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[Lunatic_Gamer]

Launching with 30fps and 40fps quality modes, there was much wailing and anguish from console users hoping to experience the latest Plague Tale chapter at 'full fat' 60fps. It's taken months, but Asobo Studio has delivered - albeit with a range of cutbacks and compromises. Also of interest is a fully unlocked 120Hz performance mode. Tom Morgan has all of the details.

A Plague Tale: Requiem now has a 60fps option - so what's the catch?

Your wish has been granted. A Plague Tale: Requiem released on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and S in late 2022 - a true…

www.eurogamer.net

 

[Bo_Hazem]

 

[LectureMaster]

 

[adamsapple]

TL-DR

- Performance mode at 60 FPS has barely any drops (when using 60hz)
- Performance mode has low rat and NPC animations (20hz to 30hz to 60hz depending on distance from NPCs)
- Human enemies still draw at 60 FPS regardless of distance

- Aside from above, pixel count drops to 1080p on PS5|SX
- Asset quality is reduced but not really that easily noticed.
- LoD, AO, shadows also effected
- In towns entire chunks of grass and wild life (ducks etc) removed in cities.
- No difference in visual quality in performance mode on PS5|SX
- Resolution mode is not effected in the new patch.

- The 60hz lock is maintained extremely tight and only 1 instance of dropped frames noted which cleared up on the 2nd run in the same spot. (on SX)

- If you have a 120hz display, the game can run at an unlocked 120 fps.
- No visual changes when running performance mode at 60 or 120hz
- Generally between 70 ~ 100 FPS

- SX can have a 3 to 7~10 to 20 FPS advantage over PS5 depending on scenario (city, combat, one specific dream scenario tested, respectively)

Adam's addendum: Set your consoles to 60hz if you want to play a 100% locked 60 FPS version.

 

[FUBARx89]

adamsapple get on it

Edit - Nevermind. Bastard

 

[b0uncyfr0]

Its the same issue with the rat animation - why'd it have to be 30 fps?

40 or even 45 fps wouldve been better. Performance on series X is already hitting 100 fps in some areas, they were too aggresive.

 

[DenchDeckard]

Great patch on an amazing next gen game from a small studio. They nailed this patch.

Can't wait for their next game.

 

[rodrigolfp]

Damn. And they dare to charge full price.

 

[Denton]

Fantastic game. Damn those cutdowns are heavy though. No animals in streets

 

[Apocryphon]

TL-DR

- Performance mode at 60 FPS has barely any drops (when using 60hz)
- Performance mode has low rat and NPC animations (20hz to 30hz to 60hz depending on distance from NPCs)
- Human enemies still draw at 60 FPS regardless of distance

- Aside from above, pixel count drops to 1080p on PS5|SX
- Asset quality is reduced but not really that easily noticed.
- LoD, AO, shadows also effected
- In towns entire chunks of grass and wild life (ducks etc) removed in cities.
- No difference in visual quality in performance mode on PS5|SX
- Resolution mode is not effected in the new patch.

- The 60hz lock is maintained extremely tight and only 1 instance of dropped frames noted which cleared up on the 2nd run in the same spot. (on SX)

- If you have a 120hz display, the game can run at an unlocked 120 fps.
- No visual changes when running performance mode at 60 or 120hz
- Generally between 70 ~ 100 FPS

- SX can have a 3 to 7~10 to 20 FPS advantage over PS5 depending on scenario (city, combat, one specific dream scenario tested, respectively)

Adam's addendum: Set your consoles to 60hz if you want to play a 100% locked 60 FPS version.

Excellent summation and very much appreciated!

 

[01011001]

WAIT
WAIT
WAIT...

WHAT?
at 13:22 it says that the rats run at 60fps in the 120hz mode...
wtf?
then it clearly wasn't necessary to reduce the update rate of them in the 60fps mode either... so why are they 30fps in the 60hz mode?

that makes absolutely no sense to me...

also, the removed animals in the town area seems also completely unnecessary to me, given that those seem to have at least 15fps breathing room when we look at the 120hz mode

 

[MikeM]

This should make it clear to anyone that games can be 60+ fps on these consoles.

