Beamer wrote on Nov 24, 2020, 16:33:

eRe4s3r wrote on Nov 24, 2020, 15:49:

IVIX1 wrote on Nov 24, 2020, 14:00:
The "Next Generation" moniker is a source of endless amusement to me. But then i talk to my console friends, and they literally think their hardware is state of the art relative to PC tech because its "next generation" as they've been told, and I have to inside a little bit.

It's so next-gen people can't tell apart whether they play a PS4 or PS5 version of a game....

That happens with launch titles every time around.

But the quick loading these consoles can do is nothing to sneeze at, and far beyond what PCs can take advantage of.

Yeah, most of the hardware for the next-gen consoles isn't anything special compared to top-end PCs except for the quick-access SSD tech that they have. That is going to be something that PC hardware is going to play catch-up with.

HorrorScope wrote on Nov 22, 2020, 18:24:
^Agree. The implementation does play a big factor in all of these features.

DLSS is in any version of MH by the way.
Yeah I need to do some testing with Death Strand, I also have Wolf Youngblood that game ran great either way.
Control I can get my hands on through my dads account to try out.
I do/need to make a couple hours and do a good personal DLSS test.

As for CP2077, I haven't been blown away by the GFX at this time, but getting the actual game will be the tell tale.

Ah didn't know that they added DLSS to vanilla MH. I'm tempted to reinstall it to try it out but that's a hefty download just to test out DLSS.

I've been blown away by CP2077's visuals, but in a more "noticing subtle things that have bugged me in games" sort of way. I've really liked how the various faces naturally animated and how almost photo-realistic some NPCs were when they were talking to V. While not perfect, the Joli lip-syncing tech is also pretty impressive for an open-world game where you'll be talking to hundreds of NPCs and the CDPR devs didn't have to hand-animate every single dialog.

[Edit: Caved in and reinstalled Monster Hunter: World. According to forum people, the game uses DLSS 1.0 and not 2.0 which is apparently what people want added to the game due to how blurry DLSS 1.0 is.]

This comment was edited on Nov 22, 2020, 19:13.

HorrorScope wrote on Nov 22, 2020, 15:47:

OpticNerve wrote on Nov 22, 2020, 15:30:

I completely agree. Don't discount how important DLSS can be if it's properly implemented (ie. Death Stranding). Not just from a performance standpoint but also as a form of lightweight anti-ailising. Right now a lot of games are using TAA as their default/only form of AA but the side effect is that it smudges and blurs textures and they often have to compensate by adding a form of sharpening filter. This is very apparent in games such as Red Dead Redemption 2 for the PC where there's a noticeable texture quality difference between turning on TAA compared to using SMAA (or turning off AA). Afaik, DLSS doesn't have this issue since it's a form of AI-powered upscaling/anti-ailising.

Here's a good example of the differences between TAA and DLSS from a 3DMark demo. The differences are especially apparent when the video pauses to compare the two and details pop out a lot more in DLSS mode compared to TAA mode: https://youtu.be/9ypswjQxgDc

In Monster Hunter it has DLSS and TAA with Sharpness Adjust. I feel I get a bit noticeable quality improvement in TAA vs DLSS. TAA you just need a sharpness adjust from somewhere (in game, nvdia game fx, reshade) to remove the blurriness.

I think that it ultimately depends on the method that the devs implement DLSS, TAA and even the method of their TAA Sharpness filter. To my eyes (and monitor), Red Dead Redemption 2's version of TAA was pretty awful and their TAA sharpness filter/slider added a filtered, artificial look to the textures that still looked smudged when you zoom in close to character/NPC faces and clothes. On the other hand, for TAA + Sharpness, I think that Division 2 did that particularly well and the textures seemed sharp and crisp with TAA/Sharpness turned on.

I haven't bought Monster Hunter's expansion so I don't know how well their DLSS implementation is, but Death Stranding's version of DLSS was excellent and I think that's the high standard when it comes to how things should be if you add in DLSS to a PC game. I've heard that Control is also a good example of DLSS but don't have that game to test out. Most likely CP2077 will have a TAA + Sharpness option since that combination has been very popular in games lately due to the light performance hit when using TAA. I think that for a game like Cyberpunk 2077 where you often talk to NPCs and have their faces right up to yours, having the best form of AA that doesn't blur the textures will be important for visual fidelity so unless their version of DLSS sucks, I'll most likely be using that.

