Technical discussion: DoW 2’s graphics. High-end vs. high-quality?

[burny]

Edit: If you are going comment on this please also read posts 15, 24 and 30 first. I know, it is a lot of text, but I already addressed some common objections. Also this might prevent you from believing I'm saying DoW2 should run on integrated graphic-cards.

In post 58 Croaxleigh linked linked this early description of DoW2 (http://forums.relicnews.com/showpost.php?p=2907554&postcount=592) containing closer information about how DoW2's graphics are supposed to look like.
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There already has been a little DoW 2 - related discussion about graphics in other threads. As I feel this is a topic that could use some more healthy and objective discussion I will open this thread especially dedicated in order to have a place for it.

This is meant as a purely technical discussion for graphic related things, everything related to gameplay belongs here (http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=184903) and for how the 3d-models might look like: here. (http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=184931) This is intended for discussing hardware-requirements related to graphics, not what we wish would be in the game or how the single models will look like.

I had a few thoughts about this, especially seeing that my next new PC lies on the horizon, far behind the possible release of DoW 2 and I like many others am running what would today be called a low-end machine. Although I don't expect to run DoW 2 on it I have come up with a quite lengthy…well, let’s call it an article.

Our imagination - what could be?

Skipping through the threads linked above I have gained the impression that the most user's wishlists for a possible DoW 2 users involves bigger and better graphics. At all costs.

After all, how cool would it be to have a nearly photorealistic Space Marine blast his way through enemy lines, leaving a clearly visible and stunningly realistic (physically correct!) trail of destruction through an ultra-high-polygon level featuring soft lightning, Pixel-shader-X (whatever) and textures with a resolution so high (and so many layers of bump mapping etc.), it makes the wallpaper in your room look unrealistic in comparison.
What could be better? Oh, of course – having two hundred of them on screen at the same time!

What a sentence. Still there?

My “loyality”, or: This is by no means supposed to degrade into a Relic vs. Blizzard thread. ;)

Let me put something right before I even start: there will be a lot references to Blizzard games from now on. Am I preferring Starcraft or Warcraft over DoW?
No! I write this article because I love and care for the DoW-franchise. Actually far more than the two RTSs mentioned above - for gameplay reasons. Maybe I even care a little bit too much, otherwise I would just ignore the games and move on instead of posting here. This is also why I feel DoW games, so far, have been a shadow of what they could be. And I fear I’m loving the games a little bit too much for what they could be, rather than what they are.
Also, I can see that Blizzard tends to do the right choices in many aspects where relic or ultimately THQ, if they are responsible, heavily lack. This by no means will be a whine, but rather a little reflection and hopefully constructive criticism.

Graphical splendour comes at a price.

As described above, realistic graphics are fine. We all like them, to look at them, to marvel them and maybe even use them as arguments to throw at players dedicated to other games - “SC 2 sux cause even DoW1 haz better graphixxx!” I’m expecting to hear this argument mostly from adolescent gamers. Orthography better or worse, proportionally related to the level of devotion the arguing person has for his favourite game. ;)
Hey, when I was younger I thought so, too.

Yet, gaming companies aren’t led by 15-year olds, willing to sell their parents for a few thousand more polygons and two more levels of anti-aliasing. They need to sell their games.
In fact, it seems the customer base for PC-games willing to regularly update their hardware more and more becomes the top of a pyramid that hardly justifies high development cost if a game won’t reach at least parts of its base.
Why are UT3, World in Conflict and C&C no longer PC exclusives and are released for the high-end consoles and why on earth are so many people so keen for a console port of Crysis? Surely the mouse-and-keyboard setup alone is enough to make us all buy a new PC?
More examples needed?
I don’t think so.

Let’s assume that relic hears our prayers and employs CoH’s engine in order to deliver the most visually stunning RTS-experience, ever to be had in the 40k-universe when DoW 2 is released.

What would be the price?

For one thing, the game would look great. It would do so even if they didn’t improve the CoH-engine significantly which would mean when the game is released a lot of people will be perfectly able to play it. But as this is relic and we’re talking a new iteration of their probably best-selling franchise it is to be expected that they upgrade everything as far as they can. The downside: whoever is able to run CoH on high setings today will probably only be able to run DoW2 at medium or even low settings. WHo is able to run CoH at medium or low settings today might have a problem.

The price many would pay is not being able to run the game, only being able to run it at low or medium settings, facing horrible framerates or having to upgrade our PCs in order not to experience the latter three points. Some would do it, no question, but seeing how sensitive people already are, especially considering bugs (that are out of place for a finished AAA product if they’re this big), hardly everyone would do so. There only needs to be some outrage for some bug and a lot of people would have an excuse not to buy the game when it is released (and not having to buy new hardware).

If we now look at global sales this will even be worse. DoW, although being farely well known by now, will not have the public perception SC2 has and everyone arguing otherwise is fooling themselves, even if SC wasn't this popular in asia.

Someone here has said American gamers have too short of an attention span, to care for strategy games. I would affirm this globally (Exception: South Corea! ;) ) and say this is natural and caused by the increased complexitiy of RTSs compared to other genres. So even more: a RTS relying mainly on its graphics as primary sales argument (no matter how innovative game mechanics are) risks a self-inducted reducing of its target audience.

Now take the little part of the gamers who care for the genre of your game anyway (as it’s not casual enough) , take a small slice of the potential customers and from them, take the small part who are able to run it smoothly if the game demands a 1.5k $ PC for medium settings (exaggerating…).
Turn off some of them by letting slip a nasty bug (as it IS impossible to fix everything before release, although one should try REALLY hard) into the final product and you achieve underwhelming sales or hurt your reputation. Predictably both.
A RTS strongly relating on multiplayer can hardly afford underwhelming sales if it is supposed to take off.

