What game holds graphical supremacy?

[Murray_H]

The marine's face in D3 is quite plasticy, compare the texture on that with the texture on the g-man's face for example

 

[crabcakes66]

How is it not impressive. Sounds more like a bias then an observation.

mabey your confusing that with an opinion.

Substitute plastic demons with generic aliens and military and you get Half-Life and Half-Life2.

wait....is that the call of a "biased" doom3 fanboy? talk about being a hypocrite.....

Lighting and shadows play a huge part in determining how a game looks. Go find a game that allows you to choose between software and hardware rendering. Notice a difference? I bet you do. The more advanced the lighting and shadowing that are used in the game the better the game will look.

....this is a load of crap.....technologies/effects mean nothing if you dont use them properly.

Doom3 is a showcase, not a game.

 

[Dougy]

But they do look grey, pretty much every creature in the D³ videos was grey or a similar tone. Great skins, but no colour going on at all.

who cares is they look grey?

grey doesnt mean plastic.

saying they look plasticy is just the sign of a fanboy who cant take HL2 being blown away in the GFX department.


im not a D3 fan, i have no plans to buy it and i dont even know when its supposed to be released, im just saying that D3 looks way better than Hl2

 

[crabcakes66]

who cares is they look grey?

grey doesnt mean plastic.

saying they look plasticy is just the sign of a fanboy who cant take HL2 being blown away in the GFX department.


im not a D3 fan, i have no plans to buy it and i dont even know when its supposed to be released, im just saying that D3 looks way better than Hl2

Knight/dougy..... you have always hated HL2.....you have never said anything good about it.....why are you even a member of these forums if HL2 sucks so badly?


Calling someone a fanboy and then saying they cant take your opinion that a differant game looks better, doesnt help your case much.

you can say say your not a D3 fanboy all you want...but you still act like one.

 

[marksmanHL2 :)]

I choose HL2. Because I am a fanboi. j/k

I choose it because it seems to be the best engine for gfx with multiplayer and flexibility generally speaking. Plus I will be able to map for it. Which is nice.
AND valve said they could update the engine with new stuff if they wanted through steam.


And another opinion/comment. Won't it be funny when all games look the same. i.e totally realistic with nothing visual to make it look like a game.
No more of these threads for a start!

 

[MultiVaC]

Holy fricken SHIT. Can you guys grasp the concept of an opinion? If people say that the appearance of Doom3 looks artificial and uninspired, that's personal preference. You guys are just being ridiculous, crying "fanboy, fanboy". I guess it's wrong to show a preference to HL2's artistic direction on an HL2 FORUM. Read some of the previous posts, they're filled with "IMO", "I think", "My idea". Oh, and one more thing. My vote went to Stalker. Maybe you shouldn't be so judgemental.

 

[OCybrManO]

HL2 is going to be just great, the engine isn't all that from what i've seen thus far. Character are low polygon, the texture sux and the level's geometry levels are too simplistic as compare to STALKERs. The only thing that has impressed me so far from HL2 is the water effects, that is about it. The game inherrited the annoying edginess from the previous engine.

Someone doesn't know his facts. You call the characters low-poly in HL2? What are Doom3 characters? Ultra-low-poly? Just look at the profiles of the characters. Almost every detail on the Doom3 characters is normal mapped on. The textures in Doom3 are also quite a bit less detailed because each model has to have 3 or 4 layers and normal maps can not be compressed very well... this is partially what gives it the "plastic" look that many people say it has (the other part is them over emphasizing the lighting).

Doom 3's lighting is made for dark survival horror games with lots of tight corridors and almost entirely indoor levels... a genre in which HL2 does not reside. Why would Valve waste all those CPU/GPU resources on something their game doesn't even need? They designed their game to look great and (almost more importantly) be very well-rounded (good in many aspects instead of just one) without the requirements being off the charts. I think they did a good job from what I've seen so far.

If all you want is a survival horror game with survival horror mods (or whatever else requires that much dynamic lighting) then Doom3 is a great choice. If you want a highly varied experience Doom3 would probably be the last choice... whereas HL2 will (and, really, already does) have a huge and varied mod scene in addition to HL2 itself. I'm not sure what kind of mods STALKER and Far Cry will have... but if their engines work the way I'm almost positive they do (or at least Far Cry) then there will be more restrictions on their modding capabilities than those of HL2. Speaking of STALKER...

