Style down the tube?

Slum

EDIT: I really meant this to be in General Discussion, as I have another thread I'd like to post in 2d/3d Discusion. I don't want to post two threads in the same forum, though. Could somebody move it for me?


With the recent advancements in game technology, and 'next-gen' development underway, games are beginning to fall into a visual style slump.

Am I the only person that feels the "normal mapped look" is a bit overused? I know normal maps add detail which is always a plus, and I'm not knocking the technology, just the way that it's used. I'm sure everyone can agree that there's a certain plastic feel with the recent 'realism' emphasized games. (i.e. Doom 3, Halo, Everquest 2) I have a feeling things will change with the next generation of consoles just around the bend. But that sort of brings me to a second point.

It seems with recent technology the goal is to push for the most realism possible. "good" graphics sell, so there's a market for it. But it's been my observation as a consumer that games are losing their character in exchange for realism. I'm a sucker for stylized toon-esque games (Warcraft, Jak, Psychonauts) and I'd hate to see them fade away.

Basically what I'm concerned about is, will games with a non-realistic style have a place to stand in the next generation gaming market?

I'm just thinking and asking questions here, looking for insight on the topic.

MoP

The certain "plastic" feel you're talking about comes from incorrect/poor use of specular maps... everyone assumes that just because a game is using normal-mapping, it'll look shiny and plastic - this does not have to be the case.

I'm sure before long we'll be seeing games where the normal-map is used to accentuate the style, think of things like Wallace and Gromit - that could be done in real-time 3d, with clay-look and fingerprints on the characters, with normal-mapping...

Basically the developers in the mainstream are making what they think the public wants - and on the PC, that's all about realism or pseudo-realism... it'll probably diverge in a while, just wait and see. Styles will always be there, whether at the forefront of the look of a game or not.

Slum

That's pretty much the idea I had in mind. I guess I'm just a bit paranoid that something I love might die. hehe.

Any other thoughts out there?

cholden

It'll all get better with time as all this stuff is very new to most companies. Keep in mind things like first generation console games versus 2nd and 3rd gen. Even though they are running on the same tech, the games look far incredibly better due to improved techniques, and understanding out how to push the technology further. As we experiment and learn more, new styles will derive from working within these new boundaries instead of just trying to push it as far as it can go with giant materials and "cool" FX.

Slum

I see what you mean.

A good example would be Resident Evil 4, for Gamecube. When it was first revealed, a lot of people had no idea that the console was capable of something like that.

CrazyButcher

for pc we have the trouble of having so much mixed hardware, ie several gpus on the market from different generations. Which means if you want to do less work and still reach most you will use less fancy shaders, so it runs on older hardware too. Also xbox1 and ps2 are as well quite limited.

the real jump we will see with the new consoles, which both have incredible shader powers as well as once shadermodel 3.0 becomes average on pc, with sm 2.0 being the low end.
because the "plastic" look mostly comes from if you use normalmaps on those old cards, you cant do much more than just the regular lighting model but with normal maps, once you have more power on your gpu, you can move away and do some more fancy shading.

actually I am sure we will see much more style diversity, simply as before we had only "one lighting model" and now with shaders we can do whatever we want. while shaders arent really new these days anymore, they just became really powerful and easy to use lately.

saturnfive

As MoP said, the "plasticy" look is pretty much attributable to the first generation of normal mapping tech being limited to fairly simple shaders. These offer control over specular level (brightness of highlight) but no control over glossiness (spread of highlight).

That alone makes a big difference in describing surfaces to the eye (the difference between the surface of a cricket ball and a snooker ball) Hopefully the extra control that more complex shaders allow will actually be used to create some nice stylistic differences, rather than just greater realism.

Toomas

Slum you should check out the MGS4 video if you havn't allready.

thomasp

hm, snakes outfit screams normalmapping as well, what's the deal?

Rick Stirling

Is it that time of the month already where we discuss the lack of style in games?

Toomas

[ QUOTE ]
hm, snakes outfit screams normalmapping as well, what's the deal?

[/ QUOTE ]

Because the suit is kinda like diving suit wich screams normalmapping irl too.
And that brings me to my next point, there are some stuff irl that if you made it in computer game people would say it doesnt look realistic atall. For example strange clouds and people etc.
The easiest option is not to put them in your game. The second one is that you prove the gamer that what you do is under control and that what you do is 100% what you meant and free of any kind of mistakes.
Second solution is rather hard to do with a single game so the whole medium has to evolve.
Let me illustrate: if you put 1000 perfectly cloned primitive shapes into a sci-fi movie it would look creepy and surreal in a positive way. Do the same in a game and people go saying that you are lazy etc and these primitives should have scratches and wear and tear and it looks boring.... If you dont understand then it is your own fault.

sinistergfx

Normal maps don't prevent you from using stylized proportions, rich colors, extra-ordinary animation, "alien" architecture, creative lighting, or image post-processing.

So, quit blaming the tech and make something cool.

That is all.

thomasp

toomas: does it? the diving suits i know are way less reflective, if at all. the robot and his gun seemed to be equally shiny btw. military equipment is rather dull looking in reality.

Steve Schulze

Our military hardware doesn't tend to have sexy, curvacious legs either...

Rhinokey

psychonauts, heaps of style and normal maps.