Armored Core 4 - PS3 vs Xbox 360 Comparison Video

When multiplatform games are released, it seems there is always a big debate over how the version on one console compares to the version on another. Armored Core 4, a big name mech franchise, is coming to both the Xbox 360 and PS3. So the question is, which console does the game look better on? Watch the video and decide for yourself...

[TheFamilyGuy]

I'm actually not completely sure which one looks better. At a lot of points, the PS3 version seems really faded compared to the 360 version, which seems to have richer colors and lighting.

Later in the video though, the 360 version seems too dark compared to the PS3 version.

[rj81]

Yup I'm a 360 fanboy but anybody who says they can see a real difference between the two is crazy.

[TheFamilyGuy]

Actually there is an noticeable difference between the PS3 version and the Xbox 360 version. To me, the PS3 one seems more faded, and now that I watch it in HD, it looks like the 360 just has sort of a richer look to it.

If you click on "View Video" below the embedded video, I linked the HD video, which is bigger and you can see the differences easily.

[Boink]

the 360 version definitely looks better to start with, more detailed. but later on it seems to be really dark.

I must say, lame game either way:)

[specialguest]

I don't see any difference besides color and contrast. Again these color and contrast level can be adjusted on any television if needed to.

After many comparisons, I think it's safe to presume that every 360 vs PS3 game comparison will show the same results we seem to always see.

[giovonni]

Right out my mouth. It seems they both have the same animation and graphics, but the brightness and contrass are different at times. This can be changed by changing your tv options

[kornbeaner]

there are certain parts in the video where you can't even see the surrounding textures cause its so dark. Going down the missle silo is where the problem is most evident, on the PS3 version you can see the silo walls not so on the 360 version. Color saturation is the one thing that seems to be the most noticable difference when both systems are compared. Somtimes it makes the game more livley on the 360 (like with NBA homecourt) but for this game it just doesn't look right.

[DixieNormS]

One of the Ugliest games to come out for any next gen platform.

[power of Green]

Aready seen real comparisons The PS3 version had some jaggies had less going on in it; like reflections and did not have any heat distortion effects. Use the search feature on this site and type Armored Core 4 and you'll find all you need if you have any doubts on anything from any poster.

[power of Green]

The games sh*t anyways. lol

[Gamer luv]

Hmm.

At differnt points i thought they were both better.
The start, i thought the Xbox looked nice, but then the PS had a more sense of realism, but thats only because of the colour, which you can adjust.

Ill give the game some credit tho, it did look better then i thought it would.

[Bad_Karma]

It deffo looked better on the 360 on the outside scenes but looked better on the PS3 on the inside scenes .. swings and roundabouts .

[Vojkan]

I give my vote to PS3. Just because 360 version was so dark. But i have to say that it seems 360 had better colors...

[CaliGamer]

This game always had so much potential but never lives up to expectation IMO. I won't even look at the box when I go to the store.

[FirstknighT]

The explosions look nicer on the 360 and overall color. The ps3 has a problem with games always looking washed out, faded, or even blurry.

*EDIT*

HAHA, I just lost a bubble by Allroundgamer. Sorry if my opinion hurt ya, but this is like 10th time a comparison has gone favor to the 360 side. You cant use that excuse all the time. No more excuses.

[AllroundGamer]

do you think im the only one, that wants you to shutup? :D you share the immature nobrain comments with theMart and PowerOfGreen, therefore you have two bubbles, and if you continue, there will be only one left...

[TheMART]

So what about yourself @ 3 bubbles?

Although the game for both consoles isn't really next gen stuff, the 360 version is sharper, better shading, drawing distance etc etc.

Again. Over and over again, the PS3 looks washed out. Bad GPU!

[AllroundGamer]

lol i love the comments about how the xbox have richer colors etc., sorry boys, but if people cant calibrate their TV + console, than they are just plain dumb...

[FordGTGuy]

That you shouldn't have to calibrate your TV every time you put a game in.

[techie]

You can callibrate your console once. Also tell me you're not going to have to turn up the brightness on the 360 one to see what you're doing.

But hey it looks kind of lame to me.

[soldier sean]

stop acting like a biotch and disagreeing with people who are correct. You sir , are incorrect, it doesnt have to do with tv calibration , its all about the shader technology inside the xbox 360.

[Foxx77]

I wonder if the fact that this game came out in early december on the PS3 in JP that is; if that has anything to do with the differences? I'm wondering if all they did was change the dialogue and this is the game I saw in Japan 4 months ago and that's why it appears the 360 has richer textures with better heat effects and what not. Not talk about color or contrast but simply Textures and Effects. Might be something to think about.

[PureGamer]

just sad people, If you gonna compare do it properly, its right there in front of you the 360 version is very dark and looks duller. The PS3 version is lighter and actually has the detail when the robot goes down into that tunnel on the 360 version you just see black and no detail. When the video first starts off the rocks looks green on the 360 version and you can barely see the enemies, the PS3 is much more brighter and you can actually see the enemies and actually see the colours better. The whole of the video you just see green and dull images oin the 360 the sky even looks green, the enemies you cant even see on most parts. So if your gonna do it properly plz dont be biased and be a little kid also this game is wank.

to the below:

wtf are you goin on about, trying to compare me with some of the mugs on here go through the whole site and find a post in which i say those things that you have mentioned i dont even have a PS3 -.-
i have looked at it and you cant fuking see anything on the 360 true fact. If you cant get over a games console then go top yourself. that goes to all of you fanboys what take games consoles to heart plz go jump off a cliff it ill do the world a lot of good not to have you morons here. Most of them are fuking americans anyway stupid wankers.

ok to the below im sorry, but this is till directed at the mongs on here.

[Dareaver1]

It's easy to talk about contrast differences, the 360's is darker, kinda weird if you ask me. Makes no sense to play it if you can't see the game. But the textures and reflections on the 360 look a lot better. Also the explosions. It does not matter on which console it came out on first, when games came on the 360 first fanboys screamed foul play because it's a port. Now the ps3 get's a game first and they scream foul play, it got more dev time to look better. Please make up your mind. Right now all you fanboys are displaying situational biasism. It's a disease suffered by true fanboys. The only cure for it is to realize that there are two different consoles with different strengths, and cross platform games are always gonna look different no matter what. You have your next gen console, sorry it didn't live up to what the super hype machine said it would, (remember when sony said that the ps2 would be able to make games look like Toy Story) but it's still an amazing console, and when God of War 3 comes out on it, i will be sure to pick it up, plus devil may cry also, never played it but i want to try it out, it looks amazing.

