Classic and Modern FPS

Figured about writing something related to this on Squidoo. I mentioned about the difference between classic and modern FPS games.

http://www.squidoo.com/classic-and-modern-fps

I think 'classic' better :)

Mainly because I re-play Doom and many older classics over and over. Sure I take a long break sometimes.

Dont get me wrong I really enjoy playing some modern FPS games. They can be very realistic and immersive. However, once ceompleted I tend not to go back, sometimes I may get half way through a second re-play, then end up playing something old like System Shock 2, X-Wing, Doom etc

Thats why I dont spend more then £15 on games, I often wait until they have been out for a while and purchase in Steam/Amazon sales or something.

I feel a little bad about this as I know making modern games is so much more work then they used to be due to so much more tech.

For instance (i know its not FPS) I just bought the new Tomb Raider game and so far its very immersive, great graphics and superb effects and the story is pretty engrossing, however, I very much doubt I will re-play it again. I doubt my keyboard will survive anyway as that game is a one mega serious hard core button masher!!! Hope they dont put any crap like that in Doom 4, dont fancy sitting there mashing various keys in sequence to open a stuck door or something....yarn!

Anyway, point is I re-play and always go back to 'classics', not with modern games. Hence why I vote 'Classic' as better, because for me it obviously is!

Not trying to be an asshole, but I think this article is wrong on so many levels. First of all, dividing the entirety of first person shooter games into two shallow categories is an unnecessary exercise and it makes no sense as most FPS' won't fit into either category. The article gives me the impression that you've more or less only ever played Doom and CoD.

Even if you put whatever games can fit into these categories, there will still be huge differences. Even though you imply otherwise, Doom and Serious Sam are extremely different types of shooters. Duke3D has areas that resemble reality, but have more in common with Doom than CoD. Jedi Knight and Dark Forces have cutscenes and ingame chat between characters, but they are non-linear and you can carry all weapons at once. Dishonored is a new game, but it is absolutely nothing like CoD. Or Doom. Where does that fit in? What about Half-Life?

And then I just have to respond to this, extremely common, misconception;

Again, "better graphics" doesn't always mean better game, but still it is great to include.

It's just not that simple. You don't go
#include greatgraphics

It's not a slider you can adjust. Also, what does "better graphics" mean? Doom has excellent graphics. So does Minecraft and the Last of Us. It's not something you craft at the last minute and it's not something that can simply be replaced. It's an integral and interwoven part of the game and the process of creating it.

Shaviro said:

Not trying to be an asshole, but I think this article is wrong on so many levels.

You're not, I'm looking for feedback actually.

Even if you put whatever games can fit into these categories, there will still be huge differences. Even though you imply otherwise, Doom and Serious Sam are extremely different types of shooters. Duke3D has areas that resemble reality, but have more in common with Doom than CoD. Jedi Knight and Dark Forces have cutscenes and ingame chat between characters, but they are non-linear and you can carry all weapons at once. Dishonored is a new game, but it is absolutely nothing like CoD. Or Doom. Where does that fit in? What about Half-Life?

Yeah you're right, that's why I already put this:
"Please keep note that this doesn't HAVE to apply for all classic games. These are various points collected from different games". And I also mentioned that there are modern games that plays like classic ones, or you can call them oldschool.

Doom has excellent graphics. So does Minecraft and the Last of Us. It's not something you craft at the last minute and it's not something that can simply be replaced. It's an integral and interwoven part of the game and the process of creating it.

I said Better graphics. This doesn't mean that the worse one has ugly graphics. Suppose we have A and B games. B has better graphics than A, but A is better in gameplay than B. You can't just say B is better than A just because it got better graphics.

By the way, Minecraft has ugly and pixelated graphics, and this is why it is a great example for this (though not a FPS game). It is even loved just because of its simple graphics and simple yet powerful gameplay.

Shaviro said:

Even if you put whatever games can fit into these categories, there will still be huge differences. Even though you imply otherwise, Doom and Serious Sam are extremely different types of shooters. Duke3D has areas that resemble reality, but have more in common with Doom than CoD. Jedi Knight and Dark Forces have cutscenes and ingame chat between characters, but they are non-linear and you can carry all weapons at once. Dishonored is a new game, but it is absolutely nothing like CoD. Or Doom. Where does that fit in? What about Half-Life?

