No Man's Sky dev says implementing 8K visuals into the PS5 Pro version "completely reset my world view" on the "repeated narrative" that there's no difference between 4K and 8K

One No Man's Sky developer says that the months spent working on the PS5 Pro support for Hello Games' open-world exploration game "completely reset my world view" on the "preconception" that there's no difference between 8K and 4K resolution, after finding that there was a "very noticeable" visual improvement.

Engine programmer Martin Griffiths, who recently said it was a "tough gig" for the Hello Games devs to produce the open-world game's PS5 Pro support just since they're such a small team, has elaborated a little more on the experience working on it. Namely, he has quite a different opinion about 8K rendering, admitting that No Man's Sky's visual upgrade came as "a very unexpected surprise" because of the preconception he'd previously had.

"There is a continuous, repeated narrative and group think that no one can tell the difference between 4K and 8K, or that you need some monster TV for 8K to notice the extra resolution. I completely reset my world view on this, while implementing the 8K, PS5 Pro support for No Man's Sky," Griffiths says. "Objectively, I found it to be a very noticeable step up visually, even 'just' with PSSR and a slightly above 4K source, driving the final display output. 

"This was a very unexpected surprise, but with hindsight it was based on a preconception without evidence," he continues. "I now believe that 8K will be much more mainstream by the PS6 era, as content that demonstrates the difference filters through and display panel prices fall."

Griffiths' opinion on this isn't too surprising – previously, before the PS5 Pro's release, he said that as an engine programmer "who has been through all the PS iterations since PS1," the "console absolutely rocks." We gave the console three and a half stars out of five in our PS5 Pro review, praising its slick design and improved ray-tracing, but pointed out that its price tag is "prohibitively expensive for most upgraders."

No Man's Sky dev shares another reminder of how hard game dev is: 20 different formats to balance, with "around 140 combinations of graphics options" on PC.