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Is HD Important To The Future of Gaming?
Gamasutra's weekly question to the industry taps the pulse of designers and developers on the importance of HD in gaming. From the article: " Absolutely. After seeing a game like Oblivion in HD, I think most gamers will never look back. That's going to affect the amount of time and money that gets put into top-shelf games. It's certainly going to increase the market for texture designers. -Morgan LaVigne, Classroom, Inc "
because I cant frickin afford one. I got a DS. Thats not in HD. Yet its some of the most fun gaming I've had in years.
:)
But then again, I'm a cynical prick
"Something's wrong with you...and I hope we never do meet again." - Deftones When Girls Telephone Boys
Yes. Yes, HD is vital to the future of gaming.
HD will allow us to make better, more engaging games. It'll make them more fun, more challenging. It'll force us to innovate by creating new interfaces and new philosophies. HD will certainly improve the quality of game software, make games more accessible to the general public, and will even go so far as to absolve gaming for being responsible for violent crime.
Chess is a great game. Chess doesn't care about HD. It never did and it never will. Article gets -1 Irrelevant. Thanks for another gem, Zonk.
Attention deficit disorder is a complicated issue, spanning several major... HEY LET'S GO RIDE BIKES!
... but that's it. Doesn't make new genres possible or improve gameplay. We just need faster and faster CPUs (for AI) and lower latency network connections more than another billion polygons or four times the screen resolution.
If there isn't more innovation people are going to get bored and stop playing.
"Armed forces abroad are of little value unless there is prudent counsel at home" - Cicero
Hi-def in games is essential in the near future because plumetting prices have encouraged many people to buy big, HD TV's. They need/want HD games for three reasons: (1) Standard-def looks poor on a digital (non-CRT) HD screen, because it has to be scaled to the HD unit's native resolution (2) On a big (40"+) screen, a game's graphical flaws (low poly count, low-detail textures, etc) are glaringly visible, and (3) In order to justify the $$ that they spent on their new HDTV's, owners want to know that all of their equipment (PVR, DVD, game consoles, etc) are showing HD content.
Slashdot: come for the pedantry, stay for the condescension.
"Is HD Important To The Future of Gaming?"
Real time graphics have come a long way. However, I'm still watching DVDs that are far more visually stunning than I'm seeing on video game systems. In the mean time, to crank out the higher resolution stuff, you need more memory and more processing power. The result? Well, sure, you're rendering at higher resolutions, but you're not gaining much detail. Just some clarity. (Slower frame rates, to boot.)
Don't get me wrong, I'd love to play in HD, but plain ol broadcast still has a ways to go.
"Derp de derp."
... It's just another thing Microsoft takes credit for "innovating". My monitor does 1600x1200, meaning I can run some games in pretty damn "HD", and I've seen the low-res textures and models before anyone complained about 360 ports of Xbox games -- I'm talking about playing Quake3 and Jedi Academy at 1600x1200...
The only thing more "HD" about the 360 is that it's probably about 3x as powerful as my desktop. But that'll change, and I don't have to pay a subscription fee to download demos of indy games. For that matter, how can a game be "indy" if it's published by Microsoft? I'd hardly call them "independent"...
And I don't really want to pay $50 for a 360 game. Know why? Because they will almost certainly be too short/repetitive. UT2004 installed on something like 5 or 10 gigs, and then there were mods -- piles and piles of mods -- and that was nowhere near the level of detail in current "next-gen" or "HD" games, and yet, Microsoft stuck with the DVD format. I don't want to swap discs, and developers know this, so games will probably stay on one disc, meaning either lower detail, shorter games, or much more repitition.
If not, well then, there are good games that are relatively small -- Half-Life 2 is just over a gig -- but in that case, I'll just stick with PC gaming, thank you very much.
I'll wait to buy my 360 until it has a solid Linux port, and I can get a DVI cable to plug it into my monitor. Even then, I might just buy an original xbox -- they're getting cheaper every day.
And for the record, I'm as much of a pixel whore as anyone else, but I don't see enough good "HD" content coming out to pull me away from my very low-definition, high-content MMO. Nexus forever!
