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[Grildon Tundy]

It's clear that significant progress has been made in terms of approaching reality with video game graphics, but I'm curious where people think the "upper limit" is, and where we are in relation to it. If realism is one end goal of video game graphics, where do you think we are right now on a scale from 1-100?

For the sake of conceptualizing and showing the trajectory of graphics towards realism, let's say Battlezone (1980) is the baseline (a "1"):

In keeping with the tank theme, about twenty years later, there was Battletanx in 1998:

And another ~20 years later, there was Battlefield 2042 (2021):

And here's a shot of an actual tank firing:

Yes, a picture of a tank is not reality, but hopefully you see what I'm getting at.

_______________________

I want to say we're at about 85%. But I remember standing in Walmart watching Ocarina of Time on the N64 and saying to the kid next to me something like: "Nothing will ever look better than this." I was proven wrong on how much video game graphics would progress then, and I hope I'm proven wrong again.

 

[Phase]

I think frames per second is a huge factor that is often overlooked when talking about realism. If a game looks really good but has 30fps it will feel substantially less real than if you had 500fps. Smooth movement in addition to great graphics gets us closer to real life.

 

[Syphon Filter]

I dont want it to be that much more close to be honest.

 

[Kenpachii]

Would say 30%, we are getting closer but still lots of progress has to be made.

 

[Danjin44]

I dont care for realisim in video games, I rather have interesting aesthetics.

 

[Aion002]

I think around 20%.

Depending on the angle and situation it can be a lot more, for example in Flight Simulator flying at extremely high altitudes makes the game look quite realistic, but the closer you get to the ground everything starts looking worse.

Then there are games like Horizon 2, that looks quite pretty, but it's more like "Pixar pretty" than realistic.

 

[Beer Baelly]

Current? We've reached that point years ago

 

[Caio]

Around 20-30%.

 

[HeWhoWalks]

As a 3D artist, this depends on the criteria. I work with high poly, uncompressed, offline models daily. They are fairly close (and some stills/movie scenes are pretty much there).

Video games on the other hand? Maybe 25. In other words, nowhere close.

 

[BennyBlanco]

This is the closest I’ve seen

 

[SHA]

Reality isn't perfect, you don't get vibrant colors in real life.

 

[Holammer]

61-70 for me. By 2032 when we have DLSS10 I expect most higher budget games to look 100% real if they chose to.
But I think lot of developers and publishers will back off from lifelike graphics in violent games like COD and your typical Sony walking simulators like Uncharted. If it's stylized it gives some emotional distance.

 

[Reaseru]

For me, as a kid, PS1 graphics looked like reality...as an adult, even Avatar CGI don't look real enough.

 

[Raonak]

I think we are at the 80% mark rn.

Stuff like spiderman 2 can look damn near photorealistic at times. Its not consistent but very impressive.

 

[Spyxos]

Somewhere in 50-60% range.

 

[Grildon Tundy]

As a 3D artist, this depends on the criteria. I work with high poly, uncompressed, offline models daily. They are fairly close (and some stills/movie scenes are pretty much there).

Video games on the other hand? Maybe 25. In other words, nowhere close.

That's really interesting because I'd put it so much higher. What is it about video games that are still so far off the mark? I'd be curious to hear your take, since your work involves approximating reality.

 

[SHA]

For me, as a kid, PS1 graphics looked like reality...as an adult, even Avatar CGI don't look real enough.

Not just reality, I actually fancy fictional creatures like crash back then, it was definitely special moments for me.

 

[Ev1L AuRoN]

For me, it's around 30%, just now we are seeing path tracing in games and the geometry is nowhere near as dense as necessary, there is also the question of animation, to avoid the uncanny valley we tend to stylize the reality. We can do pretty good scenery tough. Humans and animals, not so much.

 

[delfrickintree]

Yea each generation I find myself saying that graphics dont need to advance any further because it looks too realistic already. And then after getting accustomed to the new gen, the previous one looks like crap. And I dont know how comfortable I am with absolute photorealism.. because after a certain point nothing is real anymore. After VR gets to be an entire body experience, all the fps games will be causing mass ptsd!

 

[HeWhoWalks]

That's really interesting because I'd put it so much higher. What is it about video games that are still so far off the mark? I'd be curious to hear your take, since your work involves approximating reality.

