Digital Foundry provides detailed analysis.
There is about a month left before the release of the PlayStation 5 Pro console, but Oliver McKenzie from Digital Foundry was already able to try out the remaster of The Last of Us Part II in an improved version. The differences here are not as big as, for example, in F1 24 or Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, but on the other hand, they are larger than it might seem from Mark Cerny’s presentation.
Naughty Dog has decided to add a completely new mode to the game, simply called “Pro”, which complements the existing pair of Performance and Fidelity. They’re still available on PS5 Pro, but at least the old Performance mode has become largely irrelevant. On paper, the differences between the old Performance mode and the Pro mode are minimal: both are rendered internally at 1440p, upscaled to 4K at 60fps. But while the PS5 version used classic TAAU upscaling, the PS5 Pro version uses PSSR technology directly from Sony.
And it is because of this that the differences in image quality are striking. As in FF7 Rebirth, textures are much more detailed and objects are sharper, and the vegetation is also much better. In addition, the image no longer flickers as much, in other words, there is significantly less anti-aliasing.
Even more interesting is the comparison with Fidelity mode, which renders at native 4K resolution at 30 frames per second. Despite the significantly lower internal resolution, Pro mode may look better in terms of detail in textures, objects, and vegetation. On the other hand, Fidelity mode has a more stable image; PSSR still cannot cope with all aliasing and flickering.
In any case, this is the second game after FF7 Rebirth to show that PSSR can produce images at least comparable in detail, even better than native 4K with TAA. This indicates not only the quality of PSSR technology as such, but also significant problems with classical temporal anti-aliasing, which is used on consoles in native resolution. It would be interesting if Sony allowed PSSR also in native resolution as anti-aliasing only, similar to how DLSS (like DLAA) is allowed on PC, as well as FSR and XeSS.
Speaking about competing upscaling technologies, McKenzie compared PSSR to them. Since TLOU2 isn’t on PC yet, it used the remake of TLOU1, so it’s not quite a 1:1 comparison, but both games look very similar. The result is pretty much the same as expected: PSSR provides a much more stable image than FSR, which suffers from significant distortion and flicker.
It is not as stable as DLSS, but on the other hand, it should be added that PSSR is still in a relatively early stage of its development. It took Nvidia several years to get DLSS to where it is today, so you can expect even Sony’s technology to gradually improve.
As a result, McKenzie maintained a frame rate where there was virtually nothing to decide. The game already ran very well on the base PS5, and you can also expect a solid 60fps in Pro mode on the PS5 Pro. Digital Foundry has not yet been able to test 120Hz and VRR modes, where the differences in console performance would be more reflected.
Source :Indian TV