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
Given that computer users have been getting near HD-quality & better for a while, it is really only important for the console systems, and as such is naturally a selling point. HD in of itself is not important as is the overall fact that game engines & hardware are improving very quickly, now approaching cinematic quality in certain instances. High resolution art will become more common in-game, not just in prerendered sequences and thus greater time & energy will need to be spend on creating those assets, but this was going to happen without HD, just look at where the Unreal3 engine is heading.
My argument is mainly that this is not a result of HD; HD has just appeared at a time when this is now possible. If we had HD 10 years ago, we would have high resolution displays with low resolution games & art. If we still didnt have HD today, we'd still have pretty nice computer monitors which would take advantage of the high resolution artwork that UE3 and the like is offering. HD just ensures it will be spread into the mainstream even faster through consoles as opposed to computers. Hopefully it will also raise the expectations of game art & assets in general for all games & systems.
"What can a thoughtful man hope for mankind on Earth, given the experience of the past million years? Nothing." -Bokonon
It is, and it will be... but not right now. At the moment, there isn't a large enough installed base of HDTVs in consumers' homes, but in a few years there will be. I'd predict around 2007 is when it will really start to matter, in the U.S. at least. This is assuming we are talking about consoles though, as high resolution graphics have mattered for quite some time in the PC market.
-Derick Eisenhardt, EMH Games
Spell cheek you've failed me four the last thyme!
HD has 4:3 aspect ratios too. It's a common misconception that HD necessarily means 16:9. In fact some xbox (1) games support 4:3 HD resolutions. It looks a little silly to play that way (since there's all that blank space unless you stretch/deform the picture) but it's nice to have the extra detail.
As for whether HD is critical to gaming, the answer should be DUH. It's been answered on the PC for years. 320x200 stopped being "enough" over 10 years ago. 640x480 (for practical purposes, this is standard TV res) went out with the VooDoo. If you are used to playing PC games at 1600x1200, you'll upgrade or drop other details before you drop resolution. It's just consoles and their addiction to the living room TV that have been stuck in the stone age.
No it wasn't. Compared to the images of pretty much any LCD game, the sprites in GB screen were unbelievably blocky. What GB did was allow the sprites to move freely, instead of just from one prepainted position to another; but as far as image quality goes, those old LCD displays beat GB hands down - and if we're just talking resolution and sharpness, they propably still beat any pixel-based display in existence.
GB allowed far more complex gameplay than the old LCD handhelds; but that happened at the expense of graphical quality, not because of it.
Personally, I have to wonder where the resources to make higher-resolution models and textures are going to come, and if they mean that game companies will become even less willing to take any risks. We need better content creation tools, where better means easier, and easier means faster to learn and faster to use. The current situation where game development costs keep on rising is simply unsustainable.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
I don't think HD is the future on its own. Surely as HD adoption happens in the TV market place, HD will become necessary and common to satisfy those consumers. HD however, is rather meanlingless in the bigger picture. Most people don't have HD tv sets right now and aren't going out to purchase them just to play games. HD is going to become a bigger headache than anything for gaming companies in the immediate future. As companies make games, they are going to have to decide how much time to devote to making the game look good and with what resolution. In the last gen, companies focused on getting standard def to look as awsome as possible. This is evident on Resident Evil 4 on the gamecube. Capcom used the system well to get a beautiful looking game out there. If HD would have been a factor, they would most likely spend the time getting HD to be awsome with little concern for the standard def people. HD will be treated as a requirement to the game.
The situation will be similiar to the X-Box 360 hard drive issue. Gamers will be assumed to own the hard drive and games will be made with that assumption. Nintendo revolution is smart in putting off HD for a generation, this will allow all game companies to make games as pretty as possible for the majority of the consumers, not just those fortunate enough (or crazy enough) to be early HD owners...
in Morrowind, I turned up resolution when I was low level so I could avoid the flying bird monsters (they're a nightmare to kill if you don't have a good ranged attack untill you're pretty high level). I was able to see them clearly from a distance because I played in 1024x768. With tv resolutions they'd be indistinguishable green dots on you before you realized it (they draw a bead on you when they get close).
When I used to play Shadow Warrior on a lan playing in 640x480 gave me a huge edge, I could see players across the whole level and nail them with a rail gun while they ran around.
