Lost Planet Performance and DX10 @ [H]

[phide]

You have an 8800GTX. Why are you complaining?

I think I can field that.

Essentially, the complaint common among many of us is that we feel we're being shafted. Consider Lost Planet's graphical fidelity and its performance on the X360. Now, the 360's a pretty damn solid performer, but it's still quite limited compared to a modern $2,000+ gaming rig. On paper, it's almost somewhat laughable (until you look at the kickass price).

Lost Planet runs pretty damn well on the 360. It takes a fairly herculean effort to squeeze performance out of what little the 360 has to offer, and developers are getting very close to hitting a brick wall in terms of the graphical fidelity they can offer.

Now, look at the raw performance of the aforementioned $2,000 PC rig, and we can expect to run Lost Planet like fuckin' butter. Considering the visuals, Lost Planet should be a breeze for any reasonable graphics card. But, unfortunately, it isn't. Very little to no effort went into the process of optimization, and it shows.

The bottom line here is that Lost Planet adorns the "Games for Windows" logo, and that's essentially all it equates to. It's technically a game for Windows, but that doesn't mean that any effort went into making it a good game for Windows, or as Kyle said, a poster child for the capabilities of Vista, DX10 and PCs in general.

CAPCOM took whatever money they were given by Microsoft for "Games for Windows" and pocketed it (I'm assuming this is what Games for Windows is all about), rather than giving us a solid gaming experience on the PC. It's an insulting slap in the face, and I hope [H] chooses not to focus any more attention on this title. I really don't believe it deserves the attention they've already given it (though perhaps that isn't specifically the point of the article).

 

[Cyant]

100% Absolutely Correct!

Average of (5 + 10 + 5 + 5 + 100) = 25

Average of (25 + 25 + 25 + 25 + 25) = 25

Which game would you rather look at? I know the example is rather extreme...but it does reflect what is fairly important to a lot of gamers which is minimal slow down or jerkyness.

Neither because in any cases I can't stand even 25FPS =)

 

[Frosteh]

Hmm..funny. [H] seemed to review the game running at 1600x1200 4Xaa 16XAF. Sounds...pretty good to me. I really don't know what you're bitching about with Lost Planet. Seems most people are happy. Then there are those who think they know how to program and report it "bad coding" like you did with CoJ too. You have an 8800GTX. Why are you complaining?

Welcome to next gen.

It runs like crap for the visuals it offers.

 

[Miscommunication]

This should have been the title of the article to make sure people understand that this DX10 implementation does not represent DX10 future =)

Bingo. Other than that, the article was excellent as an article (the [H]ard way ). Actually the above is making it K.I.S.S., even though the conclusion states this pretty clear. The world we live in is full of assumptions and the only feasible solution is to post things "in you face". Ah well, the good thing is that there's plenty of people here who understand what's really being said and of what's about to come .

 

[zamardii]

Shitty console port. Lost Planet DX10 performance means nothing. End of story.

 

[jmackay]

Shitty console port. Lost Planet DX10 performance means nothing. End of story.

LOL, you obviously missed the WHOLE point of the article, which was to show DX10 vs DX9 in Lost Planet, nothing more, nothing less.

 

[hoboman]

just wondering, would quad core help dx10 performance? like a test with dual core vs quad core on the game?

im still a newbie so dont attack me for the comment plz

 

[Nenu]

Only if the game requires, it cant be quantified that easily.

 

[Hexen525]

Native DX10? Who wrote this article? Xbox360 is not a DX10 machine, therefore the game was NEVER a native DX10 game, but merely a DX10 port of a DX9 game at best.

 

[Citizen86]

Native DX10? Who wrote this article? Xbox360 is not a DX10 machine, therefore the game was NEVER a native DX10 game, but merely a DX10 port of a DX9 game at best.

durrrr it's already been said, the "native" is in quotes for a reason, it's simply the first game that can be bought off the shelf with Directx10 ability. Nobody said Xbox360 is a DX10 machine....

PS:

Author:
Brent Justice
Editor:
Kyle Bennett

 

[Dreknaught]

just wondering, would quad core help dx10 performance? like a test with dual core vs quad core on the game?

im still a newbie so dont attack me for the comment plz

In general the guy above is right, it all depends on how the game is written. If the game has components that can take advantage of extra cores (SupCom, Oblivion kinda) then it could help.

