It may feel like a conveyor-belt process at this stage, but TT Games' Lego titles are not just reliably scheduled - they're also dependably solid productions. While the basic gameplay rarely changes, the developers always seem able to translate their tried-and-tested concepts across wildly differing entertainment franchises, seamlessly integrating the unique mythology and humour of each subject in the process.

The technology behind the games is similarly solid and dependable, disciplined enough to save big leaps forward for when they're ready rather than going out on a limb, delivering only subtle tweaks and incremental changes in the meantime, and Lego The Hobbit is one of the more subtle updates. It seems to have been built using the same blueprint as Lego The Movie and Lego Marvel Super Heroes, which means those lovable plastic bricks and Minifigures are in for a mixture of post-process effects, advanced shading and lighting that work together to create a more realistic and cinematic presentation than last-gen.

There is a change, but it's mostly down to the art style rather than the underlying technology. Compared to Lego The Movie, Lego The Hobbit's art is a lot more organic, allowing surfaces like wood, mud and rock to display a range of different characteristics to a greater extent than environments in previous games, leaving the famous Lego sheen mostly to the bricks themselves. It's a style that suits the world of Middle-earth very well, even if it means there are less of the iconic bricks and pieces on-screen than usual.

Despite the change in art style, the basic rendering set-up remains unchanged from Lego The Movie. The PS4 game offers up a 1920x1280 image vertically super-sampled down to 1080p, providing extra anti-aliasing in the process, while Xbox One operates natively in 1080p and PC can do that and more. All three utilise similar forms of post-process anti-aliasing, although coverage seems to be a tad spottier on the PC in certain areas. Check out our Lego The Hobbit triple-format comparison gallery for examples of this and the face-off comparison videos below.

"Lego The Hobbit revisits its predecessor with native 1080p on Xbox One, super-sampling on PS4 and minor reductions in PC image quality."

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Due to the minor use of super-sampling, the PS4 actually demonstrates slightly cleaner edges than on the other formats, although this doesn't really translate into noticeably superior image quality. The heavy use of depth-of-field in all versions works well in curtailing jaggies, while the post-process anti-aliasing edge-detection algorithm appears to be a little better than in previous Lego titles. But besides the slight difference in the framebuffer sett-up, both PS4 and Xbox One basically deliver an identical graphical experience throughout.

Once again it's up to the PC version to provide the main differences, although as with recent next-gen Lego titles, it's not always for the positive reasons you might anticipate. In fact, there are a number of effects that either appear to be pared back or removed on PC. The reasons for this aren't always clear, but one cause could be the developers supporting older GPUs that predate the latest DirectX 11 feature-set, with newer effects hacked in to work using an older API and running into problems as a result. (The minimum requirements show support for DX10, along with the Nvidia GeForce 7600 GS or ATI Radeon X1950 Pro graphics cards.) Either way, it means that PC owners see some small but curious graphical differences.

PS4 gains a mild advantage with a 1920x1280 framebuffer downsampled to 1080p, providing an extremely light extra layer of anti-aliasing (compared to native 1080p on the Xbox One and PC), but the upgrade to image quality is minimal. Shadow quality is a match between the PS4 and Xbox One, but curiously these elements are rendered in a lower resolution on the PC. Notice how the stair-stepping around shadow edges is less prominent on the consoles. Camera and object blur help to give Lego Hobbit a cinematic presentation. However, the strength of the effect is considerably reduced on the PC. Screen-space ambient occlusion is absent on PC. However some indirect shadowing is baked onto textures in many locations, which adds some extra depth to the scene. A height fog effect of sorts is visible on the PS4 and Xbox One in both indoor and outdoor locations, but curiously is missing from the PC game.

So, it's perhaps unsurprising that once again we find camera and object blur are dialled back, while screen-space ambient occlusion seems to be entirely absent. Interestingly, checking the game's 'pcconfig.txt' file shows that SSAO is enabled by default, even though there is little evidence to suggest it in practice. Some ambient occlusion is baked onto the textures, though, which means that environments still benefit from a little indirect shadowing and the extra depth this provides.

Curiously, shadows are rendered in a lower resolution than on consoles too, and there are also a few instances where certain details appear scaled back on the PC - such as the reduction in the level of grass located in a few locations. However, if we look more closely it seems as though the grass has simply sunk into the ground, leading some of the small shoots to disappear, which seems like a rendering or geometry error more than a deliberate reduction.

Slightly lower-quality level-of-detail models are also used for the characters. Up close the smooth contours of the Lego Minifigures appear a little blocky around their claw-like hands compared to PS4 and Xbox One, while the textures feature UV mapping errors where the 2D artwork isn't wrapped across the geometry correctly.

That said, the lighting model - along with the vast majority of other effects - remain on a par with the PS4 and Xbox One versions, so for the most part the games do look very close in motion, to the point where some of the slight downgrades and bizarre rendering anomalies on the PC don't noticeably stick out during gameplay.

Level-of-detail models are slightly lower-quality on the PC. This mostly results in some texture UV mapping errors, where the 2D artwork doesn't wrap around the geometry correctly. But we also see blocker edges around hands and other rounded details. For the most part texture detail is identical across all three versions of Lego Hobbit, although lower-resolution assets are used in some places on the PC. Perhaps this is down to a LOD-based rendering issue. Some scenes display what looks like reduced levels of greenery on the PC, which is a likely side effect of another rendering quirk: most of the time it appears as if the grass is partially submerged in the ground, rather than actually pared back. Here we see distorted textures at the base of the throne on PS4 and Xbox One, while the rest of the artwork is basically a match across all three formats in the same scene.

The PC version of Lego Hobbit does have one major benefit over the console releases, though: the ability to run at frame-rates much higher than the capped 30fps provided by PS4 and Xbox One. We easily hit a near-solid 60fps on our Intel Core i5 and GTX 680 system, with only a few torn and dropped frames appearing during transitions between cut-scenes and different environments during gameplay, although it should be noted that cut-scenes often tear frequently for the first few seconds before v-sync is locked down. A similar level of stability should be possible on machines boasting lower specifications, too, with just a few more noticeable drops in smoothness during demanding scenes.

Console owners are left with a respectable 30fps, at least, and it generally serves the forgiving Lego gameplay very well. Controls feel heavier when executing attacks and trying to perform quick jumps, but this is never so intrusive as to make things frustrating for the player. The use of v-sync ensures that torn frames are rarely seen, while performance practically never deviates from the 30fps target on either platform outside of a few isolated incidents.

These occasional interruptions in smoothness manifest in different ways on each console. On PS4 we see some mild judder, followed by the odd tear when exploring the Middle-Earth hub world. Essentially, frames are delivered to the screen at irregular intervals despite the solid 30fps update, with a unique frame followed by two duplicates - whereas in a standard 30fps cadence we see one unique frame followed by a duplicate in a repeated pattern. Meanwhile, the Xbox One game momentarily freezes from time to time before delivering a torn frame, suggesting some kind of bug causing a GPU stall. Again though, it quickly recovers and rarely impacts gameplay.

"For the most part all three versions of Lego Hobbit look very close in motion. The issues found the PC game rarely stick out noticeably during general gameplay."

This content is hosted on an external platform, which will only display it if you accept targeting cookies. Please enable cookies to view. Manage cookie settings Frame-rate tests for Lego Hobbit reveal a mostly rock solid 30fps frame-rate on both current-gen consoles, with the exception of the odd torn frame, plus some mild judder on PS4 and a few momentary freezes on the Xbox One.

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