Unlimited Graphics.

[Adm_Z]

You guys should watch this video and/or read this article. I watched the video with no sound and was simply blown away. It seems that the future of gaming graphics may change drastically soon enough and the end result may be some shockingly realistic games.:Y

Graphics With Could Soon Be Reality | PCWorld

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00gAbgBu8R4&feature=player_embedded

 

[Hellkite]

looks grate

but at what level will this tax our graphics cards?

 

[Adm_Z]

Its supposed to be way less intensive than polygon graphics, but there will always be something else that will tax our computers.

At this rate, I think that with models being such high quality, shadowing and lighting will be the things that tax computers.

 

[CABAL]

This is just amazing. I thought for a while now that something like this would eventually replace polygon graphics but I never thought somebody would produce a usable system this soon!

 

[Iashar_Koranin]

O M G, now I just need to create my body in a 3D prog, the way I want it, and then port my mind in!
I finally get to be a Ghost in the interwebs!
That's really cool, I hope its true.

 

[thunderfoot]

A truly impressive piece of work. Artists will no longer be constrained by a polygon budget. However I cannot help but wonder if this will swing the pendulum all the way over to eye candy instead of good game play and quality coding. Far too many PC and console game already rely heavily upon stunning visuals to mask or excuse poor quality in other areas. I started PC gaming on a Commodore C64. One of the first games I ever purchased was a Dungeons and Dragons type fantasy adventure. The eight bit graphics meant no matter what I did, one jagged blob representing one of my party members resembled the others. I've yet to find another game which is as challenging to play well or as rewarding to win. The one thing I remember most about that game was I really had to work hard to survive, let alone play well. Even with all the amazing graphics and 'realism' out there, most of the games produced over the last ten to fifteen years have a very low replay value. I don't play games online either, due to the huge numbers of cheaters, whiners and disruptive influences who dominate online play.

I guess overall, my reaction to this could be categorized as, "Meh. Had to happen sooner or later."

 

[Terra_Inc]

I started PC gaming on a Commodore C64. One of the first games I ever purchased was a Dungeons and Dragons type fantasy adventure. The eight bit graphics meant no matter what I did, one jagged blob representing one of my party members resembled the others. I've yet to find another game which is as challenging to play well or as rewarding to win. The one thing I remember most about that game was I really had to work hard to survive, let alone play well. Even with all the amazing graphics and 'realism' out there, most of the games produced over the last ten to fifteen years have a very low replay value.

TF, do you play Roguelikes? 'cause those are quite similar to what you describe.

 

[CABAL]

Thunderfoot has a good point, but it's also possible that this could have the opposite effect; since every game would have amazing graphics the developers would be forced to create quality gameplay.

Besides, there have always been horrible games and great games. We think that the newer games are worse on average because we only remember the old games that were truly great since the bad ones were so forgettable.

 

[Iashar_Koranin]

Yeah, I agree with CABAL on the forgetting of the lame games and remembrance
of the greats, some people repress bad memories, or just overwrite them.
Me being a Halo fanboy doesn't so much help my point of view though.
And in the end, if you make something look like it's supposed to be like that then people are far more forgiving.
Look at minecraft, great hit, amazing game! And it's supposed to look like that.
Yet you don't see most fans complaining about graphics on it, everything is
SUPPOSED to be blocky. Its fun and its cool. Who cares if there are a few graphics drawbacks.
Darn it! Broke my LOL! sign

 

[K_merse]

I still do not understand. OK, so we drop polygons and use atoms instead. But our CPU and graphich crad still has to process them, and it has to process a lot of them! Lot more than polygons.
I think it's OK that it makes modeling easier and games nicer, but there is no home PC which could use this technology at full potential. Also, more detailed models need more worktime. game developers just won't have the time and the budget to make model about every small piece of dirt. I think that even if this technology breaks into the gaming industry it will just lower the level of required configuration compared to the same visualisation with polygons.

 

[CABAL]

About the speed, they mentioned in the video that this type of rendering has historically been too slow to be practical in games, but that they had recently figured out how to boost the speed to 20fps in software rendering mode, using that island as an example, and that other builds were even faster. Considering how slow software rendering is, with hardware designed to work with this, speeds of 60fps should be simple.

 

[Dominus_Noctis]

Case in point, A2 uses software rendering for explosions, cloak, team colors in A1... etc