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Earlier this week, we reported on the PS5 version of Black Myth: Wukong, and how it seems to hold up from a technical perspective. Our impressions were based on roughly six hours of playtime, and our main takeaway was that while none of the game's three graphical modes are perfect, the performance mode in particular seemed fairly solid, offering gameplay at 60 frames per second — or near enough — in exchange for a lower resolution.
As it turns out, though, Digital Foundry has identified an additional performance mode problem that we never quite picked up on. According to their analysis, Wukong actually makes use of frame generation tech in order to close in on its 60fps target. Basically, frame generation does exactly what its name suggests — it artificially provides more frames per second to give the impression of a smoother visual experience.
However, in Wukong's case, the frame generation results in increased input lag. Essentially, you're playing the game at around 30fps — it's just that the frame generation makes it look like you're sitting pretty at 60. Inevitably, this means that you'll run into moments where you'll swear that you pressed the dodge button, or hit L1 to take a sip of your health-restoring drink — but the input simply doesn't register.
Needless to say, this is far from ideal for a title that's so heavily focused on action combat. For the record, we had started to notice some kind of input lag while venturing further into the game for review purposes — but we were putting it down to the protagonist's long attack and recovery animations. Digital Foundry's findings make much more sense of the situation.
Fortunately, Digital Foundry believes that Wukong's PS5 performance can be improved — so developer Game Science will hopefully grace us with a patch or two in the near future.
Have you noticed any input lag when playing Black Myth: Wukong on PS5? Try not spike your DualSense in the comments section below.
[source eurogamer.net]
Comments 55
That’s very annoying. It’s a good job I’m not playing this at launch then tbh… and hopefully it’ll be in better shape by the time I get around to it.
In before the “This is why the boss keeps stomping me” comments.
Sounds like I'm playing at 30fps
I've been playing via my Portal, so I play with a bit of input lag in mind anyway. It hasn't bothered me yet.
Uff thats really bad, glad i didnt buy yet.
Seems like quality mode is the way to go, id rather suffer thru 30fps than fake 60.
Edit - Did anyone got beyond chapter 2 on ps5? Ive heard thats where most of the performance problems start on PC
Game will be great on sale but £55 for a boss rush simulator (albeit a pretty one) is a little too steep for me with all the games releasing this month/next month.
The only thing I am mad about with the game is that I spent 45 minutes trying to kill a powerful mini-boss only to find out there is some game mechanic that I haven't learned about yet that is required to gather whatever it dropped and now it's gone forever since it disappeared since Resting!
Basically, I spend a lot of time to "git gud" only to find out, there was a reason is felt way too powerful - I needed to wait to kill it!
I still haven't discovered whatever it is I needed to collect what it dropped.
I am being purposefully vague to avoid spoilers. Also, I am playing on PC, not PS5.
I suppose this means that the Sun Wukong of this game has the looks of Lu Bu, but lacks the might of Lu Bu. Tragic.
@GamingFan4Lyf That spirit will be available at a later bonfire under the heading 'lost spirits'. You dont lose anything if you kill that mob before yiu can grab the spirit. Nothing missed mate.
Yes you can feel the character is very clunky while moving around, i also need to press L1 a couple of times before it drinks from the gourd
Good thing I got it on steam then, it was even cheaper.
Technically speaking, at most the input lag penalty between 60 FPS and 30 FPS would constitute just 16.7 milliseconds - not something human brain can register (do yourself a favour, measure you reaction time with a ruler dropped between your fingers. The normal result is about 200 ms). So, it must be something else happening in the frames between the input and rendering that eats up additional time to make it noticeable.
I hope that they will change that. Otherwise I'll skipping the game, sadly
Frame Generation, specially FSR isn't really ready for 30fps to 60fps uplifts, AMD is clear on that & they recommend having 60fps baseline before using it. From personal experience using FSR Frame Gen, you can go around 45ish fps and still get solid results, at least on lower resolutions.
I wasn't too interested in the game until I found out it's UE and works well in UEVR on PC. Heading that way, with VR.....yeah, this'll be a must play!
@Titntin @WhiteRabbit OH THANK GOODNESS!
That enemy was the bane of my existence for a while - took up most of my "game time" last night.
