AO is definitely not the best IMO. Still a shame though. Not the hardest thing to do, right.

You should be more sad there doesn't seem to be any parallax oclussion mapping on textures instead, or tessellation.

oh my god you're absolutely right. Bethesda, what the [censored] is your problem? it's 2011, this [censored] is totally inexcusable. i'm not spending $50 on this [censored] now that this has come to light.

alright seriously

1) if you're playing on a console and complaining that there's no SSAO, deal with it. your [censored] came out in 2005 - get a PC if you want flawless visual fidelity in every game you play.

2) if you're playing on a PC and complaining that there's no SSAO, deal with it. we'll get SGE inside of a year.

3) if you don't care, good on you.

4) If you want good quests. Deal with it. Imagine them in your head instead.
See how flawed your argument is?

Actually, the value of Ambient Occlusion is adjustable at a system level, thus is what they do for the consoles...

Well quest quality is not limited by hardware...

how did you get that from my telling everyone to shut up

like i'm genuinely impressed by your conclusion and i want to know how you arrived at it

The AO in uncharted 2 runs solely off the spu's on the ps3 and doesn't even need the ppe. I don't want to hear that it can't be done on the console because its been done and obviously not very taxing since the ps3 is doing it with spu's.

Crysis running on the PS3
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbwZwQeGvD8

Whoa that is awesome!

That's CryEngine3, rather than Crysis. Crytek's engines have typically been very scalable, able to run on everything from a moon computer from space to your kitchen toaster.
Crysis, the game, cannot run on console in its PC form. Even on lowest settings, it requires too much RAM.

The console demos of Crysis-like environments had very clear shortcomings - much lower view distance, distant land of low quality, trees almost completely static and shadows quite blocky, so on.
However you put it, you can't push hardware past its physical limits.

Gameplay > than graphics.

"Oh no! It will take away from the immersion! HERP A DERP!" It won't take away from the immersion. I still play SotC and I still feel like I am part of that world, and that game is like 7 years old. Grow up kids. If the graphics or the lighting or any of that is that big of a deal for you, you are gaming for the wrong reasons. It's like saying Minecraft isn't an immersible experience because it doesn't look like [censored] Crysis.

All we need is an interesting, complex and gripping story/world to be immersed and if that still doesn't work for you, try getting the stick out of your asses. I'd rather Beth spends their time on making an interesting game than a pretty one. Because after all Crysis wasn't even very good. It's kind of like Avatar, pretty as can be, but shallow and dull.

You're saying that demo didn't look great for running on a console? Crysis 2 is releasing on the consoles is it not?

Btw, have you seen la noire, which is console exclusive? Its using never before seen technology.

Gee, aren't you fun. It is possible, you realise, to care about something without it becoming the core part of your life. If you're going to attempt to do a modern engine, do it right. Good SSAO looks better than no SSAO - why does anybody need more of a reason than that? It takes nothing away, and you get lovely SSAO.

I have no issue with old graphics, I play (and love) games such as BG2, or even Elite, but this is 2011. We can do better than static lighting. We SHOULD do better than static lighting. Why? Because not only does it increase the atmosphere (Because no, not having it doesn't take away from the atmosphere, having it adds to atmosphere. An important distinction) and adds more tools for a quest designer to make an awesome quest, it can look damn pretty. And by jove, I play video games for fun and escapism, and if I can see a glorious scene that I have to stop and look at, then I frankly don't give a damn if you'd rather have PS1 era graphics. If that would somehow enhance your experience, well, get it for PC, shove all the settings down, turn things off in the INI, mod the textures to be smaller, and enjoy your "better" game.

Meanwhile, I'll be over here, not [censored]ing because technology progresses and there are kids on my lawn with their hoverboards and laser guns.

@Dragonborn; Sure, it was pretty, but significantly less pretty than Crysis was, even if you ignore the low framerate and resolution. La noire, I assume you're referring to the facial capture techniques? Well, how you capture facial animations don't got [censored] to do with the hardware those animations run on, cap'n.

I thought that was all behind the scenes type technology like how they capture facial movements. That sort of thing would have minimal impact on performance, since in the game setting it's still just a recorded set of movements.

Since when has AI been calculated with GPU? It's unbelievable how so many people without a clue about what they are talking are saying anything about performance and graphical features. :flamethrower: Ambient Occlusion is done strictly by GPU, CPU has next to nothing to do with it. AI etc are not factors in this. Open world games have large environments to be rendered and that's the important thing, but even that is only a matter of good programming. TES-games have been graphically top notch before and they could be now too if devs want that.

