does good graphics lead to bad gameplay? Pages 1 2 3 NEXT | |
I don't know if I consider good graphics to lead to bad gameplay, but they are often the result of a "make it more cinematic!" philosophy of game design that I think frequently leads to bad gameplay. So, correlation, but not causation. | |
Does good graphic lead to bad gameplay? No, not per se. Witcher 2 is an amazing looking game with great gameplay. The same goes for Crysis. Have the games with "bad gameplay" put too much time in making it shiny and modern instead of polishing the gameplay? Well... yes. And that's the thing. In many cases the gameplay suffers because some studios lack the balance. Also: The "hunt" for realistic visuals is nothing new, obsession with graphics existed even back then. Marketing with "X bit" graphics or the first CD based systems (with video motion or how the hell you called that). Heck, the N64 has this shit in the name of the system! | |
Animation, for me, is more important than graphics. The textures are still awful and people are still block men, but everything moves like it should. I just wish Half Life actually played like that :D There are lots of games with pretty visuals, but some things just don't move like they should. Character models in Mass Effect move terribly in cut scenes. | |
I've actually often had similar thoughts. Really it's my theory as to why (at least from my perspective) older games are far superior to the modern ones. It is my belief that developers are using pretty visuals as a crutch. They're trying to show how amazing their technology is while the game itself is pretty hollow. Look at Rage, for instance. Most would agree that the game is quite visually stunning...yet the game itself is extremely lacking. It's really why I like the old Final Fantasy games more than the present ones. Final Fantasy 1-6 didn't have to worry about dazzling their audience with amazing visuals, as such they could focus on gameplay and story. The most recent addition of FF titles, though, practically literally play themselves (just from what I've heard, I gave up on Final Fantasy after 10) and as such have traded gameplay for aesthetics on a most literal of levels. | |
It's good to see other people thinking the same thing I've been saying for years. Be prepared for alot of tin foil hats references. Nostalgia will get into it alot as well. But otherwise your on the right track. Thankfully the games industry hasn't done anything to stop its freefall away from creativity, others are noticing. | |
I wouldn't say good graphics directly lead to bad gameplay, but sometimes game companies focus so much on the graphics that they seem to forget to implement good gameplay. This is my observation. | |
That is totally what I was trying to articulate. Thanks for putting it into better words for me! | |
I don't think so. Halo is a fine example of a game series that has always looked great and played great. As long as realism doesn't take priority over gameplay, I think it can be a great asset to the overall project. I know a lot of my enjoyment of Red Dead Redemption and Skyrim came just from appreciating the gorgeous game worlds. | |
Hell yeah, second that. Good graphics are nice, but it falls apart in no time if the animations are off. One of the things I hated the most about TES4, and several other games, was how rigid and out of sync with the world every single bloody character looked. Same issue has turned me off several MMOs over the years. Also, to the OP, it seems pretty undeniable that the increasing requirement for a game to have good graphics in order to appeal to the general market (because it has virtually become a requirement, detailed realism and sleek stylization alike) has been putting constraints on the actual game part of a lot of games over the last several years. | |
I don't think there's any real correlation between graphics quality and game quality. I think what happens is this: Good Graphics + Good Gameplay: Most praise focuses on the gameplay, the quality graphics are an afterthought. Bad Graphics + Good Gameplay: All praise focuses on the gameplay, the poor graphics are an afterthought. Anyone griping about the graphics gets shouted down for failing to appreciate the gameplay. Good Graphics + Bad Gameplay: People buy it because of the amazing visuals, realize the gameplay is terrible, ponder aloud whether there is a correlation between good graphics and bad gameplay. Bad Graphics + Bad Gameplay: Hardly anyone ends up buying or playing these, as they're disasters. Realistically speaking, designers who care enough to lovingly craft quality gameplay will often also craft quality visuals. At least artistically pleasing, if the budget isn't there to make them bleeding edge. | |
