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NICE GRAPHICS: A SMALL CELEBRATION - by Mr Biffo

14/3/2016

14 Comments

 
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I've always been a bit of a graphics tart. I remember getting 3D Seiddab Attack on my Spectrum, and being so unable to comprehend the first-person perspective that I got overly flustered, and died. 

Knight Lore. Castle Master. Sonic the Hedgehog. F-Zero. Virtua Fighter. These are all games that I remember causing me to take a moment to just stop and catch my breath.

Of course, look back on all of them now and - while we might be able to appreciate some of the design elements - they don't exactly compare. They might've been acceptable at the time - like, say, The Black and White Minstrel Show or forcing human children to drink the milk of another species - but people would cluck and tut if you came out with a Virtua Fighter now.

And that's the thing, see... with every generation, it reaches a point where graphical achievements become sort of taken for granted. Whereas Knight Lore impressed everyone so much that they erected a statue of Sabreman in Hyde Park, by the time of Head Over Heels - just three years later - everyone had kind of accepted isometric graphics as a thing, and just saw them as incidental to the gameplay.

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THE GENERATION GAMES
Something noticeable in the switch from the last generation of consoles to the current one is that the leap in graphics is much more subtle than in previous generational jumps.

The stride from the Super NES to the Nintendo 64 was obvious - everything went crazily 3D. The jump from, say, Xbox to Xbox 360 was similarly noticeable - everything became very obviously HD, and far crisper. 

This time around - certainly at launch - it was harder to point to any one game and go "That's why I've bought a PS4/Xbox One". 

Now, though, I'm starting to notice it. Particularly, it has to be said, in games from Ubisoft. You can mock them for their endlessly recycled map-mopping model, but if you don't look at something like Assassin's Creed Syndicate and appreciate what an achievement it is, then you have, quite literally, "the badman eyes". The subtle lighting, the litter-strewn streets of London, the sheer scale of detail... it blew me away, and was far and away the best thing about an otherwise slightly tedious game.

What I found weird though - and it's happening even more with The Division - is how few reviews I read bothered pointing out how good it looked. All the talk in The Division's write-ups is of the gameplay, as if graphics are no longer a big deal.

And this is despite the fact there's more effort going into how games look than ever before, yet we appear to be accepting a certain level of realism as standard now. However, I'm not sure I'm ready to take things for granted. Not yet.

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WHATEVER ELSE
I suppose I just wanted to dedicate a moment to going "Wow - game graphics are really good these days", instead of ignoring the fact.

Because, you see, The Division - and I'll get into the real good and bad of it elsewhere - is a stunning looking game, and nobody is talking about it.  

I became a gamer in the days when a couple of flickering pixels jittering around a screen was enough to send people fleeing computer fairs in terror. I could never conceive that we'd reach a point where games would look this incredible.

There have been moments while playing The Division where I've just had to stop and look around. I mean... how do they do it? It must've cost a fortune; the level of detail is insane. It's a version of New York, recreated down to the most minute detail - and then given a post-apocalyptic wash. There have been times when I've been mid-mission and wished I didn't have to spend it cowering behind cover, because I wanted to admire the way my opponents are silhouetted against a burning fuel tanker, or spend a moment taking in a hanger full of corpses. It's beautiful. 

What's more, so much of it the art in The Division is incidental. It isn't there for you to go up and look at - it's designed to be absorbed subconsciously, and just add to the overall atmosphere of the world. 

I'd actually thought I'd started to grow tired of modern gaming's obsession with striving to create photorealistic visuals, but The Division has won me over. I mean, I'm a sucker for anything a bit post-apocalyptic-y anyway, but Ubisoft's graphics slaves have succeeded in creating such an incredibly compelling and tangible environment that they've won me round.

Everything about The Division's graphics screams "blockbuster", and we should be thankful for it. Whatever age you stumbled upon video games, there's no question that gaming has never looked better. Video games aren't a simple case of pointing a camera at a scene, and hitting 'record' - every cracked window pane, every shadow, every dust mote, has been created by hand.

And it's an incredible thing. Let's not forget it. 

Want further proof of how good graphics have gotten? Go take a look at Andy Kelly's sublime Other Places series, which celebrates the gorgeousness of our virtual worlds.

FROM THE ARCHIVE:
REVIEW-IN-PROGRESS: HAVE A LOOK AT THESE SHITTING BABIES WHILE I TELL YOU WHAT I THINK OF THE PS4 VERSION OF 'TOM CLANCY'S THE DIVISION' THUS FAR​
TOM CLANCY'S THE DIVISION - SCREENSHOT GALLERY
PIXELS: THE NEW CLICHE - BY MR BIFFO


14 Comments
Archibald Bumflaps
14/3/2016 10:55:29 am

Did you know that 'Seiddab' is 'baddieS' backwards? You do now!

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Mr Biffo
14/3/2016 11:25:54 am

I realised it many, many year ago and couldn't believe I hadn't spotted it at the time...

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Archibald Bumflaps
14/3/2016 11:28:17 am

And Namtir Invaders. Do you know about that? Well, do you, punk?

Archibald Bumflaps
14/3/2016 11:29:05 am

...I meant Namtir Raiders, obviously. So that, but with all the same attitude at my last post. Thanks!