No kidding. It's a pointless dichotomy as this list can go on and on. Where does kingpin fit? Deus ex, SS2, Sin, Soldier of fortune, Red faction, NOLF? All of these are technically 'old-school' given their age and yet they suffer from most of the problems attributed to modern cod and bf. On the flip-side, the Borderlands series as an example does not despite being modern.

C30N9 said:

Yeah you're right, that's why I already put this:
"Please keep note that this doesn't HAVE to apply for all classic games. These are various points collected from different games". And I also mentioned that there are modern games that plays like classic ones, or you can call them oldschool.

Right, and once you distill it all down you start to see that you're really only comparing 2 or 3 older games to 2 or 3 newer ones.

C30N9 said:

I said Better graphics. This doesn't mean that the worse one has ugly graphics. Suppose we have A and B games. B has better graphics than A, but A is better in gameplay than B. You can't just say B is better than A just because it got better graphics.

But what *ARE* better graphics? How do you define that? Also, you can't do a clear-cut distinction between graphics and "gameplay". These aren't two self-contained entities that work together. Part of the "gameplay" is graphics. I will also oppose against the loose term gameplay. It's often presented as a standalone module that is directly comparable. This really isn't the case. It's an awful word that nobody will ever really agree on.

By the way, Minecraft has ugly and pixelated graphics, and this is why it is a great example for this (though not a FPS game). It is even loved just because of its simple graphics and simple yet powerful gameplay.

Minecraft has very professional graphics. In fact, a big part of the game's success is due to its graphics and how it perfectly goes hand in hand with the construction part of the game. He found the sweet spot where his game looks consistent and nothing is out of place. The style goes a long way in hiding the limitations of the game and accentuate the strengths. The graphics of Minecraft are a masterpiece.
Look at the million clones. They mostly look like crap.

"Better" graphics is completely subjective. To some degree, one can argue that rendering without errors is an objective classification; but other things such as stylisation, colour use, detail et cetera - those are in the eye of the beholder.

One example off the top of my head (because I'm playing it recently) is Rage. I've been told it has "beautiful" graphics because it is very detailed and very smooth (even on 360 which I'm playing). However, I'm finding the graphics too cluttered and with a lot of very similar washed-out colours; couple this with the smooth framerate, and it makes me feel slightly queasy to play. Though competent, I personally wouldn't call these 'good' graphics, though many will.

Entirely subjective.

I would say that's "prettier" graphics or "more visually pleasing" graphics you're defining. If I had to come up with a definition of better graphics, it would be how well the graphics complement everything else you're attempting to achieve and convey. Going with this definition, Minecraft has better graphics than Blockland (and many many many other games. Even AAA titles).

Shaviro said:

If I had to come up with a definition of better graphics, it would be how well the graphics complement everything else you're attempting to achieve and convey.

It's from this standpoint that, when asked, I personally name the arcade game Asteroids as having some of the best graphics ever. Aesthetically-pleasing minimalism married to perfect functionality. There's no possible way they could do their job better than they do.

Well yeah, exactly. You could say the same about something like Space Invaders. You can't turn up the fidelity of the graphics without clashing with everything else. The simple mechanics and the simple graphics go hand in hand. This is also why a strict HD Doom would never work (well).

In my view, Doom and Minecraft are very beautiful games because although they are low fidelity, they are not low fidelity enough to be out of place and in the right circumstances (right level design) they can look very good. The first rule in games like these (or any) is that everything should be of the same quality.

There have been numerous Doom texture projects, each more faithful than the last. The problem is that one you apply those textures to the default levels, they look very weird because they are much higher quality than the environment, therefore they look out of place and break the coherence of the level. It's not as simple as making better textures. When you upgrade something in a game, I think everything has to be upgraded: from textures, models, animations and level geometry itself. The same thing happens when you do the exact opposite in modern games http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iuGRo87MhY or when you use ultra high-res minecraft textures.

Although I am a great admirer of 3D graphics, there is a weird trend among gamers that if a game is not 3D, it is automatically graphically inferior. I think this is because we got 3D graphics in a time when the industry was not yet ready for this but they had such an influence because it was new, exciting and the mentality of gamers had not yet been fully formed yet.

I view the relentless push of technology in the 90s after Doom to be like giving alcohol to a teenager and expecting him to be mature about it. Not only do I think that early 3D Quake models are visually much inferior to Duke Nukem 3D and especially Curse of Monkey Island but they directly led to AAA games when the industry was not yet ready for such things.AAA games are extremely expensive, and developers could no longer be independent which means that they had to look for publishers who may or may not let them develop a unique idea.

