Horizon Zero Dawn: DLSS vs. FSR Comparison

[maxus24]

Horizon Zero Dawn has been updated to support NVIDIA Deep Learning Super Sampling (DLSS) and AMD FidelityFX Super Resolution (FSR). In this mini-review, we take a look and compare the image quality and performance offered by both solutions.

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[BArms]

There's a surprisingly large amount of difference between native and FSR in the background rock shading. FSR apparently completely removes the shading of the distant cliff which is kind of surprising. DLSS does the same though less pronounced, I always thought that these upscaling techniques didn't alter the overall shading pipeline just enhanced the final image but apparently there's more going on.

 

[Frick]

So I can't really tell which one is suppoed to be better, but I didn't know you could zoom in on those cool images and that is really cool.

 

[lightofhonor]

Haven't played the game, but on your 1440p run-through FSR has moving vegetation and DLSS doesn't. Just happenstance or side effect of DLSS?

DLSS seems to have less movement in the beginning side by side too, though does have no shimmer too.

 

[Lew Zealand]

Haven't played the game, but on your 1440p run-through FSR has moving vegetation and DLSS doesn't. Just happenstance or side effect of DLSS?

DLSS seems to have less movement in the beginning side by side too, though does have no shimmer too.

There's a lot of shimmer in certain areas of this game when you play it at native resolution, which IMO is the game's biggest visual problem by a long shot as everything else looks very good. And while I'd love to test side by side, I only have a GTX 1080 so no DLSS for me. If the shimmer reduction is as good as it seems with DLSS in the clip, that just aces using DLSS in Horizon if you have the option. 2060? 3050? Turn on DLSS, period.

BTW, I tried the game with FSR Quality last night with the 1080 and my FPS went from average 70 to about 100 (@1440p, custom settings), so a nice improvement and frankly the reduction in visual quality was negligible. BUT! I'm indoors close to the end of the Frozen Wilds expansion part of the game and with fewer fine lines/details (grass/branches/leaves), this plays to FSR's strengths. Or if you prefer, avoids FSR's weaknesses.

 

[DeathtoGnomes]

There is some back and forth, each side has its qualities and shortcomings. One thing that stood out what the rocky mountain back ground whited out pixels (1080p 122fps) when zoomed in far enough. Also I could not distinguish leaf shapes when zoomed in, it make me think of turning one over to see the bottom or the top. Distance matters, as long as you are looking at a tree from a distance, DLSS wins, but up close FSR does. That could be due to sharpness levels, IDK, just my 2 cents.

 

[Imsochobo]

There's a surprisingly large amount of difference between native and FSR in the background rock shading. FSR apparently completely removes the shading of the distant cliff which is kind of surprising. DLSS does the same though less pronounced, I always thought that these upscaling techniques didn't alter the overall shading pipeline just enhanced the final image but apparently there's more going on.

The lod details with dlss is really lowered by a lot throughout the game and in movement I spot a shit ton of wobblyness, and rather blurry.
That being said the positives is the stability of the image which is greatly enhanced over the native renderer, I found with FSR if I super res up to around 4K and then apply FSR I get a more comparable image at naturally lower performance.

If the wobblyness is fixed alone then dlss is killer and maybe The 2nd best dlss implementation I've seen, I don't care that much about the Lod because the grass is no longer aliased\shimmering with dlss which is pretty darn impressive, and fsr only hurts this.

Not to hate on fsr, I've seen some absolutely dlss killing performance in certain titles, but here it's not great.

And please try it, screenshots never showcases these technologies well tbh!

 

[nguyen]

jup, DLSS in this game fixes the nauseous shimmering vegetation in the Native + TAA and even worse with FSR.
I couldn't play this game at all because of how badly the vegetation look, might give it a try now.

 

[Zubasa]

The lod details with dlss is really lowered by a lot throughout the game and in movement I spot a shit ton of wobblyness, and rather blurry.
That being said the positives is the stability of the image which is greatly enhanced over the native renderer, I found with FSR if I super res up to around 4K and then apply FSR I get a more comparable image at naturally lower performance.

