[LTT] Assassin's Creed Black Flag benchmarked

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RussianSensation

Elite Member
Sep 5, 2003
19,458
765
126
I don't think the optimization is as bad as what you're claiming.. The game looks very nice, and has some very GPU intensive IQ enhancing technologies. HBAO+, PCCS and the enhanced God Rays are the biggest performance suckers..

But the game looks much better with those features on than off. Performance will undoubtedly improve with further driver and patch updates.

That's the point I am making. You can add ABCDE features you mentioned but the game doesn't look next generation and runs like an unpolished turd. To hit a minimum 30 fps you need an HD7970GE/770 and FX-4300 3.8ghz but a PS4 with a weak 1.6ghz Jaguar CPU and a GPU slightly faster than HD7850 2GB is locked at 30 fps at 1080P.

You need an $800-1000 290s/780s to hit 60 fps at 1600P in this game. This is just insane. This is a straight up current generation title, not next generation PC game and it's owning $500 GPUs. This is not a knock against this title per say but a general trend lately. Games like AC:BF and COD Ghosts are horribly unoptimized on GPU hardware 3-4x faster than PS4. Next gen console games should be made on the PC and then ported back to PS4/XB1. This will allow better PC game code optimization. Clearly, the awful performance of these 2 titles reflects that they were made primarily for consoles first, and for PS360 ones too.

Sure, they improved a lot compared to AC3 but that's not saying much since that port was utter trash. There should not be a single cross-platform title not made for the PC first out right now that needs GTX780 SLI/R9 290s to hit 60 fps at 1600P. We are talking about launch PS4/XB1 games. If this level of PC console port optimization continues, can you imagine what would happen with 2015 PS4 console ports on a card like 780? What are we talking 25-30 fps at 1080P?
 
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Feb 19, 2009
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Why are we even surprised that these two companies, responsible for COD and AC, both with a history of suffering consolitis... is again producing unoptimized console games?? I had a good look at the new COD running to compare it to BF4 and it looks horrible for the GPU grunt it requires to be smooth in comparison.
 

Keysplayr

Elite Member
Jan 16, 2003
21,211
50
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Why are we even surprised that these two companies, responsible for COD and AC, both with a history of suffering consolitis... is again producing unoptimized console games?? I had a good look at the new COD running to compare it to BF4 and it looks horrible for the GPU grunt it requires to be smooth in comparison.

Looks good to me.
 

RussianSensation

Elite Member
Sep 5, 2003
19,458
765
126
Why are we even surprised that these two companies, responsible for COD and AC, both with a history of suffering consolitis... is again producing unoptimized console games?? I had a good look at the new COD running to compare it to BF4 and it looks horrible for the GPU grunt it requires to be smooth in comparison.

I am not. I am surprised people keep defending both of these franchises year after year.

GTX780Ti manages 58 fps at 1080P in AC:BL but in Crysis 3 that's completely on another level graphically it hits 55 fps. HD7990 gets 59 fps in C3 but only 61 fps in AC:BF.

http--www.gamegpu.ru-images-stories-Test_GPU-Videocards-radeon_r9_290x-test-c3_1920.jpg


ACBF = 58 fps on a $700 GPU for a PS4 launch title at 1080P. D: :thumbsdown:

Looks good to me.

COD Ghosts looks good to you? You must be joking. You might want to edit your post as it is one of the ugliest 2013 3D games out this year. The game looks far worse than the now ancient Crysis 1. The textures in MP maps are are so awful you may be mistaken for playing MW3 or Black Ops 2, if not worse.

Not sure why there is a constant need to defend unoptimized 2013 PC console ports with crappy graphics and performance and outdated physics and animation system.

"Despite the solid performance metrics, when frantically running around Havana we still found some of the transitions in animation to be a little jarring. But the cause of this visual phenomenon appears to stem from the game's somewhat dated animation system, which doesn't blend individual motion captured movements together as smoothly as titles such as Naughty Dog's The Last of Us and Uncharted 3."
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-ps4-ac4-patch-analysed-in-depth

Every veteran console/PC gamer is laughing online at the current launch line-ups of PS4/XB1 games since there isn't a single must have next gen game for them. You have PS360 games with higher resolution textures and a bump in resolution and some sprinkled DX11 effects posing as next gen gaming. COD: Ghosts, ACBL, Batman AO, Need for Speed Rivals are all current generation games, not gen. When you start with low quality graphics, you can't do much even if you throw a $1000 GPU PC hardware at it. Yet, the programmers still managed to "take advantage of next gen 28nm cards" to bring them to their knees with last gen graphics. Yawn.
 