Personally, I think STALKER's environments look great, but I honestly don't see how they are so much better than HL2. Same with the player models. It looks great... but beyond that it's hard to judge.

Also, considering that the videos we have seen of HL2 had lots of placeholders and we were told that they don't even include DX9 effects (except for the HDR video) I don't see how people can say that it will look horrible.

Doom 3 looks great. Far Cry looks great. STALKER looks great. HL2 (or what we've seen of it) looks great. I don't know... HL2 just happens to look the best overall, in my opinion. I just like the way that it all fits together. There's something to be said about the feel of the movement and netcode, as well... both of which I would assume are at least as good in HL2 as they were in HL (I think this was a big factor in HL's, and its mods', survival). As for the other games... I have no idea how they will perform in those aspects. We can only hope for the best.

 

[Caminante]

Someone doesn't know his facts. You call the characters low-poly in HL2? What are Doom3 characters? Ultra-low-poly? Just look at the profiles of the characters. Almost every detail on the Doom3 characters is normal mapped on. The textures in Doom3 are also quite a bit less detailed because each model has to have 3 or 4 layers and normal maps can not be compressed very well... this is partially what gives it the "plastic" look that many people say it has (the other part is them over emphasizing the lighting).

Doom 3's lighting is made for dark survival horror games with lots of tight corridors and almost entirely indoor levels... a genre in which HL2 does not reside. Why would Valve waste all those CPU/GPU resources on something their game doesn't even need? They designed their game to look great and (almost more importantly) be very well-rounded (good in many aspects instead of just one) without the requirements being off the charts. I think they did a good job from what I've seen so far.

If all you want is a survival horror game with survival horror mods (or whatever else requires that much dynamic lighting) then Doom3 is a great choice. If you want a highly varied experience Doom3 would probably be the last choice... whereas HL2 will (and, really, already does) have a huge and varied mod scene in addition to HL2 itself. I'm not sure what kind of mods STALKER and Far Cry will have... but if their engines work the way I'm almost positive they do (or at least Far Cry) then there will be more restrictions on their modding capabilities than those of HL2. Speaking of STALKER...

Personally, I think STALKER's environments look great, but I honestly don't see how they are so much better than HL2. Same with the player models. It looks great... but beyond that it's hard to judge.

Also, considering that the videos we have seen of HL2 had lots of placeholders and we were told that they don't even include DX9 effects (except for the HDR video) I don't see how people can say that it will look horrible.

Doom 3 looks great. Far Cry looks great. STALKER looks great. HL2 (or what we've seen of it) looks great. I don't know... HL2 just happens to look the best overall, in my opinion. I just like the way that it all fits together. There's something to be said about the feel of the movement and netcode, as well... both of which I would assume are at least as good in HL2 as they were in HL (I think this was a big factor in HL's, and its mods', survival). As for the other games... I have no idea how they will perform in those aspects. We can only hope for the best.

True, i don't know my facts and your are obviosly bias. Lets not get into technical detail over here. Nonetheless, and with all due respect Sir. you most be blind to state that D3's character are ultra low poly - i'll recomend you a good thick pair of glasses for those blindly eyez of yours. Your explanation about texturing layering and so forth contradict the obvious.

All D3's character look better then any HL2, they may be "normal mapped" but the way the light interacts with the surfaces, it makes appear fully bump-mapped, something that HL2 does not.

This is regarding the bias STALKER vrs HL2 outdooor enviroment comparation. Although, i would love to wait untill you get a good pair of glasses, unfortunately, i am not able to wait a couple of weeks. HL2's outdoor maps are plain and simple, whereas, STALKER are more detailed and polished with ten times the geometry level- not need to get into further detail and for computer's sake look at some of the STALKER media!

 

[OCybrManO]

* Doom 3's characters easily have lower polycounts than HL2, STALKER, or Far Cry characters... if you don't know what a polygon is, look it up.
* Normal mapping is a more advanced version of bump mapping. Both HL2 and Doom3 can do normal mapping.
* The more texture layers that have to be rendered the slower it will render.
* If textures can't be compressed you can't use as many of them or they will have to be smaller.
* The smaller the textures are the less detail they can show, making the textures look fuzzy/blocky/smooth.
How does that contradict the fact that Doom3 models have lower polycounts because they couldn't afford to use high-poly models and high-res normal maps at the same time? Even as it is you still need a beast of a computer for it to look as good as in the screenshots.