This comment was edited on Nov 22, 2020, 17:52.

PropheT wrote on Nov 22, 2020, 14:53:

1badmf wrote on Nov 22, 2020, 06:17:
if ray tracing is the goal then stay away from AMD this gen. this is their first attempt at raytracing hardware and it shows. in benchmarks that i've seen it 2x to 3x slower than comparable nvidia. if you can live without RT then AMD is a good deal - $50ish bux cheaper like for like for comparable performance. might be a driver thing, but i doubt a driver fix could improve performance by 100 to 200%

It's not just raytracing, though, there's also DLSS. Once DLSS is involved, Nvidia's cards are getting close to double the framerates of comparable AMD cards right now, too. So it's not just RTX with Cyberpunk; it's also the performance increases of DLSS, and if things hold out to be the same for the game as they have for other titles that were tested the performance difference between AMD and Nvidia is gigantic in Nvidia's favor.

AMD's a solid competitor with no raytracing and no DLSS. But RT is getting more common, and DLSS isn't rare with big titles, either.

I completely agree. Don't discount how important DLSS can be if it's properly implemented (ie. Death Stranding). Not just from a performance standpoint but also as a form of lightweight anti-ailising. Right now a lot of games are using TAA as their default/only form of AA but the side effect is that it smudges and blurs textures and they often have to compensate by adding a form of sharpening filter. This is very apparent in games such as Red Dead Redemption 2 for the PC where there's a noticeable texture quality difference between turning on TAA compared to using SMAA (or turning off AA). Afaik, DLSS doesn't have this issue since it's a form of AI-powered upscaling/anti-ailising.

Here's a good example of the differences between TAA and DLSS from a 3DMark demo. The differences are especially apparent when the video pauses to compare the two and details pop out a lot more in DLSS mode compared to TAA mode: https://youtu.be/9ypswjQxgDc

The Half Elf wrote on Nov 21, 2020, 18:28:

RedEye9 wrote on Nov 21, 2020, 18:09:
They might as well delay the game for another 90 days so it can support Ray Tracing upon release. /s

Ok so here's the Elephant in the Room question. The hardware SEEMS great, but it never seems to be hardware issues over driver issues. Has ATI/AMD finally gotten over this issue to the point where I would switch my loyalty to AMD? Cause I currently have a 1080TI, the 3070's are looking super sexy right now, and with Ray Tracing now in full swing, should I wait to see if AMD can pull it together?

I was fortunate enough not to have many driver issues when I was an AMD videocard user. Anytime I did have any issues, rolling back to older drivers helped placate things until AMD released updated drivers or hotfixes.


As for your second question, I was debating the pros and cons between going AMD or Nvidia with this round of GPUs in preparation for my new Cyberpunk 2077 rig. I was leaning more towards Nvidia since CP2077 is going to support Nvidia's DLSS 2.0 and the recent GPU benchmarks from both companies leaned more heavily towards the NV 30xx series in regards to Ray Tracing performance. Plus this announcement puts more of a stamp on it if you want RT effects in CP2077 right off the bat. DLSS + RTX seems like it would be a good combo to have for CP2077. If you don't care about Ray Tracing at all, then the AMD videocards might be more tempting (especially if you can grab one).

In the end, it was ultimately decided for me since it's so damned hard to get ahold of NVidia or AMD's newest line of GPUs. Fortunately EVGA's queue offered one up for me and I quickly snatched that up and I don't have any regrets yet. The biggest con at the moment is that it does get hotter under a full load than my last card (a 1080t) but adjusting the fan curve to be a bit more aggressive helped that immensely and so far, so good.

Sweeeet. I got lucky by signing up for the notification/queue thing from EVGA and grabbed a RTX 3080 (this sucker runs HOT) and I should be getting a Ryzen 7 - 5800x from Amazon on the 11th to prepare for CP 2077. It's a shame that they didn't list the framerate that these specs are aiming for though, but just the idea that I could potentially run things at max/near max settings has me amped. It's been ages since I've been above the curve when it comes to PC hardware for gaming.

I just really hope that the game's not a buggy mess on release though.