Running in danger of sounding like a broken record and not being constructive at all I’m now going to point out how I think a wider audience could be targeted without sacrificing graphical quality. Here, I consider Blizzard an example of how things can be done and what reasonable economical choices are.
At this point I expect a lot of you to disagree with me, but you will have your chance to destroy my arguments – if you will be able to. ;)

Keep the hardware requirements at a minimum!

This is the biggest criticism I always had about DoW’s graphic, still have and am not alone with. Units look great, even today, but the levels are boring and could be so much more without stressing the hardware more than they do. Have a look at this: The journalist is tactless to come up with this in a presentation and demanding too much from an addon, but with level’s visuals he has a point… oh - and with the campaign! (http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=184912)

Many will jump to the conclusion keeping requirements low will result in an ugly visual presentation.
In the Contrary!
Always assuming players have a sufficiently powerful PC will result in low-qualitiy graphics experienced by most players.

While this sentence might be too striking for its own good I will explain how I differenciate between low-/high- end and low-/high- quality graphics.

Company of Heroes has:
high-end graphics in close timely relation to its release and high-quality graphics when you are able to run it on high settings and the game isn’t older than maybe four years.

This changes with time and / or the player’s hardware:
As an aging product and with the progress of hardware CoH graphics will become low end graphics and relatively to other, more recent, products the graphics will also become low-quality graphics, even in the eyes of the most devoted fans.
If this was different, no one would hope for DoW 2 to employ CoH’s engine. Yet, DoW is only four years old, so why are SC-players not all moaning about low quality graphics of their favourite game?

This is because:

Blizzard games in general have:
low-end graphics compared to competitors even immediately after release. However, they have high-qualitiy graphics even years after they are released and compared to their competitors, no matter how much more DX 10 or 10.1 effects WiC or CoH throw at you.

Already hating me? ;)

Then let me explain further and show you some pictures.

Have a look at those two screenshots!
http://img520.imageshack.us/img520/838/cohscreen01cp3.th.jpg (http://img520.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cohscreen01cp3.jpg) http://img259.imageshack.us/img259/2399/s13xlkr5.th.jpg (http://img259.imageshack.us/my.php?image=s13xlkr5.jpg)

The first one is taken from CoH on lowest settings. The second one is taken from Warcraft 3 (what else…) on maximum settings.
Which one looks better?

To me, the answer clearly is: The second one (Warcraft 3).
Now, what PC is required to run both games? A PC able to run CoH on these settings smoothly could almost run WC III two times parallel. Now, aside from what we prefer gameplay-wise (CoH in my case, as its gameplay is much less about “heroes” and “roleplay” than WC III’s ;) ) you can’t deny that smoothly running a game on the settings its supposed to be run is more satisfying than sacrificing graphical quality in order to be able to run a game at all. And if you’re really forced to play CoH at these settings you will not be able to run the game really smoothly.
The conclusion: get better hardware, play another game or leave it be.

It’s the potential customers who leave it be that will hurt a game’s sales. I already pointed out that a mp-strategy game has to target the widest possible audience if the developer makes sensible decisions. I can promise the most striking gameplay innovations will not sell a game if half the potential customers have to spend money, they could buy a console for (or a game that runs!), on hardware first.

I have never looked at a Warcraft 3 level and thought it looked boring. The level’s geometry, vegetation and texturing give a far more lively impression than any DoW level I have seen so far. This is because WC 3 doesn’t substitute style with pseudo-realism.
Here is a screenshot from one of a DoW level with some vegetation in it. All graphical settings are on high. Compare this to the WC3 level shown above. See what I mean?

http://www.dawnofwar-game.de/screenshots/screens/35.jpg

DoW sadly has a far lower graphical quality than WC 3 because not everything looks as good as its units. In fact, have you ever asked yourself why there are no animated unit reponses in DoW? This is a small detail, yes, but it is another detail where DoW is graphically outshone by a lower-end game with a much older engine. Even Starcraft had this small detail and it would’t have hurt DoW to have it, too.

If you’re still disagreeing I will break my point down to this example as it is much less emotionally bound: Which is the better picture of a sunflower?

http://img230.imageshack.us/img230/3976/sunfloweragainnewsue3.jpg http://img138.imageshack.us/img138/6166/happydaysdpdd8.jpg


If you are convinced the first (“realistic”) is, you’re what I would call a graphic-whore. You wouldn’t have been able to identify the second image as a sunflower because it doesn’t feature as much realism, right? ;)
If you prefer the second one you’re probably rather looking for an abstract style and don’t care as much for pure realism.
I don’t see which is better. In fact I wouldn’t dare to say there is a difference in quality, as both painters display the essence of what is a sunflower quite perfectly.

But if I had to make a rational decision which one could be painted faster I would certainly pick the second. The same goes for 3d-models and detailed textures. Explain to me why 9 million people are playing a graphically outdated MMORPG, willing to spend hundreds of dollars on building up a fictional character that has a real value close to zero? Certainly not because the graphic’s quality is unbearably low.

The detail of Dark Crusade’s 3d-models (units, not environment) would be completely sufficient for DoW2 if relic chose to go for a more simple visual style in favour of hardware requirements. How much time do we even spend watching the units close up? Hardly any if we are seriously playing.
DoWs units are its most graphically impressive aspect and they still look good and lively today. In order to improve the graphics, some bump- or normal-mapping etc. might be thrown in for good measure as this really makes models look more detailed and gives the impression of shadows and depth. In fact, looking at some SC2 screenshots I believe DoW’s models partly actually have more polygons. Is there a need to multiply DoW's 3d-model’s level of detail while it’s still competitive?

Last example: Watch this video (http://www.gametrailers.com/player/23208.html), and have a careful look at the 3d models, especially fingers and facial expressions. I don’t think they use significantly more polygons than a standard CoH-ingame model, only textures on higher resolution. However, I would argue, that these 2 min of storytelling create more atmosphere (story-wise) than the complete DoW and CoH franchises together. And its sad for me to say this as I’m a great 40k-fan, play the tabletop and see what could be done with DoW. So how much do graphics matter?

