PS5, Series X and Series S tested.
At least not sinceShadow of Mordor way back in 2014 on PS3, an infamous porting disaster.
Gollum is fundamentally flawed in ways that go way beyond its frame-rate, which isn’t great.
Jumping over to Series S, we get two modes, performance and quality - no RT here.
Otherwise, Series S is a feature match for the premium consoles, even down to the resolution.
The catch is that gameplay is capped at 30fps on Series S regardless of mode.
Most curious of all of the options on console is the RT mode on PS5 and Series X.
The opening cave area is a great RT showcase with its dewy wet surfaces.
In general though, most scenes are identical in their visual make-up regardless of mode.
There’s an extra twist to this RT mode.
Before launch, this was easily the standout visual flourish on console.
Version 1.1 also featured enhanced water shaders, adding a diffuse layer to RT reflections.
Clearly though, those extra visual features were jettisoned to shore up the frame-rate.
Enter patch 1.3, which massively improves frame-rates using the quality RT mode.
In one spot in the cave, I measured 15-20fps before the patch and 30-40fps after.
The bug affects Gollum’s jumping animations in a similar way.
Moving on, there are other issues.
I eventually had to delete my PS5 save and start all over again.
Unfortunately, you do have to contend with a forced 30fps cap during cutscenes.
Even on performance mode, the low frame-rate and uneven frame-pacing adds additional judder to movement.
Unfortunately, performance mode is the best case scenario here and comes at a significant cost to image detail.
It’s not great and for both consoles the higher-resolution quality mode tends to waver between 35 and 50fps.
More glaring is the state of in-engine cutscenes, which now run into the teens.
That makes quality mode a very tough sell on both PS5 and Series X.
On both PS5 and Series X it makes for a sluggish experience in parts.
We haven’t forgotten Series S, which takes performance to heretofore unseen levels.
Expect big lurches in frame-times without obvious cause, so good luck timing your jumps.
In cutscenes,in performance modeI remind you, Series S drops into the low teens.
I’m not sure why it’s included.
All movement is simply out of sync with the frames being rendered, even at 20fps.
Even later sections don’t improve as we work our way into the lava-filled mines or the prison camps.
Overall, it’s easy to count the shortcomings of Lord of the Rings: Gollum.
