Realism boost

[Fidcal]

Video games need 'realism boost'. The TDM team and betamappers are already working on it.

[Winkler Oszkár]

What do you mean?

[Komag]

it's a secret!

[Fidcal]

I mean the article begins "More than good looks are needed to make a great video game" and that is just what TDM are striving for and adding as much realism as possible.

[Winkler Oszkár]

I completely agree with you! Realism and little sweet things are very important. (but please do not create hungry and thirsty factors for our hero. Anything else can come!)

[ironpants]

"Finally, he said, easy to use tools for players were growing in importance and in some cases had become as important as the gameplay itself."

 

The move by the games industry to give players more tools, such as the much-anticipated Spore game by Sim City creator Will Wright, was like the trend towards user-generated content seen on the web, said Mr Entis.

 

"It's an exploding area," he said.

 

Ummmm, Quake was released in 1996. I have yet to experience an explosion of user generated content on par with what Quake ushered in, eleven years ago. Of course, I don't play depressingly boring shit like the Sims.

 

My point is, this is not a new phenomena. Note to big company executives: pull your head out of your ass.

 

He gives Crysis as an example of interactivity, which is good but != realism. I never finished Farcry because of the goofy weapon handling. Everything seemed so realistic until I got into a gunfight, which gave me eighties flashbacks. Is it really too much to ask that a game primarily about shooting stuff has satisfying weapon feel and somewhat realistic ballistics? Cartoony glowing bullets lazily meandering back and forth doesn't exactly keep me immersed in an otherwise convincing world.

[jdude]

haha I like how they use a picture of Crysis. Yes realism, like getting shot with 900,000 high-powered bullets and being able to run around. Or how about using a 50 cal weapon and shooting someone's arm and only knocking them down. If you ask me realism may be more gruisum than what we already have in fps lol.

[Vadrosaul]

I'm struck by just how severe the obsession with "realism" is within the game industry.

 

Lets get one thing straight here: Videogames, cartoons, and computer generated cartoons ARE NOT REAL! You may be able to try to make them look realistic, maybe even succeed, but there is no imperative need to make them look real.

 

My honest suggestion, let artists come up with interesting character designs, art styles, atmospheric lighting, etc. altogether to make the visual design of a game fluid and seamless. Then, focus on gameplay. Much like Thief was constructed under LGS

 

On one final note, unrealistic doesn't automatically mean cartoony either. There are plenty of styles out there where characters have realistic proportions, gritty faces, quality expressions, but still don't look "realistic" either.

[Winkler Oszkár]

This is maybe a stupid question, but...

 

The textures of Doom 3 aren't so detailed if we look them closer. What about The Dark Mod's textures? The mod's play-style is slow, so I guess we can enjoy the detailed, high resolution textures, yes?

[Capela]

This is maybe a stupid question, but...

 

The textures of Doom 3 aren't so detailed if we look them closer. What about The Dark Mod's textures? The mod's play-style is slow, so I guess we can enjoy the detailed, high resolution textures, yes?

 

 

Well most of the doom 3 textures where 256X256, im my opinion they are great and serve well for the game, because the facilities where divided in small areas.

 

I remember very well when i play my first Quake game with my friend, he said "and it have surround sound", that was the game for my first mod as well. Thats why, no matter what people say the games are good or not, i will always buy any doom or quake game they are part of my life now, they are a symbol.

 

John Carmack can be many things, but greedy its sure not one of them.

[Capela]

"Finally, he said, easy to use tools for players were growing in importance and in some cases had become as important as the gameplay itself."

 

The move by the games industry to give players more tools, such as the much-anticipated Spore game by Sim City creator Will Wright, was like the trend towards user-generated content seen on the web, said Mr Entis.

 

"It's an exploding area," he said.

 

Ummmm, Quake was released in 1996. I have yet to experience an explosion of user generated content on par with what Quake ushered in, eleven years ago. Of course, I don't play depressingly boring shit like the Sims.