Would the atmosphere created by this in-game sequence change in any way if the models were better (say, Crysis level)? Would SC2 playability improve if Blizzard multiplied the 3d-model’s detail?

Hardly.

Would less people be able to enjoy the game (Aside from those, who regard it as religion ;) )?

Yes certainly.

Would I like to see relic spend more money on production values like the ones shown in the video above and ultimately: sell more games (earn more money for sequels!) / have more people enjoy a truly realised AAA title that doesn’t waste potential (with DoW there is a lot of it to be wasted and unfortunately has been wasted…)?
And a little more perfection in terms of bugs /balance… ;)

Absolutely!

You actually read this? Thank you very much for your attention.

This article might very well be futile if the first pictures of DoW 2 are shown next month.
By then, the train in terms of graphics will be long gone and it’s far too late to change the engine in the middle of development. This obviously doesn’t count for a certain Duke.
I just feel it needed to be said.

Also, I think what I just said will become extremely important for developers in the coming years. High-profile-, high-end-games will be more likely to be developed for cross platforms or exclusively for consoles as the pyramid of PC-gamers shrinks further and the core audience changes to more accessible platforms.

In the future Games will be bought for PCs rather than PCs for games.

Then, one of the big names in PC-exclusive games will be Blizzard, because their potential user base does not exclusively consist of people ready and willing to afford high end PCs. And their games will look good, because they weren't made only with high end PCs in mind.

However, DoW in its third iteration (assuming it survives this long), might very well be forced to accept that only the way of cross-platform development will justify its development cost, if relic chooses to do a graphical leap like the one from DoW to CoH a third time - regardless of the hardware requirements.

In terms of gameplay they already have proven that they are capable of creating unique products (at least in multiplayer) and there, I have faith. Yet, I feel relic’s games are underachieving and I’ve just argued to death one reason that might be very well responsible for this - aside from quality problems.
Low PC-specification directly transfer to accessibility, yet do not mean a sacrifice in quality.

Any viable counter-arguments? How do you feel about this?

And keep EVERYTHING not graphics- or performance-related to the threads linked above.

[step2ice]

You actually read this? Thank you very much for your attention.

Well not completely but partially.

In fact I'm a guy who prefers good art style and a sense for balance in performance and look.

Blizzard is a very good example for that.
Warcraft III runs flawless even on absolutely low end machines and looks beautiful at the same time.
The art, the sound, the colors, everything comes together and is top notch.

Then you take CoH which relies on very high hardware specs while making use of DirectX 9.

I take the balanced version over "eyecandy" any time.

In fact I bought CoH but never bought the expansion because my PC can't handle games bigger then 2 player maps without getting in the 10 fps area.

Another genius in making balanced and absolutely outstanding games is Rockstar. GTA SA, Bully, Manhunt, The Warriors you name it.
All beautifully done. Superb animations, great art style, outstanding sound and voice work. But not high poly or shader intense. Why, cause it's not needed.

I wouldn't go as far as the dogma from independent game developers (or how it was called) but a good balance between performance and gfx is very important.

Another example would be Team Fortress 2. While the game has a great style, it way too demanding. Why? Because the engine isn't really made for multiplayer without having a total ubermachine. And with recent patches it's not very enjoyable on the fps perspective anymore.

1. Plan your game
2. Make a enging for that game and not vice versa
3. Make it so many people as possible can play it on there machines
4. You're done

What I hope for Dow2 is that they make a engine capable of portraying big fights and not only giving fluid gameplay on 2 players maps.

Even Dow wouldn't be very enjoyable in big fights if you would play on the recommended system specs.

I don't want to see the same happening in DoW2.

It's all about balance and playability, not about shaders and poly count.

My two cents.

[Imperial Dane]

Well first off, great thread and some very good points, secondly, that last video, the link didn't work for me, so could you A) post another link to it or B) just tell me what to search for at gametrailers ?.

But yeah, you've got some good points here, but just a point, if they are going to use the essence engine, i don't think we should expect such a massive jump in requirements, but again time will tell, and i would assume they are aware that just pumping up the graphics isn't the way to success.

In fact, have you ever asked yourself why there are no animated unit reponses in DoW? This is a small detail, yes, but it is another detail where DoW is graphically outshone by a lower-end game with a much older engine. Even Starcraft had this small detail and it would’t have hurt DoW to have it, too.

Uhmm.. starcraft didn't have animated unit responses, or are you thinking of the portraits ?

I have never looked at a Warcraft 3 level and thought it looked boring. The level’s geometry, vegetation and texturing give a far more lively impression than any DoW level I have seen so far. This is because WC 3 doesn’t substitute realism with style.

Again, you won't hear me complaining, warcraft 3 had some quite amazing levels, and sometimes i would just gaze at them for a few minutes while having the Ai tied up during the campaign, and seeing such a thing in DoW 2 would be fantastic, i mean it, that way of bringing a map to life would be perfect, and would add to replayability in some way. But again, we really can't say until DoW 2 has been announced and they are showing off screnshots.

[F-Minus]

This is completely personal preference. Warcraft 3 had great graphics for the game it was, those graphics however wont ever fit in the Warhammer 40k universe, cartoony still just wont cut it here.

But as said, no point comparing those two games as they both have completely different art direction.

That said, I wouldn't be too happy if DoW2 releases and looks like DoW with next to zero graphical improvements. But as said that's personal preference. I have the computer to run it as should anyone who expects to play the latest games, you don't have to have an uber rig for $3.000 either or are you telling me that you expect to play DoW2 smoothly, which will possible be released in 2009, on a computer from 2004/5?

The industry just doesn't work that way.

[Testify]

The OP's thread was one of, if not the, most thought-out and intelligent posts I've ever read, on any forum.
I also completely agree. Good graphics have nothing to do with technically advanced graphics.
This transcends genre...
Just compare the hand-drawn backgrounds of Baldur's Gate II with the 3D images of Neverwinter Nights...
http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20061103/baldursgate2.jpg
or
http://news.softpedia.com/images/reviews/large/NWN2_007-large.jpg
I know which has the greater charm.

