Splinter Cell Chaos Theory - Retro 2005 PC vs OG Xbox - A Technological Milestone!
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- čas přidán 26. 08. 2024
- A properly impressive technological milestone in its era, Splinter Cell Chaos Theory was renowned at the time for pushing the OG Xbox harder than many other games - so why was it so impressive, and how did the PC version compare? Alex and John team up to 'let's play' the game simultaneously on both systems.
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Ubisoft doesn't make games like this anymore.
Nope. They really were proud of the realism in their games. It was a great time for gamers.
Too busy milking Assasin’s Creed and Just Dance
They should
yeah, splinter cell and prince of persia trilogy, good times.
Agreed
When I first played this in 2005, I was fully convinced that this was the technological peak of video games and nothing could ever get more realistic than this.
Yes, the first level from the demo was so inspiring for me too. I got into shaders completely back then.)
Just unfortunately peak splinter cell game
I couldn't believe how good it looked at the time.
Riddick was such a wonderful graphic artist, too.
XBox was a great machine
I think Doom 3 was its most impressive port.
@@vrASMR180
I loved DOOM 3 too, but the Xbox performance was very bad
@@a.s.cirillo6785 yeah but when you take into account the specs needed to run it at the time it's truly one of the most impressive ports to Xbox. Also it incorporated a system link co-op mode which was never even included on the PC version or any port after.
This and Riddick, were my two favourite Xbox games, without Halo in the title.
@Ehm
Same here! Also the OG version of SC Double Agent.
This games visuals were unbelievable back in the day.
Man, I'm STILL impressed the Xbox was able to put out those kinds of graphics. The thing was basically a Pentium 3 with a GeForce 3, and it still went toe to toe with the best of them.
@@anusmcgee4150 yea it really was insane. This game was the game that had me saying "if the Xbox can do this then I cannot imagine what we are going to see on the 360"
@@evo7836 Gears of War 3 and Halo 4, to me, were the 360's equivalent of "just wait until the Xbox One, kids".
Not just this one. I remember I got a playable demo of the first SC (remember magazines?) on the OG Xbox just before it came out, and I couldn't believe what I was seeing: Night vision, thermal vision, and you could fire the little cameras out of your gun! I mean, what the actual fuck??? Also, I seem to remember Michael Ironside made a sex-groan whenever he took meds! I must have clocked up 30\40hrs or so just on the demo. Kojima even expressed a desire to turn it into the new metal gear game whilst it was in development. Talk about praise from Caesar!
My Pentium 3 PC with Windows 2000 was blessed to run this game smoothly. Swapped a 32mb GeForce 2 with a 128mb GeForce 4 4200Ti and it was smooth and beautiful
"This is pretty interesting John, right?"
"Yeeuuuaaahh"
thats right
@@MrStrangermoon That's right, Jay.
@Lov Mir Dilate
For sure.
Alex is enjoying this more than John. 😂
This is my favourite stealth game ever. The story, graphics, sound, music; all incredible!
*looks up Amon Tobin’s recent music
Yeh the soundtrack is an absolute 💎.
Soundtrack is gold. Everyone always says that MGS is the best stealth game of all time but then I ask if they’ve played Chaos Theory
@@VideoGems117 I've always preferred the A.I. in MGS but both are some of my absolute favorites.
Amen! With today’s tech I think 🤔 a splinter cell could be made to some mind blowing levels, but it wouldn’t be easy. Balancing them casual players and hardcore with gameplay mechanics would be quite a challenge.
Impressive looking for the time
in a lot of ways, I think it still holds up beautifully.
It still does absolutely.
I was thinking the same thing, but not just for its time. The "in its time" part seems disrespectful and condescending. Theres well crafted games and games that don't meet that standard, and the former are timeless. This looks like it could be one of the former but never played it so I can't say for sure. I like the mood it conveys. Very cool.
@Gareth Fairclough Dammit Gareth my backlog is huge as it is without you making me add this to the list! Oh well, I can easily think of worse problems. Thanks for the info!
I'd say character faces, some oily surfaces and some NPC animations are the only things that could be considered bad by today's standard (who am I kidding - they looked bad when the game came out). Everything else still holds up better than many more modern games: every object in this game feels like it has physically correct weight (especially Sam himself and enemy bodies), every location feels like it's an actual lived-in environment and not a videogame map, the sound design (especially with turned on EAX support) is borderline ASMR, soundtrack - perfect, Sam's banter with guard - genuinely one of the best elements of the game. Conviction and Blacklist for some reason don't have that "weight" to be as immersive as Chaos Theory.
