Halo 3 - Microsoft Game Studios's first 1080p game?

Usually only third party publishers have had the HDTV 1080p logo on the back of their released Xbox 360 title's boxes, but nothing released by MGS. That will change on September 25th.

[radzy]

HALO 3 IS GONNA ROCK

[JsonHenry]

It has an output of 1080p, but so what? So does any other 360 game I own.

The internal rendering frame is what I want to know. What resolution does the game run in BEFORE being upscaled to 1080p. The PS3 and the Xbox360 does NOT have ANY games that run NATIVELY at 1080p.

Anyone who knows anything about the bandwidth needed to run a graphics intensive game NATIVELY at 1920*1080 knows that neither console can handle that heavy of a load.

Don't be fooled here people. Read my other posts, I am a Microsoft fan. I am not dissing this game as I have it pre-ordered as of today. Just saying this is propaganda at its finest.

[Ju]

I don't know for Halo, but I can guarantee that PS3s

Ridge Racer 7, Full Auto 2, Virtual Tennis, Ultimate Alliance (badly, though) run native 1080p (which I own), beside Ninja Gaiden Sigma and Lair (which I don't own but had rented or played the demo).

Why I know its 1080p native ? Because the PS3 scaler is so bad, you get blurry images if upscaled (e.g. see Rainbow6 Vegas. That always upscales - probably a 360 left over ? - even if you have a 720p res set and no way to disable that).

[VirusE]

Ju the games you named are 100% native. Sigma looks great in 1080p!

[i Shank u]

a couple months back i remember reading Bungie saying the game will run in 720p natively and be upscaled to 1080p. unless anything's changed, i'd bet thats how the game will be

[JsonHenry]

You obviously know nothing of what I am talking about. The games are rendered internally at a set resolution, then upscaled. MOST games for both systems don't even run at a full 720p resolution.

And no, your PS3 DOES NOT run those games natively in 1080i/p. It is upscaled as well using a software scaler. (which is why it usually looks like crap when upscaled) It outputs them in 1080 to your TV, but the game is rendered internally at a much lower resolution.

It is a trick developers have been using for a long time. Nothing new to see here folks!

[Ju]

@JsonHenry

You're a funny guy. No really. You know this, because ? (you are a developer, right?).

Well, I can assure you, the games I have mentioned render a 1920x1080 framebuffer and do not upscale (or to say it in other words: the rasterizer renders into a 1920x1080 memory buffer). You can accept this or not. I leave that up to you.

One reason would simply be, the PS3 cannot upscale 720p to 1080p. There is no Y-Scaler. It can to some basic X-scaling which is best used if the field size is an even multiplier of the target line length - resulting in strange buffer resolutions like 960x1080; you gotta fix the aspect ratio manually). You can do Y-Scaling in SW, sure. The result is a blurry picture like in RB6V.

720p game run 720p on the PS3. Even if you activate your menu in 1080p/i mode. It will only scale, if a) the game forces it to (like RB6V) or b) the game allows a fallback in case the PS3 does not have the 720p option active (in case your (old) TV can only display 480i/480p and 1080i but nothing else). But even then, this case must be explicitly activated by the game vendor. If not it will simply scale down to 480p/i.

Enough PS3 excursion. (Why do I even respond...). Subject is Halo 3 in 1080p. Sorry guys (and gals).

[FadeToBlack]

Sorry but you are incorrect about the ps3. I have the ps3 and it cannot upscale from 720p to 1080p as i have tried with resistance and motostorm and it wont do it. While games such ninja guiden sigma ran at a native 1080p resolution. It is very much possible to run native 1080p games on both the 360 and PS3. The question will be how many graphical attributes will be running in the game and the hits you would take in performance for the higher resolution.

[Raptors]

I thought Bungie said that the game would be locked in at 30fps and 720p? If they can pull it off then great, I just hope they didn't sacrifice game performance for it to run at 1080p.

[Trauma]

Campaign is locked at 30 fps and 60 fps for multi. For the graphics the last I read was that its scaled to 1080p.

[SKUD]

In 1080P. WOW.

[i Shank u]

be funny if there's an armor permutation that adds a little armor flap between the legs and swings while teabagging

[tplarkin7]

I only have 1080i (or 720p), but that is great news. It looks like Halo 3 will be polished. Of course, that's no surprise.

