Stay ConnectedWhen it comes to video games and the hardware and tech we play them on, the team at Digital Foundry are unparalleled experts. Each week, DF Direct breaks down the latest breakthroughs in video game visuals, sound, and performance happening on PlayStation, Xbox, the most powerful PC setups, and more. If you’re a geek for graphics, GPUs, or just video games in general, DF Direct will help you get the most out of your gaming setup.
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This is the news! John, Rich and Alex take to the mics to discuss the end of CDPR's REDengine, image reconstruction via FSR 2.0 and XeSS, plus the long awaited confirmation of VRR (variable refresh rate) support coming to PlayStation 5. In short, there's a lot of 'hullaballoo' to sift through this week.
00:00:00 Introductions
00:00:36 News 01: CD Project RED announces UE5 powered Witcher game
00:18:26 News 02: VRR is coming to PS5
00:28:19 News 03: AMD's FSR 2.0 presentation at GDC
00:33:34 DF Supporter Q: Do you think FSR 2.0 could be used on console as they are AMD powered?
00:45:36 News 04: Unity releases new "Enemies" real time cinematic showcase
00:52:54 News 05: Zelda Ocarina of Time has been decompiled and released publicly
00:56:56 News 06: Nintendo Switch gets "Groups" folder support
00:59:03 DF Supporter Q: Would you still play new PC releases if you didn't review them for a living?
01:03:21 DF Supporter Q: What type of video or content do you dream of making?
01:12:27 DF Supporter Q: Does it make sense for Nintendo to target 4k on the next Switch even with reconstruction?
01:18:03 DF Supporter Q: Can AMD and Nvidia do something to fix the shader compilation issues on PC?
01:22:46 DF Supporter Q: Will you review GTA 5 when it releases on Playstation 6 and Xbox Series XL?
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A packed show this week! Alex shares his impressions on Grand Theft Auto 5's arrival on the new wave of consoles, the Elden Ring performance saga continues with the arrival of patch 1.03, AMD reveals the impressive-looking FSR 2.0, while AMD also aims to take on Intel at the more budget-orientated end of the market.
00:00:00 Introductions
00:01:09 GTA Fünf releases on PS5
00:09:48 Elden Ring 1.03 console performance boost?
00:21:36 FSR 2.0
00:31:39 AMD New CPUs taking on Alder Lake
00:37:48 GT7 servers down for 24 hours
00:44:05 Microsoft "releases" DirectStorage
00:46:28 UK sales physical vs digital
00:50:01 DF Content Discussion: Steam Deck
00:52:46 DF Content Discussion: DF Retro Gran Turismo
00:56:47 DF Supporter Q1: With the reality of console supply shortages isn't crossgen the more responsible course?
01:02:39 DF Supporter Q2: If you didn't have to use them for coverage purposes, would any of you ever touch a PS4/Xbox One system ever again?
01:06:07 DF Supporter Q3: How close are the two horizons (Forbidden West/Forza) to Nanite/UE5 in terms of geometric density/complexity?
01:07:52 DF Supporter Q4: Steam Deck has this very useful 30 FPS option built in. Do you think, the console manufacturers could implement such "half refresh rate" feature into their own SDK?
01:10:28 DF Supporter Q5: How do you keep CRT TV's maintained and going?
01:13:52 DF Supporter Q6: What went wrong with Microsoft's Windows Experience Index score as a replacement for system requirements?
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In a packed show, it's Rich, John and Alex at their respective microphones, sharing their thoughts on the Japan-focused State of Play, what tweaks to image quality Guerrilla Games has delivered for Horizon Forbidden West, plus a quick look at Dying Light 1's 60fps patch. Meanwhile, Alex is raging about stutter in PC games... but we're not going to let him talk about it. Not just yet.
00:00:00 Introductions
00:01:05 State of Play reactions
00:14:04 Horizon Forbidden West 1.07 patch
00:20:26 Dying Light next-gen patch
00:25:44 F-Zero X comes to NSO
00:29:55 Media.Vision announces 5 games in development
00:31:38 Switch OLED 3600 hour burn-in test
00:38:31 DF Supporter Q: Do you think the "burn-in crisis" is overblown?
00:42:37 DF Content Discussion: Guardians of the Galaxy on GamePass / DF Retro update
00:51:02 DF Supporter Q1/2/3: Elden Ring performance questions
01:02:57 DF Supporter Q4: What would you prefer? Locked 60fps or 60-80fps VRR?
01:06:22 DF Supporter Q5: Why is it so hard to produce OLED-Screens for the PC market?
