-Some miscellaneous information on the PS4 version of the game:
-Hair (including facial) is now fully rendered instead of using flat texture/normal map (they can draw bout 40,000 individual hairs per player).
-Lighting is now fully dynamic, and uses some new technology like sub-surface scattering. So now instead of seeing definitive borders between light and shadow on a player (for example), you can now see that light actually bleeds across the player, even showing a slight reflection/halo effect on sharper angles like the nose. They’re also using sub-dermal light diffusion, so the light that hits the skin actually shows a slight transparency (we’ve seen this recently in Tomb Raider Definitive Edition).
-Grass on the field is now rendered down to individual blades of grass, and the blades are actually dynamically lit as well. When you zoom-in to where the grass borders the sand in the infield, you can actually see specific shadows for the blades of grass. It’s something many probably wouldn’t notice, but that’s the level of detail that we’ve come to expect in The Show.
-Objects like scoreboards and signs are now fully built-out instead of being flat textures. So you’ll see actual backings on signs and other objects.
-All 30 stadiums have been rebuilt from the ground-up, nothing has been ported from the previous versions.
-Another tidbit about the grass, it actually displaces when a foot hits a spot, or when the ball rolls or lays on the grass. From a physics standpoint, a lot of those behaviors would happen, but you wouldn’t see it visually. The ball will actually act as it should as it rolls across the grass, as it’s spinning, and displacing the grass, the ball can sometimes get ahead of itself and actually hop-up because it’s hitting the blades of grass instead of rolling through. You’ll also see grass clippings flying up when a player runs through with his cleats.
-Leather actually looks like real leather now, with the fielding gloves and the batting gloves, which now show that fuzziness when the batting glove is new.
-An example shown is the old score wall at Fenway in left field. Historically it’s been a pretty flat texture, but in the PS4 version, all of the old, metal plates are present, beaten over the years by a myriad of impacts from baseballs. They’re true 3D objects now, and yes, all scoreboards and walls are fully functional.
-The crowds in the PS3 version were comprised of about 42 different models, so you will still see some copies out there. Now, since the PS4 has much more power, the crowd is made up of over 1,000 unique models. Each crowd model is made up of the same polygon count of a baseball player in the PS3 version of the game (and they’ve even included kids into the crowd now).
-Crowd members will now catch foul balls and be able to reach over and grab fouls that roll by. They’ll also hold signs up, and those signs will be contextual. So if a player starts heating-up, you’ll probably see some fans rooting him on in this manner. Furthermore (this is for the Operation Sports crew) the Pitcher can now pick up the rosin bag and throw it back down.
-Finally, they’ve added Bat & Ball boys and girls.
-All of the crowd audio and chants have been re-recorded in High Quality.
-All reflection maps on things like the helmets and sunglasses are all rendered in realtime now
