TheGrayGhost
Banned
Sheffield is just saying that graphics-technology has become a commodity. And he is absolutely, positively, 100% right.
-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
Game Developer magazine joins the next-gen hate train (Wii > *.*, Blu-ray sucks, etc)
- Thread starter Zombie James
- Start date
Forsete said:
You have absolutely no idea how stupid that statement is. In fact, it's not even stupid: it's the complete opposite of what is happening.
Why? Because the kind of thought process that led to the Wii as it is is exactly the same as Henry Ford's when he started making the Ford T. As he said once, if he had listened to his customers, he'd managed to have faster horses and would never have made an automobil, just as Nintendo would have made a powerful console with traditional controllers and traditional games.
Now, of course, you could argue that you're not talking about Nintendo but Sheffield, but his stance is pretty much in line with that of Nintendo. Maybe his editorial is poorly phrased, maybe some of his arguments are poor, I don't know. I'd like to read the whole article to get a better idea of Sheffield's overall argument, but I don't think it's available online, is it?
It has never been about saying that graphics (and technology) never mattered at all in fact, if you remember Nintendo's E3 2006 press conference, Reggie only said "graphics are secondary, nothing more, but rather that, sooner or later, you hit a "good enough" spot (one could call it a sweet spot, I guess), at which point any other fast progress in that direction leads to overshooting, because tech tends to evolve at a faster pace than the market's needs do.
Now, whether Nintendo has hit the "good enough" spot for now or is a bit below is debatable, but that's another point entirely. I was just reacting to your post to show how blind it was. Where there's white, you see black.
[EDIT] To the poster below: spot on, man. Spot on.
It's kinda shocking how many people in this thread completely missed the point of the article, OP included. I mean, the guy who wrote it even posted a clarifying comment in the thread.
The point isn't that we should halt all graphical progress. The point isn't that graphics don't add anything to games. The point isn't that we should all run to the Wii and herald casual gaming and Wii Music with open arms.
The point is that the returns from advanced technology are diminishing rapidly, and costs are rising exponentially. And as developers pursue the highest end graphics, their money is spent on creating Epic's jiggling meat cube, something that looks cool, but adds nothing, instead of polishing and refining game mechanics.
Sometimes, I see graphics comparison threads, and people get all worked up, but I just don't get it. Do you really care that much if Gears of War has a few jaggies? Do you really care that much if MGS4 has a few blurry textures? If one looks marginally better than the other, does it really make a difference?
What the Wii has exposed is that many consumers don't particularly mind if the graphics aren't the latest and greatest if they get games that they enjoy. That doesn't mean we should stick with that level of graphics, but it does mean that developers should be critically evaluating spending tens of millions on the graphical work required to render a next-gen game, and just what that money does for sales and overall quality.
I'd trade a slight dip in graphical quality for an environment where it's easier for a game to succeed, developers can produce games more quickly and with more polish than they could before, and publishers are less afraid of taking a risk on something new because of what it might do to their wallets.
The point isn't that we should halt all graphical progress. The point isn't that graphics don't add anything to games. The point isn't that we should all run to the Wii and herald casual gaming and Wii Music with open arms.
The point is that the returns from advanced technology are diminishing rapidly, and costs are rising exponentially. And as developers pursue the highest end graphics, their money is spent on creating Epic's jiggling meat cube, something that looks cool, but adds nothing, instead of polishing and refining game mechanics.
Sometimes, I see graphics comparison threads, and people get all worked up, but I just don't get it. Do you really care that much if Gears of War has a few jaggies? Do you really care that much if MGS4 has a few blurry textures? If one looks marginally better than the other, does it really make a difference?
What the Wii has exposed is that many consumers don't particularly mind if the graphics aren't the latest and greatest if they get games that they enjoy. That doesn't mean we should stick with that level of graphics, but it does mean that developers should be critically evaluating spending tens of millions on the graphical work required to render a next-gen game, and just what that money does for sales and overall quality.