If anything the detail difference between HL2 and STALKER outdoor levels might be something like 1.2x. The only thing I see a lot more of in STALKER are little 4 poly bushes and plants all over the ground. None of the other geometry looks amazing. Though, in your defense, the HL2 textures do get fuzzy in the distance (anisotropic filtering was probably off) in most of the screenshots. I'm not saying STALKER looks worse than HL2 in outdoor environments, but the difference isn't as big as you are making it out to be. I said HL2 was probably more versatile/well-rounded... not the absolute best at everything.

 

[NSPIRE]

DOOM III imo. Pretty much a toss-up between that and HL2, though... damned close.

 

[Quixote]

How do you guys even know how versitile it is or isn't neither game is out yet. Either, both, or neither engine could be complete crap or absolute goodness. Right now all we have is hype and frankly how easy and versitile can an engine be when the games have been long delayed?

Bah, I say. Bah!!!

Edit: and far cry is using technology to that makes very low poly count models look like they are high poly count. I wouldn't be surprized if they end up having the lowest of the group.

 

[OCybrManO]

There is only one way to make things looks like they are a higher polycount than they really are... normal/bump mapping. Doom3 has much better use of this technology.

The versatility of the engine is the range of different types of mods that are capable of being made using the engine... not how long it takes to make content for the games. That would be ease of use. Valve is known to have great support for the mod community and HL2 is supposed to be even better for modding than HL was... which will be awesome if it is true.

Doom 3's unified lighting architecture would not be suited to huge, highly detailed outdoor environments as seen in STALKER.
Far Cry and STALKER are both primarily made to do outdoor scenes... games like that usually have trouble with other environments (This definately looks like the case for Far Cry from the screenshots and video I have seen of indoor areas. Though, I'm not sure about STALKER as I haven't actually seen any indoor areas other than one the size of a barn... but I hear it's also supposed to do indoor areas well).
HL2's Source is a brush-based engine (great for indoor maps) with displacement maps (generated by Hammer) used to make flat brushes into curved terrain. It's not the best way to make terrain but it allows more flexibility than traditional methods.

The X-Ray engine (STALKER) looks impressive... I just hope there are a lot of cool mods for it. I would hate for something like that to go to waste. I'm definately going to buy HL2, Doom3, and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. but I'm not sure about Far Cry (I'll probably end up getting it, unless I'm strapped for cash).

 

[Ownzed]

aaaah whatever! I think they all have good graphics But i myself think HL2 has the best

 

[Asus]

Game Graphics IMO
#1 HL2
HL2 I think has it best overall for graphics. HL2's environment is graphicly pleasing and beleavable. Wood looks like wood and stone looks like stone. With the addition of HDR, lighting is much improved + soft shadows (I am bias toward soft vs hard shadows, sry). I like the detail of all the models (especially the NPC's faces) and the general overall appeal of textures. I think it is the most "realistic" looking between the games even though the tech specs on how it works isnt as realistic (e.i. multipule realtime lighting in D3).
I perfer it's general environment and NIC graphics as well as the debris and weapons. It has a good solid realistic 3d skybox along with good graphics for weather.

#2 Doom3
I like the general idea behind Doom3's bump mapping and not using textures but rather having the model portray the detail. Parts of it look great and other parts look like, well, plastic or clay.
I think the realtime lighting by multiple sources really helps with the graphic appeal although I also think it takes away from it in a way as well and might be why parts look like "clay". The graphics in the environment really are only improved in only one way, lighting. The models do look good with the bump mapping though but it just does not come accross quite as realistic as HL2. I don't see myself being able to reach out and touch it, believably...unless you consider it clay, then it is very believable. jk!

