Need For Speed developers: "The move to DX11 from DX9 has given us around a 300% improvement in rend - Polidicks

[IMG]http://gon.cdn.on.net/uploads/2012/09/nfsmwint4.jpg[/IMG] [QUOTE]After our recent hands-on session with Need for Speed: Most Wanted, we managed to corner the game’s producer, Criterion’s Leanne Loombe, for a chat about why the PC version will make its console counterparts look positively ugly. Read on for all the specifics, including how they’ve leveraged DX11 for a 300% performance increase on PC, and exactly what sort of rig will be required to push it as hard as you can. games.on.net: There’s a growing gap in performance between the PC and consoles as consoles get older. Does that create more work for you guys, because you need to spend more time on the PC version? Leanne Loombe: Yeah, we have a dedicated pipeline for the PC version. The way that we have it set up means we can dedicate more time to PC. The PC version of Most Wanted is obviously 1080p, 60Hz, and we’re using DirectX 11 as well. That’s there for the PC gamers. games.on.net: Do you know which features of DX11 you’ll be using? Leanne Loombe: We’re primarily leveraging the increased efficiency of DX11 to give improved performance. The move to DX11 from DX9 has given us around a 300% improvement in rendering performance. This has enabled us to provide an improved image based lighting model over the console version, as well as allowing us to run with higher detail shadows and reflections. The increased power of DirectX 11 hardware has also allowed us to implement features such as real-time ambient occlusion, and light scattering algorithms which are absent in the console version. games.on.net: What other changes have you made to the visuals in the PC version? Leanne Loombe: PC supports a number of advanced graphical features including SSAO, light scattering, high dynamic range motion blur, high resolution textures, advanced specular lighting models, headlight shadow casting, enhanced VFX quality, and enhanced shadow quality levels. We also scale geometry detail and level of detail switching according to screen resolution. games.on.net: How deep are the graphics configuration options on PC – are we talking a short list of three or four options, or a deeper screen with over a dozen? Can you tell us what options PC users will be able to tweak? Leanne Loombe: Options are available to enable High Resolution textures, motion blur quality, shadow quality, SSAO level, reflection detail, visual effects quality, geometry detail levels, and light scattering. games.on.net: Will Most Wanted need a very fast PC to run at the highest graphical details? Leanne Loombe: A modern quad core PC with an AMD Radeon 6000 series or NVIDIA Geforce 500 series can run the game with highest details settings. games.on.net: Will the PC version use peer to peer gameplay for the online mode, and what are the number of players it supports? Is it more players than console? Also, do you support LAN play? Leanne Loombe: PC uses peer to peer and supports 12 players online, whilst console only supports 8 players. An internet connection is required for multiplayer, so LAN only play is not supported. games.on.net: What controls will the PC version support? Can we expect full Xbox 360 controller support on the PC at launch? Leanne Loombe: The Xbox 360 controller is fully supported and is the recommended controller for Most Wanted. We also fully support keyboard and the majority of DirectInput controllers, including steering wheels. Controller bindings are fully configurable in game. games.on.net: Have you had to change the interface at all for the PC version? Leanne Loombe: We have always strived to provide an accessible user experience, regardless of platform. We want the game to be fully playable whether you are hunched over a 15” laptop, or sitting on your sofa playing on your PC hooked up to a 50” plasma TV. As such minimal changes have been made to the PC interface, other than providing enhanced settings menus and a quit option. Origin In Game is also fully supported to allow you interact and manage your Most Wanted friends on PC. games.on.net: Comparing the handling of Most Wanted to Hot Pursuit, are you aiming for the same feel? Leanne Loombe: It’s brand new handling this time around. It’s unique for every single car, so every car has a different model. We wanted the player to feel like they were driving the real car because they’ll never get to drive those high-end sports cars in real life. games.on.net: We just drove the Aston Martin in the demo and it felt quite heavy and sluggish. Is that because I was driving the Aston Martin, or is it part of the new handling, with cars having more weight? Leanne Loombe: I’d say it’s probably because you were driving the Aston, where we tried to reflect the car’s weight. games.on.net: How do you then balance that in online racing, where everybody is driving wildly different vehicles? Leanne Loombe: With the Speed List that you get served up there are car restrictions, so you do have to go in particular cars. We try to get that balance right. We have a wide range of cars, mainly for multiplayer, so we try to balance them in each event’s restrictions. games.on.net: In a lot of racing games, after a couple of weeks the community has found THE fastest car for each category, and that’s what everybody races. How are you tackling this issue so that your entire collection of cars get used? Leanne Loombe: That’s part of the reason why we’ve made all the cars available at the start. Then people can go and drive their favourite car. games.on.net: Cop chases are out of multiplayer. Given that was such an amazing feature of Hot Pursuit, why did you remove them? Leanne Loombe: Most Wanted has a different focus to Hot Pursuit. Hot Pursuit was very much about racers and cops, whereas Most Wanted is about racing with friends, driving in the open world. Obviously it has chasing with cops in single player, but we do other things in multiplayer instead. games.on.net: What’s the level of involvement of the cops in single player – will they use all the same tricks that we saw in Hot Pursuit? Leanne Loombe: Fully integrated – if you start driving dangerously, or too fast, then the cops will be on you. You have to get out of their line of sight, which drops your heat level. As your heat levels increase, more cops will come, and they’ll do roadblocks, and drop spike traps, but no helicopters this time around. You then use the open world to evade the pursuit. games.on.net: Can you describe the matchmaking, and how that works? Leanne Loombe: We try and keep the players in the world at all times, so we don’t have any lobbies or anything like that. We do it all from in the world. The matchmaking will happen while you’re in free drive, and then drop you into the speed lists. To find friends you can bring up “Easy Drive” which will show your list of friends, and you can select your friend. You can also create a private or public and match make that way.[/QUOTE] [url]http://games.on.net/2012/09/why-the-pc-version-of-nfs-most-wanted-will-be-the-best-around-criterion-talks-tech/[/url] This is why its wrong to say "well with so many games behind held back by consoles, at least we'll have easier to run games". DirectX 9.0C came out nearly a decade ago and does not have proper optimizations and proper support for newer hardware, multicore cpu support is extremely limited on DX9 compared to either DX11 or OpenGL (Borderlands 2 suffers because of this). Even Activision is making Black Ops 2 DX11 only* because it runs better that way. *(DX11 can be made to be backwards compatible with DX10 graphics cards, just less graphics features)

