Why do GT games look so freakin good?

[inefficient]

I dunno, the cars look great but the environments seem bare. It's almost like the a-team worked on the cars, and the rest was outsourced. I just saw this link in another thread on PGR:

It looks perfectly fine for Suzuka. The road itself looks great. And the surroundings are a fairly accurate representation of the real circuit that happens to be out in the middle of no where.

What are you suggesting they add to the environment to make it less "bare".

 

[Cheezdoodles]

anybody got gt pics of suzuka?

<- havent seen them

 

[aselto]

its quite obvious the rear/side mirrors are not finished yet and they just put those in for place holders. they even said that in the dev walkthrough video.

Sorry, I didn't see any dev walkthrough for this game, only gameplay video from gamersyde(not saying they didn't say that or that it won't change in the final version).

as for the environments, they are simple because thats how they are. GT uses real tracks, its not like they're going to throw a bunch of city building at Laguna Seca just to make it look pretty.

But objects that are on the tracks could be more detailed... just look at trees.

wait until we see some city tracks before you say such things.

Didn't we already see them in the E3 trailer?

as for aliasing, i have to agree. i wish they targeted 720p with anti-aliasing instead of 1080p without. hopefully they can add some AA in the final product. still, aliasing does not make it look worse overall.

Worse than what? Hipothetical GT5 Prologue without aliasing?

 

[joker454]

It looks perfectly fine for Suzuka. The road itself looks great. And the surroundings are a fairly accurate representation of the real circuit that happens to be out in the middle of no where.

What are you suggesting they add to the environment to make it less "bare".

Not suggesting anything, just trying to figure out what people here see in GT that makes them spit coke from their nose when compared to it's competitors.

 

[Cheezdoodles]

Not suggesting anything, just trying to figure out what people here see in GT that makes them spit coke from their nose when compared to it's competitors.

it has allways been the cars for me. They allways (imo) looked better than the competition. The environment, not so much.

 

[Lycan]

Not suggesting anything, just trying to figure out what people here see in GT that makes them spit coke from their nose when compared to it's competitors.

It just looks better, 1080p at 60 fps being the icing on the cake. How they achieve it is their own matter...

 

[MonkeyLicker]

I got absolutely torn apart on GA forums for suggesting that Polyphonys secret is their incredible artists. Someone suggested GT5 was a title that showed the PS3s power advantage over the 360. I replied that it was Polyphonys artists and their ability to maximize their available resources that made it possible.
I was basically called an idiot and received a tag from one of the Sony fan mods because of it.
I bring this up simply to say how much I appreciate this place and the open minds people bring to discussion. I also appreciate the fact the we have developers kind enough to post here to help keep everything rooted in reality and fact.

 

[Arwin]

For me its' the cars first and foremost. The details on them, the way they are lit, and the way they move. Other car games all have plenty of stuff in them that breaks the illusion, whether it's the lighting, mistakes in the car models, or mistakes in their animation (in terms of how the springs move and so on).

Adding to that, while their tracks aren't always the most detailed or best ever, they are huge on fidelity - again, they rarely have parts that break the illusion. The lighting and colors are still about as real as they are on the cars, and the 60fps always helps too. There's videos of the Nurburgring side by side with the real thing in the same season, and it looks incredibly accurate.

It's the kind of attention to detail that really sets the game apart.

Of course, all the recent criticism (with regards to GT4) is justified too - it really needed online play. Without it, you needed better AI. It had neither. For me personally it was a small problem - I enjoy the racing and the improvement in realism with the 900 degree FF wheel from Logitech was incredible. Added to that, I have for a long time gotten my kicks from GT through online Time Trials and regional LAN parties, which have always been great fun and stimulate you to work on your lines in between the events.

 

[Crayon]

Wait wait wait. The cars look the best in GT5 Prologue, but other than that there's nothing extraordinary. Aliasing is very bad, reflections in mirrors have extremely low resolution and shadows are very jaggy. Not only that, but environments are quite simple. imo it's not better than competition.

I ddin't mean to suggest that the argument is forever settled. Just that we have for the most part reached a consensus that there is something to the artistry in GT's visuals that puts it a cut above. I think that's fair to say.

