Yes, but the real problem isn't answered by any of that stuff. Do those things really make a better game? Sure its a better looking game, but they already look pretty good and does getting all the way to "indistinguishable from reality" (if that is your goal) make the game better?
Well, truth be told, for a lot of people it does. My roommate loves Final Fantasy X. I've tried to get him to play some older Final Fantasies or other RPGs (ones that are IMO much much better), but he refuses because the "graphics aren't good enough."
Another of my friends was shocked that a PS2 game looked as bad as she thought it did (Xenosaga), which while the art direction was terrible, had really good graphics for PS2. She seriously assumed it was a PS1 game.
Did I miss something... The multi board GPU reviews I've read suggested to me that the FPS, at the high end, were limited at the CPU end and not the GPU end (i. e. the CPU is starving the GPU)...
I think the thing you are missing is that those multiboard GPUs (let's just take 2 SLI/ Crossfire since Quad-SLI is problematic at the moment [driver issues, slow, etc.]) are very high-end in the reviews. They bash together two 7900GTX's and you see insane frame rates like 150fps or something.
The trick is go to TomsHardware, look at their Interactive VGA Charts in the pic links on the right. Once you drill down to mid-to-high nVidia 6-series and mid-level 7-series like SLI'ed 7600GTs, for example, you're looking at 1.2x to 1.6x performance depending on the game. Crossfire is not better, AFAIK. It depends on the game, and it depends on the particular GPU engines you're pairing together.
CPU limitation in the reviews only become an issue when they pair the extreme high end GPUs together to then get distinct FPS differences when comparing different CPUs. This was the issue for the Conroe reviews that showed big FPS differences because the GPU power was really maxed out, that is, CPU became the primary differentiator. AMD fanboys shot back with benching mid-to-high GPUs, dual boards and single boards, and showed less FPS differences between Conroes and Athlon64/FXs.
Yes, but the real problem isn't answered by any of that stuff. Do those things really make a better game? Sure its a better looking game, but they already look pretty good and does getting all the way to "indistinguishable from reality" (if that is your goal) make the game better?
Yes and No. Tie Fighter is in my mind one of the best flight sims ever, and it had OMFG just Gouraud shading and a total number of polygons you could count with your fingers (well, not quite, heh). That's right boys and girls, no TEXTURES whatsoever.
At the same time, it's a poorly kept secret that I looove HalfLife2 and HalfLife2:Episode1. An unparalleled first-person cinematic experience.
It's a similar debate to photorealistic movie visual effects. The original Matrix had visual effects that worked hand in hand with a great story and engaging philosophical questions. The bullet time sequences were revolutionary. As well as the cinematography of the Lobby Scene, that has to be one of the all-time great people-shooting action sequences in any film.
Then you take Star Wars Episode I. The visual effects were like 5000 candy bars squeezed into a big gumball and shoved sorely up my a$$. That's because the story was rubbish, the acting was nonsense, and it was too much of a vast change from the original trilogy that we got to know and love as kids.
They redeemed themselves with Episode 3's spacefight opening sequence, that was rather cool.
Personally, when it comes to gaming, I like newer, better graphics and physics. But the gameplay and story has got to be there otherwise it's a bit hollow like Quake4.
Yes, but the real problem isn't answered by any of that stuff. Do those things really make a better game? Sure its a better looking game, but they already look pretty good and does getting all the way to "indistinguishable from reality" (if that is your goal) make the game better?
My interest isn't only in games.
My feeling is that someday we will be able to do, on our desktops, movies that come from computer generated elements, without having to shoot a thing, or to incorporate it into our own shoots. The possibility of doing something, and have it render in real time would be a fantastic help.
Eventually, I believe major movies will be done in this manner. The "stars" of these movies will be stage actors, personalities, singers, etc.
They will have their faces, and bodies incorporated into a computer generated character. They, of course, will be paid handsomely for this. These movies won't look different from any shot today.
On the desktop, we will be able to so the same thing, with less rez, and likely, lesser known, or unknown individuals (major personalities won't appreciate their likenesses being used for home made porn).
So, while games will benefit because most gamers are looking for an eventual photorealistic experience, there are more uses for it than that.
But, games will drive it. We have been seeing the move towards it for years. The appearance of physics boards, and the incorporation of them into the GPU, plus multi-core cpu's will all lead to this result.
Physics leads to a far more realistic experience. It's not just for effects. If someone is splashing through the rain, or going across a river, and has to fire a gun, a drop of water in the eye will change the entire concept. That can't happen now.
Physics allows real action. Now, all action is contrived. Nothing actually interacts at all. We still have people putting their arms through walls when they walk next to one.
What happens when bullets hit walls? Nothing. They act as though they didn't exist. In real life they would ricochet off a hard surface. That makes a big difference when spraying machine gun fire down a narrow corridor.
