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Fully Utilizing Next-Gen Console Hardware

DICE's Johan Andersson Talks BF4, Frostbite, Mantle, The Future
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Chris: Right. Are you rendering it to a different resolution natively on Xbox versus PlayStation 4?

Johan: Yeah, we’re rendering essentially to a separate render target and then up-sampling that to the native 1080p and then we’re rendering the UI on top of that in 1080p, which actually helps quite a lot because there's a lot of text and small details in the UI on BF.

Chris: Got you. I know that developers took a while before they were really able to utilize PlayStation 3’s architecture. Given the composition of these next-gen consoles is it less challenging for you to fully utilize them and is there a lot of untapped potential still, or are you guys taking advantage of most of that right out of the gate?

Johan: Definitely it was a lot easier this generation and a lot quicker. I think you're going to see that on the games that we and other people launch that they actually are, for launch titles usually so early in the generation, the first title that you have they typically are not great titles, or perhaps the actual games are not that great but they look okay. Here we got off from an extremely good start I think and we've spent a lot of time working on that to make sure that we got to that point, but there is still a lot of things about next-gen consoles that we can specifically optimize and utilize. Things like I mentioned with the async compute or things with how we tweak for the CPUs or what are the exact shaders and settings that we’re using for our graphics rendering. There are still some, quite a lot of untapped potential in the consoles there that we’ll be utilizing for the upcoming games. 

Chris: Okay, cool. I know you mentioned that we were going to start getting to the point where we could talk about performance benefits of Mantle in Battlefield 4. Are we there yet or do we need to keep waiting a little bit longer? 

Johan: (Laughs) Yeah, we’re not there yet.

Chris: Okay.

Johan: It's a lot of work just putting all of the pieces together and performance is the thing you get last there. I don’t want to give any numbers that are not fully representative yet either.

Chris: Sure. 

Johan: Yeah, we’re not there yet.

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Top Comments
  • 18 Hide
    deejaybos , December 3, 2013 5:33 AM
    Yeah, the game looks amazing, then it crashes randomly. Then you play it a little, then it crashes. Then in single player it crashes, then during a map change it crashes, then when someone blows something up somewhere else on the map, it crashes. Guess they forgot to mention the terrible release they've had and the lack of support or acknowledgement. Unless of course you count double XP and a pistol attachment, "acknowledgement".
  • 13 Hide
    shaydogs , December 3, 2013 2:18 AM
    Arrgghh, Give us more details on Mantle implementations in BF4 already!!!
  • 11 Hide
    anbello262 , December 2, 2013 10:09 PM
    On Page 1, the soldier, is that Joey Tribbianni? :D 
Other Comments
  • 11 Hide
    anbello262 , December 2, 2013 10:09 PM
    On Page 1, the soldier, is that Joey Tribbianni? :D 
  • 2 Hide
    DanglingPointer , December 2, 2013 10:49 PM
    I can't wait till this game is on Linux with proper fully baked FGLRX drivers and Mantle on Linux!

    Come on AMD! Bring it already!!!! SteamMachines are around the corner!
  • 0 Hide
    vaughn2k , December 2, 2013 10:52 PM
    Yeah, it seems like him... but I am skeptic, if he could do a bad ass soldier though.. ;) 
  • 10 Hide
    cats_Paw , December 3, 2013 12:58 AM
    Very low quality Interview. All questions are made in a way so that Johan Andersson can promote their company and their games. There is not a single question about something meaningfull to the comunity. Its all like:
    -Your game is good in this?
    -Yes our game is good in this becouse [...].

    Just the phrasing and the form changes.

    At least the users in tomshardware can still offer some solid information. And later people dont understand why 80% of the readers automaticly jump to user comments before reading the full article.
  • 13 Hide
    shaydogs , December 3, 2013 2:18 AM
    Arrgghh, Give us more details on Mantle implementations in BF4 already!!!
  • 8 Hide
    bemused_fred , December 3, 2013 2:50 AM
    "Sure we did still have to do a little bit of a compromise on the solution. We're not running at the full native 1080p; we’re running a little bit lower resolution than that."

    Good lord! The PS4 can't even run Battlefield 4, a launch title, at 1080p? Where will these consoles be in 5 years time?!?!
  • 2 Hide
    tomfreak , December 3, 2013 2:57 AM
    Quote:
    "Sure we did still have to do a little bit of a compromise on the solution. We're not running at the full native 1080p; we’re running a little bit lower resolution than that."

    Good lord! The PS4 can't even run Battlefield 4, a launch title, at 1080p? Where will these consoles be in 5 years time?!?!
    Gulf town or Any 6 core Intel CPU will be the next QX9650, after 5-8years and will still be kicking ass.

    May be spending $500-600 on a CPU + a 5years warranty reliable Asus Sabertooth X79 isnt a bad investment. lol

  • 3 Hide
    ikefu , December 3, 2013 4:11 AM
    Quote:
    Good lord! The PS4 can't even run Battlefield 4, a launch title, at 1080p? Where will these consoles be in 5 years time?!?!


