The Art Style and Graphics Discussion

[Tyaren]

Let's talk about the picture quality difference between 5LR and this game

(and also how they messed up Helena's face in X3) I was talking to @Tyaren about it and he said it looked like aggressive anti-aliasing putting a blur over the whole image like a thin layer of vaseline on a camera lens. I honestly prefer 5's pixelly lines over X3's poor image quality and I really REALLY hope they don't adopt this for DOA6 or the over-the-top post-processing looking like some bad sweetfx. It's pretty sometimes but it makes stuff like Nyotengu's hair look odd with bright purple and and blue spots.

Are we really sure this is not upscaled from 900p to 1080p? There should be no reason the PS4 can't handle to output a game like DOAX3 in 1080p but it looks really blurred and if we look closely enough (on her knuckles for example) there are still aliasing jaggies, just blurry ones.

For example proper aliasing:

The image is also very soft but there are no jaggies.
Here is an example of a crisper image with proper aliasing:

I don't know what kind of aliasing DOAX3 uses but it is certainly not very good. :/

 

[KasumiLover]

I don't like X3's graphics much in general, the bodies and skin are softer but the faces on some girls looks off and uncanny. That's why I haven't gotten to downloading the F2P version, Kasumi just looks unnatural to me.

 

[Tyaren]

In some of the pictures I saw in the DOAX3 or the DOAX3 photography thread Kasumi's face and eyes looked outright creepy. Completely dead.

 

[Chapstick]

Are we really sure this is not upscaled from 900p to 1080p?

This is what I was thinking. I mean

I didn't blow this up at all but it looks like it

 

[Tyaren]

This is what I was thinking. I mean

I didn't blow this up at all but it looks like it

Honestly, you didn't blow this up? o__O
Yep, that's definitely upscaled! The game seems to have a dynamic resolution. That means that it sometimes reaches 1080p but scales it down to 900p or even 800p in stress situatons. Many games on Xbone use this method, for example the new Quantum Break or the upcoming Final Fantasy XV. Don't ask why a game like DOAX3 has to run like this though...

 

[Tyaren]

The beautiful lighting of the Witcher 3:

Open world games usually don't reach the graphical splendor of smaller, more enclosed games but it is the lighting in the Witcher 3 that really pushes the overall look and atmosphere further.

 

[Jadeinchains]

The beautiful lighting of the Witcher 3:

Open world games usually don't reach the graphical splendor of smaller, more enclosed games but it is the lighting in the Witcher 3 that really pushes the overall look and atmosphere further.

Awesome pictures! Do you still play the witcher? I hope they release another game at some point because I loved playing through it.

 

[Russian-chiropractic19]

just finished SF5's story mode and a lot of the game should never be seen that close. they use all in game assets so poor textures are everywhere and there is so much clipping. its hard to take a scene seriously when Vega's braid starts vibrating constantly.

fun, but by no means pretty.

 

[KasumiLover]

just finished SF5's story mode and a lot of the game should never be seen that close. they use all in game assets so poor textures are everywhere and there is so much clipping. its hard to take a scene seriously when Vega's braid starts vibrating constantly.

fun, but by no means pretty.

Vibrating braid? Huh, that seems to be the trend in current Gen fighters, Kasumi's does the same thing, must be a way to stabilize the hair and prevent clipping. The game's never been a looker imo, good physics and nice detail, but it's not exactly gorgeous. Tekken definitely looks miles better than SF and it's not even finished yet.

 

[Tyaren]

just finished SF5's story mode and a lot of the game should never be seen that close. they use all in game assets so poor textures are everywhere and there is so much clipping. its hard to take a scene seriously when Vega's braid starts vibrating constantly.

fun, but by no means pretty.

Don't even get me started on Street Fighter V again. D: That game is graphically so poorly optimized for the PS4 it's ridiculous. (And this is a PS4 console exclusive!) The game runs and looks like crap. Not my images:

By the way, I finally got an answer by someone who knows his stuff, what this ugly pixelated effect is. It is so called ambient occlusion:

I knew about ambient occlusion, it's some kind of diffuse contact shadowing, I just didn't recognize it as such in Street Fighter V. It can be found in most modern video games actually but this is the first time I saw it in such a low resolution. In the PC version of the game you only get that pixelated effect on the lowest settings.There is no reason whatsoever consoles shouldn't be able to handle this effect properly (they do it in other games all the time). The guy I talked about this said it was probably some kind of technical error or oversight that they should be able to fix with a patch. The only question is: Will Capcom look into it or just leave it as it is? Considering the amount of other stuff that is still unfinished in this game and that literally no one other than me ever complained about this...it will probably never happen, lol.

 

[DontForkWitMe]

AO has many forms such as SSAO which is the basic least demanding form usually used in console versions while other more advanced forms of AO like HDAO,HBAO,HBAO+, and the new VXAO(used exclusively in PC version of Rise of The Tomb Raider ) look much better. Current gen console are simply too underpowered to use the more advanced forms of AO so are stuck with ssao or no ao at all.

