When the next great jump in capability hits, what could games do they can't now?

[maniacalpha1-1]

What are some things that games in say, 2021 might be able to do that they can't now? Or even 2026 if we must go that far.

For a shooter like Battlefield, obviously a Battlefield MMO would be great(although I think that's doable now). Something more in line with the topic would be - having a map where there is a dam that can be burst and floods the map. What are some other ideas? I actually came up with this question while playing Medieval 2 Total War but I can't seem to think of any examples of what kind of future innovation comparable to a dam burst and flood would go into a Total War game.

Unless it's that the TW of 2021 allows you to actually drop down to unit level and fight as an FPS and yet everything affects the game as normal, lol...

 

[KaOTiK]

How about we work on getting some good AI first.

 

[CottonRabbit]

More integration with social networking sites and the ability to make seamless microtranscation purchases in game.

Looking back to what we could do in games in 2001, not much has fundamentally changed. Physics were supposed to change gameplay, but most of the time it's still extremely gimmicky (pull that lever and watch as a conveniently placed stack of logs crush the enemy).

 

[KaOTiK]

More integration with social networking sites and the ability to make seamless microtranscation purchases in game.

 

[Fenixgoon]

http://www.pbfcomics.com/?cid=PBF134-Game_System.gif

pbf knows all.

 

[Schadenfreude]

How about we work on getting some good AI first.

Agreed.

I think as far as gaming goes, we've hit the practical limit as graphics/gameplay/etc. You see this transition on the developers/hardware vendors as well:

- On the console side, we have HDTVs that dramatically up'ed the display resolution, and the current-gen consoles caught up. New interfaces - most notably Kinect, IMO - have been made for better immersion.

- On the PC side, we see new GPUs offering options like triple monitor gaming (eyefinity) and the like; and of course, all the crazy-awesome stuff that hackers have come up with the Kinect hardware as well.

I suspect that graphical/pure gameplay updates will be less noticable for the established joypad/KB+Mouse genres but more processing power may be required under-the-hood for the new interfaces arriving in the near future.

Conversely, I think the real future for "hardcore" PC gaming in the traditional senese - for better or worse - is the indie/social gaming scene. It's an odd-mix of lo-fi and hi-fi: Small teams of 3 or 4 make a game purely focused on the core gameplay devoid of any bells and whistles that oftentimes look like a throwback to the 8-/16-bit era, intentionally or not(lo-fi). But the emergence of this new crowd is only possible by the distribution of powerful hardware (do you really need a core-i7 Sandybridge CPU to run Excel?) and broadband internet connections being commonplace (hi-fi).

 

[paperfist]

Gaming is going backwards, in 2021 we'll see stick figures replace realistic people, cartoony WoW graphics representing real worlds and you'll only need a mouse to play them.

What we should be seeing is realistic graphics of whole worlds rendered, AI so clever you'd swear you were playing against Johnathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel. We'd have SP/MP games again where you're so compelled to sink 25 hours into the single player before ever stepping foot in MP.

 

[Schadenfreude]

Gaming is going backwards, in 2021 we'll see stick figures replace realistic people, cartoony WoW graphics representing real worlds and you'll only need a mouse to play them.

What we should be seeing is realistic graphics of whole worlds rendered, AI so clever you'd swear you were playing against Johnathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel. We'd have SP/MP games again where you're so compelled to sink 25 hours into the single player before ever stepping foot in MP.

I'd disagree; as long as the GUI is eloquently designed, why not simplify the gaming interface? If I can do all the actions in a game just using a mouse w/ 2 buttons and a wheel just as well as using 90% of the keyboard, why not make it easy and accessible? Knowing which button to press in a game isn't really a part of the gaming experience, IMO.

I can definitely appreciate - and gravitate towards - games with a distinct, unified visual design: Give me Okami, Mirror's Edge, Brink, WoW, Team Fortress 2, Borderlands etc. over CoD or BF any day! Both designs have their place definitely, but I'd much rather a publisher/developer try out something new and bold graphics/gameplay wise - and if one day it does come to a point where games become hyper-realistic I'd rather not see what my AK-47 does to my opponent in an FPS, thanks!