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parvadomus

Senior member
Dec 11, 2012
685
14
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Looks like this game needs driver optimizations for both AMD and NV. Specially AMD, a 650TI on par with 270X? LOL
 

el etro

Golden Member
Jul 21, 2013
1,584
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Why are we even surprised that these two companies, responsible for COD and AC, both with a history of suffering consolitis... is again producing unoptimized console games?? I had a good look at the new COD running to compare it to BF4 and it looks horrible for the GPU grunt it requires to be smooth in comparison.

I played CODG yesterday. It's beautiful. At Least have Metro:LL graphics quality, and with stunning lightining/reflection effects. Maybe its more beatiful than BF4(I have to play BF4 again to take conclusions).
 

Grooveriding

Diamond Member
Dec 25, 2008
9,147
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I played CODG yesterday. It's beautiful. At Least have Metro:LL graphics quality, and with stunning lightining/reflection effects. Maybe its more beatiful than BF4(I have to play BF4 again to take conclusions).

Post of the year right year. Ghosts looks like pure garbage. Unbelievable.
 

24601

Golden Member
Jun 10, 2007
1,683
40
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I played CODG yesterday. It's beautiful. At Least have Metro:LL graphics quality, and with stunning lightining/reflection effects. Maybe its more beatiful than BF4(I have to play BF4 again to take conclusions).

You must be blind.
 

DarkKnightDude

Senior member
Mar 10, 2011
981
44
91
I can't take anyone seriously if they claim CoD Ghosts looks better then Metro Last Light.

I played through both games. Ghosts is no sloucher, but its performance hit doesn't seem all that worth it and seems unoptimized for a CoD game. Metro Last Light is just gorgeous. The firefights are just pure beauty.
 

blackened23

Diamond Member
Jul 26, 2011
8,548
2
0
You must be blind.

I think he's being sarcastic. Ghosts definitely does look like utter garbage, of that there is no doubt. I hope he's being sarcastic because Ghosts looks worse than freaking Black Ops II which looked pretty god-awful (but was a fun game). AC IV looks way, way better and most of the reports of performance issues are from those that haven't played - it really does run fine unless you use stupid crap settings like 8X MSAA or TXAA.
 

Carfax83

Diamond Member
Nov 1, 2010
6,841
1,536
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That's the point I am making. You can add ABCDE features you mentioned but the game doesn't look next generation and runs like an unpolished turd. To hit a minimum 30 fps you need an HD7970GE/770 and FX-4300 3.8ghz but a PS4 with a weak 1.6ghz Jaguar CPU and a GPU slightly faster than HD7850 2GB is locked at 30 fps at 1080P.

I can't believe you're comparing the PS4 version with the PC version :eek: The PC version has much higher visual fidelity than the PS4 version, and also runs at a higher resolution.

You need an $800-1000 290s/780s to hit 60 fps at 1600P in this game. This is just insane. This is a straight up current generation title, not next generation PC game and it's owning $500 GPUs. This is not a knock against this title per say but a general trend lately. Games like AC:BF and COD Ghosts are horribly unoptimized on GPU hardware 3-4x faster than PS4. Next gen console games should be made on the PC and then ported back to PS4/XB1. This will allow better PC game code optimization. Clearly, the awful performance of these 2 titles reflects that they were made primarily for consoles first, and for PS360 ones too.
According to Ubisoft, the PC was the lead platform for AC IV..

It's not uncommon for PC games to have poor performance at launch. Just look at BF4.. That was a complete mess as well, and that game used the PC as the lead platform as well.

But having played both AC IV and BF4 (single player), I must say that AC IV runs much better than BF4 did at the time that I played it, which was shortly after launch. I'm sure it runs better now after some patches and a driver update though.

Also, you don't need 780 SLI or 290 CF to hit 60 FPS at 1600p. You just need to dial back some of the settings a bit. You think realistic soft shadows, the most accurate form of AO in video games and tessellated god rays would be a free lunch?

Seriously...
 

blackened23

Diamond Member
Jul 26, 2011
8,548
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I can't believe you're comparing the PS4 version with the PC version :eek: The PC version has much higher visual fidelity than the PS4 version, and also runs at a higher resolution.

Just to correct you, the PS4 version was patched and runs at 1080p native now. It received a patch on day 2 after release for the PS4... It looks very nice, although the PC version has the potential to look better.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-ps4-ac4-patch-analysed-in-depth

To add to the goodness, the PS4 version is using FXAA and looks *awesome* on a bigscreen.

