FSR 2.0 tested with God of War and Farming Simulator 2: here’s how graphics and performance improve

With the implementation of advanced rendering techniques such as Ray Tracing and the need to render game images at very high resolutions (4K, but also 8K), the upscaling techniques of the new generation are acquiring an increasingly decisive role. They are pushing on these techniques either AMD that NVIDIAwith the former having to develop a version 2.0 of its technology, after the disappointing quality results of the first version.

If FSR 1.0 was limited to simply rendering images at a lower resolution and then performing an upscaling, FSR 2.0 performs a more careful study of image quality. The first approach, in fact, does not allow to obtain a satisfactory final result, compromising a lot of the sharpness of the original image. FSR 2.0, on the other hand, relying on time data and motion vectors, almost entirely preserves quality, bridging the gap with NVIDIA DLSS. It involves refining those points in the image that need it by drawing on data from previous frames.

God of War e Farming Simulator 22 are the first games, besides Deathloop, to support FSR 2.0, but soon another 16 games will benefit from the new technique. FSR 2.0 is more complex to implement than the first version, requiring developers several days of work in the case of games without FSR 1.0 support. When the latter is present, however, the implementation of the new version is much faster.

Let’s evaluate how much you can earn in performance through FSR 2.0. As you can see, there is essentially no difference in terms of frame rates compared to FSR 1.0. By also supporting the previous technique, in fact, Farming Simulator 22 allows us to make a performance comparison between FSR 2.0 and FSR 1.0. The tests were carried out on our usual video card testing platform, equipped with an Intel Core i9-10900K processor and 16 GB of RAM.

Farming Simulator 22 an agriculture and farming management game developed by Giants Software. The series debuted in 2008 and now includes several chapters, while the last one, FM 22, arrived last November. Players have to cultivate and raise livestock in order to sell the proceeds on the market and earn money in order to improve the equipment available to them.

Let’s move on to qualitative comparison.

It is evident that FSR 2.0 has made a huge qualitative leap over FSR 1.0, aligning itself almost completely with NVIDIA DLSS. Settings only Ultra Performance e Performance (we left the names as they appear in the graphics options menus) show a slight drop in definition at the edges of the letters, while all the other settings offer a more or less aligned final result. FSR 1.0, on the other hand, significantly compromises the image, giving the strong sensation of the presence of upscaling and loss of detail even while playing.

In the case of God of War, where FSR 1.0 is not present, the qualitative differences are decidedly very little marked. Here is the comparison.

We can verify how FSR 2.0 and DLSS do a great job, in some cases even improving the sharpness of the original image. Some discrepancies are noticed only at the most extreme settings, that is Performance e Ultra performance. In this case we note that FSR 2.0 is more effective than DLSS at smoothing edges, while NVIDIA’s technique is more prone to jagging. At the same time, the texture with FSR 2.0 is minimally less defined than with DLSS enabled. But the differences, we repeat, are decidedly small. The PC version of God of War arrived last January: here the complete technical analysis.

FSR 2.0 is based on a time-based algorithm. AMD developed it from scratch with the aim of offering a similar or better image than the native one, while guaranteeing an increase in frame rate. Similar to FSR 1.0, the new solution it does not use machine learning and therefore works on both AMD hardware and competing GPUs.

This last point is very interesting. In fact, NVIDIA claims that DLSS is only possible thanks to hardware integration and support for Tensor Cores found in GeForce RTX video cards. But the fact that AMD has managed to achieve virtually identical results casts doubt on the indispensability of hardware support for managing an upscaling technique of this type.

Ultimately, the new tests confirm the big step forward of FSR 2.0 also recognized in the previous test. Not only qualitatively at DLSS levels, but also on the performance front it defends itself very well, deviating very little from its (uglier) brother FSR 1.0.