8th gen console speculation

[Raoul Duke]

Sony announced that they are going to make a big announcement on feb 20th. Gaming press is pretty sure it's the next console.

Both Sony and Microsoft's next gen specs have been leaked and lawsuits regarding the leaks confirm their accuracy. Unfortunately I don't understand what those specs actually mean. I'll know when I see pretty pretty pictures. I know they are upgrading the resolution from 1080p to "4k" whatever that means. I think the resolution craze is just hype so you'll buy a new TV every other year.

Last console jump I think what made the difference was going from grunge maps to normal maps. I can't wait to see what trick they have up their sleeve this time.

Square put out a "real time" tech demo last E3. I'm just not sure if they know the difference between realtime and pre-rendered.

Crytech may already be running on their next gen engine. I know even the best, highest upgraded PCs struggle to run it cranked all the way up.


I'd put money emphasis on supporting some sort of tech that makes it easier+faster=cheaper way to make things pretty.

[Velocity Kendall]

its a sure thing each company will want to milk as much money out of each development as they can, but theyre also in a race to one up eachother. = lots of screens with gradually increasing resolution and reduced power draw.
when individual pixels are invisible to our eyes, thatll be cool.

i really want to see this in GTA. be so fun.

[Raoul Duke]

Damn that looks like fun. The polycount for those cars must be a million times what they appear to be.

One more thing I'd put money on is 3d headtracking. Sure they could do it with all the current consoles if they really wanted to. Hell, you could do it with any phone with a front facing camera. I just don't know of any apps that support it.

[FightingSeraph]

That Final Fantasy tech demo looks amazing, and yet I'm not convinced that it's going to make the games better.

[sone_one]

i dont see much happening on the pixel end of things... not like i could really tell the difference between 720 and 1080 on my tv. probably gonna be about physics, more polys, more texture memory... those.

[Velocity Kendall]

yeah real physics. the new realtime fluid models on youtube are amazingly real. I guess its tending slowly toward being able to recreate reality to an arbitrary level of accuracy all the way to simulating volumes down to the planck scale (or some compressed, smudgy work around at least).
i think you can figure the equipment out for that; simulating N moles of matter accross T seconds at X resolution, or whatever. maybe it would melt or be bigger than the universe tho.
in any case, more physical realism seems a given.
screens or viewing equipment or some kind will be near as damnit perfect long before that tho.

also smarter AIs and story structures, stuff that boosts gameplay.

plus asset markets, ie making and trading customised game assets more.

the stars are too far, time to turn inward..

[sone_one]

also smarter AIs and story structures, stuff that boosts gameplay.

man i wish! not at all see this happen though. seems to me gamedesigners get lost in whats possible, instead of what should be nowadays. deepest storytelling game ive played goes back to 1996 i think. most of the stuff is just highly polished and incredibly detailed, but completely bland and useless if it comes to storytelling.

[Raoul Duke]

man i wish! not at all see this happen though. seems to me gamedesigners get lost in whats possible, instead of what should be nowadays. deepest storytelling game ive played goes back to 1996 i think. most of the stuff is just highly polished and incredibly detailed, but completely bland and useless if it comes to storytelling.

Maybe you just haven't played any games since 96. Your statement is only almost half true. The ability to tell a decent story probably started around 96. But story telling in games have come a very long way since then. Now the player can explore the story in an open world. Now game designers no longer have to limit a character to either shooting, fighting or driving. Now most games are action RPG's without that turn based bullshit. Games are no longer trapped in a B Movie quality of storytelling.

Here is a short list of games that couldn't have been made in 96.
Red Dead Redemption
Fallout 3
LA Noir
Allen Wake
Farcry 3
Assassin's Creed
Many Many More!

[sone_one]

Maybe you just haven't played any games since 96. Your statement is only almost half true. The ability to tell a decent story probably started around 96. But story telling in games have come a very long way since then. Now the player can explore the story in an open world. Now game designers no longer have to limit a character to either shooting, fighting or driving. Now most games are action RPG's without that turn based bullshit. Games are no longer trapped in a B Movie quality of storytelling.