I still have no idea what's going on in the game. I fought what I assume was a main boss after the mini-boss and rang a bell. 🤷♂️
Just like the game Jedi Survivor, I planned on buying it day one but when you find out that the game is somewhat janky, I’ll wait for a sale and patches.
Makes sense. My main sticking point with the game so far is that the combat feels a little impresice. Now I know why.
Still beat the Wandering Wight though.
@WhiteRabbit hmm maybe it’s just the streams I watched then, didn’t seem too much to break up the time inbetween boss encounters
@GamingFan4Lyf Don't stress my guy, if you're talking about the Blue Big Head guy (wandering wight) you can retrieve his spark at the shrine after getting your gourd upgraded by a certain gourd master. Watch out for the tabs with red circle in front them, there's always new stuff for you to find.
@GamingFan4Lyf I'm pretty sure you can retrieve it from any shrine.
@NEStalgia The UEVR made it another game. I found it easier inside VR actually since the bosses' moves appear more telegraphed for you to respond. But the performance is not great
Damn, okay. I'll definitely hold off from buying it then.
I do kinda notice this with healing on PC. It's like it drops my input when I press L1 to heal. Maybe I'm just used to Elden Ring where pressing square heals right away, like a snap. May just be my imagination.
I've not really noticed if there is input lag or not. It's not affecting me enjoying the game at all.
So they cheating really, i mean it's good to have smoother visuals, but if its fake and feels different that isn't so cool.
Oh man, I could have sworn that this was happening but thought I was just running out of stamina or something!!! Good (and highly disappointing) to know that this is a real thing with an identifiable cause. Kind of annoying considering that this problem makes an already very difficult game even MORE difficult to play! :'-(
I have noticed this occasionally and thought something was wrong with my controller. it is not ideal but not a massive detriment most of the time. would be nice if they can fix it though
@DonJorginho there are a lot of boss fights and they are definitely the main attraction but there is still plenty going on outside of it
While this is an action game it's not that difficult. I'm cruising through it and the input lag isn't noticeable at all on performance mode. The only sticky part is when I try to use an item but this has been an issue in Souls games for years. The gourd works on time which is actually an improvement on Souls games.
Every action game has its own cadence anyway and you should be adapting to each one after an hour or two.
I've been playing it but I think I'd rather just be playing Elden Ring instead. That game does everything better really. Wukong doesn't justify the hype around it imo. It does look good though.
@spiralarmz Nice! How bad is the performance? (and on what GPU/CPU?)
Unless the performance is absolutely horrible I'm thinking this and the Luke Ross Elden Ring mod are going to be amazing.
As far as I'm aware, input lag or frame generation does not cause the game to ignore inputs. It just delays them. Aren't we conflating two distinct issues here? It might feel like they're correlated but, technically, they shouldn't be.
@NEStalgia On my rig:
7800X3D, 32GB RAM, 4070 Super
Game settings:
1440p
DLSS Quality (75%)
Very High Preset
Full RT On and set to Medium
Frame Gen On: 90s - 100s
Frame Gen Off: 50s - 60s
So input lag isn’t too off
If I turn off RT, I can get 70s without FG and into the 100s with it on.
I wondered what the hell that was? The health in particular is annoying as I end up double spamming, but also the heavy attack on Triangle. I have got used to it now, as I thought it was by design. Still... I love the game!
This is exactly why I'm waiting on it. Input lag is my biggest gaming pet peave. Appreciate all that chimed in now realizing they've experienced it or not noticed it.
I have a feeling I will.
I actually don't think they will be able to Make the game run any better at the framerate targeted in performance mode if they had to use frame Gen to Even get there. It was never meant to be used this way and suggests the cuts would have to Be even more massive to the visuals to even remotely come close to 60, and with FSR in play that's just not something I want to pay full price for as FSR is consistently a very poor reconstruction option in terms of. Visuals.
It is understandable that people are having fun with it, however it does make sense why they didnt give out ps5 codes pre-Launch. they knew this was a very handicapped version of the game.
Could this have been better optimized? Absolutely. But if you thought FF16 was playable at launch, then so is this, if not better.