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Mrtankthreat
14/3/2016 01:02:11 pm

So with money being tight I still haven't got a new generation console yet and have been avoiding watching videos or anything of games I'm interested in to try stay spoiler free but I watched that Chuckle Brothers playing Hitman video, hadn't read the title properly and for a minute thought "those graphics look bloody amazing, I must get a new console asap".

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John Kiely
14/3/2016 01:04:09 pm

I'm so glad you've said this. Each generation I've been amazed at how the graphics keep improving each time.I often love just flying around GTAV in my plane, just to appreciate the fact that I can climb so high that I can see the curvature of the earth, then I can dive and skim past cars on the highway, then fly through valleys and over mountains.

I often wonder whether kids playing these games take it for granted or whether they appreciate it as well.

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Retro Resolution link
14/3/2016 05:08:15 pm

As an aging gamer, I still find myself vividly recalling my ZX81's sub-ASCII character block graphics, and each and every graphical incremental leap thereafter:
on existing systems coding alchemists wrought higher resolutions, more simultaneous colours, in-border overscan graphics, 3D...
And on each new system we expected more, faster, better...
Sometime after PC 3D cards and 16 million colours became standard, the leaps had to be ever larger to even be discerned, but I still watch in awe as my aging xbox 360 renders amazing scenes in Portal 2, or an Atari ST demo forces the 16-bit underdog to warp reality in some astounding new demo.
I believe that 'the yoof' just are not equipped to appreciate all this - familiarity breads contempt.
I feel glad to have witnessed the metiric rise of the machines (but hope it stops short of Skynet sentience - n.I.m.l.t (not in my lifetime))

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Retro resolution link
14/3/2016 05:13:29 pm

So much for proofreading - scuppered by auto 'correct'
Meteoric, not metiric (autocorrectted to a non-word? Awesome)

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Retro resolution link
14/3/2016 05:14:18 pm

Sigh. Give up.

Ben
14/3/2016 06:18:36 pm

As an art guy in the games, it has irked me for some time how games journos barely so much as mention graphics these days in reviews etc. The irony is that as much as they are apparently taken for granted by the media and maybe even the audience in general, they are by far and away the area in which the most money and time (and blood, sweat, tears and misery) are invested and are, from a marketing POV at least, the most important part of the package.

Personally, as a fan, fancy pants graphics are all well and good, but I can't help but think that if as much money and effort had been pumped into developing AI, design, writing etc as has been into the purely visual aspect of the medium, as unquestionably impressive as all that guff is, games would probably be a lot more interesting (albeit maybe a bit less pretty) than they are.

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Chris
15/3/2016 12:13:07 pm

I feel the same way about films! All that money spent on pretty sets, big explosions and cool special effects (or Special FX as the kids say) often serves no purpose but to conceal a poor script.

I'd rather watch something well written that has a set literally made out of cardboard and actors pulled straight out of uni.

Of course, if you can pull off both then that's another matter, and games are getting to the point that unless they been written by somebody who has done the graphics themselves, they all have a minimum level of prettiness.

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Kelvin Green link
14/3/2016 06:26:08 pm

I am glad that people aren't as obsessed by graphics as they were a generation or so ago -- although I'm not sure it's true -- because all that arguing and frothing about how many turboparticles a second could be forced into your eyes by the latest X-Station got really boring.

Photorealism has its place but for me it's not the inevitable end-point of game graphics; I much prefer a good sense of design over realism, so -- for example -- Sonic 2 will always look good to me, no matter how primitive the technology behind it.

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Superbeast 3700
14/3/2016 07:17:39 pm

Graphics don't matter, it is all about game play!

Umm no! That's a load of b*ll*cks! I just said that to virtue signal and make myself seem right-on and trendy!

I should have name dropped an indie game with 8bit graphics and declared it "better than GTA V" to further enhance my edge lord credentials!

I spent too many years of my life in the real 8-bit era and I was mighty impressed by The Divisions graphics. Graphics have always been important to me and always will be very important to me.

Graphics are also important to everyone that went out and bought a new console on launch day because with a heavy price penalty for early adopters and bugger all decent software for months (bar the tech demos like Ryse and Killzone) I just don't see why else you would!

I want to really feel like I am in a freezing cold New York winter during a crisis. If graphics didn't matter I'd just call up my friend and we would go out in the garden and pretend like we did as kids!!! At least we literally would be cold!

When I play games with realistic (for the day) graphics it actually starts triggering my other senses. I can almost smell and taste that sense you get in the winter with the mix of frozen air and traffic fumes and feel the snow compressing under my feet along with the squidgy splashes of that black half-melted slush.

I actually had those same sensations on the speccy but as time rolls on and the child/imagination within me fades, I need more and more stimulation to achieve the effect.

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Omniro
14/3/2016 11:51:16 pm

Totally agree about The Division. I recently upgraded my PC and The Division was the first game I played on it. The graphics and level of detail in the world is amazing, a true work of art. I have stopped many times just to marvel at the environment. There are moments, when the light and angle is just right, it almost looks real.

Compare this and others to how games looked 10 years ago, or even less. It is amazing how far they have come, and the progression seems to occur almost without noticing at first, bu then something like The Divsion comes along that makes you realise just how far things have progressed.

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