Performance in Tron 2.0

Tron 2.0 is a “fresh” 3D action game based on the story from the Tron movie, one of the first movies where they used computer graphics effects. The gaming environment is the insides of the PCs, servers, routers and the like, as the developers see them. And these guys really seem to have excellent imagination :)

The game is a very unusual and beautiful one. However, even though the LithTech engine from Monolith requires installed DirectX9, it only uses DirectX8 pixel shaders. The most remarkable effect used in Tron 2.0 game is the multi-color halo around the brightest objects. NVIDIA and Monolith together developed this special effect for Tron 2.0 game, and without it the game lose at least half of its unique charm.

For tests in tron 2.0, I selected a scripted scene from City Hub level and used Fraps for performance measurements:

The graphics quality settings in the game were maximum. The only exception was anisotropic filtering: we disabled it in the game settings, because the driver anyway forced it when necessary.

Here come the results:

ATI based graphics cards are ahead of the competitors, because they are in a bit better situation: most Tron 2.0 objects are created with a single texture layer, and ATI chips are known to be performing the DirectX8 pixel shaders faster than NVIDIA GeForce FX GPUs.

Despite the enabled full-screen anti-aliasing ATI chips retain the leadership.

Enabled anisotropic filtering provides ATI chips with an additional advantage over the rivals, as they are using a fast though less quality algorithm.

So, even though NVIDIA took active part in Tron 2.0 development and the into-message says “The way it’s NVIDIA meant to be played”, GeForce FX 5950 Ultra failed to outperform ATI RADEON 9800 XT.