*spin-off* Art vs Tech... and stuff.
- Thread starter Beef Stallmer
- Start date
Posted this in the Uncharted 3 thread, with the same bickering about tradeoffs, and feel it warrants an appearance here:
ND are incredible at what they do. Why is that not enough, and people feel compelled to say they are better than everyone else (or other developers making excellent use of these consoles)? We've had a few pages of crap in this thread as a result, same as every exclusive. Okay, the likes of Scofield should learn to just ignore the gushing, but the incessant arguments do my head in! Especially when the whole discussion of tradeoffs is then referred to as a fanboy excuse.
I think the primary complaint, one I subscribe to, is that seemingly with every exclusive on every platform there'll be a number of fans claiming the developer is godlike, doing more with the platform than any other developer and putting all other developers to shame. This is disingenious to other developers, irrespective of platform. And most of the time the developer of choice is placed on a pedestal not because of their superior technical accomplishments but because they work the whole package, or some key element of it. I can point to the lighting in LBP2, and say MM are technical gods better at using the PS3 than anyone else, but there the choices are quite obvious in the game's restrictions enabling this choice of lighting model. It's not that no other developer could possible get the same lighting, but that no other developer is going for that look or style.
ND are incredible at what they do. Why is that not enough, and people feel compelled to say they are better than everyone else (or other developers making excellent use of these consoles)? We've had a few pages of crap in this thread as a result, same as every exclusive. Okay, the likes of Scofield should learn to just ignore the gushing, but the incessant arguments do my head in! Especially when the whole discussion of tradeoffs is then referred to as a fanboy excuse.
The problem is that it shouldn't be a "versus" argument at all. It's art AND tech. If you design your tech around the art style of the game, and bend the art style to the limitations of the time, you can do things that look absolutely fantastic within the style of that particular game.
I always thought Bioshock was a good example of this. Their art style and the UE3 tech blended together amazingly well.
And yes, you have to take the time period into account. No one ever expects technology to stand still, even within a single hardware generation. Gears 1 pushed Epic to their limits at the time, but then the limits changed, and it makes all the sense in the world that later games would improve on a technical level. How the developer chooses to adjust their art style (or not) as a result if that is the question. As for Gears specifically, I never finished the first one, and never played the second, nor will I play the third.
Now, I would like to touch on AlStrong's original statement in the OP.. I think the last thing we need is for the games industry to end up like Hollywood, just remaking all of the successful games every few years. I think the new remake of Halo is just stupid, and a blatantly obvious attempt at money-grabbing. If they start getting into this habit, we'll end up with nothing but the same five or six IPs being made over and over again. No thank you.
I always thought Bioshock was a good example of this. Their art style and the UE3 tech blended together amazingly well.
And yes, you have to take the time period into account. No one ever expects technology to stand still, even within a single hardware generation. Gears 1 pushed Epic to their limits at the time, but then the limits changed, and it makes all the sense in the world that later games would improve on a technical level. How the developer chooses to adjust their art style (or not) as a result if that is the question. As for Gears specifically, I never finished the first one, and never played the second, nor will I play the third.
Now, I would like to touch on AlStrong's original statement in the OP.. I think the last thing we need is for the games industry to end up like Hollywood, just remaking all of the successful games every few years. I think the new remake of Halo is just stupid, and a blatantly obvious attempt at money-grabbing. If they start getting into this habit, we'll end up with nothing but the same five or six IPs being made over and over again. No thank you.
I can list two things why the Halo remake makes sense beyond money grabbing:
- a lot of the Halo3/Reach players have no idea about the original game
- a lot of the people who played it 10 years ago would probably like to own it on the same console as H3 and not in the antiquated form that the backwards compatibility allows
But 40 bucks is a bit too much indeed.
- a lot of the Halo3/Reach players have no idea about the original game
- a lot of the people who played it 10 years ago would probably like to own it on the same console as H3 and not in the antiquated form that the backwards compatibility allows
But 40 bucks is a bit too much indeed.
