– [Falcon] Graphics are getting
incredible in video games,
and let’s talk about the
top stuff of the year.
Hi, folks, it’s Falcon,
and today on Gameranx,
the 10 Games with the
best graphics of 2022.
Starting off with number 10, it’s Stray.
This is a game that’s relatively modest
in terms of next generation
graphics features,
but it makes up for it in
fantastic art direction
and an incredible attention to detail.
This indie hit
has some of the most
amazing looking environments
that are both expansive
and intimately detailed
while also running silky
smooth on both consoles and PC.
In fact, one of the things
I can say about the game
is how well it runs on PC,
even when using fairly outdated hardware.
Firstly, it’s a well optimized game,
which isn’t something you normally see
with every indie out there.
So the fact they really put in the work
to make this game run
well on older systems
is a really pleasant surprise.
The game just looks incredible too.
Some of the larger city environments
are so dense with detail and color
that it can be overwhelming.
It really can’t be understated
how great this game looks.
The animations and visuals of
the cat are astounding too.
I don’t think anyone’s gonna
mistake this guy for a real cat
just looking at the face,
but the animations and overall
detail are still astounding
for what’s easily the smallest
budget game on this list.
At number nine is A Plague Tale: Requiem.
On the opposite end of the spectrum
is A Plague Tale: Requiem.
This game requires a beastly machine
to run at a solid 60 frames per second,
and on next gen consoles,
it’s still locked at 30,
which is a little disappointing,
but the cinematic gameplay
makes it so twitch reflexes
aren’t really the priority,
so it’s not too difficult to adjust to it.
The frame rate isn’t the best on consoles,
but everything else is
absolutely stunning.
Every environment feels like
a painting come to life,
be it beautiful and pastoral
or disgusting and rat infested.
Special mention is given
to the rats in the game,
which can be seen
in what seems like almost
incalculable numbers at times
flowing through the world like water
during some of the
biggest set piece moments.
It’s this crazy surreal effect
that had to have taken
an obscene amount of work
to get right.
The world looks fantastic
and the character models
are no slouch either.
They’ve got a certain stylized,
almost painterly look to them
that’s part of the game’s distinct look.
Like they don’t look like real people,
but the detail on their faces,
clothes and everything else
is really impressive.
The only reason this
game isn’t any higher is,
it’s just the performance.
Honestly, it should run
better on PC than it does,
but they really went out of their way
to make this game look
as detailed as possible.
And in terms of graphics,
it really is a big step
up from the first game.
And the first game wasn’t
exactly something to sneeze at.
At number eight is Ghostwire: Tokyo,
set in an impeccably modeled version
of Tokyo’s Shibuya District.
Ghostwire: Tokyo is both
fantastic in terms of visuals
and its unique sense of style.
On top of the flashy and
surreal visual effects
are some amazing graphics
that include ray traced reflections
and really making the rain
slicken city streets pop.
Everything in this game
is just so precisely
detailed and rendered.
The outdoors look fantastic,
but the indoors especially
can almost feel real at times
with all the incidental details.
As long as there isn’t a monster on screen
or some of the ridiculous collectibles
that can’t exist in real life.
The contrast between the
very real looking city
combined with the supernatural elements
give the game a really unusual feeling.
Not exactly scary per se,
but it’s so bizarre.
It’s definitely unsettling.
And at least now it runs
great on both PC and consoles.
It wasn’t completely the case
when the game first came out,
but now it is playing
without any problems.
Ghostwire: Tokyo is one of those games
that just looks so good
you have to stop and stare sometimes.
It makes me wanna take a
trip to Shibuya sometime too.
At number seven
is the The Witcher 3:
Wild Hunt next gen update.
Kinda hard to believe that Witcher 3
is nearly eight years old,
not because it’s still popular,
but because the game
still looks fantastic,
especially on PC,
and I’m talking without the update.
Once you throw in this next gen update,
this game looks incredible.
Like there’s only a
few major improvements,
but they make a massive difference.