Now I have defended Skyrim quite a bit, the graphics look fantastic and I am not unhappy with the outcome, but the people in here saying that a lack of AO is inexcusable are correct. It's just a shame that intelligent discussion seems impossible on these forums, maybe they have their reasons for not implementing it, or perhaps they have and we have yet to see an up-to-date build of the game. Yes, several forms of AO are pretty easy to implement and not very taxing on systems, but because there are several types of AO (SSAO, HDAO, HBAO etc.) perhaps this is something they are still working on.

There are several months left for development and that's assuming that the release date doesn't get pushed back.

People really need to calm the [censored] down around here, worst case scenario, we wait for SGE.

It's not that I'm [censored]ing about technology, I'm just saying that graphics don't make the game (as many people tend to think these days). Sure the technology is available and sure it looks amazing and sure it would be nice, but I'm not going to complain about the engine not including it. No, I don't prefer outdated graphics and I don't think that outdated graphics make a "better" game as you said. It's just that while these updated systems are nice, it doesn't mean that they are needed to create a good experience. People should stop complaining and trying to have them revamp everything just to fit their aesthetic wants. I mean, it's not like the game doesn't look good the way it is. Mod it if you are unhappy.

How ironic you calling out people for not knowing what they are talking about. The CPU has next to nothing to do with AO? Is that why naughty dog used solely the PS3 CPU for the AO in Uncharted 2? AO runs directly off of the cell processors SPU's. So not only can the console handle AO, it actually handles it quite well without taxing the GPU at all.

I wouldn't complain (at least for a while) if the game looked like Oblivion (with better animations, anyway). However, that doesn't mean I don't want nice graphical features. Why would it? Does everything have to be so absolute? Is it not possible to want something without requiring it, now?

No, there's what I won't complain about, and there's what I'll be totally happy with. And hey, I'd prefer the latter, though I won't complain about the former. Somehow wanting better graphics than we had 4 damn years ago makes me a graphics [censored], though. Perhaps I am, if the definition of graphics [censored] is "Wants graphics to advance at least a little".

@Dragonborn; The PS3 is a very different architecture. Did you know that sony originally wasn't going to include a GPU? The Cell processor was designed to be a unified system, that's why it has so many highly specialised SPEs. SSAO on every other platform runs on the GPU, and you cannot draw comparisons with an architecture designed to not use a GPU. Additionally, low quality AO at low resolutions really doesn't have much of a performance hit, it's an effect that scales quality and performance quite well.

You know, some people like to have both. You could call it a case of wanting your cake and eating it, too, but with graphics and gameplay you can. Provided that the company puts forth the effort. Especially when you consider that more than likely the people designing the story and coding the gameplay aspects are probably not the same people doing the graphics.

Yes but the fact remains that regardless if the original ps3 design intended do have two cell processors or not it shipped with a GPU. So even though it has a GPU you can still code a lot of graphical stuff on the CPU which is a huge luxury.

All a GPU is is a specialised CPU. The Cell processor is a collection of specialised CPUs. See where I'm going? Both of them shove numbers around to get a result, they're the same thing, in effect. They both calculate. It's not inherent to the PS3 to be able to calculate graphical things on the CPU, it's part of the design that it has CPUs tailored to doing certain things very fast. Effectively, while it's called a "CPU", it bears little resemblance to a general purpose processor. It cannot be directly compared to either a CPU or a GPU.

Maybe it's just that I am the type of person who honestly doesn't care about graphics or the way things look (with any medium), as long as it provides a good experience and isn't an eyesore. It's all perception and maybe I honestly just don't understand the people who get all upset about these things. Yes, it would be nice if the graphics were top notch, but do I care if they are? No. I'm sure that there was some miscommunication going on here and that is all understandable and if I came of as hostile I didn't mean to. Now, I am not accepting defeat. I expect to see you at dawn behind the old crab shack off of Dunburry St. What are you terms? fists? firearm? blade? to the death or until blood is drawn? You name the game friend.

This is the TESV forum, how could I choose anything but blade!
Well, hand to hand I guess would be a choice, but I've never been very good with the whole punching thing. Too bruise-y.

Red Dead Redemtion was listed and it lests you do just that.

And the graphics seem great, so I dont understand why people are getting so worked up over this.