Another big gain came from the bloom effect where we combined several blur passes into one single pass and compensated by changing the pattern of the texture samples. Playing with the order of the draw calls within each scene also led to some improvement because of the way the system implements deferred tile rendering. There's an extra overhead for doing each of these passes because a new scene needs to be started for each one, so it's a good idea to reduce the number of scenes or change the scene order to combine scenes that render to the same buffer. One of the biggest problems for us was having a lot of full-screen passes during each frame for various effects. To run at full resolution it really came down to fill-rate and making the necessary changes to make sure the GPU isn't overloaded for any part of the frame. It was only after an intense period of optimisation that we realised we would be able to run at native resolution and have the decent frame-rate as well. This was our approach for the first half of the project. After porting Stranger's Wrath I can understand why, at the start of the project, you might think about the compromise of a lower resolution to give you a decent frame-rate. The screen on the Vita is a wonderful and vibrant display and it would seem a shame not to use it to its full potential. Yes, Stranger's Wrath runs at full 960x544 resolution. Backing up the coverage is another first - Digital Foundry articles rely heavily upon video assets for judging aspects such as graphical features and performance and, thanks to some customised hardware, we can finally acquire direct-feed Vita visuals to pore over at our leisure and share with you.īut first, it's over to Just Add Water programmer Peter Memmott and JAW CEO/Oddworld development director Stewart Gilray to get some idea of what actually happens when a new piece of gaming technology arrives on the doorstep. In this tech-skewed developer interview, the game makers talk us through the process of developing for Vita, revealing some new insights on how the hardware is utilised and some of the tricks of the trade in squeezing more performance out of the mobile chipset. With that in mind, a visually enhanced version of a last-gen game seems like an ideal fit for PS Vita and a good place to begin our revisitation of the hardware. It's an interesting initial port of call: it's no secret that Sony's handheld device lacks some degree of horsepower compared to the current-gen consoles, and some might say it occupies something of a middle ground between the capabilities of the PS2 and the PS3. Our first stop is Just Add Water and Oddworld Inhabitants, who've recently released a fully featured PlayStation Vita version of the Stranger's Wrath HD remake, the original PS3 release having garnered an impressive 9/10 Eurogamer review score. At Digital Foundry, we're on record as being rather partial to the PlayStation Vita and while we've looked at major titles such as Uncharted: Golden Abyss and WipEout 2048, coverage opportunities have been limited - something we're acutely aware of and aiming to address in a series of upcoming pieces that delve deeply into the character and capabilities of the hardware.
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