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[SlimySnake]

Games hit the end of history by the end of PS360 gen, or early PS4 gen at the latest. The rules of design have largely been set in stone since then. The "open world game" blueprint was finalized with Far Cry 3. A lot of the big live service games got their start then, and some of them are still going. In the decade since, most games are just bigger/prettier versions of PS360 era design tenets. Iiterative advancement at best, or no advancement at worst. Pick up almost any modern game and there's nothing conceptually separating it from games fifteen years ago. Most of the gameplay innovation in recent years has happened in multiplayer games, not singleplayer.

We can blame budgets and risk aversion but I blame the limits of imagination first. I sure don't know where game design goes next. I don't think it's "better physics" or "better AI" or "better reactivity". Strive for these things, yeah, but they're not going to take game design to the next level by themselves. I have no idea what the future is, or if there's a future.

At least we still have pretty graphics to look at.

Yep, been saying this for years. We've been playing the same ps360 era games for the last two decades. Far Cry 3 was the last time we had any innovation in that space.

I was mostly ok with Sony's efforts because Horizon had a cool spin on the open world thanks to dinobots, Days Gone had hordes, and ghosts felt fresh despite being fairly ubisoft like. DS1 was extremely original. But they kind of just did a copy pasta for the sequels which is why i feel like we've stagnated. the leading studios should never just do a DLC like sequel. especially after taking 5+ years. I think what Tears of the Kingdom did was phenomenal, its literally copy pasta in terms of the open world but the added physics and building mechanics made it feel like a brand new game. And this coming from a BOTW hater.

All of that to say that you dont need to completely reinvent the open world genre, you just have to continue innovating with each entry. Something most devs this gen have failed to do. Just looking at horizon as an example, in their first concept screenshots that leaked all those years ago, they had several different hunters working together to take down one Tallneck. It felt like a game that had you lead a group of hunters and work together instead of a solo rambo like Aloy does just by shooting a bunch of arrows. it hinted at puzzle elements, a bit of strategy, and cooperation (not online). Maybe you give out orders to companions like in other RPGs. But nope, lets do Horizon 2 Rambo Returns with the same exact gameplay loop.

 

[SlimySnake]

How much of RE9 takes place outdoor in bright environments? Cause the screenshots i've seen and some even posted here, look horribly dated compared to interiors.

1/3rd id say. All of Racoon City. Lighting is good. Asset quality is mid. Some areas look better than others. Chase scene is the highlight but its spoilery so wont post it just yet.

 

[CowboyLou]

Yep, been saying this for years. We've been playing the same ps360 era games for the last two decades. Far Cry 3 was the last time we had any innovation in that space.

I was mostly ok with Sony's efforts because Horizon had a cool spin on the open world thanks to dinobots, Days Gone had hordes, and ghosts felt fresh despite being fairly ubisoft like. DS1 was extremely original. But they kind of just did a copy pasta for the sequels which is why i feel like we've stagnated. the leading studios should never just do a DLC like sequel. especially after taking 5+ years. I think what Tears of the Kingdom did was phenomenal, its literally copy pasta in terms of the open world but the added physics and building mechanics made it feel like a brand new game. And this coming from a BOTW hater.

All of that to say that you dont need to completely reinvent the open world genre, you just have to continue innovating with each entry. Something most devs this gen have failed to do. Just looking at horizon as an example, in their first concept screenshots that leaked all those years ago, they had several different hunters working together to take down one Tallneck. It felt like a game that had you lead a group of hunters and work together instead of a solo rambo like Aloy does just by shooting a bunch of arrows. it hinted at puzzle elements, a bit of strategy, and cooperation (not online). Maybe you give out orders to companions like in other RPGs. But nope, lets do Horizon 2 Rambo Returns with the same exact gameplay loop.

Death Stranding and TotK are definitely a couple of the exceptions to the rule. At least they were trying new and different tricks, even if they ended up a little polarizing as a result. The DLC-sequel approach for every major Sony franchise has been crazy to watch.

