The Onslaught of Photorealism

I would like to see that game that looks like a Japanese painting in action.Buthere is a similar game that takes simplified drawing and makes a shooter from it.Unfortunatly the web page is long gone,so savor the few screenshots here:

http://www.oldmanmurray.com/features/92.html

This may seem kinda out there to some, but give this a try and see how differently the game world appears. Use DOOM 3 for the best example.

Shut off all lights, so the room is completely dark except for your monitor. Lean in close up about half a foot away. Close your left eye and only view the game with your right. Play for about a minute and the gameworld will seem a bit more immersive than usual. You won't get the same feeling using your left eye. Trust me on this.

More games need to consider how humans' vision system works. We do not percieve every detail in our field of vision at any given moment, and making games render every detail in the field of vision is a waste imo. More power could be given to storytelling and interactivity if graphics were about emphasizing whats important in a scene, and less about tons of detail and lighting effects just for the sake of it.

Of course, theres plenty of games that take this into consideration and are doing a great service by showing the industry what can be done with graphics yoked to storytelling and immersion, instead of vice versa. I just wish there were more games like that.

No graphics have impressed me since 1998 and Unreal 1.
It all looks pretty samey to me nowadays.
It's boring.
Photosourced textures that just end up looking fake.
I don't really like realism in games. Realism is mistaken for suspension of disbelief, which is what you should strive for. Consistency.
Gritty 3dginess is getting p-r-e-t-t-y old.
Go for purdiness instead, thanks.
Oh, and for god's sake stop with the mirrored skins already. Yes, I'm talking to you, id.
UE3 looks OK, but I'd like to see how it looks with good, original art direction.
Please, someone make a game with good art direction. Please? For once?

Half-life 2 is probably the best looking game on the pc In my opinion, they did such a good job with the textures baby!

I think part of the problem is that everybody is basing aesthetics on tech alone.

It doesn't matter if you are trying to achieve a realistic look or a stylized one, as long as it's artistically sound, because tech will not last past the initial novelty.

After all this years, i still experience aesthetical pleasure in looking at Stacraft and the game was technogically behind THEN, let alone now.

Looking at Quake4 on the other end does nothing for me even though the game's graphics are sparkling new, merely because the novelty wore off with Doom3 and the game's visual design is completely uninspired and offers nothing to supplement the purely technological elements.

Good quality art with stylized and consistent art direction > Photorealism

In the same vein as the examples within the article, there's a Doom 2 mod being put together called Foreverhood ( http://www.foreverhood.com/ ). Even with a pixelated renderer, the designer is trying to attain a surreal atmosphere that nobody has really tried within that engine. Unfortunately it hasn't been released yet. :/

Who is David Hayward?

He links the Rebirth mod for System Shock 2, but the project hasn't been updated for 2 years. :( I want the complete version of that patch.

We'll always stand by gameplay: but it's graphics that will be handcuffing us to the bed during our next "business trip".

Haha. This guy is great, that describes *so* many gamers.

I'm sticking with my own quote.

"Game development is the art of illusion, not perfection!" - Thearrel 'Kiltron' McKinney

Do we really want to mimic complete reality of every realworld thing in games? Lighting is what the mind pics up the most visually. Once realistic lighting is achieved, the senses can be fool, and you will be fully immersed on the visual side of things.

I've never seen this! Hollow Moon mod for UT2k4. This looks so damn neat. I may have to find my old copy and re-install it.

http://www.planetunreal.com/ivangraphics/hollowmoon/

This topic has been going since forever. I remember seeing a digitized picture of marilyn monroe on some crappy bbc micro or something and it was the most realistic picture i'd ever seen. It was like you could tell it was a copy of a real photograph. OMG SO REALISTIC!!!

I see photo realistic movies and tv shows all the time on my television.

For decades people have been saying photorealistic graphics are just around the corner. Sure go back 15 years and show someone Battlefield 2 or CS Source or something and they'll shit their pants, but at the end of the day, you just get used to the norm.

Games will always be about gameplay. When the games stop being fun, then people will stop buying them.

