[PS3] Uncharted 2

[Arwin]

If they could have, they would have.

Which part of 'if I stream a video from BluRay I have bandwidth to spare for loading my next level into RAM in the background, whereas if I render it realtime I have to stream in textures, geometry and sound and use all my RAM and end up with a loading screen afterwards' do you not understand? Ratchet & Clank did the same I think, but R&C did only the movies that lead to a new planet (completely new environment) and the rest realtime, I think. Maybe Uncharted did that too, but I can't remember. Doesn't Gears also stream in level data while playing (these days fairly badly compressed?) videos? I'm sure there are more examples.

 

[el_rika]

what's the point in arguing, really. If it gets the job done, who cares if it's realtime or not.

 

[Betanumerical]

I know they kept saying that, but the strange thing is that the game doesn't load even if i skip cutscenes.

No idea what game your playing, but if i skip the cutscenes the textures are very low res for a couple of seconds, so its clear they are loading somehting in the background.

I wish i had your magical copy so I could skip the cutscenes all the time.

 

[DaJuice]

If you play footage for cut-scenes, all you have to do is stream a video from the disc. If you try to do the cutscene in real time you have to load a bunch of assets into memory that you likely won't need for the upcoming gameplay sequences. That's all the reason right there to do cutscenes as rendered footage, and why so many games do it this way.

Cutscenes in Uncharted were very close to actual gameplay, IIRC there wasn't even any extra AA.

 

[FirewalkR]

I think my graphics whorishness (wow huh?) had something to do with what happened in this thread. *strokes chin, wondering*

ps: sorry for my part! o

 

[Npl]

I'd actually be interested to know if the cut scenes from the first game could be rendered in real time on the PS3 with a with a completely stable 30fps like the pre-rendered ones are.

For the record, ND already had Cutscenes with improved models and lighting.. in realtime, for Jak 2 and Jak 3. So its very well possible that their engine can do more if you know it will be restrained to specific camera-angles.

 

[SonComet]

For the record, ND already had Cutscenes with improved models and lighting.. in realtime, for Jak 2 and Jak 3. So its very well possible that their engine can do more if you know it will be restrained to specific camera-angles.

I know it's possible. Deepbrown implied that he had a direct contact at naughty dog and so I was curious as to what they had to say.

 

[Gitaroo]

ppl got confused with what ND mean by pre record video to mask load time, its not to mask the loading between level or stages. This was what they said

http://ps3.psu.com/PSU-talks-Uncharted-with-Naughty-Dog-Co-Vice-President--a0001851-p2.php

"The only reason we did this was to eliminate any loading time before or after a movie and make our memory management easier."

basically, if they do everything in real time, then they will have to clear some of the data in the memory and load the mew data that are needed for the cut scene, then delete the data they loaded for the cut scene after the cut scene is over and load back what ever thats need for the levels to continue the game. So there will be a much longer loading screen before cutscene, and loading screen after a cutscene, kind of like MGS4. They way they do it is reserved a tiny bit of ram for the video playback and play it instantly most of the time, if I remember correctly that is what they say in their PDF file. Honestly who cares if they get the job done and its also all about design choices, they want to game to load fast and they did it.

and they use the same character models in for Uncharted games in cut scene and gameplay, just slightly higher quality lighting and shadow.

http://www.gamezine.co.uk/news/game-types/action-adventure/naughty-dog-uncharted-2-teaser-real-time-$1252556.htm

"Richard: Thanks! Nope, the in game models are the exact same models that are used in the cutscenes. They also use the exact same textures. There really is no difference between them at all.

The only difference between the cutscenes and in game is a little higher quality lighting and shadowing. Hopefully not too noticeably different. We really wanted to keep the players immersed as much as possible. This meant using the same assets across the board."

Im pretty sure Epic did the same for gears 1, some of the rendering looks totally different in the cut scenes, like the ending thats recorded in bink video looks like it has ambient occlusion which is not present in Gears1. by the way the Uncharted 2 looks, I think they added ambient occlusion also.

