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When looks are no longer enough
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mckmas8808
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pc999 said:
Do you completly agree with this statement?
I know I don't. And most people here knows that, that statement is incorrect. I agree with their main overall point though. We just need to give next-gen longer to actually show itself.
Well I wouldnt say that we cant have better gfx (dont think that it is what he meant too) because I am sure we can but I think that the diference will be to small to most people (me included) real care about it. Althought there are some uses of gfx that can also have a effect on gameplay like massive (really massive) scenes but with aid of others things, ie just more shaders, GI, vertex per carachters ...
And yes I think the AI could be one of the most important things to improve gameplay (see Intia demos for a good example), althought not the only.
And yes I think the AI could be one of the most important things to improve gameplay (see Intia demos for a good example), althought not the only.
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mckmas8808 said:
This isn't the entire article, just a part of it. Nevertheless, Dr. Laird's answer is there.
[size=-2]"Improved AI is a big part of the answer, he says."[/size]
Graphics are 'topping out' in the sense that they are reaching a point of diminished returns. Game makers are putting more into visuals than they are getting out.
Now this doesn't mean that eye candy can't (or won't) improve; it just means that the returns on graphics investments are shrinking. So, as academia seems to be saying, it makes cents to pour one's resources into areas with better yields, like AI.
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pc999 said:
Exactly!
thenefariousone
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Yup. It's the growing pains of a new medium.
Oh - for anyone interested, the facade game mentioned in the article is available free for download at: http://www.interactivestory.net/
Oh - for anyone interested, the facade game mentioned in the article is available free for download at: http://www.interactivestory.net/
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I agree with his assessment _if_ his definition of AI is broader than pure "computational AI". I just want an interesting environment that surprises me from time to time. Any good combination of scripted code/tweaks, computer cheats and "computational AI" are all fair game to me
This does not mean we should stop improving graphics though especially when graphics is the manifestation of physics and AI in video games.
This does not mean we should stop improving graphics though especially when graphics is the manifestation of physics and AI in video games.
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Technically it is incorrect, sure. In practice tho, maybe not entirely incorrect... We have lots of devs who have said development costs have/will skyrocket with this generation of consoles. Pushing the envelope with PS3 and 360 will cost major dough, and if the game bombs it will mean big losses for the devs/publisher.mckmas8808 said:
I can well imagine some devs NOT pushing graphics all that hard just to not have to spend quite so much money on finishing the game... We see this at work even on a much simpler platform like the PSP, with a title like Loco Roco for example.
They've been talkling about AI forever in games. Although not lately probably because Cell is good at physics instead so that's what's getting all the forums push.
Point is, AI is one of the most overrated things in videogame history.
Carmack has touched on it, how the Doom creatures used incredibly simple scripts, but some people thought they were doing all this complex intelligent stuff, setting traps and stuff, when they were just following simple routines and it was all in the players imagination. Or how, you can dedicate tremendous time and power to some background AI that may cause certain behaviors, or you can do the same thing in the spots you want much easier with a some simple scripts.
There are certain idea that come up in videogames like clockwork and they are pretty much always wrong. The idea that an AI revolution is right around the corner is one of the big ones. It's been talked about for decades in glowing terms. It never happens. It cant happen, in fact, I'll go ahead and say. If a computer cant pass the turing test which it cannot, then you cannot have lifelike AI. Sure, you can have better AI, but it's always only to a point. We have a thousand times the processing power as 15 years ago, and probably not much different AI. It's not for lack of trying. It's because more or less it cant be done. That's not going to change.
Point is, AI is one of the most overrated things in videogame history.
Carmack has touched on it, how the Doom creatures used incredibly simple scripts, but some people thought they were doing all this complex intelligent stuff, setting traps and stuff, when they were just following simple routines and it was all in the players imagination. Or how, you can dedicate tremendous time and power to some background AI that may cause certain behaviors, or you can do the same thing in the spots you want much easier with a some simple scripts.
There are certain idea that come up in videogames like clockwork and they are pretty much always wrong. The idea that an AI revolution is right around the corner is one of the big ones. It's been talked about for decades in glowing terms. It never happens. It cant happen, in fact, I'll go ahead and say. If a computer cant pass the turing test which it cannot, then you cannot have lifelike AI. Sure, you can have better AI, but it's always only to a point. We have a thousand times the processing power as 15 years ago, and probably not much different AI. It's not for lack of trying. It's because more or less it cant be done. That's not going to change.
