Have game graphics reached a stand-still?

Nvidia and ATI keep putting out new gpus, but game graphics haven't really gotten any better since crysis. Have we reached a point where it just isn't worth it to spend the time and money to improve video game graphics? I hope so cause I really don't think graphics need to get any better than they already are. I would like to see developers start focusing more on gameplay.

 

I don't think so. I think Crysis just leap-frogged a hardware/software balance that had settled into a comfortable pattern for a while.

Crysis was a huge jump forward and it's just taking a while to catch up.

 

And some people wonder why i get excited when a $1300 laptop runs crysis on Very High XD ye crysis was a huge leap but was POORLY Opted so if it had been done better we might have seen Very high without the need of Quad 900GX2's (first very high icluding AA) so its quite good to say if you can play very high on crysis you can on most WAIT every game and also depend on rolution and yes looking at killzone 2 Crysis may have met its match XD

 

no. right now graphics follow consoles limitations. pc's can take better graphics, but developers are focusing on consoles as they make more money. you can expect graphics to go up quite a bit once the next gen of consoles comes out (2011/12 ish)

 

Graphics are nowhere near a point of plateau.

 

mah ha ha. crysis looks better, sure, killzone looks great, but crysis looks better.

 

Joshthor did you watch the Killzone 2 E3 demo i was YES finaly the crysis killer tbh i just think killzone has prettier motion blur :3 to much grey brown grey brown OOOOOOOOOOHHH a wait Gunmetal grey wahooo variation!

 

I would say that the hardware has reached a steady arms race, but the software is still improving by leaps and bounds. DirectX 11 is changing the way GPUs are used in daily computing; with newer versions and applications like Adobe Photoshop CS4, the graphics card will become increasingly busy with more than just games.

Even if game development slows, graphics cards will eventually become important for use in non-gaming tasks.

 

Yep, looking at Wolfenstein and other games you can clearly see the graphics capped for Xbox and other consoles. Since most games are unfortunately now designed as console games and then ported to pc we no longer by default get better graphics which are dumbed down for the console. We often get console graphics that are ported straight over without the work involved in higher texture maps and the like being done. Joshthor is right, you will see more of the same until the next gen consoles hit.

 

People probably said ''Graphics don't need to get any better'' after they saw Pacman.

I think everything in gaming needs to improve alongside eachother. If you improve the gameplay and don't focus on improving the graphics because you think they are already good enough, then you will be missing out on the extra potential of immersion and enjoyment of the game.

I am very satisfied with the current state of the graphics in most of my games, for example Arkham Asylum but it doesn't mean that I want them to stay this way if they released a sequel.

 

there are a few things going on:

1. crysis definitely took a big step forward early (the hardware wasn't really ready for it at the time of release, if you remember) and now we are playing catch up

2. any games that are multiplatform (nearly 100% of the good ones these days) are holding back the PC platform. this phenomenon won't last forever though- the next generation of consoles will be another leap forward. so in general, you should expect to see a big push every few years when the new consoles come out and then smaller changes between generations of consoles.

3. game graphics are NOT EVEN CLOSE to a stand-still. there are still tons of things that video game designers *simply cannot include*, but are done in CG film, because everything needs to be rendered in real-time in games. the solution is to come up with better algorithms (unlikely) or get faster hardware (near certainty).

4. conceptual thinking example: in CG film, each frame takes about 3 hours to render. the most complex frames can take a full 24 hour day to render. these renders are done at similar resolutions to our realtime games. and yet we render games at .03 seconds per frame, or even .01 seconds per frame depending on the game and hardware.

if they wanted, they could render CG film at 30 frames per second, like we do in games. however, it isn't totally necessary, and for the extra time cost they are getting quality and quantity of lighting, shadows, and effects that simply aren't possible to do in realtime currently.

however, as technology advances, games adopt more and more CG-like effects: and the number and quality of lights, objects, character detail and animated detail all increase.

 

I agree with LaptopNut.

I remember a few years back when I got the urge to play FF7 (had never played it before) and I bought the game, turned on the PS2, and bam! My eyes felt like bleeding it was so hard to play with those graphics, Cloud had big blocky arms, reminded me of an ape. LOL Mind you I loved the CG version. But strangly I don't remember hating the graphics in general when I was young, probably because I thought they were good enough...that is until something better was released.

 

It stinks to see how much powerful PC hardware is now compared to the current consoles but yet how we are held back by them, we have to wait while they play catch-up. But they are the market leaders and thus whom everyone will pay attention too, whereas our HD5870s will have to be running largely multi-platform console ports in the meantime.

I hear that Epic and ID Software won't release their new graphics engines until the next consoles come around, when I bet today's gaming PCs could run them just fine.

This will also be a longer console generation than most so we are just here tapping our feet.

 

I thought Crysis Warhead used the Crysis engine just well tuned. So you will see how well Warhead runs. Much better. I would much rather they concentrate on game mechanics, improved AI, and overall better, unique, and most importantly fun gameplay.