 

[SlimySnake]

Oh shit. Crimson Desert devs flexing a bit. Gave all the evidence to DF and will let them break the news.



I wonder if its 1440p 60 fps. Crazy if they are able to hit that number despite looking far better than Death Stranding 2 and Ghost of Tsushima. Even Horizon FW was around 1296p upscaled to 1800p using checkerboarding.

 

[RSMan]

GT7 on the PS5 PRO on my calibrated C8k is truly a sight to behold.

I can only imagine how utterly insane its going to look with PSSR 2

 

[SlimySnake]

GT7 on the PS5 PRO on my calibrated C8k is truly a sight to behold.

I can only imagine how utterly insane its going to look with PSSR 2

? You can play this at native 4k 100 fps on the base ps5. The pro should easily run it at native 4k 120 fps. Why do you need PSSR?

 

[Bojji]

GT7 on the PS5 PRO on my calibrated C8k is truly a sight to behold.

I can only imagine how utterly insane its going to look with PSSR 2

I think 8k mode is not using PSSR, just TAA?

Name of the tv fucked me up, lol.

 

[Cumulus]

More continuous Crimson Desert gameplay footage:


Honestly I´m not too impressed with anything I see here.
f.e. If this really has RTGI it`s on "Doom - The Dark Ages" level or even worse. lots of "glowing" out of place looking stuff the moment direct sunlight is missing. The assets/textures are nothing out of the ordinary and also have quite visible lod/transitions and pop in.
I guess that if this turns out to be impressive after all then it will be through sheer scale. I can certainly see why this supposedly runs so well...

 

[SlimySnake]

More continuous Crimson Desert gameplay footage:


Honestly I´m not too impressed with anything I see here.
f.e. If this really has RTGI it`s on "Doom - The Dark Ages" level or even worse. lots of "glowing" out of place looking stuff the moment direct sunlight is missing. The assets/textures are nothing out of the ordinary and also have quite visible lod/transitions and pop in.
I guess that if this turns out to be impressive after all then it will be through sheer scale. I can certainly see why this supposedly runs so well...

Everyone was praising Indy's 1800p 60 fps RTGI on the XSX well before Doom came out with its own high res 60 fps RTGI that barely looked better than the last gen Doom Eternal.

people think good visuals are free. They've been led to believe that the problem isnt hardware limitations, but 'optimization' and/or bad developers or engines or budgets. Nah, good graphics cost GPU processing power.

i think this game will impress regardless of its lighting quality because as i said above, games are more than just lighting. the scale, npc behavior, draw distance and level of detail will impress even if its RTGI isnt as intensive as say Lumen or Anvil or Snowdrop's RTGI.

 

[analog_future]

1/3rd id say. All of Racoon City. Lighting is good. Asset quality is mid. Some areas look better than others. Chase scene is the highlight but its spoilery so wont post it just yet.

This is the best looking part of all of the outdoor areas in the game. The rest of the outdoor areas looks very cross-gen IMO.

 

[BlownUpRich]

Some more random npcs in C77 with PT on/off, NO MODS:

As you can see above it doesn't look good. No indirect lighting, only strong phong shading. Her plastic shirt looks horrible because it relies entirely on normal mapping with no lighting at all. Her eyes and fingers look horible because even at ultra lighting there is not enough resolution to cast proper self shadowing so everything "glows". And this is actually the best situation for normal rendering, close source of light singular.

Here PT resolves everything and that bad looking npc (which is standard pretty much in all open world games) becomes actually pretty nice looking lady. The little details like her fingers and eyes now are awesome, her plastic shirt makes more sense, quality of materials also rose up significantly and they aren't just texture blob.


Here is when you find no light near and game has to rely on fake lighting in game aka ambient light:

You know that look from playing other games. That's why developers don't like foggy areas etc. without adding strong lights somewhere in scene. She looks like PS4 character.

