Xbox Series X/S Next Gen FPS Boost has expanded from it's initial offering of just a handful of games.
I’m a recent convert to extra frames. Well off course it seems silly to not at least like the idea of a higher frame rate in your games. Yet while I never has any dislike for it, I honestly wasn’t able to tell the difference enough to think of it as worth it.
My views weren’t helped by seeing commenters online talk about playing their previously 30 FPS game in 60 as being like ‘playing a different game’. This angered me in a way that something which has no effect or detriment on my life should. How could it be like a different game! Sure, it’s smoother, but that’s literally it right.
Yes, and no. I do still think these people are over exaggerating the benefits. I still feel I'm playing the same game I was before, because I am, but I have at last attuned my eyes to the subtlety of a not-so-subtle doubling of the images I'm seeing.
It started with Immortals Fenyx Rising. An absolutely fantastic game which I will wax lyrical over in a future review, I'm sure. In Immortals it gives the same settings that many of the latest games have whereby you can pick between performance, aka frame rate, or quality, the resolution and draw distances. Why in a stylized game like this there is a need to choose when running on a next gen console is beyond me, but that’s a different matter. I tested out both. Frustratingly having to restart the game each time I made the change, trying to spot the difference. I couldn’t.
(Gorgeous)
Now my eyes aren’t the best, I'm a proud thirty levels up in life and I've worn glasses for most of them. I suspect if I did have more Legolas benchmarked eyesight, I might have been able to spot the differences right away. But as it stands I couldn’t, so I picked the ‘Quality’ setting, as I at least felt I might be seeing slightly further into the distance with that one. Not being able to quickly change without restarting the game made quick comparisons impossible.
However, the internet and some gaming friends kept telling me that frame rate is a massive improvement that I started keeping an eye out for it. And wouldn’t you know, I was in Tartaros dungeon idly rotating the camera around my gorgeous Fenyx and I spotted it. I could see the stuttering drops in frames. The dark backgrounds with fire motes rising up created the perfect framing to spot it. I opened the settings. Changed to ‘Performance’, restarted the game and rotated some more. It was better. Much better. No longer was my camera a juddering mess from an archaic age. It was smooth. Beautiful. I was converted and never would I be able to look upon a 30 FPS game again without being sick in my mouth. Hurrah! ... But oh. So many games are still that. What has been seen cannot be unseen.
(Motes!)
I was free of the Matrix and I wanted back in. Yes, I know it’s not steak, I know that when I put it in my mouth, the Matrix is telling my brain that it is juicy and delicious. After nine years, you know what I realize? Ignorance is bliss.
But unlike Cypher I cannot be plugged back in, and must live in this horrible world where 30 FPS *Spits* is allowed to exist. However, there is hope.
FPS boost exists. Those geniuses at Xbox have been magically uncapping frame rates left and right. Well just left for now, but right to come soon I'm promised.
And now games from the EA Play catalogue available on Xbox Game Pass Ultimate is getting some of this wizardry.
Based on the tweet put out today the following games are getting not only 60 FPS but 120. As soon as I figure out how to fit a 55” OLED TV in my lounge without kicking my partners TV off the wall I’ll be taking advantage.
I’m very excited to jump into many of these but with that added razzle dazzle.
But, for how good I now see 60 FPT to be. And for all my above bluster. It’s still the same dam game!
Grab yourself Immortals: Fenyx Rising here to see why i love it.
Or need a TV to support your new 120FPS games, this is our recommendation.
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