Seriously though, who asked for photorealistic graphics? If people agreed on a reasonable target, we could just have games at a reasonable size and cost, hardware upgrades wouldn’t need to be so insane, and teams could be put on other important things like, I dunno, making sure the game works instead of just looking pretty.
Do I need my games to have photorealistic graphics? No.
But there is something about the occasional game with such an impressive visual fidelity it makes you stop and go "wow, that is pretty".
It doesn't make up for poor gameplay, but played on top of good gameplay it does create an additional sense of wonder/amazement.
I definitely agree and hear what you're saying but strong art style achieves the same thing and invariably ages better. There are definitely occasionally those games going for photorealistic that make me pause and appreciate it but more often than not it's the games that really own a distinct, creative, and well thought out visual style.
I think the obvious games that had this reaction for me were the Witcher 3 and AssOdyssey, but neither of those are photorealistic, they both just make smart use of lighting and environment design. They're both gorgeous, stylized worlds.
Seriously though, who asked for photorealistic graphics? If people agreed on a reasonable target, we could just have games at a reasonable size and cost, hardware upgrades wouldn’t need to be so insane, and teams could be put on other important things like, I dunno, making sure the game works instead of just looking pretty.
Do I need my games to have photorealistic graphics? No.
But there is something about the occasional game with such an impressive visual fidelity it makes you stop and go "wow, that is pretty".
It doesn't make up for poor gameplay, but played on top of good gameplay it does create an additional sense of wonder/amazement.
I definitely agree and hear what you're saying but strong art style achieves the same thing and invariably ages better. There are definitely occasionally those games going for photorealistic that make me pause and appreciate it but more often than not it's the games that really own a distinct, creative, and well thought out visual style.
I think the obvious games that had this reaction for me were the Witcher 3 and AssOdyssey, but neither of those are photorealistic, they both just make smart use of lighting and environment design. They're both gorgeous, stylized worlds.
@t3rmit3 @uninvitedguest
AssOdyssey sounds like a very different kind of game.
What recalled this feeling for me was Crysis - which at the time was obviously gunning for visual fidelity and nothing else.