Halo 3 IQ discussion * - Stay civil and polite folks!

I'm in the middle (I think) of the campain. This games visuals range from "amazing to look at" to "not that good"... Some of the explosions I've seen, especially when the blur filter kicks in, are spectacular. On the other hand, some of the interiors look IMO bland and uninspired...

 

I can provide direct screenshots from the game in HD resolutions without the added AA and such that the screencap feature provides. If anyone has some specific shots they want just let me know.

Sample:
http://dot50cal.the-horror.com/071003-0819040796-1280x720.jpg

Edit:
I have some pictures I took with my capture card. The first is what you see in game, the second is what the 360 renders when it takes the photo. I cant post the bungie.net high res shot, since I need to be a gold subscriber or bungie pro, both of which I have no desire to become.

http://dot50cal.the-horror.com/raw.jpg

http://dot50cal.the-horror.com/render.jpg

Mod:
Image size. BTW, nice seeing you back again and thanks for your effort

 

Poor environment textures..
No AA..
Poor texture filtering..
Where's the lighting (in this shot)..?

GeOW contender in the visuals department..?

Hmmm..

 

Two more, the game has really poor texture filtering.

http://dot50cal.the-horror.com/071003-0853290421-1280x720.jpg


http://dot50cal.the-horror.com/071003-0855140375-1280x720.jpg

 

The E3 2007 trailer showed every symptom but it's hilarious to look at how some people refused to see the reality when I mentioned it 2 months ago...

http://forum.beyond3d.com/showthread.php?t=42687&page=7

 

Disagree, they're OK

It's a given with most console games

For a quick example, look at the inner side of the Warthog gun's armor plate. You won't get that soft bounced light there with any other method.

You can make bad looking screenshots in any other game as well. Don't base comparisions on just this single image.
Then again, if you're already commited to a platform or have an agenda...

 

Except that it's a single image Motion blur is crucial for this game.

 

yeap, motion blur really works good for halo, doesn't it dot50?

 

The motion blur looks good, it at least masks some of the texturing issues and aliasing. Though it only appears during fast motion, so more often than not you are left with the above shots.

http://dot50cal.the-horror.com/071003-0921470187-1280x720.jpg

Its still nowhere near the level of Gears IMO

http://dot50cal.the-horror.com/071003-0928110343-1280x720.jpg

 

image size....

 

Yeah, but Gears is nowhere near the scale of Halo either. And in the Mark Rein interview thread I've already mentioned that the quality of the artwork is a very important component as well - and this is where some parts of Halo could really use some more work.

 

Did scale excuse the graphics of Lair?

 

I only really notice the motion blur when it switches to third person when you're killed - outside of that I can never notice it.

 

I agree with Laa-Yosh on this, GoW environments are much smaller scale and again has terrible texture filtering. With the main colour scheme on GoW being shades of grey & brown, it was hard to tell friend from foe at a distance.

Gears art direction on structures was stunning and friendly marines detail much better than Halo's, but again less of them. Is Halo 3 a big step up from Halo 2? Yes it is.

 

Could they have a cleaned up the graphics in Halo3 a bit more? yeah! I believe they got a bit carried away with the lighting and didn't budget resources properly. However, I simply would not want Halo to look like Gears. Both have a different art style to them and keeping Halo's (half real and half cartoony/animated) is good.

 

I'm just finishing the last level of the game, and all in all it really is hard not to be dissapointed with Halo's IQ when you looks at titles like COD4.

The lighting is certainly nice, but so is the lighting in COD4, and they also have amazing animations, textures and character models. So, bungie really did drop the ball on this one in that regard.

It's a nice looking game, but not for a 2nd generation title.

 

Agreed, but I still think it looks much better in motion and viewed in person than in those dot50cal's screens.

 

I didn't find the lack of AF to be particularly distracting during the game, although taking a minute to stop and look at the texture work, the presentation lost a lot of detail.

The aliasing can be too prominent in certain parts and makes me shudder, particularly in multiplayer, but again... it was not something that distracted me often.

The really short clamp on character shadows destroys the overall look with the great lighting, IMO. Would it have killed performance to just have blob shadows in the distance

IMHO, the lack of AA/AF just makes it harder to appreciate the amount of work put into the lighting and the texture detail.

 

I see I wasn't far off with my prediction.

 

In my opinion though, its lighting, scale and art direction (I may digress a little here) are what save the game's lack in some other visual departments. It's not the prettiest game out there, but when you consider the scale, I can only think a few games that, IMO, match Halo 3 both in visuals and scales (Oblivion, COD4, and probably UT3 and Killzone, and of course, there is Crysis, but that's not just matching it ).