Hornet303 wrote on Nov 19, 2020, 16:54:

The Half Elf wrote on Nov 19, 2020, 15:22:

Rhett wrote on Nov 19, 2020, 12:30:
Shadowlands and Black Ops both set new sales records against previous entries, sadly... Shadowlands looks kinda promising, but anything's better than the current expansion at least. Black Ops looks like a big step back though.. not sure why people are buying into it...

Shadowland Pre-patch event..... was..... I don't want to say a complete and utter disappointment, because that would be elevating it way above it's station. The money and dev is all going to Call of Duty Franchise and at this point Blizzard (with or without Covid) is indeed circling the drain.

Blizzard needs to figure a way to buy itself back and get away from Activision before it's too late.

For the sake of conversation, I don't see how Blizzard can survive on its own right now. They need the COD money to help support the development of new games, that don't seem to be coming out anytime soon! It's fucked, but if they don't focus on the cash cow, none of the other cows will get fed and Blizzard is just about out of cows! Is WoW still printing money?

In my mind, Blizzard used to excel at creating games that appealed to everyone. Every Blizzard game was highly anticipated! Now, I don't care about Hearthstone, and I haven't played WoW since the second expansion pack. Overwatch was great, but fell out of love after level 40 or so. So the only thing I'm interested in is either Diablo 4 or potentially some game I'm unaware of. I'm sure Covid is not helping the situation.

Yeah, I'm getting Bioware vibes from current-day Blizzard. Back in their heyday, whenever both companies released games they were insta-buys for me and my friends. Sadly that is no longer the case and I'm going to wait for reviews for both Overwatch 2 and Diablo 4.

The Half Elf wrote on Nov 17, 2020, 21:15:
I am hearing people having issues with the combat, is it better/worse then the combat used in Origins/Odyssey?

It's different. In a way, they took Odyssey's combat system, but gave it a Dark Souls/Seikiro-lite'ified makeover (but not as frustrating unless you actively seek out enemies of a *much* higher power level than you) where mastering dodging and/or parrying can give you a huge advantage in combat. They also removed the cheesy life-regen and you have to use health "rations" that you find from bushes or food laying about. I do think that the combat changes are going to be divisive to fans since it's probably the toughest it's ever been in an AC game (which isn't saying much tbh) but that's not to say that there aren't builds that allow you to completely decimate enemies that should be much tougher than you. Part of the fun for me is finding the combination of weapons and perks that worked when I was seeking out tough enemies (higher power Zealots) and fighting them.

They also dramatically scaled waaaay back on the amount of weapon and armor loot that you get compared to Odyssey. Now there's only a handful of gear (each with a certain perk bonus or set bonuses that they provide) that you just constantly improve by finding materials to do so. They also changed the character skills/stat system. Active skills are now skill pages that you seek out as treasure in the world and stats/perks are now points you spend upon leveling up in a big maze of a skill tree ala. Path of Exile. Some perks that you can unlock are amazing such as being able to dual-wield any 2-handed weapon or slowing down time whenever you successfully dodge a melee attack.

I've found the new combat system a nice chance of pace but am too early in the main storyline to make an informed opinion about the plot and writing. So far, the characters are more likable and interesting than Odyssey and Origins though. I also like how they changed up how "side quests" work in that they're short bites of a quest that gives you a bit of insight and glimpses of NPCs in this world rather than drawn out affairs that force you to travel back and forth across the map. If you want an epic quest, do the main mission(s). Want something short to do to have fun? Do a World Event (aka. Side Mission). I'm enjoying Valhalla so far but I do think that there are some QoL changes that they need to implement and a bunch of bugs to fix.

This comment was edited on Nov 18, 2020, 02:46.

According to the Creative Director of KSP2, his recent forum post says that it's going to be
delayed till 2022.

This comment was edited on Nov 6, 2020, 04:22.

For any other studio, I'd be pretty wary of an Early Access game, but this is Larian Studios. I highly doubt that they're just going to cut and run with our money. Plus, I fully expect them to actually take player feedback to heart when it comes to BG3. They did the same thing with D:OS2 and the player feedback they got during EA/Kickstarter seemed to have helped them tremendously when it came to gameplay elements, UI issues and class balance.

