Did you ever play "Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver" on the PSX? It's a fantastic game - controls are tight, voice acting is excellent, and the graphics are just gorgeous. Definitely one of the last-gen PSX games, the scale of the environments you ran through was really surprising given the "limitations" of the system. The Crystal Dynamics developers really hit it out of the park.
- Jim Jim Davis wrote: >>-----Original Message----- >>From: Vivec [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] >>Sent: Tuesday, June 07, 2005 10:14 AM >>To: CF-Community >>Subject: Re: XBox 360 stuff >> >>This looks good. >> >>I also saw an article online that questions the benefits of the Xbox >>360 for developers, since they are going to have a hard time writing >>new code because of the Out of order parellelism that the Xbox 360 >>requires, or words to that effect. >> >>It also mentions that perhaps Microsoft hasn't done as much on that >>development side to make it easier to code the necessary routines that >>would code gameplay, AI etc. >> >> > >I wouldn't be surprised to find that - the same has been said of most >consoles (especially the PS2). > >When it comes right down to it the initial games on any system are >essentially "betas" - they rarely use even half of the raw power provided. > >It's not until at least three years or so in that the really stunning games >come out - those games that make people say "that system shouldn't be able >to do that!" > >"Resident Evil 4" on the GameCube may go down as Game of the Year for good >reason. Remember "Donkey Kong Country" for SNES? > >The current crop of PS2 games has some sheer stunners. The latest "Splinter >Cell" does things that people said were impossible on the PS2. "God of War" >made people rethink PS2's ability to scale large objects. The previews I've >seen of "Shadow of the Colossus" have enormous creatures hundreds of feet >tall, intricately detailed. > >In most of these cases the developer's have essentially said "we finally >figured out the vector units!" (Ubi is actually using the vector units to >stream raster textures in Splinter Cell). > >The first gen games for a system are like battering rams: they slam through >the system using brute force and unoptimized code. The later games get >trickier and more elegant and suddenly find that they have more power than >they thought they did. > >The systems are all radically different, but they do have commonalities: all >of the next gen systems are using some type of PowerPC CPU (although >radically different implementations). Two of the systems are using AIT >graphics and all will support fundamental graphics libraries (OpenGL and >DirectX for example). > >I hope that this means that engine developer's will jump on all the systems. >Epic has already announced the Unreal Engine for both the 360 and the PS3. >Valve has made noises that Source will be available for at least those two >as well and ID is clearly on board (since Quake will be available for both). > >What we need (as you mentioned) in addition to this deluge of graphics >engines are better libraries for physics (although Source does cover that >well) and AI. In addition the next gen systems will finally have the >horsepower to do real-time procedural processing on a large scale. > >Massive armies with independent behavior at the soldiers level (like, well, >"Massive"). Flocking and herding behavior reacting to the environment. >Fractally-generated vegetation, growth and decay. > >With these capabilities we may finally see some new experiences, some new >genres... > >Jim Davis > > > > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Find out how CFTicket can increase your company's customer support efficiency by 100% http://www.houseoffusion.com/banners/view.cfm?bannerid=49 Message: http://www.houseoffusion.com/lists.cfm/link=i:5:159746 Archives: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/threads.cfm/5 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/lists.cfm/link=s:5 Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5 Donations & Support: http://www.houseoffusion.com/tiny.cfm/54
