More Next-Gen In-Game Goodies From EA

I reall ythink the image is indicative of what the game will look like... the visual fidelity will be the same... the onyl difference will be that during the game you will be farther away so it will be a less exciting image and there will of course be little colored circles on your current cotroled player and images of corespoinding buttons for recievers and it will seriously detract from the realism, plus a camera placed perpendicularly to the line of sckirmage will never look like the camera angles used on tv, it just doesnt make sense for control sake. But i really dont think they are varyign detail at a distance, especially considering these games will be running in high def, the weird pop in on distant opjects in halo2 is bad enough, the sudden swing in when a reciever catches a ball doesnt allow any time for a change of resources and it would also tie up ram to have multiple version of every model. We are talking about a system that is theoretically 3 times as fast as a current top of the line mac with a s**t ton of fast ram (when you consider there is no OS) and a 2 generations from now graphics card, its really not that rediculous to think that they could render some decent face detail on 24 (22?) players at once. has anyone played halflife? there are a pretty good numebr of charcters running around at once in there (and very complex environments and complex physics)and top of the line pcs arent nearly as fast as the 360 will be when it is released.
_________

This image just proves to me that in the foreseeable future we will never have games that can replicate reality.

I want a picture where the ball is in a move, with the normal camera 30 meters away from the football players, and if the game has new ways to lead the team.

Realistic graphics is more helpfull in games like Shootings, RPG, action games.
Even in thes games It is hard to tell if next generation improoved graphic can add new elements for the gameplay comparing with this actual generation consoles.

Some times too realistic games look artificial and like a mock of the reality, thats why it is important a good artistic direction.

Since I haven't actually developed 3D games with replays, I'm not sure I'm in a strong position to argue.

However...

Surely the game must record the geometory of the various car models, in relation to the track (which is of course static), throughout the course of the race. As the game is obviously raced in real-time, and is decided by the user in real-time, the engine must refresh the rendered images in an instant. Therefore, the level of complexity in creating shadows & lighting etc must be limited to keep the number crunching down. Since the geometic positioning of each car model is known prior to the replay starting, surely the processer can process what's about to be diplayed before the replay actually starts?

i havent developed any games either but i have done a pretty good amount of 3d work and read and study it a good deal



the difference being that the replays are viewed form a different angle so it still si being rendered in real time, each frame has to be complelty drawn over, in GT for example you can instantly switch camera angles, the only thing you mention that i think might help at all is knwoing where the shadow of a car may fall ont he track or where the shadow of a tree mgith fall on the car, however in order for this to be worth while it woudl have to basically create a lightmap for each individual frame and make the texture on the car animated to match its position in relation to its suroudning objects, which woudl require the sytem to save the shadow info in a movie file of sorts. Its been a whiel since i have doen any real time work but when i dabled in Quake3 level designing i know it took an awfull long time for the game to produce the light maps... several minutes... and those where static. also the fact that the backgroudn is static doesnt really matter as nothign is techically static in the sense that it isnt being redrawn. an actual static backgroudn would be like those in resident evil (not4) weatehr or not somethign is moving doesnt matter its all relative, it seems as though its sitting still and you and your car are movign through it but that makes no diffe to the processor it still has to redraw it from a diferent angle for every frame as it is being scene froma different angle.

i think im over analyzing this, but i like to cover all the bases... if im wrong abotu any of this please feel free to correct me as i am certainyl not an expert.
_____________

LUPOS, you told me that you are an expert in software inventory, now i realize you are an expert in graphic processing too. It looks like you are jack all the trades.
What else you know about?

Yeah, that was my bad in using the word render. Obviously every 3D image displayed, that has been calculated by host CPU, is constantly refreshed.

My main point is that before a replay is shown, the gemoetric position of a car, relative to the track (and other car models) is already known. Whereas during the game, the geometric position of a car is decided "on the fly" by the user (and your AI controlling your competitors), which requires more CPU resource.

When it comes to the replay, the resource required for calculating geometric positioning is now freed; thus giving the CPU the resource to render more fancy effects.

Er, I think.

jack of many trades master of none :/

i went to college for computer graphics for 3 years, didnt have the scratch to finish however. I do web stuff, flash animation, 3d modeling, basic programing, if it involves a mouse and keyboard im all over it, which is probaboly why im not especially good at any of it... my mind wanders across to many differnt things.. i always thought game producer woudl be a good career. since it involves knowing a bit about all the different aspects... yet here i am... inventorying eggs :/

i have been told that starting out as a tester is a good way to get your foot in the door and prove your know how... unfortunatly i cant afford to live in the NYC area on a testers pay.
ces la vi!
________-

correct you are, however the cpu does not handle much of the actual rendering process, it mainyl deals with calculating positions and physics and ai liek you said, so the actual visual quality is not determined by the cpu strength, the bottle neck exists at the gpu (which is generaly do way more calculations than a cpu oddly enough). So while the cpu may be free to do other things it really cant aid in the graphics on the screen that much (it can just feed the information to the gpu faster)... especialy since all those fancy effects, multiple textures for specularity and normal and bump mapping, z-buffer to create a focus effect for depth, real time lighting, are all handled by the gpu with shaders (at least on the xbox and GC, i dont know how such things are acomplished on a ps2 as i think it has no built in shader suport, so that might actualy be handled by the cpu, but then it is more of a post render effect so i dont know for sure).
__________

When stating CPU I was sort of referring to number crunching in general. But overall I think this deserves a harmonious YAY!