Imagine a reboot of this series with raytracing which you need for gameplay. This is all I want
Yep, Splinter Cell is amazing 😍 I hope Ubisoft reads your comment 👍
@@SweDownhill Ubisoft: "Understood. Splinter Cell with microtransactions and lackluster open world coming soon!"
I can’t believe we went a whole generation without a splinter cell game
What about TWO Generations without the Sony Bend Classic SYPHON FILTER!!!!???
You want open world splinter cell game , with towers, points of interest ?
Seeing what Ubisoft has become, is it really a bad thing? xD
@@Verostik honestly I’d like if they did how they did with blacklist that was really good with different play styles and stuff but I’d also like a really fitting great end for Sam fisher it’s just time for him just one game would make everyone happy
Hm, that's true. I hadn't thought about it.
Ugh that Amon Tobin soundtrack is legendary
Edit: holy shit that bridge in the cave, that whole area looks incredible
Back on OG Xbox the cloth physics and dynamic shadows blew me away.
Now most of the time things are stiff and unrealistic with the excuse that cloth is not worth it bruh
They still blow me away. On modern systems they don't even try this stuff anymore. The game even has working mirrors.
Good times, when you didn't have open worlds everywhere
I Miss those times
There are much more variety these days, especially if you consider indie gaming.
there was so much more variety back on the ps2 open world games where few and far between so you only really had the great ones.
@@John-996 Hmm no, and it's not even close.
I have been playing games since late 80s and there were never as many genres and sub-genres as there are now. Today you have the same AAA diversity you used to have in PS2 days, and thanks to indies, we got back a ton of genres that have been dead since 8 and 16bit days. Then you have new singleplayer genres, the option to play online multiplayer, VR adding new levels of immersion, etc, etc. There are more open world games indeed, because there are literally more of everything.
The fact some people pretend that greedy companies like EA, Ubisoft or Activision are all we have now, ignoring 95% of what's available, is entirely their fault. I still love to play my old consoles and games, but there's a massive difference between healthy nostalgia and blind one.
Yes i think we will have games like that this gen.
Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory!?
Yup. Just going to instantly like this one. All time favorite game right here. Alex's got his Crysis shrine.. I've got a "Chaos Theory" shrine.
If you ever need someone to fill a 2v2 lobby of Spy vs Mercs to analyze that aspect of the game, hit me up ;)
Edit: You gotta be careful with Amon Tobin's music. They hand out copyright notices all the time.
Oh yeah, tell me about it. I upload a 10 second Chaos Theory segment and I get slammed with the copyright.
Speaking of SvM, are you available and are in the dedicated Splinter Cell discord? I'd like to play SvM Chaos Theory as well with anyone at this point. hahah
@@Sheridan2LT Yup - Amon Tobin's copyright protection team is always on point. Only music that I post when I share Chaos Theory content is the stuff by Jesper Kyd.
Nah - I've been too busy to play SvM recreationally unfortunately. Got a lot of footage to record of classic battlefield matches :)
Amon Tobin's music needs to be in all future Splinter cells just like Michael Ironside is Sam Fisher
@@frank2043 I love Amon Tobin's work in Chaos Theory - but I don't think it's necessarily a requirement for a good Splinter Cell. The music in Splinter Cell 1 is still pretty good, same with Pandora Tomorrow
@@Nick930 Those were pretty generic "spy thriller" tracks in every other game. Chaos Theory's identity is tied to the music. It's fucking sublime.
The OG Xbox was a beast. I miss the huge generational leaps we had back then. Also missing Ubisoft games being interesting.
Blacklist was interesting, but nobody care, just like you and now series is dead. thx mate
Well there is a reason why Xbox 360 lasted 8 years.
If PS4 and XB1 were powerful as the GTX 780 Ti with a very powerful CPU, it would provided a real generational leap over PS3 and Xbox 360.
However a very powerful console as high end PCs is very expensive
@@DDT-lr3zz 360 lasted for 8 years because of the outstanding hardware costs of Gen 7 and the impact of the Great Recession.
@@nigralurker The PS2 lasted 6 years when it was weak compared to PCs in 2000, there were PCs in 1998 more powerful than PS2
@@DDT-lr3zzeverything looked better than jaggiestation 2
Not only is this game amazing, but the OST is unforgettable. Amon Tobin did mesmerising job.
PS. This was back when Ubisoft meant pure awesomeness.
The Xbox original Chaos Theory got some Xbox One X enhancement treatment too I believe.
Indeed.
Every Splinter Cell title are actually.
@Lov Mir yeah but the game came out in 2005 lol. They're justified to use 2004 spec hardware here. There's not much difference anyway beside resolution, not being downplayed too bad.
