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Forums - Nintendo - Breath of the wild runs better on portable mode (digital foundry)

KLAMarine on 04 March 2017
thismeintiel said:
xl-klaudkil said:

If horizon would have such framerate drops every review would score the game lower.

Measuring with  a double standard, really showcasing the biased factor when reviewing games.

Same goes with graphics if a game gets a 10 i expect state of the art current year graphics

A 10/10 means the game is top notch in every way zelda clearly is not.

Personally, I think many reviewers avoid giving Nintendo games anything less than an 9 because they know they will be hounded by the diehard fans.  Especially at launch when they know Nintendo NEEDS the Switch to be a success, fans are going to be out en masse trying to combat any negativity.  And while I don't really agree that graphical prowess neccessarily has to downgrade a game (it really should be based on the HW), frequent/random framerate drops and lag should 100% be something you dock a point or two for.  They aren't going to do it, though.

@ OP

I'm going to guess that a simple upclock in the Switch's chipset isn't quite enough to get a game like BOTW from 720p to 900p without the sacrifices.

But think of the sweet, delicious, clickbait ad revenue!.. No reviewers seemed to go for it as far as I know.

twintail said:
KLAMarine said:

Wouldn't be the first time a game with framerate issues got high scores. Press doesn't seem to care about framerate too much.

And how many of them are passed off with 95% scores?

Dunno. Haven't counted.

I did do some admittedly brief and not-very-thorough research into this matter and noticed that Shadow of the Colossus, despite its framerate issues on the ps2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_GLmE7ZBPE

received extensive praise: http://www.metacritic.com/game/playstation-2/shadow-of-the-colossus/critic-reviews

Kristan Reed of Eurogamer, the company which hosts the Digital Foundry channel if I understand things correctly, gave it a 10/10 back in 2005: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/r_sotc_ps2 . Don't see any mention of framerate/performance issues.

 

Don't worry though, I'm not going to speculate on motives or any such thing. I don't think it a fair thing to do. Just gonna acknowledge Kristan Reed's opinion and move on with my day.



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superchunk on 04 March 2017

Game is awesome. I'll end up playing more in portable mode, even if it is just around the house. Though I did notice that the game was not a smooth on my TV as it was in portable. Definite framerate drops. But still looks great and it didn't impeded my play.



SvennoJ on 04 March 2017

Can't stop playing but the frame rate issues can interfere. Hunting boar in the choppy spirit forest is a lot harder when trying to shoot a running boar at 20 fps. Easier to chase one into a group of enemies and they'll kill it for you lol.

It seems to be worst with a lot of grass on screen. The framerate tanks too out in the open in some places with lots of grass moving in the wind. I ran through the same areas in portable mode with no issues.



KLAMarine on 04 March 2017
SvennoJ said:
Can't stop playing but the frame rate issues can interfere. Hunting boar in the choppy spirit forest is a lot harder when trying to shoot a running boar at 20 fps. Easier to chase one into a group of enemies and they'll kill it for you lol.

It seems to be worst with a lot of grass on screen. The framerate tanks too out in the open in some places with lots of grass moving in the wind. I ran through the same areas in portable mode with no issues.

Makes me think portable mode was prioritized.

Nintendo needs to get on patching docked mode and soon! If not, I'll have to look into emulating BotW on PC. Heard some good things about the WiiU emulator. Maybe modders will put in Princess Mononoke skins? That would be the shit!



hsrob on 04 March 2017

When the WiiU came out, it was broadly lambasted in certain quarters for not having a standard 1080p 60fps, although Nintendo generally did an admiral job from the outset of prioritising 60fps. When the Xbox1 and PS4 came out with a host of sub 1080p games at 30fps those same quarters were deafeningly quiet

My perspective:I love me a good frame rate but to be honest the dips in Zelda just aren't frequent enough to bother me.

It certainly is obvious in the opening scene, which is unfortunate, and you do notice it from time to time, usually in long grass, but I can't say it's impacted gameplay for me. It will be nice if they can patch it, but play it and make up your own mind rather than losing it by listening to the hype, half of whom haven't actually played it and are just playing the predictable, new-generation downplay game.



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Panama on 04 March 2017

I dont even bother docking it now. How this was overlooked in all those glowing reviews is worrisome. Inb4 20fps is reminiscent of OoT.



DarthMetalliCube on 04 March 2017

Maybe I'm just not nuanced to notice such detail when it comes to tech related stuff, but I don't see where this frame rate hoopla is coming from playing Zelda in docked mode.. I haven't noticed any glaring issues, though I haven't really played much in docked mode. If the game really does hit 20fps a lot it sure doesn't seem that way when I've been playing



 

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rbej on 04 March 2017

"Memory bandwidth is rated at 25.6GB/s over a 64-bit interface."

Any patch for Zelda don't change it. This is real bottleneck.



Barkley on 04 March 2017

As someone who will use the Switch docked pretty much all the time... god dammit Nintendo.



ICStats on 04 March 2017
thismeintiel said:
ICStats said:
How are you all finding the size of the screen? I played some Zelda on a colleague's Switch today and it feels really small in portable mode.

I think that has to do with how mobile gaming has changed.  While the screen is large compared to past HHs, with so many people getting used to 7"-10" tablets, anything smaller seems like it should be a phone.  Which really makes me think, how much money could Nintendo have saved if they went with a more standard 7" screen?  They are widely available and probably much cheaper since they are the standard size.  Even if they added Gorrila Glass, I have to think it would at least come out in a wash.

Yes, it could be this.  Plus I don't play much on handhelds so that's maybe another reason I'm not used to it.

I think it's also the type of games.  Playing a game with complex camera controls doesn't feel immediately good on the Switch's cramped, not ergo form factor with small analog sticks.

For Ocarina of Time and Mario 64 the games were great, and also the analog controls were amazing.  Now we have BoTW, and a true 3D Mario o the way, which are likely amazing games... with portable form factor being the worst way to play that type of game.

For me I think it would have to be with the Pro controller, or with the Joy-Cons in detached Wii-Mote/Nunchuk form factor.  The latter is a lot more comfortable than attached to the Switch, but still not as comfortable as the Wii controls.



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