Quality/Performance Issues in Assassin's Creed: Unity [WCCF]

[f1sherman]

Ya I understand that I was just saying in general.
And if that's the case, and downsampling doesn't add that much, what dosen't keysplayr's video look like that?

Because none of the screenshots keysplayr or escrow have posted look anything like those 3 pics and they're at 19x12

Again, the beauty in these 3 images, well first two anyway, is not in the fine detail,
but in overall lighting, lighting volume, fine shadows, big shadows, and light-dark contacts.

That is how I see them at least.
Also, the game does ramp up in fidelity in cutscenes and that is when best pics can be taken

@RS

Those are really nice shots. I have always been impressed by Project CARS.
Imagine if/when they implement physically based shading and rendering

 

[tential]

Again, the beauty in these 3 images, well first two anyway, is not in the fine detail,
but in overall lighting, lighting volume, fine shadows, big shadows, and light-dark contacts.

That is how I see them at least.
Also, the game does ramp up in fidelity in cutscenes and that is when best pics can be taken

I know you had posted to talk about the lighting sorry for that I just had wanted to make a comment on general quality.

As for the bolded comment, well we aren't playing the cutscenes are we? =D

 

[Keysplayr]

No idea what this nonsense is. These are your words not mine, unless you can point out where anything like that was said ? I think your mixed up on your end here, unless you can point out where this was said ?

I'm not creating screenshots, youtube videos and long defense posts in earnest. Though many of us are using the offered screenshots and youtube videos to show how badly broken this game is with its poor visuals and ridiculous performance demands, so they've been helpful to that end. No effort exerted and not invested one way or the other Just pointing out the reality echoed in reviews and this thread for the most part.

Posts like this one (in bold) says that you think I have an agenda. That I am earnestly defending something indefensible.

A side note: You can't create videos and screenshots and long defense posts because you do not possess the game. Amiright?
If you did you'd be singing a different tune. Yeah, the bugs are heavy, but they are getting worked out, and the game is redonkulously beautiful. You saying it isn't is just giggle worthy.

 

[Keysplayr]

I know you had posted to talk about the lighting sorry for that I just had wanted to make a comment on general quality.

As for the bolded comment, well we aren't playing the cutscenes are we? =D

No, but close.

 

[f1sherman]

@tential
I don't think those are cutscenes.
And tbh ramping up is a clever way to enhance game experience, and yet remain in game(engine), without breaking immersion with CGI or prerendering

 

[tential]

@tential
I don't think those are cutscenes.
And tbh ramping up is a clever way to enhance game experience, and yet remain in game(engine), without breaking immersion with CGI or prerendering

Nah I didn't say they were I was just making a joke at the bolded lol. They clearly are ingame screenshots with HUD removed)
The best shots I have seen are all ones downsampled from 1.7x+ resolution. The ones at native 1920x1080 just look bad.

So far though, only 1 member has been able to reproduce those screens and that was a $3000 system.

If a system more along the lines of keysplayr's single GTX 980 was able to reproduce those screens (at a playable frame rate with the HUD up) then it would change my perception of this game. Ultra settings with the rendered frame at 1.5x+ looks like it would produce a great image from those screens but need to actually be able to confirm that.

 

[Grooveriding]

Posts like this one (in bold) says that you think I have an agenda. That I am earnestly defending something indefensible.

No, they don't, as I said before point out where anything like that was said - clearly you can't and it is something on your end that you shouldn't of said in the first place. You need to work on your comprehension of what has actually been said by myself and others in this thread pertaining to this mess of a game and separating it what from what is going on in your mind, sort of like your take on the state of this game.

Not sure you have anything solid to offer to the discussion in this thread any more that does not amount to fictional motives of the other participants here. I don't believe that has anything to do with the thread and should be left out of your posts.

Your videos certainly didn't make much of a case, more reinforced that the game is rather poor looking. Perhaps you can create some screenshots for us of actual game play that looks like those touched up renders a few posts back ? It would actually add something to the thread instead of derailments about beliefs that everyone who posts here is participating under a given mandate...

 

[Grooveriding]

Don't you know that if a game has 5000 NPCs and it's large, then all is forgiven? Tomorrow some indie developer will make a Pac Man game with 10,000 NPCs and 1000 levels, so it'll be the best looking game in the world and huge!!!

