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The Big Graphics Problems Bungie Wants To Solve
by Staff [Console/PC, Exclusive, Programming, Art]
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December 27, 2011
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Hao Chen, Bungie's senior graphics engineer, identifies the big visual problems the Halo creators want to solve in the coming years, in today's Gamasutra feature interview, reprinted from sister publication Game Developer magazine.
Asked about the big graphics problems that need to be solved in the coming years, Chen's answer focused on Bungie's own graphics and engine.
"Number one is removing digital artifacts... removing all the jaggies, having very clean foliage edges, and awesome looking hair with no artifacts. Removing these digital artifacts that remind people you are staring at a computer screen is one of our top priorities."
"The other challenge is selling a dynamic world," Chen said. "In terms of what we think is important, we will even lower some of the quality in order for us to have a more dynamic world. This means dynamic time of day, lots of things that move in the wind, lots of things reacting to players moving through them, and when you walk on soft surfaces like sand and mud, you leave footprints. So basically everything we do to sell that this world is moving and dynamic is important to us."
"And then perhaps the last one is believable characters. That's still one of the areas where we still spend a huge amount of emphasis in animation, in the rendering of character faces and facial animation, and just characters in general, that's still one of our high emphases. In the end what we're trying to do is deliver the fidelity where it really matters to the end user."
Why are these three elements the major targets for Bungie's efforts? Said Chen, "that's the stuff that makes the player not believe they're in this game."
The "illusion is broken" when players don't believe in a character's face, he said, and creating the illusion is what keeps Bungie making games.
The full feature, in which Chen goes in-depth into just how the developer is tackling its graphics development solutions for its next title and the next generation of consoles, is live now on Gamasutra.
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Have little hope that console makers will focus on these areas anytime soon.
Would recommend anyone interested in this problem to read "The Illusion of Life" (which is about early Disney animation but have similar challenges)
This means that the fault lies in developer's simply not caring or not being able to afford the face capture for true emotional acting in games. So, Bungie coming out and saying they care about faces is huge in my opinion :)
Next generation technology from what I'm seeing will be fully procedural facial and character animation (aka Natural Motion), next generation post process anti-aliasing solutions, voxel based technologie, next generation procedural soundscape engines, full cloth based dynamics for character clothing and muscles..
Secondly, all signs are pointed to Bungie's next game being open world. Yes they make FPS's but this one is gearing up to be an MMOFPS. This is not a new development. While there is barely any concrete information we at least know that much.
Secondly, while Bungie DOES make FPS's, in no way does that mean they can't make an open world FPS. (Borderlands) In fact Bungie is pretty much confirmed to be making an MMOFPS. They may have denied it but that doesn't mean much coming from Bungie.
The facts are there. Bungie is in Activision's pocket now and I wouldn't be the least surprised if it turned out that they are working with Blizzard to make it. Time will tell Duong, time will tell.
My initial impression was Bungie was focusing on the minutia and not seeing the bigger picture but after reading the full interview, they seem to have it in hand..
That's just plain false. Faces in the Halo series have always looked sub-standard, yet they've had no impact on sales or fun factor. The core mechanics of Halo are so overwhelmingly fun that you can stick any sort of face in there you want, and people will still enjoy it, buy it, and keep Bungie is business. Things like facial animations, anti-aliasing, day-night cycles, and footprints in the sand, are NOT what sells games (they are icing on the cake). Not that you shouldn't improve those things, but hopefully Bungie still has its priorities straight.
- A native 720p or 180p resolution
- Sharp graphics (8xAA, 16xAA, FXAA, MSAA, etc.)
- At least 60 fps
That would be awesome, really.
Halo 3, ODST, and Reach (to be fair, Bungie had less of a hand in this title), have run at sub 720p visuals. Despite some application of AA the games are noticeably jaggy. Funnily enough I remember playing Halo 2 on my 360, upscaled to 720p, looking sharper.
I suppose the challenge lies in "having it all". But while it's nice to think that brand new hardware means more of "having it all", we all saw this wasn't the case with Halo 3, which sacrificed image quality and clarity for its implementation of HDR (which I admit, was fantastic and still holds up to this day).
Recent games on the 360 give me the feeling that I need additional glasses, because we don't see much what is rendered. Too much aliasing and the image is all blurry.