I miss the days of pushing raw graphics

[R.U.S.E]

I think a simple answer to this is that because we pushed so hard for so long, It's become easier (and cheaper) to sell a game through other methods such as soundtrack and gameplay.

[fenrif]

It's because about ten years ago developers decided to focus on console hardware over PC hardware and it completely stunted the improvement of graphics, as well as gameplay. Graphical fidelity is still pushed, but not to the extremes that are capable with modern PC hardware. Instead it's the push to wring the blood out of the stone that is limited console hardware.

[Phabe Jewell]

As for me, I'm more concerned with consistent animated movements than Realistic Graphics these days, just seeing stiff animation like the mass effect series and the Fallout series really bother me.

[Saskia]

I think back in those days when game developers were constantly trying to push graphical boundaries was a time when video games were mostly played by actual gamers and computer nerds who usually upgraded their hardware fairly often.
Now that video gaming has become so mainstream and 'accessible', I think game developers are shifting their priorities to the average consumer who most likely don't have a beastly gaming machine.

Personally though, I'll take good gameplay over good graphics anyday. Games that have more artfully stylised graphics, rather than realistic graphics, tend to age better as well.

[Ma Ma G47]

I agree. 'Realistic' graphics can only come so close to reality before we can't tell the difference, but artistically creative graphics do not have limits on how beautiful they can be. That and decent gameplay is a necessity.

[Ma Ma G47]

I can recall around the time I built my first PC, a game called Crysis was the big fish that everybody strove to be able to play even on moderate detail on their PCs. One of the great things about Crysis was that it had the fun gameplay to back it up when you finally got it running, which made the satisfaction of completing a rig that much sweeter. There was definitely a special sense of accomplishment from witnessing a PC you built push the boundaries of graphics.

On the same token however, I think good gameplay needs to go hand-in-hand with superb graphics, as graphics alone do not maketh the game. I can't update my nVidia drivers these days without getting blasted my promos for ray tracing in Battlefield V, a game with pretty good graphics for today's standards, but the fun-factor is mediocre at best for me.

Meanwhile, this discussion reminds me of this snippet from Nintendo Power on a comparison of graphics between Castlevania for N64 and Symphony of the Night for PS1. The N64 version, though it was cutting-edge full 3D at the time, has been largely forgotten; meanwhile SotN has gone on to become one of the greatest games of all time.

[Garrett]

I couldn't care less about pushing the boundaries of graphics as long as basic boundaries of tech remain unbroken for the sake of graphics. If it's a choice between increasing graphical quality and eliminating loading zones when moving from an open world into an indoor location, the latter is the only choice. True 3d open world games have existed for two decades and they still haven't gotten past this. If it's a choice between increasing the visual quality of lighting and the elimination of static pre-baked light maps in exchange for full dynamic lighting, then full dynamic it is. There really is no excuse for invulnerable light bulbs in AAA anymore. When these things that have been done over a decade ago in very few games have been implemented and optimized, then you can start pushing other graphical boundaries.

There is one choice that is between graphics, and gameplay+graphics and developers seem to insist on choosing only the graphics because it's much easier. AAA games need to start attempting to seamlessly tie player control to dynamic animations with the visuals having no influence over the control. Animations need to be there to add flavor to what the player is doing, they shouldn't be there to narrowly dictate what actions are possible with the player desperately trying to work around them to make the character do vaguely what they want.

For example the Assassin's Creed games are just animation showcases where the player can give broad suggestions as to what the character maybe should attempt to do and the game then makes a guess as to what the player actually wants. -Which ends up being right about 60% of the time. No success ends up being the player's accomplishment and every failure ends up being the game's fault. It's like the opposite of entertainment. Half-Life has no movement animations, so every frame of character action corresponds to precise player input. You can congratulate yourself for a job well done and laugh at yourself for making stupid mistakes. Then there's F.E.A.R, which has precise player input, but with dynamic animations attempting to follow. Works pretty good. Every game should do this.

[Aerrae]

I miss the days when I was excited for more than one or two games a year. Because they were GOOD.

Lots of pretty games are boring as hell. Oh sure. I can walk around the world for a while and enjoy it but I'm not DOING anything. Things are happening to people I don't care about because they're poorly developed, the world isn't built, and the plot is so cliche and dry I could find fresher material from a desiccated Egyptian Pharaoh.

[isturbo1984]

Said the anime avatar. I played and beat 42 games this year. None of them, I'd consider "shitty." Only a handful were mediocre. Most of them I'd describe as good, great or sublime. How many games did you beat this year, just curious?

[fenrif]

What does the anime avatar have to do with anything?

[isturbo1984]

When the market is dominated by two Japanese systems, one console and one handheld... the emphasis on graphics tends to be toned down.

