Gaming Effects Versus Hollywood, Part II

Ok who has slipped their ten year old kids school project on here.
This is nothing more than showing two games one a few years old, one a few months old then saying "new one looks better".

I think this shows that we still have many years to go before games start to be photorealistic. I'll be glad that when they get to that point. The goal then becomes, what else can be done? Things get back to be all about creating something other than photorealism.

When it gets to that point i think I'd rather not play a photorealistic war game. Watching people being harmed or blown apart should never be entertaining. Governments will pass laws banning it after a certain amount of photorealism. I'm happy to shoot things that still look like 3D.

As a part-time animator it amazes me how silent some games are. Disney aminators knew way back, see a sound hear a sound. Yet games like crysis have me running in a jungle with not much sounds at all.

Give people real sound and the images will take on a new life.

Wasser!! I love it!

@waxdart - check out the demo for Left 4 Dead if you want an abundance of ambiance on the auditory side. The 3d environment in that game is immersive but definitely not photorealistic.

"And this is what the coming generation of 3D games will look like." - Are you being serious? I had Toms Hardware down as a relatively well written place, but you are taking the piss now. This whole article read, as Belinda put it, like a "ten year old kids school project".

What a terribly written article on what is a very intersting subject.

"In addition, the screen turns red, and the stronger the coloring, the more serious the injuries. In multi-player shooter games this is sometime unfair, as you are unable to get away under heavy fire, and lose orientation due to the changed color."

Are you serious?! As someone else said, it's like a ten year old is writing this.

I was hoping this article would discuss how game developers use various tricks to make up for PCs not being quite as potent as render farms.

Instead I get: "It is difficult to say whether it is the lighting, the graphics quality, or the audio support that makes Hollywood movie monsters appear more threatening."

Yes, it is the lighting, graphics quality and audio support that makes "Hollywood" monsters seem more realistic.

Could a paragraph have been included on how rays are traced and mapped in games, despite the lack of true raytracing? Or how about mentioning that "Hollywood" models muscle mass and movement subcuteneously in it's characters. Or there's always internal reflections, such as those in human skin. Then maybe move onto artificial intelligence and the use of agents to create realistic crowd movement, rather than the "crowds" that gather in Assassin's Creed.
Then there's physics. In films it's easy to simulate physics, because you can do it by hand so it looks real. As apposed to games, where each and every object actor has to have various physical parameters imbued into it, even if it never gets moved!

I'm only guessing this is an oversight due to babelfish having trouble with deutsch...

Dont get this article at all.

I'll tell you a story yeah.
I got a Voodoo One(16bit) 10 years ago and went from pixel jaggy extreme, too smooth as silk jaggless graphics.
I got the first T & L gfx card and was blown away.
Even since iv been crying out for good shadows and textures you can read and see very clearly from F1 liveries to terrian detail in FC 2.
@1280 x 1024(32bit)[are we ever gonna see 64bit color?] using only a 9800 GT this PC roxxerz the boxxerz.
I have never ever seen such detail in ALL MY LIFE.
Hollywood VS 3D Graphics though?
The fact that DX10 didnt hit the ground running shows me this GFX thing is slowing right down. The only thing that drivers GFX card makers are higher resolutions. 3 years ago 1280 x 1024 was the standard RES. Now its 2600 x 2000. What that tell you?

And just look as those FC2 comparisions. Hardly ever can you tell theres a difference. You could 3 years ago when making the comparision between low and high textures or 800x 600 / 1280 x 1024. But today the difference is so so so so so small. A tiny section of lighing/shadow. WOW, not nearly enought to right home about. Long live 3DFX and the greatest DX version transition ever, DX 8 too DX 9.

One of the greatest problems of improving graphics is the amount of work (and money) that needs to go into making games. Textures need to be higher quality or they look out of place, models need to be made up of more polygons or they look out of place, everything needs to be at the same level or it looks odd.
I'm starting to think that the focus should go to refining the few special effects, fire, water & dust particularly then it should go more into non-graphical elements e.g. Body language, AI, voice acting. The experience is beginning to be limited by things other than graphics; not beacuse we don't have the technology but because the emphasis has been on graphics for so long that other elements of the gaming experience have been forgotten.