I am not impressed with the graphics card industry.

[TraumaRN]

Originally posted by: Frackal
Definitely true there. Source should be applauded while we ought to be demanding much better from game devs.

I definitely second that...Source is an example that game dev's can make a decently scaling game for the masses......why do you think HL1 and HL2 have sold so well...because they designed it for the common man and for the hardcore OMGZER 7800GTX/X1800XT PWNS Jo0 gamer

 

[Gamingphreek]

Originally posted by: DeathBUA

Originally posted by: Frackal
Definitely true there. Source should be applauded while we ought to be demanding much better from game devs.

I definitely second that...Source is an example that game dev's can make a decently scaling game for the masses......why do you think HL1 and HL2 have sold so well...because they designed it for the common man and for the hardcore OMGZER 7800GTX/X1800XT PWNS Jo0 gamer

The DIII engine scales even better in a sense. (Ever seen the SS of the Voodoo5 running it)

 

[niggles]

I can wait to play F.E.A.R. It'll be at least a year before I attempt to play that game. I've built my current rig to play BF2. Only multiplayer games require timely upgrades because you want everyone playing them. If you miss the boat on a multiplayer you may end up playing it alone. F.E.A.R. isn't going anywhere. Pick up a copy when the price comes down to around half what it is now, then sit on it until a reasonably priced GPU will run it.

 

[fierydemise]

Originally posted by: Gamingphreek

Originally posted by: DeathBUA

Originally posted by: Frackal
Definitely true there. Source should be applauded while we ought to be demanding much better from game devs.

I definitely second that...Source is an example that game dev's can make a decently scaling game for the masses......why do you think HL1 and HL2 have sold so well...because they designed it for the common man and for the hardcore OMGZER 7800GTX/X1800XT PWNS Jo0 gamer

The DIII engine scales even better in a sense. (Ever seen the SS of the Voodoo5 running it)

Unreal 2 is also good in the scalability department but other then those few engines its all crap because it takes too much time to code a good engine and time is money.

 

[CP5670]

I'm pretty happy with the way video cards are progressing, but some game developers are leaving something to be desired with their engines. My brother picked up FEAR today and it seems to run just as badly as the demo. It's basically limited to 800x600 with some of the details turned down for smooth gameplay. I don't know how people with 17/19" LCDs can play this game decently with anything less than a 7800GTX/X1800XT, as it's extremely choppy at 1280x960 for me. The graphics are similar to those of Doom 3, maybe with better character models, but it runs at less than half the speed.

What I would like to see is more developers licensing the good engines and focusing on gameplay and art content rather than spending time making their own crappy performing engines.

 

[Rage187]

Game developers fail to realize we are more likely to buy their games if they used a proven graphics engine then one they craptastically coded themselves.

 

[WhipperSnapper]

Originally posted by: HDTVMan
I dont believe any game is worth $440.00 $400 for the video card and $40.00 for the game.

I will pass until the video card is $200.00 and the game will probably be under 20 by then. Sad I would have liked to have played it.

Look at it this way. If the game is really so worthwhile, people will still be playing it online once the prices come down. So, you could use that fact as a filter to avoid wasting money on the new fads and gassers and instead pick up a game with staying power. Heck, you can still find lots of people playing the original Unreal Tournament (1999) online.

 

[jasonja]

Sounds like someone needs to buy a console.

 

[gac009]

Originally posted by: niggles
I can wait to play F.E.A.R. It'll be at least a year before I attempt to play that game. I've built my current rig to play BF2. Only multiplayer games require timely upgrades because you want everyone playing them. If you miss the boat on a multiplayer you may end up playing it alone. F.E.A.R. isn't going anywhere. Pick up a copy when the price comes down to around half what it is now, then sit on it until a reasonably priced GPU will run it.

You have a much better rig than I and I play Fear just fine. at 12*10 the AA really isnt necessary as the jaggies seem less noticeable in fear than other games to me. Put it at 24bit color, medium particles, shadows and textures and you can max everything else out, cept soft shadows ofcourse. For me fraps alomst always stays above 30fps. The only time it drops is when I do bullet time which i diddnt even notice before I used fraps, prolly because Im moving so slow.

