Gethsemani said:
Really, a lot of multi-platform releases do that? Name me a few, because I am honestly drawing blanks here. The one I can think off is Dragon Age II which had a completely broken DX11-option (it took my, then, brand new gaming rig down to single digit frame rates). When it comes to games like CoD, Skyrim (did get a HD texture pack post-release though), Borderlands 2, GTA IV, Saints Row 3, Arkham City etc. there really doesn't seem to be many extra options for getting that extra bit of awesome out of the graphics. Most seem content to sit on the same level as their console counter-parts graphics wise.
Let me just count the options Skyrim had for one;
-Resolution
-Antialiasing
-Anisotrophic Filtering
-Texture Quality [NOT including HD texture patch]
-Radial Blur Quality
-Shadow Detail
-Decal Quantity
-FXAA
-Reflections in Water
-View Distances
-Detail on Distant Objects
Arkham City had;
-Antialiasing
-DX11
-DX11 Tessellation
-Detail Level
-Dynamic Shadows
-Motion Blur
-Distortion
-Lens Flare
-Light Shafts
-Reflections
-Ambient Occlusion
-PhysX
Haven't played the other games, so I can't comment on them.
However, those two at least do look different on PC compared to console. You might not agree, because its not PS2 vs PS3 level graphics difference, but the difference is there, and is quite noticeable to those who are used to the higher detail and extra shader effects and such. It kinda hurts to play something like Arkham City on a console because it does look very different to me, and is noticeably lower res, even on the same screen resolution, compared to the PC version.
As for multiplatform games with PC settings, you're really not trying too hard. MOST games offer options on the PC, and they're usually better than the console version because its really not that much effort to just shove in the original textures you downscaled to run on a console and label them "Ultra" in a texture setting, or to add in a FoV slider so that you can change a 1 integer variable in a config file somewhere. Examples recently; Sleeping Dogs, Battlefield 3, Farcry 3, TW2 and doubtless others that I haven't played because the 2012 lineup of games was decidedly average.
Its the reason why there is generally a big deal made out of these things; Its not rare for games to offer graphical options, its rare for them NOT to, and it is very easy to tell when they don't.
Granted, some games look alright either way, like the Mass Effect games, but you get things like Dark Souls or Darksiders, and they just look terrible. The textures end up upscaled from 720p [Because few console games actually render at 1080p, and a lot render even slightly below 720p just to get out that extra bit of performance] to either 1080p, 1440p or 1600p - dependent on what screen given person has - and that is the biggest noticeable difference IMO outside of shadows, which in a number of games are noticably blockier than Minecraft rather than smooth like a normal game.
Now, is it that big a deal... Maybe. It depends on how the game ends up looking anyway, and whether things really are locked down to a stupid extent where you almost have to go to more effort to lock them down like they were in Dark Souls, though I guess they get the excuse that they made the console version first which has to be locked down, and CBF unlocking when developing the PC version they never intended to make.
Anyway, I'm not thinking this is going to be a good PC port. Chance of no graphics options, certainly none that make it look better than it does on a console [Hopefully excluding Resolution and FPS. If they are locked down F*** you devs], possibility of low performance, likely bad control port seeing as their opinion towards it is a very casual "Well, yeah, we'll give you KB+M controls. That's enough right?", and likely no effort put into it at all. We'll see though. Could turn out decent.
