Does the next-gen start when Naughty Dog says it does?
Uncharted 4 goes much further than any PS4 or Xbox One game we've seen in its use of physics, and the layering of world detail with shaders. Opening at the gates of a bustling Madagascan marketplace, what unfolds is unlike any major title seen on console to date. Where the December demo focused on wide spaces, foliage systems, and its more flexible AI, the E3 demo goes to town with object physics applied across the world, as flaunted brilliantly with a jeep chase to 'Sam's tower' at the bottom of the city.
As a bonus, motion blur is added since the PlayStation Experience demo, kicking in heavily during this chase, with both camera and per-object implementations. It adds a filmic touch sorely missing in the last showing, though a banding trail is also now left behind moving objects - likely an artefact of the temporal component utilized in Naughty Dog's chosen anti-aliasing technique. A recent post by Timothy Lottes (creator of the widely adopted FXAA algorithm) adds his two cents to this theory. The supreme, clear edge treatment in the December demo is seemingly swapped out in this E3 update, with Lottes suggesting a move to a "viewport-jittered neighborhood-clamped high-feedback temporal AA without MSAA."
Overall, it's a slight step back for Uncharted 4's image quality since the last demo, but the results are still ahead of most PS4 titles today. As a sign of future releases, it also suggests a native 1080p is still very much viable for PS4 releases pushing the envelope with a huge world, though developers are seemingly still keen to top this off with a post-process method of AA - and all the caveats that brings to absolute clarity.
The extent of Uncharted 4's use of physics goes much deeper than you'd expect. One of the more surprising applications of this is one that goes unnoticed; rice bags actually deflate using a mesh distortion system Naughty Dog has in place, as detailed during a recent Headspace panel with the team. It's an effect also applied on Nathan Drake's face when pressed against the floor during the game's first blue-hued E3 2014 reveal.
In essence, for this demo, it allows each sack to sink as rice leaks out from bullet-holes, where each shot cues a physics-based impact on the bag, while deflation is simulated using mesh distortion.
Based on this latest footage, Naughty Dog once again opts for a locked 30fps in gameplay, and with v-sync engaged. This falls in line with the PlayStation Experience gameplay, another demo locked to a 30fps output, though at a time when the team's original 60fps promise hung in the balance. Alas, it has since been confirmed in an interview that a solid 30fps for single-player is now the team's committed target, and judging by our gameplay analysis that's precisely what we're getting.