 

My point is, this is not a new phenomena. Note to big company executives: pull your head out of your ass.

 

He gives Crysis as an example of interactivity, which is good but != realism. I never finished Farcry because of the goofy weapon handling. Everything seemed so realistic until I got into a gunfight, which gave me eighties flashbacks. Is it really too much to ask that a game primarily about shooting stuff has satisfying weapon feel and somewhat realistic ballistics? Cartoony glowing bullets lazily meandering back and forth doesn't exactly keep me immersed in an otherwise convincing world.

 

 

Dont forget Half Life.

[Crispy]

@ironpants: Modding is one thing - when people speak about user-generated content these days, they're often talking about in-game editing. This is the big deal with Spore; in theory it allows one to create hugely different creatures and buildings without needing to go through the huge hassle of learning how to use a level editor; or learning 3D modelling, figuring out how to export your models into the game, going through a modify-export-test cycle, etc.; or whatever. Of course we're yet to see how successfully Spore does this, but that's the goal.

 

The Sims does the same thing on a different scale; house-building instead of fully-fledged modelling and texturing. Learning the ins and outs of a modelling app or a level editor takes effort, but anyone can wave their mouse around and say "I want a wall here with this wallpaper on it".

[Domarius]

On one final note, unrealistic doesn't automatically mean cartoony either. There are plenty of styles out there where characters have realistic proportions, gritty faces, quality expressions, but still don't look "realistic" either.

Yep, just look at Doom 3 characters. At a glance they look "realistic" but actually they are very stocky, big heads, big hands, good for a video game where you can bring out the subtleties of the facial anims, and also gives it a unique style.

[Winkler Oszkár]

On more detailed textures I mean: Will The Dark Mod support triple-buffering on the textures? When the player sneaks next to the wall, maybe he or she would like to feel it more detailed...?

[STiFU]

You just mean detailmaps, right? I think tripple buffering is something different. Didn't Doom 3 have detailmaps by default? I mean even the unreal 2 engine had them or Serious Sam.

 

But in general I am absolutely of the same oppinion as Vadrosaul. So every computer game should be super realistic now?? Ok, then TDM would have to remove many of their arrows (like the vinearrow) and ban every kind of mystic stuff, like magic and undead etc. . Since when is the quality of a game linked to its realism. I am sorry, but this is total nonsense. I guess in a few years we'll only get to play games like Counter-Strike and I can tell: I am happy that I am old enough to have played many good classics!!

 

Ok, now I read the article!! The realism that that guy is talking about, is not what was mentioned in the discussion before and it's nothing the DM-team could realize in their mod (only to a certain degree). He talks about realistic character animations and the "Game worlds [which] must not just look lifelike, [but ...] must also react in a realistic manner". For example, if you walk along a big leaf it should bend physically correct. This is nothing the Doom-engine can handle and I am assuming that you guys don't have the money for motion capturing, so ultra realistic animations will be hard to do too... But I trust, you'll do a great job on them.

[Winkler Oszkár]

That was just a question. But you are absolutely right. Well, I don't know... maybe if I edit my doom3.ini I can turn on the detail map...?

[STiFU]

Nope, I have to correct myself. I looked it up. There were no detailmaps in Doom 3, which is kinda suprising. So that was actually a good question of you. Will you guys include detailmaps or is it even possible at all?

[Ishtvan]

I'm not a texture person, but I'm pretty sure it's possible and we already have detail maps in some of our textures. On Doom3World I'm pretty sure the Full Metal Jacket mod made use of detail maps on their sand textures as well.

[Domarius]

Meh, I thought the article itself was pretty redundant. All it's saying is "It has to behave realistic as well as look realistic." Wow, what a ground breaking concept.

