Graphics Rant.

Ok.. so ps3, xbox360, ati, gforce,high definition, blu-ray, oblivion, console wars, direct x, cell shaders, load time, physics, multithreading blah blah blah. What do they have in common? They affect how you game.. I am getting tired of how graphics are quickly becoming the sole driving point of gaming systems and games themselves. I personally opted for the nintendo wii because I am sick of the graphics crap. Now.. I am not bashing any of the above but, I am getting ticked.

Latly it seems the games are no longer about playing games themselves.. but, rather just someone seeing what can be done. Latly I have been somewhat disgusted with the number of people who claim to be "gamers" yet, all they talk about is "omg graphics graphics.. it looks so tight to see the guy sweat while playing basketball" and how "my 360 pwns your wii" or.. "omg omg ps3 is going to have such great games". And the sad part? none of them have ANY clue what they are talking about... none of them take in to account what is under the shell of their console its just.. "BLU-RAY ALL THE WAY.. PWNED YOU!!" I am sorry guys.. but, I'm tired of graphics and obsessive attention to detail along with the idiots who will pay just because its pretty. The reason why I pick xbox and ps to demonstraite this is because it is a PRIME example of my point.

If the game is good.. it should draw you into the game.. it should make you apart of it.. and.. If it is doing its job... your not going to really notice the basketball player sweat after a few minutes of gameplay.. and if you do.. odds are the game isn't that great because your watching a guy sweat rather then playing your game.

I am not saying I believe we need to live in the world of text based gaming.. and I want graphics to get better as much ast he next guy.. but, I am sick of sport game fanatics argueing over graphics and talking about how cool they are.. when I will be honest.. my knowledge of the graphics only scratches the surface.. so.. I am pretty well assured they have no knowledge at all..

So.. anyone else tired of the gaming industry being driven forward by idiots who will buy something just because its "pretty"..

 

Fight the power brother! Lets all go play Space Invaders!

I'm just kidding of course

Yeah, it can be annoying, but then, without advancements on graphics, all you'd have is... space invaders

 

@Snow_fox - You should get classic compilations of 16-bit games (available for PSP and I think PS2). You can play the old games on SNES, Sega Genesis, and Atari 2600 that were about gaming as opposed to graphics. Real retro fun.

 

Point and case, anyone who has ever played system shock 2 will more than likely tell you its by far one of the best games they have ever played (I know it is to me). The games graphics, well, its an OLD game, so they are very outdated. But the game itself...you get sucked into so much that you don't even realize it. If the game is worth playing, the graphics are the least of your worries. I know I don't find myself going "ohh, look at the realistic reflections in the windows" when I'm playing bf2142, no I'm too sucked into the game to even realize it, so all of those wonderful graphics are pretty much a waste. I must agree with you snowfox.

Edit: Before this gets out of hand I think snowfox is trying to say that GRAPHICS appear to be driving the game industry, and they simply throw a plot and fun gameplay into the end of it. When in all reality it should be the gameplay and the plot that drive games forward, and advances in graphics should only be made to make such things possible. Like the realistic action of throwing a grenade, you shouldn't want to duplicate that because it looks "pretty", you should want to duplicate it because it adds to the gameplay.

 

Hey, I don't agree with ya on this (Well, not totally, Alot of your points I agree with, but I do like graphics... But ya, gameplay is good), but anyone who buys Nintendo Wii is good in my book

 

In modern FPS titles graphics can equate in some cases to gameplay.

Take for example, Call of Duty 2. Great game. Now, compare running it on a high end system on dx9 high settings, to a crap system on the lowest settings possible on dx7 settings. On the lowest settings, it looks awful, and the game becomes far less enjoyable to play for it as it looses its 'immersive' quality. The same can be said for a fair few other titles these days.

Some titles like Half Life 2 are still fantastic on low settings because they have such a strong storyline. Call of Duty is essentitally point and shoot, and that's it. The graphics to a large extent 'make' the game. But did that stop people from saying it was a brilliant game? Nope!