Honestly, while I expect the PC only people to "rabble rabble rabble consoles suck" the PS4 is pretty darn awesome. I played BF4 on it and it looks downright amazing for a console. So does AC IV. Like I said, the PC versions have the potential to look better but I was pretty impressed by the PS4 nonetheless. BF4 also plays at a super high framerate on the PS4 @ 1080p. That said, I also played BF4 on the XB1 and it looked much worse than the PS4 version - the difference was not subtle either. Clearly the PS4 is much more capable than the XB1.
 
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Stuka87

Diamond Member
Dec 10, 2010
6,240
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Seriously though, probably has to do with throttling. They, as mentioned about 1,000 times...overclock all their cards...which is what most enthusiast do, so this gives a good example of the real world end user enthusiast experience.

This game looks good, btw. I think other than BF4 this will definitely be on my must get list.

Wait, the posted benchmarks are not stock clocks? Which means the graphs are basically worthless.

Adding OC graphs as a secondary "here is what we got" is ok. But a review should never be based on OC results only. Because its entirely subjective as there is zero guarantee. What a waste.
 

Techhog

Platinum Member
Sep 11, 2013
2,834
2
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What saddens me most about this is that it likely means that Watch Dogs will suffer a similar fate and be unplayable on my system... I'm never buying an Ubisoft game again if that happens.
 

Spidre

Member
Nov 6, 2013
146
0
0
I'm playing AC4 right now, and yes, as everyone has been saying, it definitely is not optimized. I had a +100 core overclock on my 780 ti and was running it fine the day after it came out, but once the new patch came out I've had crazy artifacting on anything above a +70 core clock. My GPU usage is only around 80% too.

Right now I'm running at the Nvidia experience recommended settings, which is awful FXAA, and it seems very choppy. I am used to 120fps, so it might not be as bad as I'm making it out to be, but I also had to turn on V-sync to get rid of an awful amount of screen tearing. In just about every other game I run with v-sync off and don't notice tearing at all.

It may not be horribly optimized 'for a port', but is that really saying much? I really don't think this game should be used for benchmarking at all unless both video drivers and game drivers can greatly improve performance.
 

BallaTheFeared

Diamond Member
Nov 15, 2010
8,115
0
71
Wait, the posted benchmarks are not stock clocks? Which means the graphs are basically worthless.

Adding OC graphs as a secondary "here is what we got" is ok. But a review should never be based on OC results only. Because its entirely subjective as there is zero guarantee. What a waste.


Which is basically what 100s of other reviewers do, what would be the point of existence?
 

el etro

Golden Member
Jul 21, 2013
1,584
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You must be blind.

I Tell all you. Ghosts is much beautiful. Have to compare again the Titles if you're saying to me that the new CoD is crap. But i'm real impressed with the lightning and reflection effects, it gives to me about to same impact LL caused to me this year(And LL is the more beautiful game i ever played).

Performance-wise Bf4 uses the hardware like no one(Looking again Bf4 feels no more Beautiful than Crysis 3 but this last never justified to me making 38 FPS in conditions i have 70 FPS on the first). Ghosts in combat scenes blows the FPS to 30-40s when cranked MSAA to 4x.


PS: Two new games i recommend too to graphics appreciators is Shadow Warrior and Alien Rage.

Post of the year right year. Ghosts looks like pure garbage. Unbelievable.

Of year right year? Well, BOPS2 are not even close to Call Of Juarez and Borderlands 2 in terms of Graphics.
 
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blackened23

Diamond Member
Jul 26, 2011
8,548
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAgc43e-zp4

Total Biscuits analysis of COD : Ghosts. I can't agree that it's beautiful, I think it's downright ugly in terms of graphics - The textures are low resolution and are no better than BLOPS 2 and in fact, BLOPS 2 has better graphics. Which is sad because BLOPS 2 is using the Q3 engine. (but I thought BLOPS 2 was a fun game).

Neither of these games compare to AC IV in terms of graphics IMO.
 

el etro

Golden Member
Jul 21, 2013
1,584
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It's not uncommon for PC games to have poor performance at launch. Just look at BF4.. That was a complete mess as well, and that game used the PC as the lead platform as well.

But having played both AC IV and BF4 (single player), I must say that AC IV runs much better than BF4 did at the time that I played it, which was shortly after launch. I'm sure it runs better now after some patches and a driver update though...

AC running better than BF4? no way! BF4 treat well the hardware like nothing since day one(As his predecessor)!


Wait, the posted benchmarks are not stock clocks? Which means the graphs are basically worthless.