Lucid_Dreamer
Veteran
General use of the term "tradeoff", without weighing what's being traded, is the problem. THAT'S what makes it a fanboy excuse. If less is being traded off, one game is doing more than another. Just saying "it's all trade-offs" is silly and accomplishes nothing. It doesn't get to the core of anything, therefore it's just an excuse.
When these types of terms are used, it's ONLY used when describing one technique. The whole is NEVER considered. That makes the "trade-off" term completely useless and therefore an excuse/distraction. This is plain as day and inescapable.
That's because the complexities of these engines are such that we cannot consider the whole thing, short of whether it looks pleasing to the eye. Which is why such debates shouldn't be entered into, when there isn't substantial technical background such as white-paper or developer diaries explaining what a developer is doing. eg. Game 2 has better textures than Game 1 - but without knwoing everything else going on, you don't know if that improvement in textures comes about as an improvement in hardware utilisation, or cutting back a bit somewhere else.
Person A sees a game from their favourite developer or on the platform of choice, and says, "this game is more technically advanced than all others." Person B replies with, "they're not technically superior; it's just using the resources in a way that's different to other devs, choosing different approaches for their different game." Person A responds, "Nah, you're just dissing this game because it's on the platform you dislike" - and sees discussion of compromise as evidence of bias.
To no-one in particular:
The evaluation of developers as doing a good job or not is a legitimate one, and one that can be qualified through various analyses. Even non-technical ones - ND are clearly worlds better than, say, ZootFly when you compare Uncharted with Ghostbusters. Uncharted trumps Ghostbusters in pretty much every way. You don't even have to count pixels and measure textures. There's nothing wrong with these sorts of comparisons.
Other comparisons are nigh impossible to make though. Comparing Uncharted to Forza to Red Dead Redemption to Skyrim to LBP2, there's no way of idenitfying who's the best developer using the hardware most effectively. The conosles are being used in different ways to different ends. Even what seem similar games, like Uncharted, Killzone, Gears and Halo, can be aiming for very different things, and use the hardware in very different ways. The fact one may have superior AA doesn't mean the devs are better than other devs that haven't implenented AA - it just means that in the list of features to have, the devs pick and choose what works best for them. There will be some combinations of choices that work better, so perhaps it can be argued that Halo's choice for HDR wasn't as optimal as another option Bungie could have gone with because of the resolution shortcomings. That's fair consideration. Short of access to the development analysis tools, there's no way to gauge utilisation of hardware, nor effective use of hardware (choice of one AA technique over another may result in a better perceptual response despite using the resources to the same degree). Throw in the added impact of art, and how a viceral response to game's appearance can be heavily influenced by choice of art over technical accomplishments, and already opaque waters become clear as custard.
The sane thing here is to step away from sports-like competitive attitudes and a desire to identify a sole winner, a best developer or best platform. The old-chestnut of trade-offs is repeated because that's the simple explanation of why such comparisons don't work. We can't normally go into detail about specifics because we never have them!
We see this discussion time and again. Killzone, Uncharted, Gears...I don't think there's any platform exclusive that escapes, without the game discussion about the game and what the devs have done right not degenerating into pointless bickering. There was a time when all comparisons were outright refused in the console quarters of B3D. I dare say we've been more relaxed about it as there are worthy comparisons to be made (this AA technique used in this game works better than that AA technique used in that game. This console's superior...fillrate, say, leads to obvious advantages in this area of the graphics). One does have to wonder though if we shouldn't get more draconian if every single time the same tired 'debate' comes up. Or maybe the solution is to let those who want to believe in the One True Developer to just have their opinion and let them gush away?
Agree 100% with Shifty. This is exactly why I always thought comparing games, especially exclusives, was always silly.
As for allowing people to gush away, everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but it's annoying and turns me away from threads. I'm very interested in some PS3 games, but having to filter out all the hyperbolic comments about how Game X is the best and does more than Game Y on another platform is a waste of my time, which is why I rarely comment in those threads. Just my 2 cents, I can be entirely in the wrong here, but that's what I see.