I'd trade a slight dip in graphical quality for an environment where it's easier for a game to succeed, developers can produce games more quickly and with more polish than they could before, and publishers are less afraid of taking a risk on something new because of what it might do to their wallets.
TheGrayGhost
Banned
Incidentally, Malstrom just put up a blog post on this subject:
http://seanmalstrom.wordpress.com/2...ld-declares-graphics-have-become-a-commodity/
He's comparing how sound and music reached the user-level happiness peak (good enough) in the SNES/Genesis era with how graphics-technology is reaching that point today.
http://seanmalstrom.wordpress.com/2...ld-declares-graphics-have-become-a-commodity/
He's comparing how sound and music reached the user-level happiness peak (good enough) in the SNES/Genesis era with how graphics-technology is reaching that point today.
Kapsama said:
The rationale for excluding Nintendo's profits while including Microsoft and Sony's losses is both simple and logical - Nintendo is not participating in HD gaming. Their profits aren't a part of the HD gaming picture, but Microsoft and Sony's hardware losses are.
EA and THQ are the usual suspects? Everyone is seeing slowing slowing profits. 3rd parties are making less money now than they were before, R&D be damned. You can pretend it doesn't exist or say Sony and MS schew the numbers, but at the very least the industry is in stagnation, and many of those that are growing are those that haven't tethered their sail to HD gaming.Kapsama said:
And again, why are people picking some of the biggest wii supporting 3rd parties to argue against the wii. Namco would be a better pick, Midway, Atari,Codemasters. Companies that actively avoided the wii.
Instead you pick companies that have put quality software on every platform and succeeded. What the hell are you arguing?
sonicmj1 said:
In between misappropriating the term luddite, and the new tagline of PS3/360 am greatest gaming crowd, you have too much faith in GAF NOT misinterpreting an editorial like this.
Though this one is probably unique in the series of write-ups that had graced GAF from Pachter prenouncements right down to random blue ocean blogs, in that the author actually posted a well reasoned clarification 'in-case' the HD retards misunderstood it to be an attack on their precious graphics. That he was completely ignored has shown the hand of his detractors.
The OP is also a flaming PS3 fan, in case you didn't know.
OG_Original Gamer
Member
For EA Madden 09 visually is looking alot better than 08, IMO of course. I haven't picked up a Madden since last gen. This year I'm interested, due to visuals. $60 or $65 after sales tax depending on where you live. Makes buying the highend consoles and games a harder sale for the casual. Even when you compare the prices of used games from this gen its a hard sale. As a hardcore gamer I was dissapointed, to see this move. But, as a hardcore gamer I accepted it, I just couldn't imagine myself passing up Gears of War, COD4, or Halo3.
Deku said:
Considering GAF's reputation in the industry and more restrictive registration policies, I at least expected people to have a little reading comprehension.
This place is still better than Gamespot System Wars, but I guess people totally failing to read is something that just comes with an internet message board.
Oh well.
BishopLamont
Banned
Guys it's really simple. Nintendo is the biggest backer of casual/innovative gaming, while Sony/MS are the biggest backers of HD gaming. The former is making huge profits while the latter are making huge losses.
Add to the fact with the general vibe of the industry being in a downhill, how can anyone think the industry is fine as it is? We don't want everyone to drop HD support and make a ton of minigames. Nintendo risked it all and they succeeded, just give the two biggest platforms of casual/innovative gaming a bigger share of the budgets it deserves. Not everything on these platforms have to be greatly innovative, just give the products you put on it more care and polish.
Add to the fact with the general vibe of the industry being in a downhill, how can anyone think the industry is fine as it is? We don't want everyone to drop HD support and make a ton of minigames. Nintendo risked it all and they succeeded, just give the two biggest platforms of casual/innovative gaming a bigger share of the budgets it deserves. Not everything on these platforms have to be greatly innovative, just give the products you put on it more care and polish.