Little stuff. Trees/bushes are still very far off, water isn't simulated realistically (some games do good, but far from real), and characters still have a very long way to go (particularly hair, which has seen some great strides this gen, but again, nowhere close to real).

One of my recent characters:

I really like it, but even that is far from it. Two other artists I know/have collaborated with are much closer:

Environments?

Video games are nowhere close.

 

[hinch7]

I mean even offline render with movie CGI is miles away from reality. We're nowhere close on current hardware in realtime.

 

[HeWhoWalks]

I mean even offline render with movie CGI is miles away from reality. We're nowhere close on current hardware in realtime.

I wouldn't say offline is miles away. It's gotten pretty freakin' close. But games are far, far from reality.

 

[nemiroff]

Tetris 0.001%
Call of Duty MW2 5-15%
MS Flight Simulator 2020 5-35%

 

[LazyParrot]

People always say it's really close, but a few years later everyone agrees it really wasn't. Been like that for decades. I remember reading a review for some basketball game on PS1 back in the 90s where the reviewer stated the graphics were so realistic that some of his family members thought they were watching an actual game of basketball on TV.

 

[RaduN]

In pictures, game characters can look good. In motion, especially facials, we've got some ways to go. I'd say we're half way there.
Environments look better, though there is still work to be done. I'd say we're at 70.

 

[Thick Thighs Save Lives]

From all my short time on GAF I'm quickly learning that a not so small portion of the userbase are quite obsessed about 'next-gen' graphics.

 

[VulcanRaven]

Enviroments are close but not people.

 

[Beer Baelly]

From all my short time on GAF I'm quickly learning that a not so small portion of the userbase are quite obsessed about 'next-gen' graphics.

INSANE right?

 

[HerjansEagleFeeder]

-27,438%

...aand the nominees for the dumbest thread titles in 2023 are...

I'd give this a solid 7/10 if 10/10 is perfect, 12/10 is somewhat serviceable 8/10 is really bad and -4 is good.

 

[Reaseru]

I wouldn't say offline is miles away. It's gotten pretty freakin' close. But games are far, far from reality.

Even your work (which is very good, by the way) is still miles away from reality, but the capability it has to simulate the detail that our eyes are able to see as far as they can of reality, it's pretty close. (i mean, we can't see every pore of the human skin in detail, right?).

So I think videogames are 60% close to achieve that detail needed for what I consider that perception of reality. We took more than 40 years to go from Pong to Spider Man 2. How many years will games need to achieve something like your work or even Avatar? And how many more to finally achieve the reality that we see with our own eyes?

 

[ReBurn]

I can't think of any games that made me feel they were photorealistic. The closest ones I've seen always let their mask slip with uncanny valley. That said, when I saw the original Mass Effect for the first time I thought it was the closest I had seen to realism on console. Then male Shephard smiled.

 

[E-Cat]

Linear or logarithmic?

 

[Laieon]

I dont care for realisim in video games, I rather have interesting aesthetics.

To quote the late, great Patrick Henry - "Give me more Wind Wakers and Katamari Damacys or give me death".

At the time, clearly, everyone was a bit confused about what he meant by that - but now it obviously makes a ton of sense.

 

[Knightime_X]

10 if you were one of those nerds who cherry picks to the extreme.
Average, I'd say about 70
Casual? Hmm, probably 110 to some, 90 to others.

 

[funking giblet]

When I played pool in VR, and I tried to put my hand down on a virtual surface, yeah that was more real than anything I've ever experienced, and it was blocky as shit.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

0

 

[Portugeezer]

We're close if you don't zoom in and analyse too much.

Urban environments still way off due to the complexity, but natural environments are very good looking.

 

[Reizo Ryuu]

I would say a solid 0, even the best in class cgi still shows cracks I spot easily and videogames are nowhere near as good.

 

[HeWhoWalks]

Even your work (which is very good, by the way) is still miles away from reality, but the capability it has to simulate the detail that our eyes are able to see as far as they can of reality, it's pretty close. (i mean, we can't see every pore of the human skin in detail, right?).

So I think videogames are 60% close to achieve that detail needed for what I consider that perception of reality. We took more than 40 years to go from Pong to Spider Man 2. How many years will games need to achieve something like your work or even Avatar? And how many more to finally achieve the reality that we see with our own eyes?