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

What we should be seeing is realistic graphics of whole worlds rendered, AI so clever you'd swear you were playing against Johnathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel. We'd have SP/MP games again where you're so compelled to sink 25 hours into the single player before ever stepping foot in MP.

Long storylines take time. Better graphics and textures take time. Better AI takes time. And that means that all of it takes money. And as with most other things, the more complex it is, the more expensive it will cost. So...how are you going to pay for this?

 

[maniacalpha1-1]

It's OK if graphics by itself has hit a standstill. As far as I'm concerned it doesn't need to be much better than upcoming games are showing.

One thing I've always wondered is, when graphics do start hitting the wall, at some point the only time companies will need to make new engines is if they come up with new physics features(or other nongraphical things). We could possibly someday have a really broad and powerful engine come out(even if each gaming company has their own) that allows developers to spend all their time on gameplay and not have to spend years developing an engine before they can even begin to seriously think about the game itself. With that much time to dedicate to the actual game content imagine what they could have.

Think of cities for example. Take Dragon Age's Kirkwall, instead of a few measly interactive areas you could have a huge city hundreds of interactive NPCs standing around instead of just a few dozen. Because at some point, that should become easy from a hardware standpoint and the true bottleneck is simply the time it takes to write lines, get voice acting, animate it, etc.

BTW I have to say, one city I'd love to see done in new graphics is Rabanastre from FF 12.

 

[paperfist]

I'd disagree; as long as the GUI is eloquently designed, why not simplify the gaming interface? If I can do all the actions in a game just using a mouse w/ 2 buttons and a wheel just as well as using 90% for the keyboard, why not make it easy and accessible? Knowing which button to press in a game isn't really a part of the gaming experience, IMO.

I can definitely appreciate - and gravitate towards - games with a distinct, unified visual design: Give me Okami, Mirror's Edge, Brink, WoW, Team Fortress 2, Borderlands etc. over CoD or BF any day! Both designs have their place definitely, but I'd much rather a publisher/developer try out something new and bold graphics/gameplay wise - and if one day it does come to a point where games become hyper-realistic I'd rather not see what my AK-47 does to my opponent in an FPS, thanks!

Now I can't stand playing BF2 sometimes because there's too many keys to remember and as a result I get my assed kicked. But I don't really appreciate the limited actions of TF2 either. So I like the tactical feel of a shooter like BF2 over TF2. And I'm not saying TF2 isn't fun to play because it's a blast, but sometimes it's just too easy.

Then you have a game like Civ V where just about everything is done with a mouse and hardly any keyboard short cuts. Well I don't really like that either, with previous versions it was so much simpler using KB short cuts to build things then clicking the mouse 6x to accomplish the same things. So sure the GUI is simplified, but is it really? You're just exchanging mouse clicks for keystrokes.

 

[paperfist]

Long storylines take time. Better graphics and textures take time. Better AI takes time. And that means that all of it takes money. And as with most other things, the more complex it is, the more expensive it will cost. So...how are you going to pay for this?

No offense but we had all this in the 90s and 2000s and we didn't hear how we can't make X game anymore cause the PC has too many pirates. Today the gaming budgets are on par with movie sets (way higher then 90s/2000s) and the rubbish they churn out now is disheartening. Yet profits are at an all time high so obviously $60 will pay for it, we just need some less greedy CEOs and board of directors.

Hell Zork is more entertaining then some of the stuff they are putting out.

It's funny, but PC gaming is back to the 80s where Indy devs are starting to rule. To me that means we are starting from scratch and in my mind 2021 will = what we had in the 2000s.

 

[paperfist]

It's OK if graphics by itself has hit a standstill. As far as I'm concerned it doesn't need to be much better than upcoming games are showing.

One thing I've always wondered is, when graphics do start hitting the wall, at some point the only time companies will need to make new engines is if they come up with new physics features(or other nongraphical things). We could possibly someday have a really broad and powerful engine come out(even if each gaming company has their own) that allows developers to spend all their time on gameplay and not have to spend years developing an engine before they can even begin to seriously think about the game itself. With that much time to dedicate to the actual game content imagine what they could have.