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I flatly disagree with that. I've been working on an AI concept where the whole game is AI based, and it would be a totally fantastic game. Likewise The Sims is an example of an AI game that's proven engaging solely because of the AI component - without AI you would have nothing. That's not to say you need super complex methods, and 'faking' AI (which is kinda what Artificial Intelligence is, sort of, although a lot of real human intelligence is following scripts anyway) will provide a lot of the solutions to the problem of AI. But AI can contribute a lot to games I think. Though not as much as Real intelligence applied by the designers to make the player control better. Too much intelligence in the enemy would make for rubbish games where you keep dying, because they have the sense to use the powerup themselves instead of dropping them for the player to use!
I think the graphical aspect of games hasn't reached it's peak.
By stating this, I'm sure everyone is wondering to what extent should I guage until I am to consider the pinnacle of graphics in the television...
My answer would be till I can play a game that can match either the quality of Final Fantasy Advent Children or get the quality of the battles shown in the Lord of the Rings movies...
However, I would rather buy a game that is average at best graphically, yet fun to play than a game that's all graphics and zero playability...
But I can't stop oogling at those pretty, pretty, pixels....
*drools*
By stating this, I'm sure everyone is wondering to what extent should I guage until I am to consider the pinnacle of graphics in the television...
My answer would be till I can play a game that can match either the quality of Final Fantasy Advent Children or get the quality of the battles shown in the Lord of the Rings movies...
However, I would rather buy a game that is average at best graphically, yet fun to play than a game that's all graphics and zero playability...
But I can't stop oogling at those pretty, pretty, pixels....
*drools*
I don't think we're hitting diminishing returns so much as we are diminishing "wow" factor. Here's an anecdote from my experience, which I think may be typical:
At certain junctures in history, graphical improvements jolt everyone's senses and redefine what they ever imagined video games could look like. Seeing these games makes everyone who even has mild interest in video games want whatever hardware it takes to play them. The SNES blew me away when I first saw it, as I had been playing mostly EGA games like Commander Keen. This happened again when I saw my first "3D" games like Doom, Rise of the Triad, and Descent. And I'm pretty sure that we can all agree that the first time we saw Voodoo-accelerated graphics, we all bitterly looked at our old Pentiums playing Quake 2 in software mode as giant hunks of junk. For me, seeing smooth, 3D accelerated games on PC in high resolution was the last time new hardware made me feel like whatever I had at the time was old and busted. As much interest as I have in hardware and games, I pretty much ceased to get really enthralled by new graphics hardware after I got a PC that could play Quake 2, Return to Castle Wolfenstein, and other PC games of the pre-shader era.
In my opinion, consoles didn't hit that point until the current generation of consoles hit. The PSx, Saturn, and N64 looked horrible. The PSx was jittery and jaggy, the Saturn was even worse, and the N64 was a blurry mess. Starting with the Dreamcast, we've been enjoying smooth, pretty 3D graphics like PC gamers have been enjoying since the Voodoo era. It's not that the X360 and PS3 aren't a massive visual leap over the PS2, Cube, and Xbox. They are. It's that the dying generation of consoles looked sufficiently good in their own right that even after seeing X360's awesome shader power, games like Soul Calibur III, Tales of Symphonia, and Crimson skies still don't look like crap to me and lots of other people. As gorgeous as Kameo was (and obviously far beyond current-gen capabilities), it doesn't make me feel jaded when I play through Beyond Good and Evil again the way playing Unreal made me feel when I went back and played Descent on my old PC.
And that's why graphics aren't as important right now.
At certain junctures in history, graphical improvements jolt everyone's senses and redefine what they ever imagined video games could look like. Seeing these games makes everyone who even has mild interest in video games want whatever hardware it takes to play them. The SNES blew me away when I first saw it, as I had been playing mostly EGA games like Commander Keen. This happened again when I saw my first "3D" games like Doom, Rise of the Triad, and Descent. And I'm pretty sure that we can all agree that the first time we saw Voodoo-accelerated graphics, we all bitterly looked at our old Pentiums playing Quake 2 in software mode as giant hunks of junk. For me, seeing smooth, 3D accelerated games on PC in high resolution was the last time new hardware made me feel like whatever I had at the time was old and busted. As much interest as I have in hardware and games, I pretty much ceased to get really enthralled by new graphics hardware after I got a PC that could play Quake 2, Return to Castle Wolfenstein, and other PC games of the pre-shader era.
