Technical Department of the publication Eurogamer presented a large-scale analysis of one of the flagship new-generation console titles Playstation 5 – Horizon Forbidden West. This is a direct continuation of the role-playing adventure game released in 2017 Horizon Zero Dawncreated by the forces of the team Guerrilla games.
Specialists Digital foundry remained delighted with the visual performance Forbidden westdemonstrated in the trailer, and noted the key points in which the engine Decima engine made a significant step forward.
Below we have written out the main points of analysis for you.
- In his new game, Guerrilla Games paid special attention to vegetation. Now the tree crowns and grass in a realistic and natural way react to the blows of the wind. This pattern of behavior of greens can be observed throughout the entire video, with the exception of only one small scene where the characters tame a monster, but this can now be explained by the fact that the game is still far from release.
- Detailed rendering of shadows and textures is now taking place not only in the immediate vicinity of the heroine, but also at a sufficient distance. At the same time, the shadows are drawn noticeably more complex, the same can be said about the previously mentioned vegetation, which is noticeably overgrown with details.
- Due to technical limitations caused by the weakness of the PlayStation 4 GPU, the Horizon Zero Dawn developers made some compromises – the sky and all the visual effects associated with it were quite static. However, now, thanks to the power of the PlayStation 4 iron, in Forbidden West, authors can afford to create really impressive images, for example a funnel of voluminous clouds that are displayed in extremely high resolution, while avoiding the appearance of any visual errors and irregularities. It is noteworthy that Guerrilla Games talked about the new cloud rendering technology in 2017 – the technology is called NUBIS.
- Another important point is how the updated Decima toolkit allows you to work with water, and especially with waves. The Horizon Forbidden West trailer demonstrates atypical detailed waves that physically reliably break on rocks. It is also curious that, as in the case of vegetation, water effects do not lose in detail even at a great distance. Nevertheless, now Digital Foundry experts cannot confidently say which way Guerrilla Games decided to go – a full-fledged fluid simulation or a mass of pre-prepared detailed animations that are used in the necessary scenes and locations. In any case, experts say, it is noticeable that the developers approached the water very carefully, and individual techniques look like a direct continuation of the foundation laid back in Death Stranding along with tar lakes, which we could observe in that game.
- As for the three-dimensional models of characters, here it is required to look at the picture as carefully as possible. Firstly, the number of polygons has noticeably increased, which is obvious, for example, on Eloy’s ears. Where in the original game there were noticeable sharp corners on her ears, in the new project their shape looks as round as possible. The next moment is the hair on the heroine’s neck, which has become a small Internet meme. Such details, even in spite of their realism, are a very rare guest in modern games, since the limitations of iron do not favor similar translucent textures, even for central characters.
- Forbidden West has a lot more shaders for different types of materials. Metal, for example, is displayed in one way, and the pearl shell of a small crab offers a completely different effect. The same applies to various unique animations inherent in all kinds of objects of the game world, including schools of fish that behave in a different way, even within the framework of a single scene.
Despite the general praise, Digital foundry cannot say with certainty that the frames shown in the trailer are a reliable display of the graphics that users will receive directly in the gameplay. Many assets, including the surface of a sandy beach and its crab inhabitants, look overly detailed and resemble materials prepared specifically for use in cutscenes.
It is also worth considering that the lighting methods that we observe in the video Horizon Forbidden West, are most often used precisely in production rollers to set the correct accents on separate elements and their physical properties.
Ray tracing technology, which seems to be a continuation, deserves mention. Horizon not used to create naturalistic reflections – in a video, reflective surfaces, namely water, have prefabricated properties.
Release date Horizon Forbidden West should take place next year only on a new generation console Playstation 5.
See also: “When there is no money on the PlayStation 5”: An unusual stone in the form of a gamepad surprised the players.
Add to our Telegram channel via the link or search for it manually in the search by name gmradost. There we publish, including that which does not fall into the news feed.. Also subscribe to us in Yandex.Zen, Twitter and VK. And do not forget that we have a dark theme and a ribbon instead of tiles.