 

I'm tired of the gaming industry catering to the people that just want pretty graphics, and focusing more on that aspect than on the actually gameplay. It kind of sucks when you see a games screens and videos for a long time, thinking they look cool, only to find out the gameplay is just trash once the game is out.

I have no issue with graphics being good. If I can get amazing gameplay and amazing graphics, then by all means give it to me. And there is no excuse for modern games to have last-gen graphics. Things are supposed to look better as technology gets better.

And I don't think there is any issue with someone being in awe of how pretty a game looks. I could say, "Wow, that game is gorgeous."

It doesn't mean I'm going to play it. I think Gothic 3 looks really pretty. It makes me wish the gameplay was good. But after watching the footage of the gameplay, I have no interest in the game. The melee combat consists of the character slowly walking forward and swinging his sword in a very unrealistic fashion from left to right. It's incredibly cheesy and looks really boring.

And, I can talk about how beautful Shadow of the Colossus is, yet I like the game for it's gameplay AND it's beauty.

 

Hey, I believe the BEST game of the new generation of consoles is, without question, The Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess. Better graphics of other consoles be damned! Zelda has a very interesting control style and nice story to go with it

My old rant on The Current Trend of Gaming and Graphics may also be realivant to this conversation....

 

*Shrug* Welcome to 10 years ago.
If anything, the industry is finally moving *past* the graphics obsession. Now we're getting fancy physics, we're getting much more experimentation with input devices (wiimote, DDR dance mats, for example).
And of course, we're also seeing all the fancy graphics being used to enable new gameplay in some cases. (Quite a few genres just wouldn't work very well in 2d, for example. And MMO's rely heavily on graphics to allow characters to express themselves. Emote animations, different clothing, customizable character looks are major ingredients in the success of that genre. Not because "they rely on graphics over gameplay", but because they use graphics to enable players to do things they couldn't do otherwise.)

And finally, I call myself a gamer, and I talk a lot about hardware, graphics and "technical" stuff. Is that a problem? Rest assured I pay plenty of attention to gameplay... But that doesn't mean we can't discuss graphics or graphics capabilities, does it?

 

It goes both ways. There are games that have great a great concept or gameplay and therefore graphical prowess doesn't matter as much. But there are also games where the sheer beauty of their graphics add to wonderful gameplay and immersion experience.

And of course there are the games with graphics and nothing else. These are stinkers.

The industry is going to go where the money is though. There are a lot of people who buy games based on graphics--so the industry caters to their dollar.

 

The best game I have ever played was Ultima Online, which I played every day for three years. The graphics were simple even when it came out, but the gameplay kept be hooked for months on end! It ran perfectly on a K6-2 500MHz with an ATi Rage Pro 16mb.

Graphics don't mean anything if the game itself is good enough. Some games gain an advantage with decent ish graphics and they're always great to look at and have that wow factor.

One thing that annoys me is the speed at which graphics card are utterly obsolete. I could buy the best card on the market and it would technically obsolete within a few months! That I find... somewhat unecessary as other components are still able to perform reasonably by comparison.

What would you rather to play FEAR, a P4 2.2 and geforce 7950GTX or a Core 2 Duo and a Radeon 9600?

 

chrisyano said it best. EVERYTHING is driven by money. Without it, the companies who do produce good games wouldn't have any means to make the things we love. I see the point in which you are talking about snow fox, but rest assured, there are still some solid gaming companies out there full of surprises.

 

If it's all about money, why do they make games with insane system specs? EQ2 for example, ran it on fairly low-ish settings on a brand new $1000 desktop, and still had problems. BF2142 REQUIRES a 128mb video card, and 1gb of RAM to even run. Believe it or not, alot of people can't afford to buy a barely passable machine and constantly upgrade it when they want to play a new game. That's why console gaming is so popular; it's easy. You buy the machine, which even in the PS3's case is still cheaper than a computer that can play modern games on anything but the bare minimum settings (if at all in some cases), and you're set.

