Malleus on 22/7/2012 at 17:18
Quote Posted by Subjective Effect
motion blur need to be simulated
As long as there's an option to turn that fucking thing off, sure.
heywood on 22/7/2012 at 23:58
I've never in my life seen motion blur as it is depicted in games. Nothing even close.
And I mostly agree with Jason about camera effects. While depth of field is a real limitation of the human eye, you can't possibly simulate it in a game because you don't know where in the scene the player's eyes are focused. DOF, lens flares, starbursts, etc. are things that should only be used very sparingly for particular effect. Unfortunately, every new lighting or post processing technique seems to get overused.
Quote Posted by Bakerman
I really look forward to seeing serious procedural generation take off in level design. Again, not random loot placement or whatever, but tools like Yakoob is talking about that generate tables, buildings, or entire cities. This is a great blog about procedural generation. It's somewhat sensationally titled 'death of the level designer', but its main point is that level designers will be able to become just that - designers, not prop-pushers. I think. That's my opinion, anyway.
I'm not keen on random level generation, except as a source of ideas. But work in this area will lead to better tools that automate more of the drudgery of level design.
Melan on 23/7/2012 at 06:46
It could be done partially, like The Dark Mod's (
http://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php?title=SEED) SEED system: you designate an area of the map for "dense foliage", "flowers" or "urban rubble", and the system auto-generates some detailwork. Or there could be different degrees of mapper control; handle the most important stuff yourself and let the generators fill in the blanks/background, then readjust.
I can't provide a link anymore, but I once saw the sample output of a procedural generator that could spit out pretty varied and believable highrise buildings. Kinda awesome stuff, although possible to overuse.
Eldron on 23/7/2012 at 08:39
Quote Posted by Subjective Effect
So what next.
Dynamic lighting.
Maps that can be altered and objects being moved around with the same quality as having a lightmap yet none of the downsides of them.
It's pretty huge from an artists point of view.
Our actual hardware is much much much more faster than the consoles are, but the consoles have been the leading platform so far, which is why we haven't seen any technically impressive games yet.
Bakerman on 23/7/2012 at 19:45
Quote Posted by heywood
I'm not keen on random level generation, except as a source of ideas. But work in this area will lead to better tools that automate more of the drudgery of level design.
I should have clarified, but I was thinking along the lines of what Melan talks about: using procedural generation to fill in details and flesh out a designer's vision in a more time/cost-effective manner. The placement of each shrub is not important, so let's make a brush that fills an entire area with varied shrubs and ground litter. The cityscape outside where the action takes place is not important, so we'll draw a rough roadmap and let the computer generate some buildings to decorate it. And so on.
That said, I do think there's a place for procedural generation of entire levels. Even in as seemingly-limited a way as Spelunky: there are large 2D chunks of map that are stuck together to form an overall grid. Each chunk is hand-designed to offer interesting gameplay and connections with other chunks, but the overall map layout is determined by the random algorithm. This simple method results in a ton of variety, especially when combined with Spelunky's different terrain types (because yes, random dirt caves would get boring), and adding more random details like traps and enemies.
Yakoob on 24/7/2012 at 06:28
Regarding DOF, lense flare etc. I do like them in some places. Yes, FPSes can probably benefit from more human-like effects for immersion, but other games which don't try to put you in the eyes of the character can benefit from more "cinematic" tricks. A great example is Witcher 2 - the depth of field and lens flare looks AMAZING in the cutscenes with very effective depth of field and lense flare.
Quote Posted by Melan
It could be done partially, like The Dark Mod's (
http://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php?title=SEED) SEED system: you designate an area of the map for "dense foliage", "flowers" or "urban rubble", and the system auto-generates some detailwork. Or there could be different degrees of mapper control; handle the most important stuff yourself and let the generators fill in the blanks/background, then readjust.
Aye and many engines already use that for foliage. Having that stuff for man-made stuff (litter/debris/furniture) would be interesting if it could go beyond "randomly pick one of 10 pre-made props/rubbish piles."
Quote:
I can't provide a link anymore, but I once saw the sample output of a procedural generator that could spit out pretty varied and believable highrise buildings. Kinda awesome stuff, although possible to overuse.
Aye, Unreal 3 has a pretty nice procedural building generation tool, and there's been some cool applications that generate whole cities based on certain specifications. Like there was one that recreated an ancient-rome style city with just a few variables inputted into it. If you search TTLG for my old thread on procedural building generation you'll find those links.
Quote Posted by Eldron
Dynamic lighting.
Maps that can be altered and objects being moved around with the same quality as having a lightmap yet none of the downsides of them.
Aye, and much of contemporary graphics works goes into simulating that. Screen-Space Ambient Occlusion, FrostBite engine or what UE4 does in the video I linked are all crude approximations of full on, radiosity-driven dynamic lighting. We are getting closer...
Thirith on 24/7/2012 at 14:16
With the current generation, I don't think I've ever thought, "Man, I'm looking forward to the next gen of graphics." At this point I'm happy with well-crafted graphics, interesting art design and increasing frame rates. I'm also agnostic when it comes to motion blur and the whole shebang - I don't judge graphics by how realistic or how cinematic they are. If something's overused, then it's the overuse that sucks, not the feature, at least for me. And I have to say I'm plenty happy with some of the graphics on my PS3, e.g. in the Uncharted games.
Eldron on 24/7/2012 at 20:16
Quote Posted by Thirith
And I have to say I'm plenty happy with some of the graphics on my PS3, e.g. in the
Uncharted games.
Current gen can get a lot done, but it's still smoke and mirrors.
fantastic games like god of war or uncharted series will have all the artwork and horsepower be spent on what they control you to see, and equally much in skyrim you'll have cities be seperate zones due to saving on rendering-power.
Imagine the graphical quality of these games with fully open worlds and big crowds, that'll be the future of graphics.
Pyrian on 24/7/2012 at 22:52
Quote Posted by Eldron
Imagine the graphical quality of these games with fully open worlds and big crowds, that'll be the future of graphics.
In truth, they could've done that a long time ago. (A few even
did, in one way or another.) But most games kept relatively similar draw distances and populations, while doubling down on the detail of each. So, your typical RPG has you wandering into "cities" with population levels approximately the same as in early Ultima games.
Phatose on 25/7/2012 at 03:57
There are still huge strides to be made in gaming graphics.
Animation in particular has a long way to go during actual gameplay. Getting AI characters to react in natural, believable ways instead of canned responses or rag-dolling - that's the next big step. The Euphoria tech used in GTA4/Force Unleashed tried it, but never seemed to pull it off that well - that kind of natural reaction will improve graphics quite a bit - eventually.
Then you've got issues like the effects of injuries. I think it's fair to say that in most games, you're inflicting bodily injury on something - but despite that, animation of those injuries is essentially still canned hit/canned death/ragdoll. It's barely advanced past Soldier of Fortune. We've got a long way to go before you can, say, shoot someone in the leg, have it cause a compound fracture and have them believably react to that. And that's a big deal - the current state forces you into alive and basically unharmed vs. dead - and that cheapens violence quite a bit. It's the difference between Saving Private Ryan and CoD:WaW, and it pulls the horror out of violence.
Then there are the thousand and one little details which add together to make a game feel artificial - hair that doesn't move anything like real hair outside of cutscenes and main characters, clothes that are still stiff boards instead of fabric. Water which splashes, but doesn't really adhere to things. Lots of stuff like that.