01:14:32 DF Supporter Q6: Do you hold out much hope for improper frame-pacing being addressed in the next Switch?
01:16:42 DF Supporter Q7: Do you think Super Switch will be capable of matching or even surpassing the visual presentation of the new Sony and Microsoft machines?
01:19:07 DF Supporter Q8: The Bubsy Curse rumor
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A gigantic week of news, covering Elden Ring, the Switch Pro leak and reaction to Steam Deck... and yes, we take more user questions than ever before in covering these massive stories.
00:00:00 Introductions
00:01:27 Steam Deck coverage and thoughts
00:10:38 Steam Deck Q1: Do you think the Deck passes the “significant other couch test”?
00:12:28 Steam Deck Q2: What happens if you put in a aftermarket NVMe or install Windows without proper drivers
00:15:42 Steam Deck Q3: Is there a danger of developers being held back by Steam Deck?
00:19:38 Steam Deck Q4: Will issues with AMD GPU drivers hold back emulation on the Steam Deck?
00:22:06 Steam Deck Q5: Do you think it would be feasible for Valve to integrate the functionality of a 50Hz mode in the Steam Deck via a software update?
00:27:06 Elden Ring coverage and thoughts
00:33:19 Elden Ring Q1&2: Is the 10/10 warranted for Elden Ring / What is causing the poor framerate in Elden Ring?
00:42:25 Elden Ring Q3: Should From Software have reached out to Bluepoint to inherit some of their expertise?
00:47:25 Elden Ring Q4: What can be done with hardware and software to mitigate the issues in lieu of a proper fix?
00:51:38 Elden Ring Q5: Elden Ring would be a DX12 game on the Xbox Platform of Consoles, which all use DX12 anyway, so why doesnt it seem that any of them suffer from shader comp issues in any game really?
00:52:43 Elden Ring Q6: Are there more things companies like AMD, NVidia and Valve can do to help improve the experience for users?
00:56:05 Nvidia leak suggests new Switch hardware specs
01:02:55 Resident Evil 2, 3 and 7 gets next-gen patches
01:05:15 DF Supporter Q1: Do you think that GT7 was held back by its cross-gen nature? And to what degree?
01:12:09 DF Supporter Q2: Would you consider an enhanced PS5 that’s more XT than pro to be worthwhile?
01:13:48 DF Supporter Q3: Is it fair to say that raw compute is becoming an increasingly less relevant factor in the performance equation?
01:17:12 DF Supporter Q4: Do you think that rasterisation performance will be less important in the PC GPU space in the future?
01:20:42 DF Supporter Q5: What are your thoughts about the no doubt inevitable push for 8k next gen?
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It's been one of the busiest weeks thus far in 2022 for the team, but nothing stops this train! Audi Sorlie, John Linneman and Alex Battaglia are here to serve up early impressions on Elden Ring, give some Steam Deck predictions, discuss various visual issues with Sol Cresta and of course, dish out the pain with the announcement of Street Fighter 6. All this and more for this week's DF Direct Weekly!
00:00:00 Introduction
00:01:13 Elden Ring impressions
00:18:44 Steam Deck review imminent
00:20:52 Bethesda launcher is no more, moving to Steam
00:25:41 Sol Cresta has issues
00:34:54 Street Fighter 6 has been announced
00:44:46 Unreal Engine 5 leaves early access
00:47:26 DF Supporter Q1: Does your mechanistic understanding of how video games and graphics work get in the way of experiencing the games you play?
00:50:53 DF Supporter Q2: Were you suprised by the strong negative backlash from console gamers regarding the image quality in Horizon Forbidden West?
00:58:15 DF Supporter Q3: When do you think PCIE 4.0 will show large GPU performance gains over 3.0?
01:00:26 DF Supporter Q4: Do any of you have any idea why AMD are dragging their feet on a DLSS equivalent?
01:02:52 DF Supporter Q5: What do you guys think about the graphics between Elden Ring and Bluepoint's Demon's Souls remake from 2020?
01:05:15 DF Supporter Q6: Do you think the fighting game genre can still impress in the age of ray traced gaming?
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The somewhat unlikely scenario of DF Direct Weekly making its way to a 49th instalment has somehow come to pass! Tom, Alex, Will and Audi are all consigned to Rich's basement this week, meaning that it's just John and Rich to tackle the big news of the week - Cyberpunk 2077's 1.5 update with next-gen features landing, Dying Light 2 receiving VRR unlocked frame-rate support on Xbox Series X and - yes - there's reaction to the reaction of Horizon Forbidden West's release.