As for allowing people to gush away, everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but it's annoying and turns me away from threads. I'm very interested in some PS3 games, but having to filter out all the hyperbolic comments about how Game X is the best and does more than Game Y on another platform is a waste of my time, which is why I rarely comment in those threads. Just my 2 cents, I can be entirely in the wrong here, but that's what I see.
Beef Stallmer
Banned
Dear S. Geezer, I agree and fully have your back on this one 
A few days ago I asked certain posters "show me a console game which has better textures". This is 1 aspect that could be compared and evaluated through screenshots.
Of course, the posters who were very vocal about the discussed game not being that impressive, could not show me a single game; not being able to defend their point of view, they more or less backed out of the discussion, looking for other flaws. Exactly the kind of behavior I expected.
To me this proved my, and other posters' point of view.
Even if the texture detail came at a trade off, you could compare it to games in the same genre, and check other things: Lighting, AO, OBM, DOF, which would still be favorable for the discussed game. So objectively it was looking like a technological masterpiece that could not be debated, because almost every single comparable aspect from competing games would fail in comparison.
This is not really an option, because screenshots and videos are hard evidence, and I expect people will get hurt if there is no one to delete posts.
If this means the "haters" stay away until they have developed good arguments or found other technological impressive games, then of course it will be a good option. But I rather see no one get hurt.
A few days ago I asked certain posters "show me a console game which has better textures". This is 1 aspect that could be compared and evaluated through screenshots.
Of course, the posters who were very vocal about the discussed game not being that impressive, could not show me a single game; not being able to defend their point of view, they more or less backed out of the discussion, looking for other flaws. Exactly the kind of behavior I expected.
To me this proved my, and other posters' point of view.
Even if the texture detail came at a trade off, you could compare it to games in the same genre, and check other things: Lighting, AO, OBM, DOF, which would still be favorable for the discussed game. So objectively it was looking like a technological masterpiece that could not be debated, because almost every single comparable aspect from competing games would fail in comparison.
This is not really an option, because screenshots and videos are hard evidence, and I expect people will get hurt if there is no one to delete posts.
If this means the "haters" stay away until they have developed good arguments or found other technological impressive games, then of course it will be a good option. But I rather see no one get hurt.
Beef, seriously, I don't know how long you've been reading B3D before registering, but this forum is not about the kind of debate you're pushing here. We prefer to discuss game technology on its own, without talking about which game has "better textures" because we understand that there's no way to decide that issue. I humbly ask you to drop these discussions becasue they do not belong here.
A few days ago I asked certain posters "show me a console game which has better textures". This is 1 aspect that could be compared and evaluated through screenshots.
Of course, the posters who were very vocal about the discussed game not being that impressive, could not show me a single game; not being able to defend their point of view, they more or less backed out of the discussion, looking for other flaws. Exactly the kind of behavior I expected.
If game A has 2048x2048 textures, and game B has 1024x1024 textures but 4x more of them, which game has better textures?
If game A has select textures that look really sharp and has many others that look blurry, whereas game B doesn't have any textures as sharp as game A but also doesn't have any textues as blurry as game A, which game has better textures?
If game A at it's best in the most prime and carefully chosen screenshots has much better textures than game B at it's best, but game B most of the time has textures that look better, which game has better textures?
If game A has much sharper textures than game B, but game B while blurry tiles them in a more clever manner resulting in a more pleasing to the eye result, which game has better textures?
If game A posts a screen shot that shows really sharp textures but not much variety, and game B posts a screen shot that shows not as sharp textures but much more variety, which game has better textures?
Or in other words, what consitutes better textures? Because I have no idea how to answer your question.
L. Scofield
Veteran
And here we see rationalization from a fanboy. You said "this game has the best textures ever". Others said "It's good but I don't see what's so mind blowing about it". Then you tasked them with doing the work of coming up with a fair comparison.A few days ago I asked certain posters "show me a console game which has better textures". This is 1 aspect that could be compared and evaluated through screenshots.
