HL2 v GR:AW comparison

[pz3]

http://media.putfile.com/HL2-vs-GRAW

Went into HL2 lost coast and GRAW... took some video

looked at FPS while recording and not .....

The only time HL2 went below 45fps was in the church where the lighting seems to be really pushed.

maybe its not conclusive since hl2 level is small but what ever it still ran it at 50fps+ most of the time at 1680x1050 and looked superb.

ill take some and leave some of the nitty gritty for smoother gameplay and better level enviroments.

*edit* btw putfile is beeing slow. try again later maybe?

Edited May 6, 2006 by Prozac360

[Malum]

GRAW is more advanced than HL2 graphically. Period.

[zwitherow]

maybe its not conclusive since hl2 level is small

←

maybe? lol. that comparison is completely unfair.

graw > hl2 imo

edit: props to audioslave, however

Edited May 6, 2006 by zwitherow

[Brettzies]

GRAW is more advanced than HL2 graphically. Period.

←

Too bad it doesn't show. ; )

Seriously though, HL2 made my jaw drop over a year ago. Not really into the game myself but graphically it was wonderful. GR:AW visually, eh, I hate to say it but it hasn't really made me go "wow." However, aside from the unintuitive interface I do like the gameplay better.

As for comparing the two, I think GR:AW's major damage is to the cpu not the graphics card. Both enemy and team AI, the map thing and controls, the map size, there's just a lot more going on perhaps.

It's fine to compare them visually, but as to why one is relatively fast on most systems and the other a resource hog, who knows? They are different games doing different things.

[zwitherow]

one reason GRAW is a huge resource hog is the view distance. HL2 looks great, but the maps are small, they don't need to be large because the gameplay is completely linear. another example would be doom3. it runs great on the maps provided.. but open up the map editor and make a huge, well lit, open area... framerate drops to like 10 fps.

this is what i meant when i said it was an unfair comparison.

the map design is one of the major reasons graw's gameplay stands out to most people, myself included.

Edited May 6, 2006 by zwitherow

[sui317]

to me hl2 does not come close to having a realistic view

when on the beach in the intro in lost coast it is like looking at a cardboard box city

when in the helo flying in or para jumping in to mexico it has a far more impressive look

graw is kinda heavy, but it flows a bit better and feels better

hl2lc does not, surely not the open spaces do it for me

the framerates might be better but that is it, graw has little of the fantasy fancy things like golden chandeliers etc to show off with but when looking at the transparency of car lights it does have that fancy stuff built in

but i do think it is also a matter of opinion

hl2 does have better framerates but that is it for me, it lacks in pretty much every thing else

(oh they have the mp7 but that is all i think)

i made the comparision on my own system, as i have (so ashamed) hl2 on it

[LT.INSTG8R]

Well HL Episode 1 is coming June 1 so we'll see what Valve improved on

[jsonedecker]

one reason GRAW is a huge resource hog is the view distance.

←

I just got the retail and spent a few hours with it yesterday, but besides the opening drop I haven't seen anything that shows longer draw distances than can be achieved by skilled level designers in Source, UE3, FarCry or even the latest version of Doom3 or UT2004.

The distance you do see uses a significant LOD system that could be implimented in many engines.

I'm not bashing GR:AW at all, just pointing out that in the aspect of the gameplay itself, not the cutscene stuff, I have yet to come across any significant draw distance.

-John

[ruggbutt]

Draw distances in FarCry are solely based on the talent of the guy making the maps. We had a couple maps that accidently had a 1.2 mile draw distance. It was a mistake in the editing and we brought it down to 700-800 meters. Mainly cuz it looked better and we were trying to keep certain maps from being a sniper camping fest.

Cryengine 2 will surpass that by a long shot.

[pz3]

use of lod models makes a huge peformance increase unless you use too many lod models. then it just loads up the memory.

i think the main reason graw doesnt run so smooth is there are to many materials / shaders and slightly more polys then actually needed to acheive the game with a good look.

[Whistle]

HL2 looks fake. GRAW definitely looks better

[ruggbutt]

HL2 doesn't look fake. I understand your faithfulness to GRAW but come on..............................

[pz3]

looks more artsy, sure i can take that... but it wasnt fake. More like a well made hollywood scene.

but the key part of this discussion was it out peforms and looks better overall with almost twice the frame rate... so i ask why graw cant do this?

Edited May 6, 2006 by Prozac360

[quiznoes]

HL2 does not look fake... Doom 3 looks fake O_O "plastic"

[Whistle]

looks more artsy, sure i can take that... but it wasnt fake. More like a well made hollywood scene.

but the key part of this discussion was it out peforms and looks better overall with almost twice the frame rate... so i ask why graw cant do this?

←

thats more of what I meant. It just looks too colorfull.

[ruggbutt]

I've been in churches in Europe. When they're dark inside with light coming thru the windows it looks just like that.

[Reb]

looks more artsy, sure i can take that... but it wasnt fake. More like a well made hollywood scene.

but the key part of this discussion was it out peforms and looks better overall with almost twice the frame rate... so i ask why graw cant do this?

←

Because the engine is inefficient. I came to the conclusion before the demo was even released. Look: http://www.ghostrecon.net/forums/index.php...ficiency&st=135 Interesting read (the whole page with responses). This discussion has been here before

Game developers should stick to major engines when developing games. I've seen this way to many times before. A great title gets pulled down because of technical issues....