Because of the push for 3D graphics, we never really tapped the potential of high quality 2D art which unlike 3D, ages much slower (IF DONE RIGHT). I mean, who here things that Heroes 2, Heroes 3 and Curse of Monkey Island, Quest for Glory (especially 4) and King's Quest series are ugly? I think they are very beautiful and surprisingly, they still look good after all these years. In retrospect, even Mortal Kombat 3 is superior Mortal Kombat 4, I think. Imagine these games made after 2000, with the same art style but no pixellated sprites and a higher sprite count, it would be like a painting! Another idea is to combine 2D and 3D art like in Diablo 3. I know some of you will say that it does not look like Diablo, but that's not the point. The game itself is very beautiful. However, you can do this only in fixed perspective games RTS, Isometric RPGs and expecially Adventure Games. Speaking of modern adventure games with a great art style, check out a Vampyre Story, a game made by ex Lucas Arts emplyees. This is how a modern Monkey Island would look like and it looks stunning.

Another argument that 3D came too early is that although hardware relative to that time could most certainly deliver a SATISFACTORY experience, the games were held back by the hardware. In the case of Quake, we got ugly 3D models which I think are much inferior to high quality 2D and in the case of Doom 3, they had to cover the levels in darkness to increase performance and to make them cramped and with few enemies. Maybe 3D graphics should have come later? I wonder how the industry would have evolved had they come only say in 2007.

You actually reload in doom , but that's only 1 weapon you reload , SSG. super shotgun. Why don't people mention this reload scene?

joe-ilya said:

You actually reload in doom , but that's only 1 weapon you reload , SSG. super shotgun. Why don't people mention this reload scene?

Probably because it's automatic and it isn't breaking the existing gameplay flow; it is part of that flow, same as the normal shotgun 'cocking' and the after-firing plasma rifle delay -- these things are consistent and part of the normal rhythm of gameplay, not an exception like manually reloading a weapon clip (that can be done at any time, thus disrupting normal firing).

I guess...? ;)

For me there is a "sweet spot" in the amount of detail and pixelation that varies between games. For example, in the Might & Magic RPG series (not the strategy games), I prefer the art in 3-5 to anything before or after. Especially the character portraits in later games put me off (just have no interest in that kind of "realism"). Monkey Island series: I like the first two, and that's it. DOOM: vanilla engine only. Final Fantasy / Dragon Warrior series: NES versions (SNES FF versions look okay too, but never played. Later stuff: ugh). But I prefer the real (original) arcade versions of some games to their "downsized" computer/console ports, so it depends.

DooM_RO said:

There have been numerous Doom texture projects, each more faithful than the last. The problem is that one you apply those textures to the default levels, they look very weird because they are much higher quality than the environment, therefore they look out of place and break the coherence of the level. It's not as simple as making better textures. When you upgrade something in a game, I think everything has to be upgraded: from textures, models, animations and level geometry itself.

Well said - but I'd not agree to it universally.
The Heretic hires texture pack works surprisingly well. The main differnce is that they attempted to make the material the texture was supposed to represent look more detailed

The problem with all those hires Doom textures is that they fail in this particular regard. Especially the STAR* textures in each texture pack I have seen look like utter shit. They have neither any real resemblance to the originals nor to the material the originals were supposed to represent. As a result any level subjected to these shitty replacements will look atrocious.

After a certain level of polygon count and texture detail, there's little difference between a "painting-like" high-res 2D game and a well-made fully-3D game. An example relevant to Mortal Kombat:

Zeno Clash.

Amply proven also with Doom models vs (unfinished) "high res sprite" packs: compare how good Doom Ascension's models look compared to even the best high-res sprite pack (well, as far as they both got, at least).

Doom Ascension:




Best high-res sprite effort EVER (with only half of ONE monster finished, and with only 8 rotations):



There is however, a major difference between 2D and 3D at that level of detail: labor-intensivity. Making a good 3D model is already a full-time job, making some hundreds of hand-painted sprites WITHOUT resorting to using models would take a lifetime. If you end up using models anyway, why not go full 3D and benefit from infinite rotations, flexible posturing, smoother animation, lower memory footprint and hardware acceleration? Get over it, pure 2D for such high-res gaming applications is dead.

Yeaaah, you're probably right, quality 2D art would likely take more time to make but I still think we should have more quality 2D like in A Vampyre Quest.

As for Doom texture and model projects, Ascension is the only one I have faith in atm.

DooM_RO said:

Yeaaah, you're probably right, quality 2D art would likely take more time to make but I still think we should have more quality 2D like in A Vampyre Quest.