[Starblade]

If you are convinced the first ( “realistic” ) is, you’re what I would call a graphic-whore. You wouldn’t have been able to identify the second image as a sunflower because it doesn’t feature as much realism, right?

I would say the first one looks prettier not because I'm a graphics whore (the only game I flatout refuse to play based on graphics is Wind Waker; I HATE that art style), but simply because I find it more pleasing and attractive to the eye than the second. It's the same with Warcraft's art style for me. I don't care at all for Warcraft 3's graphical style, but that doesn't mean I dislike exaggerated styles; only WC3. At any rate, DOW2 should try and find a middle ground between high-end and high-quality. It can look photorealistic but no one will care if no one can play it (Crysis felt this problem greatly, apparently).

[burny]

...secondly, that last video, the link didn't work for me, so could you A) post another link to it or B) just tell me what to search for at gametrailers ?.

Sorry, fixed that! Its a video of a story sequence from Starcraft 2, where an old Protoss friend of Jim Raynor makes an apperance.

I'm really happy there are people agreeing with me. Also I really feel that relic ought to know it's th gameplay of their games (when they're finished...) that seperates them from the crowd.
Nearly any company is able to produce high-end graphics nowadays if they only get enough money.

[Imperial Dane]

Ahh that video, well okay, but i have always been a believer that it isn't the size of the graphics that matters, it is how you use them :P I mean it, doesn't matter if you have cool graphics, but don't use them to create some cool enviroments and so on, and relic did succeed somewhat at it, they just need to take it to the next level, make it better, improve, although that might not be necessary to say, because my experience with relic says they always strive to improve.

[Old Painless]

For me Relic could just double the size of the textures used and i would buy it.

Better textures even on the same model = extra pretty. Therefore people with crap hardaware can still play it but those with super graphics cards can enjoy it at its best.

There really isnt much wrong with the effects in DOW, its not super nice to look at but if every unit, building and piece of scenery was as pretty as the best models, it would be far more pretty overall.

Compare some of the very high quality texture DOW mods like witch hunters (iirc) with the current slugga boy texture and you'll see what can be done simply by getting more from the textures.

[Chaingun]

The first one is taken from CoH on lowest settings. The second one is taken from Warcraft 3 (what else…) on maximum settings.

Which one looks better?

To me, the answer clearly is: The second one (Warcraft 3).

As a fairly unbiased person in this matter (I own neither CoH or WC3), I'd say these pictures look fairly equal in terms of graphical quality. It's just a difference in art style, the second one obviously looks more appealing in a way because it's not a wasteland. ;)

I read the rest of the post and while I feel a lot of it is valid, it's not anything I intend to get into an argument over.

Let's just say that it's possible to create a graphics engine where Low settings actually make the game playable on low end computers, with High looking a lot better.

[FerociousBeast]

One of the reasons Warcraft 3 gets away with as much as it does is because of its cartoony style. DoW should never attempt such a style, however. 40k fans want bleak, yet colorful; gothic, yet realistic. I agree that more effort should be put into style, but I think if you're going for a more realistic look, to some extent you're forced to rely on "graphixxx," as you put it.

Which sucks for me cuz my rig currently is just capable of playing DoW on the highest settings. Minus much in the way of shadows, unfortunately.

Great post burny, by the way :awesome:

[RMX]

Like you said, the DoW units look pretty and stylish still today, and wonderfully animated (missile physics aside).

They just need to pump up the environments (which actually succeed at ruined cities, deserts and snowed plains) and the production values: keep up with the voice acting and the scripted scenarios (which suffered a lot in SS).

I'd like to draw your attention to both DC and SS's cinematic intros. One can assume they're basically DoW engine-made with a tweak here and there on the visuals, yet look at the quality jump (compared with the ingame engine, not the DoW original intro :p). It's just what I'd like to see in DoW2.

As for the portraits, animated ones would be sweet but I overall didn't mind about them since the voicing of the units was in my opinion on par with Blizzard's acclaimed titles.

[Imperial Dane]

Animated portraits ? If they did something like that it should be something akin to Z ! Why you ask ? Because in Z you would have the portraits pop up in a corner with Sit Reps, that was awesome "Were getting our asses kicked here !" Now imagine that with a guardsman, face covered in grime, blood or both according to the status of the squad, now that would be awesome and would add flavor.

[Lex]

Let's stick to the main point - stunning graphics is not the solution for any game. Even the best hardcore-realistic graphic gets boring after some time.

It's the story, the world, the characters and the amount of work put into them by the producers that create good games.

[burny]

This is completely personal preference. Warcraft 3 had great graphics for the game it was, those graphics however wont ever fit in the Warhammer 40k universe, cartoony still just wont cut it here.

But as said, no point comparing those two games as they both have completely different art direction.
One of the reasons Warcraft 3 gets away with as much as it does is because of its cartoony style. DoW should never attempt such a style, however. 40k fans want bleak, yet colorful; gothic, yet realistic.

It is true, there is no point in comparing two different art styles, because then we would ultimately end up in a War-/ Starcraft vs. Warhammer (40k) argument. But we go beyond that and compare how well the different art styles are delivered. And in this sense there is nothing Warcraft has to get away with aside from absolute perfection.
The first quote even says that WC3 had good graphics “for the game it was”. In fact, as I said above, WC3 graphics still haven’t suffered over the years and are good for the game it IS.
Something we can’t say for DoW for the given reasons.
While I will admit that Warcraft's style doesn't fit into the 40k-universe, Warhammer's style is far from not being "cartoony" itself, as parts of it (the models themselves!) are extremely cartoony in a pseudo-realistic way. And DoW's 3d-models are almost exact digital counterparts of the tabletop models. Yes, I agree, Warcraft’s current art direction is to Warhammer’s what is an average superhero comic (for children) to Frank Miller’s graphic novels (thinking of “300” or “Sin City”).
There is however, every point in comparing DoW to Warcraft 3 or Starcraft (1/2), as long as we are talking about the quality of the game’s design. When I say design, I mean the design as a product, not the graphical design alone. This of course includes graphical design, gameplay, online component etc. But I would like to focus entirely on the part of the graphical design which affects a game’s performance and thus affects the overall game’s design and success. Here, with all compromises made in terms of graphics – its distinct art style included, WC3 continues to outshine DoW even today. I would blame a lot of aspects lacking in DoW’s design on apparently very limited budget (campaigns, product testing, even level-design, pressure from publisher?).