[Marriot VP]

that's all anybody has.....really

don't feel bad, very few people can drop a couple thousand for a 1080p

[TheSadTruth]

it's probably a mistake.. they pretty much confirmed it wouldn't run at 1080p in a weekly update before as well

no game can run at 1080p with environments the size of Halo 3... at least on this gen of consoles

[i Shank u]

its been confirmed for awhile the game runs in 720p and is upscaled to 1080p when selected

[tonsoffun]

I always thought that if it said 1080p on the back of the 360 games it meant that it was scaled up - I am assuming that it isn't true then?

[SuperSaiyan4]

1080p isnt anything special I have 2 HDTV's in the house I live in a 720p/1080i and a 1080p image quality wise there isnt that much of a difference.

So I have to laugh everytime someone says 'Wow 1080p!' thats a joke.

I have the money to get a 1080p screen for my room but i prefer my current Samsung in 1080i.

[tplarkin7]

For those that have huge 1080p HDTVs, it makes a difference. I am happy with 1080i since that is all I have.

[i Shank u]

ive got 20/15 vision (pretty good says the doc) and the diff between the two that i can see is tiny, only on sets around 50in and above is there a real diff. i was looking for 37in for the bedroom so i decided to get a 720p set and save a wad of cash

[Crazyglues]

Look who just Arrived at the HDTV party and decided to start kicking some butt. This would be so awesome if it's true.

Are you saying that halo 3 will play at 1080p running at 60fps... wow, Bungie must have put some serious work into this game if that's true.

Because I do remember them saying it will run at 60 fps. That would just be amazing. -wait this is Halo 3 where talking about right, that would just be Unreal. Think about the size of the game.

With as big as halo's open boards are, running at 1080p would make the game look like something incredible. I hope it's true (because if it is, it also means halo 3 will push the system like no other game that has come before it.)

This will be a defining moment in gaming. If halo 2 did 125 million in it's first few days, I can only guess what halo 3 will do. (200 million?)

(Microsoft just might be right about that perfect storm because I think halo will sell from now all the way into Christmas)

[Jeebus]

But it was stated just last week that H3 is going to run at 30 fps and at 720p.

Also, 3 is going sell as much as 2 did and then some, but you also have to consider that this time there are 3 versions, meaning the most diehard fans are buying both the Legendary and whatever the other one is, banking around 200 dollars for one game, to one customer. What a cash cow of useless paraphernalia. They know people are going to just pour money into it because it says Halo 3 and they are getting a bonus video if they buy both versions. Undoubtedly it will be a great game, but I'm so sick of all the hype and people forming religions and cults around it. It's ridiculous. So in regards to it making more money than Halo 2, definitely. The 360 costs more than the original, the vanilla version costs 10 dollars more, and the most expensive is over 120 dollars. Wtf?

[power of Green]

720p native games are listed on the site as 720p the upscalable games then show on the back of the box the max rez.

1080p native games are shown as 1080p on the site.

Now this site has been known to be behind of have incomplete info thus the Eternal Sonata posts I make last night.

This game's 1080p Native: http://www.xbox.com/en-US/g...

This games is not 1080p native but on the box shows the max rez(upscaling): http://www.xbox.com/en-US/g...

Don't be suprized if Bungie and MSFT were playing the industry slaping people in the face.

[ShiftyLookingCow]

you certainly got a point there to people who say every 360 game marked 1080p is upscaled. But I am still thinking its a mistake on part of xbox.com, as Bungie said Halo 3 will run natively at 720p and upscaled to 1080p in a FAQ a month or two back.

[TrillHeat954]

reasearch people!!!!!! Xbox 360 games are always scaled from 720p to 1080p with the exception of nba street homecourt. Bungie has directly stated in many interviews that the game is rendered in 720p but upscalable to 1080p. And by the way to the person who said ps3 cant do real 1080p, unfortunately ps3 does not have a scaler chip at all thats why there a very few games which run in 1080p and those that do..... actually have 1080p on the supported resolutions area on the back of the box.

[aiphanes]

So it has a scaler...it maybe software...using some or one of the Cell cores but it is a good scaler...the best DVD upscaler, something that the Xbox 360 can not do that well..

[Ju]

No, it can upscale (the PS3, that is, see RB6V does this). But the "scaler" has a way lower quality then the 360s scaler, and the PS3 does not have a dedicated "scaler" chip like the 360 has. The "view" games supporting 1080p is about 50% of my library. I wouldn't call that "view" (and BTW. I forgot NBA Homestreet, I have that, two, runs 1080p native).
BTW: PS1/PS2/DVD upscaling is done in SW. The SPUs are fast enough and idling around any way in that mode. They can as well scale - and filter (!) - an image.