ABOVE: whoah whoah, calm down, if you read my comment it was actually meant for 15 not you, clicked the wrong replay button. My sincere appologies. but we can do without the name callin. I mean i'm from jamaica, but i recently became a U.S. citizen, so i half to defend my country. And i do also get tired of all the fanboyism....

[calderra]

Color and contrast = only differences, really.
And that's pretty universal. Some titles also show differences in textures and lighting, usually favoring 360, but they're often very small differences. A lot of PS3 games seem to have the color and contrast cranked up too high (including Motorstorm, IMHO), 360 too low (starting with King Kong).

I have no idea why developers would do the color/contrast like this, but it's pretty much universal at this point.

[Raist]

What's up with glow effects abuse on the 360. Just look at the mech when it boosts, or the limit between sky and mountains. It's glowing like hell on the 360. Not the first time I see this tho, games always look more plastic and glowing on the 360. Not my cup of tea.

Other than that, i barely see any differences in models, animations etc.

[Shadow]

The Xenos, while related to the R600 series of ATI GPU's, uses the R500 series's shaders (which are really just the R400's with a 20-pack of redbull).

The RSX uses the Nvidia equivelant of the same shaders, and Nvidia's shaders actually do a better job of pulling off dynamic HDR lighting.

So in most cases, the same game with the same effects, the PS3 version will have functional lighting, but the 360 version will have very very strong bleed-through and an almost overpowering lighting contrast when the Bloom shader is applied. It tends to get passed-off as "better lighting" by the pro-360 camp when its really a limitation of the hardware.

[Dareaver1]

Now shadow, i would like to see you substantiate your claim. Every site i have ever been two has said that the 360 has a far superior graphics card, and has more shaders. So please share where you have gotten your facts from. I don't want to give any information that can be perceived as fanboy talk. But there are several sites that i can post to let you know where i get my information from.

[Shadow]

Far superior how? Most of the informed sites I've been to have remarked that the two are about the same, only varying in featuresets, beyond3d for example (a site where many game devs post and exchange info). Even more of a problem is that many of the workings of the RSX are still not fully understood, and the majority of comparison articles between the RSX and Xenos were made before we even fully understood the big picture.

Heck, don't believe me? Look up FP10 blending vs FP16 blending. 360 uses mostly FP10 blending but PS3 by definition doesn't support it. FP10 helps as a way to get HDR running, although, the range isn't as high so it tends to show artifacting and banding. FP16, by comparison, has a larger range, so things don't tend to look as "blown out". Its also more work intensive. Its also part of the reason some of the tweaks in PS3 Oblivion can't be transferred to 360. FP10 vs FP16.

Then you have even more exotic stuff, like NA032, which Heavenly Sword uses.

Its not cut and dry which GPU is better overall, since they're both widely divergent technologies and both excel in different ways, not to mention, the RSX has the CELL to help it with its sore-spot, namely vertex work.

[OldSchoolGamer]

These are parts of greatly informative articles where I draw information from in comparing the two GPU's for the systems, do the reading and you may learn something, if not may explain potentials minus the CPU's of course.

As for Xenos:
"... ATI's Xbox 360 GPU (codenamed Xenos) is quite interesting. The part itself is made up of two physically distinct silicon ICs. One IC is the GPU itself, which houses all the shader hardware and most of the processing power. The second IC (which ATI refers to as the "daughter die") is a 10MB block of embedded DRAM (eDRAM) combined with the hardware necessary for z and stencil operations, color and alpha processing, and anti aliasing. This daughter die is connected to the GPU proper via a 32GB/sec interconnect. Data sent over this bus will be compressed, so usable bandwidth will be higher than 32GB/sec. In side the daughter die, between the processing hardware and the eDRAM itself, bandwidth is 256GB/sec.

At this point in time, much of the bandwidth generated by graphics hardware is required to handle color and z data moving to the framebuffer. ATI hopes to eliminate this as a bottleneck by moving this processing and the back framebuffer off the main memory bus. The bus to main memory is 512MB of 128-bit 700MHz GDDR3 (which results in just over 22GB/sec of bandwidth). This is less bandwidth than current desktop graphics cards have available, but by offloading work and bandwidth for color and z to the daughter die, ATI saves themselves a good deal of bandwidth. The 22GB/sec is left for textures and the rest of the system (the Xbox implements a single pool of unified memory).

The GPU essentially acts as the Northbridge for the system, and sits in the middle of everything. From the graphics hardware, there is 10.8GB/sec of bandwidth up and down to the CPU itself. The rest of the system is hooked in with 500MB/sec of bandwidth up and down. The high bandwidth to the CPU is quite useful as the GPU is able to directly read from the L2 cache. In the console world, the CPU and GPU are quite tightly linked and the Xbox 360 stands to continue that tradition.

Weighing in at 332M transistors, the Xbox 360 GPU is quite a powerful part, but its architecture differs from that of current desktop graphics hardware. For years, vertex and pixel shader hardware have been implemented separately, but ATI has sought to combine their functionality in a unified shader architecture."

"Vertex and pixel processing differ in purpose, but there is quite a bit of overlap in the type of hardware needed to do both. The unified shader architecture that ATI chose to use in their Xbox 360 GPU allows them to pack more functionality onto fewer transistors as less hardware needs to be duplicated for use in different parts of the chip and will run both vertex and shader programs on the same hardware."

"ATI is predicting that developers will use lots of very small triangles in Xbox 360 games. As engines like Epic's Unreal Engine 3 have shown incredible results using pixel shaders and normal maps to augment low geometric detail, we can't tell if ATI is trying to provide the chicken or the egg. In other words, will we see many small triangles on Xbox 360 because console developers are moving in that direction or because that is what will run well on ATI's hardware?

Regardless of the paths that lead to this road, it is obvious that the Xbox 360 will be a geometry power house. Not only are all 3 blocks of 16 shaders able to become vertex shaders, but ATI's GPU will be able to handle twice as many z operations if a z only pass is performed. The same is true of current ATI and NVIDIA hardware, but the fact that a geometry only pass can now make use of shader hardware to perform 48 vector and 48 scalar operations in any given clock cycle while doing twice the z operations is quite intriguing. This could allow some very geometrically complicated scenes."

