Sony releases PlayStation 5 update for God of War

Sony will release a PlayStation 5 update for God of War on Tuesday. The 2018 game will get an Enhanced Performance Experience mode. The game runs at a 2160p resolution with checkerboarding and a frame rate of 60fps.

God of War is already playable on the PlayStation 5, but has so far been running in compatibility mode with the same settings as the PlayStation 4 Pro. That meant that the game ran in a Performance mode with a 1080p resolution and an unlimited frame rate. On the PS5, that mode already worked at 60fps for the most part, but with the new Enhanced Performance Experience mode, players get both a high resolution and a high frame rate.

The Enhanced Performance Experience mode replaces the existing Performance mode in the game. Furthermore, the game will have an Original Performance Experience mode. According to developer Santa Monica Studios, that is equivalent to the resolution mode of the game on the PS4 Pro. In addition, the game runs in 30fps with a 4k resolution and checkerboarding.

According to Santa Monica, God of War on the PlayStation 5 uses a 2160p resolution with checkerboarding in all cases. With that technique, half of the pixels are rendered in a checkerboard pattern and the remaining pixels are filled in with interpolation. In practice, that result approximates the display of a native 4k resolution, but does not contain the full eight million pixels.

God of War was released in 2018 for the PlayStation 4. The game is part of the PlayStation Plus Collection on the PlayStation 5. That is a collection of games that holders of Sony’s PS Plus subscription can access if they own the new console. Santa Monica is also working on a new God of War game, due out this year.

Looking Back: Review of God of War on PlayStation 4