Of course, the posters who were very vocal about the discussed game not being that impressive, could not show me a single game; not being able to defend their point of view, they more or less backed out of the discussion, looking for other flaws. Exactly the kind of behavior I expected.
To me this proved my, and other posters' point of view.
Even if the texture detail came at a trade off, you could compare it to games in the same genre, and check other things: Lighting, AO, OBM, DOF, which would still be favorable for the discussed game. So objectively it was looking like a technological masterpiece that could not be debated, because almost every single comparable aspect from competing games would fail in comparison.
This is not really an option, because screenshots and videos are hard evidence, and I expect people will get hurt if there is no one to delete posts.
If this means the "haters" stay away until they have developed good arguments or found other technological impressive games, then of course it will be a good option. But I rather see no one get hurt.
It's YOU, who made the hyperbolic comments, who has to provide the comparison, not those that are skeptical about them
Beef Stallmer
Banned
You already answered it, but to answer your question:
the sum of everything you mentioned; both the resolution, variety, micro-texturing as well as not having /the least of possible 'worst' textures. And also; the textures themselves (color /art) as well as their ability to be elevated through the lighting. (GT5 is a great example: a lot of the standard cars have really dull textures, but because of the IBL they appear almost photo realistic both in motion as well as photo mode).
p.s. I did not start the mentioned argument, I only participated in it because I wanted to see if the 'critics' could back up their claims about the game being nothing impressive.
If you can't take the heat, stay out of the kitchen basically
on the topic of Art vs tech
in a way I didn't find the concept of Lightmass (UE3) that impressive, but having seen it in motion, it really is great because it could not have been done in realtime on 2005-2006 hardware. And it appears to look everything as good as the real thing. And that is the art of (clever) technology (instead of art vs tech).
edit: @ L. scofield, i am very sorry i was not aware that you make the rules on who has to provide a comparison. I don't like you using the word "fanboy" but reading a few of your posts, you appear to be master on the subject so I guess you are allowed to use the word
Last edited by a moderator:
I disagree. They obviously put some effort into it, rather than just mailing it in. Everyone's always on about the cost of game development. I have no problems with the asking price. After all, we are talking about arguably the best game in the series.
Lucid_Dreamer
Veteran
Surely, you should be required to compare more than one or two pieces of the whole against another game. Otherwise, you can belittle the game as a whole because of picking only one piece of a large puzzle. Would you like your work as a whole to be belittled because of one aspect being pulled out and compared to another?
Person A takes on 4 different tasks. Person B takes on 1 task. Person B does he one task at a slightly higher or comparable level as Person A. Person B is herald as being better than Person A by complete disregarding everything else Person A is doing. That scenario above plays itself out a LOT. THIS is what I and a lot of other people have a problem with. Just be fair. That's all I care about. I don't like when people try to unfairly balance something that isn't naturally balanced. And, I don't like it when people try to unfairly tip a scale.
Exactly! QFT.Dear S. Geezer, I agree and fully have your back on this one
A few days ago I asked certain posters "show me a console game which has better textures". This is 1 aspect that could be compared and evaluated through screenshots.
Of course, the posters who were very vocal about the discussed game not being that impressive, could not show me a single game; not being able to defend their point of view, they more or less backed out of the discussion, looking for other flaws. Exactly the kind of behavior I expected.
To me this proved my, and other posters' point of view.
Even if the texture detail came at a trade off, you could compare it to games in the same genre, and check other things: Lighting, AO, OBM, DOF, which would still be favorable for the discussed game. So objectively it was looking like a technological masterpiece that could not be debated, because almost every single comparable aspect from competing games would fail in comparison.
Problem with this scenario is that we never have all the pieces of the puzzle. Even if we have as much info on person A as we do on person B, we still don't have all the information on either person, making any comparison pointless.
To touch on Laa-Yosh's comment of an agenda, yours is quite apparent. Not really sure where you guys get this superiority complex from, but I really wish you would take it elsewhere.