Tweet
Putting foliage differences aside for a moment, it's clear Rockstar Games' tentpole release emerges on PS4 and Xbox One with visual enhancements aplenty. Both versions push for an ambitious 1920x1080 framebuffer this time, even adding in a first person mode to invite closer scrutiny of Los Santos' finer details. The confidence is well founded too, with updated textures and new effects in place - but do both consoles qualify for the equal treatment, or does the PS4 advantage go beyond its extra woodland flourishes? As tested on the latest patch 1.02, this updated Grand Theft Auto 5 is obviously more than a simple resolution bump, though that's a fine start. The 1080p resolve is backed by higher-grade post-processing AA, flattering the game's more generous allowance for draw distance. Horizon details are easier than ever to pick out here, and trekking through Rockstar's pastiche of Los Angeles no longer produces the obvious pop-in artifacts of the last-gen releases. The switchover is still there, but for both PS4 and Xbox One, objects now draw in at the same impressive, far-flung range.
For any massive sandbox world, the surplus of RAM on these new machines is a vital resource. Here we see the Rage engine is no longer beholden to streaming all assets from the optical media and HDD caches - and the GPUs on each unleash the potential for more effects. On PS4 and Xbox One alike, we now get focal effects such as depth of field (DOF), god rays, and also screen-space reflections across glossy floors. It's still a last-gen game at its core, but the extra finesse here makes it hard to go back a generation - and neither Sony or Microsoft's new hardware misses out.
Read more…
More...