"There are 3 parallel groups of 16 shader units each. Each of the three groups can either operate on vertex or pixel data. Each shader unit is able to perform one 4 wide vector operation and 1 scalar operation per clock cycle. Current ATI hardware is able to perform two 3 wide vector and two scalar operations per cycle in the pixel pipe alone. The vertex pipeline of R420 is 6 wide and can do one vector 4 and one scalar op per cycle. If we look at straight up processing power, this gives R420 the ability to crunch 158 components (30 of which are 32bit and 128 are limited to 24bit precision). The Xbox GPU is able to crunch 240 32bit components in its shader units per clock cycle."

"Those who paid close attention to the amount of eDRAM (10MB) will note that this is not enough memory to store the entire framebuffer for displays larger than standard television with 4xAA enabled. Apparently, ATI will store the front buffer in the UMA area, while the back buffer resides on the eDRAM. In order to manage large displays, the hardware will need to render the back buffer in parts. This indicates that they have implemented some sort of very large grained tiling system (with 2 to 4 tiles). Usually tile based renderes have many more tiles than this, but this is a special case.

As for the PS3 RSX:

"The PlayStation 3’s RSX GPU shares the same “parent architecture” as the G70 (GeForce 7800 GTX), much in the same way that the GeForce 6600GT shares the same parent architecture as the GeForce 6800 Ultra. Sony isn’t ready to unveil exactly what is different between the RSX and the G70, but based on what’s been introduced already, as well as our conversations with NVIDIA, we can gather a few items.

Despite the fact that the RSX comes from the same lineage as the G70, there are a number of changes to the core. The biggest change is that RSX supports rendering to both local and system memory, similar to NVIDIA’s Turbo Cache enabled GPUs. Obviously rendering to/from local memory is going to be a lot lower latency than sending a request to the Cell’s memory controller, so much of the architecture of the GPU has to be changed in order to accommodate this higher latency access to memory. Buffers and caches have to be made larger to keep the rendering pipelines full despite the higher latency memory access.

The RSX only has 60% of the local memory bandwidth of the G70, so in many cases it will most definitely have to share bandwidth with the CPU’s memory bus in order to achieve performance targets.

There is one peculiarity that hasn’t exactly been resolved, and that is about transistor counts. Both the G70 and the RSX share the same estimated transistor count, of approximately 300.4 million transistors. The RSX is built on a 90nm process, so in theory NVIDIA would be able to pack more onto the die without increasing chip size at all - but if the transistor counts are identical, that points to more similarity between the two cores than NVIDIA has led us to believe. So is the RSX nothing more than the G70? It’s highly unlikely that the GPUs are identical, especially considering that the sheer addition of Turbo Cache to the part would drive up transistor counts quite a bit. So how do we explain that the two GPUs are different, yet have the same transistor count and one is supposed to be more powerful than the other? There are a few possible options.

So it is possible that NVIDIA’s estimates are slightly off for the two GPUs, but at approximately 10 million transistors per pixel pipe, the RSX will feature more than the 24 pixel rendering pipelines of the GeForce 7800 GTX, yet NVIDIA claims it is more powerful than the GeForce 7800 GTX. But how can that be?"

"The most likely explanation is attributed to nothing more than clock speed. Remember that the RSX, being built on a 90nm process, is supposed to be running at 550MHz - a 28% increase in core clock speed from the 110nm GeForce 7800 GTX. The clock speed increase alone will account for a good boost in GPU performance which would make the RSX “more powerful” than the G70.

Remember that the Cell host processor has an array of 7 SPEs that are very well suited for a number of non-branching tasks, including geometry processing. Also keep in mind that current games favor creating realism through more pixel operations rather than creating more geometry, so GPUs aren’t very vertex shader bound these days. Then, note that the RSX has a high bandwidth 35GB/s interface between the Cell processor and the GPU itself - definitely enough to place all vertex processing on the Cell processor itself, freeing up the RSX to exclusively handle pixel shader and ROP tasks. If this is indeed the case, then the RSX could very well have more than 24 pipelines and still have a similar transistor count to the G70, but if it isn’t, then it is highly unlikely that we’d see a GPU that looked much different than the G70.

The downside to the RSX using the Cell for all vertex processing is pretty significant. Remember that the RSX only has a 22.4GB/s link to its local memory bandwidth, which is less than 60% of the memory bandwidth of the GeForce 7800 GTX. In other words, it needs that additional memory bandwidth from the Cell’s memory controller to be able to handle more texture-bound games. If a good portion of the 15GB/s downstream link from the Cell processor is used for bandwidth between the Cell’s SPEs and the RSX, the GPU will be texture bandwidth limited in some situations, especially at resolutions as high as 1080p."

In summary:
The Xenox, built ground up by ATI, is capable of using today's graphic's engines to make some amazing looking screens with 10 mb of memory dedicated to 4x Anit-Aliasing (smoothing of jagged lines) at no cost to graphics horsepower. 332 Million transistors and 48 pipelines allow for lots of texturing, able to be flexible enough to do geometries (not currently the case) or pixels (much more used currently, especially by the Unreal engine, which is licensed for use the the vast majority of game developers) as needed. The GPU is linked very closely to the CPU, and is able to shift 512 mb of RAM towards either as needed.

The RSX is based on the G70 and is a card that was implimented late in the game when the cell could not handle graphics processing as was assumed it could (whether due to programming difficulty or simply too much drain on resources). The differences as noted above amount to a lessened memory bandwidth versus the 7800GTX PC cards. This will cause more reliance on the Cells Memory controller and memory banks (which causes a major problem in high detail at 1080p, which is why you are seeing the majority of PS3 games running 720 best frame rates).
300.4 million transistors and 36 piplines, 24 and 12 dedicated, versus 332 million (that is with the skimping due to unified pipelines, normally 48 pipelines would use a heck of alot more) and 48 pipelines, combined with 512 system memory and 10 mb dedicated 4x AA = roughly 522mb that could be used for graphics (more realistically about 386-412mb for pure graphics due to other needs), versus the 256 mb dedicated in the PS3 just allows for a more powerful GPU on the 360.