Think of cities for example. Take Dragon Age's Kirkwall, instead of a few measly interactive areas you could have a huge city hundreds of interactive NPCs standing around instead of just a few dozen. Because at some point, that should become easy from a hardware standpoint and the true bottleneck is simply the time it takes to write lines, get voice acting, animate it, etc.

BTW I have to say, one city I'd love to see done in new graphics is Rabanastre from FF 12.

But then you have games like CoD which is pretty much using the same engine over and over again. The results? gameplay in each incarnation has hardly been progressive. Even the SP used to be epic is now just a trainer.

I agree with you, something like your NPC example would be awesome, but devs don't seem to want to spend the resources on it. If they do they call it an MMO. Seriously, how much has NPCs evolved in game play? I can remember playing Dark Age of Camelot and the NPCs in Dragon Age are pretty much the same simple creatures.

 

[maniacalpha1-1]

But then you have games like CoD which is pretty much using the same engine over and over again. The results? gameplay in each incarnation has hardly been progressive. Even the SP used to be epic is now just a trainer.

I agree with you, something like your NPC example would be awesome, but devs don't seem to want to spend the resources on it. If they do they call it an MMO. Seriously, how much has NPCs evolved in game play? I can remember playing Dark Age of Camelot and the NPCs in Dragon Age are pretty much the same simple creatures.

Well, COD is a double issue, one, the engine they use is nowhere near the bleeding edge of graphics and two, they are copy and pasting the stuff that goes in the engine too and just putting on different uniform skins. Hell, due to the copy and pasting they do, the biggest labor of their game development might be putting voiceovers into the game, LOL. So COD is behind yes, but considering what BF3 looks like, how much better do we need it to get? For FPS for example, I think(or hope) that due to diminishing graphical returns, the issue will sooner or later shift from looking better, to being able to render more people and objects in the same small area. More players, persistent vehicle wreckage, and so forth. And even though maximum graphical quality hits the wall, rendering more and more of it in the game without dropping quality to allow for quantity.

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

No offense but we had all this in the 90s and 2000s and we didn't hear how we can't make X game anymore cause the PC has too many pirates. Today the gaming budgets are on par with movie sets (way higher then 90s/2000s) and the rubbish they churn out now is disheartening. Yet profits are at an all time high so obviously $60 will pay for it, we just need some less greedy CEOs and board of directors.

Hell Zork is more entertaining then some of the stuff they are putting out.

It's funny, but PC gaming is back to the 80s where Indy devs are starting to rule. To me that means we are starting from scratch and in my mind 2021 will = what we had in the 2000s.

Yeah. Of course. How could I have missed the way we had games that looked this good, or this good, or even this good in the 90s? Do you know why I can? Because this is what games looked like in the 90s. And this, and this.

 

[motsm]

Yeah. Of course. How could I have missed the way we had games that looked this good, or this good, or even this good in the 90s? Do you know why I can? Because this is what games looked like in the 90s. And this, and this.

He was talking about graphics, and you know he wasn't, so stop it.

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

He was talking about graphics, and you know he wasn't, so stop it.

You care to change that so you make sense?

 

[FallenHero]

You care to change that so you make sense?

Don't be a troll. You know exactly what was meant by the post he made and the one you responded to. "He wasn't talking about graphics, and you know he wasn't, so stop it." It was a post about entertainment value in games, not about graphics.

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

Don't be a troll. You know exactly what was meant by the post he made and the one you responded to. "He wasn't talking about graphics, and you know he wasn't, so stop it." It was a post about entertainment value in games, not about graphics.

That would be a good argument, except if a developer ever sacrificed graphical quality to develop a 'good' storyline, a whole new, different bunch of people will probably be up in arms about how PC gaming is dying and progress is slowing, how it 'obviously' shows the effect of consolification, and how their graphics cards will last forever because nobody seems to improve graphics quality anymore. The only difference between this guy and all these other people is that he's complaining about the gameplay rather than the graphics.