Gonna pick this up next time it goes on sale for PS over my PC because Dualsense.

 

[Skifi28]

The best thing about the update is the 40fps mode is now nearly flawless on PS5, which was nearly unplayable back at launch. Honestly, it's the best mode to play the game as far as I'm concerned. You get all the eye candy and while not 60, it's in the "smooth enough" range. The game is slow paced without manual aiming, I think it's the perfect fit.

 

[Go_Ly_Dow]

Quite a few compromises to get to 60fps, a lot of finer details such as the great texture work lost in 1080p, reduced foliage, removal of wild animals etc... along with the lower refresh rate NPCs. Seems like quite an inconsistent experience. 1440p 40fps the way to go in my opinion.

 

[GHG]

This should make it clear to anyone that games can be 60+ fps on these consoles.

Gonna pick this up next time it goes on sale for PS over my PC because Dualsense.

Wouldn't advise it.

It drops to 1080p on consoles and the PC version has full Dualsense support.

 

[Pelao]

I didn't need DF to know that the framerate was unlocked, but at least this serves to confirm it for people who for some strange reason are unable to notice performance differences.
The game finally became playable for me with this update. I tried the 40fps mode at launch, and there's no way I can be convinced that it's a valid alternative to 60fps or above.

 

[RobRSG]

WAIT
WAIT
WAIT...

WHAT?
at 13:22 it says that the rats run at 60fps in the 120hz mode...
wtf?
then it clearly wasn't necessary to reduce the update rate of them in the 60fps mode either... so why are they 30fps in the 60hz mode?

that makes absolutely no sense to me...

also, the removed animals in the town area seems also completely unnecessary to me, given that those seem to have at least 15fps breathing room when we look at the 120hz mode

I was thinking about that, and perhaps the rat count is further reduced in this mode, because 30FPS animations on a 120hz container looks very distracting. I can think about how Halo Infinite lip sync looked terrible running at 30FPS in the 120hz mode.

 

[mrcroket]

Quite a few compromises to get to 60fps, a lot of finer details such as the great texture work lost in 1080p, reduced foliage, removal of wild animals etc... along with the lower refresh rate NPCs. Seems like quite an inconsistent experience. 1440p 40fps the way to go in my opinion.

Things that you can't notice unless you do a direct comparation. 60 fps is an improvement waaay more noticiable.

 

[Kataploom]

Clearly seems like the game was mainly designed for PC, runs way better on similar PC hardware without compromises on high

 

[Fafalada]

Its the same issue with the rat animation - why'd it have to be 30 fps?
40 or even 45 fps wouldve been better.

30 fps is a multiple of 2. An actual 40-45fps tick would look far more jittery without interpolation than 30, and if they had interpolation working, they'd already run them at 60 for display, and noone would know the difference.

 

[01011001]

I was thinking about that, and perhaps the rat count is further reduced in this mode, because 30FPS animations on a 120hz container looks very distracting. I can think about how Halo Infinite lip sync looked terrible running at 30FPS in the 120hz mode.

I mean sure, but if the rat count is smaller, it surely isn't at all noticeable, which would mean the additional amount of rats would be completely useless to have there...

so either the rat count is the same, or it's lower but not noticeably so,
and either way it makes no sense for the 60fps mode to suffer like this.

 

[adamsapple]

I mean sure, but if the rat count is smaller, it surely isn't at all noticeable, which would mean the additional amount of rats would be completely useless to have there...

so either the rat count is the same, or it's lower but not noticeably so,
and either way it makes no sense for the 60fps mode to suffer like this.

I think in the video he says the rat count is the same but their animation quality is reduced. If it's lower, it's probably a small margin that isn't noticeable just on a side by side.

 

[Anchovie123]

The performance overhead seems high. They should implement a dynamic resolution system.

 

[Feel Like I'm On 42]

Things that you can't notice unless you do a direct comparation. 60 fps is an improvement waaay more noticiable.

That's just not true at all unless you're someone who really doesn't care about graphics.

You don't need a side by side to notice or "feel" the downgrade. Just going from 4k/1440p to 1080p is a big downgrade for most games. Say goodbye to fine detail, texture, etc

 

[Feel Like I'm On 42]

Great patch on an amazing next gen game from a small studio. They nailed this patch.

