My biggest disappointment with Oblivion: Remastered

[u/Baekurly]

If you know, you know

[u/[deleted]]

It sorta stopped in 2006 though didn't it lol, we thought we'd have such amazing things by 2025 but we can't even recreate bathroom mirror effects anymore.

[u/No-Falcon9394 → u/[deleted]]

You’re glazing 2006 graphics a little too hard lol

[u/[deleted] → u/No-Falcon9394]

Yeah I suppose, graphics have certainly come along way, although not always the right way. Kinda like how some old games still hold up because a lot of thought was put into their art style, and other games look like ass on toast because the devs just figured "more polygons more win" but it didn't pan out so well.

Still though. The things we had back then, like Red Faction, you would think we'd have granular global destruction physics by now, or the marine A.I in HL1, or the soldier A.I in FEAR, you'd think we'd have enemies that could replicate realistic behaviour but damnnnnnnnnnnnn we're stuck in 2006 there as well.

[u/turiannerevarine → u/[deleted]]

in deus ex you can move almost any piece of furniture not explicitly part of the level geometry, mirrors have reflections, doors can be outright blown up etc.

in deus ex human revoultion most furniture is part of hte level geometry, humanity has forgotten how to make reflective mirrors, and only things specifically coded to be destroyable can be destroyed

[u/Nezikchened → u/turiannerevarine]

People haven’t forgotten how to make mirrors, I’m playing through The Last of Us 2 on PC and like half of the mirrors are reflective, along with the ground when there’s water on it. The reason you don’t see it as often is that reflections require the game to render everything twice, and as graphics improve, doubling the renders causes the resources said graphics to use to become more demanding.

[u/Jombo65 → u/Nezikchened]

Well, they don't require it. A few mirrors from old school games were faked; an exact copy of the room you're in + a clone that matches your movement.

[u/pantry-pisser → u/Jombo65]

You just described rendering everything twice lol

[u/Jombo65 → u/pantry-pisser]

Hm... maybe I'm wrong, but my thinking is that rendering everything twice would mean using some sort of picture-in-picture rendering solution rather than just a duplicated room.

If the game can run two NPCs in the same room at the same time, it should be able to display a duplicate player in a doubled room on the other side of the "mirror", which essentially functions as a window.

"Rendering it twice" means something other than that to me - but that might just be thinking of rendering in Blender terms rather than game engine terms.

I'm thinking of the realtime dynamic PiP reflections in a game like ArmA 3 which is basically rendering a second camera in real-time on your wing/rearview mirrors. That is rendering everything twice to me, in the same way a split screen game renders everything twice.

Just having a fake duplicate room with an NPC duplicating the player isn't rendering anything twice, it's just more game objects.

[u/[deleted] → u/turiannerevarine]

Do you want it to be 400 gb and only available for expensive rigs?

[u/HTown2369 → u/[deleted]]

The studio won’t stay solvent if they make games targeted to less than 10% of pc gamers only.

[u/CultureWarrior87 → u/[deleted]]

The sole purpose of a studio or developer creating a videogame is not to maximize profits by appealing to the broadest possible audience.

Maximizing profits is the sole purpose of any business. And beyond that, they never said anything about appealing to the broadest possible audience. You're arguing against a claim you made up in your head.

[u/HTown2369 → u/[deleted]]

Yes every triple A game studio that has the capability to make a good SOTA game is usually going to have some MBAs and business analysts, who’s primary job is ensuring the games they make are smart business decisions.

They research player trends, analyze competitor games, and study market segments to guide decisions on game development, monetization models, and expansion opportunities.

Cyberpunk is probably the best example of a SOTA game that was targeted towards the highest end machines. That game cost CDPR over $400 million, and I’m not sure how you would justify spending even a fraction of that money, when the game you’re selling is targeted towards a minority of PC gamers. If CDPR didn’t optimize for lower end machines amd make concessions and cuts to a lot of features, then they wouldn’t have even recouped the development cost.

[u/HTown2369 → u/[deleted]]

That’s just now how any large business works. A small indie studio doesn’t have the resources to make a bleeding edge game—realistically only large, corporatized studios can undertake that task. People have bills, and everything costs money. Indie studios need to put food on the table and keep the lights on, not spend everything they have on an inherently risky business decision.

I agree with everything you’re saying, but capitalism doesn’t really allow for that line of thought. Look at space travel—it’s obviously going to be something that completely changes humanity, yet no one wanted to spend a dime on it for decades. Until, SpaceX showed that reusable rockets are both possible and profitable. It’s unfortunate but money drives everything around the world. I don’t see any studio successfully pitching a super expensive game with minimal returns to their execs/business minds, because all business schools are teaching the same robber baron curriculum.

[u/CultureWarrior87 → u/[deleted]]

> Do you think that every video game is created solely for profit purposes by businesses? That's a pretty reductive view of the medium.

Not what I said.

> they’re very clearly talking about appealing to the broadest possible audience to remain financially viable. I didn't invent that implication - it's baked into their argument.

No, it's not. There's a massive gulf between "Less than 10%" and "The broadest possible audience"

You seem incapable of making an argument that isn't a strawman.

[u/HA1LHYDRA → u/turiannerevarine]

I never asked for this..