Imagine the impact of DX10 on gaming.

PlacidCasual · 29 Oct 2006 at 06:57

Hi peeps

We've all seen the wonderful graphics associated with DX10 floating around on the boards and I don't know if they are genuine respresentations of what DX10 games will look like.

The question is, if the graphics are that good aren't you worried that gameplay, innovation and choice will drop.

At present major releases take years to design and make, they cost millions of pounds and they employ dozens of people working in ever more specialised areas of design. I think if the graphics are required to be too good they will take longer to make and require more people to do so. This will put costs up. Higher costs lead developers becoming more risk averse so we'll see even more farnchises and congregation around low risk game models (FPS). Also who will risk innovating on a £10-20million pound game that took 2-3 years to make?

I worry that the ceaseless march towards higher resolution gaming and "prettier" graphics will erode what makes gaming most fun, the gameplay. I know the industry is mature but outside of Nintendo how often do we see genuine gameplay led innovation in the market these days?

Anyone else have any thoughts on this?

Edinho · 29 Oct 2006 at 09:30

Well graphic are like a pretty women. Yeah looks awesome at first then you soon realise looks arent everything. And I agree innovation has been lacking in the last 6-8 years in games. I cant think of anything thats broken the mould in that time.

KNiVES · 29 Oct 2006 at 12:03

That's possibly because every idea has just about been done now, and it's really hard to think of or design something original in this time and day. Still, here's hoping some clever dude makes a breakthrough anytime now

SCM · 29 Oct 2006 at 13:01

You just need to look at the UT series and what happened each time a new engine was developed the eyes candy went up, game play and fun went down. For a lot of us we would rather have a game that is fun, fast and has gameplay to eye candy that is irrelevant for the majority of us.

Some publishers will get caught up in the eye candy but hopefully other remember that the game needs gameplay and fun to be sucessful.

SCM

dirtydog · 29 Oct 2006 at 13:10

SCM said:
You just need to look at the UT series and what happened each time a new engine was developed the eyes candy went up, game play and fun went down.

That's very debatable. There have only been two major releases of UT - the original one from 1999 and the next one, in 2003 and then slightly enhanced in 2004. Many people prefer the newer version to the original one for gameplay.

Psyk · 29 Oct 2006 at 13:24

Whether or not there is an increasing trend of graphics over game play, DX10 won't be a sudden change. DX10 doesn't automatically change graphics completely. It just adds some fancy new features and does things in a more efficient way. It's not suddenly going to mean every game has photo realistic graphics.

I'm not convinced that game play is going downhill the way people claim it is. I just think it's more a case that people have forgotten about the old games that weren't innovative and original.

dirtydog · 29 Oct 2006 at 13:31

We had all this hype when DX9 came out. Where are all the heart-stopping DX9 games which look sooooo much better than DX8 games?

Darkwave · 29 Oct 2006 at 13:32

dirtydog said:
We had all this hype when DX9 came out. Where are all the heart-stopping DX9 games which look sooooo much better than DX8 games?

Quoted for truth, we danced around in all the hype when Shader Model 3.0 came out too.

bilston · 29 Oct 2006 at 13:53

KNiVES said:
That's possibly because every idea has just about been done now, and it's really hard to think of or design something original in this time and day. Still, here's hoping some clever dude makes a breakthrough anytime now

Try Okami on the PS2, proof that innovation and new ideas are as strong as ever. Developers just need to put a little thought in to their work

ps3ud0 · 29 Oct 2006 at 14:07

bilston said:
Try Okami on the PS2, proof that innovation and new ideas are as strong as ever. Developers just need to put a little thought in to their work

Agreed - finding a new innovation is always going to be hard to realise, thats the point

. We are nowhere near saturating every possible scenario and make a viable game revolving around it.

We just need developers to think more laterally and not to be bound by established ideas. Revolution not evolution per se

ps3ud0

eekfek · 29 Oct 2006 at 14:08

no interest in it at all, oh wow more effects, sorry but ill take gameplay over gfx anyday

theres plenty of 8 bit games from yester'year that walk all over todays efforts

saffyre · 29 Oct 2006 at 14:13

IMO good game play will be taking precedence again with this next generation. We've just come through a era of technological change in the games industry, many companies have been competing to develop new technology to put into games and that really has been the main focus of games companies for a long while. I think were about to hit a plateau in games technology with the coming of DX10 and all the next gen consoles. So what happens now that the technology hits a plateau...Its back to developers to use this technology to make games which are fun to play. No longer can having good graphics etc sell your game, as the technology for great graphics and interactivity are available across the board. This was clearly the original premise of computer gaming but it got swept aside as companies set off to develop better looking and more interactive games. Now thats out of the way i hope we can look forward to some exciting and interesting new titles.