Heh heh, my degree in English hasn't done much for me, but at least it's made me a good wordsmith, so it was my sincere pleasure. But really I do agree with you that it seems developers these days are more concerned with finding that perfect way to render the sun's reflection off a lake than making interesting characters/story. Again I point to Rage, a beautifully rendered world but with a main character and story that is absolutely impossible to relate to... ...and an ending that makes the ending to ME 3 look like the bowling alley scene at the end of There Will Be Blood. | |
I'm throwing money at the screen but nothing is happening! Why?! Why isn't it working?! OT: It has been said already but I'll just add my spin to it - no. Not really. Now, some games do emphasise on shininess instead of content but that's not the rule. Maybe the problem is that developing a pretty looking engine takes time, time that could be used polishing the game. However that isn't inherently true, as not everybody is trying to create their very own engine. One could just use a pre-made one trading off money for time. Good gameplay and good looks are doable. I think the issue is that there would always be games that suck regardless of how they look. Hence graphics (or aesthetics, if you wish) aren't the factor here. | |
Hmm... Catalyst: Synthesis! Synthesis, Shepard, you boy. Synthesized completely. I'm so sorry. Here, if you have a galaxy, and I have a galaxy, and I have some reapers. There it is, that's a reaper, you see? You watching?. And my reaper reaches acroooooooss the universe, and starts to synthesize your galaxy. I... synthesize... your... galaxy! Meh. Still an improvement. | |
xD just imagined that little scene playing out the way you've got it set up, and I must thank you for giving me a rather hearty chuckle. | |
With a lot of studios today....yes, good graphics lead to bad gameplay. Gameplay and story tend to take a back seat to making everything look as pretty as possible. I think that's part of why the indie business has taken off the way it has. People are getting sick of slick looking but bland AAA titles, so they turn to indie games, which don't have as good production value but provide much more stimulating gameplay. | |
I think that better graphics CAN make for better gameplay (this is why we have discussions about if a game has aged well or not) but I don't think that better graphics automatically makes gameplay better or worse. The main problem is when developers forgo gameplay in exchange for better graphics. As if looking pretty will somehow make a bad game good. | |
A solid example that's in my mind from another thread, and is highly relevant to the topic: Rise of the Robots on the SNES. Revolutionary graphics for its time, and notoriously boring gameplay. It was of course almost unanimously criticised for how badly it played. But more to the point, the graphics actually were responsible for the poor gameplay. The sheer number of animations that were present in each usable ability and movement was such a drain on the systems resources that the number of abilities available had to be limited. This was directly responsible for how repetitive and dull the gameplay was. I'm not sure modern games hold such concrete examples as modern PCs and consoles have such vast resources that the gameplay doesn't usually suffer so directly. You could point to examples of horrible performance and bugs in the likes of Skyrim, say, but this seems to be more forgiveable from the players perspective that outright hollow gameplay from the likes of RotR. I agree mostly with correlation but not causation. I think maybe the direct responsibility of graphics causing poor gameplay is probably a rarity, but it is evident that developers spend more time than they should on making a game look the part. | |
Not inevitably, no. But if certain resources are being devoted to shiny crap, what is to be expected? Riveting gameplay AND good graphics? A compromise has to be made and it's usally in the gameplay or story department. | |
I agree. Having experienced every combination of good/bad graphics and good/bad gameplay, I think graphics and gameplay exist on different continua. | |
No. While I agree that sometimes developer focus too much on graphics, it's not a zero sum situation. Besides, I love me some good animation. It makes characters and worlds feel more believable. There's this one fan-made Half Life video...