As mentioned by another poster above, it's always a worry when developers become too narrowly-focused when it comes to their game (Anthem anyone?) and that they lose sight of what the average player thinks of X and Y features, UI elements or issues. I can see Larian Studios treating BG3's Early Access as they did with D:OS2's Early Access to take into account player feedback so that they can make adjustments and changes to things that urgently need to be changed asap.

Also, given the stuff that they're mentioning in their blog about the various elements the studio is keeping track of (the type of characters that players are making; where, which and how often party members are dying, etc.) it seems like the studio is taking advantage of the varied and wide EA player-base to keep track of what needs to be tweaked. Stuff that they wouldn't be able to know of if they relied on a small team of internal testers who probably know the game like the back of their hand at a certain point.

EUTHANIZE wrote on Oct 3, 2020, 13:39:
I really hope the multiplayer mirrors the original BG games where each player can save their characters to their own computer and not DOS2 where only the host saves all characters. I haven't seen any mention of this in the news leading up to release so I worry it will be the latter.

I'm thinking it'll be similar to how DoS1 and 2 co-op was handled in that it was a self-contained session. Co-op players could create characters in DOS2 but were able to select which character(s) to control at any time and saves were saved to the host's computer. I'd be surprised if Larian deviated from that system since people seemed mostly happy with it in DOS 2.

maddog wrote on Oct 2, 2020, 18:33:
I'm pretty much a SP (me vs bots) type guy. Can anyone say if I can play the MP modes solo vs AI bots?

Thanks!

Yeah, there's a button for "Fleet Battles vs AI" in the multiplayer section and you can opt to play with randos (don't see an option for inviting friends though) or solo with AI squadmates vs AI.

No option for vs AI in Dogfight mode afaik.

I'm hoping that one of the post-release content is that multiplayer addition that they've been hinting about.

I wonder if it'll be just some form of deathmatch (I doubt it - that seems a bit underwhelming and wouldn't be tied up in so much secrecy), co-op-specific missions/horde mode (more probable and easier to implement), or something bonkers like a full campaign co-op mode (I can see CDPR aiming for this but it'd be such a headache to implement and to squash potential issues and bugs when you have another player involved in a decision-heavy campaign). Maybe they'll go the way of Rockstar and have a separately instanced co-op mode that has a stripped-down version of the SP map for players to rampage/co-op in.

Either way, post-release Cyberpunk 2077 should be very interesting and exciting for fans.

Beamer wrote on Aug 11, 2020, 11:35:

WaltC wrote on Aug 11, 2020, 11:20:
I find this strangely underwhelming so far. Really don't care for the low-life, living-in-the-gutter, heartless environs--where everyone is a selfish jackass of some kind.

Trump's America! BOOM!

I kid, I kid. I am with you, I'm not so much into gutterpunk, either.

From what I've seen and read, the gutterpunk aspect is usually in the lower tier/poorer part of Night City (which makes sense) but the higher up you go, the richer the people are and the architecture seems to reflect this. This is also pretty apparent in the Lifepaths section of the video where the three Lifepath background origins reflects the different sections and atmosphere around and within Night City.

The Nomad lifepath has a more western/Mad Max feel to it whereas the Street Kid has the gutterpunk atmosphere. The Corvo lifepath background shows off the rich/corperate buildings and background sections that were more sterile and cold like something from Bladerunner or Deus Ex. They're all a part of Night City and it makes perfect sense that there would be a poorer part of the city and a richer part of the city as well. I would imagine that the main questline and side quests would have you traversing through all the sections of this city but picking a certain Lifepath would show off these specific sections right off the bat.

You definitely wouldn't want to start off as a Street Kid if you dislike the gutterpunk motif

The Half Elf wrote on Aug 10, 2020, 22:31:

Cutter wrote on Aug 10, 2020, 21:59:
I'm thinking corpo for the first run. Is everyone else on board with that too?

The smart weapons look far too OP. Totes easy mode. I'll take the thermal katana for $600 please, Alex.

Nope, Probably Nomad for my first (get to drive quicker) then Street Rat.

Yeah, Nomad for my first run as well. I'm not well-versed in the Cyberpunk lore so Nomad should be a good introduction into that world. Plus I liked the atmosphere that the Nomad intro in this video set up.