#3 Stalker
I love stalkers environment graphics for the most part. Trees and plants look very good and are probably the most realistic. Because it is mostly outdoors that is important for Stalker. It also has a good quality 3D skybox and weather. The buildings are good but not as good IMO to HL2 (just because something looks ravaged and has detail to show that doesn't mean it looks better than something that is not ravaged). I think the guns need improvement and I tend not to care for the cartoonish (textures are fine but the shape can be exaggerated) look on some of the faces or models. While it has great environments and equal lighting to HL2 (except maybe HDR), I don't care for the models, guns or the style of the models. But the environment is really great and is what could pull it above 3rd if my opinion changes.

#4 FarCry (Tied)
I love how it adds so much viewable distance and does not take away from the number of plants or detail. Although I don't think the detail of the textures themselves have been really improved from previous games, the amount has. The game looks otherwise average for graphics.

#4 Pacific Assault (Tied)
Other than the viewable distance, facial features the differences between Farcry and PA are not as easy to spot. They both look about the same quality as far as graphics go but then again there as not been as much released on both of these games.

 

[blahblahblah]

Asus, you're right about one thing, soft shadows look so much better than hard shadows.

 

[Shuzer]

Asus, you're right about one thing, soft shadows look so much better than hard shadows.

Agreed.

And I agree with most of what Asus said. I don't agree FarCry looks average for graphics, though. FarCry is still my #1 most anticipated game (probably because it's got the best chance of being out first..), followed by HL2, STALKER then Doom 3.

 

[Asus]

I probably havnt seen enough of Far Cry to give it my fair opinion. Some SS and some videos. Even though almost none of this is fair since the games are not released yet.
Although the HDR HL2 video is key.

 

[Shuzer]

Although the HDR HL2 video is key.

yep.. all the other bink videos look crappy compared to it

 

[Styloid]

I voted HL2 but now that I think about it, I definitely had a bias. I realized that some people consider nothing but what they've seen (which is actually good) but I was mixing up my ideas into what I see. For example, when I look at the ant lions in bugbait, I kind of relate them to the guard seen in the HDR vid. Likewise I don't really see many of textures in the vid to be 'final products', though they may be. I've also been wondering about what the shaders in source will really accomplish- valve have said things like motion blur, depth of field, HDR, better shadowing techniques, tone mapping,etc.. but how much of these have we actually seen? not much. Yet, how much do these things affect my judgement? I think quite a bit.
Anyways, I think that people will just have tastes as to what they consider better graphics (though sometimes they can't explain it so well) and you can't expect to change that opinion by telling them they're wrong.... maybe some form of brainwashing would work...

 

[Caminante]

There is only one way to make things looks like they are a higher polycount than they really are... normal/bump mapping. Doom3 has much better use of this technology.

The versatility of the engine is the range of different types of mods that are capable of being made using the engine... not how long it takes to make content for the games. That would be ease of use. Valve is known to have great support for the mod community and HL2 is supposed to be even better for modding than HL was... which will be awesome if it is true.

Doom 3's unified lighting architecture would not be suited to huge, highly detailed outdoor environments as seen in STALKER.
Far Cry and STALKER are both primarily made to do outdoor scenes... games like that usually have trouble with other environments (This definately looks like the case for Far Cry from the screenshots and video I have seen of indoor areas. Though, I'm not sure about STALKER as I haven't actually seen any indoor areas other than one the size of a barn... but I hear it's also supposed to do indoor areas well).
HL2's Source is a brush-based engine (great for indoor maps) with displacement maps (generated by Hammer) used to make flat brushes into curved terrain. It's not the best way to make terrain but it allows more flexibility than traditional methods.

The X-Ray engine (STALKER) looks impressive... I just hope there are a lot of cool mods for it. I would hate for something like that to go to waste. I'm definately going to buy HL2, Doom3, and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. but I'm not sure about Far Cry (I'll probably end up getting it, unless I'm strapped for cash).

Now you are talking out of your own mule. Actually, both Far Cry and STALKER are caple of handlying either indoor and outdoors enviroments alike with out any problems at all. You are talking as though, you've played all this game before. You are such of HL2 fanboy that, haven't even taken the time to check all the other games media and can't seem to stop from making bias statements.