Adding OC graphs as a secondary "here is what we got" is ok. But a review should never be based on OC results only. Because its entirely subjective as there is zero guarantee. What a waste.

That's why i want to see future benchmarks of R9 290X Matrix vs GTX 780 TI HOF.
 

futurefields

Diamond Member
Jun 2, 2012
6,470
32
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Rich people populating internet games forums have convinced these companies that everybody has GTX 680 SLI bare minimum.

But more seriously,

The thing with console games, is they are way more important to the developer. They make orders of magnitude more money on console gaming. It's a much more profitable business on the software side.

So the companies will take the super high precision algorithms they use on PC for "very high' spec, and they will work to come up with a less precise algorithm that looks 98% as good as the 'very high' PC spec, specifically for the console version.

But unfortunately, they will only use this algorithm on the console version. On the PC, you only have the super high precision, ultra hardware taxing 'very high' spec algorithm, or you have to drop settings. but dropping settings on PC won't look as good as the aforementioned console algorithm which is custom made to look as good as 'very high' on pc spec but using not nearly as much resources.

I hope that makes sense.
 

Grooveriding

Diamond Member
Dec 25, 2008
9,147
1,329
126
Rich people populating internet games forums have convinced these companies that everybody has GTX 680 SLI bare minimum.

But more seriously,

The thing with console games, is they are way more important to the developer. They make orders of magnitude more money on console gaming. It's a much more profitable business on the software side.

So the companies will take the super high precision algorithms they use on PC for "very high' spec, and they will work to come up with a less precise algorithm that looks 98% as good as the 'very high' PC spec, specifically for the console version.

But unfortunately, they will only use this algorithm on the console version. On the PC, you only have the super high precision, ultra hardware taxing 'very high' spec algorithm, or you have to drop settings. but dropping settings on PC won't look as good as the aforementioned console algorithm which is custom made to look as good as 'very high' on pc spec but using not nearly as much resources.

I hope that makes sense.

Battlefield 4 PC vs PS4 single player comparisons.

http://www.gametrailers.com/videos/68b5pv/battlefield-4-pc-vs--ps4-graphics-comparison

I'm not a big fan of these videos because they are so heavily compressed that you can't really see the differences. I'd prefer someone put out a brief few minutes of a side by side of uncompressed video rather than a long one like this. But, I can't miss the differences in textures, shadows and clarity between PC and PS4.

The PS4 is pretty impressive though, looks really good considering what hardware it is running on. And it's not night and day worse than a PC, just not quite as nice.
 

blackened23

Diamond Member
Jul 26, 2011
8,548
2
0
Yeah, a PC with maxed out graphics will be better - that comparison has BF4 on the PC completely maxed out. Not many "average" PC's and certainly not cheap PC's can MAX OUT BF4 at 1080p. PS4 is playing at 1080p during the SP campaign, and it looks really freaking good. The PC version can look better too. But, again, not all PC's will max BF4 out at 1080p for the same 60 fps framerate.

The PS4 version is really freaking impressive, period. There's no 400-700$ PC (including EVERYTHING, OS license, case and all) that will come close to matching that. In that price range you're looking at low end CPUs such as an AMD APU and those will not run BF4 at any decent framerate at 720p, much less 1080p. But on the other end of the spectrum, a high end and expensive PC will look better than the PS4, of this there is no doubt.

Anyway, like you said, you really can't rely on youtube videos for these comparisons. Go to a store and watch BF4 on the PS4 in person. It really does look great. I was impressed, and I didn't think I would be impressed prior to tinkering with the PS4. As per this topic, you can try AC IV on the PS4 as well. Now the PS4 version is 30 fps, but you don't really notice it on the bigscreen - yet the graphics are very nice in AC IV as well for the PS4.
 
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escrow4

Diamond Member
Feb 4, 2013
3,339
122
106
Hold on, a 7970GE gets 32/39 at 1200p, the 290X gets 43/51. What is the point of upgrading if the highest end current AMD GPU only gets 43 FPS minimum? I want at least 50FPS+. Even a 780 Ti can't crack it.
 

Spjut

Senior member
Apr 9, 2011
931
160
106
I'm tired of seeing games that still don't benefit by having more than two cores. Especially when there's a PS4 version running just fine.

It hampers performance on both old and modern systems.
 

futurefields

Diamond Member
Jun 2, 2012
6,470
32
91
it makes no sense economically for them to code to PC strengths. the games would look and run too much better than the supposed "next gen" consoles, which is where the real bread and butter lies. they have to achieve parity, more or less.