Yeah there is no logic there. It's about quality not quantity. If cramming a bunch of low res NPCs that look like something out of an Xbox 360 game is next-gen then I can whip up a quick screen with thousands of stick figures in photoshop :biggrin:

 

[Keysplayr]

No, they don't, as I said before point out where anything like that was said - clearly you can't and it is something on your end that you shouldn't of said in the first place. You need to work on your comprehension of what has actually been said by myself and others in this thread pertaining to this mess of a game and separating it what from what is going on in your mind, sort of like your take on the state of this game.

Not sure you have anything solid to offer to the discussion in this thread any more that does not amount to fictional motives of the other participants here. I don't believe that has anything to do with the thread and should be left out of your posts.

Your videos certainly didn't make much of a case, more reinforced that the game is rather poor looking. Perhaps you can create some screenshots for us of actual game play that looks like those touched up renders a few posts back ? It would actually add something to the thread instead of derailments about beliefs that everyone who posts here is participating under a given mandate...

You can go on pretending that we can't read between the lines. I'm ok with that.

My videos certainly weren't offered for image quality. They were offered for fps at given settings.
If I wanted to show off image quality it wouldn't be through you tube videos. It would be through screenshots with other people have supplied in plenty.

Meanwhile, I'll just sit hear a little baffled how you cannot call this game stunningly gorgeous. I mean, you're certainly entitled to your opinions, but man, at least have an opinion that is believable and doesn't leave people scratching their heads.

At any rate, I see you're busy, soo..
/peace.

 

[Grooveriding]

You can go on pretending that we can't read between the lines. I'm ok with that.

Refer back to post #282, paragraph one.

 

[tential]

Refer back to post #282, paragraph one.

People don't seem to get what we're saying so I'm going to try to break it down for the thousandth time.
People say this game looks great AND it runs well.

Yet when they say it looks great they post this:

When they say it runs well they post this:

See the MASSIVE difference in quality between the two screenshots?

Odd how we can't get an image like this

(this is from the open multiplayer beta and is just for reference since I'm too lazy to search past the first page. We all know what Crysis 3 looks like)
The game looking good AND hitting decent FPS....

 

[Carfax83]

I see no mention of this ideology being platform specific, they did mention the 30fps on PS4, but he goes on to say the 'industry' and even delves into some bifurcation on game genres, as if any genre is better at 30fps.

Source on this not being the case ?

Dude, honestly. It's very apparent that they were talking about consoles only. AC Unity still runs at 60 FPS on PC last time I checked, and so does Far Cry 4..

Again, locked frame rates on PC don't make sense, because the platform is open, settings variable, and the hardware is constantly evolving. On consoles, locked frame rates make much more sense because it's a closed and static platform with invariable settings.

To do 60 FPS on consoles would require way too many concessions if they want to do any kind of cutting edge title. Even at 30 FPS, some games on the PS4 and Xbox One have performance issues, let alone 60 FPS..

 

[Grooveriding]

Dude, honestly. It's very apparent that they were talking about consoles only. AC Unity still runs at 60 FPS on PC last time I checked, and so does Far Cry 4.

But it's not apparent, especially not with statements like this;

"At Ubisoft for a long time we wanted to push 60fps," Guérin said. "I don't think it was a good idea because you don't gain that much from 60fps and it doesn't look like the real thing. It's a bit like The Hobbit movie, it looked really weird.

...

"30 was our goal, it feels more cinematic.” said Amancio. “60 is really good for a shooter, action adventure not so much. It actually feels better for people when it's at that 30fps. It also lets us push the limits of everything to the maximum.

It would nice to believe that developers making games wouldn't believe hogwash like this, but they are pretty clear that they equate playing a game to the experience of watching live action cinema. As well that certain genres are actually better at 30fps.

I agree 30fps makes no sense, not just on PC, at all. Certainly due to hardware limitations and how unoptimized this game is you'd expect 30fps on console, but never, ever is it better to be at 30fps than 60fps.

Scary stuff, but not surprising from the devs who created this mess of a game.

 

[Silverforce11]

People don't seem to get what we're saying so I'm going to try to break it down for the thousandth time.
People say this game looks great AND it runs well.