Heres some comparisons showing how much good AO adds to the visuals of games

Far Cry 4
HBAO+ vs No AO
http://international.download.nvidi...cclusion-comparison-3-hbao-plus-vs-no-ao.html

HBAO+vs SSAO
http://international.download.nvidi...occlusion-comparison-3-hbao-plus-vs-ssao.html

Witcher 3
HBAO+ vs No AO
http://international.download.nvidi...ive-comparison-1-nvidia-hbao-plus-vs-off.html

HBAO+ vs SSAO
http://international.download.nvidi...ve-comparison-1-nvidia-hbao-plus-vs-ssao.html

Tomb Raider

VXAO vs HBAO+
http://images.nvidia.com/geforce-co...-comparison-008-nvidia-vxao-vs-hbao-plus.html

 

[Tyaren]

Thanks, that is informative! Used right it does do a lot for more depth and plasticity of a game. But if you just can't get it right and it looks as crappy as it looks in Street Fighter V you better pass on it completely. It is the single most ugliest effect I've ever seen. Zoomed out the pixelation stays as big as it is it is zoomed in. Some characters, depending on their character model/costumes, are completely overlayed with this mess during gameplay.

 

[Tyaren]

Nuh...the DOA 5 girls are still better modelled and textured than Tekken 7's:

 

[KasumiLover]

Nuh...the DOA 5 girls are still better modelled and textured than Tekken 7's:

That's true, though I'd have to say Tekken does some things better in a way that makes the Tekken models in general look more solid.

 

[Tyaren]

That's true, though I'd have to say Tekken does some things better in a way that makes the Tekken models in general look more solid.

It's the lighting. Tekken 7's lighting mechanics are more advanced than DOA5's inflexible pre-baked lighting and shadowing.

 

[KasumiLover]

It's the lighting. Tekken 7's lighting mechanics are more advanced than DOA5's inflexible pre-baked lighting and shadowing.

That and DOA just has more well shaped and curvature then Tekken does given the focus. Tekken I noticed has better fine detail in areas like the hands(It's not perfect but much better) and hair, bangs for example are thicker, move, and don't have that weird effect where it's transparent and looks half finished. Plus some cloth effects in the new outfits and cloth/hair physics look much better and visually pleasing. DOA trumps Tekken in the body design of the characters however...well at least the girls anyway. Tekken may make them a bit bulky, but the males definitely have more passable musculature than what DOA offers, and it seems to vary depending on character instead of using the same resized and retoned torso for them like DOA does.

 

[Juihau]

So, I feel it's worth mentioning, some awesome dude on the Steam boards released a camera hack for Guilty Gear Xrd. I've been playing around with it a bit, and it's pretty neat to see how things work without camera trickery. The models actually seem to hold up at just about any angle, too, which is cool. I've not really taken any pictures with it yet, though.

 

[Tyaren]

...and hair, bangs for example are thicker, move, and don't have that weird effect where it's transparent and looks half finished.

Sorry, to tell you this, but DOA5's multi-layered alphamap hair is much more detailed and it's transparent look is actually much more costly than Tekken 7's low resolution, almost bitmap-like looking alphamaps.
This is not good looking hair:

If you would be able to zoom in more, like you can with DOA5's models, you would really see it's actually one of the worst realized hair this generation. Other games have done so much more and DOA5 is actually holding up pretty well.

I know you and Chapstick don't like Kasumi's thin open hair, but still the DOA hair is one of the best in business, even now.

So, I feel it's worth mentioning, some awesome dude on the Steam boards released a camera hack for Guilty Gear Xrd. I've been playing around with it a bit, and it's pretty neat to see how things work without camera trickery. The models actually seem to hold up at just about any angle, too, which is cool. I've not really taken any pictures with it yet, though.

That is awesome news! Please, please take some photos of the characters and post them here?

 

[Juihau]

That is awesome news! Please, please take some photos of the characters and post them here?

It's a bit awkward to take pictures of things in motion because you can't move the camera while the game is paused, but not impossible. Any characters in particular you want to see?

 

[Tyaren]

DOA has better models of course but i feel like Tekken has better lighting (and better characters designs overall). Soul Calibur has the best lighting though. DOA lighting is okay in bullshots but in game it's kind of low. Like shadows aren't as strong as in bullshots.

Tekken 7 has more advanced lighting, of course, but I don't really get what you mean by lighting/shadowing in DOA bullshots... In-game the shadowing of the PS4 and Xbone versions is pretty crisp and strong. Look at the shadows casted on Kokoro:

And this is not a bullshot since I took it myself in-game during a fight.
And this here is actually one of the first DOA5 pictures that I ever took (also during a fight) and it's from DOA5 vanilla on Xbox360: