A lot has been said about New Football Game Online Performance Test, Konami’s network beta tryout. Their thinly-disguised eFootball PES 2022 demo has had a mixed reception. Placeholder visuals, weird ball shadows or trails, incompetent defensive AI and host of other issues make the demo a rough experience. However, our two generations of test Pro Ev are clearly far from finished, with our PS4 demo being the less complete of the two.
Click here for a quick read on our first impressions of eFootball PES 2022 demo for PS5
Visually speaking, you can see some progress over Fox Engine but not much yet. Lighting and shadows are more complex in areas where the demo implements them. For instance, fabric and faces are lit in a more realistic fashion than Fox Engine. You can also see additional visual effects and quality on the more powerful hardware and that’s where our comparison piece comes in.
PS5 screenshots on the left throughout this piece while PS4 Pro shots are on the right.
Additional Environmental Lighting
Our stadium shots show more complex environmental lighting on PS5. Extra shadow complexity is visible above as well as a pleasing sunny glow for our crowd to bask in. While the lack of crowd on PS4 complicates comparisons, we can still see the ambience of Unreal Engine scaling across generations.
Interestingly, eFootball PES 2022 demo’s on-pitch graphics on PS5 are less saturated most of the time. Despite that sunny, warm shading on the environment, colours are slightly muted on the 9th generation console. This is (probably) a simple volumetric distance effect that is absent or just less accurate or effective on lesser hardware.
Scaling the Classics
One scale that even an early build of eFootball PES 2022 handles well is resolution. PS4 Pro looks softer and there are details, like goal nets, that can really stand out as sharper on PS5. Generally speaking, on any area of a PS4 Pro image will reveal downscaled textures and lower resolution native rendering. We can’t comment on the PS4 Pro pitch texturing – it’s clearly temporary.
LoD scaling is similarly well done on PS4 Pro with some pixel peeping required to behold the downgrade. However, like PS5’s improved resolution, you will notice it if you really look at it. Lighting and shadow complexity scales hard on PS4 Pro with some shadows completely absent . Most notably, players leave no shadow on the pitch during night-time matches on 8th gen. system.
Unfinished but Still Revealing
Of course, both versions eFootball PES 2022 demo are a long way off. Any of our differences are subject to change. We could see the gap open or close in the next three-to-four months. However, we can see how PES Team has tried to get an early build running smoothly on both systems and the choices they had to make make this happen.
The lack of crowd on PS4 Pro might suggest there is a significant gap in performance for their base build. This is good news if you are an Xbox Series X or PS5 owner happy to see last-gen. systems left behind. Not so good news if you can’t land a 9th gen. console in the next few months.
Do you feel there is a generation’s worth of a difference – even with months to go? How big a deal is PS4’s absent crowd? Is it a sign that Konami are behind on 8th gen. versions or that they just haven’t optimised it much so far? Was it a good idea to release something so unfinished considering the mixed reaction to the mechanical and visual quality of the test?