Right now I don't feel games are much fun. I mean we have the fantastic graphics, the millions of dollars invested in development, the scriptwriters, the voice actors, but I think we're moving away from having fun.

I mean a game to me is only a game if you're enjoying it with someone else now. We had out multiplayer revolution and it was great, now most games give you the chance to have fun with other people. That's all I care about now.

To me single player games are trying to be movies, but instead of letting me lie on the couch for 2 hours and relax while the story unfolds before me I have to "think" and look for health and ammo and die repeatedly so I can get to the next part of the "story".

Jeez I've been a gamer all my life, but I'm not really very enthusiastic about the games that are coming out just now.

Sure there are a ton of them, but I don't know. Maybe you do actually get to an age where computer games don't interest you anymore. I'm 26.

Maybe women have had it right all along.

This isn't just limited to gameplay, either.

For example, the cutscenes in the Thief series - originally they came about because it was cheaper to do them as a combination of lightly animated backgrounds with characters in silhouette. The result, though, is a very different, stylized movie, and yet it doesn't look any less professional than incredibly expensive 3D or full live action.

I guess Im stupid or something cuz hot graphics still get me hawt. Some of the things coming out on Xbox360...Unreal 3 tech...ect. I still dont think i've played much of anything that was 'real' looking. I mean, even HL2 looks cartoony if you look at next to real pictures, maybe the HDR will improve this. I want more real graphics...I know, the graphics dont make it fun, but the graphics are what give it a...wow...factor. I know there are probably tons of examples (I cant think of one right now), but what has had photorealistic graphics that was a fun game?

Uncanny Valley man. Uncanny Valley.

at least the weird plastic look that people get confused with reality

I've been saying for at least a couple years now that I disapprove of the push for photorealism because of that. The closer things get to true realism, the more I realize that there's still a very long way to go.

I think it's the way in-game lighting reacts to materials.. I've seen almost realistic looking scenery. I've seen almost realistic looking character models. Once they put a nearly realistic character into a nearly realistic scene, though, it's very obvious that the two don't belong together. The only thing I can think of to blame is lighting.

It's going to be interesting once we do obtain true photorealism in games. I bet we do a 180 and start exploring more stylized graphics. Zelda WW, WoW, etc.

that hollow moon mod looks really freaking cool. goes on my play list.

Hey Chris, any chance we can get larger versions of the thumbnails you put up?

Great article. Its something that I've thought about quite a lot. One thing is that you've got all of this computing power, but does it necessarily have to go towards photorealism just because you can? There are so many other interesting aesthetic directions you can go into. When I first saw Final Fantasy: Spirits Within, all I could think was that they sacrificed any opportunity to make interesting design choices by focusing so much on looking "real". Any interesting takes on character design, etc, were limited by this decision. Pixar has made films that take place in the "real world" but with an aesthetic twist based on the world that they are creating. It makes for much more interesting and expressive character design than if they were going for something that is trying to look real. The Incredibles wouldn't have been the same if it looked "real" instead of the stylized mid-20th century aesthetic they went for.

That said, for genres that have to take place in the real world for that immersion (military sims/fps), controlled photorealism is the way to go. Games like Half Life 2 and Call Of Duty obviously benefit from this kind of thing. They still are heavily stylized and art directed in their own way, severely limiting their color palettes, etc. I suppose it is all about what works best for the project. I myself am a huge fan of animation and good character design (if I could draw I'd probably be an animator), so I guess I'm more blown away by stylized design approaches.

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Anyway, great link!

"or at least the weird plastic look that people get confused with reality" lol so true

Ah, Darwinia. Now there was an interesting visual style. It was great because it was different and totally fit the concept of the game, while, at the same time, allowing the developers not to have to focus on high-res polygon models or texturing.

Agreed, HL2 is a good example of proper use of near-photorealism, and it's great for simulations...but the nonstop love for older games and their pixelly look is a reminder that perhaps photorealism isn't the end-all, be-all of gaming. 8-bit will never die!

sexxay