00:00:00 Introductions 00:00:55 Cyberpunk Patch 1.5 is out 00:17:07 Dying Light Xbox VRR Mode 00:20:07 DF Bonus Supporter Q: Hey guys, did you have any chance to look at the Dying light 2 VRR mode for Xbox? Seems like it now runs at 80-100 fps on average in performance mode, as far as I can tell through LGs built in VRR info screen. Do you think DRS with a locked 60 would have been better instead? 00:22:28 Nintendo announces the death of 3DS and WiiU storefronts 00:27:52 Chrono Cross Remaster filters can be disabled 00:30:14 Final Vendetta - Bitmap Bureau's new game 00:31:52 Elden Ring Recommended Specs are bizarre 00:37:11 DF Content Discussion: Horizon Forbidden West 00:41:31 DF Bonus Supporter Q: SkillUp's review for Horizon Forbidden West showed significantly more noticeable pop-in than Digital Foundry's. Any idea why that might be? 00:45:16 DF Bonus Supporter Q: Do you think there is enough headroom for a 40 fps mode? 00:46:20 DF Bonus Supporter Q: Do you think AMD FSR would be the better choice for the performance mode of horizon forbidden west? 00:49:12 DF Bonus Supporter Q: What do you think about the fact that all Decima games we've seen so far only lightly utilize TAA? 00:50:30 DF Bonus Supporter Q: What graphical elements of Horizon Forbidden West could benefit from an eventual PC port? 00:56:49 DF Supporter Q1/2: Would it be possible to make a kind of generation comparison video? 01:01:00 DF Supporter Q3: Is there a setting on LG C1 that is suitable for 30 fps games? 01:03:21 DF Supporter Q4: What are some great hdr implementations in games to really convince somebody that hdr is as amazing as some people say it is? 01:06:13 DF Supporter Q5: Who would you recommend to buy AMD GPUs assuming the cards are available at MSRP? Do you think AMD can catch up with Nvidia in RT/ML and does the coming XeSS help AMD? 01:12:42 DF Supporter Q6: Do you think we're going to start seeing larger and larger gaps between 30fps quality modes and 60fps performance modes? And do you expect some games to drop their performance modes all together? 01:15:08 DF Supporter Q7: What do you think is responsible for the lack of four- and even two-Player split-screen multiplayer on modern consoles? 01:19:27 DF Supporter Q8: How do you decide which platform to buy a game on?
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In the week where a favoured few posted their Steam Deck hardware reviews, and where Nintendo posted a new Direct, it's down to John, Rich and Alex to sift through the revelations and present their views and opinions... of which there are many.
00:00:00 Introductions 00:00:41 Steam Deck review reaction 00:01:09 DF Bonus Q1: Did you receive a Steam Deck and what are your initial anecdotal impressions? 00:11:09 DF Bonus Q2: Do you think display cost is the (only) reason for the Steam Deck not having VRR and do you believe there's a chance we will get a revision with VRR anytime soon? 00:15:02 DF Bonus Q3: What do you think about Steam Deck having a system level FSR, so that the games don't actually have to support it? 00:23:04 DF Bonus Q4: Do you think the Steam deck as a platform would benefit more from frequent (yearly) iterations? 00:25:44 Nintendo Direct 2.9.2022 00:36:46 Call of Duty will stay on PS "beyond the existing agreement" 00:39:51 Google Stadia shifts focus to Google Stream 00:46:18 Crysis Remastered gets last patch 00:53:53 DF Supporter Q1: Alex, are you excited for Total War Warhammer 3? 00:55:46 DF Supporter Q2: Will a fast quad core like an Alder Lake i3 last for the rest of the generation since it out performs a similar 8 core to what is in the new consoles? 01:00:58 DF Supporter Q3: Are there any types of GPU cards that made a particularly strong impression on you? 01:09:23 DF Supporter Q4: Why don't the new consoles use 16x anisotropic filtering? 01:11:02 DF Supporter Q5: Do you think next-gen came too soon? 01:18:03 DF Supporter Q6: Do you think we will see Pro consoles again this generation? 01:23:25 DF Supporter Q7: Do any of you typically go in for collectors editions of games?
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The Digital Foundry team amass to discuss Sony's acquisition of Bungie, Destiny remaining multi-platform, DLSS arriving for Flight Simulator along with the phenomenal success of the Nintendo Switch. And what's the score with Dying Light 2's resolution reaction?