@GamingFan4Lyf Not too shabby! Of course it's an Nvidia sponsored title so I'd hope current RTX could have a good showing
What spiral and I were taking about was UEVR performance on it, which is a VR injector for Unreal engine games. In theory it makes any UE game a VR game. But the catch is it's REALLY resource intensive on a "4090 isn't really enough and 5090 probably isn't either" sort of way. I know Pimax has setup instructions for wukong specifically (they're a Chinese company so cashing in on wukong vr is a huge deal for them) but spiral actually tried it albeit with performance issues
😁
@CrashBandicoat Who would have thought we'd get to the point the streaming has less latency then local console lol
@BloodyBlact it's just animation delay. Game plays fine on performance, also I would never ever play at 30fps. Feels awful especially if you play on a big screen
@Art_Vandelay couldn't agree more!
I like Digital Foundry, I’m a subscriber, but they can be pedants about this sort of thing. The truth is most people DON’T realise the minutiae that they do, and they often make mountains out of molehills.
@GamingFan4Lyf No it will be at the checkpoint after you unlocked the thing. Dont worry. I did the same
I never really feel input latency so it hasn't bothered me. The sharpness though i agree is pretty bad so hopefully a patch let's us change it.
I'm finishing chapter 3 (doing all bosses) and man, the performance in the snow field is quite jarring at times. Hopefully it doesn't get worse in later chapters :'(
@species I'm still in Chapter 2 atm but I believe I'm close to the end of it. I'll report back! I've been playing in performance mode and it has seemed okay, but I'll happily blame input lag for all the times I've died
@JohntheRaptor I definitely know the fromsoft frustrations of thinking "why the fu#k didn't he sip his flask" as I hammer the drink button 20 times mid-bossfight.
Don't know about the problem as I'm playing on quality mode 33fps, and everything is responsive as it should, no delays, plus everything is beautiful and sharp. Just enjoying my time with it
The game is not that hard at all, if you use your toolsand know when to fight the mini-bosses or just leave them be until you get stronger. Regular enemies are quite week, some of them tougher but they don't respawn
@jrt87 I managed to find a good balance of image quality and performance by putting Full RT on Very High, Very High Preset, and dropping DLSS down to 60% (Balanced).
I get in the upper 70s - 90s with Frame Generation and input latency feels fine using the Xbox controller. I also turned off Motion Blur because it was causing weird artifacts around the character when turning the camera.
@GamingFan4Lyf I thought I lost it permanently as well, but keep progressing and you'll get it back.
@Spectre27- Yup! I got it last night - along with a bunch of other stuff.
@colonelkilgore classic, a person who hasnt played any about the game and commened the game sucks, and got the most likes
@NeoC how would one play any about the game exactly? 🤔
@colonelkilgore I’m 22 hours into the game, and the overall experience has been very good. There are occasional frame rate drops or lags, especially at the start of large battles, but the gameplay remains smooth. The game’s response time is decent, with actions and commands registering almost instantly. I’ve barely noticed the issues mentioned in this post. Over the past few days, I’ve seen a lot of so-called reviews talking about these 'technical issues'—IGN even gave it an 8 because of them. Honestly, that’s just BS to me.The game isn’t 100% perfect, but the so-called performance issues are definitely not a reason to skip it.
@NeoC oh I won’t be skipping it, I might even line it up to be a milestone platinum… I just have a backlog the size of the Great Wall of China and am clearing old games at a rate of knots in an attempt to catch up.
@viktorcode Where do you come up with stories like.. the human brain can't register 16 milliseconds. That's a very long time in table tennis. Training training training. Perhaps your human brain can't but this isn't everyone.
@elfoam You are confusing reaction time with motion perception. Majority of people do discern difference between 60 and 120 FPS, given the large object is moving on the screen.
Reaction time has nothing to do with that. It is the time between human seeing something and performing an action, like catching a falling ruler between the fingers, after it started moving. As I said, 200 ms is the human norm.
Input lag in games is noticeable for another reason: in physical world every action provides immediate feedback. Not so in games, where a control input will always have some delay before the eye will see the result. It is very unnatural, and everyone hates it.
However, cutting down input lag by a meagre amount of 16ms will not improve reaction time in any noticeable way, despite feeling nicer.
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