There’s 4K textures,
there’s ray tracing
with reflection shadows
and world lighting,
and it all looks insane
if you have a machine
capable of running it.
Like just look at this stuff,
it makes an already amazing
looking game look even better,
especially in places
where you can really see
greater details in the textures.
And like seeing the ray tracing work
in the city of Novigrad.
For people with older PCs
who just wanna play the game or use mods,
the next gen update
isn’t the most welcome,
but the new visual updates
really make the game look way better,
even if the performance suffer
is a little bit as a result.
I mean, it just looks stunning though.
Look at this.
At number six is The Last of us Part I.
Naughty Dog’s some of
the best in the business
when it comes to pushing
visuals in their games.
Last of us Part I wasn’t
made entirely by them,
but the level of subtle details introduced
to the remake of this frankly
pretty old game at this point,
I mean it’s a decade old,
but you can’t understate these things.
The funny thing about
this version is the game,
at least at first,
it’s kinda hard to tell
what was even changed.
But once you look at a
side by side comparison
of just how massive the
graphical jump actually is,
characters look more realistic than ever.
The environments are incredible.
Even if it’s mostly building
on what the original game did,
it just cannot be denied
how good some of these locations look.
It’s all, for all intents and purposes,
nearly identical to the original game.
It just looks so much better in every way.
It’s even a huge jump over the remaster
because all of the previous
versions of the game
are working mechanically,
exactly the same as the first,
whereas there were a
lot of new technologies
introduced to this remake.
And at the end of the day,
it’s a graphical update
with some minor tweaks
done to the classic game.
So it’s not getting brought up
on a ton of end of the year type lists,
but at least in terms of graphics,
Last of us Part I is
easily one of the best.
At number five is Horizon Forbidden West.
A banner year for the
PlayStation this year.
So many high profile sequels coming out,
and all of them top each
other in terms of graphics.
I’m gonna say it right now,
this is kind of a PlayStation heavy list,
but is it really like a
confusing set of choices?
Like look at some of these games.
Horizon Forbidden West
is a game that kind of got
lost in the shuffle a bit,
coming out the same time as Elden Ring,
but it is a really good
game, graphics aside.
But once we actually start
looking at the graphics,
it just deserves a huge
amount of recognition.
The world here is detailed and varied.
It’s both heavily stylized
and incredibly subtle.
Like you’ve got pretty wild
costumes on the characters,
but they’ve all also been
facial scanned and modeled,
even down to the most unassuming NPCs.
For an open world game,
it’s just an unprecedented
level of realism
in the character models,
especially the faces.
You’d expect the main
character to get all the love,
and Aloy is crazy detailed,
but almost every other
character in the game
is just as detailed.
Performance, not quite
as good as we’d like.
It can be like annoying
and slowdown sometimes,
but it’s a technical marvel in
pretty much every other way.
At number four, Gran Turismo 7.
Come on, man.
Gran Turismo’s always a
standout from PlayStation,
and Gran Turismo 7’s graphics
are all about substance.
Now, is it as flashy as
other games on the list?
Maybe not, but it’s got a
beautiful art direction,
contrast in colors,
fantastical environments,
and fine details.
The details in this game
are just incredible.
Take any car and just stop and look at it.
Everything is accurately rendered
from the hubcaps to the
stuff you might never see
like the dashboard and upholstery.
The tracks are just as impressive.
Every raceway looks as close
to the real thing as possible.
And under the right conditions,
the game really is
almost undistinguishable
from the real thing.
The biggest giveaway is just how perfect,
and when I say perfect,
I mean that like, wow,
everything is impossibly perfect.
That’s the giveaway,
but it’s also graphics.
It’s not really the worst problem to have.
Like check out some of
the interior dashboards.
Every button, knob, every screen,
it’s all accurate and it looks good.
The Gran Turismo series
has always prided itself on accuracy,
and with 7, they topped themselves.
At number three is Call of
Duty: Modern Warfare II.
Say what you want about
the quality of the game,
there are some pretty divisive
opinions about it I’ve seen,
but you really can’t deny
how impressive it looks.