00:00:00 Introductions 00:00:33 Sony buys Bungie 00:15:22 DLSS coming to Flight Simulator 00:19:56 Switch is the fastest selling console of all-time 00:27:25 Bloodborne "PSX Demake" releases 00:31:50 Team17 pledges support for NFT, cancels support for NFT 1 hour later 00:40:51 DF Content Discussion: Dying Light 2 00:50:26 DF Supporter Q1: Do you believe that games on the next generations of consoles from Sony and Microsoft will rely mostly on ray tracing for rendering graphics? 00:52:56 DF Supporter Q2: Do you think the Steam Deck would be capable of becoming a portable 60fps PS3 thanks to the emulator RCPS3? 00:55:55 DF Supporter Q3: How does id Tech 7 avoid the shader compilation stutter issues we see in Unreal Engine games? 00:58:36 DF Supporter Q4: Does DLSS work with Dynamic Resolution? 01:02:05 DF Supporter Q5: When developers get a idea of what hardware will be in next-gen consoles? 01:07:58 DF Supporter Q6: Local hardware combined with cloud based hardware = Super hardware?
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What's going on with Call of Duty on PS5 following the Microsoft acquisition of Activision? What actually happened when Alex Battaglia discovered that Crysis 4 is in development? Just how good does the Resident Evil 4 HD mod look? The answers to these questions and many more are to be found in DF Direct Weekly #46 with Rich Leadbetter, Alex Battaglia and John Linneman on mic duties.
00:00:00 Introductions 00:00:31 Activision/Microsoft continued 00:08:12 Crysis 4 announcement 00:12:57 DF Bonus Supporter Q: Crysis 4 get its own "parallax sand" moment? If so, what are your predictions on what Crytek will bring to the table? 00:16:13 New Black Myth Wukong dev diary 00:20:27 Resident Evil 4 HD Project will see release Feb 2 00:24:18 Epic Games Incubates New Studio in Poland 00:28:00 DF Content Discussion: Uncharted PS5 00:39:41 DF Supporter Q1: Would Sony be able to shrink the PlayStation 4 into a handheld form and have it play the entire PS4 library? 00:43:23 DF Supporter Q2: If Nvidia released an RTX 40xx series graphics card tomorrow, which games or tech demos in your current library would you want to test first? 00:52:54 DF Supporter Q3: Rich, when can we expect more 4K on a budget? 01:02:23 DF Supporter Q4: I've seen rumors that Sony is looking to add backwards compatibility of some sort for PS1, PS2, and PS3 to the PS5. How would you like to see Sony handle this? 01:09:28 DF Supporter Q5: With our move to a post-resolution future, what are some games that you think *do* benefit from a native resolution? 01:12:06 DF Supporter Q6: Do you think another player could (or even should) enter the console market as it is today?
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Audi, Alex and John take on this dramatic week of news as we further reflect on the ongoing Microsoft/Activision rumblings, the dreadful AMD RX6500 XT launch, Cloud only gaming on the switch, Diablo II DRM and even a bit of Netflix and chill. All this and more in DF Direct Weekly!
00:00:00 Introductions 00:00:56 Microsoft/Activision 00:16:11 Horizon Forbidden West Story trailer (no spoilers) 00:20:27 Diablo II Remastered DRM troubles 00:26:22 AMD RX6500 XT 00:35:30 Kingdom Hearts on Switch, could only, $90 00:43:16 Cuphead coming to Netflix, Shenmue The Animation debuts Feb 00:48:13 Final Fantasy 7 classic version gets native 60fps support 00:54:30 DF Content Discussion: John's Big Rig 01:08:37 DF Content Discussion: Patreon content plans 01:11:27 DF Content Discussion: PC Time Capsules 01:14:53 DF Supporter Q1: With the upcoming Steam Deck I fear that it will flop because of availability issues. What are your thoughts on this? 01:17:23 DF Supporter Q2: Is there any hope for Xbox in the Japanese territory? 01:22:59 DF Supporter Q3: What are the chances that old Activision titles like Deadpool, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles™: Out of the Shadows and the Transformers games by High Moon Studios will be relisted for PC again? 01:26:19 DF Supporter Q4: Take a favorite game of any genre, now have it remade in a completely different one. 01:29:50 DF Supporter Q5: Anything you guys looking forward to with HDMI 2.1a? 01:31:10 DF Supporter Q6: Do you think that Microsoft's acquisitions will eventually include major tv and film content? 01:33:28 DF Supporter Q7: Alex, what is the game box to the left of the white Quake box behind you?
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