DF vs. Titanfall (Xbox One/PC)

DriedMangoes

DriedMangoes

We The North 🦖🍁
Sep 12, 2013
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Sounds like the Xbox One version is suffering from some issues but it'll still be fun, just not as close to the developer's vision as the PC is. Rendering it at 720p instead might have helped.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2014-titanfall-next-gen-face-off

"So, just like the beta, we see Titanfall frame-rates on Xbox One dip into the mid-30s at its worst, and at those points the rock-solid consistency we saw in the early iterations of the Modern Warfare experience is gone, and with it - arguably - the essence of the "twitch" shooter."

Verdict -

When we spoke to Respawn producer Drew McCoy at Gamescom last year, we were fully onboard with the "frame-rate is king" response when we asked about the possibility of 1080p60 on Xbox One. The key to the best Titanfall experience is all about the frame-rate - it's a crucial element of the interface between player and game and it's a core element in defining the gameplay. The end product is still a massive entertaining, highly playable piece of software, but on Xbox One at least, the performance level clearly isn't anywhere near locked to the magic 60fps, with Respawn sailing dangerously close on occasion to nerfing the the magic formula that makes this game great.

By and large, when you need the signature twitch-levels of response, Titanfall delivers, but it does so at a price - eye-rending screen-tear. That's a compromise that the erstwhile-Infinity Ward team members never implemented during their run on Modern Warfare and we were surprised to see it manifest so obviously here. As a result, the pure thoroughbred arcade experience that defined Call of Duty and is instrumental to Titanfall's success is left somewhat compromised, with a level of visual artefacting that frequently looks plain ugly.

To be clear though - while this is an easy win for the PC, any Titanfall purchase is still a good one. Respawn's focus on technology to facilitate fun as opposed to pushing back the frontiers of rendering has paid off, and while the Xbox One game has its issues, there's no doubt that the experience is enjoyable. However, from everything we know about the studio and what it sets out to achieve with its games, we can't help but feel that Xbox One under-delivers while the PC game is much closer to the experience the developers set out to create.

A lot rides on the success of Titanfall. For Respawn Entertainment it is the culmination of four years' hard work - the first project that many of the team has shipped since the release of Modern Warfare 2 in November 2009. For Electronic Arts, it's a chance to redeem something from its lacklustre EA Partners endevour, while the game represents Microsoft's biggest hope in regaining momentum and catching up with the PlayStation juggernaut. In our opinion, Titanfall is a stand-out game that must be played - but Xbox One is perhaps not the best platform to play it on.
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The headline differences are nothing new - the Xbox One version of Titanfall still operates at a modest 1408x792 resolution, with 2x multi-sampling anti-aliasing, whereas the PC game runs at any resolution you care to mention, with support for hardware anti-aliasing. You get access to 2x and 4x MSAA, while owners of Nvidia cards have access to a raft of CSAA options up to 16x (used for our comparison shots).

The only other major difference is a skewed gamma ramp on Xbox One, introducing black crush into the image, robbing it of some of the subtle detail you see in the PC game. We understand that this could be an issue in how the Xbox One blends its multiple display panes and would be more of an issue in upscaled games, and we're quite surprised that Microsoft hasn't sought to address this yet.
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The 792p resolution on Xbox One is a curious one. It's a 21 per cent increase over 720p, and the use of multi-sampling anti-aliasing makes it punch a little above its weight in an era where the more usual post-process AA can actively harm image quality at lower resolutions (as seen on Battlefield 4 on Xbox One). However, when we first saw Titanfall, we were pretty certain we were seeing 720p or something close to it (1366x768 perhaps). We remain curious about why Respawn would choose this particular framebuffer size, as that additional 21 per cent of resolution isn't giving us a boost in quality commensurate with the GPU resources being allocated to it. The question is, could that graphics power have been better deployed elsewhere?
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The reason we ask is fairly straightforward. Titanfall is a game that thrives on a 60 frames per second update, and as we'll swiftly discover, the fact is that it doesn't quite deliver on Xbox One. Now, as we recently discussed, in many engines there is no linear relationship between pixel-count and frame-rate, but based on the performance of the Xbox One game, we can't help but feel that it's a trade that should have been made. The more resources dedicated to frame-rate, the better.
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There's been plenty of talk about Titanfall's sub-native resolution, but while that is not exactly ideal, the biggest problem we have with the game in its current format is that the magic combination of ingredients that made Modern Warfare work has come slightly off the boil here: the Xbox One version simply cannot sustain the required 60fps. The consistency in performance just isn't there and so the gameplay often doesn't feel quite right.
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Faced with the challenge of being unable to sustain 60fps, Respawn has two choices: it can retain v-sync and face increased judder and loss of response in the controls (the solution chosen for the less capable PS3 version of Modern Warfare). Alternatively, it can utilise adaptive v-sync - locking at 60fps, but tearing beneath. While image integrity is shot to hell, at least the results of your controller inputs are rendered on-screen as quickly as possible, meaning that the hit to the gameplay experience isn't quite so pronounced. The latter is the route Respawn has chosen.
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On balance, it's probably the best choice, but we do note that when v-sync is inactive, a lot of the action isn't being delivered on-screen in a consistent manner - you can see that in the frame-time element in the video below. In essence, in addition to torn frames, there's noticeable judder and a less than solid response from the controls - especially evident when you're in the Titan. We also note that sometimes the engine stalls for a couple of frames, producing the big spikes downward in the frame-time graph.