ps3ud0 · 29 Oct 2006 at 14:45

saffyre said:
IMO good game play will be taking precedence again with this next generation. We've just come through a era of technological change in the games industry, many companies have been competing to develop new technology to put into games and that really has been the main focus of games companies for a long while. I think were about to hit a plateau in games technology with the coming of DX10 and all the next gen consoles. So what happens now that the technology hits a plateau...Its back to developers to use this technology to make games which are fun to play. No longer can having good graphics etc sell your game, as the technology for great graphics and interactivity are available across the board. This was clearly the original premise of computer gaming but it got swept aside as companies set off to develop better looking and more interactive games. Now thats out of the way i hope we can look forward to some exciting and interesting new titles.

Im afraid I have to disagree that weve hit a plateau with regards to technology available and the graphics we are seeing in the latet games. Far from it, since technology is still unable to provide a total immersive environment yet...

ps3ud0 :cool:

Lashout_UK · 29 Oct 2006 at 14:58

I'm always of the impression that immersion is not down entirely to graphics either - sometimes I find DOD:S very immersive with little touches like condensation from people's breath on colder levels but on a stronger point - the sounds. Dynamic effects on things going on the distance really ram the environment home and make it feel much more inspiring.

Psyk · 29 Oct 2006 at 15:17

eekfek said:
theres plenty of 8 bit games from yester'year that walk all over todays efforts

There's also plenty of 8 bit games that are so bad you'd rather put a cheese grater down your pants than play them.

Ever heard of ET on one of the Atari machines? It was so shockingly bad, the game was recalled and all copies were destroyed and buried in the desert in New Mexico. True story.

Psyk · 29 Oct 2006 at 15:19

Lashout_UK said:
I'm always of the impression that immersion is not down entirely to graphics either - sometimes I find DOD:S very immersive with little touches like condensation from people's breath on colder levels but on a stronger point - the sounds. Dynamic effects on things going on the distance really ram the environment home and make it feel much more inspiring.

Indeed. Attention to detail is what's important to immersion. But that goes hand in hand with graphics. You need a lot of extra power to process all these little effects. That's where physics acceleration comes in.

mrk · 29 Oct 2006 at 15:25

I agree gameplay is everything but today graphics is what drives the industry - There are plenty of nice looking games on the PC out now but only a select few can be put on the top of the pile for good quality gameplay.

Gone are the days of 64bit graphics on say the N64 with 4 friends huddled around the TV having hours and hours of fun playing quality games.

Things are so much more complicated now.

SCM · 29 Oct 2006 at 15:40

dirtydog said:
That's very debatable. There have only been two major releases of UT - the original one from 1999 and the next one, in 2003 and then slightly enhanced in 2004. Many people prefer the newer version to the original one for gameplay.

As someone who was involved heavily in the clan scene i talk from experience here, as more clans returned back to play original UT after they tried the newer versions and found it lacking in any features to keep them playing clan wars. The gameplay in the original still cannot be bettered by any of the newer versions for a lot of the old time UT players.

Edit

Just had a look at clanbase and the clans involved in the newer UT games, it is a shadow of what the original had clan wise at it's peak. The old community is waiting to see what UT2007 is like as it is make or break time for them.

SCM

dirtydog · 29 Oct 2006 at 15:51

SCM said:
As someone who was involved heavily in the clan scene i talk from experience here, as more clans returned back to play original UT after they tried the newer versions and found it lacking in any features to keep them playing clan wars. The gameplay in the original still cannot be bettered by any of the newer versions for a lot of the old time UT players.

SCM

I realise opinion is polarised on the issue of which version of UT is better

I was careful to say that many people prefer UT2003/4, rather than 'most' people. I don't think you can disagree that a lot of people did/do prefer the newer version.

I think a lot of people who preferred UT99 did/do so because of its easier learning curve and generally more powerful weapons. The gap between unskilled, moderately skilled and highly skilled players in UT2003/4 is much higher isn't it.

dirtydog · 29 Oct 2006 at 15:52

SCM said:
Just had a look at clanbase and the clans involved in the newer UT games, it is a shadow of what the original had clan wise at it's (sic) peak. The old community is waiting to see what UT2007 is like as it is make or break time for them.

I won't be going to UT2007 as it would require me to upgrade my machine too much