[fenrif]

When the market is dominated by EA, Ubisoft and Activition who deliberatly target console hardware instead of PC the emphasis on graphics tend to be toned down. Japanese or not has nothing to do with it. When the 360 was king of the consoles graphical development across the board was hamstrung for about a decade.

[isturbo1984]

Yes, japanese does have a lot to do with it. Whether you are talking consoles or PC... Microsoft, Nvidia and AMD are all Western (specifically American) companies. One of which, has the most powerful console on the market right now. While Japanese PlayStation recently came out with a piss poor upgrade system and Nintendo is trying to call their handheld a console.

You are also wrong about the 360 too. It was notoriously easier to develop for.--Again, in the same era as the PS3's cell processor, while superior in squeezing out juice, most PS3 ports under-performed. Also, might I add, the same gen as the Wii.--Not exactly a power house.

[Aidy]

The other thing to bear in mind is that in the distant past the coders did all the graphics too. They would have a model (a spaceship or whatever) and would have to apply a transformation matrix to that model to move it's vertices to the right orientation and distance, then it needs to work out what faces were visible and what should be culled,

then more transformations were needed to convert the points in 3d space to 2d space for display

. That's your "Elite" level graphics. As PCs got more powerful they were then able to fill the faces with a colour where the colour could change depending on it's relation to a light source. As PCs got even more powerful they were able to additionally transform 2d textures onto the faces of the models, and with even more power additional transformations\mappers\shaders could be applied to those textures for dynamic lighting.

These days all of that work is done by graphics cards which aren't programmed against directly, instead games use APIs like Direct3D or OpenGL and the graphics cards then realise those APIs, so there isn't a lot games devs *can* do to push the hardware. They need to wait for the next iteration of graphics card and APIs and see what features it has and how those features can be leveraged for better graphics, and I think the likes of nvidia allow development of custom shaders etc giving games devs the ability to get a more custom look to their game.

[Borghir]

I think games are still pushing graphical boundaries both on consoles and PC. RDR2 looks absolutely fantastic on PS4 and PC games now often have HD res texture packs for the people with high end graphic cards. In my opinion graphics are not the major selling points anymore. We're getting to a point where everything looks good already. Most games have motion blur, ambient occlusion, real-time shadows and lighting etc. by default. I remember seeing the trailer for the first Splinter Cell where they were showing off real time shadows being cast on the character. I was blown away!
The same thing happened with physics. When Half-Life 2 showed of their physics engine people went bonkers, but now it's common. it's like diminishing returns where it becomes more and more difficult to reach true realism.

[The_Dirk_Diggler]

I personally thought pushing graphics was awesome back in 2007, 2008. But those days are gone. With the outsourcing of coding to China and the relative ease of making a game "look good" developers don't have to push graphics because casual gamers will buy anything that looks good.

Also the advnacing of graphics these days is more about shadowing, lighting, post processing. Textures, animations, and modeling have pretty much topped out. It's harder to notice these other effects and kind of harder to appreciate outside of screenshots and comparison videos.

[xadu]

I remember the days where Tomb Raider was too pixelated, so I temporarily changed the resolution up and down, just to see how it looked at his best, and suffered how low the FPS fell at high resolutions.

It had a big difference between high settings and low settings, so I needed more powerful hardware all the time, and all the time there was a new processor, or a new GPU which crushed the older ones.

Every time I bought a new CPU, or a new GPU, I played old games again to enjoy them at high resolution.

But today, it is the same to play at low settings or high settings. The differences are minor. I have an old CPU (i7 920), and an old GPU (Geforce 670), and I can play any game I want. I do not use 4K, but don't need it. I don't notice the difference between 4K and 720p after the game starts, and my CPU is like 10 years old, but still on the same league than new ones, because new CPUs were like just 5-10% faster each year.

[R.U.S.E]

As for me, I'm more concerned with consistent animated movements than Realistic Graphics these days, just seeing stiff animation like the mass effect series and the Fallout series really bother me.

I would LOVE to see a good focus on animation!

[xadu]

I would LOVE to see a good focus on animation!

Lara animations on the first Tomb Raiders felt more realistic than the animations on the latest games.

I cringe each time lara jumps and grabs a wall. It feels sooo consoleish crappy animation. She is not correctly aimed. Gravity is unrealistic. She moves like super mario bross.

[humanevil]

It is pricey to develop a game with cutting edge graphics and it is super time consuming, but when you back the massive graphics with good gameplay and good story telling you generally come out ahead.

SaltyPaladin I'm not sure what you're saying. Most games that come out are games that have ultra stylized unrealistic graphics.

i dont think we have its just that consoles havent moved on so the graphics hasnt as companys dont want to program for pc's and use there hardware so the cheap out and make all there games for console then if we are lucky we get an ok port for the pc i would name a game that would probably prove my point however i heard this was a nice place to come and chat games so i dont think ill clight that fues lol

[Hambone]

Absolutely not man, inflated graphics budgets fuck over the industry and push out B-tier developers