toblix

Well, I don't think there's much point in considering the post-processing in particular as an advantage. The two ways of rendering the game world are so wildly different what counts as post-processing in one can be considered an integral part of the other. It's simply a matter of giving the modelers, animators, designers and texture artists greater freedom, by several orders of magnitude in almost every aspect. There's just a fuckton of faces and reflections layered materials that real-time rendereres are only considering faking.

Obviously, although I still think Riven looks better and feels more immersive than any other game. Obviously, there has been progress in various areas, and Riven is clearly aging in areas like image resolution and the animation of the various animals, but the islands themselves, and the materials and lighting and the realness of everything, a feeling of physical presence of every little thing from buttons to trams to walkways I've never seen the like of, even in the sequels. I'm suspecting there's a huge element of nostalgia or something fogging and blurring and colouring my view, but fuck it.

Of course you're confused when you only read half my sentence. Let's have a look! See? Riven was prerendered, and I wondered what a prerendered Myst game would be like in 2008. Of course, I kind of failed to mention Myst IV, which was prerendered and came out in 2004, so okay, four years later. Anyway, these two later games weren't made by the same people as Myst and Riven, and even though they both look amazing, there's still something about Riven that just blows my mind, and I think that if that game was made today, it would be abso-fucking-lutely amazing to behold.And yeah, Myst V was real-time, and it looked good, but come on, real-time always looks like shit compared to prerendered.

Of course he is. No real American would fight the military!

Not the quite same thing, though, if I understand this Messiah business right. Dynamic LOD is old hat, simplifying meshes based on certain parameters (most often distance). The way I understood the Messiah thing, though, was that the character development workflow throughout game development allowed for dynamically altering the detail of the characters at any point, so that they could possibly release a 2010 (or whenever) version of the game with the characters completely intact as modeled. Of course, I may be wrong. I often am, haha!

You mean you don't know of and haven't seen 1600x1200 LCD monitors right? Because they're very, very, very common, especially in the corporate business office world, where widescreen seems resisted somehow. But if you're talking about monitors at home you'de be more right, although there's plenty of 1600x1200 LCDs in people's homes as well. There was quite a long period of time in which a 1600x100 20" or 21" LCD was the most sensible thing to get.

I played it for a bit and thought the totally consistent first-person perspective coupled with some scenes any other game would've cut-scened was awesome. I stopped playing because it just got too hard. But it was pretty intense while it lasted. edit: Having watched the video review, I'm getting memories of thinking the game just got boring. So maybe not intense but boring. Anyway, I remember this sequence where you're hiding from a guy searching the room, trying to find you, and that was sort of cool. I think.

At least play to the rape sequence.

I think we can all agree that the term "resolution" is not really applicable to these numbers unless the physical screen dimensions are also known, so that we get an actual number of pixels per area and pixel per horizontal and verical length unit and shit like that.

Having all sorts of different connectors and terms and resolutions and stuff is the sort of shit the TV makers should've figured out never to do back in the fucking eighties. Even the terms they invented to try to make it easy suck.

Anyway, daily my ass.

Being brainwashed must be fucking awesome!

It's just... you know?

I'm always interested when someone goes "I wasn't really interested in this game, but look at this [screenshot/text/feature/hot lead designer]".

Well, you could always just return it if you're not satisfied, if the store or your country's consumer laws allows it.

Well, I was really thinking about televisions 42" and down, and only because from what I've seen and heard, there's no perceptible difference between the two resolutions on televisions that "small". Of course, that's based on two assumptions I didn't mention:This is of course dependent on viewing distance. I was basing my comment on the viewing distance I have here and will have in my apartment. If you're going to use the screen as a computer monitor, web surfing, whatever, you'll appreciate a higher resolution more. Also, the 42 inches isn't a magical exact dimension, just one I pulled out of my ass, sort of. Also, I'd argue that even if you do see a difference between the two resolutions on a given screen size at a given distance, you should still seriously consider image quality a hell of a lot more as long as the lower resolution isn't annoying in any way. Could be just poor motion enhancement.

If I were to buy a new HDTV I'd not make the mistakes of: ...primarily focusing on 1080p. The resolution is maybe one of the least important factors in image quality. If you're only buying a 37"-40" television, I'd go with the higher-end 720p sets. ...not buying a television based on viewing it in a store. Electronics stores are horribly well-lit environments most likely very different from where the TV'll end up. I also expect the sellers to adjust the sets according to commision rather than spending some time finding the best image settings for each. ...not spending a shitload of time adjusting the picture after purchasing it. I'd say buying the television is one half of the job, image adjustments being the other. I've never heard of a LCD or plasma TV that has even half-good factory settings. Profit!

That would be cool. I've always liked the idea of sequels (or other related software) being able to read player data from the other games like that. For example, the Quest for Glory games allowed you to save and import characters throughout the series. It didn't change the story, though, but that would also be cool. Of course, it might also be time-consuming and alienating to first-time players or something. Anyway, Steam is the sort of platform that could enable stuff like this. Also, maybe Xbox Live could.

Yeah, I wonder if that could've been handled differently. For example, would a playable recap be possible?

If there is, I never heard of it.

Hot

This graph from the Wikipedia article on the uncanny valley is so awesome:

OH! OH! http://www.google.com/search?q=idle+cunt+thumbs

Holy maloney, this film is awesome. Here I was, thinking that all non-Miyazaki anime is crap, and then I watch this and it's fucking beautiful. The animation, music, everything. Just shut up and get it and watch it. Now. NOW!