Edited May 6, 2006 by Reb

[theWalrusKing]

im kind of worried how people think GRAW looks better than Lost Coast, im a big GR fan but im not blinded by it. That LC map is not small, and the water alone in LC outperforms any factor in GRAW, gameplay or not. Comparing the actuall games is stoopid because they are very diff.

[Cpl Ledanek]

theWalrusKing, what an awesome name

I agree about using LC map, but I would have used the outside map of LC for the distance draw comparison-techy stuff (I'm blabbering), instead the inside of the church.

I'm just surprised that Prozac didn't used the OE map for a semi-GR-to-GR comparizon. Yeah it didn't have HDR-whatever-lighting but map size to map size I guess it would look awesome.

Whatdahell! I'm just glad Prozac had the balls to show us some comparison knowing he'll probably get flamed for this.

[XenoSoft]

im kind of worried how people think GRAW looks better than Lost Coast, im a big GR fan but im not blinded by it.  That LC map is not small, and the water alone in LC outperforms any factor in GRAW, gameplay or not.  Comparing the actuall games is stoopid because they are very diff.

←

I think GRAW looks better, but because it lacks AA, Half-Life 2 wins. Graphicly speaking of course.

Edited May 6, 2006 by XenoSoft

[pz3]

im all for a succeding version of ghost recon, I just cant help but feel this game isnt it, with the peformance problems ontop its not even enjoyable for me to play.

I seen no change in peformance with low graphics.

and at 1024x768 or lower is the only time i can even reach 50fps.

With my current monitor i need atleast 1280x960. Wich all games seem to run 50fps+ at thus far with high settings.

BTW farcry does run hdr @ 1680x1050 with 60frames per second, and it looks amazing!

but i didnt really want to use it as a comparison because farcry does have a sureal feel to the engine and not as gritty like HL2 did.

OH BTW i have no mouse lag HL2 when it does drop to 35fps in the church at times... even when recording at 20fps i had no mouse lag, but graw still had plenty of it.

Edited May 6, 2006 by Prozac360

[Sup]

HL2 does not look fake... Doom 3 looks fake O_O "plastic"

←

You should see what artists have to go through to make anything in that engine look plausible.

Cryengine 2 will surpass that by a long shot.

←

I should hope so, it's years newer.

[Nemon]

Too much geometry. Pretty much convinced that's the reason GRAW runs so poorly and why your settings have little effect. The GRAW level designer created an architectural masterpiece, but pushing around all that data on "todays" hardware isn't happening. Perhaps if you went out and blew $3K+ on a new machine with SLI and a OCed CPU you'd get 60fps+, but that's an insane amount of cash to be pouring into a machine just because one game runs crappy.

60fps+ min for a FPS i'm affraid. If someone tells you it runs great without any stutters, ignore them unless you get an average FPS.

[jsonedecker]

im kind of worried how people think GRAW looks better than Lost Coast, im a big GR fan but im not blinded by it.  That LC map is not small, and the water alone in LC outperforms any factor in GRAW, gameplay or not.  Comparing the actuall games is stoopid because they are very diff.

←

I think GRAW looks better, but because it lacks AA, Half-Life 2 wins. Graphicly speaking of course.

←

This is an interesting discussion, purely on it's "artistic" merits alone. Art is funny, as no one will agree 100% on what looks "good" and what doesn't.

But, I'm not sure how someone can think that this:

http://www.ghostrecon.net/fileman/users/ny.../Images/bau.jpg

Actually looks "good".

Compare that to something like this:

http://developer.valvesoftware.com/w/image...stcoast_bay.jpg

or

http://www.bit-tech.net/content_images/los...k/eyecandy1.jpg

or

http://www.ixbt.com/games/images/halflife2/hl2_01.jpg

Of course you can't compare gameplay, but as a gamer, my main issue with GR:AW PC has been what do I get for my steep tech investment? I play HL2 and it looks just like those screens at 1680x1050 on my ATI x800XL 256mb, 3000+ amd64 and 2gb ram... all with 60+ framerates. That GR:AW shot was taken on my 3.4 P4 with a nVidia 7800GT 256 and 3gb ram and with 35fps.

GR:AW actually has some fun gameplay in SP, but I just cannot figure out why people think it looks so good. Are the blinded by the "new car smell" of a new GR game? Am I seeing something different? Am I getting old? Not sure, but to this salty old dog, there is nothing in the game to graphicaly justify the HW requirements.

No one can run on High settings as the HW isn't available you say....that's fine and all, but unless there is something in the game that just turns on in the future, running a 512mb card doesn't change things much. Maybe the game has some DX10 features in it already, who knows.

Will I still enjoy the game.... probably. Does it look sub par going into mid 2006.... definately. Should GRIN have licensed an engine..... probably not. Should GRIN have used more mature tech, say something else in the Ubi closet(RSE or even in house stuff)........Yes. I feel they would have got a lot more mileage out of the game and reduced some of thier internal headaches.

-John

[Sup]

I have to agree about http://www.bit-tech.net/content_images/los...k/eyecandy1.jpg

Wonderul use of HDR and stunning art work pushes this above GRAW easily. I mean no offense to the Grin devs; they did a good job, but there's little competing with images like that.