[WilliamRLBaker]

aiphanes the 360 upscales games and movies VASTLY better then the ps3, Specially when it comes to scalling any 4801/p content to 1080i/p.

Where as most of the time content in those low resolutions only look best when upscaled to 720p.

Or are you going to tell me that the ps3 that uses nothing but software upscalling is better then an hardware solution?

[ShiftyLookingCow]

this was already debunked by Bungie

[edit] this is probably a mistake

[DJ]

But do the Campaign and Multiplayer modes really have two different framerates? I know campaign is at 30 FPS, but what about the multiplayer?

Edit: Not sure what the disagree was for. Bungie themselves stated the game is 720p, and then upscaled.

[Funky Town_TX]

I have a few 360 games tat say 1080p on the label. So they are not native 1080p. When a PS3 game has 1080p then it is 1080p. Last I read the PS3 had a sofware scaler not a hardware, therefore it needs code to do scaling. The 360 has hardware scaler so no code is needed. Eitherway, I have a 1080p sammy. When I set the 360 to 720p,1080i, or 1080p they all look great. In the end this is what matters right?

[Ju]

I am not sure if that means anything. I e.g. do not recall if RB6V has a "1080i" label on it. It might. But the native resolution is definitively 720p. It upscales 1080p/i (while "i" is better then "p", oddly enough).
I think what it simply means is, if you have a TV with any of the resoultions given, it will run. Lair, OTHO misses 1080i - has 1080p/720p and no 480p AFAIR (?) - on the box but runs either 1080p or i, depending on the settings. See, that is not on the box but works.
So, could well be that Halo runs 1080p native (others here say its upscaled...I actually have no idea). I'm just saying. Read that with a grain of salt.

[Crazy Larry]

that Blue Dragon was native 1080p...maybe not...who the hell knows? Either way, Halo 3 is good times.

[St0]

AAAHaaaaaaaaaaaaaa now we no why it looks like sh*t, 1080p = worse graphics

[kewlkat007]

and all.

But

If you have a 42 inch set or less..man 1080P is so Overrated.

I guess it's nice for those with 50+ inchers....I just think 1080p, is all marketing. I guess it's still nice.

[TheMART]

"Ridge Racer 7, Full Auto 2, Virtual Tennis, Ultimate Alliance (badly, though) run native 1080p (which I own), beside Ninja Gaiden Sigma and Lair (which I don't own but had rented or played the demo)."

Oh those sound like real important PS3 games to have in 1080p...
The only one that is good in 1080p is Ninja Gaiden Sigma. The rest of the games suck pretty much.

I'd take 720p over 1080p any day if the games are better. And it shows again 720p is the sweet spot for gaming this gen.

[Ju]

(Last bubble, so I better make this sound important - if not, I hope you guys have a good laugh :)

Well, yeah, true, I have other games on my list which are 720p only, like Resistance and Warhawk. Hopefully Graw2 and Heavenly Sword soon (don't know if Graw2 renders 1080, though).

But Lair and Ninja Gaiden are pretty good candidates for high level 1080p titles. Ninja Gaiden uses lesser detailed BG textures (@60fps), but I don't know if Lair strips things down (@30fps). For the later I cannot really say it is less detailed then say a 720p game (maybe it has only 5000 soldiers on the bridge compared to the 10k+ in HS ?). I think the second wave games by late 2008 might go more and more 1080. NBA08 is also a high level 1080@60fps game.

Long story short, I might agree, the time for 1080 titles (at least on the PS3) is not here yet, but I think it will come. If they found a way to really render Halo in native 1080, then it shows the 360 is even closer there.

(BTW: how was that ?)

[FirstknighT]

1080p is a bad idea. You get better framerate with 720p. And you don't want to upscale a 720p game to a 1080p resolution since that will create some lag.

[Leo Atrox]

I know it doesn't say it on Xbox.com, but the "Blue Dragon" box has the "1080p logo on the back" if my memory is true.

I don't know if that's natively rendered at 1080p, but I know that a lot of the animations are a little choppy when running at 1080p ...

Anyway, regardless of whether it is rendered natively, the headline on this one isn't accurate ... Or my memory isn't accurate. Oh well. Who really cares?

[Wii60_FTW]

that's pretty pointless considering only about .00001% of HDTV owners...you know....actually have a 1080p set. this is dumb. 720p is more than fine.

[Stretchystrong]

For my recent 55" 1080p hdtv purchase. I don't think 1080p is overrated. People do think it is a lot better, but under 50 inches it is in no way noticeable. I still love my old 1080i tv. Even if it is just upscaled it will still look beautiful, so who cares if it is native or not.