[Maximius]

He gives Crysis as an example of interactivity, which is good but != realism. I never finished Farcry because of the goofy weapon handling. Everything seemed so realistic until I got into a gunfight, which gave me eighties flashbacks. Is it really too much to ask that a game primarily about shooting stuff has satisfying weapon feel and somewhat realistic ballistics? Cartoony glowing bullets lazily meandering back and forth doesn't exactly keep me immersed in an otherwise convincing world.

 

What blew FarCry for me was the ridiculous storyline and especially the upper level mutant AIs which were freaking ludicrous conceptions. The game went (for me) from a pretty fun shoot em up with some hugely fun boat battles and on expert setting some nearly impossible shoot outs with the mercs to total crap.

 

Suddenly, completely idiotic monsters, not scary at all but stupid looking, the little ones looked like something from a 2d game and the big ones looked like strogg. The fast middle ones looked like disco studs carrying machines guns and wearing monster masks, with those tight jeans they were wearing. It took me five months to play through to the rest of the merc battles, which were ok but not great. But it could have been a thousand times better without those cornball monsters. A straight out merc/reality setting would have been a better game, blow up a coke ring or an arms dealer or something.

 

I'm struck by just how severe the obsession with "realism" is within the game industry.

 

My honest suggestion, let artists come up with interesting character designs, art styles, atmospheric lighting, etc. altogether to make the visual design of a game fluid and seamless. Then, focus on gameplay. Much like Thief was constructed under LGS

 

On one final note, unrealistic doesn't automatically mean cartoony either. There are plenty of styles out there where characters have realistic proportions, gritty faces, quality expressions, but still don't look "realistic" either.

 

These are some really interesting points. One thing I remember from the THief games was how even with the simple and repetitive objects available, good settings and lighting, careful object use and a general sense of things being in their places provided a foundation on which to build storyline and gameplay. It still got old of course but only because it was so good I played it to pieces.

 

To bring up a boogeyman as a counter example, I think one of TDSs problems was that the relationship between the gameplay and the environment was over done, over developed in a way. I rarely felt the sense of freedom that I did while playing T1/2 at its best, that I could dart off in any direction and start messing around, feeling my way through the map and all the various situations it presents, soaking myself in that world and feeling like I was actually running around in it.

[Domarius]

To bring up a boogeyman as a counter example, I think one of TDSs problems was that the relationship between the gameplay and the environment was over done, over developed in a way. I rarely felt the sense of freedom that I did while playing T1/2 at its best, that I could dart off in any direction and start messing around, feeling my way through the map and all the various situations it presents, soaking myself in that world and feeling like I was actually running around in it.

You mean progressing through a level felt like it had to be too linear, so the plot would progress properly? I think I agree.

[Maximius]

You mean progressing through a level felt like it had to be too linear, so the plot would progress properly? I think I agree.

 

yes, thats pretty much what I meant. There was never really the feeling that I could take off into a random direction and find some thing interesting, everything was laid out like a big plan, at least thats how it felt.

[STiFU]

Yeah, but that's what happens to nearly all of today's commercial games and I guess we have to life with it. The times of Big labyrinths and absolute unlinear gameplay are as good as over!

 

Anyway, don't wanna turn this into a "modern gameindustry" discussion, so please don't react on this post...

[Ishtvan]

There's no reason it has to be linear though. Just the simple act of putting in somewhat realistic architecture, like a mansion with 5 different entrances, makes it a lot less linear. One of my gripes with TDS was they never had a well-developed perimeter area, where you could scope out several possible entrances an pick one you thought was best (like First City Bank & Trust). The only TDS mission that came close to that sort of freedom was Overlook Mansion. The rest were all pretty much a closed in court yard and maybe two doors going inside at most.

[STiFU]

Yeah, but we have to admit that the leveldesigners were also limited by the crappy engine here. Big open air areas are simply impossible if you want to stick to the normal level of detail (especially amount of lights). When I started working with T3ed, not knowing shit about the engine, I planned a classic thief style map, much freelance, a lot to explore, but not THAT big, since it was my first map with the editor... Of course that project died due to huge fps problems.