... You horrible, horrible person. | |
Yes. I stole the video you showed me. I'm awesome :D | |
I like Oblivion's memes much better. | |
I buy games to play them, not gawk like a fool at the graphics. Graphics are an excellent bonus however. | |
A great game has both great graphics AND great gameplay. | |
There are definitely games out there that have good graphics and so-bad-I'd-rather-be-set-on-fire-and-watch-grass-grow gameplay, but the graphics aren't the problem, at least directly anyways. The problem is lack of good gameplay, which might happen as a result of investing too much of a developer's scarce resources into making good graphics. | |
So, uh, what does that make Super Metroid? | |
It's been mentioned before but I just want to mention the Metroid Prime games. Those somehow looked awesome and I feel they played just as good as they looked. Hard to believe that the GameCube pulled those looks way back when. Though you could say it's just an art style that is pleasing but it's not very realistic. Also, having some knowledge in video game development, I see it in this sense though it's very very very watered down; You have 100 blocks of resources to create this game, you can spend them in three categories; Game Play Way back when, systems couldn't handle awesomeamazing graphics, it just wasn't possible, so more resources were poured into game play and animation. These days, now that hardware can support awesomeamazing graphics, it's all about looking good. Since it is somewhat easy to achieve now, more is spent there. Of course, I'm just reiterating what other people have already posted but I just like typing. | |
Nope. It's a combination of valuing graphics over animation, interesting art style, and quality gameplay/narrative elements. It's the sort of thing that brings this question up to begin with. | |
Sometimes. Usually a studio working for EA does that sort of shit. But there are others. And it's good that such a strategy doesn't always work. Volition traded good gameplay for better visuals in SR3 and it flopped. That was fun to watch. | |
Even without new animations, textures and what not, the original Half Life is still one of the most immersive games I have played. If theres a game out there that one can call perfect, Half Life is the one. OT: Nah. Video game development is a lot more costly nowadays, especially when both graphics and gameplay are given the attention they both deserve (something a lot of developers flat out do not do nowadays) but games have also become a lot more profitable. If a developer spends so much time on getting graphics to todays standard that gameplay is neglected, thats down to time and/or money restraints on the publishers side. | |
not exactly the reason pretty games suck is because devs in that case assigned more personnel and money to graphics instead of game design. Sometimes pretty games are also fun but not often. | |
Jim Sterling actually wrote a nice article on Xenoblades touching on this. Good graphics don't lead to bad gameplay. But good graphics do impose limits on other parts of the game. Though I'm probably not the best one to talk to about graphics. Since I think everything these days looks absolutely fantastic. Even games that apparently look like shit. I can't really tell. It all looks great to me. | |
Certainly there is some correlation but it's not that direct, there is always a budget on time / money / people, so if they put more time into X there is less for Y. Comes down to the devs to know their limits and what needs most attention in their game, but I have noticed that games where devs go "we just want it cinematic" do end up rather wanky. | |
while i believe devs are, and the gaming community to some degree are to hung up on graphics, i don't think 'good graphics' directly leads to 'shit gameplay' and to blame bad game play on the graphics departed is kinda silly,since no on working on the games look is coding how the game plays. no, i blame bad DEVS for bad game play. we have a ton of games with good graphics and game play, I'd have be willing to give CoD a nod for this *stabs leg in penance for heresy* so there's no one TO blame but the people in charge of programing game play to blame for the game play sucking | |
| Pages 1 2 3 NEXT | |
This is just something I was thinking about this morning, on the way into work...
I've played games since I was very small, starting at around 7 or so. As I get older, and look forward to new iterations of my favorite games, what I see is a lot of attention paid to aesthetics and less and less all the time to innovative game mechanics. As CG has evolved, we've become obsessed with the idea of making the games look as 'real' as possible. The issue is... things look very real now, but fail to feel any different in spite of that.
I think the best examples of this are Mario and Halo/CoD. If you come over to someone's house expecting to play Mario, and he hands you Super Mario Bros. 2 instead of the New Super Mario Bros for Wii, you probably aren't going to freak out about it, because it's pretty much the same thing. It is similar, I find, with many FPS games.
Further, I'm not even sure that developers are succeeding at their goal of realism in focusing on the way a game looks. Honestly, Manny from Grim Fandango feels much more real to me than [insert modern character name... see? i can't even think of one] in spite of his blocky pixels. I think it's the fact that your goal in the game is to navigate the underworld beaurocracy, the fact that he as a person is a novel idea. Again, it's the gameplay and the writing, not how many blades of grass are on the ground.
It is my hope that we'll eventually reach a plateau of visual realism, at which point developers will have to start thinking about other things again.
What do you guys think?