Yet when they say it looks great they post this: [Slideshow SSAA 4K rendered scene with mods]

When they say it runs well they post this: [Their own screenshot]

See the MASSIVE difference in quality between the two screenshots?

Posting special rendered scenes to claim the game looks awesome & runs well when in fact, their own gameplay scenes look like out-dated blurry crap is a common tactic of those too biased to remain logical.

Here's a clue, you don't have to defend Ubi just because you like NV's GameWorks. You need to demand better from them. They are charging full premium AAA pricing for their PC games, demand special PC quality treatment.

 

[Spjut]

Haven't seen this posted yet, Digitalfoundry's finished analysis
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2014-assassins-creed-unity-face-off

 

[RussianSensation]

What I don't agree with is the reason cited, about 30 FPS being more "cinematic." That's seems like it's just a placating gesture to console gamers to temper the sting of basically saying that the current gen consoles just aren't powerful enough to do 60 FPS in demanding titles.

For nearly 2 weeks now you keep ignoring that you can't hit 60 fps consistently on the PC either. Just because you and Keys get 60 fps in some places of the game, doesn't mean that the performance is consistent throughout the game. In fact, you can't get 60 fps constantly on GTX980 SLI and 5690X @ 4.5Ghz at 1080P. However, for nearly 2 weeks now you keep telling us how your 970 SLI runs 60 fps at 1440P. Come on now! You basically ignored every professional review that proved you guys wrong, what about AT's?

Ubisoft is already on Patch #3 and they admitted the game code in the game is broken/poorly optimized. So expect Patch #4 and maybe more coming. This was a $50 beta test. Glad I didn't buy this broken mess at launch.

Dude, honestly. It's very apparent that they were talking about consoles only. AC Unity still runs at 60 FPS on PC last time I checked, and so does Far Cry 4..

You are in a crazy denial phase. You can't hit 60 fps constant on the PC in Unity on any dual GPU cards at 1080P or above maxed out.

970 SLI also can't get 60 fps in FC4 maxed out at your resolution.

 

[96Firebird]

Woohoo MSAA benchmarks!

 

[Keysplayr]

RS

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALtKiniMSoM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00eqasGPGhg

980SLI FXAA. With an aging i5 2500K at 1200p. Is it so far fetched that with a higher performing higher core count CPU that 970SLI can't hit 60fps at 1440? Especially overclocked or factory superclocked model? I think it's doable and Ubi is also working on "overloaded registers" ?? So it remains to be seen if performance can be improved.
And also, 60fps is at the most difficult rendering area of the game. I can often hit 70's while climbing rooftops and parkour. The heaviest load is in the streets among the people and buildings graphic detail.

 

[RussianSensation]

Woohoo MSAA benchmarks!

Yes, what's wrong with those? Best IQ is SSAA > MSAA (sometimes SMAA > MSAA) > MFAA, then all the other garbage like TXAA/FXAA/MLAA*.

Hybrid Reconstruction Anti-Aliasing (HRAA) can be better than MSAA/MFAA but almost no games use it. It's funny how you want to ignore MSAA to prove a point.

In current state, AC Unity is unoptimized, average looking and needs many patches to come:

"Overall, it's very difficult to avoid the sense that Assassin's Creed Unity was released in an unfinished state. On PC in particular, it really feels like beta code - feature-complete, but lacking in optimisation, with bugs manifesting regularly. On console, the game is more stable, but clearly performance is unacceptable - the frequent dips to 25fps on Xbox One are jarring enough, but it remains truly remarkable that the PS4 game should drop just as often to 20fps. Last year, Ubisoft had the courage to realise that Watch Dogs wasn't ready for release and pushed the game back. The end product might not have been a masterpiece, but we didn't encounter any game-breaking bugs and performance was generally solid. We can't help but wonder how long it will take until Assassin's Creed Unity is in the same state. There's certainly a long way to go yet." ~ Nov 17, 2014 (Digital Foundry -- see link above by Spjut).

 

[96Firebird]

Yes, what's wrong with those?

The fact that you use MSAA benchmarks to try to discredit people who are not using MSAA. You don't see anything wrong with that?

