Taking this bait, I think the problem is that these features are doing multiple things, and almost all of them are bad in the name of “better” graphics (which is subjective)
- characters look worse, like AI slop filters were added over their faces and bodies
- creative vision of the people making the game is bastardized behind these “enhancements” altering the look and feel of the game.
- higher bar for entry for performance requirements and still getting poor performance if you do bite the bullet for a more expensive setup
- a lot of these games aren’t that good, don’t get me wrong a few are, but having to buy extra equipment and push your PC to get marginally better graphics to play an “okay” game isn’t gonna make people jump for joy.
You used half life 2 as an example, that was arguably one of the greater games out there at the time, tech and story wise, when it released. People bought better equipment because they wanted to, and even then, the game was still really good. Not so much with these new releases.
You can blame the complaints on people hating AI, they do. But it’s not like everyone who doesn’t like these games and their requirements is hating it just because of DLSS. The problem is people are complaining about performance along side other issues and DLSS is being presented as “the solution to performance issues” when it’s not even close.
in4apenny@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 days ago
In many cases that’s true, but not in all cases. Makes sense considering that no games have had this technology to be used in their art direction, no wonder it looks like ass. If your only citation for this take is that one Resident Evil screenshot that made headlines then I suggest you look at the world deeper than just headlines and clickbait engagement farming articles.
I guess all these mods that revamp textures or do ENB shaders or lighting adjustments are “bastardizing” the creative vision too. I would argue that even running a game on low-medium settings for the sake of framerate is bastardizing the creative vision, as artists worked very hard to produce high quality assets meant to be seen in it’s highest fidelity. Do you consider running games on lower graphics settings a bastardization? Didn’t think so.
Again, same with every new generation of graphics tech. It’s always a higher entry for performance, it’s always in the hands of the few first, and poor performance is also, again, not the fault of AI but bad optimization.
There have always been games that are shit but pushed for graphics, in damn near every console generation since PS2. It’s a unique selling point to have shiny graphics. The good games that last on good gameplay and good optimization for good performance are lauded, and for good reason. AI won’t change that, if anything make even cooler stuff like HL2 did with it’s latest tech. You know what does make shitty games? Situations such as “Studio with best selling game lays off 40% of its developers.” And before you say “But they’re doing that because AI,” again AAA studios have always been doing that since way before, in other industries too, since Thomas Edison. All the EA and Ubisoft controversy? Way before AI. The problem is capitalism, and execs at the top making a buck at the expense of good quality products with planned obsolescence and cheaping out their workers. This is a problem in every industry, AI or not. But these stupid companies that are investing entirely into AI at the expense of good art, writing, and gameplay (whether it uses AI or not) will always fail because it’s slop. It’s the Charlie and the Chocolate Factory “Machines stole my toothpaste job” stuff, old man yelling at cloud behaviour. It’s the exact same logic that blames immigrants for stealing our jobs, without even looking at the bosses who are firing workers and replacing them with exploited immigrants.
I love AI for what it could be, but we’re not ready for it under capitalism. Cognitive offload is only a concern for people who don’t respect learning and understanding to begin with, I say get them out in the open. Smart people don’t fall for it. Capitalism is using AI to destroy itself for short-term gains and it’s happening right before our eyes - “Capitalists will sell you the rope to hang them with,” and all that.
abigscaryhobo@lemmy.world 5 days ago
I mean look it might become a useful tool in the future, not denying that. But what we are seeing is DLSS5 being shoved into a lot of mainstream games as a replacement for polish. We can let the big studios drive themselves into the ground chasing profits and slapping on whatever new tech they think will give them a sales boost, no complaints here.
But as it stands it’s a capability that’s over hyped for what it is, like you said yourself, art teams aren’t using it as part of their art direction so it’s clashing with the designs, and the hardware level barrier for entry isn’t worth the money it costs to get there.
That’s all subject to change, it could become a staple of the industry, it could become the linchpin that lets smaller games perform while still letting the game have great design. But right now there’s too much opposition for too little benefit. It could be great, sure, but people playing games now don’t care what it “could” be. They care what it “is”, and right now for the most part what it “is” is an over hyped buzzword feature that jacks up the “cost” of a game for no real benefit to the player.
And to give a counter example, the same thing was said about Ray tracing when it initially came out. It was cool but it would practically set your PC on fire at the time, but even then, people liked it. It was overpriced and not really that different, but some people thought it was cool. DLSS5 doesn’t even have that.
in4apenny@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 days ago
I mean I’ve tried DLSS5 on a bunch of games in my library. On most of them, it tanks my framerates and sometimes looks like absolute ass. But in two of my games (Cyberpunk 2077 and Stellar Blade) it looks and runs incredibly, and it’s hard not to see the potential.
As far as everything else you’ve said I 100% agree. It’s just not there yet, I think one day it will be though. I’m lucky I got my 5070 right before the prices started getting jacked up, so I’m privileged to be able to experiment with what’s already out. And believe me when I say the results vary - at the moment. Even as a fan of the tech and I can confidently say it’s not ready. And yes, studios that cram it as a staple feature in place of good optimization and, quite simply, a good game, then they’re gonna fail because they released slop. But that’s not the destiny of every game that uses it. I’m telling you, one day this tech is gonna be in mass produced hand-held devices. At the current rate of Nvidia GPU prices, they’re not gonna be the ones mass producing it and winning. Only a matter of time till China comes out with a 32gb Vram, Blackwell tech x4 GPU for like $200, meanwhile the 16gb equivalents today will cost under $100. Because Nvidia (while I admit they do produce cool tech) are greedy capitalist bastards. All the AI slop companies are greedy capitalist bastards. And I continue to blame the capitalist bastardary more than I do the shortcuts AI unlocks. If the economy wasn’t so shit and things in general were more affordable, and one of these GPUs were affordable after a few months of saving like things were 20 years ago, we’d be much happier with this. However we’re overall unhappy with it because it’s not being developed for affordable entertainment, but instead being used for surveillance powered by datacenters that destroy our environment so a handful of lizards can make billions, while we’re literally struggling to afford groceries. I want to burn down those remote, gated billionaire communities and replace THEM with datacenters for OUR general use.