Sony’s adding system-wide supersampling to the PlayStation 4 Pro as part of the in-beta firmware update v5.50, and that means Digital Foundry’s already whipped out its pixel counters and magnifying glasses in order to confirm that the enforced antialiasing is doing its job. A new article on Eurogamer.net reveals that the feature is offering up some nifty improvements to titles that don’t natively downsample, with a reduction of jaggies being the most notable improvement.
For those of you who don’t know what supersampling is, it’s essentially the act of taking an image rendered at a higher resolution and scaling it back down to 1080p. This means you end up with better picture quality, and while most PS4 Pro titles support the feature natively, there are a handful like The Last Guardian and Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain that don’t.
Now the functionality’s not perfect. For starters, games like The Last Guardian actually perform worse in 4K than at 1080p on the PS4 Pro, therefore if you opt to supersample you’re stuck with an impacted framerate in exchange for better image quality. Also, you can get some blurring on assets designed for Ultra HD screens when they’re scaled down. The feature’s totally optional, though, and can be toggled on and off, so while it’s not the most elegant solution, it’s getting the job done.
[source eurogamer.net]
Comments 13
Seems it could be interesting to try. I totally caved and got the MH Pro before my old system's disc drive broke but without a 4K screen the only boon to me right now is the cool Rathy on the front. Hopefully not many games suffer a performance loss.
This has little use for me as I have a 4K screen and I'm assuming that with it activated you are locked into the 4K options in the game and would have to turn it off to access any performance modes that are only for 1080p screens?
Due to how many games are already on Pro it seems like they cannot now implement super sampling as something that is automatic due to the issues that it would cause. Better late than never but as this was one of the key points when the Pro was revealed it's implementation was never the best
@Cassetticons I mean that's not true, you're getting lots of benefits on a 1080p screen. The cool design is definitely the highlight, though.
It's good to know this looks like a decent option as I'll have a Pro soon and only have a HD TV. I'm more interested in smoother performance, so I'll benefit most from games like SotC or rise of tomb raider etc. I wish ALL pro updates enhanced performance for 1080p output, but resolution always seems to take precedence these days which is unfortunate.
It's annoying that Supersampling can impact the performance of some games, as it means I'll need to keep track of which games to turn it off with. Still, it's a nice benefit to have, so kudos to Sony for adding it in just as I'm getting a Pro
@get2sammyb Probably better to say I haven't noticed many of them yet then, to be fair though - I'm still transferring over my gmes so rather than the patches to FFXV and Witcher 3 I've been playing... Gundam Versus a whole bunch...
@GravyThief Super-sampling itself doesn't impact on the Performance - or at least it shouldn't do. The issue is that games like the Last Guardian suffers with performance drops with its '4k' mode and those performance drops are still present if you choose to Super-sample. The Last Guardian doesn't have a 1080p mode but if you force the game to play at 1080p, the benefit is an improved performance (because the game isn't running at higher resolution) but for those that have their Pro set to 4k, the game suffers.
Super Sampling is literally playing the game exactly as it would as if you had a 4k screen but, instead of that image being too big for a 1080p screen, its shrunk down to fit (super sampled - the opposite to upscaling) on the screen. The performance isn't impacted by the super-sampling but is identical to the way the game runs if it was connected to a 4k screen.
The games that don't offer a dedicated 1080p option will play exactly the same as they would as if your Pro was connected to a 4k TV. For 4k TV owners to get the 'best' performance, they have to force the Console down to 1080p (as if it was connected to a HD TV) and restart the game. Because the console didn't super-sample and thinks its connected to a 1080p TV, the game only runs at 1080p and therefore you get a better frame rate consistency. What Super-Sampling does is essentially make the game run as if the console was connected to a 4k screen so you get all the benefits of the enhancements and then 'shrinks' the image down to fit the screen. However any 'performance' issues that 4k TV gamers experience, so will those who super-sample as the game runs exactly the same. Super-sampling itself isn't the issue, the issue is the way the game runs at higher resolution.
A game like Fifa for example that runs perfectly well at 4k/60 would run perfectly well at 60fps with super-sampling too. The benefit though is that you get that 4k quality image shrunk down to fit your 1080p TV. This eliminates (or at least greatly reduces) shimmer and jaggies. However if a game runs at an average of 55fps in its '4k' mode, the super sampled version will run at 55fps too with the exact same frame rate drops in the exact same places. As I said, Super-sampling isn't the cause, its the way the game runs at higher resolution that causes performance drops.