Cutter wrote on Jul 28, 2020, 19:12:
Jesus, when will you trolls learn I'm virtually always right and you're always wrong?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9JDPm_QHk4

It's one thing to be annoyed or angry about the plot or characters in a game or a movie but another thing to send death threats to actors/directors/writers. If you're angry about them so much, just don't support the next project they're in. Simple as that.

Man, some people need to get their fucking priorities in life straight...

Beamer wrote on Jul 3, 2020, 11:11:
Even Westworld Season 1 kind of sucked. The plot was interesting, but they forgot to change up tone. People love shows like Breaking Bad and Game of Thrones because of the variety between scenes, which helps you connect with characters. One scene you're worried Tyrion may die, the next you're laughing as he's snarking off to someone. They had intense, heavy scenes, but balanced them with light scenes that served no real purpose other than to give you another side of a character or make you smile with them.

Westworld didn't have this. Every scene, every line, was intense and heavy. Misery and torture. You never saw anyone relax or take a single moment of joy. It made each hour feel very long.

It would have been an all-time great had they not done that.

You make a good point. The show was constantly dreary and one-note in its tone and "twists." There have been plenty of great shows that relied on heavy and dreary, atmospheric settings (Chernobyl comes to mind) but that was balanced by the enthralling acting AND fantastic writing that made you want to watch more even though that "more" consisted of more sadness, death and misery.

Unfortunately, Westworld was missing the later part of that balance and that becomes plainly clear in the second season forward when the writers relied heavily on gimmicky jumps in time to try to force plot twists. And often, those type of twists were handled much better or more gracefully in other movies or shows.

Burrito of Peace wrote on Jul 2, 2020, 20:12:

RedEye9 wrote on Jul 2, 2020, 19:48:
Oh this will be great. Can’t wait.

Sadly, no, it is going to suck. Westworld has been in a steep nose dive since the conclusion of season one. I have no faith that Fallout will be any better if Nolan and Joy are involved.

Agreed. Westworld had such potential too. Fantastic actors, an interesting concept, a big budget, a network that would fully support them and that a lot of people actually watch. And yet the show-runners just made a mess of it all and it's clear that they have no idea what they're doing plotwise.

In an ironic sort of way, Joy and Nolan are VERY fitting for a Bethesda Fallout show.

This comment was edited on Jul 3, 2020, 02:55.

Quinn wrote on Jul 2, 2020, 17:55:

OpticNerve wrote on Jul 2, 2020, 16:19:

Quinn wrote on Jul 2, 2020, 11:25:

Acleacius wrote on Jul 2, 2020, 11:14:

Quinn wrote on Jul 2, 2020, 02:52:
On the GTX 1070Ti DX12 works but feels unstable. My gut feeling always has me select DX11 over 12 based on past experiences.

No wall-running, DX12 only, no playable female protagonist... What other strange news will we get right before the finish line?

Wtf, is this about removing the female protagonist, got a link? Damn, if true it really pisses me off. I can't imagine CD Projekt Red would try to charge extra for a female protagonist but I would rather pay extra than not have the option.

Edit: NM, I see the rest of the thread on Female Protagonist.

Haha oops! That was a joke I planned to come back on about an hour after I initially posted it just to see some reactions, but I forgot xD Sorry folks, hehe

You're actually sort of right. I did read an interview with one of the devs last night since I wanted to verify your statement and they said that there wouldn't be a binary male or female character selection but that you're just "V" and can pick different body (and voice?) options.

Given that one of the major themes of Cyberpunk 2077 is being able to modify yourself in the future since you're not limited by what you're born with/as, this decision by the devs made sense to me. It's probably going to stir up a bit of controversy once the game is released.though.

Hehe that's pretty cool and well thought out by them. I did always like the different dialogue options depending on playing a male or female (shocker right, usual suspects? What a fucking misogynist I am, and fuck me I probably hate transgenders too!) but the decision and reasoning makes sense to me as well. I'll probably just play a dude (I know, the monster I am) with a small Italian penis.

That'll probably be replaced with the origin stuff in CP2077 since I'm guessing that Nomad origin characters are going to be treated like outside trash by certain NPCs whereas a player who picked the Corporate origin will be treated differently by those same NPCs. It works out fine for me since certain studios are kind of a hit or miss when it comes to writing female-centric dialog in their games so it's probably for the best (and I would imagine a lot less work for CDPR).