As is the case with any major AAA game these days, people had their eyes trained on the upcoming Spider-Man, waiting to see if it would have a graphical downgrade from what was originally (or subsequent to its original unveiling) shown off to players. Taking to Twitter, Insomniac’s James Stevenson responded to player concerns and queries regarding this matter.
Stevenson noted that the game has categorically not seen any downgrade, and that the videos people are using to claim that it has are comparing scenes with different lighting, different camera angles, and obviously, suffering from video artifacts, such as crushed colors. Of course, many are convinced that there was a downgrade, and not paying attention, which seems to have caused Stevenson no shortage of frustration.
Regardless, with the game’s release a little over a week away, one way or the other, we will soon know for sure whether or not any visual downgrades were made. To my eye, the game seems to look better now than it did before, for what it’s worth.
Spider-Man launches for the PS4 on September 7.
It’s not a downgrade. The sun moved. It’s in shadow now. That video is overly compressed and crushing dark detail. Looks great at full res
— James Stevenson (@JamesStevenson) August 25, 2018
Yes because the lighting and the video compression. I looked at it in full res this week and the suit detail is there. The video compression is crushing it
— James Stevenson (@JamesStevenson) August 25, 2018
There is no downgrade. The sun moved during the course of development, which changed the lighting in the scene, and we reduced the amount of puddles there. Please enjoy the hour of amazing footage we've released since E3 illustrating this.
— James Stevenson (@JamesStevenson) August 26, 2018
No it’s not. Lighting changed and we moved a puddle. Games change in development. All the level of detail is still there
— James Stevenson (@JamesStevenson) August 26, 2018
No just go watch the hour of footage we’ve put out since E3, realize there has been. I downgrade, stop stressing out, and enjoy the game in two weeks
— James Stevenson (@JamesStevenson) August 25, 2018
Yes. The lighting changes the dark details of the scene, but all the detail is still there. We didn’t remove or downgrade anything. Insomniac has never done that.
— James Stevenson (@JamesStevenson) August 26, 2018
I am telling you I talked to the technical and engineering and art staff, and looked at the live code of this from the final build. There was NO DOWNGRADE.
— James Stevenson (@JamesStevenson) August 26, 2018
First: it's not a downgrade. Downgrade implies we showed something not possible as a trick or reduced capabilities. Neither of those a re true.
Second: Attitudes like that are why game devs don't want to show stuff in production because people can't handle minor changes
— James Stevenson (@JamesStevenson) August 26, 2018
you have to be kidding. go look at the examples from the game you reference. that's night and day.
this is a lighting change and some aggressive video compression and a puddle being moved. It looks great at home and every journalist who has played at E3 or preview build agrees
— James Stevenson (@JamesStevenson) August 26, 2018
And despite my adamant explanations, clarifications, and assurances, people don't want to listen. Yet I'm the one with the Dev kit and 4K monitor here.
— James Stevenson (@JamesStevenson) August 26, 2018