But these are facts, you read and you decide. May explain something though.

[Dareaver1]

Thanx Oldschoolgamer, i know you have had to make similar posts, and i didn't feel like cut and pasting links, so thanx for the info drop. I'm not trying to be biased shadow, but those are the facts that i know of. Now can you please substantiate what you are saying. I have a couple of sites that say the same thing Oldschoolgamer just placed down, if you don't believe me here they are.

http://xbox360.ign.com/arti...
http://dpad.gotfrag.com/por...

P.S. Let's not forget the whole apollo tragedy, they had a whole theater choose which fightnight looked better Xbox360 vs. Ps3 and it was unanimous that the 360's looked better. Now that is saying something. Because they said that the ps3 version received more polish. Oh they also said that the 360 version played better. Now this was a unanimous decision, sorry to break it to you, but if you want that link too, here you go:

http://www.n4g.com/gaming/N...

[Toolman]

When i watch this om my computer the xbox version looks better, if i watch it on my hdtv the ps3 version looks better. It seems the consoles output different contrast/brightness, and that should be addressed before an comparison like this is done

[Odiah]

On both consoles

[Violater]

I was sooo going to say the same thing, I see no reason to compare crap.

[sajj316]

While we are at this, let's compare Street Fighter II Champions edition on the Genesis to Super Street Fighter II on the SNES.

[sajj316]

While we are at this, let's compare Street Fighter II Champions edition on the Genesis to Super Street Fighter II on the SNES.

[SIX]

However, I've been burned by this before. Does anyone remember the Ridge Racer comparison? Based on that comparison, I went out and bought the 360 version and thought it was great! That was until I saw my buddy's PS3 version. I almost flipped! The 360 version was too dark and was less detailed. While the PS3 version was sharp and detailed. You could see a tree from miles away. The colors where vibrant and realistic. The think I find with alot of the 360 games is that they look too fake with all of the HDR lightng. It works for some games but not for others. I wonder if it's even possible for developers to turn it off, or at least mute it somehow. I just couldn't figure it out. The screen shot comparison looked so much better on the 360 version.

[Dragonopolis]

Was in favor of the PS3. It seemed the person who did this purposely set the Xbox 360 tv set to dark and the PS3 set to bright (resulted in the faded look. I believe the outside seemed more realistic on the PS3 than xbox 360. I usually find myself defending the PS3 in articles like this, but this time I find that this person seems to be favoring the PS3 in the line-up. I believe if you had a decent HDTV and HDTV recording ability (to preserve quality) and optimised the TV to match each console (rare that two electronic devices are calibrated exactly alike - However, two different consoles of the same brand (example 2 different PS3) will probably be a lot closer than two different consoles all together. This has been true at least for me and DVD Players. I always have to readjust my TV to match a new DVD player I bought) My Camcorder doesn't like my TV setting for my current DVD player. As far as color, from what I see the PS3 always seems to favor more natural look (less vibrant, cartoony look) were as Xbox 360 people like the "in your face" color). That said I believe that is the fault of the developer not the PS3 or Xbox 360. After seeing other game demos recently, the PS3 is quite capable of vibrant colors in games its just developers choose not to use it. In favor of the Xbox 360 I felt that the over all frame rate seemed smoother on the Xbox 360 video. Again, this is not an indication that the Xbox 360 is more powerful or better but probably the fault of the person trying to transfer the footage to video. I viewed other content from more credible video footages of game play at news sites and the motion is way more fluid than the demonstrated video (also not as washed out).

Probably not going to be much of a difference to sway PS3 fans or Xbox 360 fans to switch....

Oh well, such is life...........

[silent ninja]

as people mentioned its the color contransts that seperates them. but to tell you the truth you will only see a difference if you looking for one

[TheFamilyGuy]

i'm wondering though why a lot of 360 games are darker than the PS3 version.

[Runnin n Gunnin]

I think its almost impossible to say that one video looks better then then the other without having some bias to a particular system. All I can see from this video is that the 360 version is too dark making it hard to see and the ps3 version is too bright making it look washed out.

[TheXgamerLive]

They seemed to of purposely filmed the end sequences of the Xbox 360 version with no lighting, odd.

The beginning sequences, the Xbox 360 was much richer as already seen and stated by many, but these ending seens, lol, well someone can't film or did it on purpose.

reguardless, it will be a great game for both systems, I look forward to playing it. I may only rent it, not sure yet but I will play it.

[DrWan]

Like everyone said, 360 version was too dark and i dont see a real difference, if you don't tell me what I am looking at I won't be able to tell you which game is which.

If they just show me those two videos and ask me which version i would play, and without knowing which version is ps3 and which one is 360. I would probably picked the ps3 version just because I can't even see my own mech without using the boosting pack to help light it up for the 360 version.

But since you guys said this is "adjustable", then i guess both versions are just as good. But if it is NOT adjustable, I would go with the PS3 version, easier on the eyes. (its like playing counterstrike and you are inside the tunnle and you have turn ur contrast and lighting all the way up to see hidden enemies..too lame -_-; gamers shouldn't have to make these sort of adjustments)

[GaMr-]

Same story. I wish fanboys would get it through their heads.

Xbox360 Darker

PS3 Lighter

Thats the only noticeable differents. You cannot compare Multi-Plats... its a waste of time. Wait for the exclusives in matching Genre's. Thats how you do.

Compare a Ps3 exclusive shooter To a xbox360 exclusive Shooter

Compare a PS3 exclusive racer to a xbox360 exclusive racer

Compare a Ps3 exclusive figher to a Xbox360 exclusive fighter

This multi plat comparisons are always going to turn up the same.

You have the brain washed Xbox360 fanboy: OMG Xbox360 version owns. I can see the pilots asssshole everytime the mech lands.

The PS3 fanboy: The cell hasnt kicked in yet.... just wait for it............keep waiting...... and.......right....... now.. did you see that. in that frame the cell kicked in and I saw all the way in the pilots asssshole. Take that 360 !

A personal fave of mine... the sensible people: Their is no real difference if your not looking for one.