If the wobblyness is fixed alone then dlss is killer and maybe The 2nd best dlss implementation I've seen, I don't care that much about the Lod because the grass is no longer aliased\shimmering with dlss which is pretty darn impressive, and fsr only hurts this.

Not to hate on fsr, I've seen some absolutely dlss killing performance in certain titles, but here it's not great.

And please try it, screenshots never showcases these technologies well tbh!

Also this game is another one of those that FORCES TAA when FSR is enabled. It is baffling to say the least, given how horrendous the TAA in this game is.

 

[tfdsaf]

What the hell, are we looking at the same pictures and video? To me at 4k and 1440p at the highest quality levels, FSR looks much better than DLSS. If you watch carefully you'll notice that DLSS makes the colors bland, I know the reviewer said FSR adds a bit dark, which I find it actually better looking than even native, but compared to native DLSS still has the issue of making the colors look bland. If you notice the blue color on the watch tower with DLSS it is bland, the blue color looks whiter and plainer, on native and FSR mode it looks richer and deeper in color.

Also with DLSS it makes the vegetation, especially tiny leaves on the trees look like scattered dots, it looks completely fake and unnatural.

At 1080p FSR starts to show its limitations and is maybe slightly worse than DLSS at highest quality mode.

So yeah, I'd say in this game because of the sharpening and darker colors FSR looks the best, even a smidgen better than native and DLSS looks the worst with bland colors, poor rendering of the leaves and vegetation in general and just an overall less detail in the textures!

 

[Dux]

Interesting. For some reason vegetation isn't affected by wind when using DLSS. At least judging from the video.

 

[nguyen]

Interesting. For some reason vegetation isn't affected by wind when using DLSS. At least judging from the video.

Shimmering is making the vegetation looks like they are moving, blurring the image actually help reducing the shimmering so Youtube compression actually make Native + TAA and FSR look better than they are in game.

 

[Ujh]

FSR is so much better than DLSS. Even better than native. Guys, how can you say the contrary?

 

[SIGSEGV]

is this an Nvidia ad? seriously

 

[Lindatje]

FSR looks way better. This is an Nvidia ad.

 

[wolf]

DLSS in this game fixes the nauseous shimmering vegetation in the Native + TAA and even worse with FSR.
I couldn't play this game at all because of how badly the vegetation look, might give it a try now.

Same! The shimmering on foliage at native had me put down the game it was that bad. DLSS clears it up completely so now I can finally play it through, FSR makes it even worse of course, and given I found it unplayable at native, FSR is sandpaper to my eyes in this game.

What the hell, are we looking at the same pictures and video? To me at 4k and 1440p at the highest quality levels, FSR looks much better than DLSS.

FSR is so much better than DLSS. Even better than native. Guys, how can you say the contrary?

is this an Nvidia ad? seriously

FSR looks way better. This is an Nvidia ad.

This is an objective assessment of Native, FSR and DLSS in this game, put down the pitchforks and persecution complex.

Native+TAA has issues, namely on foliage shimmering. DLSS with it's own AA cleans this up beautifully and also provides it's expected result of being comparable to native. FSR also achieves it's expected result when taking a flawed native image and exacerbating the shortcomings, so the foliage is even worse, and there is visible quality loss and sharpening artefacts at all settings.

Don't just take this reviews, the vast majority of user opinions, and my word for it, try for yourself (if you have an RTX card), and see what will be extremely obvious. By incorrectly accusing an objective assessment as being biased, you've just aired your own bias.

 

[Dux]

I get some kind of a flicker since this update. Like some trees and rocks disappear for a fraction of a second and then reapear.

 

[ThatOncleSam]

Hi
I have only one quick note:

Please use both GPU Vendors and not only 1. You can't use Radeon Software with your Nvidia GPU. So your Test is incomplete.

 

[wolf]

Please use both GPU Vendors and not only 1. You can't use Radeon Software with your Nvidia GPU. So your Test is incomplete.

Can you elaborate on what you mean? FSR works on Nvidia GPU's as well as AMD GPU's, and DLSS only works on RTX series, so an RTX series card occurs to me as the best choice to test both as apples to apples as possible.

 

[Space Lynx]

@maxus24 will we be getting a God of War on PC comparison of DLSS/FSR?

its out as of today. I am just curious, if you to busy its cool.