News PGR3: Textured, not stirred

[The_Pope]

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2005/07/15/pgr3_textures/

Simply stunning

[Firehed]

1024x1024 textures? madness! that's higher than doom3 on ultra (which really needs the 512mb framebuffer), isn't it? although imo some of the textures in doom3 positively sucked (even on ultra) but that's another matter. In any case, I can't wait to see levels of detail that high in PC games. We're fast approaching it as it is, SC:CT is definately the secks with hdr on.

[Da Dego]

Not bad...not bad at all. Pretty textures!

Now wake me when it's real wireframe and rendered realtime.

[The_Pope]

Firehed: I don't know about Doom3 off the top of my head, but I know there have been games that use 2k textures - these are "only" 1k

Da Dego: I have a feeling that even in-game footage won't convince you, since you'll swear it was pre-rendered, eh? I guess you'll just hang out til November for the real deal then - fair enough.

[The_Pope]

Before I get slapped for being a thicko, it's well past 2am here, which is "late" even for me. 2k texture support has actually been around on PCs since the Riva TNT2 - here's an example from way back when 3dfx were still with us: http://digilander.libero.it/F1Land/3...ktextures.html

I remember all that S3TC and DXTC stuff from what must've been about 1999. I'll see what other links I can find

[The_Pope]

OK, so 1K textures go waaay back to the original Unreal - you can have a read of Tim Sweeney's "blog" from July 1998: http://unreal.epicgames.com/Texture.htm

Back then, cards like the Voodoo II only handled textures that were 256x256 max (I think) - don't forget, we're talking about cards that only had 8MB or 12MB of VRAM! Then came along S3TC - S3 Texture Compression - which suddenly meant you could have photo-real textures squeezed into hardware that really had no right to render stuff that good-looking.

It's a REAL challenge to find content from SEVEN years ago, but check out half way down this page for some screenies: http://www.unreal.com/comdex98/main.html

It's also interesting to note that S3TC is still around today, and was used by Sony for PSP: http://www.anandtech.com/news/shownews.aspx?i=22852

[Da Dego]

Originally Posted by The_Pope

Da Dego: I have a feeling that even in-game footage won't convince you, since you'll swear it was pre-rendered, eh? I guess you'll just hang out til November for the real deal then - fair enough.

Hehe...no, it's not that. It really IS pretty. Has nothing to do with the textures being rendered or pre-rendered. In fact, I'm quite sure it's rendered on the fly. But how hard is it to put a texture on a wall? We've been doing it since before we even left sprites.

I'm just waiting for the next BIG step. We're still technologically hung on this "Make a flat wall, put textures on it, bump map the textures to fake height, environ map the textures to fake light, etc."

It's damn purrdy, but I'm just not technologically impressed. We've been doing this for years and years and refining it for years and years, and so now the best we can offer is "we spent even more time on the textures this time!" I'll be impressed when we start seeing true dynamic light, raytrace, and more than 20 objects on screen that aren't baked into the groundwork. I want to see the "textures" part be a minimum repeatable pattern of no more than a little surface...and then have it applied on a wall where the cracks, the windows, the overhangs, the designs, and even the crown moulding are wireframe objects unto themselves or child objects to their respective parents (each textured independently). We've just gone to pretty much the limits on using textures to approximate an object...it's time to move onto building the object.

I don't want to see 1024x1024 texture on a 1024x1024 wall to give the look of windows like I'd see in a photo. I want to see 20x20 textures applied to a 1024x1024 wall and have it look like a photo. So that when I go up to that window or a piece of moulding or an outlet on that wall, right next to it, it STILL looks like a window or moulding or an outlet, and not a blurry, flat mess. That'll be done when we stop wasting memory and processing on applying a bigger tex and instead use it to create more and more detailed wireframe (which means more and more quality , interactivity, deformability, and lighting).

Until then, it's just textures. Purrrrdy textures, but just textures.

[Firehed]

I think once the PPU goes mainstream we'll have more of that. I could be wrong though, I read something about more realistic fog and know raytracing got dragged into the discussion, so blame the fact that I've had a half hour of sleep in the past 24.

[dom_]

you think they would have removed the reflection of the 4x4 from the pictures wouldnt you?

[webbyman]

if they are that good when the game come out... speechless

[The_Pope]

Originally Posted by dom_

you think they would have removed the reflection of the 4x4 from the pictures wouldnt you?

LOL - now THAT is funny. Well spotted!

[Cheap Mod Wannabe]

Da Dego you probably puked when (if) you saw Unreal Engine 3 Demo when the guy explained how much they advanced in making low polygon environments with insane bumpmaps and shaders =DD
I know what you mean though. Now hardware cought up with the software and if software developers will not implement new ways of creating virtual environments then potential development in hardware will not be triggered. Unreal Engine 1 at the time of release was able to do so much however there was no hardware that could use all g-engine's features. However now new g-engines are not advancing much (as Da Diego said) they just advance in with shaders, bump-maps and other ways of creating an illusion of reality instead of trying to copy-create virtual reality. That on the other hand is far complex, too expensive to implement and is too risky. Sure it would be revolutionary however as in every revolution, many things have to be sacrificed and none of the companies want to invest money. I even think that in a short run this graphics revolution would have negative effect on both game creators and users. It is much easier and cheaper to create games with blurry textures thus making more games available for public. Also amateurs can create maps and various mods due to simplicity of quite many g-engines. So Da Diego, we can try stirr graphic revolution, accept the damn blurry textures or we can go make static meshes for games =)

P.S. "new Voodoo3 (yes, THREE) and it was sweet. 1024x768 smooth as a baby's bottom" Also they said that ATI with 35PS beat other video cards... Ha ha It is so fun to read those old articles.