that sure is a lot

[QUOTE=AJisAwesome15;37825698]that sure is a lot[/QUOTE] Hot Damn it is.

Good on you Criterion. I commend you for not forgetting about us and actually using new technology.

So does this mean Most Wanted isn't a port?

"Origin In Game is also fully supported to allow you interact and manage your Most Wanted friends on PC" ... Please don't only be for Origin.

[QUOTE=potsale;37826099]"Origin In Game is also fully supported to allow you interact and manage your Most Wanted friends on PC" ... Please don't only be for Origin.[/QUOTE] It's only for origin. Although why not just DL it through origin and place the shortcut into steam? I don't think origin has to be open to run it...

[QUOTE=potsale;37826099]"Origin In Game is also fully supported to allow you interact and manage your Most Wanted friends on PC" ... Please don't only be for Origin.[/QUOTE] Is Origin [b]really[/b] that bad or are you just bandwagoning?

[QUOTE=lavacano;37826126]Is Origin [b]really[/b] that bad or are you just bandwagoning?[/QUOTE] I have used it, and it wasn't a very nice experience. I don't know if it's been fixed, but I my computer used to completely freeze for a bit when I started it, and it just doesn't have as much to offer as Steam does. I don't want to have to use it when it could just not exist and the games could be on Steam.

[QUOTE=lavacano;37826126]Is Origin [b]really[/b] that bad or are you just bandwagoning?[/QUOTE] I don't like it because all my games and friends are on steam.

I don't like EA and I don't agree with their business practices.

Origin works just fine for me. Shit, it's download speeds are insanely fast as well. Unless they changed something recently.

well regardless on one's view on Origin, I hope that more developers ditch DX9. I mind if they go for DirectX11 or OpenGL (it'd be better if they went OpenGL because more OS's are supported) but DX9 just has to go, for performance sakes

Origin runs better for me than Steam. But it's still lacking features and in general I'd rather use Steam since all my friends are on it. More on topic, sort of looking forward to a new NFS game. I was a bit disappointed by the Hot Pursuit Criterion made because I was hoping it would be more like Hot Pursuit 2 and have splitscreen.