I’m gonna say this,
and it might be a bit of a nitpick,
I don’t really think
it’s quite as impressive
as the 2019 Modern Warfare,
but that’s a crazy high bar to clear.
That game has some
photorealistic stuff in it.
And while this game doesn’t
quite reach those highs,
it’s still incredibly good looking.
The gun models are all
time best in the business.
The character models
are all scanned from real
actors and animate fantastic.
The environment’s absolutely stunning.
The game’s more open approach
is probably why we don’t
necessarily see that photorealism.
There’s more going on at any given time,
more space, more stuff, et cetera.
But it also serves the game
well in some of the best levels.
It legitimately looks real at times
and it doesn’t have to use
the previous game’s crutch
of darkness to do it.
It’s just one of the
game’s many highlights
with a varied and exciting campaign
filled with some
incredible looking levels.
It’s a game where they strive
for virtual realism at times,
and while it doesn’t always pull it off,
you can really see the
money on the screen.
The graphics are incredible
and blow past the couple
of non-Modern Warfare games
out in the series this year.
At number two is The Callisto Protocol.
Speaking of games with divisive opinions,
The Callisto Protocol
wasn’t exactly the true
successor to Dead Space
we all wanted,
but I mean you really just
can’t deny this game looks good.
The characters, the
lighting, the environments,
it’s all next gen as hell.
You can just say to yourself, oh yeah,
this game requires an
absolute monster of a PC
to run on the best settings.
And at release,
people reported their RTX
4090s were struggling with it.
But a few major patches
have done real wonders
for the performance,
at least for me.
The real standouts with this game
are the character models and the lighting.
There aren’t a lot of characters here,
but they’re all really realistic looking.
They’re natural animations
combined with very high-res textures
to look incredible in the game’s
beautiful lighting effects.
The lighting makes a huge
difference here as well.
It’s important that a game
like this have good lighting,
but they really pushed
everything to the max here.
The environments are not too exciting
from an artistic standpoint,
but if the pure graphical power
is what we’re talking about,
this is easily one of the best
looking games of the year.
It may not win any awards for gameplay,
but you gotta admit that
the visuals are incredible.
And finally at number one,
God of War Ragnarok, doy.
The PlayStation had a great year,
but they of course saved the best for last
in both artistic and technical aspects.
God of War,
I mean really the whole series
relative to its time period
is always an absolute
masterpiece, visually speaking.
But in this game,
it’s incredibly detailed
character models, environments,
beautiful effects that
really come together
to just make something huge.
Everything looks incredible in this game
from the lavish cut scenes
to the most subtle moments,
and it all runs at just
a rock solid frame rate,
all while keeping the game’s
gimmick of being a oner,
like there’s never a
camera cut in this game.
It’s a single seamless camera
for the entire 40 hour journey.
That’s I mean maybe not as
impressive as it was in 2018,
but something about it feels impressive.
Now, unlike the previous game,
which was mostly set
in the beautiful but kind
of samey Lake of Nine,
this game takes you all
over the nine realms.
And wow, do they all look amazing.
The first place you visit,
the Realm of the Dwarves,
deserve special mention for
looking all around fantastic.
Like Ragnarok is just this
staggering achievement of a game
that deserves every bit
of hype it’s getting,
but a special mention should
really be paid to the graphics.
What’s wild is that this game
is still somehow cross gen,
and it still manages to look amazing.
Like it goes to show you
how far solid art direction
and technical prowess
can really take you.
And that’s all for today.
Leave us a comment.
Let us know what you think you.
If you like this video, click like.
If you’re not subscribed,
now’s a great time to do so.
We upload brand new videos
every day of the week.
Best way to see them first
is a course to subscription,
so click subscribe.
Don’t forget to enable all notifications.
And as always,
we thank you very much
for watching this video.
I’m Falcon, you can follow
me on Twitter @falconthehero,
and we’ll see you next time
right here on Gameranx.