But let's give it PT treatment in scene where there is no direct light and only ambient scattered light:

Now it makes sense. Everything look correctly now. Her head doesn't look like Final Fantasy VII cloud anymore. Her bra/shirt also isn't flat but has intricate detail, bumps, meterial, it's streached etc.


Ever wondered why black skin characters look so wrong ? That's because a lot of what makes black skin color work is actually shadows and subsurface scattering. And with PT effects are dramatic:

Here without PT:

Looks like normal no. Pretty standard black person in game these days. Let's look at the guy with PT:

Yoooo, that's a different person alltogehter.


Another. This npc as far as npcs go in C77 is pretty good even without PT because his eyes aren't shown and his clothing is pretty simple.

But let's take this guy and give him PT treatment. Suddenly we go from good looking NPC to hero level in other games characters:

Path Tracing is the real thing! I want alll games to have it as a mode on PC version if you have the hardware to run it. Cyberpunk 2077 looks a generation above with it set to ON.

That is also true for RE9 Requiem, it looks like an entirely different game in many scenes.

 

[analog_future]

Everyone was praising Indy's 1800p 60 fps RTGI on the XSX well before Doom came out with its own high res 60 fps RTGI that barely looked better than the last gen Doom Eternal.

people think good visuals are free. They've been led to believe that the problem isnt hardware limitations, but 'optimization' and/or bad developers or engines or budgets. Nah, good graphics cost GPU processing power.

i think this game will impress regardless of its lighting quality because as i said above, games are more than just lighting. the scale, npc behavior, draw distance and level of detail will impress even if its RTGI isnt as intensive as say Lumen or Anvil or Snowdrop's RTGI.

I agree with you here but to be fair, you've really harped on the whole "lazy devs" rhetoric a lot in the past yourself.


With that said, I think Crimson Desert will impress in many ways and disappoint in others, just as all the top visual games do.

 

[SlimySnake]

I agree with you here but to be fair, you've really harped on the whole "lazy devs" rhetoric a lot in the past yourself.


With that said, I think Crimson Desert will impress in many ways and disappoint in others, just as all the top visual games do.

I use that rhetoric on devs who themselves have admitted to being lazy and risk averse. People who target native 4k and do not invest in Lumen, RTGI, virtualized geometry like other devs have. Most Sony devs have not and used excuses like how they are risk averse (sucker punch), how the gap between the ps4 and ps5 wasnt large enough for a big graphics leap (Kojipro), how they wanted to keep the look of the game the same as previous titles for coherency (an actual excuse used by ND), how they did not want PS4 owners to feel left behind (ssm), and how they felt PS4 did not hold them back (GG).

On the other hand, I went out of my way to praise a lot of games that caught a lot of flack from the general gaming populace for their bad performance. Starfield, Star Wars Jedi Survivor, Callisto and well most recent UE5 games because those devs did embrace new tech, and were crucified for it. I even stood up for Todd Howard when he told PC gamers to upgrade their CPUs.

 

[BlownUpRich]

Yes but until the hardware is there, let's avoid making our games look like garbage on the current consoles.

I think it's the major difference you're seeing between consoles (including Pro) Vs high-end PCs, I feel the difference got bigger in this generation than the PS4 & Xbox One generation, which is something I'm really glad to see. Thanks to Nvidia's unabashed efforts towards making sure Ray tracing and AI features run the industry.

 

[BlownUpRich]

I don't think there's such a thing as "lazy devs" as these devs work their asses off, c'mon now. It sort of an outdated right-wing centric rhetoric that implies "devs now are hired based on identity" because "white devs" should be at the helm or else other identities are lazy. Not saying anyone who says "devs are lazy" means they're part of that group, but we definitely gotta be careful with throwing out affirmations which are unfounded.

I say there's management issues, hardware progression issues & gamer expectations issues.