In today’s review, we’ll look at graphic settings and their impact on picture quality in the most anticipated game of the year – Dying Light 2: Stay Human. So the long seven years of waiting have flown by. Yes – yes, the continuation of the zombie shooter that shook the game – the world in 2015 is before us. Techland worked together with NVIDIA to add all the advanced ray tracing effects to the game – global illumination from the Sun and flashlight, physically correct shadows and penumbras, diffuse lighting from light-emitting materials and surfaces (lamps, stained glass, etc.), as well as reflections on wide range of materials.
Will the sequel repeat its success? Let’s find out. Let’s look at the important graphic settings and their effect on the picture.
Rendering mode. There are three DirectX rendering options to choose from: 11, 12 and 12 Ultimate. All visual effects are available on DirectX 12 Ultimate – that’s the icing on the cake.
DirectX 12 Ultimate takes gaming realism to the next level with support for ray tracing, Mesh Shading, Variable Rate Shading and Sampler Feedback. This type of rendering is available on GeForce RTX and Radeon RX 6000 series.
If you do not own a GeForce RTX or RX 6000 series, then you have only two DirectX options available: 11 and 12. You will not be able to enjoy all the delights of the visual component of the game on which the NVIDIA and Techland team worked. The game was originally designed for the latest version.
Below is a comparison of DirectX 11 and DirectX 12 Ultimate. In the game, the time of day changes dynamically, as a result, at sunsets and dawns there is a colossal difference in some places, but at night the difference is not noticeable. The new version of the graphics API allows you to simulate the actual behavior of light in a game, creating incredibly realistic graphical effects such as global illumination, reflections and shadows.
DLSS vs FSR. Let’s start with a little theory. There are several key differences between each upscaling technology, the main one being that Nvidia’s DLSS is based on artificial intelligence. Nvidia’s technology is only possible thanks to the Tensor Cores in the 20 and 30 series GPUs, which brings us to the next important difference: compatibility.
AMD FSR is open to a wide variety of cards, including Nvidia 10-series GPUs. FSR does not use AI and is instead based on a complex set of algorithms.
Let’s see scenes with different NVIDIA DLSS and AMD FSR settings. Below is a comparison for each of them. For these tests, the game’s Ultra socket was used. In the image below you can see the difference between native HD quality and DLSS/FSR in both modes at 200% zoom.
By zooming in on a certain area of the image, it is possible to evaluate what the technology is capable of. NVIDIA DLSS achieves greater texture clarity, while AMD FSR does the opposite. With NVIDIA DLSS you can see a wicker fence, clear writing on a wall, the texture of a house, but AMD FSR is not able to show this, it softens them more.
The following image shows how DLSS does the job perfectly. The details are well defined and the shadows are correct.
Go ahead. Attention is drawn to AMD FSR in “Performance mode”. When choosing it, we sacrifice the quality of objects such as grass, turning into an almost shapeless green spot.
Below I suggest you familiarize yourself with the full-size images to appreciate the visual component.
Anti-aliasing quality. The parameter has 3 modes – “Off”, “Low”, “High”. Dying Light’s cityscapes are replete with jagged edges on buildings, cars, and other objects.
If the option is enabled, the “ladder” disappears, and the image looks realistic. But the problem is that if you turn on maximum graphics settings on a weak computer, FPS will decrease. Depending on the computer settings, the user selects the type of option, each of which has a specific effect on the image.
Particle quality. In this item, you can choose between: “Low” and “High”. Dying Light introduced a lot of high-tech effects like volumetric smoke and fire, as well as simply stunning explosions.
All this beauty, of course, affects the operation of the game, but it affects it moderately. Therefore, if you have a computer with a configuration closer to the recommended requirements, you can safely set the particle quality to “Medium”. And if everything is bad – “Low”. As the value increases, the smoke becomes more voluminous and rich, the fire becomes brighter and denser.
Quality of sun shadows. There are two modes available: “Soft Shadows with RT” and “PCF”. Tracing adds dynamic, radiating shadows to objects and creates a more pronounced transition between the light and dark sides of objects, emphasizing the directionality of lighting. Tracing shadows are rendered at screen resolution and are capable of conveying the smallest details near an object. The technology for creating shadows allows you to make them more realistic and closer to life. The outlines of shadows dissolve as they move away from the object casting the shadow.
For a more accurate comparison, below are screenshots from different locations.
I would like to note the point with RT. For the first time, NVIDIA introduced us to RT shadow technology in a game Control, but they used hybrid shadows – tracing in places of contact with the surface to ensure high detail (since the resolution of shadow maps is not enough for these purposes), flowing into regular shadows by rasterization as they move away from the object.