@Lov Mir get some help man
@Lov Mir seriously, what the fuck is wrong with you. this entire video is them being impressed with the feature parity in the xbox version of the game. your replies make you seem like you live in a different plane of reality and just want to yell into a void so people hear you
@Lov Mir PC and Consoles are developed in different ways. PC games target the highest hardware for their time because each year more powerful hardware is available. Where as Consoles are static platform, the developers forced to develop that must work for that hardware.
But PC hardware gets more powerful over time. It's not cheating because that is the advantage of buying a pc despite the cost.
I still hate ubisoft for not making a new Splinter Cell after all this time. They seem to have a hard on for anything open world which allows them to somehow jam micro transactions into.
They announced a new AAA splinter cell game last year at facebook connect
Right... They lost a lot of their originality that made us love Ubisoft back in the day.
Have u played all of them? A lot of ppl forget about the more recent ones, but if your sc fan they are good.
"Micro"trasnsactions in AC Valhalla for last few months made them more money, then all Splinter Cell series. Sad, but it's not art for an master - it's buisness for an company.
It's already been proven that single player games are in high demand. Seems like a no brainer.
I only played Chaos Theory a few years ago and was surprised by some graphics effects.
Amazing that Ubisoft hasn't released a remaster for the Pandora Tomorrow & Chaos Theory... Like they don't want easy money.
That would be nice, what's annoying is I can't use my Chaos Theory key in Uplay for whatever reason so a proper remaster would be sweet.
They should remaster all the main splinter cell games for Xbox one and series consoles
@@rcng086 they are all at 4k in xbox one x and series x.
What's the point? Chaos theory is already obtainable and playable on both pc and xbox. Or do you want another lazy ubisoft remaster like assassin's creed ones?
Not even a remaster, a full on remake with raytracing. This is one of those games where it would really benefit the game, especially if you combined it with HDR.
Back when Ubisoft innovated instead of following the generic open world rpg formula
Yeah those days are long gone
Yeah
To be fair, they kind of invented said formula. Making it innovative.
They just also *immediately* ran it into the ground.
back when every year we have some innovated game... you should look at whole picture instead of hating just one company.
that being said, with time it hard to be innovative. thats why everyone stick to some formula they invented. hell, even rockstar still using same singleplayer formula since GTA3. but everyone ok with that and prasied how technically good their games. they trying something new with online, but its just a mess
so back to topic. innovative stealth game? but... like, the ONLY stealth game that was kinda innovative since Chaos Theory release is MGSV. so, its hardly is Ubisoft fault of not making innovative stealth game
If only we still had open world RPGs; these days we've Open World, Action, Stealth, Driving, Platformer, Spy, FPS, RPG; and they do none of it well, if at all.
Ran the original disk version on Windows 10 at locked 1080p60 with minimal issues.
Just make sure to download the "Wide Screen Fix" patch from "PC Gaming Wiki" which not only allows upto 4K resolution but also corrects the FOV. All in a all, an *EXTREMELY* crisp experience!
Just had a few issues with night vision not displaying correctly but luckily it can be easily fixed by pressing alt-tab and re-maximizing the game.
My only issue with the PC port is controller support is wonky af and next to impossible to get working like it did on Xbox
The apex of the shiny period was Perfect Dark Zero on the 360, almost every surface had a specular map applied to it. That game had its issues but it had some of the best POM brick textures I've ever seen. Wasn't matched until Crysis 2 DX11 tessellation came out IMO.
Awww yeah... PDZ bricks were nice
I grew up obsessing over this franchise and I was so fascinating with the next gen feel, same with Chronicles of Riddick and Doom3 those were my most treasured games along with halo.
Yes Riddick was incredible 😊
One of my fave games of all time, loved doing the splitscreen coop missions on the xbox with my mates
What I liked about the coop is that the levels they designed for it required you to work together, IIRC
Yea, that co-op was awesome!
This will probably forever be my favorite stealth game unless they bring back Splinter Cell the way it used to be and also Michael Ironside.
Michael Ironside played Sam Fisher in Ghost Recon : Breakpoint. If a new install of Splinter Cell were in development I'm sure he'd reprise his role.