As far as this game goes though, I wouldn't think so.

Looking at the graphs it seems plain to me that in DX9 mode the frames scale pretty nicely. The 2900XT is doing nicely (even with AA enabled *gasp*), we'll get there in a sec. This leads us to believe we are GPU limited. I only see one spot (right after 241) where all the cards seem to try to equalize, like maybe due to some CPU bottleneck. But without being there, it could just as easily be where you come out of a cave or around a corner and it has to reload a bunch of textures.

LP was developed on the 360, which has an ATI graphics solution. So even if the architectures are nothing alike, I'm sure ATI atleast made sure the 2900 would rock in DX9 (the vast majority of peeps still have XP) in LP.

*que lights and chorus line*

The First Retail Title Supporting DX10!!!!

*kill lights, yank chicks*

DX10 is much the same, but everyone has taken a noticeable hit and the 2900 slips to caboose status. I'd guess the raw muscle of the Nvidia chips is showing itself here. But the negligible IQ improvement indicates to me that the game is just activating/reorganizing a bunch of registers without actually doing much with them. So you are incurring the performance hit the DX10 architecture entails, without realizing any of the benefits you'd get from DX10s rendering enhancements.

Because most of the people who actually have Vista (it came with their PC) not only have no intention of playing anything more demanding then Alchemy, but couldn't run anything more demanding anyway because they are running on GMA900 or something equally sad. And they aren't even pissed off about it...

Bah, I'm rambling now, sorry....

So no, I don't think a Quad would help. Atleast not anymore then the 2-3% you see in other games that can't take advantage of multiple cores.

But as usual I reserve the right to be completely wrong

 

[Devistater]

Yet another reason why the average gamer should wait to upgrade to Vista. Not really any DX10 stuff worth upgrading yet.
And surprise, surprise, most of them ARE waiting
Of course, this will change, but the question is when? What if crysis shows the same small differance between DX9 and DX10 modes? For the forseeable future, most games will have both DX9 and DX10 modes, most companies dont want to lose out on the 98%+ of average gamers who don't have DX10 cards with vista.
Or if a MUST HAVE game comes out with incredible DX10 graphical differances, that could push many to upgrade.
Games have very often been a serious force to upgrade, dating back to the original wing commander II with its heavy RAM needs, and earlier.

The ATI card didn't come and smash the competition either, what happened to all the people saying the 2900 was supposed to crush the competition in DX10? I mean the game was developed to run on ATI hardware in the xbox, why didn't they do better? And [H] even did a bunch of apples to apples comparisons, which should satisfy some of the ATI complainers comparing [H] articles to other websites. It should, but I doubt it will
I hope ATI comes back with something that can beat nvidia, the best thing for the graphics industry is competition.

It's a ported console game which had DX10 support added as an afterthought, it's just about the worst kind of example you can use for DX9 vs DX10 performance. I would rather the review clearly state that this is a ported game and was not built from the ground up to support DX10 and as such is not a good measuring stick to gauge future DX10 performance.

Actually I disagree. If this is an uber poorly optimized DX10, then it may well be EXACTLY what we should be looking at for a measuring stick. It very well might be showing what kinda FPS we can expect from games that have seriously loaded DX10 effects in a year or so.
In other words, perhaps because of its ineffeciency, it loads the system down far more than you can expect with PC designed DX10 titles, and looking at heavy loads is often far more useful than looking at things like a Quake game that might show hundreds of FPS.

At any rate, this is the only retail released out of the box DX10 game that I'm aware of. So its essentially the only measuring stick availible if you want to stick to retail released games that support DX10 out of the box to do benches.
I don't think demos or things of that nature are very good benches to use in determining DX10 performance, and even ATI said something similar when they were asking reviewers not to bench the 2900 on a demo of lost planet.

HDR was pretty ugly to the GF6XXX line, and brought with it hellishly low FPS scores.

Since when was the Geforce 6 series during the transition from dx8 to dx9?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Directx says that dx9 came out in 2002.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geforce says that the FX series is more around the time of dx9 release.
According to the same page, Geforce 6 supporting HDR came in 2004, 2 years after that.


Anyway, just a few thoughts of mine after reason the article and this thread.

 

[Netrat33]

I think I can field that.