Just run the test settings with everything maxed out and then with everything at medium, looks almost the same.

If you have a CRT just play at 10*7 and youll be fine too. auto detect for my rig puts everything at 10*7, max graffics/effects settings with 0AA4AF and soft shadows off, and it test with 0% below 25fps, that aint bad.

If you absoluetly have to have every game you play at some crazy resoultion with 8AA16AF, max everything @ 120+fps, then I guess you are gonna have to miss out on fear.

If you cant understand where all the resourses in the game go turn off the lights, volumetric lights, and shadows and then bench it. Complex lighting and physics are the future of grafics tech and those takes a lot of grafics power.

Oh yeah and one more thing, not a fan of bullet time, fear is a lot more fun without it.

 

[DJSfurry]

I dont see what the big deal with BF2 is about. i played the older ones and i thought they were crap. if youre having to worry about people not playing it in future than that says alot about the game, although that MAY not be the case for that particular title. just look at CS. its easily the most popular FPS out there. i love it. played it for over 4 years and im not bored of it, neither is anyone else for that matter. plenty of servers are full and its just great. my friends who take the game more seriously than i even prefer playing 1.6, pre-source. they dont even CARE about the graphics. its the gameplay that counts and thats the most important thing. (and its not like theyre running crap computers either)

 

[StrangerGuy]

Originally posted by: VIAN

Short version of rant: Why do graphics cards go out of date and get brought to their knees so soon? It sucks! No other component becomes obsolete as fast as a graphics card. By obsolete i mean not useful for its original intended purpose anymore.

Here's my answer:

Play at 768. At least that's what I've heard developers are saying, that any resolution higher than 768 is just too taxing for a GPU.

There you have it. Have a nice day.

"So I have bought a $450+ card for their game and now the developer wants me to play at only 1024x768?"

Either Nvidia/ATI/game developers have a reality check, or they can just go to hell.

 

[mrkun]

CS 1.6 is the most horrid monstrosity to ever be excremented by Valve. 1.3 was the best. =)

 

[Jeff7181]

Originally posted by: BFG10K
It's funny, back when the situation was reversed people complained that there were no games available to take advantage of the cards.

Exactly... makes me feel good that my $375 I spent on a 6800GT last year is actually being used, even if I'm not happy with the performance in F.E.A.R.

*EDIT* I've also said before when people complained about nothing using the hardware to it's full potential that hardware HAS to advance ahead of software or performance will be so bad people will be unhappy. Looks like I was right, huh? Just look at my sig.

 

[Spamdini]

FEAR graphics are terrible minus cool slo mo effect. and player models are ok.. doom 3 engine sucks

 

[Dethfrumbelo]

Crappy graphics engines can ruin gameplay, however.

When it gets too hitchy/jerky/inconsistent, it just kills the experience.

 

[dfloyd]

Imo this is more to do with programmers than to do with the hardware. Quake IV looks amazing on my X800XL at 1280 x 1024 with everything maxed. I honestly did not think it would run all that smoothly but man its just amazing. It looks so much better than Doom III did. The lighting is just jaw dropping, and dont get me wrong Doom III looked kind of cool but compared to Quake IV it just looked like a tech demo. Quake IV really got it right and it runs extremely smooth and looks jaw dropping. So yeah hardware is in ways to blame, but so to is the programmers who create the games. If M$ created an OS that would not run smoothly until hardware caught up to it years later M$ would not be doing very well right now.

There is a saying I use since I play guitar, just because you can dont mean you should. What that basically means is they need to mix some rhythm in with thier lead and programming a good game, like music, has everything to do with timing.

Edit: And you have to remember this day and time gamers are spoiled. We are used to being able to crank up everything max it out and play games at godly high res with FSAA This and AF that. When I first got 3d hardware I was danged impressed to see GLQuake running at twenty fps. That my friend was jaw dropping. But the point is we have came so far so fast that we expect almost hollywood level graphics running at 1600x1200 and above with at least sixty fps. Now we may be able to do this in some games, but to be able to do it in every game, at least imo, is expecting a bit much. The computer hardware industry moves at a amazing pace, but not quite that fast and its bound to level off some, which is what I think it has done and why we are having this discussion.