So, just like the beta, we see Titanfall frame-rates on Xbox One dip into the mid-30s at its worst, and at those points the rock-solid consistency we saw in the early iterations of the Modern Warfare experience is gone, and with it - arguably - the essence of the "twitch" shooter. In mitigation this does tend to happen while you're seated in your Titan, so the need for ultra-low latency controls is lessened, but there's no doubt that the player's immersion in the experience is dented by the compromised performance.
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Well, we put some time into this and didn't spot any single-digit frame-rates, but this is clearly a great way to stress-test the game, and we can well imagine that if all 12 Titans were let loose in a confined space, frame-rates could plummet to a noticeably unacceptable level.

The real issue we have with this game on Xbox One is that playing Titanfall on Xbox One appears to be a case of taking the hits wherever they come from, and hoping that the core gameplay experience isn't impacted too much. By and large it works out acceptably, and the sheer fun of playing it can't be denied. However, the outlook changes appreciably once you play the game on PC, where - hardware permitting - performance is just so much better. At that point, you can't really go back. It's not difficult to get an experience that easily outstrips what's offered by Xbox One with hardware that needn't cost the earth.
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Microsoft should have just released it on the Xb1 and not the PC. Would've have been a better move...also..who didn't see this coming. PC >.
 
Ascalaphus said:
Microsoft should have just released it on the Xb1 and not the PC. Would've have been a better move...also..who didn't see this coming. PC >.
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Yes, releasing it on the PC just exposes the flaws even more. If MS was able to make it Xbox One exclusive, it would have a positive impact on the game. Now just wondering how the Xbox 360 version will fare?
 
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I'd rather play Titanfall on the Xbox One over the PC. Any day of the week and two times on Sunday.
 
I'm glad I got the game on PC. The xb1 version seems very sad, next gen is sad. It's okay though guys, graphics and performance aren't important. It's all about how fun it is!
 
Trolling.
Xbox one continues to show that it is underpowered, especially for the price. That's what happens when you literally put a Radeon 7780 into a box with a shared pool of last gen DDR3 memory. What else is new.
 
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DriedMangoes said:
More details maybe on the res and framerate? I know it's just PR talk but it'd be nice to get some details.
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If it is indeed sub-720p and 30 fps as Famousmortimer has rumoured then they aren't going to broadcast that. They are going to keep quiet on the performance and we will find out when the embargo lifts, assuming that isn't the day of release.
 
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Ascalaphus said:
Microsoft should have just released it on the Xb1 and not the PC. Would've have been a better move...also..who didn't see this coming. PC >.
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Why? What benefit would ever come from such a move? You aren't about to say PC held back the much weaker Xbox One, are you? :p
 
Screen tearing drives me absolute bonkers. I'd rather play at 20 fps w/o screen tearing than at 60 with it.
 
Kassen said:
Why? What benefit would ever come from such a move? You aren't about to say PC held back the much weaker Xbox One, are you? :p
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Nope. Just not as many people will be playing this on PC compared to Xb1. I can understand the business aspect of it but at the same time releasing this game on the Xb1 & 360 only would have comparable or even more sales without the PC version making the Xb1 version look incredibly inferior.
 
Wait...people are advocating not releasing a game on pc just to mask the flaws of the inferior version? Wow.
 
Ascalaphus said:
Nope. Just not as many people will be playing this on PC compared to Xb1. I can understand the business aspect of it but at the same time releasing this game on the Xb1 & 360 only would have comparable or even more sales without the PC version making the Xb1 version look incredibly inferior.
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Nice try but no cigar.
 
Qbert said:
Wait...people are advocating not releasing a game on pc just to mask the flaws of the inferior version? Wow.
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I'm not advocating it....just think it might have made more sense to keep it Xb1 & 360 only to drive more sales. The fact that it looks worse on the Xb1 compared to the PC is not a point of contention. It was a fact from day 1.
 
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