My point was that even with global dynamic lighting and reflections turned off, games still chug a lot of power for some reason. It's not like games have exponentially changed in the way they function, look, and play. They still utilize a mix of static and dynamic lighting in the scenes for the most part. Only other thing I can point to is geometry that hasn't been optimized. I know modern devs love using premade quixel assets. Wonder how much optimizing goes into their usage; I've only ever used their textures, they are godsend for that kind of stuff.
Shadows is also lighting, where in today games you can turn them off? It can be miriad of reasons, but yes, too much geometry really can bog down performance. But there is need to be a proof of that and not just assuming that devs are brainless monkeys that would just place million polygon assets without even proper graphics pipeline and hardware supporting it, or would not atleast decimate it. In UE 5 to enable Hardware Lumen and Nanite you need Virtual Shadow Maps, DX12 and SM6 shaders. VSM, DX12 and SM6 graphics pipeline is already substantially ups minimum hardware requirements even in simplest plain looking scenes (but performs faster in very complex scenes compared to old graphics pipeline like DX11 with SM5). So, if you just use Software Lumen or turn it off - you will not gain THAT much performance, whole pipeline needs to be changed for that.
DX12+SM6+Deffered Rendering+VSM+Hardware Lumen+Nanite - suited for very complex scenes, but has too high entry point for today's hardware (PS5), more suited for PS6(RX 9070, RTX 5070 with node shrink if it releases in 2 or 3 years i think) and higher.
DX11-12+SM5+Deffered Rendering+Cascaded Shadow Maps+Optional Software Lumen - suited for PS4 like games (with right graphical budget) and PS5. UE4 is faster, but UE5 is more convenient to develop with.
DX11+SM5+Forward Rendering+Cascaded Shadow Maps - with proper budget you can target PS3 like performance with this, it will not be exactly PS3 like but still quite cheap. A lot of Lighting/Shadows need to be baked with limited usage of dynamic ones to not make performance worse than deffered rendering approach.
Modern game developers don't care about optimization and probably don't know how to, and the default configuration and promoted functionality of UE5 makes games less likely to be optimized, including the very large file size of stock UE5. UE5 games can be optimized but they simply aren't being optimized and the use of UE5 over other game engines implies that the game won't be optimized.
Oh they do care about optimization, optimization for maximum graphical fidelity on any given hardware that they make for, even if assets are not that great for half the time(and story and gameplay etc).
The argument is that MGSV still looks great by modern standards (and in fact in some ways is more photorealistic than any other game), while requiring far fewer resources to achieve that. If MGSV was actually built for the PS3 and then upscaled for PS4, this wouldn't change the argument, although it should be said that it was just one of those past-gen backports for higher sales and the game barely runs on PS3 and 360.
The argument was that Fox Engine is godsend from heaven and is "much better than Unreal slop" and that it even scored 60 fps on 560TI (PS4). While i showed an Unreal Engine game (Batman Arkham City) that is no less complex visually than MGSV, has open environments, performs same on 560TI and it even is PS3 game that released earlier (2009). Who would have thought that ps3 game would perform same as "ps4" game with same complexity assets (except textures). And its Unreal slop game!
Companies is not some charity that would strive to make balanced games that will run great on some budget 5+ years hardware. They would always go for maximum fidelity (as much their skill and budget allows, even if it doesn't look that great actually). If Kojima is some high performance games proponent, why is Death Stranding runs 30 fps on PS4 with clearly more complex assets than in MGSV? Maybe because he was making PS4 game? Decima is good engine, it would easily run 60fps target with proper assets. I think it's just a case of failed attempt of making killer high fidelity PS360 game on time just before PS4 launch to just relegating on making PS4 60fps version because making more complex assets would be too costly and time consuming (considering that they are already late) and ps3 lags anyway.
First screenshot and some engine showcase from 2011, which means development started way before that.
Kinda reminded me of that one developer that would horribly fail to meet performance goal on target platforms of their ambitious game, but the game would play just fine 60 fps on nextgen platform with backwards compatibility that released just 1 month before. Except, they could not figured out that they could just wait 1 or 2 years to larp as 60 fps ps5 game.
Kojima was in there even. But now their engine considered as some precious lost relic because they choose to switch to UE5(or UE6 even when game actually releases)
Muh gwaphics are the worst fucking thing to happen to gaming, look at this kike treadmill they've made for buying the newest $2,000 graphics card for what?? Play a Soynigger game with zero innovation and clumsy reaction time to play it?? Imagine playing fucking basketball and you're reaction time is reduced by a few seconds, the ball is blurry and hard to see. Oh, but don't worry, the niggergraphics look good.
The top priority of a game should be control, is it fast, snappy? It's literally hardwired into our nervous system to utilize responsiveness. No? Oh, the game can run at 40FPS with TAA and DLSS and Framegen and fucking faggotry. You know what's more fun?
Throwing paper into a fucking wastebin. At least there's 1:1 feedback and you can improve at that.
And I don't mind story games when there's basically no gameplay, because at least the game is upfront with you: this takes no skill, just figure it out.
So, most of present games. What's the problem then?