 

[BenSkywalker]

A CPU would never be brought to its knees by any game in such a short amount of time.

Give that statement a little bit. You may be surprised how unplayable games are at their max settings if your rely solely on the CPU for running all game related code.

Besides that- high end SLI setups seem to be handling FEAR with extremely solid performance. Devs are going to target the highest end parts if they want to stun people with visuals, and that is what Monolith was trying to do.

It's not Nvidia or Ati, it's the game developers. Source pretty much proved that with its incredible framerates.

Proved what? That you can make an engines that looks five years old run fast on three year old hardware? Source was dated when it came out, FarCry and D3 are from a different generation technology wise.

 

[Jeff7181]

Originally posted by: BenSkywalker

A CPU would never be brought to its knees by any game in such a short amount of time.

Give that statement a little bit. You may be surprised how unplayable games are at their max settings if your rely solely on the CPU for running all game related code.

Besides that- high end SLI setups seem to be handling FEAR with extremely solid performance. Devs are going to target the highest end parts if they want to stun people with visuals, and that is what Monolith was trying to do.

It's not Nvidia or Ati, it's the game developers. Source pretty much proved that with its incredible framerates.

Proved what? That you can make an engines that looks five years old run fast on three year old hardware? Source was dated when it came out, FarCry and D3 are from a different generation technology wise.

Good point... HL2 is definately behind in terms of lighting and shadowing. Hopefully Lost Coast brings some better lighting and shadowing and not just HDR. Would be nice if the Source engine was that flexible.

 

[Sunrise089]

2 Points:

1) The market will tell whether or not F.E.A.R.'s developers made the right decision, if it sells well then obviously there were enough people who thought they could run it OK. Personally I hope its a financial disaster, and therefore it encourages other companies to better optimize their code.

2) I see a HUGE difference between today's video card market and the market when Quake 3 arrived - LCDs. As other have said, playing older games at 640x480 was always an option, that doesn't exist anymore for anyone buying a new display (or more realistically 1024x768 or even 1280x1024 for the 21? crowd). The simple fact is that falling display prices have had the side effect of raising the resolution of most users PCs much more rapidly than had previously been the case. As far as I know a situation where (for NEW displays) the midrange market (19") requires at least a mid-high range video card to play new games well (6800gt, x800xl), and the higher-end market (21"+) basically needs a GTX and more likely a SLI setup is crazy. Does everybody really think that everyone who purchased a 24" widescreen LCD planned on having to buy a new $500 GPU every year?

 

[Acanthus]

Originally posted by: Rage187
I only care about performance in the big 3 graphics engines

Doom3
Source
and the Unreal engine.



Games like FEAR, Farcry and CoD2 I could care less about since most new games will be running on one of the big 3 engines.


But I agree, there is no reason why FEAR runs like crap on the best graphics card when games that look better(like HL2 and Doom3) run perfectly smooth at the highest resolutions.

As an owner of all 3 games i strongly disagree that doom 3 and HL2 look better than F.E.A.R.

As for fear performance, 1280x960, everything maxed, soft shadows off, no AA, 4x af

(nvidia drivers set to high quality)

Runs great.

 

[CaiNaM]

Originally posted by: Rage187
Game developers fail to realize we are more likely to buy their games if they used a proven graphics engine then one they craptastically coded themselves.

i'm thinking the sales figures for F.E.A.R. will prove otherwise....

 

[jim1976]

You do need to realize ppl that this is pc gaming not console...
We are paying the extra premium( pc gaming is an expensive sport ) in order to have the best from our hardware even if that means that our $$$ gpus are dated somehow in the end of the day.
You should be happy with gaming evolution, not acting like this. What do you want? A game that has nothing new to add to the inventory? What are we, console users?