Games also suffer from consolitis. When developing textures and 3D models for consoles, they can only do so much, so that is ported over to the PC typically, so you won't see a whole bunch of improvements.

All these new graphics improvements are nice and do add to immersion, but more often than not they are just a gimmick, or require a high end desktop PC to really make it look good.

 

All these new graphics improvements are nice and do add to immersion, but more often than not they are just a gimmick, or require a high end desktop PC to really make it look good.
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I agree completley. Crysis is a perfect example of this. I was a huge fan of farcry. The game did everything well, graphics, sound, and AI that you had to use your brains against. When I heard about crysis I was expecting the same great experience enhanced with amazing physics and graphics. What we got was a horribly watered down experience with all kinds of gee-wiz technology. The AI was dumb as nails (just sit down in a doorway, fire off a round to get everyone's attention, and pick em off as the file through the doorway one by one).

Another example of gameplay quality going down while graphics go up is systemshock 2/bioshock, but that had more to do with ization of gameing by the console crowd.

 

People posed the same question when FSX came out way too early for the hardware available at the time. The general reviews of the game stated that you (sadly) would probably be best advised to wait till Vista arrived and that hardware was miles behind FSX, now FSX is one of the very less demanding games. In regard to the comment that "people probably said that when Pac-man came out" i do somewhat agree with that but with pac-man and games in that era there was tons of room for improvement that was obvious, now the room for improvement is getting smaller and smaller. Unless you take a huge step forward where actual physical senses of our brain or mind are perceived in games, which would take the power of the human brain, which according to the calculation of synapses, can hold the equivalent of 10GB of "RAM", and a calculation speed of 168GHz in general tasks, and also constantly stream higher than CD quality music, whilst no "lag" in everyday tasks.

 

Graphics are not going anywhere fast until developers start developing for the PC FIRST instead of for consoles. The consoles have reached their limits (and have so for a while now) while PC's are vastly more capable.

 

I haven't looked into it yet, but I've heard that sony and microsoft plan on keeping the current consoles around for another 5-10 years so that they can re-coup the money they spent on r&d.

The only problem I have with PC games being developed with consoles is that this tends to mean that the gameplay is designed around appealing to the idiot masses (again I point to bioshock). Content is also affected. The first two fallout games could be as gritty as possible because pc gamers tend to be somewhat of nitch, but the third installment had to be scaled back so it could be sold to kids whose parents will not tolerate any mature content beyond ball-to-the walls violence and gore.

 

5-10 years? No way. Consoles always come out sometime in the fall to get Thanksgiving/Christmas sales...They're not coming out this x-mas, probably not next x-mas (especially not the PS3), and Xbox's Natal means that the 360 will be around until at least 2012.

 

The main issue which faces graphics today is cost. Creating highly detailed graphics requires a huge amount of time from a huge number of graphics artists using expensive tools. All of this results in very high costs.

If game developers can figure out ways to make better graphics at a lower price, then they'll do it. Unfortunately, game development is an insanely conservative industry, and no one seems ready to do anything except outsource.

There is some hope for the future, however. DX11's tessellation spec could open the floodgates for more advanced graphics.

 

5-10 years from when they came out maybe.

 

Great graphics and great gameplay are not mutually exclusive; you can have both, so I don't think developers should focus solely on one or the other. I am pretty satisfied with the current level of graphics, but I believe in progress for the sake of progress. Besides, one of the factors that gets me excited about a new games is the higher level of immersion and realism it can offer. Better graphics are an integral part of that.

 

As mentioned before the primary issue with the slowdown in graphical advancement is cost versus benefit. Graphics, as mentioned, still have long and far to go before stalling. Its the business side slowing progress. The cost aspect has already been mentioned. The profit however, has taken a similar hit. PC gaming is not nearly as lucrative as console gaming for producers atm so programmers focus first on developing for weaker console systems. Even within home consoles, Nintendo's Wii and DS have shown that there is a large market for games that very technically very cheap to produce.

The PC industry itself has also halted graphical advancement. Laptops have increasingly taken more and more marketshare from desktops and the fact that netbooks, business models, and macbooks dominate sales further diminishes the importants of pushing graphics. Right now development of hardware is focusing on energy efficiency and improving integrated graphics to the point of consistent HD video playback.

Lastly, because of the HD transition, 720p laptop screens are increasingly becoming more common (and I imagine more the norm). Given that 1080p laptops will likely remain more for enthusiast and 1080p monitors (or their 16:10 equivalent) will likely be the hard cap for most people resolution wise (2500x1600 requiring way to big of a screen for most users), the resolution gap that has usually been what pushed PCs far ahead in GPU power has finally reached a bottleneck commercially. With resolutions evening out and new cards (ATI 5000 series) already destroying games at high resolutions, there there will be a stall for a several years in terms of marked graphics improvement.