[HardOCP] Tomb Raider Performance Review w/ new drivers

[Termie]

HardOCP has its evaluation up of Nvidia and AMD in Tomb Raider with the latest beta drivers:

http://hardocp.com/article/2013/03/20/tomb_raider_video_card_performance_iq_review/1

Surprisingly, after a rocky start, Nvidia has pulled ahead in this game. But to AMD's credit, TressFX was not limited to AMD cards, and that has allowed it to work on Nvidia cards with a driver tweak.

Overall, the performance looks very good on all cards, but it's a demanding game - it took dual 7970 or 680 setups to play at 2560x1600. In fact, the 680SLI setup appears to run out of VRAM with SSAA applied at this resolution: http://hardocp.com/article/2013/03/20/tomb_raider_video_card_performance_iq_review/5

 

[Majcric]

Those mins are still too low for higher end setups. Dropping down in the teens is crazy.

 

[Termie]

Those mins are still too low for higher end setups. Dropping down in the teens is crazy.

Those aren't during gameplay:

The lower framerates at the end of the run through did not effect our gameplay. Most of this area is full of close up cut scenes and cinematics.

 

[railven]

Those aren't during gameplay:

I don't get why some cinematic scenes can be so brutal. Not speaking about TR, but another game I'm playing where it switches to a cinematic and my performance drops into the 30/40s even though the engine doesn't look any more posh than it normally does.

I can only imagine for TR, they are probably rendering facial whiskers during the close up scenes.

 

[Elfear]

That is an amazing driver fix for Nvidia. Weird that TressFX takes a bigger hit on AMD cards, like twice the hit.

 

[railven]

That is an amazing driver fix for Nvidia. Weird that TressFX takes a bigger hit on AMD cards, like twice the hit.

Well they did said they had to change some game code. Maybe her hair for nVidia is running on CUDA power!? They put in some PhysX run times in there.

I wonder if there is a visual difference now on the hairness. To the IQ machine!

 

[AnandThenMan]

lol

 

[Majcric]

Those aren't during gameplay:

Ok that's good to know. Anyway, I'm currently downloading the game as I type this. Looking forward to both gameplay and seeing how it performs on my system.

 

[f1sherman]

Well they did said they had to change some game code. Maybe her hair for nVidia is running on CUDA power!? They put in some PhysX run times in there.

I wonder if there is a visual difference now on the hairness. To the IQ machine!

I think there are IQ differences between the patches; thicker hair perhaps?

but either way TressFX Lara imho falls in uncanny valley, albeit rather shallow one. Meaning I'd almost use it, but not really.

 

[raghu78]

for AMD its hugely embarassing. Nvidia cards are running better on GE titles. they better have some performance improvements in their upcoming drivers.

 

[f1sherman]

AMD contributed to one of the best pc titles lately, and they give it free with their GPUs. Nothing to be embarrassed about

I love that 2x, 4xSSAA is becoming standard with AMD titles.

 

[railven]

for AMD its hugely embarassing. Nvidia cards are running better on GE titles. they better have some performance improvements in their upcoming drivers.

"How embarrassing, the game they helped code runs slower on their hardware."

"Cheaters, the game they helped code runs worse on their competitor's hardware."

Never a happy medium around here.

 

[sontin]

for AMD its hugely embarassing. Nvidia cards are running better on GE titles. they better have some performance improvements in their upcoming drivers.

Crysis 3 and Farcry 3 are not really "GE" titles. They are more sponsoring titles.

 

[raghu78]

Crysis 3 and Farcry 3 are not really "GE" titles. They are more sponsoring titles.

Tombraider is a key AMD GE title with the TressFX technology showcase. its just plain ridiculous that AMD can't beat Nvidia on a title they worked closely with the developer.

 

[boxleitnerb]

AMD contributed to one of the best pc titles lately, and they give it free with their GPUs. Nothing to be embarrassed about

I love that 2x, 4xSSAA is becoming standard with AMD titles.

I don't. Why? Because the SSAA AMD is promoting is OGSSAA - the most inefficient SSAA there is. SGSSAA looks massively better at higher or the same performance. With ingame SSAA for example in Sniper Elite V2, Sleeping Dogs and Tomb Raider, I can still see quite a bit of shimmering. SGSSAA would be a much better solution. Curiously, AMD seems to be working on this in their latest SDK. I hope it'll pay off, soon.

 

[wand3r3r]

TressFX looks pretty neat on the hair. Is that all it does? (I've gathered that is about all?) Edit. Now I see the 40+ page thread on this that I've been ignoring. XD

It reminds me of physx, just a tack on thing. Physx is gimmicky and just adding a few curtains waving in the breeze and scraps of rock that bounce and then lay above the ground before fading away isn't doing much to improve IQ.

 

[f1sherman]

I don't. Why? Because the SSAA AMD is promoting is OGSSAA - the most inefficient SSAA there is. SGSSAA looks massively better at higher or the same performance. With ingame SSAA for example in Sniper Elite V2, Sleeping Dogs and Tomb Raider, I can still see quite a bit of shimmering. SGSSAA would be a much better solution. Curiously, AMD seems to be working on this in their latest SDK. I hope it'll pay off, soon.