 

[Darkon]

I got absolutely torn apart on GA forums for suggesting that Polyphonys secret is their incredible artists. Someone suggested GT5 was a title that showed the PS3s power advantage over the 360. I replied that it was Polyphonys artists and their ability to maximize their available resources that made it possible.
I was basically called an idiot and received a tag from one of the Sony fan mods because of it.
I bring this up simply to say how much I appreciate this place and the open minds people bring to discussion. I also appreciate the fact the we have developers kind enough to post here to help keep everything rooted in reality and fact.

Are you trying to suggest that GA is a Sony love fest forum ?

you gotten a tag because you said something stupid get over it.

PD isn't done with the game yet so who knows how the environments look like in the final build , I do expect to be equally impressed as I am with the car models

 

[xatnys]

Are you trying to suggest that GA is a Sony love fest forum ?

you gotten a tag because you said something stupid get over it.

Except what he's describing doesn't seem at all stupid. On top of their usage of the PS3 (i.e. on the programming end) their artists are definitely very talented.

@joker454: I have to say that PGR4 video does look very good. I'd honestly prefer to play both games myself before giving judgement. I don't think there's any doubt that PD could achieve similar results particularly on the environment end, but that simply doesn't seem to be their focus at present.

 

[ihamoitc2005]

as for aliasing, i have to agree. i wish they targeted 720p with anti-aliasing instead of 1080p without. hopefully they can add some AA in the final product. still, aliasing does not make it look worse overall.

My personal choice for this one game is 1080P with no AA is best. GT5P has no AA and for me it looks amazing. I think because of 1080P resolution jaggies are not so obvious unless you look for this in screenshots. In video you do not notice this. At low resolution like 720P, even with 2xAA, I think you can see more jaggies Ido you remember PGR3?) and you have blurrier picture. Someone made Halo2 PC comparison pictures where you can see this problem. If you must have great AA then have 480P and get 4x AA and 6x effects! But GT5P already has enough effects for real life look so extra effects are not needed. For GT5P I am happy to have 1080P because you get enough effects and can see more details like real life so you get very good "immersion" sense.

 

[Cheezdoodles]

Um...

1. PGR3 wasn't 720p @ 2x AA. It ran at a sub 720p resolution and upscaled
2. 2x AA at 720p is roughly the same amount of jaggies that 1080p no AA offers.
3. Personally jaggies are super visible in games with no AA (both in 1080p and 720p), aspecially racing games if you use the behind car camera.

 

[ihamoitc2005]

same jaggies, much sharper picture

Um...

1. PGR3 wasn't 720p @ 2x AA. It ran at a sub 720p resolution and upscaled
2. 2x AA at 720p is roughly the same amount of jaggies that 1080p no AA offers.
3. Personally jaggies are super visible in games with no AA (both in 1080p and 720p), aspecially racing games if you use the behind car camera.

So since 720P 2xAA has same jaggies as 1080P no AA then obviously if we can have 1080P no AA it is much better image quality because the picture will be much more sharp but have no more jaggies.

Maybe I am incorrect on this but I feel there are areas where 720P 2xAA will have more jaggies than 1080P no AA. Like telephone lines.

 

[Laa-Yosh]

you gotten a tag because you said something stupid get over it.

Actually he's quite right, Polyphony's artists are out of this world...

 

[Kfyh]

I had a theory that no other driving game developer wants to directly compete with the Gran Turismo cars. So some focus on environments, some on car customisation, tire grip, driving model etc. This helps gran turismo cars stand out more.

I was looking at some of the GT5 screenshots I've collected. Some of the things that really stood out for me were:

1. The way the glass windows refract and reflect
2. The perspex on the headlights and taillights seem to have some thickness to it
3. Car badges look like actually badges attached to the shell
4. Grills and exhaust have a thickness to them
5. The different materials used like carbon fibre on the GT-R
6. The camera focus making the car in focus look sharp
7. The camera angles feel like tv coverage of a racing event
8. The reflections off the cars seem to be coherent across the panels on the side of the car
9. Lack of motion blur and limited bloom.

Bloom effects never feel right to me in a video game (including some of the GT5 screenshots). IDK, maybe I'm projecting the level of light i have in my room onto what i see in the picture and they don't line up. Or maybe the dynamic range of light i'm used to on a tv signal is very low. Still shots with motion blur also feel wrong to me as well, cameras are better than that.