    Its still early in the console cycle and devs will need time to fully unlock them. With the semi heterogeneous architectures of the new consoles its going to be a steep learning curve to figure out the best ways to utilize GPU compute power. They talk about having the CPU at 95% utilization but just because its busy doesn't mean its efficient. Busy is easy to achieve, efficiency is not. There's a lot of room to grow yet.

    That plus I don't think most exclusive console gamers are really worried about 1080p (other than a random number in a vacuum that seems bigger than other random numbers). If they were truly worried about resolution they'd be on a PC. The games are still prettier than a 360/PS3 so they'll be happy in the end.

  • 0 Hide
    cypeq , December 3, 2013 4:24 AM
    Quote:
    "Sure we did still have to do a little bit of a compromise on the solution. We're not running at the full native 1080p; we’re running a little bit lower resolution than that."

    Good lord! The PS4 can't even run Battlefield 4, a launch title, at 1080p? Where will these consoles be in 5 years time?!?!


    Frostbite is probably most demanding engine out there... check if your PC can run BF4 at min. 60 FPS in high details @ 1080p. There are many that can't.
    Next gen consoles are speced like mediocre gaming PC of today. WTH you expect.
    In near future programmers will be able to squeeze bit more juice of them because of more unified and exposed hardware but that's all.
    Performance and Quality is on PC.
  • 18 Hide
    deejaybos , December 3, 2013 5:33 AM
    Yeah, the game looks amazing, then it crashes randomly. Then you play it a little, then it crashes. Then in single player it crashes, then during a map change it crashes, then when someone blows something up somewhere else on the map, it crashes. Guess they forgot to mention the terrible release they've had and the lack of support or acknowledgement. Unless of course you count double XP and a pistol attachment, "acknowledgement".
  • -1 Hide
    deejaybos , December 3, 2013 5:34 AM
    Yeah, the game looks amazing, then it crashes randomly. Then you play it a little, then it crashes. Then in single player it crashes, then during a map change it crashes, then when someone blows something up somewhere else on the map, it crashes. Guess they forgot to mention the terrible release they've had and the lack of support or acknowledgement. Unless of course you count double XP and a pistol attachment, "acknowledgement".
  • 1 Hide
    tomc100 , December 3, 2013 5:42 AM
    Really poor interview. No specific details on mantle or how much boost in performance, any graphic enhancements, or if/how it will affect Nvidia gpu. I learned absolutely nothing reading this interview.
  • 2 Hide
    expl0itfinder , December 3, 2013 6:07 AM
    I REALLY want to see some Mantle news. A release date would be great.
  • 4 Hide
    lp231 , December 3, 2013 6:45 AM
    In other news Nvidia has been secretly creating their own api call Lava.
  • -6 Hide
    getochkn , December 3, 2013 6:47 AM
    Everyone whinning about mantle, this is an article talking to Dice, not AMD. Dice can't talk about another companies product that they haven't discussed yet. What did you want, Dice to spill everything?

    As for the PS4 can't do 1080p, so what? How much do you have to spend on a PC to 1080p on BF4 on ultra? $1500+ compared to $400.
  • 1 Hide
    DanglingPointer , December 3, 2013 6:58 AM
    @getochkn
    Mate, it is actually far less than $1500... try $499; BUT a caveat, only possible once Mantle is out AND available in Linux AND the game has a linux-steamMachine port; else Windows-reinstall on the SteamMachine with BF4 running with Mantle.

    But it is still all theory, no proof! Here's to hoping! :) 
    http://rootgamer.com/8383/tool/steamos/steam-machine-amd-hardware-cost-499
  • -5 Hide
    getochkn , December 3, 2013 7:06 AM
    Quote:
    @getochkn
    Mate, it is actually far less than $1500... try $499; BUT a caveat, only possible once Mantle is out AND available in Linux AND the game has a linux-steamMachine port; else Windows-reinstall on the SteamMachine with BF4 running with Mantle.

    But it is still all theory, no proof! Here's to hoping! :) 
    http://rootgamer.com/8383/tool/steamos/steam-machine-amd-hardware-cost-499


    $499 for a hypothetical machine that doesn't say anywhere it will do BF4 on max, or that BF4 would even be ported to it. This article is about BF4, comments were about BF4, so you post a steam machine page.
  • 0 Hide
    EllisD , December 3, 2013 7:27 AM
    Where is the 3D in BF4? BF3 was 3D vision ready and after upgrading to a second graphic card in sli just before launch we find out no 3d support. Is this because of their marriage with amd this round? very disappointing.
  • -1 Hide
    EllisD , December 3, 2013 7:28 AM
    Where is the 3D in BF4? BF3 was 3D vision ready and after upgrading to a second graphic card in sli just before launch we find out no 3d support. Is this because of their marriage with amd this round? very disappointing.
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