Based on what's released so far, what do other people make of the graphics engine in Skyrim?

Personally, I have to say it looks pretty awesome aside form a few things they've never managed to do right. For example, and this is a big one: hair. Obviously modelling hair in a realistic way is not easy. However, given their experience and the fan/modder feedback following the releases of Morrowind and Oblivion, you'd think they'd make something better than what we can see in the screenshots. Particularly the way that it appears wooden, two-dimensional, and entirely unaffected by gravity. Also note the appauling appearance of the 'casting' (left) arm and hand. I'm fairly certain that looked better in Oblivion, and hope they fix it before long. Trees and vegetation, once again look good from afar, but for obvious reasons tend to look a bit too papery close up. Oh and rocks. Those are supposed to be rounded, Bethesda!

Obviously I'm excited by the upcoming release and will almost certainly buy the game. However, some of the screenshots are somewhat disappointing, because they could've come from a modded Oblivion game. That said, Skyrim is supposed to a different flavour to Oblivion, and it's hard to measure it from a handful of carefully chosen screenshots.

Well its no Crysis 2 but I think the graphics are amazing for a game this size! :tes:

The graphics are pretty good. They aren't the best, but it's mostly just a sign of the age of this generation. We're overdo for a new one, and when that happens, we can finally use the potential of newer hardware. On one hand, it would have been good for Skyrim to come out next generation so it can take full advantage of the newer technology, but at the same time Oblivion had that same situation and it just looked bad compared to games released later on that took advantage of the finalized hardware and optimization.

Personally, I disliked the gameplay of Crysis so much i didnt even pay much attention to the scenery. Far Cry was fun though.

In terms of fairly realistic graphics I would tend to use Stalker as an example, it certainly does buildings and trees really well (I always turn grass off, as well as shrubbery if I can).

Also what exactly do you mean by 'a game this size'? Are you referring to the amount of space the game will occupy, or the size of the game world? Because we don't know the game installation size, as far as I'm aware, and having a large game world is no excuse for poor graphics (though the screenshots are by and large impressive).

Yeah there are plenty of threads about Skyrim graphics. Some of what I've read indicates that PC users are alittle concerned about consolization, and I admit that I was myself, however after reading many posts I am now less concerned and in general it seems that people are very exited about Skyrim graphics. As newshurtugal mentioned, the size of TES games often mean that they lack some of the graphical detail of other games that pale in comparison for game size and scope. In my experience I am always wowed by each TES game as their graphics vastly improve upon the predecessor (in my opinion). Skyrim is by no means complete and from here on in will be tweaked to the best that Beth can produce, and the awesomeness that is the TES modding community will only make it shine more.

Graphics are great. I wouldn't want them to change a thing.

Yeah the gameplay wasnt to fun but the graphics were great. I just got far cry 2. Love that game!

Not another graphics thread...

Flaming inc.

As for my input, gameplay > graphics, to an extent.

Crysis 2 looks worse than crysis 1 and has an extremely shrunken scale of gameplay so lets just get that out of the way. Also a game the size of an ES game can be done with Crysis esq graphics/physics and it WOULD NOT AFFECT THE GAMEPLAY OR STORY. Proof people who do graphical design work in a different department than story/gameplay. The problem would be you could only release the game on PC, and no you probably wouldn't need an expensive pc to run it. Hell a 9800gtx, a basic quadcore, and 6gb's of ram on a 64bit exe only....should be fine to run a game of that size and graphical fidelity at medium/high settings.

As for crysis 1 the first 1/2 of that game is pretty good nothing beats hunting down Koreans feeling like predator, amazing ways to kill people in that game.

Terrible video quality and i cant find the HD version

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

Also crysis 1 scale was quite impressive, especially some of the HUGE custom maps. Also the cryengine is made based around large scale.

http://i.neoseeker.com/n/1/oblivion_to_crysis2_thumb.jpg

Also crysis 1 had an impressive scale; example.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPeb547pis0

He's messing around with the editor but if you go 2:00 and watch to 2:30 you'll see what i mean of course thats a smaller island.

deffinitly this skyrim IS the Crysis 2 of open world games as far as graphics go :tes:

I don;t want to speak for someone, but generally game of this size is referring to a few things. Map size sure, but its not just the map but what is in it. A lot of giant map size games have great graphics, but are the NPCs actual characters or randomly generated when you get within draw distance, the building you see can you enter it or is it just scenery, the objects you see are they background images or something you can interact with(if you can interact is it full interaction or just physics letting it fly around when the shooting starts). The more you add in not just map size but depth to that map size the more resources it will take and graphics will slide in order to make it work. They why this happens you'd have to ask a programmer, I just notice that it happens. I highly doubt all open world RPGs just happen to hire people who don;t program graphics as well as other games. So I suspect the talented people they hire are making it look as good as they can with the resources they have.