 

[Acert93]

I dunno, the cars look great but the environments seem bare. It's almost like the a-team worked on the cars, and the rest was outsourced.

Wait wait wait. The cars look the best in GT5 Prologue, but other than that there's nothing extraordinary.

I agree. Although I would probably say, "The cars in GT are amazing and are head and shoulders above most of the competition, and ahead of all. The environments and other elements are above average, but nothing to write home about imo". Some other racers do "other stuff" that GT isn't doing, and vice versa, so the comparison isn't so linear.

I don't want to get into comparisons, but I will say this: The low contrast "overcast" lighting in another game is really impressive in regards to lighting model. Particle effects are really insane in some of the competition, as is weather in one. Damage is a central part to a couple other racers.

So, like you, I don't agree that GT5 blows everything else away. It looks great, even amazing. Best cars to date in sunny situations. But as a total package, I agree with joker that it seems all the A-team is on cars and the B-team is everywhere else. The contrast between the fidelity of the cars and everything else is jarring to me.

And what I like about GT is the craftmanship. Even before there were reflections it looked amazing. The attention to detail is superb. And I think they do a good job of balancing the techniques currently available in a way to meet the "eyes' expections". It doesn't matter if you have excellent models, per pixel reflections, nice soft shadows shadows, and ambient occlusion maps if your paint shader is off, your lighting saturation is overdone with way too much bloom, and so forth.

The PD guys have shown for 3 generations now that they know how to use the hardware to best convey their cars. GT/GT2 were nice looking games, GT3/GT4 were amazing looking on the PS2 with outstanding car models (even with poly limitations) and excellent lighting, and GT5 has cars that when combined with excessive DOF and from the right angle look near photorealistic. They have an eye for technology and art. The fact the environments are bland is partially due to the nature of the art assets (same thing I said about FM2 before we saw screenshots; the realism of race courses is quite bland and boring) but also because they have put so much effort into the cars and their design goal (60fps, 16 cars, etc). If they were aiming for 30fps with 8 cars could they improve their scenery a lot? Add a better particle system? Do damage and weather effects? They would have more resources to play with, that is for sure.

 

[Acert93]

I had a theory that no other driving game developer wants to directly compete with the Gran Turismo cars. So some focus on environments, some on car customisation, tire grip, driving model etc. This helps gran turismo cars stand out more.

I don't think they do it to avoid GT; that is like saying GT is focusing on the cars so as to not compete with the other areas you mention. The evnironment is as much, if not more so, part of the game's graphics. And driving model and customization are core elements of the gameplay/diversity. I think it comes down to design decisions. PD wanted killer cars. They wanted 1080p, 60fps, with 16 beautiful cars on screen. Other games had different, but overlapping, goals. I think the finished GT product will be one of the top 2 or 3 looking racers (very likely #1), but it is about tradeoffs and goals. Maybe going big on the car budget is the best use of resources with the current technology?

 

[MechanizedDeath]

GT5P has twice the number of cars at twice the resolution. The gauntlet has been thrown down. I don't know how it can be argued that the game is not a technical marvel. If PD is making compromises, then wtf is the competition doing?

I've proposed this before, and GT5 was actually the first game I expected to see showing off 1080p visuals (didn't expect Lair to achieve so much). I proposed that the dominance of opaque draw in racing games allowed higher resolutions due to reduced overdraw. As a result, PD can get away with not just more objects on screen, but more pixels drawn as well. I don't think we'll ever see an FPS at 1080p, but a racing game should work well.

It's as technical as I'll get since I have no shader/coding knowledge and can't get in-depth in the actual mechanics of a graphics engine. But I do understand that a hindrance to high-resolutions is bandwidth and shader power, and I think racing games, by nature, ease the requirements for both. Just my thoughts. PEACE.

 

[wco81]

From one of the latest trailers, I thought London looked amazing. Plus previous GT games, they rendered other familiar sites very well and they made a big deal of the fact that they traveled to these places to capture the terrain.

Also liked the E3 2005 trailer where they showed like an aerial chase view. Don't know if that was in game but if they could do replays like that, it would be amazing. It was almost Lair-esque in scale and macro detail.

Still, If they do have to budget resources, it'd be perfectly acceptable to take away detail from the environments, most of which you'd be whizzing by high speeds.