 

[cadaver]

Doom3 may have good tech, but they just did a pretty crap job in the artwork section if you ask me. The Doom3 world looks like it's been constructed out of 3 elements: Rubber, clay, and plastic. It looks all soft and fake, like action figures in a toy playset. They soft edges contrast the ugly sharp shadows and doesn't look real at all. A lot of the monsters don't scare me at all. I'm sorry, but I think they just look... well... stupid.

what about the spitting "crocodile" monster in hl2... that is a stupid looking creature. hope valve removes that one.

I go for D3

 

[SubKamran]

The graphics for Doom3 are amazing but I vote HL2 since the environments look way too convincing.

 

[Sprafa]

PA wins all the way in its liquid simulation system and facial animations from all other candidates.
And it I'm not sure if the whole aging tech are just other NPc models or generated. If it is real-time generated it should be great.
However its lightning looks too artificial (sort of like Far Cry) and most NPC animations seem to have too few frames.

Doom 3 engine seems to have awsome bump-mapping tech and lighting but the the closed, small env. killed it for me.

Source wins overall with HDR, great facial animations, and if you see Vampires-the masquerade: Bloodlines, it seems to have great adaptability.

 

[daveodeth]

what is the HL2 HDR?

 

[Sprafa]

what is the HL2 HDR?

High-Dynamic range Rendering.
The final vid to come out was x-clusivily made to show that

 

[Asus]

Yeah, if you download any HL2 Video...make sure you include this one.
Link
The other bink videos do not fully show how the end graphics will be.

 

[maximus0402]

I vote...

Deus Ex: Invisible war

 

[marksmanHL2 :)]

I hope thats a joke......

 

[Koldfire]

S.T.A.L.K.E.R for graphics and enviornment/atmosphere.

Hl2 has long since been outdated in the graphics department. should have came out in december like it was supposed to.


Even Painkiller looks betetr than hl2 and has better physics.

 

[maximus0402]

look, no one can vote on anything!!

None of these games are out......screenshots and video give you a crappy presentation of a product. As far as I'm concerned Half-life 2 wins. it would win if they had everything they promised it to be and still used the halflife1 engine. Story, gameplay, and flat out IMMERSION is the key to the best game. Graphics is part of the immersion factor, but only part of it. If people say doom3 looks better...who cares....to me carmack and crew have always been focused on multiplayer and done crappy on story everytime. look at quake 1 ...all technology crappy game. doom ...weak story, but basically mindless killing...there has not been 1 single game carmike has done where the story was awesome....I can have a game completly top of the line graphics...complete photorealistic can't even tell I am in a game or looking out the window...if it doesnt have a good story or gameplay...it sucks and is incredibly boring...ok anyways let me get off my tangent and say...yes DEUS EX Invisible war is so far the best.....you know why???? graphics use the latest direct x9 features and its actually out in stores(not in beta version or whatever) and the story is incredible just like the first one.

 

[PvtRyan]

S.T.A.L.K.E.R for graphics and enviornment/atmosphere.

Hl2 has long since been outdated in the graphics department. should have came out in december like it was supposed to.


Even Painkiller looks betetr than hl2 and has better physics.

First of all, Painkiller (in the current state of developement, the leak is 2 weeks old) does NOT look better than HL2, it looks great, but that's mostly because of the high res textures. The physics are Havok 2.0, while HL2 uses a heavily modified version of it. So the physics are certainly not better than HL2's. And it's wrong to judge an alpha, I know, but the physics were kind of buggy (and it's supposed to come out in March) It still kicks ass though, greatest actionscenes since Serious Sam

 

[OCybrManO]

I have seen plenty of indoor screenshots of Far Cry and they don't look good. I have seen at most two indoor screenshots of STALKER even after hours of looking for STALKER media... both of which were very good (that and the fact that the developers said they designed it to do both indoor and outdoor scenes well is why I said "but I hear it's also supposed to do indoor areas well").

HL2 is "outdated"? Hehe... funny. It might not have the most amazing graphics of all video games... but it's far from outdated. I have no doubts that HL2 will be an incredible value in the long run... as much or even more than Half-Life. Half-Life, although it looked pretty good, was "outdated" (as you people seem to say if a couple of games look a bit better in certain areas) when it was released... that being said, it's still in use more than five years later.

How do we know that they aren't using this time to make some things look better? I mean, they aren't showing us anything new at all... and they haven't for months. I don't know... maybe it's just wishful thinking.