Gaming and computer companies need to get that through their heads. Sure, BF2142 looks pretty sweet with all the enhanced lighting, good textures, appealing character models and effects... But it's the gameplay that will make you tell your friends about it and suggest they buy the game, not the graphics. If they'd make purely gaming computers more affordable without having to build you're own, or simply make games scale better it would increase their profit by a lot. But that's the thing with PC gaming nowadays. You can spend $400 on a machine that will run most games, barely... But that's still most games. What if one of the games you want is in the list of the few you can't? And with a machine like that, in no time there'll be a much longer list of things you can't play unless you upgrade; and a machine that cheap won't have much upgrade capacity. Whereas if you buy a PS3 of Xbox 360, that $450-600 purchase and you're set for years until the next gen comes out.

I mean I had a machine with a 32mb video card, 1.80ghz processor and 128mb of RAM for five years, I know the feeling. I wanted to play Dark Age of Camelot, but didn't have the cash to buy a new desktop to play it. So I was stuck playing Starcraft, Diablo II, Unreal Tournament and Runescape during that time until I bought an Xbox... Which basically killed off my PC gaming until I got my new desktop last year and got into WoW, and now my laptop with BF2142 and Oblivion.

If I could've played Half-Life 2 on 128mb of RAM with a 32mb video card? I would have, hell yeah. And there are a ton of other people who would too.

 

I think this is a good topic. It is getting ridiculous how so many games nowadays focus on bigger and better graphics rather than gameplay. I've played some of the "newer" games, and I gotta tell you guys, I had more fun playing Tetris or Donkey Kong Country. I mean, sure all these FPS and what not coming out are great looking but do they really bring anything new to the table? Do any of them have the story and genius of, say, past FPS like Deus Ex or Half Life? Or how about the new MMOs? I don't see any of them as being as popular, with the exception of WoW, as say Diablo II. But on the other hand, this trend is present because of consumer demand. So I think that we as gaming consumers have a responsibility to tell the industry to focus on gameplay rather than more graphics by boycotting games that are gorgeous, cell-shaded, 4xAA on, steaming piles of cowdung. What we are in now is a rat race for consumers, and by forcing companies to focus more on gameplay, it's a win-win situation for everyone. Consumers get higher quality games that they actually enjoy, and don't have to go bankrupt by being forced to get a better system every couple of months. For companies, it'll be cheaper to develop better gameplay and story vs. new graphic technologies and they'll still have people buying their games.

 

im the same way as you man... i love good graphics just as much as the next guy but if the game with worse graphics is better than the one with good graphics i totally rather play the one with worse graphics.. (bassically why i still play 1.6 and not source) how ever new games like crysis and cell factor look way cool and fun to play with all the crazy stuff you can do thanks to good physics and graphics

 

yea i really hate how fast the way over maximum requirement pcs are now the minimum and how you ahve to go and upgrade or buy whole new pc to play with a decent fps rate... ive gone threw 3 pcs in the past 4 years to try and keep up with the curve and have had all sorts of different graphics cards in them

 

Battlefield 2 has to be the worst. I upgraded from an Athlon XP 2700+ with a 128mb Radeon 9700 and 1GB PC2700 ram to an Athlon 64 3000+ overclokced to 2200MHz, 1GB DDR-400 and a 256mb X800pro. Quite some upgrade you might think but not according to BF2 which ran at EXACTLY the same settings as on the old machine and compalined if I put them any higher. Also the game play is rubbish, the user interface, opening screens game selection etc. is the slowest thing I have ever come across in the history of computing ever ever ever (and I started on a 386 back in 1995), the graphics are badly coded and take up far too much system resources and don't even look THAT good... I mean that Athlon 64 pc could handle FS2004 with heathrow pro and about 400 aircraft at heathrow at the same time no problem but BF2 at high settings? Forget it. I loved 1942 and vietnam but battlefield 2 was... well it was ****.

