South of Midnight - Xbox Series X|S + PC Tech Review - Unreal Engine Meets Stop Motion Style
- Thread starter RedC
- Start date
vaibhavpisal
Member
Looks well optimised, fairly polished title.
adamsapple
Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
- Third game from Compulsion, each title has a unique visual style
- Refreshing to have a guided experience in deluge of open-world games
- Game seems to use Unreal 4, not Unreal 5
- All cut-scenes run at 30fps with certain elements running at half-refresh ala Spider-Verse
- Stop motion effect is convincing at creating an 'other-worldly' effect
- Gameplay runs at 60fps but running and enemy animations employ the same effect
- However, there is a toggle to disable the effect during game-play on both console and PC
- Series S and X both run DRS with Unreal's TAA to up-scale
- SX: DRS 4K between 1080p and 2160p
- SS: DRS 1080p between 540p and 1080
- Series S Image quality can take a hit and look blurry but most chapters hold up well
- Most effects are the same with depth of field taking a hit on Series S due to lower resolution
- Textures, AO etc are the same. Shadow quality take a minor drop on Series S
- PC version at 4K/Ultra has shadow quality being the main divider between SX and PC
- PC supports DLSS and frame-gen.
- 4080 is comfortably at or above 60 but frame-gen can make it go north of 100
- Minor stutter / streaming hitches present
- Consoles both target 60fps with V-sync and seems to stick to both decently
- Worse drops seen to low 50's but well within the VRR range
- Single digit streaming drops also seen infrequently
- The 30fps cut-scenes suffer from uneven frame pacing, however
Verdict:
- Well optimized with a single mode for consoles, either is recommended but Series S can suffer from worse image quality by comparison.
- Refreshing to have a guided experience in deluge of open-world games
- Game seems to use Unreal 4, not Unreal 5
- All cut-scenes run at 30fps with certain elements running at half-refresh ala Spider-Verse
- Stop motion effect is convincing at creating an 'other-worldly' effect
- Gameplay runs at 60fps but running and enemy animations employ the same effect
- However, there is a toggle to disable the effect during game-play on both console and PC
- Series S and X both run DRS with Unreal's TAA to up-scale
- SX: DRS 4K between 1080p and 2160p
- SS: DRS 1080p between 540p and 1080
- Series S Image quality can take a hit and look blurry but most chapters hold up well
- Most effects are the same with depth of field taking a hit on Series S due to lower resolution
- Textures, AO etc are the same. Shadow quality take a minor drop on Series S
- PC version at 4K/Ultra has shadow quality being the main divider between SX and PC
- PC supports DLSS and frame-gen.
- 4080 is comfortably at or above 60 but frame-gen can make it go north of 100
- Minor stutter / streaming hitches present
- Consoles both target 60fps with V-sync and seems to stick to both decently
- Worse drops seen to low 50's but well within the VRR range
- Single digit streaming drops also seen infrequently
- The 30fps cut-scenes suffer from uneven frame pacing, however
Verdict:
- Well optimized with a single mode for consoles, either is recommended but Series S can suffer from worse image quality by comparison.
Last edited:
Bumblebeetuna
Member
Haven't noticed any performance issues on the Series X, game runs very well.
adamsapple
Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
Have you noticed any streaming issues?
One of the reviews said they noticed some texture streaming delays on the console version. Not sure how old their review build was and if those issues have been fixed in any day 0 patches.
Shaki12345
Gold Member
Another win for GamePass. Footage won me over. Installing now.
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FalconPunch
Member
Looks pretty cool. Might check this out when it's on sale.
adamsapple
Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
The frame pacing issues on the 30fps cut-scenes seem like a bummer, wish the scenes were also 60fps.
DenchDeckard
Moderated wildly
Looks pretty dang good. Deffo going to give this a play at some point.
The only time they found it dropped below 60 was in a specific area during a storm scene.
It's a very well-optimized game with good IQ. The fact that they don't see the need to offer more than just one mode speaks volumes about how they understand they've done their own optimization work. Not just on XSX/S, but it seems to work well on PC as well.
DanielG165
Gold Member
Super well optimized game, this is, and across all platforms. This is one I can get close to maxing out on my PC with headroom to spare, and the Series X seems like it crushes this game with no issue. Good stuff. Well done by the devs and how well they understand how to optimize for different hardware.
I'll personally be leaving the "stop motion" effect toggled on.
I'll personally be leaving the "stop motion" effect toggled on.
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Self_Destructive
Member
Colin Penty from The Coalition worked on optimizing this game up to 60fps on Series consoles.. so that's good to see. He's a part of Microsofts Xbox technology group meant to help first parties optimize their games.
adamsapple
Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
That's not a bad thing, similar to how Sony used their ICE team to help out devs back in the PS3.
OmegaSupreme
advanced basic bitch
540p on the s? Christ on a cracker. It'll be funny if this comes to switch 2 and looks better than that.
Gambit2483
Member
Switch 2 has DLSS so it's very well possible