[TheFamilyGuy]

i think GTAIV is going to be a multiplatform game that will be heavily compared with the PS3 version's graphics vs. 360's

[gnothe1]

I think at the start of the video it was xbox hands down because it looked richer an the PS3 version looked like it had fog all around!! alot of there games has that effect,but once they went is side then it looked better on the PS3. only because the xbox screen was to dark.but anyway these comparisons are just to close.an why wont you guys just accept the fact that the PS3 aint the monster that sony made it out to be.accept the fact that there pretty much equal, because the PS3 is clearly not 3 times more powerful that the 360!!but because of claims like that made by sony, these comparisons will be magnified 5 times over!!

[JasonXE]

then the obvious choice is the xbox 360 verison. That's all i'm saying on this subject.

[makingdamage]

I haven´t even seen the video but I think it´s funny how people think that you objectively can judge the graphic. To me it´s like a debate of which music is the best. Unless there´s a huge difference between the games of course.

[ALIEN]

Both look great.

[Hayabusa 117]

Can we all agree that both versions look sh!t?

[MySwordIsHeavenly]

There's a HUGE difference here. Not in graphics, but in brightness. The 360 version is just a lot darker. Explosions and everything look identical. Honestly though, it doesn't look ANYTHING like target render.

What's with this? They make the 360 version really dark and the PS3 version really bright? It happens with all the ports. Check out COD3. They actually look exactly the same if you reduce brightness on your TV for the PS3 version...or if you increase brightness on the 360 version. I don't understand it.

[TheSadTruth]

you guys complaining that the 360 version is too dark, you are IDIOTS, whoever captured both videos obviously changed their TV settings so it would look bad and the jaggy ps3 version would get the nod

what a joke

[rossiscratch12]

Something looks wrong with the color/contrast level on the TV/Monitor used to capture these videos. Not just for the PS3 but also for the Xbox 360, why so light and why so dark respectively? Something isn't hooked up correctly?
I always see the same thing from Game Trailers though. I know for a fact that when I watched the GeOW vs R:fom on GTs I was like wtf happened to Resistance? I had just finished playing it on my bravia on default settings and it looked MUCH better than the GTs video. Perhaps they are using the av cables instead of HDMI or component? I don't know, but I do know that I take GTs comparisons with a grain of salt because I know that at least for my setup GTs videos look nothing like the actual game.

[f1r3waII K1LL3r]

Both versions look pretty bad to me, I had such high hopes for this game but oh well not buying that. Maybe one day they will make an awesome gundam game

[Raist]

People that now say "calibrate your stuff lol! BS ! darker settings on purpose !"

And when one says that same can be done when PS3 games look less contrasted, the same people laugh ?

haha !

Turning lighting up won't fix the over blooming in 360 games, tho.

[Gamer13]

But 1 will get a better review than 1, i like this game its fast action.

IM OUT...///"""

[FKN Unbelievable]

The Xbox 360 has more Detail in the background,More textures in the ground. The Xbox version appears darker cause maybe the stage is at a evening time and the forest and hills are supposed to dark?

The Ps3 has Slowdown and the framerate drops slightly also in the Building the Background seems washed out with little or no detail.

The lighting effects and Dusk particle look stunning on Xbox360 where on the Ps3 it ok but not as vibrant.

"The PS3 version is lighter and actually has the detail when the robot goes down into that tunnel on the 360 version you just see black and no detail."

Maybe the Tunnel is supposed to be dark cause the Mechs is breaking and Entering DUH! The Decend part on 360 is shaded way better if you wanna get technical.

Both are a decent game but im gonna go with the 360 version cuz i hate slowdown more than anything in this world when it comes to fast-paced action.

[spacetoilet]

Well I'll say It again, if you do these side by sides on multi platform games, the 360 will always have better colours because ATI has better image than Nvidia. Having said that, the 360 one looks TOO dark to the point where you can't see detail in the blacks. Still looks better than the ps3 one though.

Oh and one more thing, you all know this game is $h1t yeah?

[AllroundGamer]

well i will play this game on my xbox360, maybe when a friend buys it for his PS3 i will compare it just for fun :)

btw. thx to the xbox friendclub (yeah the 3 most inteligent xbox fans on this site :D ) that took my bubble, you just confirmed, that you cant calibrate your TV set :D omg xbox has so much colourfull games lol

[n4g sucks]

hahahaha....i love this game. i've played this game since ac2 on ps2 and i cant wait( come on wed ) as for the comparison, nothing a person with knowledge of their tv cant fix....plus i use hdmi on my ps3 so i know it will look great...as for the system of choice...i will follow the REAL fans of the genre and buy it on ps3.( great competion online) any other fans out their???? ErcsYou is the tag psn players. hit me up !! real gamers play games, not b!tch on the internet.. Represent

[HaKeRsCanRotINHEL]

any actual reviews for the 360 version?

Unless you have the exact same television, its not going to look like that so why bother!? ENJOY BOTH.

[OldSchoolGamer]

These are parts of greatly informative articles where I draw information from in comparing the two GPU's for the systems, do the reading and you may learn something, if not may explain potentials minus the CPU's of course.

As for Xenos:
"... ATI's Xbox 360 GPU (codenamed Xenos) is quite interesting. The part itself is made up of two physically distinct silicon ICs. One IC is the GPU itself, which houses all the shader hardware and most of the processing power. The second IC (which ATI refers to as the "daughter die") is a 10MB block of embedded DRAM (eDRAM) combined with the hardware necessary for z and stencil operations, color and alpha processing, and anti aliasing. This daughter die is connected to the GPU proper via a 32GB/sec interconnect. Data sent over this bus will be compressed, so usable bandwidth will be higher than 32GB/sec. In side the daughter die, between the processing hardware and the eDRAM itself, bandwidth is 256GB/sec.

At this point in time, much of the bandwidth generated by graphics hardware is required to handle color and z data moving to the framebuffer. ATI hopes to eliminate this as a bottleneck by moving this processing and the back framebuffer off the main memory bus. The bus to main memory is 512MB of 128-bit 700MHz GDDR3 (which results in just over 22GB/sec of bandwidth). This is less bandwidth than current desktop graphics cards have available, but by offloading work and bandwidth for color and z to the daughter die, ATI saves themselves a good deal of bandwidth. The 22GB/sec is left for textures and the rest of the system (the Xbox implements a single pool of unified memory).

