No, the dismal 30fps days aren’t coming back

For many years, there were two ways console games were rendered: at 30 FPS or, more rarely, at a smoother 60 FPS. Those days seem to have passed since the arrival of the PS5 and Xbox Series, it seemed – almost all current games run at 60 FPS. But now 30 FPS games are making a comeback. The question arises: are the dark times coming back? no There are good reasons against it.

A comment by Frank Ritter.

A few years ago I got myself a PS4 to finally be able to experience The Last of Us. I played the sequel straight away. The Last of Us Part 2 (Test at spieletipps.de) demanded a lot from me. And by that I don’t mean (just) the plot and the level of difficulty.

Because the biggest break for me was the frame rate: while I was using TLoU1 60 frames per second got to know part 2, which I played directly afterwards, only delivered 30FPS. Sure, The Last of Us 2 looked a lot prettier than its predecessor. But it ran less smoothly because of the 30 FPS, played more slowly and less directly. It worked, but it wasn’t fun. Mainly because I as a PC player used to the fluidity of 60 FPS am.

30 or 60 FPS – always a compromise

My gaming experience reflected the dilemma console game developers have been in for the past decade and a half: Do they want to release a game that above all else runs smoothly? Then, especially in 3D games, they had to limit the visual quality. In order to get 60 FPS on the screen they had to reduce detail, resolution and view distance – if it was at all possible. The full graphic quality was only available at 30 FPS.

Of course, there were exceptions like the Doom or Call of Duty series, which managed to reconcile image quality and fluidity well. Or Forza Horizon 3, one of the games where you had the choice between “smoother” and “prettier”. But the best of both worlds was only available on PC.

(Some players rationalized this with the now-meme claim that the difference between 30 and 60 FPS isn’t visible anyway. That’s nonsense.)

But the technology does not stand still. In the first two years of the new generation of consoles, consisting of PS5 and Xbox Series S|X, 60 FPS became practically the standard. What a relief! Sure, various games still offer an optional 30 FPS mode with more graphical quality, but a 60 FPS option is almost always offered today. Several previous generation games were even retrospectively patched to 60fps when running on the new generation of consoles, including The Last of Us Part 2. So the future of gloriously smooth 60fps is finally here, one might think think. But …

Is the 30fps renaissance imminent?

A Plague Tale: Requiem and Arkham Knights have recently been released with two games that do not have a 60 FPS mode. Are we concerned that this will bring back 30fps games as the norm? This is a thesis that Richard Leadbetter from Digital Foundry, among others, put into one Article on Eurogamer sets up.

no Or better: Rather not, is my answer. And that has several reasons.

The most important reason is that Performance of PS5 and Xbox Series X. While the previous generation already struggled to keep up with contemporary gaming PCs at release, the PS5 and Xbox Series X have more power than typical current mid-range gaming PCs are able to deliver. And by “mid-range” I mean PCs in the $800 range.

New consoles can compete with average gaming PCs

This performance offers enough headroom for 60fps gameplay, and for the foreseeable future. Because the parallel development of games on different platforms will no longer happen with the consoles as a performance bottleneck, as was the case in the previous generation.

Of course, some titles will still push the limits of what is possible in the future and flirt with 30 FPS. Upcoming games with Unreal Engine 5 using all its capabilities could be candidates – the impressive Matrix demo, which only runs at 30 FPS, gives an impression. However, these will be in the minority and on cinematic gaming experiences be focused – outstanding image quality and motion blur that makes graphics appear more realistic.

Next reason: The parallel game development for PCs and consoles ensures scalability. Of course, new graphics cards and CPUs continue to raise the theoretically available level of performance in the PC sector, but game development will continue to concentrate on the greatest common denominator there as well. In view of supply bottlenecks, rising prices and global crises, high-end hardware will become even more of a consumption target for a niche target group. However, this will then be able to enjoy new effects, especially in the ray tracing area, rather than abnormally high frame rates. My thesis: For a long time to come there will be PC games that (at least without ray tracing) achieve 60 FPS on today’s mid-range hardware – and these tend to be the graphics configurations that are also set on console hardware.

Ironically, another reason right after that is that Xbox Series S. Because of all things, the reduced performance of Microsoft’s “entry” next-gen console means that game developers always have to provide an option with lower graphics settings than the version for the Series X. And no, publishing games exclusively for Series X comes for Microsoft not in the bag until further notice.

The Series S might be a bottleneck, but it’s also a reassurance. A low-performance version of current games has to be developed, which in turn could, at least theoretically, also run on the Series X with correspondingly higher performance. There may be exceptions, primarily in CPU-limited games, but the trend is clear.

One of the mentioned 30 FPS outliers is the aforementioned Arkham Knights, which only runs at a maximum of 30 FPS on all latest generation consoles. Here, the investigations by Digital Foundry have shown that the game runs so rough because the CPU is the limiting factor, i.e. the main processor, not the graphics unit. However, since there are enough comparable open-world games that perform better even on last-gen hardware, the suspicion arises that in the development of the game not enough emphasis was placed on performance.

Gamers want 60 FPS

In other words: With better programming and optimization, the game could have run at 60 FPS. Leaving out the optimizations necessary for this is a risk that the studio and publisher accepted – and that is will presumably also be reflected in the sales figures.

Then there is a “soft” reason: In recent years we have Gamers have become accustomed to the luxury of 60 FPS. I suspect that high frame rates are more important to most gamers these days than high resolutions or “expensive” ray tracing effects. Based on the reactions to the 30fps limits in recent games on social media, the developers know that it is at least a factor in user dissatisfaction – and will try to avoid it.

A final argument is that advances in technology mean that developers now have more options to frame rates in between Achieve 30 and 60 FPS. The reason is new televisions, with technologies that were previously only known from the PC gaming sector.

Variable refresh rates help. Robert explains what that is in the video.

These are, for one variable refresh rates also known as VRR or FreeSync. These ensure that a game runs smoothly even at frame rates between 30 and 60 FPS. Uneven framepacing, which causes micro stutters, is thus effectively prevented. More and more televisions support thanks to connections after the HDMI 2.1 standard also 4K images with up to 120 Hz. In contrast to 60 Hz televisions, in 120 Hz mode it is also possible to play games with even 40FPS to represent.

Why 40 is halfway between 30 and 60

Even if it doesn’t sound like it, are 40FPS right in the middle between 30 and 60 FPS, in terms of the frame time, i.e. the display length of a single image (30 FPS → 33.3 ms; 40 FPS → 25 ms; 60 FPS → 16.6 ms). This new picture mode represents a perfect compromise. 40 FPS modes are supported by a growing number of games, most notably Sony’s own productions, and most recently A Plague Tale: Requiem.

In summary, I don’t think 30fps as an exclusive option has a future for new games anymore. If so, then at most in individual cases or as a “high-fidelity” option in games that also offer 60 FPS. New technical possibilities soften the borders and make interim solutions possible. In addition, players are now used to 60 FPS, many do not want to go back. And the performance of consoles will be sufficient for new gaming experiences for a long time to come, apart from ray tracing, which will only be used in exceptional cases. 60 FPS (and more) is here to stay.

Personally, I struggle with completely playing through The Last of Us 1 and 2 again after the remaster of the first part. I don’t know when yet. But one thing is clear: I won’t have to endure the second part in 30 FPS anymore – thank God!