call them out on it, any less than calling out a lazy console port. Telling people that buying Nvidia hardware is the solution is not pro-NV anti-AMD, it's pro-NV anti-consumer.


To be clear, I'm not complaining about low performance on AMD hardware (I knew what I was getting when I bought mine, and high tessellation wasn't part of it), I'm complaining about a surprisingly lackluster job from Crytek of all developers. The fact that they worked closely with NV and still managed to do such a lackluster job is what fuels a lot of the conspiracy talk and finger pointing, but I don't think that's the important part anyway.

As gamers we were let down. If you don't feel it as much because you're rocking hardware that isn't as impacted, great--doesn't mean there is no problem. That's all I'm saying.

I have absolutely no problem raising or others raising negatives towards nVida, AMD or Crytech. My point is the rush to judgement. I'm all for more investigations and asking tough questions to Crytech or nVidia. Debate is healthy.

 

[SirPauly]

Though we might well lose it if SirPauly has his way..

Imho,

I smiled when nVidia offered that and to me, has learned from their mistakes. Instead of having a focus for questionable optimizations, place more resources on adding features that improve fidelity and immersion. For example: Transparency for DirectX 10/11 content.

Optimizations are in place, to me, translates into hardware not robust enough when compared to the competition. One did see it with questionable, aggressive optimizations with filtering last decade with settings on default from nVidia, imho, You did see it with questionable optimizations in 3dmark.

Hope nVidia keeps that promise but if AMD continues to add optimizations, they may have no choice to add them as well, sadly.

 

[Caerid]

I'm sorry Sirpauly but your argument makes absolutely no sense.

You say optimizations shouldn't take place. By that logic z-culling techniques or any culling of any kind shouldn't happen, and that's something that's constantly tweaked by both AMD and Nvida with each new gen of cards. Hell tessellation in and of itself is an optimization technique.

Your argument shouldn't be on how they go about drawing a scene but whether or not the final output matches what the developer intended it to be.

That being said I think some people are missing the point with everyone's gripe with Crysis. People need to stop looking at it with Nvidia/Amd in mind and just look at Crysis' implementation of tess objectively, not subjectively.

Fact is a flat surface will not look any better with a million triangles vs one with only four. And that's what people have a problem with. Hell if they had used twice as much on character models and made them look like it instead of pouring it all into barriers that never needed them in the first place we probably wouldn't be having this discussion.

I don't think tess will take off anytime soon, not in the way people would like it to be. Games need to be developed from the ground up with tess in mind to fully take advantage of it because of the way the art has to take it into account and that's not gonna happen unless the next gen consoles have it.

 

[SirPauly]

I said going behind the developers back and trade image quality for performance, no matter how subtle, and nVidia agrees with me, so it must make some sense.

 

[Keysplayr]

I said going behind the developers back and trade image quality for performance, no matter how subtle, and nVidia agrees with me, so it must make some sense.

Yes, that is a slippery slope. No trading image quality for performance.

 

[NoQuarter]

I said going behind the developers back and trade image quality for performance, no matter how subtle, and nVidia agrees with me, so it must make some sense.

But they don't agree with you.. They have plenty of their own optimizations already available.. They already are on your slippery slope.

 

[SirPauly]

I don't disagree, there have been examples of them on the slippery slope and was consistent back then as well.

 

[ocre]

They don't care about you or your card's performance. They just want to win in the published benchmarks. Since we compare by price nVidia benches will always be higher. You have 3 or 4 titles where the performance is heavily skewed in their favor, then the "overall performance" will look like their cards are x% faster in comparison.

Now your saying *(without any prove that i ask to see) that nvidia made the tessellation in crysis 2 to win in benchmarks. okay, where are these benchmarks? I havent seen any tessellation benchmarks for crysis 2. I am willing to bet that most of thepublished benchmarks that you see on crysis2 will be without the patch.

This story keeps growing and growing, getting nowhere.

It looks as if most ppl posting already have their minds set and without an ounce of evidence. the post seem like nonsense to me, that dont even add up. I asked, seriously asking and i got, "because nvidia is like this..... because i say"

.....pretty much

Where is this goin, is it even a debate?

Wait! i get it now. Nvidia is so baaaad. They dont even care about my 460 and they made the tessilation in crysis2 just to make amd cards look bad, and to make their own cards look bad.....bcause these posters said so without any proof or reasoning. My next purchase will be AMD for sure. lol. is that what were after? i dont know what else we are goin for here.

 

[3DVagabond]

Now your saying *(without any prove that i ask to see) that nvidia made the tessellation in crysis 2 to win in benchmarks. okay, where are these benchmarks? I havent seen any tessellation benchmarks for crysis 2. I am willing to bet that most of thepublished benchmarks that you see on crysis2 will be without the patch.

This story keeps growing and growing, getting nowhere.

It looks as if most ppl posting already have their minds set and without an ounce of evidence. the post seem like nonsense to me, that dont even add up. I asked, seriously asking and i got, "because nvidia is like this..... because i say"

.....pretty much

Where is this goin, is it even a debate?

