http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2014-lords-of-the-fallen-face-off
Detail-wise, the game is completely identical between console versions, but the PC version allows for an increase in texture and scenery detail. Texture resolution across the board is reduced in quality on both consoles, and this is surprising considering the amount of memory available. Less of a shock is the reduction in scene complexity where building facades, statues and other structures all appear simplified next to their PC counterparts. It's clear that all of these cutbacks on consoles were necessary, however, as evidenced by the game's biggest problem: performance.
When the developers set out to create a game in the vein of Dark Souls they probably didn't set out to use Blighttown as a model for performance. However, in many ways that's what it feels like here. Lords of the Fallen is a good-looking game on all platforms but its performance on console very nearly spoils the experience.
Regardless of what's happening on-screen, there is a sense that the game is simply unable to hold a consistent 30fps update. Dips are frequent, complemented by noticeable screen-tear, particularly on PlayStation 4. Looking at the frame-time graphs for each game reveals an unstable level of performance for the majority of the duration. Interestingly, torn frames are generally limited to the upper portion of the screen on Xbox One where the framebuffer waits to flip until the next frame if the resulting tear would appear too central on the screen. What you gain in image integrity you lose in the form of even less stable overall performance, resulting in increased judder compared to the PS4 version.
Curiously, on the PS4 version there's an observable, constant tearing occurring along the top five per cent of the image. We've chosen to omit these frames from our performance analysis video in order to produce something that was more readable (also, it's not obtrusive during gameplay), but regardless, torn frames routinely appear throughout the image and prove quite distracting. As the framebuffer is flipped at any point, the average frame-rate is ever so slightly higher on PS4 - but ultimately neither version feels fluid or smooth at all, often recalling the poor performance we were accustomed to on challenging PS3 and 360 titles that arrived at the tail end of the last generation.
It could have been worse though. The initial patch on PS4 is over 4GB in size, and before we installed it our initial experiences were even less impressive. If the unpatched downloadable version of the game represents the retail disc release, we have yet another unoptimised gold master on our hands. The frame-rate is lower and screen-tear is even more evident in this state. The patch improves matters, but even with it in place the experience as it stands now is still disappointing.
It's a different story on the PC where after a brace of patches the game runs extremely well on our GTX 780/i5 3570K combo. As it stands we're able to hit a mostly steady 60fps with the advanced particle simulation enabled at 1080p. We did encounter a series of minor hitches, however, which persist at various points for reasons unknown - something the game did not suffer from prior to the latest patches. Increasing the resolution does result in a noticeable loss of performance with 1440p regularly producing frame-rates under 60fps. Impressively, we noted extremely efficient CPU scaling across multiple cores. Fledge appears to be a very PC-friendly engine indeed.
Reading over the engine documentation available suggests that there is a lot of untapped potential here. In addition to the advanced rendering features included in Lords of the Fallen, the Fledge engine also offers a full PBR (physically based rendering) render path and an advanced hair and foliage simulation - neither of which made their way into the game. The engine seems promising - especially on PC - but as it stands the poor performance on console is a huge hurdle the team must overcome.
Lords of the Fallen - the Digital Foundry verdict
Looking at the two console versions it's rather difficult to give a solid recommendation here as neither version performs well. Image quality is certainly superior on PS4 and, while performance is quite similar, screen tear is more noticeable. On the other hand, the Xbox One version suffers from more severe judder and its frame-rate dips even lower than the sub-optimal PS4 version. Both versions are playable but neither feels enjoyable as a result of the low frame-rate and inconsistent performance. We'd give the nod to the PS 4 version if pressed, but we can't help feel this is not the way the game should be played.
That particular honour goes to the PC version of Lords of the Fallen. It's a demanding title, but even middling hardware should be able to achieve a more stable 30fps than the consoles - and without the intrusive tearing. It's just a shame that the finished product ended up shipping with so many performance problems as the game itself is actually rather well made and definitely worth playing. For now, we can only hope that Deck13 concentrates on optimising console performance.