OG_Original Gamer
Member
avatar299 said:
Good question, at the end it all boils down gameplay. I've always had high expectations of Madden visually. This gen in particular and the first two for me failed.
VanMardigan
has calmed down a bit.
Is that saying that XBLM movies are lower quality than YouTube?
rohlfinator
Member
That's a great sentiment, and one I'd gladly get behind, but I don't think the Wii is any closer to being that environment than either of the other two machines, and such an environment is not much of a focus to Nintendo at this point.sonicmj1 said:
rohlfinator said:
I was hoping the Wii would be that environment. I don't like Nintendo's direction as a developer, at least as of late, but I hoped that the environment they created would be a good one for hardcore game development because of lower costs. While a few titles from smaller developers are coming on the platform, that largely hasn't been the case.
I think that next-generation, though, such a platform might be more viable. I'm almost certain that Sony and Microsoft will try to keep hardware advancement much more in line with costs this time around.
VanMardigan said:
No. It's saying sources like 360/Netflix are only slightly lower quality than the original source; the point is that people are willing to sacrifice quality for convenience, and as the scale gets further towards convenience (i.e. direct satisfaction of the job) and farther from quality, the more people are inclined to use it. There is definitely a point where people would not accept what's being offered, so it only goes so far.
rohlfinator
Member
Yeah, I agree. Although I think more powerful hardware can be helpful to small developers to some extent -- there are fewer hardware restrictions to work around, and obviously things like hard drives and network capabilities make digital distribution much more feasible for small devs. As long as buyers don't demand that every game push hardware to its limit, stronger hardware is generally a good thing for developers.sonicmj1 said:
I think the only way the industry can establish a healthy environment for small/indie devs will require a digital distribution platform that covers a variety of game types and price ranges, and a significantly large userbase that treats digital distribution as a viable alternative to retail games. None of the big three are there yet, but there have been some pretty strong advances in the area (sadly, few of them from Nintendo).
test_account
XP-39C²
Ye, the way its written there it could indeed looks like they mean that the XBLM got a lower quality than the movies/movie clips that you find on YouTube, but if i should guess i would guess that they wrote something about the Bluray earlier in the article and that they are reffering to Bluray instead, and not YouTube. Please correct me if i'm wrong thoughVanMardigan said:
Chris Remo
Member
I sit next to Brandon Sheffield at work, and I can say extremely conclusively he is not "in the tank for Nintendo" or any such nonsense. To the best of my knowledge, the direction Nintendo is going is not the direction in which he is interested as a gamer. His editorial is trying to call the situation as he sees it, in a way that might be interesting or offer a useful perspective to game developers, the actual audience we target.
(And clearly it was not written to generate forum posts. It's a print magazine that also has a private digital version that can't be directly linked on the web, so there would be no way for us to profit from threads like this. Hell, it's even offered free to game developers.)
(And clearly it was not written to generate forum posts. It's a print magazine that also has a private digital version that can't be directly linked on the web, so there would be no way for us to profit from threads like this. Hell, it's even offered free to game developers.)
Jesus Christ this post is excellent.Threi said:
sonicmj1 said:
This. At the rate we are going like I said earlier publishers would have to charge $80 per game or sell a shit ton more software than they already are on average to turn a decent profit because when companies are seeing very high revenues but their profit margins are shrinking considerably then something is very wrong. Anyone arguing the industry is healthy right now compared to last generation need to do the research. We are almost 3 years into this generation so the "transition period" has gone and passed. Someone needs to go back and look at the industry numbers from the fiscal year at the same point we are now into this generation (2 years 9 months) and compare them to current numbers to find out if the industry is contracting or expanding.
solid2snake
Banned
alright, can't wait for the first impressions of GTAIV for Wii. after this article, this is the only logical conclusion.
This article is just one year too early. When Nintendo brings 1:1 controls in 2009 then the chiasm between new gen and next gen will be complete.