Remember the good old days when the names meant something. Splinter..... Cell.... So stealthy? Never there? Deniable right? Oh no no no, gunz, martial arts, explosions, John Wick center-axis relock with parkour in broad daylight, ah gotcha. And Ghost.... Recon.... Ah Ghost stealthy stealth? Invisible? They don't exist.... Wow pairs really well with Reconnaissance, wow it's like elite reconnaissance and intel, wait why are we charging around lighting up half of a fictitious South American country with automatic weapons? Cos we're Ghosts hurr hurr hurr! Yeah but..... Ghosts and and.... Reconnaissance. We're supposed to be like..... "Nuhhh pew pew". Well. :/
22:44 you get this for free with shadow mapping! A shadow map on a thin surface will bleed through, usually you want to bias away from the light-source (to simulate a thicker material) to remove the shadow glitching through the other side (and properly shadow the side you care about), but you can also bias it towards the light--source until the cloth's own shadow disappears and you're sampling as if it's the other side.
I didnt understand one word
But i guess you deserve the heart from DF
"The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay" would be a great game to give this treatment.
Such memories of being utterly in awe at this game on the original Xbox. Literally couldn't see a difference between it and the trailers for the then upcoming 360. One of ubisofts best games
Looks good on Xbox backward compat these days on Xbox One X or Series X. Got slight enhancement some time ago to sharpen everything up except the UI and menus.
@@LouSassol69er don't have either unfortunately! Will get a series X when the scalpers decide it's time to calm down
Maybe the best looking game of that console generation.
@@gokhan7482 OF THAT CONSOLE
@@gokhan7482 The underlying tech, whether one likes the look as much, was almost certainly more impressive on the Chaso Theory side.
The game had to be rebuilt on PS2 and GameCube because of the Xbox's superiority off the NV2a. The programmable shaders and even the SIMD CPU+hard drive gave the Xbox huge tech advantages over the other two consoles.
This is why the maps in Splinter Cell releases tend to be redesigned when ported to PS2.
Something like Doom 3 on Xbox also is an important milestone, and is essentially a generational argument: the other two consoles would not be able to run its lighting models.
Lack of true DOT3 on GC compared to Xbox -- the latter able to run Doom 3's dirt maps, for example -- shows that tech gap was quite wide between MS's console and the competition at that time.
Itagaki estimated that the Xbox was 500% more powerful than PS2. That's a half-gen. And things like programmable shaders are arguably a generational argument in Xbox's favor.
Very interesting generation technologically.
60fps Rallisport Challenge 2 and native 720p Amped 2 are strong contender too in my opinion.
@@anen9332
It really was. All three companies went in completely different directions with their hardware design philosophy.
For the PS2, it was all about moving data fast. That MMU architecture is still impressive. And when developers leveraged what the PS2 offered at the Metal you saw some stupid impressive results that seemed impossible on that console.
For the Xbox it was all about programmable shaders and raw power. It felt like a early sneak peak at the Xbox 360 and PS3 looking back.
Of the three the GameCube was the most conventional design. But it was the perfection of that conventional design that had been honed for years.
I’ve seen a comparison between the PS2 and The original XBOX and it’s night and day the Xbox was very powerful
In my opinion the best stealth game ever.
The controls on xbox for aiming weren't the best or most accurate compared to more recent which made it feel even more tense if you missed , compared to say blacklist/conviction instantkills/ headshots were so easy
@@sean7332 I played this came on pc. One hand on my controller and one hand on mouse. It was the weirdest setup as a kid but I have fond memories of it.
Not an opinion bro it's a cold hard fact, especially for the time.
"Spinter" Cell?
This and MGS alias snake 👌🏻
White or black button.......MAN classic Duke controller sentence I haven't heard in like 20 years
"Yeah?"
"Yeah!"
"Yeeeeaaahhh!"
*Yeahing intensifies*
In my opinion, this is one of those few “perfect” games that have ever been released.
Intersting thinking
Any other titles you would call "perfect"?
@@TonyMontana-ys5xz gta san andreas
One of the things that really blew my mind that most people didn't really pay attention to in this game was one of the attention to details.
It can be missable but during the first mission, when you get out of the rain, you can see Sams suit go from being a glossy wet, to being dry.
Something games didn't start doing until the next generation. So for a 2005 game puling that off was insanely amazing!
Two years ago I played it on OG Xbox hooked up to CRT TV and I couldn't believe my eyes. I mean I played it back in the day on PC with Radeon 9000 but I didn't appreciate it nearly as much as I do now. One of the graphical miracles from that era.
And here I am, sitting and waiting for a new Splinter Cell with a sound/light meter...
Light meter + a detection meter like new Hitman games or MGSV.
I remember this and The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay blowing my mind back in the game. They both looked freaking stunning.
I've been championing this game as one of the best stealth games (and indeed, one of the best games ever, period) for more than a decade, now. Fond memories of playing it in college when it came out. Great multiplayer mode, excellent level design, all-time great soundtrack. Thanks for looking at it!
I would like to have seen a third comparison with the original game on Xbox One X/Series X in 4K.