In Dying Light, all shadows are done by tracing. With tracing, the further the shadow is from the object that casts it, the more diffuse that shadow becomes (see illustrations on Wikipedia for the query “Penumbra”). Conversely, the closer the shadow is to the object that casts it, the greater the detail and clarity of traced shadows. These phenomena are known as shadows and penumbras. If you look closely, many objects in games “hang” in the air because they either do not have a shadow, or their shadow is not correctly correlated with the object. I am sure that you have encountered this problem, but now you can forget about this “nonsense”.
Quality of contact shadows. The item has 5 parameters: “Off”, “Low”, “Medium”, “High” and “Very High”. Contact shadows allow you to give greater depth to all objects away from the player – for example, window frames, equipment and other objects receive visually more correct subpixel shadows. When the parameter is turned off, the shadows will begin to merge into a single dark area, and when turned on, each of them will be clearly drawn along the edges, even inside the other.
We invite you to familiarize yourself with the influence of this parameter. For a more accurate comparison, below are screenshots from different locations.
The difference between the images is clearly visible. Contact shadows improve overall perception. They allow you to additionally indicate the junction of objects, better highlighting different elements of architecture, shadows appear between trees, and there is a shadow from debris on the ground.
Shading model quality. The parameter has 4 modes – “Off”, “Low”, “High”, “Ultra with RT”. Background shading makes the lighting in a game scene more realistic. Objects cast shadows where there are obstacles in the path of light: details in corners or surrounded by other objects become darker, and everything that is exposed to light sources becomes lighter.
For a more accurate comparison, below are screenshots from different locations.
In the first scene we can see that the High setting makes the overall picture lighter and some of the shadows, notice the chair, are saturated compared to Ultra with RT. Completely disabling AO leads to the disappearance of penumbra and the influence of objects on each other.
Second scene. When you select “Ultra with RT,” the grass and bushes have rich shadows, which makes them stand out and adds volume to the entire picture. With the “High” setting, shadows are less pronounced. No difference was noticed between “Low” and “Medium”. Without AO there are no penumbra or shadows from vegetation on the ground at all. As a result, the grass merges into one green mass – the attractiveness of the final picture suffers greatly.
Global illumination quality. It has 4 modes – “Low”, “Medium”, “High”, “Ultra with RT”. Dying Light uses NVIDIA RTX technology to create realistic in-game lighting, using real-time ray tracing to simulate global illumination.
Ray tracing simulates the actual behavior of light, and light is the key to realism in games. Realistic lighting helps to further convey the atmosphere of a dark, harsh world. That’s why NVIDIA helped Techland bring trace-based global illumination to Dying Light, the long-awaited sequel to the zombie shooter.
Reflection quality. Available in this item: “Low”, “Medium”, “High”, “Ultra with RT”. Reflections add a lot of realism to the world of Dying Light. These are exactly what are missing in many other games. Puddles, wet surfaces, and some shiny surfaces may reflect objects, characters, and other game elements.
For a more accurate comparison, below are screenshots from different locations.
When set to “Ultra with RT”, the corresponding elements are reflected in good quality. With “Medium”, detail and brightness are reduced, and artifacts appear during gameplay. At Low, almost all reflections disappear, only the reflection of light on surfaces is visible, as you would expect.
Flashlight with ray tracing. In this item you can choose between: “Off” and “On”. Even before the release, the developers talked about their experiments with secondary lighting (reflections from surfaces), which comes from artificial light sources (the main character’s flashlight).
Thanks to ray tracing, some scenes have become darker, and the flashlight has become brighter and clearer. How do you like the innovation from Techland?
Fog quality. The parameter has 3 modes – “Low”, “Medium”, “High”. Fog is an FPS eater. The density of the volumetric fog is not so important for the game. During the review, the influence of this parameter on the visual component of the game was not noticed.
So let’s summarize. Dying Light 2 may well repeat the fate of the first part.
At the moment, this is the largest game based on the studio’s own engine called C-Engine. And this is the first game with ray tracing from Techland. Therefore, the development team is actively collaborating with NVIDIA to introduce new technologies. Thanks to the partnership, the visuals of Dying Light 2 Stay Human are top notch!
Dying Light 2 can be called one of the best zombie games in the entire industry. Never before has one project simultaneously included crazy gameplay, cool graphics, and a great plot. More parkour, more story and more choices – Dying Light 2 retains everything we love. So, enjoy the game!
The iron test is available at this link