Essentially, the complaint common among many of us is that we feel we're being shafted. Consider Lost Planet's graphical fidelity and its performance on the X360. Now, the 360's a pretty damn solid performer, but it's still quite limited compared to a modern $2,000+ gaming rig. On paper, it's almost somewhat laughable (until you look at the kickass price).

Bullshit. It really hasn't happened until now with the 8800gtx video card that a PC can out perform a 360. Most people have Dual core, not Quad Core while the 360 has 3 cores. Do you forget all the overhead a regular pc has vs a console for simply running a game? Guess not.

Lost Planet runs pretty damn well on the 360. It takes a fairly herculean effort to squeeze performance out of what little the 360 has to offer, and developers are getting very close to hitting a brick wall in terms of the graphical fidelity they can offer.

WTF? I guess you don't realize that consoles games simply get better looking and better looking throughout the years. Show me the proof where developers are saying "HEY GUYS! Where are getting close to hitting the wall in what we can offer you"

Didn't think so

Now, look at the raw performance of the aforementioned $2,000 PC rig, and we can expect to run Lost Planet like fuckin' butter. Considering the visuals, Lost Planet should be a breeze for any reasonable graphics card. But, unfortunately, it isn't. Very little to no effort went into the process of optimization, and it shows.

Are you blind? What's the problem with Lost Planet's graphics? They are quite impressive and definately an example of next generation graphics. DX10 isn't the cat's meow in this game, but that doesn't mean this game is a pushover graphically. Show me a game out now that has as much going on screen at one time.

The bottom line here is that Lost Planet adorns the "Games for Windows" logo, and that's essentially all it equates to. It's technically a game for Windows, but that doesn't mean that any effort went into making it a good game for Windows, or as Kyle said, a poster child for the capabilities of Vista, DX10 and PCs in general.

Games for Windows basically has a few things such as widescreen and controller support to earn the label. Has nothign to do with DX10. I don't think Microsoft ever said "This is our DX10 poster child" Just happens its the first game to have DX10. There is nothing wrong with this game.

And although not better, I believe Capcom has stated they are introducing a patch to truly add more DX10 features. So yes. That is shitty for announcing it like out of the box this game is a DX10 jaw dropper.

CAPCOM took whatever money they were given by Microsoft for "Games for Windows" and pocketed it (I'm assuming this is what Games for Windows is all about), rather than giving us a solid gaming experience on the PC. It's an insulting slap in the face, and I hope [H] chooses not to focus any more attention on this title. I really don't believe it deserves the attention they've already given it (though perhaps that isn't specifically the point of the article).

For DX10 features: Yes. Game: No. And Capcom has stated they are commited to making this game even better. Lost Planet I feel is NO different than Farcry when it was first released. It was a SM2.0 game that most people had a hard time running at high resolutions. Later it gets SM3 slapped on and it was the posterchild for SM3 gaming.

 

[Netrat33]

It runs like crap for the visuals it offers.

I don't see many games overing the visuals this game offers on PC.

 

[Frosteh]

I don't see many games overing the visuals this game offers on PC.

There's a decent amount of games out there I would consider better looking, but that wasn't really my point.

What I'm talking about is visuals compared to performance, the game offers reasonable graphics but with really awful performance.

Actually I disagree. If this is an uber poorly optimized DX10, then it may well be EXACTLY what we should be looking at for a measuring stick. It very well might be showing what kinda FPS we can expect from games that have seriously loaded DX10 effects in a year or so.

A badly coded port is not a good example for predicitng a well coded native DX10 game in the future. Lost planet barely uses any DX10 features anyhow, that's the whole point, even with graphics the same DX10 runs worse than DX9, which should send off alarm bells in your head prompting you to asking why is this the case when DX10 is more efficient.

We really need Crysis, and as soon and possible, I'm confident that they will offer you the ability to set DX9/10 modes but keep the graphics the same and prove there's a performance increase to be had with DX10

The real kick in the bollocks here is that lost planet isnt even a very good game, everyone I know who's played it thought it was crap :>

 

[Netrat33]

There's a decent amount of games out there I would consider better looking, but that wasn't really my point.

What I'm talking about is visuals compared to performance, the game offers reasonable graphics but with really awful performance.