Can't wait for their next game.

This patch sounds terrible. Those are massive cuts just to get 1080p at 60. I could see 1080p if there were NO CUTS to all the affected graphical settings but not both!

This game shows the weaknesses of these consoles whenever a game pushes the hardware beyond the typical crossgen visuals we've gotten all gen.

I also agree that this game must not be optimized well for consoles to begin with. Still disappointing.

 

[kikkis]

This patch sounds terrible. Those are massive cuts just to get 1080p at 60. I could see 1080p if there were NO CUTS to all the affected graphical settings but not both!

This game shows the weaknesses of these consoles whenever a game pushes the hardware beyond the typical crossgen visuals we've gotten all gen.

I also agree that this game must not be optimized well for consoles to begin with. Still disappointing.

It just highlights that zen2 cpus are not some wells of infinite power compared to mobile cpus from 2013.

 

[lh032]

This patch sounds terrible. Those are massive cuts just to get 1080p at 60. I could see 1080p if there were NO CUTS to all the affected graphical settings but not both!

This game shows the weaknesses of these consoles whenever a game pushes the hardware beyond the typical crossgen visuals we've gotten all gen.

I also agree that this game must not be optimized well for consoles to begin with. Still disappointing.

wait for the pro console! day 1 for me!

 

[mrcroket]

That's just not true at all unless you're someone who really doesn't care about graphics.

You don't need a side by side to notice or "feel" the downgrade. Just going from 4k/1440p to 1080p is a big downgrade for most games. Say goodbye to fine detail, texture, etc

I'm pretty sure that if you were shown a mix of frames from the game in both modes you'd have a hard time telling which one belonged to which mode. The game still looks incredibly good and is still a graphical powerhouse in the new performance mode.

And complaining about 1080p is pointless, since with modern rescaling techniques and temporal resolution the raw number of pixels is more irrelevant than the final quality. And on a TV (which is where you are going to connect a game console mainly), you will hardly notice the difference if the image reconstruction is good.

Finally, having more frames also increases the graphic fidelity, since the image is much less blurred when rotating the camera, and contributes to a better quality of image reconstruction by having more frames nearby as a reference.

 

[Fbh]

Some of the cutbacks still seem weird.
Like in the city areas they cut down the foliage, they lowered texture resolution quality, they have NPCs updating at 20-30fps unless you are standing right next to them and they even removed all the animals like ducks and chickens running around. But then the unlocked framerate mode shows those areas running at 90fps. Were all of those cuts really necessary when you are getting 30fps above target?

 

[rofif]

Pointless mode. 30 and especially 40 is perfectly fine for this game

 

[01011001]

Some of the cutbacks still seem weird.
Like in the city areas they cut down the foliage, they lowered resolution quality, they have NPCs updating at 20-30fps unless you are standing right next to them and they even removed all the animals like ducks and chickens running around. But then the unlocked framerate mode shows those areas running at 90fps. Were all of those cuts really necessary when you are getting 30fps above target?

I feel like that's another case of a developer just using their PC presets instead of actual tailoring the game to the system

 

[Dunker99]

Pointless mode. 30 and especially 40 is perfectly fine for this game

A 60+fps mode in any game is never pointless.

 

[Putonahappyface]

A 60+fps mode in any game is never pointless.

It is when it drops to 1080p on a 77 inch screen.

 

[cireza]

1080p@60Hz is the way to go as far as I am concerned. Not changing my 1080p TV for 4K that's for sure !

 

[mrcroket]

It is when it drops to 1080p on a 77 inch screen.

When it runs at 30fps on a gigantic OLED screen showing the jumps between frames.

 

[Esppiral]

Don't they say in the video that in 120hz mode the game runs uncapped above 60fps and still retaining the 60 FPS animations? Then why cut them in the 60 FPS mode?

 

[Putonahappyface]

When it runs at 30fps on a gigantic OLED screen showing the jumps between frames.

Runs at a buttery smooth 40fps for me.

