Summary
Though the graphical leaps from generation to generation have slowed down in recent years, it’s hard to deny that thePS5is an impressively powerful graphical machine that can generate some of the best graphics ever seen, and that means games have never looked more realistic.
Whether its graphics so immersive that it makes the game feel like a movie or visuals stylized in such a way as to keep the player fully immersed in the realism, these games (some of which were first released on PS4 but got PS5 upgrades) are themost immersive PS5 games with realistic graphicsaround, and make for a great technical showcase for the console.
WhenThe Last of Us Part 2first released in 2020, it was a complete technical marvel in how it originally ran on the PS4, with immersive graphics that took everything great from the original PS3 game and amped them up to 11. Few video game cities have ever looked quite as stunning as this game’s interpretation of Seattle, and fewer still have crafted such adisgustingly realistic gallery of monsters.
Those realistic graphics only got better with the release of the remastered version of the game on the PS5, demonstrating the future potential of Naughty Dog’s unparalleled graphical tech and wizardry. Though it’s clearly still a video game, some of the cutscenes in this game captured actor performances so well that it’s easy to forget that it’s not a TV show.
It’s often repeated that Hideo Kojima is a movie director who happened to stumble into the world of video games. Even if that’s true, the gaming world is lucky to have him, because regardless of whether his games appeal to the masses or not, they’re always pushing forward in terms of gameplay, story, and graphics. That is certainly the case withDeath Stranding.
Apart from the meticulous motion capture detail translated from Kojima’s cast of Hollywood actors, the environmental graphics ofDeath Strandingare unparalleled, evoking vast Icelandic-inspired worlds, each of which could be its own piece of romanticist art. The PS5 version makes those environments even sharper and more realistic, truly displaying the stunning world design of Kojima’s latest work.
Of all the horror series, theResident Evilfranchise evolves and changes more than any other, always shifting with the times, and often in quality, but never forgetting to push forward and try to create something new. With the soft reboot of the franchise inResident Evil 7, the series took a bold step into the realm of first-person horror with the stunning RE Engine, which made its environments look more realistic than ever before.
While the police stations and villages ofResident Evil 2andResident Evil 4 Remakeare certainly stunning, nothing quite beats Castle Dimitrescu inResident Evil Village.The castle is one of the most lovingly crafted and stunningly realistic environments ever put to pixels, and it’s all explored bythe franchise’s surprisingly deep characters. Fill that castle with hyper-realistic models of Lady Dimitrescu and her daughters, and it’s hard to deny the sheer impressive scale of Capcom’s achievement.
Where franchises likeSilent HillandResident Evilare long-storied franchises,Dead Spacewas unlucky enough to only get three games, and never reached the full potential it held if given more time and resources. That missing potential feels all the more prevalent with the recent release of theDead Spaceremake which transposes the original game into stunningly realistic PS5 graphics that make the USGIsihmuraandits various gruesome weaponscome alive.
The remake’s lighting deserves special mention, with expressive cones of light cutting through theIshimura’sfrightening corridors, where the very spores and specks of dust can be seen floating in the beams. For a horror game, it’s stunningly beautiful at times and shows the artistry involved in making realistic graphics as appealing as possible.
In terms of modern console launch lineups, a remake of FromSoftware’s notoriously tricky and jankyDemon’s Soulswas not on many people’s wish lists, but Bluepoint blew the gaming world away by delivering not just one of the best launch games of all time, but quite possibly one of the best remakes of all time as well.
That’s partly because of Bluepoint’s technical mastery of the PS5 platform, extracting every ounce of graphical power to render the fantasy world of Boletaria in stunning realistic detail,making every morsel and hidden itemof FromSoftware’s original world sing. Yet, somehow, it is still as faithful as possible to the original game, even if its design is outdated. It’s a remarkable achievement that every PS5 player should check out.
Few people will argue that, in terms of theBattlefieldfranchise,Battlefield 2042wasn’t a miss in terms of its design, and was a great disappointment to many. While the game has been slowly building itself back up since it launched, there is no doubt that the Frostbite Engine has never looked better than in this much-maligned sequel.
Despite its unwieldy nature,Battlefield 2042proves that the Frostbite Engine remains unparalleled in sheer pound-for-pound graphical fidelity, delivering stunningly realistic models, lighting, and environments that make the futuristic battlefields appear strikingly beautiful in the right lighting.
Remedy Entertainment are about as unapologetic of a developer as it’s possible to find in the current landscape. They always execute a very particular vision of their games, increasingly blending the world of games and movies together to the point where full-motion video is intermingled with graphical output.
The only reason this trick actually works is because the game’s visuals have such high fidelity that it can, at times, be mistaken for full-motion video clips. With atmospheric lighting, stunning facial capture, and a particle system that often defies belief,Alan Wake 2delivers on every front, particularly when it comes to its realistic graphics. It’s evena pretty good entry point for beginners to the Remedy formula, although a quick viewing of anAlan Wake 1recap on YouTube is recommended.
Some games adopt realistic graphics, others abandon them for different visual styles, but Polyphony Digital has stuck to its guns since the very firstGran Turismogame, pushing whatever console they’re releasing on to its absolute limit and setting the benchmark for realism in video games, somehow pushing the envelope further and further each time.
Part of the reason this works is that Polyphony pays attention to detail where it matters. The crowds along a racetrack remain unconvincing, as do some of the buildings, but when it comes to the cars and the racing, the graphics are unimpeachable, sometimes being genuinely indistinguishable from a photograph. For any gamer looking to experience the most realistic immersive graphics on the PS5, the answer has to beGran Turismo 7.