A badly coded port is not a good example for predicitng a well coded native DX10 game in the future. Lost planet barely uses any DX10 features anyhow, that's the whole point, even with graphics the same DX10 runs worse than DX9, which should send off alarm bells in your head prompting you to asking why is this the case when DX10 is more efficient.

We really need Crysis, and as soon and possible, I'm confident that they will offer you the ability to set DX9/10 modes but keep the graphics the same and prove there's a performance increase to be had with DX10

The real kick in the bollocks here is that lost planet isnt even a very good game, everyone I know who's played it thought it was crap :>

Which means you're going to have a better idea of how BADLY a ground up DX10 game will be. It WILL be more demanding. Tacking on a few bells and whistles means it would be less stressful. All reviews for Crysis I've seen I recall them saying they are at 1024x768.Are you going to scream poor optimizations then too?

The only thing Lost Planet has a problem with DX10 is it doesn't really add anythign new visually now. Capcom showed earlier however that snow was supposed to do some deforming and more bullet hole impacts.

And lets be honest too. Vista Drivers are not optimized yet. They are still very young for pretty much any thing. I don't care if you like the game or not or don't liek the art direction. Fact of the matter that it IS a demanding game and has demanding graphics.

 

[Miscommunication]

I don't know if he's talking primarily about the "demands" of the game. Any shmoe can program a crappy game with poor code and suck up memory just because it's there. There are a few 15+ year old game engines that do this. A poor coded game does not always equal what a more demanding one will be like. As for Crysis, it is still very much an unknown and the only source that's said a 1024x768 res was IGN about 3 months ago IIRC. No one really knows what the resolution at E3 was at for sure, but it looked and played better at the same time. I can run LP at 1280x1024 (max res. for me ) and I get 52fps avg inside and out. Crysis looks to be able to do that, faster, and look so much better it's sad. Smart programming is what it's really all about, LP is just what a poor effort yields.

Especially if the hardware and performance specs hold true even somewhat, the game will be lovely. Sure, don't expect to run Crysis maxed out at 1600x1200 with 16AA/16AF and still be over 50fps, at best a top end system with a GTX-OC/Ultra will probably manage 30-35fps avg at best imo (who knows, still).

 

[Netrat33]

I don't know if he's talking primarily about the "demands" of the game. Any shmoe can program a crappy game with poor code and suck up memory just because it's there. There are a few 15+ year old game engines that do this. A poor coded game does not always equal what a more demanding one will be like. As for Crysis, it is still very much an unknown and the only source that's said a 1024x768 res was IGN about 3 months ago IIRC. No one really knows what the resolution at E3 was at for sure, but it looked and played better at the same time. I can run LP at 1280x1024 (max res. for me ) and I get 52fps avg inside and out. Crysis looks to be able to do that, faster, and look so much better it's sad. Smart programming is what it's really all about, LP is just what a poor effort yields.Especially if the hardware and performance specs hold true even somewhat, the game will be lovely. Sure, don't expect to run Crysis maxed out at 1600x1200 with 16AA/16AF and still be over 50fps, at best a top end system with a GTX-OC/Ultra will probably manage 30-35fps avg at best imo (who knows, still).

no that is what you are just hoping (run faster, yes it looks way more amazing than any other game out there though) The game is scaleable 2 years back and 2 years forward. Pretty sure that means "fat chance" And if they are showing IGN 1024x768, that's probably what you're going to expect and that wasnt even with everything on.

I would agree with anyone saying "this is a poorly coded game" if it wasn't for the fact that basically system to system (360 to PC) it's playing the same quality if not better.

 

[phide]

Bullshit. It really hasn't happened until now with the 8800gtx video card that a PC can out perform a 360. Most people have Dual core, not Quad Core while the 360 has 3 cores.

Erroneous argument. Firstly, G80, at standard clock speeds, is vastly more powerful than Xenos, which, from a raw performance standpoint, is roughly positioned between R520 and R580. And, no, many have been enjoying X360-class performance since the arrival of G70/G71/R580, and that's evident to anyone who has played Oblivion, a modestly shoddy port, at 1280x720 with no additional features enabled on such cards. My own fairly modest X1900 XTX-based rig runs Oblivion as smoothly, if not more smoothly, at 1680x1050/2xAA/8xHQAF than the X360 does at an inferior resolution and with vastly inferior image quality.