 

[rofif]

A 60+fps mode in any game is never pointless.

this game is all about graphics and story. playing it at 60fps with worse graphics... meh

 

[Dunker99]

this game is all about graphics and story. playing it at 60fps with worse graphics... meh

I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree! For me, visual clarity achieved by smooth higher framerates IS the graphics. I understand there are trade-offs (resolution, LOD etc) but I just can’t do 30fps anymore.

 

[yamaci17]

This should make it clear to anyone that games can be 60+ fps on these consoles.

Gonna pick this up next time it goes on sale for PS over my PC because Dualsense.

It has fully fledged Dualsense support on PC, even with Game Pass version.

 

[Kenneth Haight]

glad they finally patched this. Still need to play the first game but have it in my backlog and will pick this up after I’m done.

 

[mrcroket]

this game is all about graphics and story. playing it at 60fps with worse graphics... meh

Even if is a game about story the movement of the camera is way more intense that in a movie, so 30 fps looks blurry the mayority of the time (unless you play only to make screenshot). So well... "worse graphics" is relative.

 

[rofif]

Even if is a game about story the movement of the camera is way more intense that in a movie, so 30 fps looks blurry the mayority of the time (unless you play only to make screenshot). So well... "worse graphics" is relative.

give me a break. It looks fine.
Even action games, everything was 30fps just few months years ago. We all played uncharted games and all other games at 30fps.... let alone slow paced game.
You can play it at 60fps if you think the downgrade is worth it. I am just saying it would not be for me

 

[mrcroket]

give me a break. It looks fine.
Even action games, everything was 30fps just few months years ago. We all played uncharted games and all other games at 30fps.... let alone slow paced game.
You can play it at 60fps if you think the downgrade is worth it. I am just saying it would not be for me

Yep that is the point, when I played these games I wish that they could have been played at 60fps and with this gen devs finally made the jump to standarized it. To be clear I'm not saying that 30 fps is unplayable but IMO 60 fps always worth the trade off. Even in narrative games. Just an opinion, like yours.

 

[Feel Like I'm On 42]

I'm pretty sure that if you were shown a mix of frames from the game in both modes you'd have a hard time telling which one belonged to which mode. The game still looks incredibly good and is still a graphical powerhouse in the new performance mode.

And complaining about 1080p is pointless, since with modern rescaling techniques and temporal resolution the raw number of pixels is more irrelevant than the final quality. And on a TV (which is where you are going to connect a game console mainly), you will hardly notice the difference if the image reconstruction is good.

Finally, having more frames also increases the graphic fidelity, since the image is much less blurred when rotating the camera, and contributes to a better quality of image reconstruction by having more frames nearby as a reference.

First of all, no I wouldn't have trouble seeing which shots are fidelity vs performance. Not with these cutbacks. Same with most people on Gaf.

Secondly-are they even using reconstruction or is it 1080p native? 1080p without upscaling sucks. You lose a ton of detail.

As far as framerate I'm not denying the importance of 60 fps at all. However, 60 fps with a scaled back looking game is still a scaled back looking game. It'll still look worse, less "new gen" than the fidelity mode at 30-40 fps even if it's more fluid. It won't feel as good to our eyes but you seem to think 60 fps somehow improves fidelity-it doesnt.

You are making some wrong assumptions I'm sorry to say. All I'm saying is these cutbacks seem too drastic considering what pa5/sx should be capable of and therefore this is disappointing update.

 

[01011001]

It'll still look worse, less "new gen" than the fidelity mode at 30-40 fps even if it's more fluid. It won't feel as good to our eyes

yes it will, it will feel way better in fact.

but you seem to think 60 fps somehow improves fidelity-it doesnt.

yes it does.

 

[jezhumphrey75]

- SX can have a 3 to 7~10 to 20 FPS advantage over PS5 depending on scenario (city, combat, one specific dream scenario tested, respectively)

 

[adamsapple]

- SX can have a 3 to 7~10 to 20 FPS advantage over PS5 depending on scenario (city, combat, one specific dream scenario tested, respectively)

 

[SF Kosmo]

I guess I'll just have to settle for playing it maxed at 100+ fps.

 

[rofif]

I guess I'll just have to settle for playing it maxed at 100+ fps.

Wow such bravery