am I the only one NOT impressed with these screen shots in the least bit... I think they look horrible, especialy the first shot that was released that featured a close up of a face.. you can clearly see the low polygon render of a nose thats also poorly textured, I think ESPN NFL 2005 on the current x-box looks substantialy better, and its already out.. although I will reseave judgement until more detailed screen shots are revealed. I didnt notice any bump mapping or normal mapping, the textures looked PS2 quality, and the low polygon models look severly outdate.. this is next generation we're talking about.. i shouldnt be able to tell the diffrence between a screenshot of an actual football game and a screen shot from a video game. These players should be sporting a polygon count of 30,000 a peice

You know something, this is stupid but I really couldn't care less about EA and their lovely looking sports title

So it looks good, yada yada yada. But where the hell is the originality to justify my spend money on this game. Frankly I'd rather look at pic of Nintendogs because despite the N64 visuals at least it's doing something different. To know from pics that you are gonna get something different means a lot (even though sometimes you want something familiar). Familiarity can breed contempt if you don't be careful.

We really have to stop worshipping at the alter of graphics unless there is some substance behind them. So far we don't know how this game will play, it could be total wank or perhaps not.

EA are on a pre E3 blitz (first NFS shots, then Burnout 4 and now this) and frankly until the show me something like remotely interesting and original I not gonna cheer for them. So far they are just doing what EA do best pushing moldy cheese and slowly cutting the links in the chains that hold this industry up.

Perhaps the whole industry deserves to die because we have all become bottom bitches for rich Armani suited w****rs who only care about dollar digits. Only that way will the powers that be and we really learn.

Grow some balls EA, and stop hiding like a f**king girl behind sports games.

woa... i hought i was the resident loose handle around here! ;P

i personaly agree with everythign you said, and trust me, i have not stopped hating EA just cause they dribbled out some semi juicy looking screens, im just intrested to know what is next, and i ll take it where i can get it... for example... my vcr is already programmed to record mtv on may12... i havent taped anythign from mtv since the MAXX was on in like 96.

i wont be buyign any EA games at launch, although burn out will be a tough one to pass up, im hoping there is enough original IP and big name sequels to keep me saciated(sp?).

anyway, you need to take a deap breath, count to ten, and relax a bit... the truth is... we are all bottom bitches... to everything... unless you dress only in salvation army military surplus, live in a house you built yourselfon land you inherited and only listen to underground music and watch indie movies for entertainment... your somebodies bitch... you pay more moeny than you shoudl for everythign in life... and 95 percent of the time it goes to people who you wouldnt like if you met them... and who certainly dont like or care for or about you.

Im all for the "viva revolution!" bit, but man was that kind of out of left feild... where do you live, i have a lovely little green plant i would like to send you, its very soothing :P
_____________

Thanks I shall take a few gasps of air.

Now what did I do with all those lovely herbs I acquired playing RE4. I feel a nice roll up smoke is due.

Yeah I know we are all bending over for someone but I made my point anyways.

LOL

I don't see the fuss. The graphics don't look that good to me. The snow is unrealistic. It won't improve the game. Mind you, this is from the person who thinks Halo has awful graphics and diabolical, unoriginal gameplay.

When we start seeing consoles that can replicate reality we will see games in a different light. This game just shows a logical graphical progression.

I bought UT2004 at the end of last year, and was shocked at how little the graphics in PC videogames have improved since the original. There's nothing reviolutionary about those graphics - except for that they need a spec about 25x better than the original. Everything still feels artificial, and I just don't understand where the clock cycles have gone.

Graphics are important, however they are a component. And a component of decreasing importance. We expect excellent graphics as standard, and no longer buy a game based on that aspect. Consoles from this gen onwards will be just like the mature 16 bit market.

I couldn't agree more. I don't think they're that great at all. To me, improvements in graphics should mean a little more than just better textures and a higher poly count. Surely having all this new available power can present something more interesting?

at first i wasnt that awe struck but after gettign boared witht he lack of news today i took a closer look at said images and i have to say there are some pretty impressive things going on...

1)real time reflections ont he helmets: its not small feet rendering the entire staidum and multiple players differently for each helmet ont he field... now im nto positive they are real time as an area map for each stadium could do a pretty good job fakeing it but im pretty sure they are.

2) the face mask and helmet: maybe the nose coudl have used a few more polys to round out the edges, but the face shield itself and the helmet are both astonishingly curvy... the number of polys on the face mask alone must be in the thousands.

3)real time lighting: the helmet is castign a light ont he guys face, his nose is shadowing his cheak, his mask is showdwing itself.. everything is being realistically lit and shodowed.

now i know your saying, meh it dont look so great, but this is also first rouns tuff... remember what the early next gen stuff was liek last time...


and of course what it looks liek now that it has had some time to develope



so yea, its a pretty good step above what is out now, and its only first round stuff... plus, this is EA after all, these guys dont break there balls to look the best, that takes to long and costs to much, their moto aught to be "just good enough!".

____________

But the images still don't look that great. Okay, so they game isn't fully-developed yet, but look at the lack of anti-alising on the people. The polygon count on the helmet isn't even large enough for a smooth effect.

We're not seeing amazing graphical jumps this generation. As I expressed above, we're seeing a situation where excellent graphics are standard. People expect them in the same way that we expect a letter to be delivered on time for a standard charge. The few times games don't have good graphics they'll flop, but it will be impossible to sell of graphics alone.

impossible to seel a game based on graphics alone cause they will all look good... that sounds liek the best news i have heard in a long time... its like back in the days of the nes, nothing on nes looked really astounding (except mario3 of course) so the games that sold well where all really really good!

its a second renesancenerhecrse(i cant spell)!
______

Yeah, I compared it to the "mature 16 bit market" above, but the NES is a better example.

Anyway that's my point :).