The 10 Games with the best graphics of 2022.
– [Falcon] Graphics are getting
incredible in video games,
and let’s talk about the
top stuff of the year.
Hi, folks, it’s Falcon,
and today on Gameranx,
the 10 Games with the
best graphics of 2022.
Starting off with number 10, it’s Stray.
This is a game that’s relatively modest
in terms of next generation
graphics features,
but it makes up for it in
fantastic art direction
and an incredible attention to detail.
This indie hit
has some of the most
amazing looking environments
that are both expansive
and intimately detailed
while also running silky
smooth on both consoles and PC.
In fact, one of the things
I can say about the game
is how well it runs on PC,
even when using fairly outdated hardware.
Firstly, it’s a well optimized game,
which isn’t something you normally see
with every indie out there.
So the fact they really put in the work
to make this game run
well on older systems
is a really pleasant surprise.
The game just looks incredible too.
Some of the larger city environments
are so dense with detail and color
that it can be overwhelming.
It really can’t be understated
how great this game looks.
The animations and visuals of
the cat are astounding too.
I don’t think anyone’s gonna
mistake this guy for a real cat
just looking at the face,
but the animations and overall
detail are still astounding
for what’s easily the smallest
budget game on this list.
At number nine is A Plague Tale: Requiem.
On the opposite end of the spectrum
is A Plague Tale: Requiem.
This game requires a beastly machine
to run at a solid 60 frames per second,
and on next gen consoles,
it’s still locked at 30,
which is a little disappointing,
but the cinematic gameplay
makes it so twitch reflexes
aren’t really the priority,
so it’s not too difficult to adjust to it.
The frame rate isn’t the best on consoles,
but everything else is
absolutely stunning.
Every environment feels like
a painting come to life,
be it beautiful and pastoral
or disgusting and rat infested.
Special mention is given
to the rats in the game,
which can be seen
in what seems like almost
incalculable numbers at times
flowing through the world like water
during some of the
biggest set piece moments.
It’s this crazy surreal effect
that had to have taken
an obscene amount of work
to get right.
The world looks fantastic
and the character models
are no slouch either.
They’ve got a certain stylized,
almost painterly look to them
that’s part of the game’s distinct look.
Like they don’t look like real people,
but the detail on their faces,
clothes and everything else
is really impressive.
The only reason this
game isn’t any higher is,
it’s just the performance.
Honestly, it should run
better on PC than it does,
but they really went out of their way
to make this game look
as detailed as possible.
And in terms of graphics,
it really is a big step
up from the first game.
And the first game wasn’t
exactly something to sneeze at.
At number eight is Ghostwire: Tokyo,
set in an impeccably modeled version
of Tokyo’s Shibuya District.
Ghostwire: Tokyo is both
fantastic in terms of visuals
and its unique sense of style.
On top of the flashy and
surreal visual effects
are some amazing graphics
that include ray traced reflections
and really making the rain
slicken city streets pop.
Everything in this game
is just so precisely
detailed and rendered.
The outdoors look fantastic,
but the indoors especially
can almost feel real at times
with all the incidental details.
As long as there isn’t a monster on screen
or some of the ridiculous collectibles
that can’t exist in real life.
The contrast between the
very real looking city
combined with the supernatural elements
give the game a really unusual feeling.
Not exactly scary per se,
but it’s so bizarre.
It’s definitely unsettling.
And at least now it runs
great on both PC and consoles.
It wasn’t completely the case
when the game first came out,
but now it is playing
without any problems.
Ghostwire: Tokyo is one of those games
that just looks so good
you have to stop and stare sometimes.
It makes me wanna take a
trip to Shibuya sometime too.
At number seven
is the The Witcher 3:
Wild Hunt next gen update.
Kinda hard to believe that Witcher 3
is nearly eight years old,
not because it’s still popular,
but because the game
still looks fantastic,
especially on PC,
and I’m talking without the update.
Once you throw in this next gen update,
this game looks incredible.
Like there’s only a
few major improvements,
but they make a massive difference.