Who doesn't foresee Nintendo's next wave of games with MotionPlus will set a new standard in terms of entertainment? Who doubts a Punch Out with cartoonish graphics but with precise, realistic controls will trounce any boxing game in HD, where you have to press buttons? It's easily predictable that most genres will be more fun to play. Games using MotionPlus will really start making graphics irrelevant, for a while. Then will come a new gen with realistic controls and realistic graphics.
Who doesn't foresee Nintendo's next wave of games with MotionPlus will set a new standard in terms of entertainment? Who doubts a Punch Out with cartoonish graphics but with precise, realistic controls will trounce any boxing game in HD, where you have to press buttons? It's easily predictable that most genres will be more fun to play. Games using MotionPlus will really start making graphics irrelevant, for a while. Then will come a new gen with realistic controls and realistic graphics.
Not bothering to read this whole thread, but will say that Brandon makes excellent points, and the OP's summary of his points is laughably poor misdirection.
Actually you can almost directly categorise GAF into two schools right from this thread: people who matter, and the rest who are basically messing up our gene pool.
Actually you can almost directly categorise GAF into two schools right from this thread: people who matter, and the rest who are basically messing up our gene pool.
So my question is how do we fix the industry? It seems apparent that people believe HD consoles are to blame, do developers just drop support for them and move to the Wii? Do only the successful genre stay on HD and all others to Wii?
Another question I've always had is what makes HD console development so expensive in the first place? I mean im sure there be a 3rd party Wii game with 150 person team, that uses motion capture for CS and all the flashly shit HD gaming consoles use. The only difference will be the resolution, so what makes people think the Wii is going to keep that from happening?
Another question I've always had is what makes HD console development so expensive in the first place? I mean im sure there be a 3rd party Wii game with 150 person team, that uses motion capture for CS and all the flashly shit HD gaming consoles use. The only difference will be the resolution, so what makes people think the Wii is going to keep that from happening?
JudgeN said:
It's not that HD development is inherently expensive. It's the notion that with these consoles come the expectations of "massive, epic masterpieces" - see MGS4, GTA4, Halo 3, etc. It's the combination of a ton of R&D time coupled with huge development cycles to hit those expectations that cause some games to have ridiculous budgets. It's that mentality that Nintendo is trying to move away from with the Wii, like it or not; there is a place for those games but they need to be shown for what they are - niche and not the industry standard.
GuitarAtomik
Member
Wow. What alternate dimension does this guy hail from? I feel the opposite about every single one of his points and most people I know would agree.
The only games on Wii that would even come close to that are from Nintendo themselves. From my understanding a lot the budget that goes into HD game development especially the nicer looking games is the Artist who do 3D-Texturing/Modeling and environments. Programming hasn't really changed all that much compared to last generation but the increase in graphical detail has and has been a big factor in current game developing budgets.JudgeN said:
What are his points exactly?GuitarAtomik said:
Chris Remo
Member
Well, it also is kind of inherently expensive aside the from "masterpiece" expectation. The higher resolution you have, the more fidelity you need to have to match that resolution, and that's content creation. Given HD and SD games of equal scope, the HD one is going to be more expensive.Wallach said:
Wallach said:
After posting that, I thought everyone was talking about the "HD stigma" and you are right not every game needs to be epic but I love my "Epic games". But now that I think about it during the PS2 era there were just as many epic games are there are now, of course I didn't pay any attention to sales then so many they didn't cost as much as I would imagine.
Shaheed79 said:
They will come from nintendo right now, but in a few years. It could be alot more 3rd parties if Wii keep selling like they do. I mean developers do like to make nice epic games themselves right and you know they gotta compete with nintendo games
marc^o^ said:
People were saying the exact same thing before the Wii launched. While I understand intellectually what the difference is, I can't imagine it'll have the impact you say it will.
Besides, this article has nothing to do with the new interface championed by the Wii.