 

[elitejp]

Long storylines take time. Better graphics and textures take time. Better AI takes time. And that means that all of it takes money. And as with most other things, the more complex it is, the more expensive it will cost. So...how are you going to pay for this?

It does take time and money for the r&d, but once that is in place it doesnt cost much at all. Its kinda like what im seeing happening with smartphones. The amount of people that are hacking and improving the ui just boggles my mind. Common people are making and adding things they want to there phone, or things the developers forgot to do or did poorly lol. This just tells me that what used to be difficult for the avg person is becoming easy. However cutting edge tech will still only come from cutting edge people, but even these people are working with a higher level of basic knowledge than they were 10 years ago. I hope that made sense, in any case i think it would be very interesting to see what can and will be done. What i would love to see is the player totally immersed in a 3d environment game. Where the screen would follow where my eyes go etc etc. Im sure this tech is already out there and being used but making it so that its cost effective will be the challenge.

 

[skace]

I'd disagree; as long as the GUI is eloquently designed, why not simplify the gaming interface? If I can do all the actions in a game just using a mouse w/ 2 buttons and a wheel just as well as using 90% of the keyboard, why not make it easy and accessible? Knowing which button to press in a game isn't really a part of the gaming experience, IMO.

I can definitely appreciate - and gravitate towards - games with a distinct, unified visual design: Give me Okami, Mirror's Edge, Brink, WoW, Team Fortress 2, Borderlands etc. over CoD or BF any day! Both designs have their place definitely, but I'd much rather a publisher/developer try out something new and bold graphics/gameplay wise - and if one day it does come to a point where games become hyper-realistic I'd rather not see what my AK-47 does to my opponent in an FPS, thanks!

Completely disagree. Of course controls are part of the game. A mechwarrior game that you play with 2 buttons is not the same as a joystick and the 30 keys. Mechs are supposed to feel complex.

And ultimately, when you try to grind down 50 controls into 2 buttons, what you get is a lot of dropped features. Doors open when you walk near them, that kind of shit. All of a sudden you have mouse gestures and shit and it barely feels like you are playing the game.

Certainly, we could turn every game into Dragon's Lair, but I don't think that is a good idea.

 

[Ross Ridge]

Don't be a troll. You know exactly what was meant by the post he made and the one you responded to. "He wasn't talking about graphics, and you know he wasn't, so stop it." It was a post about entertainment value in games, not about graphics.

Uh, no. Paperfist said "What we should be seeing is realistic graphics of whole worlds rendered, AI so clever... ", and in reply Mr. Pendantic pointed ouu, "Long storylines take time. Better graphics and textures take time. Better AI takes time." Then paperfist responded with "we had all this in the 90s and 2000s". There's nothing in paperfist's second post that woud indicate that he wasn't including graphics in "all this", or that he was no longer talking about graphics at all.

The fact is that there's not a lot of reason to believe any new forseable technology would result in a "great jump in capability" for the reasons Mr. Pedantic and others gave. For that to happen there either has to be fundamental change in how games are made or financed, or some radical new technology. Just simply increasing budgets every year until everyone goes bankrupt or doubling the speed of GPUs every couple of years isn't going to make it happen.

I do think there one small possibility for a jump in capability when the next console generation hits. It wouldn't be a great jump and it wouldn't be anything we can't actually do today. RAM size on the consoles is a hard technological barrier that some game developers are currently running into and it limits them even when the budget wouldn't. Of course there is already tons of memory available on the PC, but given how many PC games are constrained by their Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 counterparts, we could see both console and PC games making advancements in gameplay, graphics, AI, storyline, etc... as a result. Probably not many, and nothing huge, but you might see games with bigger open worlds, more destructable environments or even just better load times.

Otherwise, the next big jump will be what CottonRabbit said about social-networking and in-game purchases. Seriously.

 

[Sureshot324]

http://www.naturalmotion.com/euphoria

 

[Attic]

How about we work on getting some good AI first.

This.

I would really like to see more engaging and believable AI in games.


I would trade this for more well done in game porn though, ala The Witcher 2.

 

[shortylickens]

On the fly AI and map generation.
How about if Fallout could dynamically modify its world?