 

[Styloid]

I think one of the best judges of computer game graphics is to let someone who has never played a computer game, never heard of CGI and never watched Matrix, LOTR, etc. Watch or play the game and let them decide. They won't be biased by hearing stuff like "normal mapping" or "shaders" or "real-time lighting" etc.. They would just decide by their sight. So far I've only seen one instance of this and it went the way of HL2 but one person doesn't really mean anything. You'd have to take a survey of many, many people... and then they might just choose World of Warcraft...

 

[Flyingdebris]

None of these games are out......screenshots and video give you a crappy presentation of a product. As far as I'm concerned Half-life 2 wins. it would win if they had everything they promised it to be and still used the halflife1 engine. Story, gameplay, and flat out IMMERSION is the key to the best game. Graphics is part of the immersion factor, but only part of it. If people say doom3 looks better...who cares....to me carmack and crew have always been focused on multiplayer and done crappy on story everytime. look at quake 1 ...all technology crappy game. doom ...weak story, but basically mindless killing...there has not been 1 single game carmike has done where the story was awesome....I can have a game completly top of the line graphics...complete photorealistic can't even tell I am in a game or looking out the window...if it doesnt have a good story or gameplay...it sucks and is incredibly boring...ok anyways let me get off my tangent and say...yes DEUS EX Invisible war is so far the best.....you know why???? graphics use the latest direct x9 features and its actually out in stores(not in beta version or whatever) and the story is incredible just like the first one.

i think you missed the point, like many other here. The point is not which is the better game (i see this has turned into another x versus y debate) This thread was supposed to discuss which looked better. Gameplay is not the issue at hand at the current moment in time.

Me, i'm an even split between doom 3 and halflife 2. Doom 3 happens to work primarily with shadows and claustrophobic atmosphere while hl2 works primarily with light and and not so confined spaces (usually) I like em both really. BTW i personally don't notice that plasticness everyone talks about, as long as it looks good to me, thats all i care about.

Stalker looks fairly interesting. Their player models look pretty good. They didn't really blow my mind or anything, however the weapon models were some of the most detailed i've ever seen, and large expanisive rural/urban areas do give halflife 2 a run for its money. I hear it also has day and night cycles which are really quite a nice touch.

Farcry, i'm not sure what to think. Honestly, i think its a really awesome engine being able to represent tropical areas in a believable way. The only thing i don't like is that the enemy soldiers look. Their arms look weird, when their biceps show they look like double stack icecream scoops, aka not natural. the ones with sleeves cave some strange edge. The pictures of the blue goggle wearing guys looks pretty cool though. my only other bone to pick is that all this time i was under the impression that the game was all about some guy versus some people. Now their new screenshots feature monsters. I get the feeling that they were tacked on

 

[Caminante]

S.T.A.L.K.E.R for graphics and enviornment/atmosphere.

Hl2 has long since been outdated in the graphics department. should have came out in december like it was supposed to.


Even Painkiller looks betetr than hl2 and has better physics.

I'm glad you mentioned Painkiller. It's actually looking pretty good. Valve will be facing some tough competition when it finally release HL2 in 2005 from a lesser practically unheard of company. Anywho, i'll buy HL2 either way, but it won't definally be all "that" as people are depicting it will be like.

 

[Caminante]

I have seen plenty of indoor screenshots of Far Cry and they don't look good. I have seen at most two indoor screenshots of STALKER even after hours of looking for STALKER media... both of which were very good (that and the fact that the developers said they designed it to do both indoor and outdoor scenes well is why I said "but I hear it's also supposed to do indoor areas well").

HL2 is "outdated"? Hehe... funny. It might not have the most amazing graphics of all video games... but it's far from outdated. I have no doubts that HL2 will be an incredible value in the long run... as much or even more than Half-Life. Half-Life, although it looked pretty good, was "outdated" (as you people seem to say if a couple of games look a bit better in certain areas) when it was released... that being said, it's still in use more than five years later.

How do we know that they aren't using this time to make some things look better? I mean, they aren't showing us anything new at all... and they haven't for months. I don't know... maybe it's just wishful thinking.

I'm trully glad you finally decided to watch some of the STALKER media - i hope you watched all the trailers. However, as usual you did not finish your homework, FarCry's indoors enviroments actually look pretty good, the contain a mixture of static and dynamic shadowing and lighting, that almost rivals Doom3, and haven't seen so far in any of HL2 media either being on Blink or .jph format.

