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Next-Gen Graphics Might Not Sell Games
jayintune writes "2old2play has a great editorial up regarding the next generation of gaming, and suggests that maybe 'next-gen' graphics and sound will not be what sells games this time around. Instead the next-gen champions will be the ones that provide better content and innovation in their games." From the article: "The average gamer is in their mid-thirties. Many of these adult gamers understand the value of a dollar and have a firm grasp on technological trends. The trend is simple: new technology arrives and costs a ton of money, then prices lower as newer technology hits the market. Developers are not screaming for larger removable disk capacity, yet Sony is forcing a consumer (and developer) to purchase a high capacity Blu-ray device 'for the future.' By the time Blu-ray and HD-DVD's are needed for gaming we will be in the 8th generation of console systems. Why force it on us now?"
Honesty may be the best policy, but by process of elimination, dishonesty is the second best policy.
Sony wants the HD DVD market. By putting a Blue ray drive into the machine, it puts that many more blue ray drives in households so they can get the movie studios to want to release movies on blue ray discs. plain and simple.
The game I've seen the most hype for lately is Spore and it goes in the opposite direction as far as graphics are concerned. It looked good, but graphics weren't really important at all. During demonstrations nobody was talking about how good the graphics were, they were talking about this new, innovative way of making games. While it's hard to sell a game that doesn't look pretty it looks like it's going to be pretty easy to sell a decent looking, completely innovative game.
I've always pictured the color of OS zealotry as a sort of bright flamingo pinkish hue
As an Xbox 360 owner I couldn't give a flying fuck about the HD DVD drive. I don't want one and I have no use what so ever of one. But I'm glad Microsoft had the foresight of not making me pay an extra $200 to have one.
Graphics alone doesn't sell games. Gameplay alone doesn't sell games. Cinematics alone doesn't sell games. If you want to sell games, have abit of all of the above, gamers want a full game, not just a cool feature or buzz word. Good games have a balance of what makes games good, so have abit of everything in them.
Gameplay always sells over graphics quality. Consider games like World Of Warcraft and GTA: San Andreas, with their blocky 3000 polygon character models, and how it sells far more than any other game.
Maybe is a powerfull word. It makes this entire article pure speculation, opinion, and suggestion.
I would like better game play, better coding so games run smooth on older hardware and better overall scene emersion but I will play anyway.
The truth is that these next gen games will sell just as well as the last, with or without game play... it that were not true Id would not be in business any more.
Let's see ... story, plot, sound, gameplay, multiplay features (assuming that the game is not multiplayer-focused), physics ...
These companies need to realize that a large portion of the gaming population came from a time when 16-color EGA and then 256-color VGA were the norm. Graphics are no longer the big "ooh aah" that they used to be because we've had realistic graphics for years! Oh, but look! We can make it more realistic!
Some games that are mindless fun have sold well (e.g.: Doom) but there still comes a time when people need more than graphics. Sam and Max and those old LucasArts games sold because they were FUN. Magic Carpet was the perfect combination of everything - graphics, sound, gameplay, fun factor! (I *so* wish someone would buy the rights to it and release a more modern version.) Look at how popular Infocom games were (and still bring fond memories to many) with no graphics at all.
Then there are games like Red Faction on the other side. Truly destructable terrain, something that had not been seen since Magic Carpet, but the game sucked! Besides destructable terrain, it was another FPS.
Frankly, with respect to this whole attitude that "it might not be about the graphics", my only response is "It's about f**king time you realized that!" Graphics are one part of the successful game formula. It's too bad that the gamers recognized that balance a lot time ago and that developers apparently are only now catching up.
The Overrated mod is for reversing inappropriate, positive mods, not for voicing disagreement with a post.
1. sparkly graphics
2. great gameplay
3. low budget
pick two.
People forget that with the bump in optical technology here we're also getting a substantial bump in data transfers.
In the case of PS3, this is false. The BluRay drive in PS3 has a slower transfer rate than the DVD drive in X360. Most likely it will be slower than Wii as well, since Nintendo's president spent a few minutes talking about slow load times during the E3 conference.
For all those people on Slashdot who argue that graphics don't matter to gamers anymore, I'd like to offer myself as a counterexample. Graphics do matter to me, in a big way. And I know that there are others out there like me, because otherwise ATI and NVIDIA wouldn't be able to sell high-end graphics boards. Maybe we aren't the majority, but we do exist.
First, let's get something out of the way. The top of the line version of each system is really the only one to get. The big thing about PS3 is blu-ray, and that will eventually be useless as a movie player unless you have the $600 version (HDMI). You get a good value for the premium 360, as componenet cables and a memory card would nearly take up the difference themselves. MS stated they would drop the price of the 360 yearly, so let us assume in november the premium will drop to $360. Nintendo would be considered a value at $250 this generation, so I'll assume they will go for that. So that leaves us $600 vs $360 vs $250.