Here is a short list of games that couldn't have been made in 96.
Red Dead Redemption
Fallout 3
LA Noir
Allen Wake
Farcry 3
Assassin's Creed
Many Many More!

i havent played the others... but man assassins creed been completely random storywise (havent bought another after ac1, because its been completely repetitive).

vk... haha yeah almost forgot. thats been fun to play... also liked wing commander 4, but the game ive actually been talking about been ultima 6.

[Psychotime]

Now most games are action RPG's without that turn based bullshit.

Aw, but I LIKE those!

[Meloncov]

Maybe you just haven't played any games since 96. Your statement is only almost half true. The ability to tell a decent story probably started around 96. But story telling in games have come a very long way since then. Now the player can explore the story in an open world. Now game designers no longer have to limit a character to either shooting, fighting or driving. Now most games are action RPG's without that turn based bullshit. Games are no longer trapped in a B Movie quality of storytelling.

Here is a short list of games that couldn't have been made in 96.
Red Dead Redemption
Fallout 3
LA Noir
Allen Wake
Farcry 3
Assassin's Creed
Many Many More!

None of those have stories as sophisticated as, say, Planescape: Torment (1999). The quality of story and the quality of technology are entirely independent of one another.

[Velocity Kendall]

"deepest storytelling game ive played goes back to 1996 i think. "

yeah man, BladeRunner by Westwood was my fave.

if i was a millionaire id play that Eve Online, I loved the shit out of Elite 2 but this look how much fun these basement dwellers are having! its like a found footage clip from the future.



some lame music comes in after a while and nothing really seems to happen, but all the battle chatter and energy beams... cool.

[Raoul Duke]

Eve Online is a game? I thought it was just a nice screen saver.

[Izi]

erm, still looks like crap compared to irl

[tobbA]

Not that I'm an expert. But to my understanding the specs of the PS4 and nextbox are similar to a "good" PC set up. You'll still get more juice out of an expensive PC. And I can almost guarantee you won't see 4K resolution games. There's no way a console could render that in real time effectively. Maybe it'll be available for movies though.

[JFierce]

Now it's going to be even more about visual flare and less substance :/
And I disagree about the storytelling. Most games nowadays minus a few of the major titles
have shitty storytelling along with the bad gameplay. *insert old man rant*

[Raoul Duke]

I'll admit AC has a random plot. But the cloak and dagger lore still drew me in. Crawling around on rooftops, spying on enemies, poisoning fools for talking shit. All great ways to move through the story. Even if it's a bad the story, the execution of it made it worth while.

[krysjez]

I'll admit AC has a random plot. But the cloak and dagger lore still drew me in. Crawling around on rooftops, spying on enemies, poisoning fools for talking shit. All great ways to move through the story. Even if it's a bad the story, the execution of it made it worth while.

Plus it's so pretty! What keeps me playing AC is the little historical (or pseudo-historical) factoids that pop up from time to time...love those.

[Velocity Kendall]

speaking of, im the brownish colour down in Nigeria..

now THATS what I call next gen graphics

http://landgrab.net/landgrab/Home?g=533616

[Raoul Duke]

Never played Ultima or Planescape. I really can't judge, so I'll take your word for it. But don't you think the cinematic aspects make a story more believable. There's still the uncanny valley gap that's always closing in. Even now with some of the games I listed there are moments where the gaps are still laughable. Which is why I sort of favor stories that take themselves less serious than others. I think some developers are smart enough to get that.

[Frida Bergholtz]

...But don't you think the cinematic aspects make a story more believable...

Absolutely not. That would be like saying that a high def 3d movie is a better tool to telling a good story than a simple cartoon.
I understand what you mean about crawling around in a game being immersed in the feeling. And advanced technology can certainly help with making the gameplay more interesting. Like adding AI to guards or playing around with lighting conditions.