Origin's download speeds are really fast for me and I do like the UI it's neat. But I only use it for BF3 however if I was to buy another EA game (which idk when that'll happen) I'll just shortcut it in steam Not the end of the world

Origin runs like shit when I play Battlefield 3, so I get random FPS drops since origin decides to jump to 70% cpu usage randomly.

[QUOTE=Intoxicated Spy;37826625]Origin runs like shit when I play Battlefield 3, so I get random FPS drops since origin decides to jump to 70% cpu usage randomly.[/QUOTE] Fucking this

People are starting to care about PC recently. I like this.

[QUOTE=The Baconator;37825690]Yeah, we have a dedicated pipeline for the PC version.[/QUOTE]Good guy Criterion, games industry take notice!

Nothing wrong with this. If you have a graphics card that only supports DirectX 9, then it's probably too old to play anything new anyway.

This is good for any upcoming Need For Burnout games that might come.

[QUOTE=The Baconator;37826281]well regardless on one's view on Origin, I hope that more developers ditch DX9. I mind if they go for DirectX11 or OpenGL (it'd be better if they went OpenGL because more OS's are supported) but DX9 just has to go, for performance sakes[/QUOTE] I could argue that if they just used OpenGL in the first place they wouldn't have problems with optimizations at API-level. Either way, this is great news.

[QUOTE=Leo Leonardo;37826247]Origin works just fine for me. Shit, it's download speeds are insanely fast as well. Unless they changed something recently.[/QUOTE] Its download speeds are insanely fast like 50 mb/s 90 mb/s but the problem with Origin is at the end of those downloads it is broken so you have to fix it. But I think it got changed to a 10 kb/s cap or something because that is what I got on my 90 mb/s+ internet connection in one of the more recent game updates.

I love you criterion

[QUOTE=lavacano;37826126]Is Origin [b]really[/b] that bad or are you just bandwagoning?[/QUOTE] Origin has a very bipolar UI where it claims to be very organized and at first sight may appear organized, but whenever you try to actually use a feature or change options you'll find the UI to be absolutely cluttered and messy.

[QUOTE=mysteryman;37828409]Origin has a very bipolar UI where it claims to be very organized and at first sight may appear organized, but whenever you try to actually use a feature or change options you'll find the UI to be absolutely cluttered and messy.[/QUOTE] “If you can't make it good, at least make it look good.” -Bill Gates Also Dx9 is over a decade old and the only reason its still used is mainly because of consoles and because there is no encouragement from anyone to use Dx10-11. There are only like a handful of games that put Dx10-11 to use, beyond better performance.

Simple Origin tip for people who want to use Steam. Make a shortcut to Origin, launch through that, then launch the game on Origin you want to play. As for the service itself I've never had issues. The UI is clean enough, it's more responsive than Steam is, and the download speeds are demonstrably faster; Origin actually maxes out my down rate.

[QUOTE=Raidyr;37828657]Simple Origin tip for people who want to use Steam. Make a shortcut to Origin, launch through that, then launch the game on Origin you want to play. As for the service itself I've never had issues. The UI is clean enough, it's more responsive than Steam is, and the download speeds are demonstrably faster; Origin actually maxes out my down rate.[/QUOTE] I'd assume the download rate would have to do with them providing less than Steam

[QUOTE=Jookia;37828120]I could argue that if they just used OpenGL in the first place they wouldn't have problems with optimizations at API-level. Either way, this is great news.[/QUOTE] of course, but thanks to MS being all anti-competitive and spreading FUD, most PC developers consider OpenGL a non-option [editline]27th September 2012[/editline] [QUOTE=zombojoe;37828610] Also Dx9 is over a decade old and the only reason its still used is mainly because of consoles [/QUOTE] No actually, the 360 uses an early version of DX10 (it can use MSAA with deferred rendering for example) and other consoles don't even use DX period. It's because MS made DX10 Vista only and with Vista being all considered bad it started the idiotic "I'm never leaving XP" movement. It's caused devs got used to coding for DX9 for years. And they are afraid of OpenGL.

Well I am still not going to buy any EA games in the future exept for Mirror's Edge 2. Unless they ruin that game too.