Secondly, one of Xenon's PPC cores is simply not comparable to one Core 2 core, for example, even at low clock speeds. The fact that you're stating that all processing performance is entirely reliant on the number of physical executional threads gives us a good indication of your level of knowledge on this subject.

Additionally, the overhead factor has become less and less critical with newer-generation console platforms. Naturally, the performance-per-watt of the X360 is stellar, but the overhead factor has become less of an issue as PCs have become more powerful more quickly than operating systems and APIs have become more taxing.

WTF? I guess you don't realize that consoles games simply get better looking and better looking throughout the years.

That's true -- to a point. A game console is a fixed platform, and it's peak performance is always finite. This means developers have a finite amount of power to utilize, and once they've come fairly close to hitting that plateau, that's it. The sky is not the limit as you so imply. I think Gears of War is a good indication of the finite power available with the X360. It's visually quite strong, though it also has numerous issues when it comes to its dynamic loading system, as [H] has pointed out previously. From a shader ops perspective, X360 has more room. From the perspective of the rest of the graphics pipeline, it does not.

Are you blind? What's the problem with Lost Planet's graphics? They are quite impressive and definately an example of next generation graphics.

There's no problem. I think Lost Planet is a decent looking game, but not quite as stellar as you believe. Nothing in particular stands out to me, and many would agree with me on the matter.

Games for Windows...Has nothign to do with DX10.

Never said it did.

Later [FarCry] gets SM3 slapped on and it was the posterchild for SM3 gaming.

FarCry's SM3.0 patch brought very little to the table. SM3.0 was very much an evolutionary step, as is SM4.0 in some many respects.

The bottom line is that many feel that Lost Planet's visual fidelity/performance ratio is exceedingly poor, and I don't believe anyone but CAPCOM is to blame. As we get deeper into this generation, we'll find out how close to the mark we truly are, but I for one am feeling pretty good about it.

 

[Netrat33]

Erroneous argument. Firstly, G80, at standard clock speeds, is vastly more powerful than Xenos, which, from a raw performance standpoint, is roughly positioned between R520 and R580. And, no, many have been enjoying X360-class performance since the arrival of G70/G71/R580, and that's evident to anyone who has played Oblivion, a modestly shoddy port, at 1280x720 with no additional features enabled on such cards. My own fairly modest X1900 XTX-based rig runs Oblivion as smoothly, if not more smoothly, at 1680x1050/2xAA/8xHQAF than the X360 does at an inferior resolution and with vastly inferior image quality.

lol EVERYONE always uses Oblivion like it's the all out indication of the 360's power, a near launch title. What about Rainbow Six Vegas, King Kong gamers edition, Call of Juerz(whatever), few others that escape me right now. They aren't exactly achieving the smoothness as the 360 but hey, another shoddy port. Always the port excuse. Besides Doom 3, can someone tell me a great graphic game that was actually "optimized" to everyone's liking?

And I said the G80 was more powerful than Xenos.

Secondly, one of Xenon's PPC cores is simply not comparable to one Core 2 core, for example, even at low clock speeds. The fact that you're stating that all processing performance is entirely reliant on the number of physical executional threads gives us a good indication of your level of knowledge on this subject.

Well actually in simplified version of everything, you can't really compare either now can you? How do I bench the xenon again?

Additionally, the overhead factor has become less and less critical with newer-generation console platforms. Naturally, the performance-per-watt of the X360 is stellar, but the overhead factor has become less of an issue as PCs have become more powerful more quickly than operating systems and APIs have become more taxing.

So for DX10 we don't need Vista? Vista isn't stealing a little bit here and there?

That's true -- to a point. A game console is a fixed platform, and it's peak performance is always finite. This means developers have a finite amount of power to utilize, and once they've come fairly close to hitting that plateau, that's it. The sky is not the limit as you so imply. I think Gears of War is a good indication of the finite power available with the X360. It's visually quite strong, though it also has numerous issues when it comes to its dynamic loading system, as [H] has pointed out previously. From a shader ops perspective, X360 has more room. From the perspective of the rest of the graphics pipeline, it does not.

Well actually Cliff B who did Gears of war said there was still lots of room for improvement. That's not a good indication if the developer is saying "Ya we could have done more" We can see that simply with the games that are coming out soon looking even better.

