Unreal 3 looks pretty!

[Neil]

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[EvilNed]

The original Unreal Tournament was kick ass. But is this Unreal 3 or a new Unreal Tournament?

[Rottedfreak]

This might be what the next range of consoles can do, the current lot are starting to show their age.

[Neil]

This might be what the next range of consoles can do, the current lot are starting to show their age.

Isn't this Unreal engine headed to the consoles? Sure, some of the bells and whistles might have to be turned off/down, but I suspect there's still some life (amazingly) in them?

I certainly haven't heard any talk of a next gen XBox or Playstation?

[MinionZombie]

Isn't this Unreal engine headed to the consoles? Sure, some of the bells and whistles might have to be turned off/down, but I suspect there's still some life (amazingly) in them?

I certainly haven't heard any talk of a next gen XBox or Playstation?

There's a modest amount of speculation that the next Xbox is now being worked on, after some job posting ... but it's all rumour and speculation ... but I'd still reckon they'd be working on it now regardless, perhaps relatively early in development. I do hope the next Xbox is built like a brick shit house though and is as reliable as Swiss public transport.

However with games like Crysis 2 taking the graphics department of the 360 to further heights, there's still life in the old girl yet.

[Tricky]

Personally I like that the current gen of consoles is reaching its ceiling technologically, it means the PC is starting to get decent exclusives again and not just half arsed console ports!

[Rottedfreak]

I expect at least one announcement at E3.
Sony intend to keep PS3 around until 2015 or so, they have been saying that since launch, Microsoft's Kinect has been a success so I think they will start a new wave around that platform, this leaves Nintendo, the Wii's sales are low, they only have two games in development - Kirby and Zelda Skyward Sword and beyond that nothing, 3DS may be their priority for a bit but they'll want a new console out there pretty soon.

[EvilNed]

So anyway - Unreal is cool!

[Tricky]

It does look very, very pretty! I wonder if younger generations appreciate how good it looks as much as us older gamers who have seen gaming technology advance from C64's and 8 bit consoles to the current generation? When I was gaming in my teens I could never even have dreamed that games would look as good as they do now, I remember being hugely impressed when basic speech started appearing in games, or when full motion video was first used in games like "Night Trap" and "Microcosm", then when the first Playstation & Sega Saturn came out they started using CG cut scenes in games which were usually the best looking part, as the actual gameplay was all in rough edge polygons with bad draw distance!
I guess for anyone under 21 now good graphics are just the norm, which in a way is a good thing as it means the game itself has to be good seen as even the crap ones are pretty, but the younger gamers dont get to be as impressed as us older ones once were at the huge technology jumps between hardware generations!

[MinionZombie]

You speak the truth Tricky - I'm amazed at how far graphics have come in my gaming lifetime. I got a Mega Drive 2 in 1993, and that was when I first properly started playing videogames, however I did have a handful of hand held individual games in the couple of years preceeding that (a rip off of Space Invaders, a racing game, and a ghost game) which were very basic graphics on a very small screen - hard to explain how, but they were the sort of level of graphics you got in Space Invaders.

Anyway, now we have stuff like Crysis 2, and soon Rage, and it blows my mind how far graphics have come during my gaming lifetime. I also remember seeing adverts for the likes of Final Fantasy 7, but they'd only show the FMV sequences, and I thought "fuck me, that looks amazing" - but of course I saw the actual game and went "oh", and that was when I properly realised they used FMV sequences to show off the best looking bits to sucker people in (indeed I recall when a judgement was made that advertisers had to put text saying "not actual in-game footage" ... however with graphics now that's not especially necessary as they often use in-game stuff these days).

Anyway, where was I? Yes, Unreal 3 looks very pretty ... let's hope the crop of games that use it will have good scripts and quality gameplay.

[Rottedfreak]

It's not just about graphics, it's horsepower, developers want to take experiences to new heights with new physics engines and such.
For example there's Dead Rising with hundreds of zombies on screen, this game isn't possible on older platforms some may point out Hitman Blood Money, Pikmin and Spartan Total Warriors but DR requires those zombies have individual AI.
Left 4 Dead has a special engine which places ammo and enemies on the maps to match the players progess.
Star Wars the Force Unleashed uses Euphoria and DMM physics for realistic effects to draw the player in.

Even though it's eight years old and surpassed I am still wowed by Rebel Strikes Triumph of the Rebellion level where you ride a AT-ST through the forest moon of Endor.