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Miller, Wright, Mechner Discuss Videogame Graphics
Thanks to GameSpot for its article covering a panel discussing videogame graphics at the Computer History Museum in Silicon Valley. According to the article: "The panel of designers--The Sims and SimCity architect Will Wright; The Manhole, Myst, and Riven-creator Rand Miller... and Prince of Persia and Karateka designer Jordan Mechner--presented ideas which simultaneously praised the progress made in the past decade and cautioned against relying solely on the bells and whistles those faster GPUs provide." Interestingly, opinions on graphical fidelity differ, with Miller arguing: "We draw every little blade of grass, because we can", but Wright "reiterated his overall recipe to making great games--a less-is-more approach to leveraging and relying on graphics to drive the user experience."
Zelda: 4 Swords is a very solid testament to the "Less is More" approach. I had a friend come over and scold me for buying what looked to be a SNES grade title, but as soon as all four of us had our glowing SP's in hand, it was a whole different story.
I remember an article [simcity.ea.com] published at SimCity's official site. It is clear that those super 3D game cards are superb in smooth reflections, glass-like layers, and so on.
But they don't make a good job rendering thousands of small renderings -- exactly what SimCity 4 needs.
I too like to use Linux to play games, except I like the fancy graphics, and I get them!. UT2004, Neverwinter, etc. What is the aversion to using X?
I'm happy to use the binary drivers to get the HW accel, but I can at least see the logic of wanting to have opensource drivers. If that's what you wan't, then just use the DRI version of dirvers for supported cards (sometimes less performance, but still OK).
But, if you demand to use the text console to play games, or the frame buffer than you have nothing to complain about -- you've gotten what you wished for!
It is true that graphics play a big role in the popularity of video games, but to me it has gotten a little out of hand in the last year or so, especially with first person shooters. Every other FPS that comes out is the same style gameplay of Counter-Strike, but with better graphics. I have personally gotten old of CS gameplay and so I moved on to Battlefield 1942 two years ago. Now I have gotten a little old of that, especially after wasting my money on Battlefield Vietnam, which was basically the same gameplay as Eve Of Destruciton (Mod of Battlefield 1942), but with better graphics. In the end, the better graphics was not worth the money. My point is that creating a fps based on another fps gameplay, but advancing the graphics is never worth the money in my opinion. Hopefully Half-Life 2 will add some new dyanmic and different gameplay than games of the past. I know the original Half-Life not only changed the way fps graphics were done, but it also created a totally new type of gameplay. The software designers should stop being lazy and start being iventive again instead of spending all their time on creating new code that only makes something look more real. Whatever happen to the genius people who first created Super Mario Bros, Zelda, Quake, & Half-Life? I refuse to think that all the gameplay types viable to be created in our graphics world have all been used up already. Shoot, I find the original Super Mario Bros (NES) more fun than some of the fps games coming out now.
I couldn't think of anything witty to say, so...you're stuck with this.
> What is the aversion to using X?
The ugly API. I write for the framebuffer because I can get a cleaner API there. Not that this is a popular attitude - slashdotters hate the Windows monopoly, but consider it a heresy to not use OpenGL for graphics. Just try saying you still use a console and it's a guaranteed Troll mod.
The second objection is that nVidia binary drivers don't work with the console framebuffer (see their driver FAQ). And for me, given the choice between giving up the framebuffer console and giving up gaming on Linux (which I still don't believe is possible), I will choose the console, no contest.
The third objection is that nVidia drivers work with a specific kernel version; if you upgrade, you are out of luck. Then you'll have to reboot into a different kernel image just to play games, and I can boot into Windows for that.
> But, if you demand to use the text console to
> play games, or the frame buffer than you have
> nothing to complain about -- you've gotten what you wished for!
And this response illustrates perfectly the reason people do not switch to Linux in droves. It's so apt, the "you weirdo!" accusation. I thought Linux was the place for weirdos, while Windows only supported conformists, but I guess I was wrong.
I do agree with you about Myst, but your comments about Prince of Persia are misguided. Yes, the fluid animation was good eye candy when it was first released, but it also broke some new ground in gameplay elements.
All of the platform games I can remember before PoP would let you jump instantly from a ledge as long as a couple pixels of your character's feet were still on the ground. PoP changed this by requiring forethought, you would only make a running jump by pressing jump a tile before you actually were going to jump.
PoP spawned its own type of game, the puzzle platformer. Out Of This World, Flashback, Blackthorne. In fact, considering the planned action and trial-and-error gameplay, I would be so bold as to say that PoP is the spiritual ancestor of the modern "stealth" genre.
I'm on top of my game like I'm standin' on Xbox.