[TMM]

****ing insane i love it!. Will really suck for people who can't have enough AF to take advantage of it though

[Da Dego]

Cheap,

I agree totally that it is held back now by business. But I guess that's part of my problem! Before, these companies were dying to push the envelope, as every start-up does. But now, gone are the times of the true innovations, because those cost money. Before, when these companies didn't have any in the first place, they didn't care. They wanted to advance technology and move forward. 3d in its infancy looked nothing near the quality and continuity that could be had with 2d. But they moved anyways, because they had nothing to lose and an idea they felt could do a lot.

Now we're dealing with hollywood-level commercialization, games companies on the NYSE, and major marketing like never-before-seen (outside of movies). It's sad, but big business makes mature companies, whose goal is to continue to produce at their current levels and styles, not to redefine the market. And so here we sit. With our GeForce 7800GTKickmyassUberPowerIcanuse2048x2048texturesan dnotbreakasweatX. And you know what? For all that beauty, there are still only 20 moveable objects on screen (much less that are deformable) and the windows are still painted on as textures.

I'm *hoping* the PPU will open things up again. But so often, we've coded software that pulls the hardware (as mentioned). Now we'll have the first step toward the hardware, but will we know what to do with it?

Raytrace is easy as far as hardware is concerned. It's 1 equation. 1!!!! A single chip that is optimised to perform that equation countless times with the variables provided by the PPU would give a texture chip everything it needs to know. Graphical ram would be minimal, because we wouldn't need to load up on huge textures, just a single instance of them, and they'd be small (because poly counts could be huge with a PPU). You'd only need enough to store the X by X textures (meaning many more different ones could be in a scene) and the completed image.

If I had the coding knowledge to write a full engine or the hardware knowledge to design a full chip, I'd do it in a hearbeat. But I have a job to do and a wife who wants to see me sometimes, so being a crackpot mad scientist in my basement is an unfortunate impossibility because I'd have to learn to do many things all over again that I don't want to do.

Heh...ok, I'll get off my soapbox now. God I sound like a grumpy old man!

[Cheap Mod Wannabe]

Naah you don't sound like a grumpy old man.... except the "to see me sometimes" part =)

Anyways it is the same with all people and companies only in a big way. They do not want to sacrifice what they have, so later generations would have something better that they have now. And I totally understand this selfishness. Everywhere you look you see that these times of people sitting whole damn life soldering chips in their garage or nerds coding in their basements and attics is almost over. I wonder what will happen next.... hmmm then I remember that article about massive internet media... crazy online rentals and I get scared.

However back to topic... Hell yeah it looks damn nice this big resolution of yours... In order to apreciate the amazing graphics of this game I will play it on the worst video card that supports highest graphic details of this game. By doing so I will be able to analyze each frame at highest detail with least motion blur at lets say 5 Frames Per Second.

P.S. I found another screenshot [in respected BitTech site] of the game in motion:



[P.P.S.S I did not intend to offend nor steal the screenshot, it was just to make a point and for a laugh, if you need notify me and I will take it out]

[The_Pope]

Nah - it's funny

[Enforcer]

I must say im dissapointed in the fact that game dev companies use real life images for their games it sorta degrades the look of the game. For instance

http://www.bit-tech.net/content_imag.../fstexture.jpg

Thats a real life image not a drawn photo. if you look carefully and study images you can tell that its a real life photo, Im reffering to the lighting for 1, window 2, and detail in the building that sorta pop out a bit, hard to notice, but if you look ar the red foot peices on the bottom of the building you can tell its real.

[Da Dego]

Originally Posted by Cheap Mod Wannabe

However back to topic... Hell yeah it looks damn nice this big resolution of yours... In order to apreciate the amazing graphics of this game I will play it on the worst video card that supports highest graphic details of this game. By doing so I will be able to analyze each frame at highest detail with least motion blur at lets say 5 Frames Per Second.

P.S. I found another screenshot [in respected BitTech site] of the game in motion:

[P.P.S.S I did not intend to offend nor steal the screenshot, it was just to make a point and for a laugh, if you need notify me and I will take it out]

Naw, that IS funny.

Pope, I feel kinda bad, like I hijacked your thread or something! I know you're excited about this game, and I DO think it will be beautiful. I just long for the days of innovation as opposed to perfection, ya know?

[The_Pope]

Don't take my non-response as a sign of something bad - as much as I'd like to interact with our loyal readers, there is contast pressure to sniff out the *next* story, as well as producing / editing the next review, case mod or feature.

So really, I try to do enough to spark off a decent discussion amongst you guys, but then I have to leave y'all to it and move on.

You can't please all the people, all of the time, and without a doubt, the handling & physics of the game are infinite more important than the graphics. But yes I'm a big fan of the series, and it's exciting to see that the graphics will be top notch.

I plan to compete in some of the forthcoming Xbox Live tournaments, and it would be cool to race against some readers online. But if the whole thing ain't your cup of tea, I'll survive.

If you're sick of me harping on about PGR3, petition some of the other developers working on Xbox 360 games (or PS3 games for that matter) and get them to release some screenshots.

And as always, if y'all see something cool you think we should feature, or investigate further, email some details to me and I'll look into it: geoff.richards@bit-tech.net You can also spam our fearless leader with ideas if you want: wil.harris@bit-tech.net

[Cheap Mod Wannabe]

Sure we want more about PGR3 from you Pope, so we could just brag about it more












and spaaaaaaam he he