Can you link to this "A Vampyre Quest" game? Google only shows the "Vampyre Quest" from Runescape, which is anything but 2D. If you mean a 2D like the one used in classic adventure games though, yeah, that's unbeatable. What's pointless is trying to use 2D as a poor stand-in for full 3D: this isn't the 80s or early 90s where full 3D would be unpractical and ugly, and where a even a half-assed 2D approximation would probably look better (e.g. driving games, Doom itself).

Maes said:

Can you link to this "A Vampyre Quest" game? Google only shows the "Vampyre Quest" from Runescape, which is anything but 2D. If you mean a 2D like the one used in classic adventure games though, yeah, that's unbeatable. What's pointless is trying to use 2D as a poor stand-in for full 3D: this isn't the 80s or early 90s where full 3D would be unpractical and ugly, and where a even a half-assed 2D approximation would probably look better (e.g. driving games, Doom itself).

Aaah, I'm sorry, I meant A Vampyre STORY, I was lost in thought while thinking about Quest for Glory 4 (which is fucking amazing)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lc-t60NN5aA

THIS is the kind of 2D I'd like to see.

DooM_RO said:

THIS is the kind of 2D I'd like to see.

Uhm....I don't know, that's not what I think of when I think "high quality 2D". At least the characters are either real-time or prerendered 3D, and the background/backdrops could be either (in any case, they have a simplified "round" style which I honestly wouldn't class as high-quality 2D, more like the kind of high-quality stop motion in e.g. the Corpse Bride). That's really blurring the lines: would you call Myst "2D"?

Want beautiful 2D that wouldn't necessarily work in 3D?

Love the shit outta this game's graphics. Those squiggly lines would look like ass in 3D. We're getting away from 'classic vs modern' FPS here, I know. But I'm a sucker for lovely graphics -- it's just that my personal definition of 'lovely' isn't all trendwhore gimmicknut techmonkey shit.

DooM_RO said:

There have been numerous Doom texture projects, each more faithful than the last. The problem is that one you apply those textures to the default levels, they look very weird because they are much higher quality than the environment, therefore they look out of place and break the coherence of the level. It's not as simple as making better textures. When you upgrade something in a game, I think everything has to be upgraded: from textures, models, animations and level geometry itself.

I do and I dont agree with this, in my opinion high res replacement textures 'do' look very good in Doom, but many texture packs are made by various contributors all with their own art style. So even though it does look better, it sort of looks out of place. In Doom Ascension, every texture goes through NiuHaka and its tweaked to hell so it fits DA art style, this keeps consistency. However, this causes vanilla monster to be out of place, especially when up close to a high res wall or dead on a high res ground. So the monsters need upgrading! Personally I think the only way to do this is to go 3D.

As for the 3D models, many port support 3D models and yea packs have been made, but they are old now and their poly limit was limited to the early engine versions/hardware at that time. However, a higher poly monster model made properly (still with sensible poly limits) and a high res texture using the 'same' style the walls etc will look much more at home. Then of cause there is the animation! This is what can make or break a good looking monster. Its not easy to animate a humanoid, your either naturally talented or have had proper training.

With these things in place I think Doom can feel and play like the original, but with a more modern look.

Finally, as for environmental models to use in levels to make the 3D monsters suit their environment, yea definitely, think Doom really needs this to make more sense of the levels purpose and add a more modern look, hopefully without effecting game play too much. (This is actually what I am working on right now and its looking nice)

All this is exactly what Doom Ascension is doing :)

However, remember not everybody will like using 3D models, many just like the pure vanilla game play.....its all a matter of preference.

Maes said:

There is however, a major difference between 2D and 3D at that level of detail: labor-intensivity. Making a good 3D model is already a full-time job, making some hundreds of hand-painted sprites WITHOUT resorting to using models would take a lifetime. If you end up using models anyway, why not go full 3D and benefit from infinite rotations, flexible posturing, smoother animation, lower memory footprint and hardware acceleration? Get over it, pure 2D for such high-res gaming applications is dead.

Totally agree with this, think the end result will never be as good looking as a decent 3D model. Also im guessing if something simple like a walking animation needs tweaking, then thats a massive change! With a 3D model its a simple tweak, and re-import....done! Hence much easier to get things looking right. DA animations are often being tweaked all the time. Its often the minor things that make a difference!