That said, I wouldn't be too happy if DoW2 releases and looks like DoW with next to zero graphical improvements. But as said that's personal preference. I have the computer to run it as should anyone who expects to play the latest games, you don't have to have an uber rig for $3.000 either or are you telling me that you expect to play DoW2 smoothly, which will possible be released in 2009, on a computer from 2004/5?

The industry just doesn't work that way.

Releasing a game in 2009 that runs on a 2004’s PC? Frankly, I don't expect relic or any other developer of an established franchise to be THIS smart Well, actually - shocking as it may be to say this - someone is! (http://www.battlefield-heroes.com/video)
You say you have the machine to run it? Well, then let's do a little speculation:
If relic just said themselves "The industry just doesn't work that way", too and was to make DoW 2 as real as I described in the first post, that is to say: assume equal or larger numbers of units on screen (per player) compared to Dawn of War, a lot of very "real" looking, very hardware-hungry effects, several hit-zones for each vehicle, 3d-models that could almost come from a first person shooter and multiplayer battles for up to eight players. As always, I might be completely wrong, but I think my “predictions” are sufficiently realistic. ;)

F-Minus, in this case you better have that 3000$ "über-rig" today or you can expect to be having a gaming experience seriously hampered by underpowered hardware when relic's next game is released. And the game after that and… Because the industry “works that way”.

I admit, I'm exaggerating a little, but not too much.
But this is what my first post is about: The industry won't “work that way” much longer. If you need any proof of that, then explain to me why the Unreal 4 engine is primarily developed for consoles, if the PC promised so much more profit. (http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/?p=1317#more-1317) Even here in Germany, one of the last, if not the last, country in the world where PC-gaming completely dominated console gaming the tides are changing.

I don't know if the people buying something like a 3000$ high-end PC today can even understand the economic magnificence of releasing a high profile game that could smoothly run on five- or six-year-old PCs. Testify got EXACTLY what I mean and has even included a highly visually appealing example. The second screenshot is taken from Neverwinter Nights 2 and look where all the high-end 3d-graphics have gotten the game.
Just imagine Bioware was to release Baldures Gate 3 exclusively for PC in 2009 and returned from their current 3d-games to an updated 2d-engine. As a result more or less everyone could play it and the game would sell itself in no time, not only because its predecessors are legendary. In return, imagine they were to release the same game using the Unreal 3 engine (or Cryengine 2, if you want even “better” graphics) exclusively for PC and how sales would turn out.

I agree that more effort should be put into style, but I think if you're going for a more realistic look, to some extent you're forced to rely on "graphixxx," as you put it.

You’re right, realism (at least in the visual sense) demands modern hardware and high-end graphics. There is no point arguing that.
But as I already said realism in video games stays realism only as long as your game is the most recent one to have a go at so called “realism”. Additionally, there is only so much room for scaling graphics up until you better start to develop a new engine. Here lies the true visual potential for Dawn of War. As it is placed in a purely fictional universe it does not have to obey the unspoken rule of the maximum achievable pseudo-realism and leaves creative room for graphical optimization.

But I’m not saying Dawn of War 2 shouldn’t push the graphics or have “no improvements”. Far from it! DoW 2 has to tremendously improve the graphics as DoW’s looks extremely dated for the given reasons. The question is: how far beyond CoH will relic go?

The problem is: scalability of graphics is a farce at best and a lie at worst. The best game I could imagine would only need three graphic settings: brightness, contrast and resolution for different monitors. For PC-games this is of course unrealistic, as the money you get from people not able to enjoy a game at full settings isn't worth less than the money you get from people with high-end PCs. Only there is more where it came from.

You may call me a “quality-whore” for this, but DoW (+ Addons) is one of the few and will be the last game I bought without being able to truly run it at maximum settings. Having to turn down graphic settings will not only transform your games visuals in a blurry mass of indistinct textures which might be still acceptable, but it is the clearest sign that the game has not been made for your PC. I want to run the game smooth in every situation, not only as long as there is nothing going on - particularly when it is a multiplayer game.
It is as step2ice says –
Even Dow wouldn't be very enjoyable in big fights if you would play on the recommended system specs.

I don't want to see the same happening in DoW2.

It's all about balance and playability, not about shaders and poly count.
On the back of practically every PC-game’s box there is written a little fairy tale – the recommended hardware requirements. That’s because there is a certain hardware-barrier above which you can practically do everything in a game on the highest settings. But this barrier traditionally lies far above what the box says and recently goes beyond what the core gaming audience has at hand.

I expect a truly great developer to find a perfect balance in style and graphical innovation. If relic had succeeded at this I wouldn’t worry at all. However there already is an extremely poor example where they screwed up in DoW:

fullres_teamcolor

It is clear that DoWs textures are supposed to look like they do with the above option set to 1, there simply is no denying that. However this option is hidden in a configuration file and only mentioned in the readme-file where it is also made clear that this is unsupported! If I interpreted this a little radically I would say we have a clear evidence of incapacity. They realized they bit off more than their customers PCs could chew at the time and simply declared the option as unsupported. Was that the right thing to do? Wasn’t there really a way to reduce the games requirements without sacrificing texture quality? Any ideas?

Relic will learn this sooner or later. Probably not from this post, but then from sales figures which could be considered the "hard way".