I hope the scenery isn't blurred when looking off into scenery in the distance like how it is, if it is in the trailer at 0:43. That's repugnant to me. For example, Grand Theft Auto IV had that where things blurred unrealistically in the distance. It's gross to me, because it dampens the clarity and clarity is pleasure for me. Blurring is unimmersive and unimmersion is unpleasurable.

I game on the xbox 360 so Crysis 2 is the best looking game (released) on this console. Hah I wish I had the money for a computer with all of that! But alas, all I have is a toshiba laptop.


I definitely agree!


Yes, that is exactly what I was talking about when I was refering to the size. Thanks!

After being playing an extensively modded Oblivion which is very graphically enhanced, I find Skyrim graphics actually pretty good. With that basis, and with a nice DX11 support, we'll see great, great things for sure.

I just hope they also release a 64-bit executable of Skyrim. I want it to take full advantage of my future 16 gb's of RAM. After playing the aforementioned modded Oblivion, I realize that 4 gb's just aren't enough...and I don't want stuttering anymore, no matter how deeply modded I have Skyrim.

Which is actually irrelevant to this discussion, because it's about graphics, not gameplay.

Anyways, they're good. I like them, but I also see some things that could be improved. A few models look a bit too low poly. The lighting looks back in a few of the images. Stuff like that.

Actually, it is relevant. I'm giving you my opinion on how I view graphics. Like you said, it's a "graphics thread" (the 5th one I've seen in a week.)

But there's not really a need to bring gameplay into this. It's simply about whether or not you think the game looks pretty. It's essentially as pointless as saying dialog/number of items/controls > graphics when asked if you think the game looks good..

Also, is the title of this thread a reference to a James Bond film?

I concur. Personally I think troika's death knell, Vampires: The Masquerade, despite having shoddy graphics, odd animations and clunky combat is one of the greatest RPGs ever. It has the right plot, has the player make significant choices on the behalf of the character and allows him to solve quests the way he/she wants. Combined with distict classes, it made for a very replayable game, even if the player-made fixes were essential to running the game smoothly. On a related note, I hope that Skyrim will take a similar approach to quests, just as the previous TES titles have.

I like to separate graphics from physics in video games. I think its more of a physics problem. The same reason that in oblivion the robes did not have true cloth simulation, but instead meshed to the skeleton and streatched the textures when you walked. I hope they have robe cloth simulation this time.

I like them. They're nice, but I do have one major issue that has been shared before many times, but I have a suggestion. The rapids. They're so flat and ugly and do not lookreal at all. What they should do is use a normal non-white flowing water texture and overlay it with flat textures (like Oblivion leaves) of white water and rapid foam, and have some of it sticking out and occasionally spray into the air, like around rocks and things, because rapids are not flat. Currently it's just a (not very realistic looking) white-water texture that moves in simplistic lines and doesn't look actually frothy at all.

I assumed this Thread was about viewing the distance on how far do you want to see.

I hated the distance Slider, since i want to see far without the Graphical Fog so to speak.

I think the graphics look pretty good so far. I've seen better obviously, and I think when it was stated (either by beth or reviewers, can't remember?) that seeing this game would be like looking at a next gen console game, well.. that was a little much. I don't think the graphics are THAT good that they look next gen, heck everyone knows crysis still looks better. That said, for an open world rpg, it's impressive. They're pretty much exactly what I expected them to be coming from Oblivion to the present. Haven't seen anything shockingly amazing, but I'm not disappointed either.

Just give us some screens of the races already, that's what we want to see.

I guess people are entitled to their own opinion as to what is important to their gaming experience. For me, in the TES series which are RPGs that are mainly played in first person, how realistic hair looks and acts is probably close to if not last on my list. I mean obviously if they make it better great, if not it wont effect my enjoyment of skyrim one bit. Oh and about the rocks comment, mountain rocks aren't rounded at all, they are jagged and sharp, at least they are here in Canada.

What I find weird is Howard saying that they're aiming for equivalent graphics all across the board. It's not about PC gamers being elitist, but if someone invests in a good gaming computer one would expect that the series with renown for their graphical fidelity and computer-centric development would at least make an effort to provide a significant, sensible improvement over the console versions. I'll get the PC version for myself and the X-Box version for my brother and I want to see a difference, not because I want to have a more integral experience than him, but because the machine it's running on simply CAN provide a more engrossing, graphically, experience.

DIrectX 11 support is wonderful news. Tesselation is quite system demanding and I don't think it really adds TOO much to graphical fidelity. Don't get me wrong, it's great eye candy, but I prefer DirectX 11 power optimization and performance tweaks than tesselation. What I'd like to have is the obvious Anti-Aliasing, filtering, Draw Distance control, texture size, control over shadows, particles etc. that really differentiate themselves from the consoles.

Bethesda has never managed to do lighting good. Not in Oblivion nor in Fallout 3. Not in Skyrim either.