There’s 4K textures,
there’s ray tracing
with reflection shadows
and world lighting,
and it all looks insane
if you have a machine
capable of running it.
Like just look at this stuff,
it makes an already amazing
looking game look even better,
especially in places
where you can really see
greater details in the textures.
And like seeing the ray tracing work
in the city of Novigrad.
For people with older PCs
who just wanna play the game or use mods,
the next gen update
isn’t the most welcome,
but the new visual updates
really make the game look way better,
even if the performance suffer
is a little bit as a result.
I mean, it just looks stunning though.
Look at this.
At number six is The Last of us Part I.
Naughty Dog’s some of
the best in the business
when it comes to pushing
visuals in their games.
Last of us Part I wasn’t
made entirely by them,
but the level of subtle details introduced
to the remake of this frankly
pretty old game at this point,
I mean it’s a decade old,
but you can’t understate these things.
The funny thing about
this version is the game,
at least at first,
it’s kinda hard to tell
what was even changed.
But once you look at a
side by side comparison
of just how massive the
graphical jump actually is,
characters look more realistic than ever.
The environments are incredible.
Even if it’s mostly building
on what the original game did,
it just cannot be denied
how good some of these locations look.
It’s all, for all intents and purposes,
nearly identical to the original game.
It just looks so much better in every way.
It’s even a huge jump over the remaster
because all of the previous
versions of the game
are working mechanically,
exactly the same as the first,
whereas there were a
lot of new technologies
introduced to this remake.
And at the end of the day,
it’s a graphical update
with some minor tweaks
done to the classic game.
So it’s not getting brought up
on a ton of end of the year type lists,
but at least in terms of graphics,
Last of us Part I is
easily one of the best.
At number five is Horizon Forbidden West.
A banner year for the
PlayStation this year.
So many high profile sequels coming out,
and all of them top each
other in terms of graphics.
I’m gonna say it right now,
this is kind of a PlayStation heavy list,
but is it really like a
confusing set of choices?
Like look at some of these games.
Horizon Forbidden West
is a game that kind of got
lost in the shuffle a bit,
coming out the same time as Elden Ring,
but it is a really good
game, graphics aside.
But once we actually start
looking at the graphics,
it just deserves a huge
amount of recognition.
The world here is detailed and varied.
It’s both heavily stylized
and incredibly subtle.
Like you’ve got pretty wild
costumes on the characters,
but they’ve all also been
facial scanned and modeled,
even down to the most unassuming NPCs.
For an open world game,
it’s just an unprecedented
level of realism
in the character models,
especially the faces.
You’d expect the main
character to get all the love,
and Aloy is crazy detailed,
but almost every other
character in the game
is just as detailed.
Performance, not quite
as good as we’d like.
It can be like annoying
and slowdown sometimes,
but it’s a technical marvel in
pretty much every other way.
At number four, Gran Turismo 7.
Come on, man.
Gran Turismo’s always a
standout from PlayStation,
and Gran Turismo 7’s graphics
are all about substance.
Now, is it as flashy as
other games on the list?
Maybe not, but it’s got a
beautiful art direction,
contrast in colors,
fantastical environments,
and fine details.
The details in this game
are just incredible.
Take any car and just stop and look at it.
Everything is accurately rendered
from the hubcaps to the
stuff you might never see
like the dashboard and upholstery.
The tracks are just as impressive.
Every raceway looks as close
to the real thing as possible.
And under the right conditions,
the game really is
almost undistinguishable
from the real thing.
The biggest giveaway is just how perfect,
and when I say perfect,
I mean that like, wow,
everything is impossibly perfect.
That’s the giveaway,
but it’s also graphics.
It’s not really the worst problem to have.
Like check out some of
the interior dashboards.
Every button, knob, every screen,
it’s all accurate and it looks good.
The Gran Turismo series
has always prided itself on accuracy,
and with 7, they topped themselves.
At number three is Call of
Duty: Modern Warfare II.