Do they even know its been enhanced or are they saving it for a future video?
Enhanced being higher res, msaa + antiscopic filtering... And that's about it. Maybe HDR. But no higher res textures or advanced lighting/shadows as seen on PC version. Same situation with all "enhanced" back compat games.
I'd buy a remake in a heartbeat.
No need for a remake, the original plays as good as "tripleA" games do today.
@@YlkevanSpankeren The gameplay was great, but Chaos Theory running on today's tech would be something else.
@@ENXGMA_YT I'd rather a sequel on todays tech. Keep this game to its era. Remake obsession is ridiculous.
@@2sallads , if a remake is done properly, it can bring a classic to modern audiences and improve the experience for longtime fans. Nothing wrong with that.
@@JimBob1937 A modern audience has no patience for a pure stealth game. It is what it is.
Been waiting for an og xbox to 2005 pc comparison!
Chaos theory is still a looker on the Pc.
So does every game ever made lmao
Played the game for hundreds of hours in my teen years way way back good times
That was a good era in gaming, when they were trying to figure our graphics and gameplay mechanics in a 3D environment, and when little new details like shadows and lighting made a huge impression.
I want more of these side-by-side playthroughs! So soothing and informative :)
Yeaaahhhh...
-John
Original Xbox, what a beast at his time ♥️
I've been playing this for the last few days.Managed to get it to work at 4k. It looks great.
Still play it and the og Xbox was just amazing
Got this game with my 7800GTX when I built my first gaming PC. An amazing showcase for what the card was capable of, and a really exciting time in PC gaming.
My all time favorite game! Thank you so much for covering this DF! Here's hoping the new Xbox FPS Boost feature will make it to this game and the rest of the trilogy!
It’s not just a trilogy though. Don’t forget about Double Agent. It’s a good game too.
@@Wally17. you are right it is but sadly version 1 is stuck on xbox at 30 fps and version 2 is a buggy mess on pc. I did very much enjoy version one though...despite the fact that there is a mission missing exclusive to ps2....
@@KingGiac 2 missions missing
@@kingdomkey2262 yes! The Ship and the German Bunker....such a shame they will be lost on a platform that really didn't run the game well.
Splintercell Chaos Theory was the best graphics on the OG Xbox, next to Half-life 2, Halo 2, Doom 3 and FarCry.
Ninja Garden Black deserves a shout-out.
Brute Force, Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath and the Otogi series were awesome looking games too..
*Edit: And Wreckless: The Yakuza Missions!
Watching with headphones. Weird detail, but the background music sounds exactly like a phone vibrating slightly every ten to fifteen seconds, haha. Was driving me nuts.
Had the exact same issue! Confused me a lot!
i remember splicing an xbox controller with a usb-A connector to be able to play this on my first gaming rig. I also used the s-video out to display it on a tv so my friends and I could spectate while me played. Great memories. Great video, guys.
I remember 2005. Played wow, had a night elf rogue named Splintercell. In ironforge "Splintercel" came up to me and he /cry.
Just finished up my first playthrough a day ago, holds up incredibly well certainly didn't feel like I was playing an old game.
You have forgotten one thing in Bathhouse level - actual working mirrors and AI reacting to your reflection in it.
"gevena conventions"
All laughs aside, Chaos Theory was and still is impressive. I believe you can inject AO into it driver-side on Nvidia GPUs on PC, and it looks pretty good.
It's a shame there's not a modern splinter cell. Could be a really impressive showcase for modern lighting and graphics, especially maybe RT.
A new Splinter Cell would be amazing, but Ubisoft isn't interested because stealth games are too niche and they want money.
@@michaelsteffensen6844 or because assassin's creed franchise.
@@michaelsteffensen6844 Yeah, I cannot possibly see Ubi making another Splinter Cell unless they'd make Spies vs. Mercs game and kinda slap a campaign with that. Maybe they'd get the R6 Siege team working with the multiplayer and a B-team working with the campaign. The B-team probably would have a lot of freedom because Ubi wouldn't expect players to come for the singleplayer. So that's the only way I can see us getting a new Splinter Cell that you can 100% ghost, has an awesome jazz soundtrack and has clever dialogue and banter and that isn't a glorified Ghost Recon game.
I spent so, so many hours getting high and playing this on Xbox. I had a TV unit that had doors, so what I used to do was have the doors open and basically use them to box myself in, then sit there smoking joint after joint just losing myself in it. Man, that feels like an eternity go.
what in the name of fu*k?! 😂
Games like Splinter Cell and Thief carefully control lighting as it directly affects stealth status (sometimes the boundary between light and darkness is quite harsh). Not sure if they are good ray trace candidates.
