60 Frames on Past Consoles.

[shredenvain]

I think in SSOD despite the somewhat stylized cartoonish look it is the amount of things happening on screen at once along with tons of npcs and open world that kept them from aiming for 60 fps. Speaking of N64 games one of the greatest games of all time in my opinion Orcania of Time is capped at 20 fps. While I enjoy 60 fps arcade style games from the arcade era I am quite pleased that gaming as a whole has taken a step toward providing depth in games even at the cost of halfing framerate. Though it is possible to have the best of both worlds in some games.

 

[Deleted member 86764]

Its not like realistic games shouldnt have been made or they should have applied a less realistic approach.

Oh absolutely, I'm not saying for a second that games should drop realism. There will always be some genres that require it.

To be perfectly honest with you, I prefer the look of COD:AW compared to Shadowfall. I know it's not throwing as many effects on screen, but the end result, to me, is infinitely better. If I were to have the option to run games with nicer graphics or a consistent 60hz, I'd choose response every single time. I couldn't care less if the top end PC guys were playing with better shadows and particles effects.

 

[Goodtwin]

Nintendo 'cheat' somewhat and avoid realistic graphics though. If your not gunning for realism, you can take all sorts of 'short-cuts' to make your art less demanding. eg. Rim lighting faked in a shader instead of calculating it per light. It works for Nintendo because they stick to game styles that work with non-realistic renderers, but that's clearly not an option for COD, Forza/Driveclub, AC, and many other core games. If we look at games that go for a simpler like, a la Nintendo, they can hit great framerates too. eg. Ubiart engine games.

This supports the idea that Nintendo is smart in their approach. To be honest though, most of their IP's are very much cartoons, and transitioning them into photo realism would most certainly be less visually pleasing. From their perspective, they are creating games that are very nice to look at and play great, so whats the problem? Nintendo is creating their vision, Mario looks as intended, they aren't having to make a bunch of sacrifices to get the presentation they desire. There are certain IP's like Zelda and Metroid that could go for the more realistic approach, but it seems like Nintendo will likely stick with the more stylized approach for the foreseeable future. Its more obtainable with their hardware, and I am sure its less stressful for the developer, allowing them to focus more on the game itself, and less on the technical nuances.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

This supports the idea that Nintendo is smart in their approach. To be honest though, most of their IP's are very much cartoons, and transitioning them into photo realism would most certainly be less visually pleasing. From their perspective, they are creating games that are very nice to look at and play great, so whats the problem?

The problem is they aren't a model that can be extended to all and every dev. They were raised as an exemplary publisher that has a high proportion of good looking 60 Hz games, but that's because they choose to stick to games which are easier to fit into that target (stylized). Sure, if everyone else was to switch to cartoons, they too could make pretty 60 fps games, but the gaming landscape would be a lot poorer.

Point being, as per post number 2, there's nothing stopping any dev targeting 60 Hz. They just have to pick their priorities to favour it. Nintendo is an example of a publisher that does that, employing the same artistic cheats that other studios (would/could) do when targeting the same sort of styles.

 

[Arwin]

I wish that someone did some measurements of 60fps games on Vita - the response between controller input and something happening on that OLED screen (which updates pixels faster than LCD as well) is really something else.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I prototyped a mobile rhythmn game yesterday and it played like stink on my Nexus 7. Looked up latency - 150 ms! Touch input can be really crappy, but it also tends to be lower on iThings, accounting in part for their sense of responsiveness (so people say).

So even at 60fps on a mobile device, the experience isn't good enough without low latency. That's another thing to consider with the Old Consoles. Their simplicity meant fast response, smooth drawing, which is what differentiated them from PCs.

 

[Davros]

(which updates pixels faster than LCD as well)

Is that still true as we now have lcd's with 1ms response ?

 

[Arwin]

0.001ms I think is the full pixel change of an OLED, so while it may be becoming negligible, OLED's still quite far ahead. LCDs also don't always manage to get to their full brightness in the quoted time. I remember reading a lot about this with 3D active displays, that the time needed to go from black to full brightness wasn't fast enough to maintain the full brightness of the image in 3D. Things likely have improved, but even with Oculus Rift development they've talked about how much better OLED is at this.