I had a couple of friends in the early '70's who told me that in WWII, they would fire a BAR down a corridor, past a turn, and hit the opposite wall at an angle. The bullets would bounce off the wall and hit whomever was hiding there. That can't be done properly now.
I'm sure you can think of dozens of actions that could occur with proper working of game parameters based on realistic world construction and physics, that can't be done now.
...Eventually, I believe major movies will be done in this manner. The "stars" of these movies will be stage actors, personalities, singers, etc...They will have their faces, and bodies incorporated into a computer generated character. They, of course, will be paid handsomely for this. These movies won't look different from any shot today...
It's real and it's here and it's now. It's called "David Tench Tonight" on Ten Network in Australia.
"...In truth, Tench is ... brought into the world by the electronic midwifery of Animal Logic, an Australian firm that has created visual effects for The Matrix: Reloaded, The Lord of the Rings and House of Flying Daggers..."
Animal Logic is THE BEST visual effects house in Australia. It produces work on par with Industrial Light and Magic, Manex, etc...
They've got this guy moving, talking, a lot of realtime expressions of motion capture, a lot of nuances, and the render in realtime is very very nice. Something like you'd need the full power of Four 7900GTX's giving true 4x performance. And maybe 2-4GB of VRAM.
Knowing Animal Logic though, the motion capture and render solution is very proprietary and a very closely guarded secret. Cream of the crop, they are, the aussies that work in Animal Logic. Funny, I've met two of them, one was quite arrogant but one was a like totally "don't tell people I work there" extra humble dude.
nVidia's Quadroplex and similar solutions going forward will enable realtime digital actors interacting with other digital or real actors in digital or real sets, composited on the fly in 720p then up to 1080p resolution.
"...In truth, Tench is ... brought into the world by the electronic midwifery of Animal Logic, an Australian firm that has created visual effects for The Matrix: Reloaded, The Lord of the Rings and House of Flying Daggers..."
Animal Logic is THE BEST visual effects house in Australia. It produces work on par with Industrial Light and Magic, Manex, etc...
They've got this guy moving, talking, a lot of realtime expressions of motion capture, a lot of nuances, and the render in realtime is very very nice. Something like you'd need the full power of Four 7900GTX's giving true 4x performance. And maybe 2-4GB of VRAM.
Knowing Animal Logic though, the motion capture and render solution is very proprietary and a very closely guarded secret. Cream of the crop, they are, the aussies that work in Animal Logic. Funny, I've met two of them, one was quite arrogant but one was a like totally "don't tell people I work there" extra humble dude.
Before that there was a female. I forgot the name. I think it started with an "A".
I was thinking of something looking like an actual person. Not a cartoon.
Comments
Yes, but the real problem isn't answered by any of that stuff. Do those things really make a better game? Sure its a better looking game, but they already look pretty good and does getting all the way to "indistinguishable from reality" (if that is your goal) make the game better?
Well, truth be told, for a lot of people it does. My roommate loves Final Fantasy X. I've tried to get him to play some older Final Fantasies or other RPGs (ones that are IMO much much better), but he refuses because the "graphics aren't good enough."
Another of my friends was shocked that a PS2 game looked as bad as she thought it did (Xenosaga), which while the art direction was terrible, had really good graphics for PS2. She seriously assumed it was a PS1 game.
I think the thing you are missing is that those multiboard GPUs (let's just take 2 SLI/ Crossfire since Quad-SLI is problematic at the moment [driver issues, slow, etc.]) are very high-end in the reviews. They bash together two 7900GTX's and you see insane frame rates like 150fps or something.
The trick is go to TomsHardware, look at their Interactive VGA Charts in the pic links on the right. Once you drill down to mid-to-high nVidia 6-series and mid-level 7-series like SLI'ed 7600GTs, for example, you're looking at 1.2x to 1.6x performance depending on the game. Crossfire is not better, AFAIK. It depends on the game, and it depends on the particular GPU engines you're pairing together.
CPU limitation in the reviews only become an issue when they pair the extreme high end GPUs together to then get distinct FPS differences when comparing different CPUs. This was the issue for the Conroe reviews that showed big FPS differences because the GPU power was really maxed out, that is, CPU became the primary differentiator. AMD fanboys shot back with benching mid-to-high GPUs, dual boards and single boards, and showed less FPS differences between Conroes and Athlon64/FXs.
Yes, but the real problem isn't answered by any of that stuff. Do those things really make a better game? Sure its a better looking game, but they already look pretty good and does getting all the way to "indistinguishable from reality" (if that is your goal) make the game better?
Yes and No.
At the same time, it's a poorly kept secret that I looove HalfLife2 and HalfLife2:Episode1. An unparalleled first-person cinematic experience.
It's a similar debate to photorealistic movie visual effects. The original Matrix had visual effects that worked hand in hand with a great story and engaging philosophical questions. The bullet time sequences were revolutionary. As well as the cinematography of the Lobby Scene, that has to be one of the all-time great people-shooting action sequences in any film.
