What happen when 3D technology reaches stagnation?

[Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman]

Today, 3D tech is still advancing. Most prominent games today are still made (and sold) due to its 3D-showcase capability (Quake III, Doom 3, etc), and while gameplay is not entirely dead, it seems that today graphic is more important as selling factor.

Now take a brief look at the "good old days"; the era of 320x200, low-res VGA graphic. Yes, there are still artistic differences between games, and there are still games that were more beautiful than others like Wing Commander (the original) and Flashback, but still, the difference is not that much. So during that era, gameplay got the more emphasizes, because they need excellent gameplay to differentiate themselves.


Today, it seems that things like pixel shader and HDR is making more difference than gameplay (some FPS are better than others, but basically they are still FPS). But what will happen when 3D technology reaches stagnation?

I imagine that almost every PC games will look the same. Yes, the graphic artists will make difference (as they did during early 90s), but on basic level, they will look the same due technological constraints; every game will have HDR or pixel shader or such other things.

Then, it will be the time for more emphasizes on gameplay again, like what we had on early 90s. Why? Because they need something to make the game stands out of the crowd.

Imagine if every games has Doom3 graphic, or HL2 graphic, and the graphic tech doesn't advance further (at least not much) due to stagnation. Then every games will look the same, and 3D graphic will be something more like commodity. Then games will need something as differentiating point.

I guess (and hope) that would be the gameplay.




Note to Ace: Ace, what I exactly mean by "gameplay" is not the one according to the masses, but to hardcore gamers like us. I don't care if the "gameplay" of a Quake clone can satisfy the Joe Mainstream; what I really mean is deep and engrossing gameplay. Gameplay which is like that of early 90s era, which I guess I already described on other previous threads here

[Hotfoot]

Graphics won't top out for a long time, as different revolutions will make things better and better. After graphics will come physics, then displays, yadda yadda.

Meanwhile, as the large companies make games that are flashy with modern technology, independant game developers and the rare major developer will make games with phenomenal gameplay using sub-par technology. With Steam and other digital distribution methods coming to the fore, the ability for smaller developers to survive without shelf space on EBGames or Gamestop increases.

You'll never stop hundreds of derivative pieces of shit from being developed. Don't get misty-eyed about the days of gaming past. Do you have any idea how many Pac-Man clones there were? For every major arcade game, there were damn near a dozen clones that people tried to use to cash in on their success.

Case in point: the current WW2 craze. For every good WW2 game out there, there's a dozen mediocre or shitty games made.

In short: Good games are still being made, it's just that hype machines tend to obscure them.

[Mayabird]

Something I think will come back will be the randomly generated games of old. The storyline and graphics and so on were often crap, but there was a new dungeon to traverse every single time, and they were annoyingly addictive.

Only this time, it'll be a LOT bigger and fancied up. You could have entirely randomly generated RPG plotlines that change as you play along. There would be no walkthroughs when the towns could be anywhere and the populations changed each time. The game need not be long, either. It could be five-ten hours per run, but with each run different, it's like a different game with the same basic mechanics and outline.

[Uraniun235]

Imagine if every games has Doom3 graphic, or HL2 graphic, and the graphic tech doesn't advance further (at least not much) due to stagnation. Then every games will look the same, and 3D graphic will be something more like commodity. Then games will need something as differentiating point.

I guess (and hope) that would be the gameplay.




Note to Ace: Ace, what I exactly mean by "gameplay" is not the one according to the masses, but to hardcore gamers like us. I don't care if the "gameplay" of a Quake clone can satisfy the Joe Mainstream; what I really mean is deep and engrossing gameplay. Gameplay which is like that of early 90s era, which I guess I already described on other previous threads here

I don't know if this is what you were trying to accomplish, but you're really coming off as trying to present yet another tired old "eventually we'll all get tired of first person shooters and then we'll have this grand revolution of nothing but new, revolutionary, innovative titles!" argument.

If so, I think this is looking at it the wrong way; have you ever heard of the idea that every possible plot has already been invented? The idea, so I was once told, is that there are somewhere around 250 truly unique plots, and everything from here on out is a retelling of one or more of those plots. Certainly, we get enjoyment from the same plot retold; otherwise remakes/retellings of Shakespeare's works would never succeed.

Similarly, while I doubt we've invented them all, I think we should realize that the very same thing is quite likely to happen to gaming. Eventually, we're going to invent every possible game type, and from there on out, our enjoyment will almost all be derived from the details of the game, the way in which the game type is executed.

I don't see what's wrong with having three WW2-based games that are each different in the way they approach the material; let's take Battlefield 1942, Call of Duty, and Day of Defeat as examples. They each have very, very different styles, ranging from the size and scope of the battles to how weapons and movement "feel". Certainly there's something to be said for a "deep" experience, but the details like I mentioned are certainly too important to casually dismiss.

Furthermore, even if graphics do hit a plateau, you'll still see distinctly different styles; Unreal is quite different from Source, which itself is quite different from Doom 3, and different people will prefer different aesthetics.

Then there's the issue of content. As engines become more sophisticated, the labor required to supply those engines with content to render will become more and more prohibitively expensive. Even if "the perfect FPS engine" was delivered to us tomorrow, it would still fall to artists and designers to populate that engine with models and textures and level designs. In this sense, there would still be games that would come out with "even better" graphics because there would still be publishers willing to spend that extra cash to bring a "new level of detail" to their games.

Speaking of content, even if everyone had access to perfect graphics, one thing that larger productions tend to have is superior sound, as they can afford to license professionally-made sound effects.

Even in such a world, the Big Corporate Publishers would still have a lot of muscle. And in such a world, people would still buy first person shooters and be attracted to games that had more polish and shine.

Small independent developers would not be in much of a better position in such a world than they are in today. The biggest advantage they will have in the future is the continued spread of broadband internet access.