Their shared enthusiasm is infectious haha
The Xbox and PC versions were really superior to the PS2 version. Chaos Theory is probably the best Splinter Cell in the whole series and was a technical marvel back in 2005, just like the first one was. I'm playing Pandora Tomorrow at the moment. Still great!
Of course, PS2 wasn't able to use actual shaders and other advanced features that was supported in Xbox and DX9 graphics cards. Still PS2 version was amazing, sometimes it even looks like it have actual PS3-like hardware features.
YES, I love these types of videos so much
El Analista de Bits has just posted a video comparing xbox vs ps2... is this a coincidence? I don't think so! Õ.Õ
I was searching for this comment. WTF just happened?
Something is very strange, this game has no reason to return to the spotlight, it is not a coincidence.
Must be just a funny and improbable coincidence, I was just kidding... or maybe DF folks tweeted about this and El Analista de Bits liked the idea... I don't know
But DF didn't put the PS2 version on the table... Why?
Lmao I saw this too I was like wtf
i will always have a soft spot for chaos theory!
This def fills my nerd, tech void for the day, Digital Foundry never fails.
This was the game (and Morrowind) I bought an Xbox for back in the day, after playing the original and Pandora Tomorrow on PS2. Those visuals were too appealing.
I can change your life forever.
This still looks great running on the series x. 4k, vsynced and 16x AF.
Let's hope it gets the fps boost
@@_-ghostfps-_8651 yeah that will be amazing,it's all based on how the game is coded though,luck of the draw it seems
Nasty rasterization without almost literal to god 3GB texture upscale mods PER MISSION. Wtf?
Ah, when Ubisoft games weren't all homogenized garbage...
Yeah I hate UBI games now, they all feel like they’re being thrown off an assembly line. The only game that I play they have is Siege, but that’s just them taking advantage of my addiction to competitive fps lol.
They all feel the same. I've not bought a Ubisoft game since GR Wildlands. Even that game felt kind like it had no soul or passion put into it despite being ok.
WE NEED ANOTHER SPLINTER CELL!!!
I was waiting for this. Good job DF! On Xbox, on CRT this game even today looks amazing (I forgot about poor framerate).
This game on the original Xbox had everybody’s jaw on the floor back then. That console was the BEAST of it’s time. I still see people online with the OG Xbox modded looking hella sexy to this day.
Think about it: Xbox was the only programmable shader console for four years, until the arrival of the 360.
It was also the only machine for four years with high-speed internet out of the Xbox and a hard drive.
The CPU was also impressive. A fully-SIMD PIII/Coppermine hybrid.
Interesting that this was the key cut to the 360 and PS3: their CPUs were not SIMD, unlike the OG Xbox.
The SIMD CPU gave Xbox huge advantages over a machine like GameCube as far as CPU tasks. Likely explains why such a physics-heavy game like HL2 was able to run on it.
@@anen9332 Man bro that OG Xbox was an amazing console. Xbox has always been ahead of the game with the technology and features in their machines. I remember being able to rip CD’s right onto the hard drive and play your own music in games. That was so 🔥🔥🔥
The 4k update on the 1X looks great.
I love the way the Xbox One X's scaling, texture filtering, etc. cleans up those old gems. SSX3 is also great to play on the newer consoles.
@@halofreak1990 As does the fable games. Though the frame rate is still 30.
I played this the most on my 3DS, it could’ve been the portable aspect but played it around 2006 as well. Still I really got into it on 3DS
I always wanted to see a pc vs original xbox comparison from DF. Those graphics for splinter cell on xbox were no joke.
I bloody loved this game back in the day. The interactivity of the environments like cutting the tents, shooting out lights etc. And the graphics on the original Xbox honestly felt “next gen” at the time.
yep and when the 360 cames out I felt like "ok but chaos theory, Chronnicle of riddick, are already next gen"
@@devilduc yeah, I remember thinking that exact same thing.
@@ozzyg82 Well the OG Xbox and 360 are 4 years apart.
That why there were xbox 360 games in 2006 that didn´t looked much better to OG Xbox games.
Gears of War 1 was the first true next gen game in 7th gen
@@Charles-hy6gp yeah good point. 👍🏻
The good times when Ubisoft made good games with passion when their games was about quality but not quantity...