I am nevertheless intrigued to see what will be revealed next month. If it is DoW 2 (I’d say chances are 90% + ;) ) we should have a very close look at any images being shown and maybe have a go at estimating what hardware will be required to run this if this is not also revealed.

[Susurrus]

Personally, I think the WC3 graphics compared to the DoW graphics suck, but that's because I don't appreciate cartoon style..

As for the RPGs, BG2 is clearly > NWN2. But with BG2, the picture is stunning. It is merely fixed and not 3D. The WC3/DoW argument is wholly different to the BG2/NWN argument. One is graphics quality, one is 2D vs. 3D.

I WANT DoW2 to look amazing. But I'd prefer that it looked slightly better and was gameplay-wise a whole lot better (see Medieval 2, which got a massive graphics update for very little gameplay update...)..

[BubblesFloat]

(Brings back memories of FF9... oh the good old days)

I think when it comes to rts you need slightly better than average graphics, other wise games like AOE2 and other games from that generation would still be massive, but thanks to 14 year old kids and EA we have seemed to have grown some sort of need for "better" graphics (I say better and not great, because it seems to be the vocal point of many arguements when it comes to slamming rts games and other games in general). That said I too would prefer OPTIONS (yes options, not standard settings but optional) when it comes to graphics, although I think having a game thats medium to high quality is awesome for bringing people who have computers a couple of years old to the title, I also want to be able to crank it up and see how much stress I can put my black pearl under before it turns into a sizzling hunk of LULZ, this would mean AA 16, a res larger than arnnies ego and perhaps a high enough population count that it makes china look like its on the verge of extinction (reading this I realise some people might take it the wrong way, this was by no means ment to be an insult) so that when I turn persistant bodies on, my fire warriors walk along a road of space marines, oh and thats another thing that could be cool, maybe some ragdoll effects where bodies stack :D that would be awesome, having units climbing over walls of eldar corpse' just to take a pop shot at a farseer.

So yeah, why not go out on a ledge and give something for every one for once (low - high graphics, res, AA, etc) instead of picking and choosing from the lot, I know this means a higher amount of sales must be made in order to turn a profit from such a project, but you could pull one smart idea from EA and have a system where people must log in online first before playing with a limmited amount of profiles per cd key, or in case some one does have a connection to the net, maybe the program itself could come with a sub application to check if there is a connection to the net and if there isn't maybe it could merely let the guy play with out net connection...(this feels more like rambling than input now)...

I am sure that if they boosted DOW anti piracy security the same way GSC are planning on developing Clear sky' security, then surely you would pull of atleast a moderate amount of extra sales.

[hylander25k]

First of all, I really DO like this thread alot. It shows great insight not into just performance but graphical style as well as courtesy and thinking ahead about older machines. But it's not just graphics that makes a game great.

You know what I hate? Watching my IG get ripped to pieces. You know what I hate more? Watching them get ripped apart AND DIE THE SAME EXACT WAY EVERY TIME.
Physics! Thats what I want. I was him to twitch as the bolter rounds literally shred him to pieces inside out. I want to see them all fall down realistically as tiny shurikens slice him through.

whats more, is i want to see hunks of my buildings go flying and guts and red dirt fly high into the sky. I want to see the ground torn apart. I would suffice to run the CoH engine at lower quality in orcder to get these desired effects.

Now I know we are talking about graphical stability here, but what I am saying is we need to have highs and lows for everyone. We are beyond the age where graphics options are just "high" "medium" "low" - we need to customize them to fit us. I run games at high rez, so i dont use AA, while my friend does the opposite to achieve a similiar effect that is less daunting on his older PC. See - right now, the DoW graphics are at least on Par with high rez graphics that WC3 or even SC2 can present. I'd like to see something in between that will mesh nicely with performance and quality.

The W40k art style is something that needs to be presented very uniquely to get the contrast of a dark gritty world, that is indeed at times misleadingly vibrant and colorful, but defined and stoic. It's not just the quality of art that does these things; it's the type. The type of art that blizzard commonly uses in it's warcraft franchise is there not so much as an issue of "quality" vs Performance, but an issue of style. (barring the argument that the game came out al ong time ago.) Look at WoW. WoW's style is the essence of Warcraft, almost polygon for polygon. They could have upped the poly count, done some high rez textures and smoothed some edges. Could have but didn't because it's an issue of style. Coincidentally it makes things run smoother. Perhaps its because they wanted to appeal to a broader audience, but they could have done that by making very intricate graphics options that run from high to low polys (most games can be run on lowest settings on a standard optiplex desktop - barring games like crysis)

All in all though - this is a VERY good thread with very good ideas. We need more of these.

[Schmapdi]

That was a long, long, long post to say that:

"Good Art Direction > Pure Horsepower."

Which is a statement in which I wholeheartedly agree.

Another good example - WoW. It has like 9 million people playing it, obviously not all of them have that great of pcs. But it still looks and runs very nicely on lower end gear.

When I started playing it, I had a Radeon 8500, and it looked and ran really good. Then at some point I upgraded to a 9800 - and it looked and ran great. Before I quit, I moved up to a X1650 pro, and there wasn't much of a bump in quality really. The game just didn't need all that power (I suppose I could have cranked the AA or something).

[fneep]

The first one is taken from CoH on lowest settings. The second one is taken from Warcraft 3 (what else…) on maximum settings.
Which one looks better?

To me, the answer clearly is: The second one (Warcraft 3).

I would have said exactly the opposite, I actually prefer the low setting CoH option.

[Drunkspleen]

You have a well thought out case for your suggestion, and I fully appreciate the sentiment, having not played some of the recent games I have been interested in such as Call of Duty 4 as a result of system requirements. However there's some ideas in the thread that I really have an issue with.