I don't care how you feel about different types of AA methods. That has nothing to do with what I'm saying.

Surely you can figure this out...

 

[RussianSensation]

RS

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALtKiniMSoM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00eqasGPGhg

980SLI FXAA. With an aging i5 2500K at 1200p. Is it so far fetched that with a higher performing higher core count CPU that 970SLI can't hit 60fps at 1440? Especially overclocked or factory superclocked model? I think it's doable and Ubi is also working on "overloaded registers" ?? So it remains to be seen if performance can be improved.
And also, 60fps is at the most difficult rendering area of the game. I can often hit 70's while climbing rooftops and parkour. The heaviest load is in the streets among the people and buildings graphic detail.

You haven't tested the most demanding sections of the game then. Every review that did proves your data is not demanding enough.

"GTX 970 SLI basically gets there, though again I'd suggest dropping the texture quality to High in order to keep minimum frame rates closer to 30. Even at 1080p, I'd suggest avoiding the Ultra setting – or at least Ultra texture quality – as there's just a lot of stutter." ~ AT

The fact that SO many people are discussing how Unity runs horrible on even 970 and 980 SLI setups is evidence enough that the game is an unoptimized turd. Even Ubisoft developers acknowledged it now and are working on a code re-write.

 

[tential]

RS

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALtKiniMSoM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00eqasGPGhg

980SLI FXAA. With an aging i5 2500K at 1200p. Is it so far fetched that with a higher performing higher core count CPU that 970SLI can't hit 60fps at 1440? Especially overclocked or factory superclocked model? I think it's doable and Ubi is also working on "overloaded registers" ?? So it remains to be seen if performance can be improved.
And also, 60fps is at the most difficult rendering area of the game. I can often hit 70's while climbing rooftops and parkour. The heaviest load is in the streets among the people and buildings graphic detail.

From Ubisoft

It turns out that reducing the size of the crowds does not impact the frame rate at all so they will remain the same:”We have just finished a new round of tests on crowd size but have found it is not linked to this problem and does not improve frame rate, so we will be leaving crowds as they are.”

 

[tential]

You haven't tested the most demanding sections of the game then. Every review that did proves your data is not demanding enough.

"GTX 970 SLI basically gets there, though again I'd suggest dropping the texture quality to High in order to keep minimum frame rates closer to 30. Even at 1080p, I'd suggest avoiding the Ultra setting – or at least Ultra texture quality – as there's just a lot of stutter." ~ AT

The fact that SO many people are discussing how Unity runs horrible on even 970 and 980 SLI setups is evidence enough that the game is an unoptimized turd. Even Ubisoft developers acknowledged it now and are working on a code re-write.

RS, no matter how many reviews you post, no matter how much data you post, AC Unity is amazing. End of story. It runs at 60 FPS, it looks like this

despite EVERY user's screenshots posted in thread looking like this (with no user so far able to reproduce the above screenshot with the HUD showing as their ingame play)

Your data means NOTHING RS. Anandtech's own reviewers clearly have an agenda. Jarred Walton clearly has something against AC Unity and thus posted those unflattering benchmarks.
If you don't own a game in which EVERY REVIEWER so far out has posted an unflattering review then it doesn't matter. The only way to disprove the haters is to drop $60 on an unfinished game and help Ubisoft betatest it. That's it!

/sarcasm

 

[Hauk]

..what about AT's?

horrible min frame rate for 970 SLI, from 4K to 1080p. Would love to see GPU memory usage.

 

[Carfax83]

The fact that you use MSAA benchmarks to try to discredit people who are not using MSAA. You don't see anything wrong with that?

I don't care how you feel about different types of AA methods. That has nothing to do with what I'm saying.

Surely you can figure this out...

Seriously, I'm done talking to RS about this subject. He just keeps rehashing the same argument over and over again no matter how many times I discredit them.

Using MSAA in this game, depending on the level, can result in an up to 20 FPS hit in performance. For the slight boost in image quality that you get over FXAA, that is totally unwarranted and only a fool would run the game with MSAA turned on; especially at high resolutions.

Maybe performance with MSAA will improve after the next patch, or the one after, but I doubt it. MSAA in a deferred rendering engine always results in a very large performance hit. The more complex the lighting, the greater the hit.