Then you take Star Wars Episode I. The visual effects were like 5000 candy bars squeezed into a big gumball and shoved sorely up my a$$. That's because the story was rubbish, the acting was nonsense, and it was too much of a vast change from the original trilogy that we got to know and love as kids.
They redeemed themselves with Episode 3's spacefight opening sequence, that was rather cool.
Personally, when it comes to gaming, I like newer, better graphics and physics. But the gameplay and story has got to be there otherwise it's a bit hollow like Quake4.
Yes, but the real problem isn't answered by any of that stuff. Do those things really make a better game? Sure its a better looking game, but they already look pretty good and does getting all the way to "indistinguishable from reality" (if that is your goal) make the game better?
My interest isn't only in games.
My feeling is that someday we will be able to do, on our desktops, movies that come from computer generated elements, without having to shoot a thing, or to incorporate it into our own shoots. The possibility of doing something, and have it render in real time would be a fantastic help.
Eventually, I believe major movies will be done in this manner. The "stars" of these movies will be stage actors, personalities, singers, etc.
They will have their faces, and bodies incorporated into a computer generated character. They, of course, will be paid handsomely for this. These movies won't look different from any shot today.
On the desktop, we will be able to so the same thing, with less rez, and likely, lesser known, or unknown individuals (major personalities won't appreciate their likenesses being used for home made porn).
So, while games will benefit because most gamers are looking for an eventual photorealistic experience, there are more uses for it than that.
But, games will drive it. We have been seeing the move towards it for years. The appearance of physics boards, and the incorporation of them into the GPU, plus multi-core cpu's will all lead to this result.
Physics leads to a far more realistic experience. It's not just for effects. If someone is splashing through the rain, or going across a river, and has to fire a gun, a drop of water in the eye will change the entire concept. That can't happen now.
Physics allows real action. Now, all action is contrived. Nothing actually interacts at all. We still have people putting their arms through walls when they walk next to one.
What happens when bullets hit walls? Nothing. They act as though they didn't exist. In real life they would ricochet off a hard surface. That makes a big difference when spraying machine gun fire down a narrow corridor.
I had a couple of friends in the early '70's who told me that in WWII, they would fire a BAR down a corridor, past a turn, and hit the opposite wall at an angle. The bullets would bounce off the wall and hit whomever was hiding there. That can't be done properly now.
I'm sure you can think of dozens of actions that could occur with proper working of game parameters based on realistic world construction and physics, that can't be done now.
...Eventually, I believe major movies will be done in this manner. The "stars" of these movies will be stage actors, personalities, singers, etc...They will have their faces, and bodies incorporated into a computer generated character. They, of course, will be paid handsomely for this. These movies won't look different from any shot today...
It's real and it's here and it's now. It's called "David Tench Tonight" on Ten Network in Australia.
http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/s...006343,00.html
http://www.smh.com.au/news/technolog...012648555.html
"...In truth, Tench is ... brought into the world by the electronic midwifery of Animal Logic, an Australian firm that has created visual effects for The Matrix: Reloaded, The Lord of the Rings and House of Flying Daggers..."
Animal Logic is THE BEST visual effects house in Australia. It produces work on par with Industrial Light and Magic, Manex, etc...
They've got this guy moving, talking, a lot of realtime expressions of motion capture, a lot of nuances, and the render in realtime is very very nice. Something like you'd need the full power of Four 7900GTX's giving true 4x performance. And maybe 2-4GB of VRAM.
Knowing Animal Logic though, the motion capture and render solution is very proprietary and a very closely guarded secret. Cream of the crop, they are, the aussies that work in Animal Logic. Funny, I've met two of them, one was quite arrogant but one was a like totally "don't tell people I work there" extra humble dude.
It's real and it's here and it's now. It's called "David Tench Tonight" on Ten Network in Australia.
http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/s...006343,00.html
http://www.smh.com.au/news/technolog...012648555.html
"...In truth, Tench is ... brought into the world by the electronic midwifery of Animal Logic, an Australian firm that has created visual effects for The Matrix: Reloaded, The Lord of the Rings and House of Flying Daggers..."
Animal Logic is THE BEST visual effects house in Australia. It produces work on par with Industrial Light and Magic, Manex, etc...
They've got this guy moving, talking, a lot of realtime expressions of motion capture, a lot of nuances, and the render in realtime is very very nice. Something like you'd need the full power of Four 7900GTX's giving true 4x performance. And maybe 2-4GB of VRAM.
Knowing Animal Logic though, the motion capture and render solution is very proprietary and a very closely guarded secret. Cream of the crop, they are, the aussies that work in Animal Logic. Funny, I've met two of them, one was quite arrogant but one was a like totally "don't tell people I work there" extra humble dude.
Before that there was a female. I forgot the name. I think it started with an "A".
I was thinking of something looking like an actual person. Not a cartoon.