 

[PvtRyan]

I'm trully glad you finally decided to watch some of the STALKER media - i hope you watched all the trailers. However, as usual you did not finish your homework, FarCry's indoors enviroments actually look pretty good, the contain a mixture of static and dynamic shadowing and lighting, that almost rivals Doom3, and haven't seen so far in any of HL2 media either being on Blink or .jph format.

The HL2 indoor scenes look better imho, due to the fact that HL2 uses indirect illumination which it bakes on the lightmaps, Doom 3 nor Far Cry have this because they render the lighting in realtime and indirect illumination is too heavy to do RT.
The lighting in Doom 3 and Far Cry is harsh, very hard and dark shadows. HL2 doesn't have this, but looks nice and smooth, altough not dynamic.

 

[OCybrManO]

"However, as usual you did not finish your homework, FarCry's indoors enviroments actually look pretty good"
Does my homework include agreeing with you? If so, I'm not going to be finishing my homework any time soon. The indoor areas look simple and unoriginal.

 

[vann7]

ok Guys.. let me give you now my ideas about this..
First.. "best" is subjective.. and a thing about personal opinion..
FOr some people Quake3 looks "better" and for others Unreal Tournament..
its the same thing here.. when discussing about Halflife2 vs Doom3 graphics..
"which one looks better" it just a matter of tastes ... Britney spears or Cameron DIaz.. i like more the first one ,but other may like more the last one.

however ,still it is possible to say wich game looks more closer to the real life. both are far for realism ,but more closer than never, each one use a diferent aproach to make you believe you are looking at "realism".

Hl2 use to achieve realism..
1)very high quality Textures ,and Pixel shaders (for water and Fire ) and some fancy HDR effects.. because everthing in the lighting departments is mostly workaround or tricks here and there.

Doom3 use..
1)Advance lighting techniques to produce Dinamic Lighting in real time/ REal time Bumpmaps / Normal maps/Real time specular maps/Diffuse maps../realtime shadows. and as a bonus very detailed characters/weapons

all that is good to do something like this..
http://www.doomworld.com/php/screenie.php?dir=/pcgamer_dec2002/

which one looks better to you is a matter of taste. for some one game may look plastic and for others the other game may look like Toons ,wich game follow a more closer aproach to the real thing is a diferent story... and here i will like to quote someone ..

quote:
"Lighting is critical to making people think a game is real."
Andy Thompson, director of advanced technology marketing for ATI Technologies...

and he was right! this is not an opinion ,this is a well know Fact, if you work in the 3dindustry as a game developer/artist or just for fun . and i will go further than that. Lighting is the MOST! important ingredient to achieve realism. not one of the most ,but the MOST! ..no more ,no less.. take your digitalcamera and fire and shot in a dark room with very poor ligthing and even if it is a picture of the *real life *,it may not look realistic.
Lighting makes All the diference.. and here is where Doom3 follow a -more closer aproach to realism - another step ,than any other game. with its unified realtime per-pixel lighting.

the future is per-pixel lighting engines.. or any other NEW thing where Lighting is first class citizen. you can do much more and more easily that any other engine that can't do that.. ask any game developer .. and they will tell you that this is simple the truth. Valve in the other hand their engine is mainly based on Lightmaps as their primary lighting technique. something that have been said carmack *invented* some years ago in quake1.

http://www.3dengines.net/feat/?f=4&page=8

however there have been many upgrades from static to dynamic lightmaps ,and more resolutions ,but still is something that idsofware dropped completly from their next game.even it is "baked" or "Raytraced" ,and other game developers will follow/,and thats including Valve ,just notice that from all those NExt generation games..
HL2/Doom3/Hl2/Farcry and Stalker only the first one doesnt support perpixel lighting.

realism can be achieved with ..
1)high quality lighting that interact with everything..
2)High resolution textures ..
3)high polygons counts and or good quality bummapping
4)specialeffects Ps2,0 .. "HDR"..Fire/water..

the number #1 is Critical , without lights ,colors doesnt exist. the best quality is the lighting and the more natural it behave ,the best quality will be your graphics. the less natural the light behave ,the less realism you will see in your graphics.

