AAA video games struggle to keep up with the skyrocketing costs of realistic graphics

yRaz said:

BG3 came out of nowhere, Space marine 2 came out of nowhere. You aren't going to compete with genre leading games, but dumping politics into games is an instant turn off even for people who agree with you. Know why SM2 is successful? Because you run around with a gun and kill monsters. No politics, no ideology, no hidden messages. Know why BG3 is popular? Because it let's you play how you want to. It creates a sandbox that allows you to project yourself onto the world.

So many of these failed games have 1, or both, of these 2 things in common. Over monetization or forcing a message. When you build a game around trying to sell loot boxes, there is very little game that people want. And the politics in games? People play games to escape the world around them. Just because the left has control over the games industry doesn't mean the right wouldn't do the same.

People just want to beat challenges, kill monsters, collect loot and have fun.

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Who said anything about that? The people behind BG3 are great and, well, the IP does its work. Title it differently and, maybe, same success wouldn't have been granted.
Space Marine 2 is a simple game, well made.

No, people are braindead, they would take in anything. Left? Right? You mean the Right of Trump(et)?

I would say the spiderman games are a bad example. First of all Sony is giving Marvel a share of the profit from the Spiderman games. Second of all the game being exclusive to PlayStation hurts its sales. How much more would this game have made if it was ported to xbox consoles and the switch as well? Tons of money is being left on the table imo by it just being on Sony consoles and PC.

AAA games can die. Originality is dead.

Do I like great graphics? Of course I do. But here's the thing. I remember when I first got Skyrim and was running down the path to the first village. There was a rapids river on one side of me and I remember stopping to gawk at it. It was pretty realistic at the time. But the graphics quickly became secondary to the game. Great graphics does not a great game make.

Half to 3/4s of the games I play on a regular basis either have simple graphics because they don't need anything complex, like Risk, or Mini Metro. Or they have mediocre graphics but the game play makes them so compulsive that the graphics become secondary. And even some games have such bad graphics they make me laugh out loud. A perfect example is the NPC interactions in Solasta Crown of the Magister, the hair looked like moss it was that bad. But the game play? It was so good that I loved it and finished the entire game plus DLC. I highly recommend it for any D&D nerd.

Oh and I was born in 61, so late stage boomer here. Been into computers and video games since the 80's. So for all the boomer bashers here. Stereotype much?

McPhallus said:

It makes sense that those in their 40s and 50s are driving the need for constantly-improving visuals. Those of us in that age group saw the progression from Atari 2600 graphics to 4, 16, and then 256-color “photorealistic” VGA graphics within a single decade. And we got addicted to the improvements. I still remember eagerly awaiting the first Test Drive game since it promised to put you into the cockpits of those cars more than any other game could’ve at that time. The differences were stunning until things seemed to level off over the years to now when you have to sit uncomfortably close to your TV to notice all the differences between the PS5 and PS5 Pro. The old low-res games are still fun to play for some reason, and now devices made to run older games are starting to have OLED screens, fast CPUs, and ways of boosting resolution well beyond what the older games were designed for.

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As a Gen Xer in my 50s I totally agree with you. I started gaming (coin op) in 1979, soon Atari 2600.
After owning a Sega Saturn and PS1, then "upgrading," to the under rated "Dreamcast," the jump in graphics was glorious! Next The original Xbox, another, but less striking upgrade, and finally the 360 and PS3.

After that I moved to PC, and was still focused on graphics a fair bit.

The GTX 580, still significant improvements which enhanced games, but starting to be less of a wow factor.
The excellent GTX 1080ti was the last time I considered graphics to be very important.

I should add that choosing good games that are fun, regardless of graphics is a constant, and always will be. It's just that better and better graphics make up less of the overall attraction for any particular game. Meaning they don't enhance games so much, as graphics have already reached an incredible level. (Compared to, say PS1)

I continue to upgrade, but graphic fidelity alone is no longer the main reason. Simply I want to play the latest games at decent frame rates and settings.

Anyone who is considerably younger will simply not have lived during the days of huge leaps and "wow factor," improvements in Graphics.

How good do graphics need to be? For me it's now about gameplay, novel ideas, and other things like running well without crashes.

Having said all that, I still love to see new graphics tech and excellence. It's just not as exciting as it was.

IMO many in the industry have forgotten how to make great games.

If you find yourself lost then the smartest thing to do is call the guys who crafted great games, humble yourself before them (after all they are Grand Masters) and ask for their wisdom.

The first thing I'd do if I wanted to make a great game is call Old Blizzard and ask for their insight. Mike Morhaime, Mark Kern, William Petras, Chris Metzen, Rob Pardo, Allen Adham.

https://wowpedia.fandom.com/wiki/World_of_Warcraft_credits

The problem is those ppl who make "AAA" games think they know everything and they don't need any wisdom from the Past Masters. So they fail. It's quite simple rly.

As a GenX-er in his 50’s I agree 100%. Great, innovative games don’t need ultra realistic graphics. One of the best examples is Disco Elysium which runs beautifully natively on my MPC spotting a Ryzen7 5700x/ GTX1080/ 32 GB 3600 DDR4/ Sony TV 4k configuration.

Come to think of it, a lot of older games such as Jedi Fallen Order or AC: Origins look great on ultra/ high settings at 1080/1440 and play well at around 70-ish fps on the same rig.

Good stories, great characters, well thought out game mechanics are a must. Graphics? Well… do I really need realistic surface reflections on the tables at the Whirling-in-Rags when I’m dealing with Titus and his Boys?

I remember playing The Day Of The Tentacle, the Monkey Island series, Grim Fandango or The Longest Journey on bulbous VGA monitors when 1080p wasn’t even a concept. Graphics were never an issue.

Who is struggling more, studios with skyrocketing costs of realistic graphics or us mortals with the prices of GPUs?