Say what you want about
the quality of the game,
there are some pretty divisive
opinions about it I’ve seen,
but you really can’t deny
how impressive it looks.
I’m gonna say this,
and it might be a bit of a nitpick,
I don’t really think
it’s quite as impressive
as the 2019 Modern Warfare,
but that’s a crazy high bar to clear.
That game has some
photorealistic stuff in it.
And while this game doesn’t
quite reach those highs,
it’s still incredibly good looking.
The gun models are all
time best in the business.
The character models
are all scanned from real
actors and animate fantastic.
The environment’s absolutely stunning.
The game’s more open approach
is probably why we don’t
necessarily see that photorealism.
There’s more going on at any given time,
more space, more stuff, et cetera.
But it also serves the game
well in some of the best levels.
It legitimately looks real at times
and it doesn’t have to use
the previous game’s crutch
of darkness to do it.
It’s just one of the
game’s many highlights
with a varied and exciting campaign
filled with some
incredible looking levels.
It’s a game where they strive
for virtual realism at times,
and while it doesn’t always pull it off,
you can really see the
money on the screen.
The graphics are incredible
and blow past the couple
of non-Modern Warfare games
out in the series this year.
At number two is The Callisto Protocol.
Speaking of games with divisive opinions,
The Callisto Protocol
wasn’t exactly the true
successor to Dead Space
we all wanted,
but I mean you really just
can’t deny this game looks good.
The characters, the
lighting, the environments,
it’s all next gen as hell.
You can just say to yourself, oh yeah,
this game requires an
absolute monster of a PC
to run on the best settings.
And at release,
people reported their RTX
4090s were struggling with it.
But a few major patches
have done real wonders
for the performance,
at least for me.
The real standouts with this game
are the character models and the lighting.
There aren’t a lot of characters here,
but they’re all really realistic looking.
They’re natural animations
combined with very high-res textures
to look incredible in the game’s
beautiful lighting effects.
The lighting makes a huge
difference here as well.
It’s important that a game
like this have good lighting,
but they really pushed
everything to the max here.
The environments are not too exciting
from an artistic standpoint,
but if the pure graphical power
is what we’re talking about,
this is easily one of the best
looking games of the year.
It may not win any awards for gameplay,
but you gotta admit that
the visuals are incredible.
And finally at number one,
God of War Ragnarok, doy.
The PlayStation had a great year,
but they of course saved the best for last
in both artistic and technical aspects.
God of War,
I mean really the whole series
relative to its time period
is always an absolute
masterpiece, visually speaking.
But in this game,
it’s incredibly detailed
character models, environments,
beautiful effects that
really come together
to just make something huge.
Everything looks incredible in this game
from the lavish cut scenes
to the most subtle moments,
and it all runs at just
a rock solid frame rate,
all while keeping the game’s
gimmick of being a oner,
like there’s never a
camera cut in this game.
It’s a single seamless camera
for the entire 40 hour journey.
That’s I mean maybe not as
impressive as it was in 2018,
but something about it feels impressive.
Now, unlike the previous game,
which was mostly set
in the beautiful but kind
of samey Lake of Nine,
this game takes you all
over the nine realms.
And wow, do they all look amazing.
The first place you visit,
the Realm of the Dwarves,
deserve special mention for
looking all around fantastic.
Like Ragnarok is just this
staggering achievement of a game
that deserves every bit
of hype it’s getting,
but a special mention should
really be paid to the graphics.
What’s wild is that this game
is still somehow cross gen,
and it still manages to look amazing.
Like it goes to show you
how far solid art direction
and technical prowess
can really take you.
And that’s all for today.
Leave us a comment.
Let us know what you think you.
If you like this video, click like.
If you’re not subscribed,
now’s a great time to do so.
We upload brand new videos
every day of the week.
Best way to see them first
is a course to subscription,
so click subscribe.
Don’t forget to enable all notifications.
And as always,
we thank you very much
for watching this video.
I’m Falcon, you can follow
me on Twitter @falconthehero,
and we’ll see you next time
right here on Gameranx.
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