The GPU essentially acts as the Northbridge for the system, and sits in the middle of everything. From the graphics hardware, there is 10.8GB/sec of bandwidth up and down to the CPU itself. The rest of the system is hooked in with 500MB/sec of bandwidth up and down. The high bandwidth to the CPU is quite useful as the GPU is able to directly read from the L2 cache. In the console world, the CPU and GPU are quite tightly linked and the Xbox 360 stands to continue that tradition.

Weighing in at 332M transistors, the Xbox 360 GPU is quite a powerful part, but its architecture differs from that of current desktop graphics hardware. For years, vertex and pixel shader hardware have been implemented separately, but ATI has sought to combine their functionality in a unified shader architecture."

"Vertex and pixel processing differ in purpose, but there is quite a bit of overlap in the type of hardware needed to do both. The unified shader architecture that ATI chose to use in their Xbox 360 GPU allows them to pack more functionality onto fewer transistors as less hardware needs to be duplicated for use in different parts of the chip and will run both vertex and shader programs on the same hardware."

"ATI is predicting that developers will use lots of very small triangles in Xbox 360 games. As engines like Epic's Unreal Engine 3 have shown incredible results using pixel shaders and normal maps to augment low geometric detail, we can't tell if ATI is trying to provide the chicken or the egg. In other words, will we see many small triangles on Xbox 360 because console developers are moving in that direction or because that is what will run well on ATI's hardware?

Regardless of the paths that lead to this road, it is obvious that the Xbox 360 will be a geometry power house. Not only are all 3 blocks of 16 shaders able to become vertex shaders, but ATI's GPU will be able to handle twice as many z operations if a z only pass is performed. The same is true of current ATI and NVIDIA hardware, but the fact that a geometry only pass can now make use of shader hardware to perform 48 vector and 48 scalar operations in any given clock cycle while doing twice the z operations is quite intriguing. This could allow some very geometrically complicated scenes."

"There are 3 parallel groups of 16 shader units each. Each of the three groups can either operate on vertex or pixel data. Each shader unit is able to perform one 4 wide vector operation and 1 scalar operation per clock cycle. Current ATI hardware is able to perform two 3 wide vector and two scalar operations per cycle in the pixel pipe alone. The vertex pipeline of R420 is 6 wide and can do one vector 4 and one scalar op per cycle. If we look at straight up processing power, this gives R420 the ability to crunch 158 components (30 of which are 32bit and 128 are limited to 24bit precision). The Xbox GPU is able to crunch 240 32bit components in its shader units per clock cycle."

"Those who paid close attention to the amount of eDRAM (10MB) will note that this is not enough memory to store the entire framebuffer for displays larger than standard television with 4xAA enabled. Apparently, ATI will store the front buffer in the UMA area, while the back buffer resides on the eDRAM. In order to manage large displays, the hardware will need to render the back buffer in parts. This indicates that they have implemented some sort of very large grained tiling system (with 2 to 4 tiles). Usually tile based renderes have many more tiles than this, but this is a special case.

As for the PS3 RSX:

"The PlayStation 3’s RSX GPU shares the same “parent architecture” as the G70 (GeForce 7800 GTX), much in the same way that the GeForce 6600GT shares the same parent architecture as the GeForce 6800 Ultra. Sony isn’t ready to unveil exactly what is different between the RSX and the G70, but based on what’s been introduced already, as well as our conversations with NVIDIA, we can gather a few items.

Despite the fact that the RSX comes from the same lineage as the G70, there are a number of changes to the core. The biggest change is that RSX supports rendering to both local and system memory, similar to NVIDIA’s Turbo Cache enabled GPUs. Obviously rendering to/from local memory is going to be a lot lower latency than sending a request to the Cell’s memory controller, so much of the architecture of the GPU has to be changed in order to accommodate this higher latency access to memory. Buffers and caches have to be made larger to keep the rendering pipelines full despite the higher latency memory access.

The RSX only has 60% of the local memory bandwidth of the G70, so in many cases it will most definitely have to share bandwidth with the CPU’s memory bus in order to achieve performance targets.

There is one peculiarity that hasn’t exactly been resolved, and that is about transistor counts. Both the G70 and the RSX share the same estimated transistor count, of approximately 300.4 million transistors. The RSX is built on a 90nm process, so in theory NVIDIA would be able to pack more onto the die without increasing chip size at all - but if the transistor counts are identical, that points to more similarity between the two cores than NVIDIA has led us to believe. So is the RSX nothing more than the G70? It’s highly unlikely that the GPUs are identical, especially considering that the sheer addition of Turbo Cache to the part would drive up transistor counts quite a bit. So how do we explain that the two GPUs are different, yet have the same transistor count and one is supposed to be more powerful than the other? There are a few possible options.

So it is possible that NVIDIA’s estimates are slightly off for the two GPUs, but at approximately 10 million transistors per pixel pipe, the RSX will feature more than the 24 pixel rendering pipelines of the GeForce 7800 GTX, yet NVIDIA claims it is more powerful than the GeForce 7800 GTX. But how can that be?"

"The most likely explanation is attributed to nothing more than clock speed. Remember that the RSX, being built on a 90nm process, is supposed to be running at 550MHz - a 28% increase in core clock speed from the 110nm GeForce 7800 GTX. The clock speed increase alone will account for a good boost in GPU performance which would make the RSX “more powerful” than the G70.

Remember that the Cell host processor has an array of 7 SPEs that are very well suited for a number of non-branching tasks, including geometry processing. Also keep in mind that current games favor creating realism through more pixel operations rather than creating more geometry, so GPUs aren’t very vertex shader bound these days. Then, note that the RSX has a high bandwidth 35GB/s interface between the Cell processor and the GPU itself - definitely enough to place all vertex processing on the Cell processor itself, freeing up the RSX to exclusively handle pixel shader and ROP tasks. If this is indeed the case, then the RSX could very well have more than 24 pipelines and still have a similar transistor count to the G70, but if it isn’t, then it is highly unlikely that we’d see a GPU that looked much different than the G70.

The downside to the RSX using the Cell for all vertex processing is pretty significant. Remember that the RSX only has a 22.4GB/s link to its local memory bandwidth, which is less than 60% of the memory bandwidth of the GeForce 7800 GTX. In other words, it needs that additional memory bandwidth from the Cell’s memory controller to be able to handle more texture-bound games. If a good portion of the 15GB/s downstream link from the Cell processor is used for bandwidth between the Cell’s SPEs and the RSX, the GPU will be texture bandwidth limited in some situations, especially at resolutions as high as 1080p."

