AND plenty of shadows to tide over those looking for them. Looks great!

Definitely an improvement, also, there doesn't appear to be a nuclear explosion going on in the Skyrim tavern. Which is always a plus for having a good time.

Woah, talking about hyperboles. If you think modern graphics are getting close to the point of perfect photo-realism, then you either need to get out in the real world more, or you need to get your eyesight checked.

Moden graphics are awesome, but we're still a loooong way to go before some developers craft a videogame so realistic that it's the same as seeing real actors.







I had the same impression.... are we really sure they're using a new engine after all??

Now I really need to see this game in motion. I'm starting to worry about the animation quality.

Don't get me wrong, if this game was nothing more than Oblivion with steroids, I'd still buy it on day one. However... I'm also hoping for more.

I just thought...will it be 3D on the ps3? as a lot of ps3 games are now 3D supported, and likewise for the pc? it'll certainly be more interesting...

I hate to stop you here, but we're actually nowhere close to photo-realism. Sure we're closer when compared to back in the day, but we're still not close.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_tracing_(graphics)

And according to John Carmack, we won't be able to achieve this in video games even in the NEXT generation. The hardware that's currently out or planned to release is nowhere near powerful enough to handle it in real time.

But we can definitely expect idTech 6 to incorporate this if and when the hardware can handle it.

Todd said in the podcast there are no plans for Kinect or 3D. He can't exclude the possibility one hundred percent, but he said he'd much rather focus on the game itself.

No, no game in the last 3 years has taken a huge leap because they're running on 6 year old hardware. Low resolution textures, and a low resolution with no great AA, and relatively low poly models with decent-but-nothing-special shadows is very far from photorealistic. At least, very far if you're not legally blind, anyway. High end PCs can render truly photorealistic visuals, but not in realtime.

Also, why go for photorealism? I know the real world, it looks boring. Bring me fantasy in my fantasy RPG.

Oh this reminds me of my work ...

http://img256.imageshack.us/img256/6508/updatedwaterfall.jpg

Is it just me or does this look better than the Skyrim screenshot? :lmao:

Very nice.

It looks very Cryengine-y. Not that there's anything bad about that (I mean what's bad about the Cryengine in terms of graphics).

Very nice indeed. :thumbsup:

Like i said before reserve judgement to when it happens in motion, if it looks any better then oblivion I will be fine with it, heck I still play morrowind loads, its not the graphics that matter to me, I was happy with NPC's looking more believable but with all this extra stuff i think it will be amazing

Yeah I agree.
Although PCs can indeed render photorealistic visuals, or at least kinda close, and in real-time.
These are not the perfect examples, but they're the prettiest I can find. 1-8 are from Crysis, obviously
The 9th one is from a real-time rendering. Best wind on trees I've ever seen.

http://h-2.abload.de/img/2pblu.jpg
http://i47.tinypic.com/2n9gy7a.jpg
http://h-7.abload.de/img/2nuq3.jpg
http://www.geekstir.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/reallifecrysis.jpg
http://www.gamerdna.com/uimage/Ifo1enYR/full/crysis-vs-reality.jpg
http://www.incrysis.com/incgallery/247.jpg
http://www.theoldbreed.com/imagehosting/68495b11b78f360.jpg
http://img262.imageshack.us/img262/3184/normal11737467062256c60rd5.jpg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjZc9ayGlaM

Whats that from?

Umm how can some people not get such a simple concept.... CLOSE TO PERFECT-REALISM IN COMPARISON TO GRAPHICS IN THE PAST. There always has to be a point of reference and the point of reference is the history of computer graphics. In comparison to the graphics over the years, the graphics now are damn close to perfect-realism in comparison. Also, "close" is a point of view, some people might think one inch is their definition of close and others may think that 60 miles is close. In perspective, yes we are close to perfect-realism....

Oh and hlvr showed good examples of Reality vs. Game graphics.

He Thanks ..






It is Cryengine 2 , its a personal work about reconstructing a Rainforest Biome on a tropical Island , fomer project for Blue Mars platform now possibly to evolve into cryengine 3 , all things there are custom made...

What's especially apparent in those screenshots: Crysis is a good example of photorealism, as in, it looks like a photograph taken by a camera. That makes the lighting seem less real than what the scene appears like when seen in first person. That's the trend in game graphics "realism" these days - more resembling what we see when looking at pictures that were taken or filmed, not really the actual scene. Motion blur, lens flares, even the wrong HDR.
To me, this makes a game look less real and more like a plastic imitation of the depicted scene. It's not a picture of a pipe, it's a picture of the picture of a pipe.

good god, dont be so pessimistic. We already saw the animation for the dwarven sphere and it looked flawless!!! The image quality of skyrim is awesome if you ask me...

Well if you consider randomly adding polys to all meshes realistic then yeah. If you ask me Tessellation still has a long way to go and when it can be applied to individual meshes at varying degrees then it will be ready for TES.



Really? I've never seen a dark skinned Nord before.



The lighting in OB was horrendous and i never used it. Up side to that is on a mid range machine(2 years ago) without Bloom,HDR or grass I can get full LOD, character and object draw.



You should do some comparisons with OB.
The following image is a full res comparison of vanilla OB.

http://thewormhole.nfshost.com/OblivionSkyrimCompare.png

Now you have to be careful when comparing OB to Skyrim because there are a lot of images out there that have higher poly meshes and improved textures. Comparing to vanilla Oblivion though it's plain to see that Skyrim has phenomenally better textures and poly count.

Just for the record though, don't be expecting video games in general to get drastically better looking in the coming years because we have already achieved practical photorealism and sorry but it just doesn't get any better than reality. We can only expect slight improvements in overall visuals from here on out.

Thanks for that! Seriously people that say the graphics haven't improved over Oblivion need some new glasses hehe. I think most people are going off what they remember the game looking like rather then a direct comparison. These are two games in the same gaming generation IMO so the improvement is still quite substantial all things considered.

Skyrim looks to be a beautiful game, it's not just the technical aspects but the actual aesthetic and theme that has me excited. Cyrodiil was just old school fantasy blah to me, Shivering Isles was a real treat though!

that bar pic looks amazing!

Oh ok fair enough. I think I would prefer them to focus on the game itself anyway.

They don't look any different, It's just the screens are much clearer.

No. The creation engine is a figment of our imaginations.

Well, not yet in video games, but yes. Computers reached the point of photorealism a long time ago in rendering.

Now, it's just a matter of time until the hardware (both CPU and GPU) catches up and is capable of rendering it in real time at the same rates that most games run at. And that's not going to be for a long while.

But once they do, it shall be glorious. :biggrin:

Wow, she actually looks like...a woman! No manly ugly shoulders.