Only exception to 3D predominance: if you have a HUGE surplus of traditional 2D animators working hard for hunger wages. That's kinda what happened with Zelda graphics (Russian animators) and what's going on in the industrial zone between the two Koreas (lots of NK animators work for the SK and Japanese anime industry).

Edit: but that still wouldn't take the technical/computer-side limitations of the format.

Certainly 2D art games can have a more striking aesthetic and age much better than some of the earlier 3D titles. There's something still visually appealing with older games like the Curse of Monkey Island and Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee.

Off-topic; a few years ago, a gentleman figured out a way to convert the 2D high (ish) resolution backgrounds of Monkey Island 2 to 3D with the Crysis engine, which preserves the original art style extremely well.

http://youtu.be/Wzoek-uAPek

Unfortunately, he never released his work publicly, as I think he was hired by Crytek shortly afterwards.

I don't know if this technique would work with other engines, but if so, I hope that it gets used a hell of a lot more in the future.

Livo said:

Off-topic; a few years ago, a gentleman figured out a way to convert the 2D high (ish) resolution backgrounds of Monkey Island 2 to 3D with the Crysis engine, which preserves the original art style extremely well.

http://youtu.be/Wzoek-uAPek

Unfortunately, he never released his work publicly, as I think he was hired by Crytek shortly afterwards.

Thanks for sharing that, I really enjoyed what he did there! A very talented guy, no wonder Crytek snapped him up.

Livo said:

Off-topic; a few years ago, a gentleman figured out a way to convert the 2D high (ish) resolution backgrounds of Monkey Island 2 to 3D with the Crysis engine, which preserves the original art style extremely well.

I think his way involved great quantities of two quasi-mythical substances called "good ole' elbow grease" and "hard work", as well as a certain dose of "imagination" and "filling in the gaps" *rolleyes*

I like classic FPS. The do what you want mentality. Go left instead of right, even if you were supposed to flip a switch in left to continue past right.

Really people just want to do what they want. Use a rocket against a single man instead of a machine gun. GTA, Saints Row, Just Cause 2 and others have made a lot of money going off of the do what you want mentality. But I guess those are 3PS or OTS.

Fallout and Skyrim are huge games because you do what you want. If I want to slaughter the people I'm trying to save.... go for it. You should get your own enjoyment out of a game and not let the game dictate how you should play it.

Its not that studios want to lead a person by the nose, but they spend so much working on the most complex 30 seconds of gameplay like Battlefield 3's collapsing building toward you that you need to hit X to jump out of the way. Did you really need to waste man hours on that building collapse? I as a player didn't think holy shit that's the coolest thing I've ever seen. I just think let me do what I want. That building didn't suddenly change the level where now I need to go in the building to search for survivors. nope just cut to another cut scene. Thanks EA for telling me what I need to do.

Maybe modern shooters are straight forward because it takes too fucking long to make a map for them, because of the details involved. No one ever minded if a hallway was pretty empty with only a few things. Now people want to see lights hanging, dents in the walls, barrels and other such clutter all with unique textures and papers littered about so it looks more immerse and less video game like. I hate GTA 4 for how real they made it look. When I still love GTA SA and GTA VC. Pretty much the same game, different graphics and physics. SA and VC didn't take 5 years to make either.

@Maes

I was talking about the backgrounds which I find incredibly beautiful. They probably had to use models for characters because I THINK they are cheaper than animation.

Maes said:

I think his way involved great quantities of two quasi-mythical substances called "good ole' elbow grease" and "hard work", as well as a certain dose of "imagination" and "filling in the gaps" *rolleyes*

Hehehe, I meant that he used a certain method of converting the art (since the MI2 backgrounds were hand painted) and when I made that post, I wasn't sure if you can do that with most modern game engines or just the Crytek one.

His website is down, but you can still view it through the internet archive where he explains how he did it; he used camera mapping to project the 2D image onto specifically shaped 3d geometry.

http://web.archive.org/web/20090731143817/http://www.loneclone.de/projects/monkey.htm


Unfortunately, the pictures are broken, which is a shame because he used to have detailed images showing each step in the process.

Livo said:

His website is down, but you can still view it through the internet archive where he explains how he did it; he used camera mapping to project the 2D image onto specifically shaped 3d geometry.

The catch is that "specifically shaped 3D geometry". Unless he found a way to automatically generate that just from 2D data, then, work-wise, it would be no different than modeling the 3D environments from scratch, regardless of how he textured them a-posteriori. The way you describe it, it sounds like he found a way to save some time for the texturing part, not the 3D modeling.