The most prominent issue I have is the concept of Style Vs Realism, these aren't always two distinctly separate choices. You comment on the style in blizzard games, and it definitely is a prominent feature, they have always had a distinct art style and often one that would best be described as "cartoony" And it works for them, but that doesn't mean that, just because their style chooses to reject realism that style and realism aren't intertwined ideals. Would a gritty war game such as Call of Duty work with Team Fortress 2's cell shading? I personally doubt it, there are times where maximizing realism is an active choice in art styling and it suits the environment better.

Speaking of Team Fortress 2


Another example would be Team Fortress 2. While the game has a great style, it way too demanding. Why? Because the engine isn't really made for multiplayer without having a total ubermachine. And with recent patches it's not very enjoyable on the fps perspective anymore.

Dare I ask what sort of computer you are playing Dawn of War on? Up until a recent failure of my graphics card I was running TF2 on an Nvidia Geforce 6600GT, sure I didn't have all the bells and whistles, but it was playable and I could still appreciate the art direction of the game.

Just compare the hand-drawn backgrounds of Baldur's Gate II with the 3D images of Neverwinter Nights...

This is to say compare the sprawling tree top elven city of Suldanesselar from Baldur's Gate II with the Generic corner of "Bandit Den" from Neverwinter Nights [2], correct? I understand the point you are making in regards to this and I agree, Black Isle did awesome things with their RPG's that would make modern game developers blush, but as far as picking a scene from Neverwinter Nights 2 to compare... well, there are many places in that game that are far more characterful than your offering. Just because they made it in 3d, didn't mean it's world lost feeling in my opinion.


I fully understand the point you are making, high end graphics isn't a substitute for good gameplay (I'm looking at you Bethesda...) but at the same time, high end graphics don't exclude good gameplay, or even a good art style / direction. I think the problem lies not with developers who choose to put realistic graphics in their games because they feel they suit them but those who would sooner build a game around a graphics engine than the other way around.

I agree with the sentiment of your message, however I think that Dawn of War isn't really the best place to apply it, as much as the Warhammer 40k universe is over the top and unrealistic, it is also GRIMDARK which to me calls for some focus on the level of realism added. Sure we don't want something silly like crysis, but the idea that you should build a game for those with the bare minimum of hardware, rather than the average system or the high end system which within a matter of months will be wide spread just seems like it is as big a mistake as going overboard on graphics. Keep the graphics to the minimum level to suit the game, not to suit some arbitrary specification to make extra money.

[medizichen]

i doubt dow 2 can carry out the cartoony style very well because it just wouldnt fit the grim nature of the whole universe. sure, its got a certain degree of cartoonyness (orks anyone?) but for someone to truly feel the impact of warhammer 40k you've got to have eye candy. not photorealistic ones because i think it would look kinda awkward but definitely more enhanced than the current dow series.

maybe those mods like witchhunters and inquisition: daemonhunt is a good start. but i think the game isnt coming out anytime soon maybe they have to go a notch higher.

nice post by op. i read everything.

[Pooey_Mess]

I really don't see a problem in using CoH's engine again for DoW 2 (Essence engine? I forget the name). Not only would Relic make the engine even more amazing-looking than it is right now in Opposing Fronts, but it will also be further optimized. Games like Supreme Commander were notorious for running slowly on almost every machine, especially when people started churning out hundreds of units. However, when SupCom's expansion came out, it ran far more smoothly than the original game (that's if you disabled the completely new graphics options that came with the game).

I have no doubt that this would be the case with DoW 2, IF it is actually going to be announced. And I have no doubt that by the time DoW 2 were to come out by the end of the year or next year, the introduction of the 9000 series of Nvidia cards will open the door for far more people to play (not because everyone can afford the new cards, but because the prices on the 8000 series will drop) games like CoH and DoW 2 on at least medium-to-high settings, which would completely TRUMP Warcrafts 3's graphics.

By the time DoW 2 roles out, there will be less and less people who can only afford to play CoH at low settings, and more and more people who can play it at higher visual qualities.

So I see your argument being valid now, but not so much in the long-term when technical limitations become less and less of a problem for current-gen graphics engines.

[burny]

But with BG2, the picture is stunning. It is merely fixed and not 3D. The WC3/DoW argument is wholly different to the BG2/NWN argument. One is graphics quality, one is 2D vs. 3D.
This is to say compare the sprawling tree top elven city of Suldanesselar from Baldur's Gate II with the Generic corner of "Bandit Den" from Neverwinter Nights [2], correct?
…
Just because they made it in 3d, didn't mean it's world lost feeling in my opinion.
On the comparison between Baldures Gate 2 and NWN2 - 2d vs. 3d:

It may be unfair to compare a generic area in a 3d game to an area in a 2d-game which was pre-rendered (not hand drawn!) and therefore appears to be of much higher quality. But it points out something which is absolutely important to remember. While NWN2, as you say, hasn’t necessarily lost its atmosphere due to its 3d-graphics, it hasn’t gained anything either. This is not purely 2d against 3d but much rather what has been achieved by what means. Or in another sense: in order to visit a friend two streets away, which is more rational? Going by bicycle or getting the Ferrari out of the garage? ;)
When we discuss about a game’s (graphical) design and the game in question is based purely on a 2-d gameplay, which includes most RTSs - (except for the likes of Homeworld, Haegemonia etc.) – DoW included - as well as most RPGs (BG2 vs NWN2), 2-d graphics aren’t but another valid design option to the developer. WC3, DoW, SC2 and CoH could ALL be done based on a 2-d or a semi 3d-engine without a single change in gameplay!
That being said I would be extremely disappointed if relic retreated to 2d-graphics for DoW2. But in order to achieve economic greatness in PC-games today one has to be extremely careful about what we assume as necessary graphical progress or inappropriate “innovation” for things that could be achieved by more efficient means.