In my opinion, consoles didn't hit that point until the current generation of consoles hit. The PSx, Saturn, and N64 looked horrible. The PSx was jittery and jaggy, the Saturn was even worse, and the N64 was a blurry mess. Starting with the Dreamcast, we've been enjoying smooth, pretty 3D graphics like PC gamers have been enjoying since the Voodoo era. It's not that the X360 and PS3 aren't a massive visual leap over the PS2, Cube, and Xbox. They are. It's that the dying generation of consoles looked sufficiently good in their own right that even after seeing X360's awesome shader power, games like Soul Calibur III, Tales of Symphonia, and Crimson skies still don't look like crap to me and lots of other people. As gorgeous as Kameo was (and obviously far beyond current-gen capabilities), it doesn't make me feel jaded when I play through Beyond Good and Evil again the way playing Unreal made me feel when I went back and played Descent on my old PC.
And that's why graphics aren't as important right now.
I think the biggest thing people want when they speak of better ai isn't enemies that are insanely difficult because they are so smart. The concept in gaming is simple when it comes to gamers and that is "figure it out". Make the gamer ask themselves "what do I do in this situation? How can I beat this guy?" With incredibly smart ai, the computer would always win. Heck as others have pointed out, it's been that way for years that if devs wanted to they could make the ai impossible to beat.
The point with improved ai is more lifelike ie: unpredictable.
This is contradictory to the "figure it out" theory as you can't figure out unpredictability. A certain amount of unpredictable though can go a long way in not having a "canned" experience as has been the case for much of gaming history. This issue has been addressed more and more in recent years but could still use some polishing.
The other more glaring issue that should be wiped out this gen is out right "stupid" ai in games. By that I mean ai that gets stuck in places, walking/running in place, broken ai that freezes the character, ai that runs contradictory to common sense (although in small spurts that can be quite funny).
Things of this nature are what I think people are asking for when they say "improved ai" or "ai revolution". Ai that doesn't detract from the experience and wherever available, actually improves on the experience and removes the "canned experience".
The point with improved ai is more lifelike ie: unpredictable.
This is contradictory to the "figure it out" theory as you can't figure out unpredictability. A certain amount of unpredictable though can go a long way in not having a "canned" experience as has been the case for much of gaming history. This issue has been addressed more and more in recent years but could still use some polishing.
The other more glaring issue that should be wiped out this gen is out right "stupid" ai in games. By that I mean ai that gets stuck in places, walking/running in place, broken ai that freezes the character, ai that runs contradictory to common sense (although in small spurts that can be quite funny).
Things of this nature are what I think people are asking for when they say "improved ai" or "ai revolution". Ai that doesn't detract from the experience and wherever available, actually improves on the experience and removes the "canned experience".
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sonyps35 said:
Well this really depends of what do you consider AI (there is many arguments against Turing test like the Chinise Room (or whatever is called)) or even inteligence (what about alien AI?
) but eg wouldnt you think that AI that can do everything a racon can (very smart animal dont you think?) wouldnt be a revolution on games?Personally I think that one can make distintion between academic AI and gaming AI (I put chess in there too).
But going for what even I dont think we should call it (real?) AI you can see in Intia demos that even it just low level AI improvements it can have quite a impact on games in general I can see what I would fell like a very fresh or meybe new type of RTS from those demos and I would really prefer getting this with blue blocks than last gen like AI with great gfx.
In other post I wrote somehing like I would really like to have (at least) for AI one that not being more powerfull/stroger (ie less damage per hit/perfect aiming etc...) can be always be a challenge (that already happen to most of us in games like chess).
That probably wouldnt fit in many definitions of AI but wouldnt we see a much better game when this happens (and IMO games like Halo already have some of that, or KZ papers also show some very nice ideas to start implementing some things like).
On a side note I saw many devs (in this forum too) that say the (one that could improve a lot AI) main problem is because the own process of devopment that dont let much of room to AI.
Anyway we saw some guys pushing AI as main factor for the games (Forza, Fable, Spore, Obvilion, Halo, from the previewns UE07 ...) and now there is AI midleware so I would expect after physics to AI show a good jump in qualitity.
BTW good point fsp.
TheChefO said:
I agree. I was really impressed by Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, because the bad guys would often do different things if I made a noise, shot at somebody, etc. I've played way too many games where after playing a level a bunch of times, it's like "Ok, when I cross this threshold, a badguy will come running from the right and hide behind the pillar. As I shoot at him and the guy on the left, I"ve got about 15 seconds until someone comes up behind me."
I prefer to either be overwhelmed with lots of dumb bad guys or a pattern based AI that requires fast reflexes than something that's scripted to a predictable death.
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