They are not promoting OGSSAA, just giving it as an option and free of any down-sampling hassle. 4xSSAA is by far the single best IQ setting in Tomb Raider, and proly the most expensive too.

SGSSAA otoh is quite nice, but if you want top quality, why not ask for rotated grid SS like in 8xSQ(4xSSAA + 2xMSAA) (AMD Cata SSAA??) . But while waiting for superior aa, 2x, 4xSSAA is there for everyones convinience.

Mediocre feature that gets implemented is better than superior one that never gets released , right?

 

[railven]

TressFX looks pretty neat on the hair. Is that all it does? (I've gathered that is about all?)

It reminds me of physx, just a tack on thing. Physx is gimmicky and just adding a few curtains waving in the breeze and scraps of rock that bounce and then lay above the ground before fading away isn't doing much to improve IQ.

Give Batman: AC a whirl, if that doesn't sell you on what PhysX can do for immerssion, nothing will.

 

[boxleitnerb]

They are not promoting OGSSAA, just giving it as an option and free of any down-sampling hassle. 4xSSAA is by far the single best IQ setting in Tomb Raider, and proly the most expensive too.

SGSSAA otoh is quite nice, but if you want top quality, why not ask for rotated grid SS like in 8xSQ(4xSSAA + 2xMSAA) (AMD Cata SSAA??) . But while waiting for superior aa, 2x, 4xSSAA is there for everyones convinience.

Mediocre feature that gets implemented is better than superior one that never gets released , right?

AMD and Nvidia use the same grid for SGSSAA. I've confirmed this by the use of the FSAA viewer a couple of months ago. I don't know if the proper term for this grid is SGSSAA or RGSSAA - anyway the quality is much better in my opinion.

Problem is that it requires MSAA to begin with, and that doesn't work well or at all with many current engines

 

[f1sherman]

Well 8xSQ destroys 4xSGSSAA + 4xMSAA, so I am guessing that's a proper RGSSAA.

Tested in Deadlight, Dishonored and HL2. Mucho expensive though

Oh yeah and AMD uses SGSSAA, forgot that 1 - thx

 

[AnandThenMan]

I'll take those numbers with a healthy dose of salt, but if accurate very embarrassing for AMD. I completely agree with the following quote though, and for me it is one of the best games I've ever played hands down. I hesitate to call it the absolute best I've ever played but honestly it is close.

It appears that Tomb Raider is helping lead the PC gaming industry onward. It is a game that demands more powerful, and faster hardware. The Crystal Dynamics team and AMD stepped up big when creating the TressFX graphics option. We commend AMD for making it a DX11 feature using DirectCompute which benefits both AMD and NVIDIA users, as well as other DirectX capable GPUs. AMD did not lock out anyone from experiencing this new technology, it stuck to open standards to accelerate this affect, helping the game overall and moving the gameplay experience forward. It is good to know that anyone can enable TressFX and experience hair technology like we've seen in tech demos; finally this technology has come to games, it's been a long wait.

 

[Dankk]

I'll take those numbers with a healthy dose of salt, but if accurate very embarrassing for AMD. I completely agree with the following quote though, and for me it is one of the best games I've ever played hands down. I hesitate to call it the absolute best I've ever played but honestly it is close.

Absolutely. I know this is the Video Card forum; but if anyone here has the time, do yourself a favor, sit down and play Tomb Raider. It really is an incredible game. Theb quality of the storyline, characters, and atmosphere far exceeded my expectations. And that's on top of the wonderful gameplay and graphics.

AMD contributed to one of the best pc titles lately, and they give it free with their GPUs. Nothing to be embarrassed about

I love that 2x, 4xSSAA is becoming standard with AMD titles.

Agreed. :thumbsup:

 

[AnandThenMan]

Absolutely. I know this is the Video Card forum; but if anyone here has the time, do yourself a favor, sit down and play Tomb Raider. It really is an incredible game. Theb quality of the storyline, characters, and atmosphere far exceeded my expectations. And that's on top of the wonderful gameplay and graphics.

The game to me feels like a great movie that I'm a part of, including the visuals they are really amazing. It's not just one thing, it's how it all comes together, the fluid hair just adds to that. I was also not expecting the game to have such emotional weight behind it.

On AMD allowing the game to run equally well on all hardware, this is a commendable thing and great for ALL gamers. But from a marketing and sales perspective, probably a mistake. I am against divisive practices that have been continually practiced and mastered by Nvidia, but they work for the companies bottom line.

 

[boxleitnerb]

Well 8xSQ destroys 4xSGSSAA + 4xMSAA, so I am guessing that's a proper RGSSAA.

Tested in Deadlight, Dishonored and HL2. Mucho expensive though

Oh yeah and AMD uses SGSSAA, forgot that 1 - thx

8xSQ is an Nvidia exclusive mode (2x2 OGSSAA + 2xMSAA). Not bad, but 4xSGSSAA is always better, especially against specular aliasing, and has a smaller performance hit. And it only works up to DX9 afaik.

 

[SlowSpyder]

Great job by Nvidia getting the driver fix out quickly! Performance is much improved. It is also really good to see that it would seem AMD did nothing to cripple a competitor's GPU.