the biggest challenge to Valve to achieve more realism in Hl2 is an engine limitation,exactly their lack of a realtime unified per pixel engine -in their engine that can interact on the fly in real time-with everything.
the real way light behaves.. light interact with everything ,not just with pre-selected things.why because effects like Bumpmaps/Normalmaps/speculars.. need real time perpixel lighting to look natural and correct.. that why Hl2 E3 demos almost doesnt use Bumpmaps ,because in that game it only works at special situations.->with static shadow maps. that why most walls in Hl2 are too smooth (flat) , same with speculars with are static.."painted" there are no accurate reflections in Hl2 ,in Doom3 there is not a single surface and single character that is not with extra detail (bumpmapped). no single surface or character than doesnt cast a realtime specular light ,no other game do that. at all times.. very few like Stalker and FArcry do it sometimes. but at all times is the way it should be if you want to be closer to realism.

just look at your keyboard and notice the beautifull specular of the light shining at ..maybe at one corner.. if you move your keyboard to a diferent angle or a diferent part of the room the specular will be in another place.. not at the same place.. right? that is what happens in most games that use Lightmaps.

the biggest challenge to Idsoftware to achieve realism in -> Doom3 [an indoors game] is mainly a hardware limitation ,your computer power .but this is something that will not be an issue in the future since every six months we will have more powerfull Cpus and video cards. to handle more detailed custom models and very high resolution textures wich Doom3 also support. BTW. it just means that Mod makers will be able to push more by a great margin the graphics in Doom3 than mod makers in Hl2. out of the box. but things are not that easy because its is well know that Hl2 support PS2.0.. (allow more fancy speciall efects ,,water..fire) and Doom3 engine not..? and also Valve developers upgrades their engine frequently ,so in the future you can be sure to see more cool stuff in that game.

quote:
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For centuries, artists have tried to capture the effects of light to present an image just as the eye sees it; Monet meticulously painted every spot of sunlight on the London's Parliament building at different times of the day. Today's game developers struggle with the same thing. "It's about creating a suspension of disbelief, and the thing that lets you do that is lighting," says Andy Thompson, director of advanced technology marketing for ATI Technologies, the Ontario-based company that manufactures Radeon graphics cards. "Lighting is critical to making people think a game is real."

To induce that level of fear, Carmack knew he had to eliminate what he refers to as "the Hanna-Barbera effect." In Road Runner cartoons, he says, you can always tell which boulder is going to fall, because it's a slightly different hue than the static background. The light doesn't look right. Until now, lighting effects in games were dictated by graphics cards in a limiting way. Games couldn't render general-purpose dynamic shadows, Carmack says, so they used light maps, static dark patches essentially painted on a surface.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
read the full article here..

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/11.05/doom.html?pg=1&topic=&topic_set=

the "hanna barbera effect" is the Barbie face ,of characters or the painted look (like Toons) of everything.

every game have its shortcomming ,, its unfortunate that Doom3 doesnt have PS2.0 so will not have nice looking water or fire.. maybe there is no water in mars and that Hal life2 doesnt have perpixel lighting like Doom3..
maybe its because its not possible to have it all..

 

[Caminante]

The HL2 indoor scenes look better imho, due to the fact that HL2 uses indirect illumination which it bakes on the lightmaps, Doom 3 nor Far Cry have this because they render the lighting in realtime and indirect illumination is too heavy to do RT.
The lighting in Doom 3 and Far Cry is harsh, very hard and dark shadows. HL2 doesn't have this, but looks nice and smooth, altough not dynamic.

Another fanboy :dork: Perhaps you'd need to take at this Far Cry and Doom3 and you'd displasantly surprice to find out that, this two gaming ingens are capable of renderring both "soft" and "hard" shadows. By the way, the reason why shadows appear to be too dark and hard on Doom3 is because, even in real life - just in case you haven't noticed it- when, a very bright light source iluminates a very dark room -such as the ones in D3- it usually makes to appear too dark the places which the light can't reach.


To be honest, when i found out that, HL2 won't be capable of such of thing, although the engine is pretty capable, i was very disapointed that Valve did not think of that. Kudos to both ID Software and Kritec engine for that.