OK TC, as a proud owner of both Alan Wake and Uncharted 2 and having finished both, U2 definitely looked much better overall. First thing is first, the supposed volumetric lighting in AW does not work like the way you imagined. There are NO godrays or sun shaft coming through the foliage nor most of the game objects. Only time I've seen any sight of volumetric rays was in the room with lady of the light and the occasional flashlight beaming on Alan himself. The cutscene does feature sunshaft but the gameplay does not support it.So in a sense there's nothing too special with that volumetric lighting when compared to U2's own very nice HDR, which also has a per pixel shadowing function.
Speaking of the shadows, they are a lot more crisper in U2 than the low res dithering mess that's found in every corner of AW. So in a sense there really isn't much of a significant advantage in AW's lighting overall.
Now, about the foliage, yes they move and do add to the atmosphere, but their shadows are completely static and baked in as seen in Day time footage. While in U2 every shadows casted by the trees, leaves and plants swayed beautifully as they should, the dynamic shadowing is just much advanced in U2.
Speaking of scale, AW has a pretty impressive view distance but much of it are like in U2, a backdrop that can't be traveled to the end. I do believe it is more open than U2 in terms of total navigation, but it offers far less DETAILED or VARIED textures and geometry. The vistas in U2 is rediculously detailed such as Nepal, SHambahala, and the ICe cave. The sheer polygon density, textures and reflection quality are simply beyond AW.
Now onto effects, U2 is simply a monster. Subsurface scattering, per object based motion blur "far superior to AW's camera based", high quality DOF, parralax mapping on a vast majority of environment and the snow shader are everything AW lacked.
Finally, the animation, character model quality, again, high res textures, lip synching and the dynamic train level are just some of the VERY important graphical features to seperate U2 from AW. Please take notice, no game will ever have everything better than another, but it only takes the perfect overall balance for one to edge out another. Also some obvious disadvantage simply can't be ignored such as the extreme low 540p resolution and blurry textures. That along sticks out like a sore thumb in AW. Both games are very pretty indeed but U2 is clearly superior in graphics.
gpuking
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