I believe most gamers will vie for something with next-generation graphics, and likely something innovative as well. So this means likely a Wii and either a 360 or PS3.
The problem I have with the PS3, other than price, is that it is a gamble. First, I'm gambling that blu-ray will become the established format. Then, I'm gambling that $70 APEX (or some other cheap chinese) blu-ray/HD-DVD players won't come out within a year and negate the PS3. All the DVD player technical reviews I have seen stated that the ps2 dvd player was mediocre quality, how do I know that the ps3 player will be superior to a cheap chinese knockoff?
So, for $600 in novemeber I can get a premium 360 and a Wii, and I bet within a year a combo HD player for under $100. Why should I get a PS3? I get both innovative gameplay and next-gen graphics for the same price as a ps3, and I won't be stuck gambling that bu-ray will be the next format. (yah, it took a long time for DVD player prices to go down, but the cheap chinese companies are already here this time, and I doubt they care if they get the blu-ray specs legally).
Good graphics just means that the game is pleasing to watch, it's not necessarily anything to do with technology.
Take Katamari Damacy: flat shaded, small textures and low polygon objects, but the whole thing looks great because of the art style. Compare that to something like Unreal Tournament 2004, which has technologically better graphics but just looks dull and soulless in comparison.
How can the game be even an evolution simulation while leaving out the possibility of fur. From what we've seen so far they seemed to have left out any possibility of creating MAMMALS of any kind. No live birth (only eggs), no hair, no mammary glands.
If I can't evolve my creature to look like any REAL creature as well as imaginary, then what's the point of giving me constrained freedom. If I can't evolve a mouse into an ape into a human, then why play an evolving game.
Seriously, the scale bump mapping looks great, but if the PS2 can do great fur for Shadow of the Collosus and the XBox 360 can do fur for Kameo, then the average 2007 gamer PC should be able to do fur no problem. I just hope that Will Wright rectifies this design error before the game ships - and doesn't make it a Mammals expansion. Just so you know I am looking forward to this game, I just thought I would cut through the irrational exuberance surrounding it.
Well playing some DS/GBA games I am forced to ask myself when Nintendo will finally pull their games into 1990 and add some bloody speech. It is really a nice change to be able to just listen to your handheld rather then having to read slowly scrolling text.
It's not a technology problem, as even the GBA is perfectly capable of decoding GSM audio at 30 kbps. It's a content production problem. It costs Nintendo money to pay Charles Martinet to speak all of Mario's lines.
Frankly we hear this same discussion about graphics being less important then gameplay every console generation and everytime a new vidcard comes out. So far it doesn't seem to stop people buy the latest console or vidcard.
That's because the console makers stop making the older consoles and stop authorizing titles for them. There are no new NES, Super NES, N64, or Game Boy Color games being produced commercially, and among the three handhelds that Nintendo sells that can play Game Boy Advance games (GBA SPv2, Game Boy micro, Nintendo DS), only one can also play Game Boy Color games.
On a good PS2 game you can have a large playable area with seemingly no loading time, the relevant datas being streamed off the DVD. Having a hard drive is a better version of this. Remember playing games like Resident Evil series (never available for the original Xbox), when you come to a door, there will a pause while the next room is loaded. On a well written game for console with a hard drive as standard, the next room will be cached to the hard drived as the player comes near it, so when he opens the door, it's already there. The PS3 don't have to install the whole game to hard drive, just that while you nearly finish with a level, next level will already be off loaded to the hard drive. Ergo, no loading time. I remember reading an old article about the Xbox. One bragging right the original Xbox have over PS2 is persistent world. Say, on a PS2, you enter a new room and suddenly decide to turn back, the console will have to load it back, taking few annoying seconds, Whereis on the (original) Xbox, the datas is still on the hard drive, taking maybe a few miliseconds to download. Now the situation is reverse.
Except that, in practice, BluRay isn't better tech after all. They still haven't cracked commercial replication of dual-layer discs, and there's no prospect of it happening at an affordable price in the next twelve months.
Which leaves at least the first gen of discs stuck at 25Gb, wheras every HD-DVD film I've checked so far has been on a 30Gb disc. Also, DD+ hi-def or TrueHD lossless audio is only optional on BluRay (and Sony don't plan to use them, due to lack of space) wheras at hi-def audio support is mandatory.
BluRay has the theoretical design capability to catch up and overtake HD-DVD, but it's got to make itself look like the winner first, or it won't even get the chance. Meanwhile, nowhere I've checked has any Toshiba A1 players in stock, because they're selling out as fast as they can make them.
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