 

[Goodtwin]

The problem is they aren't a model that can be extended to all and every dev. They were raised as an exemplary publisher that has a high proportion of good looking 60 Hz games, but that's because they choose to stick to games which are easier to fit into that target (stylized). Sure, if everyone else was to switch to cartoons, they too could make pretty 60 fps games, but the gaming landscape would be a lot poorer.

Point being, as per post number 2, there's nothing stopping any dev targeting 60 Hz. They just have to pick their priorities to favour it. Nintendo is an example of a publisher that does that, employing the same artistic cheats that other studios (would/could) do when targeting the same sort of styles.

Sure they can, there is nothing stopping other developers from adopting more cartoonish art styles for their games. Borderlands and Sunset Overdrive both come to mind. Using a certain art style doesn't determine the genre for a game, any game can be portrayed with any art style the developer so chooses. I have no issue with developers choosing to go for photo realism, but they could end up in a situation where they work harder to make a less visually pleasing game. Time and resources are always of consideration, and not to mention where your artist strengths lie. If your of the opinion that every game developer would really prefer have Crysis visuals, then I think that's pretty short sighted, and in my opinion wrong. Nintendo doesn't choose make Mario in cartoon graphics because they couldn't do realistic graphics, but because they feel that the cartoon world is where Nintendo belongs.

The gaming landscape would just be less diverse, and that's not good. I think a variety is good, and a good looking game should be given credit for being a good looking game, regardless of the art style. As a gamer, I don't have to be concerned with what is more difficult to do, only the how I interpret the finished product on screen. This comes down to personally preference, you will have people who think Borderlands is a better looking game than Crysis, and vice versa.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Sure they can, there is nothing stopping other developers from adopting more cartoonish art styles for their games.

I would absolutely hate to play The Last of Us, any Elder Scrolls game, a modern GTA, Call of Duty, almost all driving games with cartoony graphics. As Shifty said, if everybody switched to a more cartoony graphical style, the gaming landscape would be much poorer for it.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Sure they can, there is nothing stopping other developers from adopting more cartoonish art styles for their games. Borderlands and Sunset Overdrive both come to mind. Using a certain art style doesn't determine the genre for a game, any game can be portrayed with any art style the developer so chooses.

Visuals don't define the genre, but do define the game. Take Mario Galaxies and slap onto that gameplay a gritty space-marines look. Is it the same game with the same appeal? Of course not. Nor would God of War be the same game with cutesy bobble-headed characters and confetti-blood, any more so than...Saving Private Ryan would be the same film if an animation with cuddly animals.

The right look is essential to the overall feel of a product, which is why lots of money is spent on employing people to do the right job, and lots of time is spent learning how to match up visual and audio aesthetics with a product or service. Gran Turismo needs photorealistic rendering to be GT, otherwise it'd be a different racing game.

The rawest example of this is to replace all the final art with the developer art. A game loses almost all meaning when the avatars and visual cues are replaced with flat squares, spheres and capsules. Take a horror game like Aliens:isolation or P.T. or ZombiU. Replace the moody lighting with flat-shaded polygons, remove the eerie soundtrack, and replace the heavy breathing and footstep sounds with debug bleep and boop placeholders. Suddenly it's not at all scary. Place in some artwork, some concept art sprites in place of the alien, say, and it's still not scary. All the pieces have to come together and fit just right to get the correct emotional response from the players.

As such, a limited palate of visual styles limits the scope of experiences. Nintendo are happy to limit themselves to that scope, but it won't do for every developer to go that route. ZombiU is 30 fps to enable the essential moody visuals.

 

[Deleted member 86764]

You can still have a realistic looking game that runs at 60hz, they're not mutually exclusive.

I genuinely wish more developers pushed for that responsive feel over having slightly better shaders. Especially for shooters and racers.

I think about DriveClub, it's a beautiful game, but is it necessary for it to have a complete dynamic lighting system? I don't think so, it only changes my game once every few minutes. If it was running at 60, it'd be improving my experience all of the time.

Edit: yes, horror games are probably better at 30.