[/rant]

On the other hand, the x200m in my current machine.. ok it cant play really intensive stuff but it's quite impressive nonetheless! War Rock on full, source engine runs smoothly, San Andreas too. Not as bad as many people say.

 

well for your x200m it depends how much is dedicated and sence you have 1 gig of faster ram and decent cpu it can handle a lot for a integrated card

 

It seems there hasn't been a point made that I can really disagree with. Even if I were to disagree with many I would still have to give credit for them being good points.

I mean graphics are definitly cool. I love it when they throw just the right style of physics in with some pretty pictures and you get something fun to do for hours.

I am not saying I want bad graphics or anything by any means lol. I think the graphics need to compliment the game. I feel fear did a beautiful job of incorporating the graphics, gameplay and art i suppose you would call it. I mean it looks beautiful. It sucks me into the game (even playing with a touchpad) and its all around fun. However, what bothers me is that while I can be content with almost any game.. games like fear are few and far between where I say "HEY THAT ****en ROCKS!!".. and sadly all the "big graphic titles" are usually pretty pricy x.x

 

I agree with the sentiments posted in this thread, but I wanted to mention FEAR because I just finished it.

Graphics are actually starting to become a turn-off for me. Thank heavens the retail version of FEAR runs so much smoother than the demo; the demo runs terribly. I'm not sure why I bought it, but I'm glad I did.

That said, I have a problem with FEAR that's become a MAJOR problem with other recent games for me: shaders replacing art design. Get a good look at FEAR. It's Soldier of Fortune II with shaders.

I'm kind of frustrated that the instant I shell out for a 7600GT, it's basically made crap by newer games like Oblivion and Call of Juarez. Oblivion...ugh, don't get me started. I'm sure it's a great game, but it's so frigging hideous to look at and runs so miserably even on my swanky desktop I can't bring myself to care. Honestly tell me, if you didn't know what the heck a shader was, that you'd find Oblivion more visually appealing than something like World of Warcraft.

I'm just sick of seeing games spiral down into performance hell.

Oh, and as for the PS3 and Xbox 360 vs. the Wii, I think Tycho from Penny Arcade said it best: "Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot it's not innovation unless it involves another render pass."

 

Graphics do not equal better gameplay necessarily.

As long as you can PLAY the game at 30+ fps, settings don't matter.

Lol do you see players @ lan or competitions complaining about graphics?? rofl if that doesn't settle the argument let me explain what they complain about:

#1: Lag/Latency
#2: Skill of others
#3: Imbalance (of course when they know there outskilled and cant blame lag)

Therefore if anything is important its a good internet connection or network card.

The great gamers are high school / college kids and most of them are on a budget. The people who care about graphics are usually guys who are 30+ and have the money to spend on that sort of thing and are in it for the visual experience; not to be good at the game. And let me say there is NOTHING wrong with that. Thats why games have those settings. Theres NO COMPARISON AT ALL between being good at a game and playing the game for the maximum experience. (as long as the game is playable). If your playing on a system lower than requirements then yes you can use that as an excuse.

 

WoW has quite a few shader effects too. Games that have no shaders tend to look, well, sterile in comparison, simply because it doesn't leave much room for the artists to make the graphics style they want.
In any case, I personally prefer WoW's art style over Oblivion's. But I have to admit Oblivion does look **** good, although that's more of a technical observation.

 

I prefer game play over graphics also. If it has both, then awesome. Some one said something about the two games that I think are possibly the best games ever made: StarCraft and Diablo II. Great game play, graphics weren't too bad, and they would play on anything. Back in high school me and my friends spent many hours playing both of those over the internet or lan. I think I might dig them up when I'm home for Christmas break.