Following Microsoft’s announcement of the Xbox Series X, two next gen games were teased: Halo Infinite and Hellblade 2: Senua’s Saga. But it isn’t the console itself or the latest in the Halo franchise that has people talking. The trailer for Hellblade 2 features such stunning graphics that people are starting to wonder if the New Xbox is really going to look that good.
There’s been a lot of speculation already, but there are a few clear points of contention that should be brought to light before fans start getting too excited about the capability of the next gen of console gaming or the capability of the Unreal Engine 4.
The trailer garnered immediate attention for obvious reasons. In addition to looking far better than Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice at first glance, the trailer was posted along with an “In-Engine” tag. This is a bit misleading because it doesn’t necessarily mean that the game was rendered in real time.
Most trailers attempt only to capture the feel of the game and give viewers a sense of the art direction or what gameplay might look like. Most of the time, this means the fidelity of the in-game product is much lower than that of the trailer. However, since there is an “In-Engine” specification with this specific trailer, it’s fair to say that the previewed look will come pretty close to what users will see on the new-gen Xbox. But how close are we talking?
In a video constructed by Alex Battaglia of Digital Foundry, a detailed breakdown of the trailer’s specifications and the technology that might have produced it is presented in order to determine what level of congruence fans might see between the graphics in the trailer and the graphics that will appear at home. Watch the full video below:
In the video, Battaglia looks at the metadata of the trailer. It’s mastered at 24 frames a second with a frame size of 3840x1608, which is “60% of the amount of pixels pushed per second vs. a 4K/30.” That means that the trailer is slightly easier to render than the real thing. Basically, it’s believable that the game could look close to this good with the next gen of consoles.
The only thing that seems implausible to Battaglia is the fact that there are no “visible limits to draw distance.” As objects get farther from the camera, they maintain their level of startling clarity in detail. In any current-gen game, objects past a certain distance will be rendered via an “LOD pop-in” due to the CPU limits of open-world games. In the Hellblade 2 trailer, you can see as far into the distance as you might in real life. While it’s clear that the trailer may be a bit of a stretch in terms of setting expectations, it’s also highly likely that the next gen of consoles will “represent new levels of detail, lighting, and rendering techniques” than anything we’ve seen so far.
READ NEXT: Looking Ahead: 10 Upcoming Games We Can Expect To See On The Xbox Series X (Project Scarlett)