In term of sounds shame EAX was abandoned
not quantity? you are funny guy. you know that they released first 4 splinter cell games in 4 years? also +1 DB PastGen and +1 PSP game
@@MrVoland44 i was talking about the games mechanics and design in their games nowadays.
not how many games they released in a time period
besides there were 2 teams working on splinter cell games:
ubisoft montreal-splinter cell 1,3,double agent ps2/gc/xbox version,splinter cell conviction
ubisoft shanghai-splinter cell 2,double agent pc/xbox360/ps3 version
all modern ubisoft games seems to work on the same template big soulless open world map filled with boring meaningless padding to artificially bloat the game and keep you busy, and missions/quests designs that are as imaginative as if an amateur with a level editor made them, filled with bugs, characters with a charisma of a wooden plank, a season pass and of course filled with microtransactions.
compare ubisoft games of 2010-2020
to ubisoft games of 1995-2010.
I love videos showing older tech pushed to it's limit. Best ones guys!
The Shiny Period preceded The Brown Period where everything turned brown.
We need splintercell xbox360 versions running with double framerate and 4K on Series X. Some are already 4K and looks great but only 30fps.
Lol pc can play them all 4K 144fps. Master Race
The Splinter Cell trilogy remaster in HD was exclusive to the PS3 (as was the Prince of Persia trilogy HD remaster)
Damn. That's a shame. Would be nice to have on Xbox Back-Compat.
@@pipgoesthepossum if you have an Xbox One X or Series X they enhanced the original games. It cleans up the resolution and anti aliasing for the jaggies. Looks alot sharper now.
@@LouSassol69er oh yeah I know. I just figured higher res assets, etc, in the first place, would be a better starting place.
It looks nice but the frame rate is bad
Brings me back to the old G4 days.
A couple of observations:
1. The HD versions were only released on PS3, and yeah, they were the PC versions (including all the problems the PC version had with Pandora Tomorrow) instead of an upressed PS2 version, as the maps in the PS2, Gamecube and Wii were different from the Xbox and PC versions. The PC and Xbox were one map without loading screens, the other consoles are split in sections through loading screens. Also the PS2, GC and Wii versions had more indestructible bulbs due to system limitations.
2. The loading screens are different between the Xbox and PC port, as the Xbox has videos (or gifs?) showing game mechanics or "tips", whereas the PC version just has a static image instead.
3. The fourth wall reference in the second mission is actually a reference to the previous 2 games where there were a limited amount of alarms depending on the missions, in Pandora Tomorrow most of the times it used to be 3. In this game (Chaos Theory), you can trigger as many alarms as you wish, and guards will become more aware and will wear heavier armor the higher the alarm goes, but the mission won't fail unlike previous games, unless you fail a primary objective.
4. At the end of the first mission, you have to turn off the light at the top of the lighthouse in order to complete it.
5. You can ghost almost the entire game, with specific exceptions where you have to take down a target in 2 or 3 missions, and it is the most fun way to play.
6. This is the first Splinter Cell that introduced optional killing when you grab an enemy or get near them, as you can either kill or knock out enemies, with different animations depending on Sam's and enemies' position. This was then ditched in Conviction and made a return in Blacklist.
Not bad for 64MB ram and a 743Mhz Pentium 3 on a Geforce 2.5
"This game is so hard!" *doesn't use any of the critical vision modes!
If you’re new or rusty, SC’s gameplay isn’t exactly newcomer-friendly. It’s part of why the early entries in the series aged so well, being so uncompromising on mechanics for the sake of new players.
@@gwen3504 Splinter Cell is easy, the problem that Alex doesn't know how to play video game
They are playing without sound and focusing on the various graphical effects & playing it for first time in years while talking so its not easy. But as always the PRO GAMER crowd shows up to brag.
@@axayd And always the crownd of kiss ass to defend
@@axayd nobody forced them to do it....soo..... you cannot shot yourself voluntarily on the foot and then blame the game because "it's hard"
I really love this series! And this is such a cool idea too, playing the different versions side by side in real-time
This is really cool! I'd love to see more videos like this.
Can’t believe the 360 came out that same year and no Alex they didn’t make Chaos Theory for the 360 gen. You’re thinking about the follow up, Double Agent.
Well, there was a PS3 exclusive 'HD' collection, which is what I think they were referring to but there was no Xbox 360 version of it for some reason. I'm pretty sure the PS3 'HD' collection uses the PC ports too instead of the PS2/Xbox versions. Perhaps this is what John and Alex are referring to?
He’s not totally wrong, perhaps he just didn’t realise it never came out. The SC HD Trilogy was supposed to come to the 360 as it did the PS3, but the 360 version was mysteriously (at the time, I’m not sure if they ever said why since) canned. But from what I heard of the PS3 version, perhaps it’s not a bad thing, I heard they were pretty bad ports.