If a game doesn't offer a 1080p mode that may improve performance (like the Last Guardian for example), you can turn Super-sampling off which should force the game down to 1080p to improve that performance - much like those of us with 4k TV's would have to force the console to think its connected to a 1080p TV to get that performance gain.
@BAMozzy thanks for this, really good info. So I suppose what I find a shame is that using the 4K mode on games that have it (which for me would be supersampled down to 1080p) can impact performance. I'd want it to at least not make it worse.
A question I do have is: if a game doesn't have a 4K mode (or 'higher than 1080p' mode), does that mean Supersampling won't do anything? Or does the Pro output 4K anyway for those with 4K TVs, and thus supersampled down for us peasants with only HD TVs?
Kind of feels like this should have been in there at the start, but welcome nonetheless.
@BAMozzy
Thanks for that. Very helpful.
@GravyThief A lot of games don't offer a choice in modes and Super-Sampling does NOTHING that impacts the performance at all. Its basically running the game exactly the same as if it was connected to a 4k screen. Instead of the Pro knowing its connected to a HD TV and blocking any UHD modes because it knows your TV can't handle it, its saying run the game as if its connected to a 4k screen and then making that image fit on a lower res - therefore doesn't impact at all on performance.
Modes/games that run at 1080p regardless of the TV will still run at 1080p exactly the same as they would regardless of screen.
A game like the Ezio Collection runs at 4k/30 on a Pro. If you don't have a 4k TV, you only get 1080p/30 with NO benefits so its actually worse for 1080p TV owners. With Super Sampling, you get the benefits of the game running at 4k with the image shrunk down to fit properly on your 1080p TV giving a 'better than 1080p' quality image - far less shimmer and jaggies.
I believe that some modes aren't even available to 1080p TV owners. You can't select the higher resolution mode because the game/console knows your TV is only 1080p - so you get less choice.
The games that may not benefit from Super Sampling - games like the Last Guardian for example - don't offer a 1080p or 'frame rate' focused option. To get them to run better, you have to basically set the console to believe its connected to a 1080p TV so it doesn't run as it was 'meant' to on PS4 Pro but defaults down to 1080p but because its not rendering the number of pixels, it has a side effect of increasing performance. If you had a Pro and 4k TV with both set-up properly to work, then the performance would suffer - exactly the same as it will with Super-sampling because its performing exactly as it should.
Like I said, with games like the Last Guardian, you have to essentially go to your settings and tell the console its connected to a 1080p TV (rather than a 4k TV) and force it to think its only connected to a HDTV to get the performance. Then later, if you play a game that doesn't suffer from frame rate drops, if you don't go back into your console settings, you can't access some of the modes - not without quitting the game, setting the Pro up properly for a 4k screen and restarting the game up again.
This Super-Sampling feature basically tells the Pro its connected to a 4k screen and runs games, including access to all options where applicable, as it would if it were actually connected to a 4k screen. It doesn't affect performance at all - the games play exactly as they would if you were to own a 4k screen - the only difference is that super-sampling shrinks the image down to fit on a HD TV where as those with 4k TV's would have the image 'enlarged' (upscaled) to fit on their screen as most games don't run at 4k (either native or Chequerboard). Its exactly the same as upscaling but instead of enlarging an image to fit, its shrinking it down. Those games, like Tekken 7 that don't run at a native 1080p on a PS4, run in engine at whatever resolution they do. The Upscaling takes place in the 'output' chain and not within the GPU. Super Sampling takes place in this chain too - just like Upscaling in reverse - and does NOT affect how a game runs at all.
As such, if a game runs at 1080p on a 4k screen, its still going to be 1080p on a 1080p screen. The output chain won't need to upscale or super-sample it down on a HD TV.
Pro is so half assed. Every single time I read an article about it, you're making compromises for one thing or another. Resolution takes away performance, performance hurts the visuals, 4K(inda) but only 30fps.... I sure hope it wasn't successful enough for there to be any more half steps in the future.
@Yowza Yeah not gonna lie, I've been disappointed with mine overall. And that's with a good 4K TV. Too many games either just full on don't support it, or the performance still feels crap with minimal visual gain.
@fuzzy833 that's really sad to hear. Sorry you wasted your money😔
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