There's no problem. I think Lost Planet is a decent looking game, but not quite as stellar as you believe. Nothing in particular stands out to me, and many would agree with me on the matter.

I see a massive snow storm with tons of enemies, some super large, some small, and moving very fluidly with incredible explosions and blur. I really can't picture many PC gaming currently doing as much as Lost Planet is doing.

Never said it did.

Snarf

.....I dunno I didn't know what direction you were going with mention the games for windows label.

FarCry's SM3.0 patch brought very little to the table. SM3.0 was very much an evolutionary step, as is SM4.0 in some many respects.

The bottom line is that many feel that Lost Planet's visual fidelity/performance ratio is exceedingly poor, and I don't believe anyone but CAPCOM is to blame. As we get deeper into this generation, we'll find out how close to the mark we truly are, but I for one am feeling pretty good about it.

I never understand what people feel is a game that pushes graphic bounderies. Lost Planet seems like one that is clearly in your face on a graphics evolutionary step. I see [H] using the same types of games which don't look as good or have as much going on (Stalker, Oblivion, WoW, BF2) I can see Lost Planet being in their line up for a long time. Right there with Crysis, UT3, and Bioshock. And that isn't me saying Lost Planet looks better than those, but it has it's place on demand.

 

[Miscommunication]

no that is what you are just hoping (run faster, yes it looks way more amazing than any other game out there though) The game is scaleable 2 years back and 2 years forward. Pretty sure that means "fat chance" And if they are showing IGN 1024x768, that's probably what you're going to expect and that wasnt even with everything on.

If the DX10 mode at E3 was running at 1024x768 (only IGN says this) it was looking to get 50-60fps likely, it was smooth. Scale up to the next resolution and I doubt there will be a massive drop to where it's below 40fps "smoothness" or playable when it's done. We won't know for sure, but even at the super low res. it still looks better than LP. Not to mention from that preview, the game has another 4+ months to go, with driver and Vista updates to boot.

The whole "settings" issue is really cloudy though, supposedly they'll release patches to the game over the next year+ enabling higher features (currently to be grayed out apparently). Ergo, "max settings" today won't equal "max settings" tomorrow, so it's really all subjective. We don't know exactly where it was running at E3 in relation to "max settings" (reportedly slower than my rig being used). The wording Cevat used was "very high, but not the highest!", so who knows what notches. The only thing I hate is that Cevat and company are so cryptic it sucks. You'd think these brainiacs would say what model and speeds of the hardware that's being used. I simply think it's more marketing by Intel and Nv to get everyone to go out buy 3.0Ghz quads and ultras when the bar is possibly a little lower. Oh well, we shall see, all this PR-pushing makes me wonder though. "Oh it's running on a C2D processor and an 8800 card...", well no shit lol.

The game is supposed to scale 1.5yrs ahead and 2 yrs back IIRC btw.

 

[SX2233]

I just bought a 8800GTS 640 with the intentions of moving to Vista x64. I must say the results of your findings are disappointing to say the least. Is my 600 dollar video and psu upgrade really worth what I'm seeing here?

600 dollar for a 8800 gts? U got RIPED OFF

 

[Devistater]

600 dollar for a 8800 gts? U got RIPED OFF

Read what you quoted, to me he's implying his PSU is included in that price. Its quite easy to spend $100 or more on a quality PSU.

 

[RaiseR RoofeR]

NVidia's new driver claims it improves performance in Lost Planet specifically.

Anyone notice any differences in performance?

 

[Miscommunication]

You are late, it does improve performance and the new LP (for retail) patch also improves DX10 performance quite a bit as well (surprising to me). Now the latest Nv driver are the 163.44s so you should also see small increase with those (5-10fps)

 

[officermartinez]

Well I just got this game as it came with my XFX 8800gts 320mb video card. I just finished running the in-game FPS test at the default settings of 1280 x 720 32bit (direct x 9.0c). It's "playable" but only on the default settings.

I averaged 65.4 FPS (Snow)
I averaged 61.2 FPS (Cave)

I had my 8800GTS OC'd to 575/950. My E6420 is overclocked to 3.4ghz. But as soon as I placed EVERY setting on HIGH and changed the default resolution to my native 1680 x 1050 resolution, my FPS fell through the floor at a whooping 17.8 FPS and 19.2 FPS, repectively. OMG!