A few days ago, EA's Immortals of Aveum became the first ever game on Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S and PS5 to support AMD FSR 3, introducing special upscaling and frame generation technology to boost performance on consoles.
With the update now live, the experts at Digital Foundry have been analysing FSR 3's frame generation on Xbox Series X, and the outcome is largely positive! As shown in the video above (which is timestamped), Immortals of Aveum "rose from a 46.68fps average to 80.43fps" with FSR 3 turned on, which represents a 72.3% boost overall.
"Similar to Nvidia DLSS 3 frame-gen, AMD's take works on buffering up an extra frame, on top of the one last rendered, then inserts an interpolated frame between them."
"Immortals of Aveum demonstrates that FSR 3 frame generation has value. In challenging like-for-like content, I noted that Xbox Series X frame-rate rose from a 46.68fps average to 80.43fps - a 72.3 percent boost. More generally, frame generation turns a game running inconsistently at between 40fps to 60fps into an HFR experience, and with VRR active, it is compelling."
However, there are a few caveats here such as the lesser fidelity of interpolated frames, certain quirks with how the HUD is displayed, and some occasional freezing issues during cutscenes. Immortals of Aveum is also using this technology to target Xbox players with 120Hz and VRR-supported displays, so it won't suit everyone.
Overall though, it's definitely good news - here's how Digital Foundry summed it up in their analysis:
"While the interpolated frames are not perfect - sometimes dramatically so - they 'strobe' between two standard rendered frames. If the frame-rate's high enough, it's hard to detect those visual discrepancies."
"Will we see 30fps games 'frame-genned' into 60fps games? I don't think that's the best application of the technology, but it might work on much slower-paced titles. Immortals of Aveum represents how it will work best - taking a game already targeting 60fps and amplifying the frame-rate into HFR territory."
It's obviously early days for AMD FSR 3 on Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S, but this is a very promising first test with Immortals of Aveum. Starfield is already using the technology on PC as well, and we wouldn't be surprised if that game ends up making use of it on Xbox consoles in the near future. Let's hope so!