For example many are bitching about FEAR performance.
Do you remember when FC came out how taxing it was on systems?
Chronnicles of Riddick with soft shadows was unplayable and still is for the majority.
HL2 might be a great scalable engine, but it adds nothing extraordinary to the gfx department.

I do realize that the vast majority of pc users are nowhere near high end pcs, but you should realize that pcs are just like that from day1 of 3d evolution.
Do you have the $$$? You can play at max resolutions with max filters and goodies on 90% of the time.
Do you have a mainstream card? You can play at medium resolutions with some sacrifices on the visual sector.
Do you find yourself incapable of catching up with pcs budget?(there's nothing wrong with that and I'm not being an a$$ just stating the truth). Then you should seriously consider the purchase of a console and keep your low budget pc for games that you can't play with a console...
That's the way it was that's the way it's gonna be.

But plz stop bitching. Make a decision. We should all be happy when we see games like FEAR reaching to pc gamer because this brings evolution.. We are not console, we are pc users.

I find myself bitching because game developers don't pay so much attention to pc users and don't produce many games like FEAR. Console gaming is where the money is for them, so they spend their whole time trying to optimize the games for consoles. As if we are not paying for our games to attract their attention? :disgust: We are paying for a GFX card as much a XBOX360 or PS3 will cost and much more. And we are not attracting their attention simply because the vast majority of the market is consople users!! Now that's a bummer!! And you're stating the opposite? Come on!!!

 

[Maximilian]

Originally posted by: jim1976
You do need to realize ppl that this is pc gaming not console...
We are paying the extra premium( pc gaming is an expensive sport ) in order to have the best from our hardware even if that means that our $$$ gpus are dated somehow in the end of the day.
You should be happy with gaming evolution, not acting like this. What do you want? A game that has nothing new to add to the inventory? What are we, console users?

We might well be in the future, all the console needs is... a mouse! then any console user can play FPS's and RTS's with as much speed and accuracy as a pc user.

For example many are bitching about FEAR performance.
Do you remember when FC came out how taxing it was on systems?
Chronnicles of Riddick with soft shadows was unplayable and still is for the majority.
HL2 might be a great scalable engine, but it adds nothing extraordinary to the gfx department.

Farcry had the stunning visuals (stunning at the time, still pretty good now) to justify the hit in performance, and if i remember correctly it was aa/af that really slowed it down, the 9800's and 5900's were the best cards at the time and werent particularly good at running games with a decent resolution and a high aa/af setting, a happy medium would be the best idea. Nowadays cards can handle aa/af better and it shouldnt give as much of a performance hit. Ive seen quite a few benches where the 7800GTX loses only 10-20 fps when aa is turned on.

I do realize that the vast majority of pc users are nowhere near high end pcs, but you should realize that pcs are just like that from day1 of 3d evolution.
Do you have the $$$? You can play at max resolutions with max filters and goodies on 90% of the time.
Do you have a mainstream card? You can play at medium resolutions with some sacrifices on the visual sector.
Do you find yourself incapable of catching up with pcs budget?(there's nothing wrong with that and I'm not being an a$$ just stating the truth). Then you should seriously consider the purchase of a console and keep your low budget pc for games that you can't play with a console...

I really hope theres noone with a similar attitude to you making pc games.... Basically what your saying is, if your poor, sod off and dont play. Itll be that attitude that kills pc gaming one day, expensive niche sports have a way of dying.

That's the way it was that's the way it's gonna be.

But plz stop bitching. Make a decision. We should all be happy when we see games like FEAR reaching to pc gamer because this brings evolution.. We are not console, we are pc users.

How does it bring evolution? It brings a 7800GTX to its knees for no apparent good reason other than inefficient coding.

 

[rbV5]

My biggest complaint from the graphics card industry is the lack of support for touted feature sets. The marketing departments and engineering seem to have a disconnect, however the technology behind the cards is very impressive to me.

 

[JonnyBlaze]

How does it bring evolution? It brings a 7800GTX to its knees for no apparent good reason other than inefficient coding.

even the anand review says its one of the best looking games out. id say thats a good reason to bring a card to its knees.

im running it on a 9800pro and it still looks great.