Thank you.

So yeah, so if my work is miles from reality, games are not even in the discussion. Perception is one thing, but to achieve true reality, it all has cooperate. When you get up close on things in a game, it all starts to fall apart.

They've achieved great illusion, however. Thanks to stuff like Anisotropic Filtering Raytracing

 

[Dream-Knife]

Current stuff still looks cartoony, you just don't realize it.

Look at GTA SA. It was "realistic" 20 years ago.

 

[HL3.exe]

From a rendering fidelity, sure, where getting there. 'Unrecorded' is a good case and point.

But from a actual simulation complexity (physics, animation, game-logic, ai reactivity) standpoint: nowhere near.

 

[Days like these...]

It's clear that significant progress has been made in terms of approaching reality with video game graphics, but I'm curious where people think the "upper limit" is, and where we are in relation to it. If realism is one end goal of video game graphics, where do you think we are right now on a scale from 1-100?

For the sake of conceptualizing and showing the trajectory of graphics towards realism, let's say Battlezone (1980) is the baseline (a "1"):

In keeping with the tank theme, about twenty years later, there was Battletanx in 1998:

And another ~20 years later, there was Battlefield 2042 (2021):

And here's a shot of an actual tank firing:

Yes, a picture of a tank is not reality, but hopefully you see what I'm getting at.

_______________________

I want to say we're at about 85%. But I remember standing in Walmart watching Ocarina of Time on the N64 and saying to the kid next to me something like: "Nothing will ever look better than this." I was proven wrong on how much video game graphics would progress then, and I hope I'm proven wrong again.

I remember seeing NFL2k on the Dreamcast thinking nothing will ever look better than this.

 

[Danjin44]

To quote the late, great Patrick Henry - "Give me more Wind Wakers and Katamari Damacys or give me death".

At the time, clearly, everyone was a bit confused about what he meant by that - but now it obviously makes a ton of sense.

Not just cell-shading, I also really enjoy surreal and out of this world aesthetics…

I find realism very boring.

 

[Reaseru]

Thank you.

So yeah, so if my work is miles from reality, games are not even in the discussion. Perception is one thing, but to achieve true reality, it all has cooperate. When you get up close on things in a game, it all starts to fall apart.

They've achieved great illusion, however. Thanks to stuff like Anisotropic Filtering Raytracing

Exactly. Videogames are in their infancy on objective to achieve reality, considering graphics. But can't help to admire the journey so far...came already a long way since Pong and Pac Man.

 

[SirTerry-T]

From a pure art/aesthetic point of view, I would take the Battlezone screenshot over the Battlefield shot any day of the week.

 

[Raven77]

I think frames per second is a huge factor that is often overlooked when talking about realism. If a game looks really good but has 30fps it will feel substantially less real than if you had 500fps. Smooth movement in addition to great graphics gets us closer to real life.

Framerate importance is incredibly overblown. 60fps games look MORE fake than 30-40 fps. Just like 60 fps movies look like soap opera garbage, so they stopped making them.

The human eye doesn't see 60fps in reality, so when we see it in media our brain thinks "fake".

Lighting and material representation, and that materials interaction with that lighting, is the holy Grail of photo realism. We're 10-15 years away.

 

[analog_future]

No where close. Even modern cutting edge movies aren’t there.

I’d vote around 30% or so.

 

[MAX PAYMENT]

10-20% maybe.
Anytime people bring up the violence vs nudity argument, I always think how absolutely cartoonish violence in games is compared to real life. Not even remotely close to the real thing.

 

[bender]

1

 

[IDKFA]

Maybe 20%?

We're getting better at lighting. Path tracing is a big leap forward at simulating light.

However,I know we're talking about graphics here, but other factors would also need to improve in order to simulate reality.

Physics are one aspect and they aren't there yet. I'm not talking about just motion (how people/animals move) but also how objects react with each other.

For example, driving a tank into a building in GTA5 just causes the tank to bounce off the building, regardless of the building. In reality the tank will go through the wall. Firing the tank at a wall just leaves a black smudge, but in reality that building would have a huge hole blown into it.

We're a very long way from games being exactly like the real world.