@@mrratchet @TheTCD you guys are right I forgot about that, but the way Alex mentioned it made me think of Double Agent, as it released together, last gen and next. That collection probably never made it to Xbox due to how bad it was. Seemed like a low effort attempt. Also, these guys are pretty bad at the game lol. Can’t fault them though, there’s a specific way to play the game, you have to be patient and calculated, hard to do that while speaker over the video.
@@shroomkingdom8152 Interestingly the two versions of Double Agent are pretty different because they were made by different studios. I like them both, but the original Xbox version is probably my favorite of the two.
@@Wally17. and if I remember it correctly, the team that made Chaos Theory made the last gen version of DA, while the team that made Pandora Tomorrow made the next gen version. I remember reviews saying the last gen version was better too
Halfway through trying to 100% this game on expert. Easily my favorite game of all time. Ridiculous how well the game still holds up considering it's 16 years old.
I thin you should bring the "4K on a budget series" back guys, it was a very interesting series of videos.
32 times where John and Alex mention "for its time/at the time/for the day/in its era/for this time period/pre-gears of war era/look through modern lens/etc" when talking about an aspect of the game (praise and criticism alike)
Hey John, just wanted to say I really appreciate all the work you do and even if you aren't feeling great just know doing things is how you'll feel better.
Yeeeaaahhh.....
Man, I wish there were a good Splinter Cell game on the horizon. Haven't had one since Blacklist and despite some flaws, that was a pretty decent game and I'd love to play this series again. Not enough stealth games anymore, unfortunately.
At least the genre isn’t completely dead, games like Aragami and the Styx series are there to scratch the itch. But it is a shame that creatively, AAA publishers aren’t willing to take risks on niche genres like this these days. It’s not a hot take, and far from an original one, but I feel that the only reason we haven’t had a Splinter Cell in years is because Ubi haven’t found a way to monetise the shit out of it while maintaining the “respect for the franchise” they claim to have. They tried to pivot the series into a straight action game and it didn’t work so well for them financially, and trying to replace Michael Ironside didn’t exactly win them any fans, so I’m going to assume Ubi are just going to keep Splinter Cell as the cameo franchise from now on.
I wish they'd sell the IP honestly. But I guess they can't as it falls under the umbrella of Tom Clancy.
We all know PS2 games can pump out some really graphically impressive looking games. Titles like Silent Hill 2, Silent Hill 3, Fatal Frame 2, Metal Gear Solid 2, Metal Gear Solid 3, Final Fantasy X, God of War 2, Zone of The Enders 2, Okami, Shadow of the Colossus, Primal, Ghost Hunter..etc is a testament to its abilities despite being inferior hardware wise.
Splinter Cell was absolutely on the cutting edge at the time. Its use of shadows, shading, and cloth and rope physics (you can see some of the rope physics on the power lines and rope bridges at the start) made it a very immersive series. It still blows my mind all of that was done on an original Xbox.
Please let them know that it will be interesting to see the comparison with the series x as well! With auto HDR , it's like it received a new coat of paint.
I have the game on disk still will try on my series X later
@@sean7332 Its great on One X so I have high hopes for Series X
i've played them all on series x (1, pandora tomorrow, chaos theory, OG xbox version of double agent). it looks incredible at 4k. it's super crisp as you'd expect but it's surprising how well the textures and stuff hold up at the higher resolutions. it doesn't look outdated at all. the only issue (if you consider it to be an issue) is splinter cell 1 and pandora tomorrow only support 4:3 aspect ratio because the original versions that the back compat version is enhancing only support that aspect ratio for those games. chaos theory and double agent are fine though.
@@supermadkid I wish there was a way to force 16:9 via the emulator patching the game or whatnot. If you have a modded original Xbox, you can patch Pandora Tomorrow for widescreen. I think the same can be done for Splinter Cell as well.
@@tet5ujin I can confirm that the game looks amazing on the series X! For SC fan, that's insane what they did from the source code and the new features of the console.
Why this series hasn’t come back...is a total mystery! These games were my life back in the day lol. Chaos theory IMO is the best stealth based game ever made!
probably because of assasins creed.That franchise is the reason why they cancelled prince of persia and probably splinter cell as well,with other games.Or maybe far cry,not sure,but these two clearly have the priority for them.I miss this series as well tbh,especially this chaos theory.THE BEST SPLINTER CELL AND STEALTH GAME TO THIS DAY.
No other Splinter Cell game has come close to the enjoyment I had with Chaos Theory.
I hope this actually go to a full DFRetro episode one day. Technical milestone, tons of ports to analyze (I know, that's a lot of works on you guys), 4K rendering on Xbox One X and Xbox Series X. awesome stuff.