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Because they also sell HD TVs, and, will sell you again all those movies you purchased on DVD, on the new Blu Ray.
some estimates say that as many as 50% of HD TV owners are not using them for HD...
I'm pretty sure that 50% of HD TV owners report they're not using them for HD. I would be a small fortune that another 30% aren't using them for HD, but report that they are.
For example, in the last Slashdot article about this very subject a disturbingly large number of Slashdot posters reported that they receive and HD signal only when they watched DVDs. In other words, a large number of Slashdotters would report that they're using their television for HD, but would be wrong.
1) Television usage has plummeted. Advertising dollars are slowly moving toward the Internet. Due to competing medias, people are watching less and less TV. Those who think HD is to the TV what Color TV was to Black TV do not get this. For many people, there is NO REASON to go re-buy their TV.
/ index.jhtml?headlines=true) To those who say, "development prices don't go up with HD", Cliffy B says the opposite. Nintendo says the opposite. Look at the prices for Xbox 360 games at $60 and you can see which direction this is headed. Even Electronic Arts has complained about the higher development costs. This means that all we can expect from HD games is LESS RISK. Since the market for HD games is much lower than normal TV games, they must either sell more games or price them higher.
2) Xbox 360 and PS3 are the very first consoles (that I know of) that are requiring the consumer to CHANGE their TV to get the most out of the console. No console has ever done this. This means many people will not think it worth buying a Xbox 360 or PS3 if they don't have HD TV. And face the facts: not too many people do.
3) HD increases development costs. From Gears of War developer, Cliffy B, said, "What other entertainment medium that's mass market is at $60 a pop?" said Cliff Bleszinski, lead designer at developer Epic's 360 title "Gears of War," due next year. "If video game pricing continues to go up, we will crash." http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1515122/20051128
4) Americans are obsessed with upgrading their televisions (they also have more money to do it). With the exception of perhaps a few other western nations, HD television is not catching on ANYWHERE in the world soon. While the American Market is very important to the games industry, we live in a global age. A console must work globally, not just in the American Market like the Xbox primarily has done.
5) The integration of 3d helped immersion. Rumble feedback helped immersion. Surround sound helped immersion. But how in the world does HD help immersion? While prettier pictures helped a LOT back in the 80s and during the adaptation of 3d, this was due to the console game industry being young (in the 80s) and adapting to 3d (in the 90s). Simpler a prettier image does not make the game more immersive but rather, less. This is why movies like Toy Story did not show the Humans in computerized graphics. It is the Uncanny Valley problem.
There is only ONE purpose of the HD console: that is to be 'technologically' elite with your HD TV. The problem is that video game console is based on bringing cheap entertainment to the masses. You get rich by selling to the poor, you get poor selling to the rich. This is why HD gaming is not important and, and why it will not catch on (at least this new generation).
The original PC had 640x200 graphics, with some unusual modes that provided for more colors at yet lower resolutions. The jump to EGA(640x350) and even 640x480 were minor because initially these resolutions didn't add more color depth. It took until SVGA to give us a taste of the good quality graphics we have today on the PC.
Now, on the PC it's fairly common to have people running in 1280x1024 mode. 1600x1200 resolution is possible for most people, but due to screen size and limited UI scaling in applications, it's difficult for those who use the UI to run at 1600x1200 on a 19 inch screen because the on-screen controls become too small in many cases.
In comparison to normal TV, 1024x768 is high definition. It may not be the same thing as "HD" since HD in this case refers to a television display, but it's up there. 1600x1200 of course would seem like ultra high definition in comparison then.
So, for consoles, the big thing is that they now are pushing into higher resolutions than they had access to before. PC games have had this level for ages now. It's just that consoles are finally starting to show up. If we compare Oblivion for the PC and for the Xbox 360, I'm sure the PC version will still look quite a bit better, even if there may be some bugs on some machines due to hardware differences between machines that you don't see on a console.
But, think about this, a game with poor gameplay won't be improved just by the move to higher resolutions. A boring game wil still be boring. A game may have amazing cinematic effects and scenery, and cut scenes, but just moving to a higher resolution won't make a bad game good.