 

[Goodtwin]

Of course visuals and the art style help dictate the atmosphere that the developers is trying to produce, but does not directly dictate the experience that can be created within any genre. Not sure that I ever said otherwise. My point is that the developer does ultimately have the same choice that Nintendo has. Do cartoon visuals best depict the experience the developers is trying to create? For many games, such as the games mentioned above, cartoon visuals would definitely detract from the experience the developer is trying to create with a survival horror game. With that said, is Nintendo not choosing visuals that best represent their IP's? I think they are choosing wisely. All developers have the same options on the table that Nintendo does, but they have to decide if that best works for their project. Can you make a shooter with cartoon visuals? Yep, Borderlands does it and it looks very nice. Could you make a racer with cartoon graphics? Yep, Need For Speed Nitro looked really nice. So, it really boils down to the presentation the developer is trying to portray, but those options Nintendo have are on the table for every developer.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

You seem to be misunderstand the situation. The market wants realistic visuals in a lot of games. Therefore, the have a product that'll sell to their audience, some developers don't have the option for cutesy games. Can you make a cartoony shooter? Yes. Can Infinity Ward make a cartoony COD? No, because then it won't be COD. Can you make a cartoony racer? Yes. Can Polyphony Digital make a cartoony GT? No, because then it won't be GT.

Nintendo (at the moment) prioritises games to be family friendly and visually light-hearted, so whatever game they make, they have the option of going cutesy and light-weight on the visuals, but they play to a niche. The whole market can't follow suit and serve that same niche. If every game in 2015 was Nintendo-style cartoony, gamers would be up in arms and developers would struggle to stand out and make sales.

Can you make a shooter with cartoon visuals? Yep, Borderlands does it and it looks very nice.

Actually, Borderlands is pretty demanding and performance is lousy (0fps on PS3 with poor IQ). Cel-shaded isn't really what we're talking about here, but simpler visuals it's easier to hit 60 fps with. Borderlands running at 60 fps on PS3 with clean lines would need a far simpler look - simpler geometry and simpler shaders.

So, it really boils down to the presentation the developer is trying to portray, but those options Nintendo have are on the table for every developer.

Yes, on paper, but in reality it's not true when you're trying to make a competitive product that sells and your audience likes realistic visuals.

 

[FarticusMaximus]

PvZ:GW is a good example of a cartoon styled shooter that hit 60fps. It could have easily been serious with gritty visuals but I thought the bright breezy presentation was spot on and the clear clean look makes spotting enemies a lot easier than hunting for a grey/brown clump of pixel in a sea of grey/brown pixels.

 

[London Geezer]

I don't really understand the correlation between cartoony and simple graphics. They can very much be indipendent from each other. Think Street Fighter 2 (cartoony) and Mortal Kombat (not cartoony). Both very simple by today's standards.
You can definitely have simple graphics that are not cartoony, just like you can have cartoony graphics which are not simple at all and are very demanding.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

'Cartoony' has (at least for me) just become a shorthand for simplified visuals, that came about because Nintendo's choice of simplified visuals are always cartoony. The choice of cartoonery allows for simpler graphics to still look acceptable. Enemies can be simple blobs instead of multi-tentacled, heavily-shaded things and it works in a cartoon world. If you're wanting to cut down on visually complexity, going the cartoon route does allow you to pair back somewhat, but as you say, you don't have to go that route.

 

[Sigfried1977]

Problem is that no company besides Nintendo enjoys the luxury of having a simplistic looking fat-ass who is insanely marketable as a mascot. The Rayman games were absolutely marvellous, slick 60 fps games too, but nobody really gave shit.

 

[Sigfried1977]

Oh absolutely, I'm not saying for a second that games should drop realism. There will always be some genres that require it.

To be perfectly honest with you, I prefer the look of COD:AW compared to Shadowfall. I know it's not throwing as many effects on screen, but the end result, to me, is infinitely better. If I were to have the option to run games with nicer graphics or a consistent 60hz, I'd choose response every single time. I couldn't care less if the top end PC guys were playing with better shadows and particles effects.

Question is would CoD: AW still run at 60 fps if it had Shadowfall's much less claustrophobic and tightly controlled level designs?

 

[Deleted member 86764]

Question is would CoD: AW still run at 60 fps if it had Shadowfall's much less claustrophobic and tightly controlled level designs?

My experience so far is that Shadow Fall is MUCH more claustrophobic than COD....