 

[Nesh]

You know something? In the "how many polygons" thread I had a brief polite chat about Uncharted's character models and one of our respected members posted 2 gameplay images that showed two characters up close. The quality was almost if not completely indistinguishable from the cut scenes. If I didnt see Drake pointing his gun in the background I wouldnt have known. Unfortunately, these images dont seem to exist now, but they would have ended this silly discussion about "cut scenes vs gameplay visuals" once and for all.

 

[Neb]

You know something? In the "how many polygons" thread I had a brief polite chat about Uncharted's character models and one of our respected members posted 2 gameplay images that showed two characters up close. The quality was almost if not completely indistinguishable from the cut scenes. If I didnt see Drake pointing his gun in the background I wouldnt have known. Unfortunately, these images dont seem to exist now, but they would have ended this silly discussion about "cut scenes vs gameplay visuals" once and for all.

Characters the same acording ND but lighting and shadows slighlty(?) improved. What more is there to discuss really?

You can say it is almost fully representative of the ingame graphics but not fully since it has some vital parts improved.

 

[GarretASUS]

Not much to have to improve visually with Uncharted 2 anyway since the first game was already beautiful.

 

[RenegadeRocks]

The teaser looks great and teases you about the possibility of new locations ! The game is already one of the best looking on the ps3!
Its nice to have that !
Why the rant and fights?

 

[wco81]

Kind of ironic that when real-life pirates are in the news, Drake is going somewhere else.

Well they couldn't repeat the story in the lush jungle again.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

where are they anyway?

Trying to earn a crust at work?

I think the cutscene versus in-game discussion has been done enough before to be redundant here. But most notably, because there's nothing to see in the trailer! I could understand the debate if the trailer looked like CG, but it doesn't. It's a barren landscape with nice snow and great terrain deformation, but that's it. Why doubt it? What is there anyone sees which deserves the response 'there's no way this can be realtime!'?

What we know is there's a sequel, and Drake is in snow. There's zip else to discuss, except maybe people's guesses what the story might be, or the artefact he found. Technical talk around this bit of video is really reaching!

So please return to talk of the game. Let's at least save the 'this is/isn't realtime/in-game' talk for when there's actually something noteworthy to talk about

 

[Strange]

Nice to see the mods still alive and kicking

I personally don't favor games in the snow that much (although in reality I do love snow).
Makes looking around very eye straining.

It would be nice if we had something more than regular people, aliens, or bio engineered monsters for a change in these TPS and FPS games. Where are the robots?

 

[BoardBonobo]

Nice to see the mods still alive and kicking

I personally don't favor games in the snow that much (although in reality I do love snow).
Makes looking around very eye straining.

It would be nice if we had something more than regular people, aliens, or bio engineered monsters for a change in these TPS and FPS games. Where are the robots?

I think the robots all became fish that live in bowls and retired to the Ratchet and Clank universe!

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Oooo, snow! Looks cold. Do you think this game is set in the northern or southern hemisphere? And what about that artefact? Must have just been dropped, to be lying there uncovered. Are there any clues which historical figure Nate is tracking in Uncharted 2?

 

[AlNom]

And what about that artifact? Must have just been dropped, to be lying there uncovered.

Only The Shadow knows.

 

[Gradthrawn]

And what about that artefact? Must have just been dropped, to be lying there uncovered.

Yes, although apparently not dropped from very high, as it didn't seem to be lodged in the snow. There's no apparent vehicle or creature foot prints around it. Considering the lack of snow build up on it, I would think snow prints would still be visible if there were any. Also of note, he has no gun in his holster, and there's some device I can't make out on his right hip. He's dripping or coughing blood, as well.

I'm curious, what is "free climbing" and how does it compare to the climbing in Drakes Fortune? That was mentioned as an added gameplay mechanic, and I'm wondering what is meant by this. I remember what you could and could not climb on being highly restricted in DF, but what you could not climb or grab onto didn't go anywhere, so, it didn't matter.

 

[el_rika]

I'm curious, what is "free climbing" and how does it compare to the climbing in Drakes Fortune?.

The term of "free climbing" is pretty much self explanatory in my opinion. It will probably be something similar to the climbing mechanics we had in Assassins Creed. Unless there's something else cooking here that is