Guardians of the Galaxy left a great impression after our tests on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X. The game itself is simply terrific and genuine highlight of 2021 – but equally obvious is that the Dawn Engine is demanding on console hardware. All of which raises the question: just how do the last-gen machines cope with the game? In a world where PS5 and Series X struggle to maintain 1080p60 in performance mode, can any PS4 or Xbox One machine deliver a good experience?
Obviously, there are going to changes from the current-gen console experience – so the option to choose between a 30fps quality mode and a 60fps performance alternative is off the table. It’s 30fps and that’s your lot, similar to Xbox Series S. Reducing resolution as well as frame-rate is another obvious way that Guardians of the Galaxy can scale: so, the base PS4 renders with a dynamic resolution range of around 900p to 972p, while Xbox One drops down to 720p (DRS is a possibility here but all counts came in at 720p, curiously). Owing to the temporal anti-aliasing in play, the lower the resolution goes, the less distinct the picture is but it’s still a good-looking game: only hair and fur elements genuinely suffer.
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