In summary:
The Xenox, built ground up by ATI, is capable of using today's graphic's engines to make some amazing looking screens with 10 mb of memory dedicated to 4x Anit-Aliasing (smoothing of jagged lines) at no cost to graphics horsepower. 332 Million transistors and 48 pipelines allow for lots of texturing, able to be flexible enough to do geometries (not currently the case) or pixels (much more used currently, especially by the Unreal engine, which is licensed for use the the vast majority of game developers) as needed. The GPU is linked very closely to the CPU, and is able to shift 512 mb of RAM towards either as needed.

The RSX is based on the G70 and is a card that was implimented late in the game when the cell could not handle graphics processing as was assumed it could (whether due to programming difficulty or simply too much drain on resources). The differences as noted above amount to a lessened memory bandwidth versus the 7800GTX PC cards. This will cause more reliance on the Cells Memory controller and memory banks (which causes a major problem in high detail at 1080p, which is why you are seeing the majority of PS3 games running 720 best frame rates).
300.4 million transistors and 36 piplines, 24 and 12 dedicated, versus 332 million (that is with the skimping due to unified pipelines, normally 48 pipelines would use a heck of alot more) and 48 pipelines, combined with 512 system memory and 10 mb dedicated 4x AA = roughly 522mb that could be used for graphics (more realistically about 386-412mb for pure graphics due to other needs), versus the 256 mb dedicated in the PS3 just allows for a more powerful GPU on the 360.

But these are facts, you read and you decide. May explain something though.

[Shadow]

The figures are correct, but there's a lot of fallacies in there, not to mention the articles you're quoting are mostly "best guess" about the RSX, a chip which is essentially closer to a G71 than a G70 LOL. For instance, there's no such thing as "free" AA on the 360 at HD resolutions, especially not at 1080p. There's absolutely no mention of the fact that the pixel shaders on the RSX are roughly equivelant to two Xenos' unified pipes.

The pixel shader units on the G71, have two ALU's, with one of those ALU's also being used for texturing. Each ALU, also has a sub-unit doing some additional math and called a mini-ALU unit. Each pixel shader on Xenos has one ALU. The texture units on Xenos are seperate from the pixel shaders, and there are 16 of them.

RSX
- 550 MHz
- 8 vertex units
- 24 pixel pipelines
- 24 texture units
- 48 pixel ALU's + mini ALU's (burdened with doing texture work)
- more overall horsepower

Xenos
- 500 MHz
- 48 pixel ALU's (burdened with doing vertex work also)
- 16 seperate texture units
- better at shading many small fragments, and code branching
- load balancing, and less chance of stalls

Different strengths, and developers will exploit those differences, but the end result will be similar simply because they are not that far apart in overall power.

[OldSchoolGamer]

"The figures are correct, but there's a lot of fallacies in there, not to mention the articles you're quoting are mostly "best guess" about the RSX, a chip which is essentially closer to a G71 than a G70 LOL."

Actually those numbers like you say are correct, just because you disagree with something doesn't make it a fallacy. The only guess work done in the article is how Sony makes higher claims about how the RSX is more powerful than a 7800GTX, both of which are very old.

"For instance, there's no such thing as "free" AA on the 360 at HD resolutions, especially not at 1080p."

This actually is in there "Those who paid close attention to the amount of eDRAM (10MB) will note that this is not enough memory to store the entire framebuffer for displays larger than standard television with 4xAA enabled." This is saying you won't get a whole frame in that 10 MB but it is enough to do AA on a frame. Again, you are somewhat on but missing the details, in 480i and p, its free 4xAA, and in larger yes would need a little extra memory from the system, but the beginnings are there. In PS3, why you have so many "jaggies" is they have nothing to help (dedicated) with A.

"There's absolutely no mention of the fact that the pixel shaders on the RSX are roughly equivelant to two Xenos' unified pipes."

I'm sorry but 24 (pixel pipelines) is not equivalent to 48, and I'm not the greatest at math.

As for the rest of your arguement this sums it up best:
"All 48 unified pipelines are capable of helping with either pixel or vertex shader operations when needed so as a result efficiency is greatly improved and so is overall performance. When pipelines are forced to go idle because they lack the capability to help another set of pipelines accomplish their task it’s detrimental to performance. This inefficient manner is how all current GPUs operate including the PS3's RSX. The pipelines go idle because the pixel pipes aren't able to help the vertex pipes accomplish a task or vice versa. Whats even more impressive about this GPU is it by itself determines the balance of how many pipelines to dedicate to vertex or pixel shader operations at any given time a programmer is NOT needed to handle any of this the GPU takes care of all this itself in the quickest most efficient way possible. 1080p is not a smart resolution to target in any form this generation, but if 360 developers wanted to get serious about 1080p, thanks to Xenos, could actually outperform the ps3 in 1080p. (The less efficient GPU always shows its weaknesses against the competition in higher resolutions so the best way for the rsx to be competitive is to stick to 720P) In vertex shader limited situations the 360’s gpu will literally be 6 times faster than RSX. With a unified shader architecture things are much more efficient than previous architectures allowed (which is extremely important). The 360’s GPU for example is 95-99% efficient with 4XAA enabled. With traditional architecture there are design related roadblocks that prevent such efficiency. To avoid such roadblocks, which held back previous hardware, the 360 GPU design team created a complex system of hardware threading inside the chip itself. In this case, each thread is a program associated with the shader arrays. The Xbox 360 GPU can manage and maintain state information on 64 separate threads in hardware. There's a thread buffer inside the chip, and the GPU can switch between threads instantaneously in order to keep the shader arrays busy at all times."

"Different strengths, and developers will exploit those differences, but the end result will be similar simply because they are not that far apart in overall power."

Not true at all, in higher resolutions "1080p is not a smart resolution to target in any form this generation, but if 360 developers wanted to get serious about 1080p, thanks to Xenos, could actually outperform the ps3 in 1080p" (period), you can play with numbers all you want but a 2 year old GPU that doesn't get released, versus a built ground up graphics card wins. Ported games may be similar graphically, but the two are not at all equal either technically, or in power terms.

These do not take into account CPU's ie; The cell and the 360s 3core CPU, as they both play a huge role in graphic's capabilities for both systems, along with the level of programming done for utilizing each system.