But what I feel is a whole lot more important when it comes to good storytelling and immersion in a computer or roleplaying game is for my actions to have any meaning and my choices to have meaningful consequenses.

I would have written more but the text window is lagging badly...

[Velocity Kendall]

my actions to have any meaning and my choices to have meaningful consequenses.

ah, true escapism

[Meloncov]

Never played Ultima or Planescape. I really can't judge, so I'll take your word for it. But don't you think the cinematic aspects make a story more believable. There's still the uncanny valley gap that's always closing in. Even now with some of the games I listed there are moments where the gaps are still laughable. Which is why I sort of favor stories that take themselves less serious than others. I think some developers are smart enough to get that.

Planescape, and other RPGs of the era, didn't try to be cinematic. Well written text is far more immersive than poorly lip-synced dialogue.

[Ian Barker]

But don't you think the cinematic aspects make a story more believable.

No way. I'm sick of "AAA" games that are all about cinematic experiences and so on. Most of them are all flash and no story or gameplay substance.

Also I've never played a game with good story. They're almost always cheesy lesser versions of comic books and movies that have already come out. Forget about updated graphics, when will we starting spending money to hire real writers to work on video games?

Actually now that I think about it I did enjoy the story in Majora's Mask and Shadow of the Colossus.

[Velocity Kendall]

yeah planescape i remember that.. the nameless dude? that was cool as fuck.

[shiroiakaru]

Hmm? I thought games are just for fun, nothing should be real serious in my opinion? Owo Most of the time I consider story is just a enhancement to the game...^^;; and sometimes, it's fine to not have a proper story for me, just nice to get you into the settings of game.
Something like Loco Roco,Patapon, anyone? OwO

[Raoul Duke]

My favorite games back in the day were Crazy Taxi, NFL Blitz and Powerstone. PC games with a story were completely off the radar. I think the first game I played with anything that could be vouched for as a story was MGS.

[JFierce]

Problem is. Growing up. I went from little squares on a screen, to little squares giving a feeling of depth, to polygons moving in an actual 3D realm, to 3D where polygons were less noticeable, then to where the 3D graphics were amazing.

But see, up until that point things were constantly being innovative, not just with graphics, but with gameplay. Nowadays though the norm is to beat out the competition with graphics. But when every game is blowing all their budget on graphics to compete with the next guy, they're losing their core gameplay innovation half the time.


I was playing one of the modern Fire Emblems for DS for instance. They basically pumped up fancy 3D graphics instead of sprites. But frankly the game is lackluster as hell. The 3D instead of sprites is dull and boring in comparison. I also played an old translation for a SNES fire emblem that came out in japan in like the mid 90's. The game had even more innovative features in it than any of the modern games. System where the stories split into 2 sagas. Who you pair up in the first saga determines what the kids look like, what they have, their bloodlines for wielding certain godly weapons, it had a skill system that was only recently brought back in the Gamecube and Wii games then removed in later titles.

The game was also hard as hell, one chapter was the length of about 3 modern day game chapters.




Games nowadays are getting dumbed down and mass produced for pretty graphics basically being the point I guess.

[Psychotime]

The game was also hard as hell, one chapter was the length of about 3 modern day game chapters.

Don't forget to mention that when a character dies, they STAY dead. And weapons break!

Man, I've never beaten a single Fire Emblem game legit. I really should try out the SNES ones, because all I've bothered with have been the GBA ones, because they were convenient and released in the states (except for 6).

To be perfectly honest, my favorite is 8 simply because along with the usual evil empire, you have to fight hordes of zombies and werewolves and stuff. Plus Satan is the final boss. Sure, 6 and 7 have you fight dragons, but that's only at the end. Early on in 8 you learn that Satan's involved in the plot once zombies, medusas, and gargoyles start popping up.

And branching class upgrades was a great idea.

[Izi]

aw man, planescape: torment.

have to play that again now.

If realistic graphics are soooo great, why does caricature animation even exist?

never underestimate good writing and good music...re:Final Fantasy franchise.