Wait! i get it now. Nvidia is so baaaad. They dont even care about my 460 and they made the tessilation in crysis2 just to make amd cards look bad, and to make their own cards look bad.....bcause these posters said so without any proof or reasoning. My next purchase will be AMD for sure. lol. is that what were after? i dont know what else we are goin for here.

You don't have to believe it. Give me a better reason to tessellate flat objects? The only possible reason is to increase the tessellation workload. You get zero IQ improvement. You surely don't conserve any resources, which is what tessellation is supposed to accomplish. It's completely counter productive.

 

[AnandThenMan]

The fact that Nvidia cards suffer less is no reason not to point at the developer and call them out on it, any less than calling out a lazy console port. Telling people that buying Nvidia hardware is the solution is not pro-NV anti-AMD, it's pro-NV anti-consumer.

Bingo.

Well said, I hope people take your statement seriously and really think about it.

 

[Lonbjerg]

Bingo.

Well said, I hope people take your statement seriously and really think about it.

Without words from CryTek all I can think is that your post is a fallacy based on a fallacy...

 

[3DVagabond]

Unless we get a written confession from Crytek or nVidia some people just aren't going to see it.

 

[WMD]

Lets take a step back and rethink. Is DX 11 tessellation really that necessary in the first place? Comparing blocky angular character models we have in games 5 years ago to modern games like Metro 2033 or Witcher 2. We have come such a long way in terms of geometry detail that further improvements while welcome is surely running into diminishing returns. Is geometry throughput even a bottleneck as opposed to lighting and shadowing in modern games? Playing witcher 2 recently with its incredibly detailed environments and characters running at well above 60fps. I can't help but think surely they can add proper staircases and details on those houses in place of flat textures in Unigine Heaven without using tessellation and cutting my fps to 30fps! Tesselation is supposed to increase performance at a similar level of detail. Had this even been demonstrated without a doubt? All I have seen up to now is high end power hungry gpus designed with a large transistor budget dedicated to tessellation performance struggling in DX11 games that manages to provide only marginal increase in detail.

 

[dust]

Unless we get a written confession from Crytek or nVidia some people just aren't going to see it.

Surely if Obama or somebody from the White House mentions it....

 

[Mistwalker]

Without words from CryTek all I can think is that your post is a fallacy based on a fallacy...

This is fairly ridiculous, isn't it? What exactly is Crytek supposed to say? Owning up to ridiculous tessellation levels would hurt both themselves and Nvidia, who partnered with them to help make the DX11 release happen. Personally I think their silence is more damning than any kind of clarification, but that's just me. It certainly doesn't mean it's not worth discussing.

Still no proof of Nvidia having anything to do with the tessellation in Crysis 2? Alright, I'll be back in a couple of days to check again, continue to claim that they did...

The tessellation in Crysis 2 has been shown to be a terrible use of resources all the way around for what it accomplishes. There is proof in this thread and elsewhere. It's inarguable. What role Nvidia played is unclear, but the fact they were involved in the development process is also fact.

If you're with Lonbjerg waiting for an official statement or some kind of leaked emails to satisfy your burden of proof, keep waiting. If you just want to remind everyone this thread hasn't offered you what you're looking for with dismissive posts, well...that isn't really contributing anything to the discussion.

Unless we get a written confession from Crytek or nVidia some people just aren't going to see it.

Well, as has been said--the poor tessellation work is there, it's out in the open, everyone can see it. The thing is neither Crytek nor nVidia gain anything by taking responsibility or pointing fingers, so this whole discussion is probably damned to the realm of the academic.

What does surprise me is how many posters want to string up Nvidia, when at the end of the day, it's Crytek's product that under-delivered, and Crytek's stamp of approval on the code.

 

[Dribble]

All this fanboy argument really falls down because crysis 2 is an amazingly pretty game that runs very well.

It's difficult for me to accept what many posters in this thread are saying because it clearly doesn't match up with the reality of playing the game. Just a lot of people with axes to grind and a very limited understanding of what they are talking about imo.

 

[Red Hawk]

Crysis 2 does not run well in DirectX 11 with tessellation unless you've got high-end hardware. That's the crux of the matter -- if it ran well there wouldn't be complaints.

Ok, there would be complaints, but they would be about different things. Not this specific complaint.

 

[Keysplayr]

Crysis 2 does not run well in DirectX 11 with tessellation unless you've got high-end hardware. That's the crux of the matter -- if it ran well there wouldn't be complaints.

Ok, there would be complaints, but they would be about different things. Not this specific complaint.

And have you actually complained? Has anyone? Maybe shot a email or two to Crytek?

 

[Dribble]

Crysis 2 does not run well in DirectX 11 with tessellation unless you've got high-end hardware. That's the crux of the matter -- if it ran well there wouldn't be complaints.

Ok, there would be complaints, but they would be about different things. Not this specific complaint.

Compared to what - show me a game that looks as good and that runs better?

As for high end hardware - I'd hardly call a GTX 570 very high end and that can run it maxed at 1920p.

 

[SirPauly]

You don't have to believe it. Give me a better reason to tessellate flat objects? The only possible reason is to increase the tessellation workload. You get zero IQ improvement. You surely don't conserve any resources, which is what tessellation is supposed to accomplish. It's completely counter productive.

I would desire to see macro details on them.