[Shadow]

"For instance, there's no such thing as "free" AA on the 360 at HD resolutions, especially not at 1080p."

>>>This actually is in there "Those who paid close attention to the amount of eDRAM (10MB) will note that this is not enough memory to store the entire framebuffer for displays larger than standard television with 4xAA enabled." Again, you are somewhat on but missing the details, in 480i and p, its free 4xAA, and in larger yes would need a little extra memory from the system, but the beginnings are there. In PS3, why you have so many "jaggies" is they have nothing to help (dedicated) with A.

You're showing your lack of knowledge here. Xenos either does all or nothing with the EDRAM. If you go outside of it, you take a performance hit, since many of those "free" effects that the 360 has aren't "free" anymore, and the system costs skyrocket. Furthermore, its entirely possible you CAN'T go outside of it since all the ROPS are in there as well as where all the completed pixels are put together. You have to create pieces of the framebuffer at a time (called tiling) and guess what. That means a performance hit.

<<<I'm sorry but 24 (pixel pipelines) is not equivalent to 48, and I'm not the greatest at math.

Not when the 24 Pixel Pipes are DEDICATED. Like I said, "Jack of all trades, Master of None" The 48 unified pipes in the Xenos have to pull double duty, so they can't be as specific in their purpose. There are some nifty things that the 24 RSX Pixel Pipes can do that the 48 unified pipes can't by virtue of them being unified.

Think of it this way, you train 4 sharpshooters and 4 regular SWAT officers. The 4 SWAT officers are great all around, breaching doors, clearing rooms, etc. But when it comes to taking a long distance shot, they don't have the same abilities that the 4 sharpshooters who have been training in JUST sharpshooting do.

>>>As for the rest of your arguement this sums it up best...

Which, as I stated, means nothing when the 24 Pixel Pipes in RSX are better at Pixel work, and the vertex work is partially offloaded to the CELL SPU's, bringing the two into parity.

Look at it this way, instead of quoting a year-old article and regurgitating half-truths, why don't you actually try and understand what you're saying, and why its incorrect? If you'd like, I can post quotes from actual PS3 devs stating quite the contrary.

[OldSchoolGamer]

"You're showing your lack of knowledge here. Xenos either does all or nothing with the EDRAM. If you go outside of it, you take a performance hit, since many of those "free" effects that the 360 has aren't "free" anymore, and the system costs skyrocket. Furthermore, its entirely possible you CAN'T go outside of it since all the ROPS are in there as well as where all the completed pixels are put together. You have to create pieces of the framebuffer at a time (called tiling) and guess what. That means a performance hit."

Wow I don't know where to start addressing the stupidity of that last paragraph. My knowledge on the Graphics cards in general is from 20+ years working with, building, and gaming on computers. My system knowledge is based on not 1 year old article, but a multitude of articles written by experts, and leading industry sources (not one article fan boy, I unlike you am not drawing all of my knowledge from 1 thread of a beyond3D forum). Most of these quotes are from 1 article, as there is no need for a 30 page comment with a bibliography that could be used for a doctorate, which deftly describes the hardware of both consoles, and uses accurate figures (which you agree on) since this is getting [email protected] long enough.

Let's discuss ROPS since you seem focused on these. Raster Operation Units (ROPS, since I need to explain things to you) in the RSX which is 8 compared to the G70 which had 16. And a total of 8 for the Xenos, so stop. As for practical terms actual shading operations, the Xenos can handle 160 programmable shader operations per cycle (48 ALUs x 2 operations + 16 texture fetch + 32 control flow + 16 vertex fetch) while the RSX can handle 136 shader operations per clock. The xenos actually can do 2 shader ALU operations per pipeline per cycle (1 vector and 1 scalar, co-issued). The RSX is in fact not a G70 nor a G71 but a watered-down crossbreed with limitations. As for vertices and polygon performance 1.6 billion vertices per second and Maximum polygon performance: 500 million triangles per second in the Xenos, vs RSX 1.2 billion vertices per second and 275 million polygons per second. That is quite a difference.

Guess what

"Not when the 24 Pixel Pipes are DEDICATED. Like I said, "Jack of all trades, Master of None" The 48 unified pipes in the Xenos have to pull double duty, so they can't be as specific in their purpose. There are some nifty things that the 24 RSX Pixel Pipes can do that the 48 unified pipes can't by virtue of them being unified."

Nice specifics (sarcasm noted) Those pipelines are dedicated and you are limited to 24 in the RSX with 12 left for other functions. The Xenos on the other hand has 48 and yes they can pull double duty, ie 24 for pixels and 12 for other functions and that still leaves 12 for more dumbass.
Your analogy is simply horrid "Think of it this way, you train 4 sharpshooters and 4 regular SWAT officers. The 4 SWAT officers are great all around, breaching doors, clearing rooms, etc. But when it comes to taking a long distance shot, they don't have the same abilities that the 4 sharpshooters who have been training in JUST sharpshooting do."

A factual analogy would be 48 Sharpshooters/Special Forces and 24 Sharpshooters, and I take the 48 guys to get the target hit versus the 24.

"Which, as I stated, means nothing when the 24 Pixel Pipes in RSX are better at Pixel work, and the vertex work is partially offloaded to the CELL SPU's, bringing the two into parity."

Lol I have stats on the "pixel work":
Xenos: Pixel fillrate: 16 gigasamples per second fillrate using 4X multisample anti aliasing, 32 gigasamples without AA
RSX: Pixel fillrate: 20 gigasamples per second fillrate without AA

And we've seen in the article how offloading work to the Cell adds latency due to needing to stress the memory controller. The Xenos on the other hand operates "at 95-99% efficiency with 4xAA enbabled", YEAH A HUGEEEEE hit, not.

"Look at it this way, instead of quoting a year-old article and regurgitating half-truths, why don't you actually try and understand what you're saying, and why its incorrect? If you'd like, I can post quotes from actual PS3 devs stating quite the contrary."

Your posts on beyond3d lol are hardly from PS3 developers *cough* (beyond3d forum USERS) and at least we know where the Fan Boy attitude is coming from, and your knowledge is pathetically limited. "Its better to remain silent and let people think you're stupid, than to open your mouth and prove them right."

[achira]

the ps3 version looks better without doubt. but the biggest difference is the brightness.