Most of you agree at least to a certain extend that not only the most high end PC is able to deliver high-quality graphics and style plays an important role.
Still, few see the importance of keeping requirements as low as possible as much as I do. ;)
But it absolutely is.
We won’t see in any sales figures the number of copies a game didn’t sell because people couldn’t run it, but this number exists and it will grow during the next years. It might not be as bad as I’m preaching but it also might be worse. While I have to agree with Drunkspleen more or less completely, the one assumption won’t hold true in the future:
… the high end system which within a matter of months will be wide spread…
The last response says the same.
It won’t. The first signs for this are showing and will be even more remarkable in the future. No matter how “cheap” a graphic card will become, by the time the average gamer will be able and willing to afford the necessary hardware, the game itself will have become a budget title. Developers will realize this, go for consoles or make profit by other means (I AM repeating a little here :P ). But this will not be by spending many millions on a games development that no one (exaggerating again…) will buy when its released. I cannot see a rational reason why any company should be so bold to produce something only the smallest part of its target audience can fully enjoy, yet is that exactly what game’s developers have been doing until now. It certainly worked so far, but enjoying an entire generation of games at full settings is no longer luxury, its called “consoles”. We have strong online components today as well as expandability of games and high-resolution graphics. The production values of many console exclusives are exceptional and the slightly higher price of an original console title is more than made up for by the systems price and not having to upgrade for 6-8 years. The only big advantage of PC games I see in the future would be that everyone has a PC, but this advantage is easily gambled by developers when only 5-10% of the PCs can run a game.
Buying new hardware? I will not. Yes I’m stubborn there. Why the heck should I spend money on hardware in order to run a game I like instead of buying four other games I like as well and can play without new hardware? People doing otherwise will increasingly become a minority. I might be exaggerating but time will tell. Once more: I think my “predictions” here are rather accurate. ;)

Most of you also say a Warhammer game will have to rely on a certain degree of realism. I have to agree. I do by no means expect to run DoWs successor on any PC I have at hand. But I feel that anything we wish for DoW2’s graphics can be accomplished on an average PC today - by average I mean a machine that would cost you 500-600€ at most – without making the game look worse than on a high end PC.

Here is what I think could count as “realism” we expect from a DoW-game in the future:


squad mechanics: they were revolutionary in DoW and give the game a less abstract feel than Starcraft/C&C/Warcraft have.
unit’s relative scaling: As opposed to the other RTSs named above – a food soldier has to be of more realistic proportions relative to vehicles and to be modelled more detailed. This leads to the more movie like appearance of relic’s DoW or CoH.
“Less” abstract gameplay mechanics than in above RTSs which are reflected in the game’s visuals. This includes cover (units taking cover), maybe a more dynamic cover system like in CoH, hit zones for vehicles, to a certain degree destructible environments, buildings which can be captured and so on
Physics in general, where they apply remains to be seen.


All these features rely on hardware and are vital to DoW’s game formula. I think everyone (including me) would be extremely disappointed not to see them in a sequel. What is more, in order to deliver Warhammer’s style it might be even necessary to rely on the hardware’s power. Highlander25k and BubblesFloat put it this way (with a little exaggeration ;) ):
Physics! Thats what I want. I was him to twitch as the bolter rounds literally shred him to pieces inside out. I want to see them all fall down realistically as tiny shurikens slice him through.

whats more, is i want to see hunks of my buildings go flying and guts and red dirt fly high into the sky. I want to see the ground torn apart. I would suffice to run the CoH engine at lower quality in orcder to get these desired effects.
when I turn persistant bodies on, my fire warriors walk along a road of space marines, oh and thats another thing that could be cool, maybe some ragdoll effects where bodies stack that would be awesome, having units climbing over walls of eldar corpse' just to take a pop shot at a farseer.

I’m going to make very specific suggestions here, something I absolutely disapprove of normally, as I believe running wild with imagination in a company’s forum when not asked to (“make unit X tier three, why not build unit Y in building Z”) has no use whatsoever. They are able to do a game themselves.
So what I say is only to be taken as an exemplary general direction for compromises, but by no means as specific suggestion to relic.

Having to store every singly virtual corpse as an object in the memory, including its position, its posture and maybe its deformation, would result in a build in slow-down- or even crash- mechanic. The immensely “real” rag doll-effect completely fails when bodies have to stack and lie still for a second. It results in a very funny mass of strangely itching polygons which would permanently need processing power and likely reduce the grim and dark pile of sci-fi corpses to a horde of undead clowns. Also, it is highly questionable if piles of corpses affecting the line of sight would add to the gameplay. Thus, we realize that absolute realism is not achievable on a PC.
Yet, the specific effects would be undeniably cool. The options a developer now has include:

The amount of corpses has to be limited, according to the PCs power. This has already been done in DoW.
Several dying-animations which play randomly and result in a static object for the unit’s corpse. This has already been done in DoW to a certain extend, too.
Employing rag doll-effects for a second after the unit “dies” and then replacing the “corpse” with a static object…

…and so on.

Other possible compromises might be (much inspired by Blizzards games):


Binding a certain texture to a “tileset” for creating levels and automatically generating borders between tiles. I don’t get what it adds to the level design when you have to pave a level with textures (which even have to be scaled) in order to make it look good or hide the border between ground textures. This WOULD result in smaller level-files as no longer all texture-positions, alignments and scalings have to be stored. It also would save the hardware from scaling every used texture first before it is displayed. Smaller level files might lead to automatic map-download in multiplayer. :P
Introducing decent cliff mechanics into the engine. CoH and DoW use a workaround. If you look closely at the CoH screenshot I linked in my first post you will realize that the “cliifs” are noting more but gentle hills with static rock-objects embedded into them. DoW does not even have those objects in the pre-Dark Crusade-levels.
Using physics simulation sparely. It does not really matter wether every brick of a small wall reacts physically correct when a tank runs over it. If DoW2 is to use a larger scale for battles it matters even less. The fact that the wall crumbles is important.
Maybe even reducing the models detail compared to CoH. It will not matter when the battles scale is larger. There will be a last example for that at the end.


We should remember that it is rather easy to throw in every graphical effect known to mankind. Relic could even go so far as to simulate sinews and single muscles for corpses or facial expressions - the technique is there. But as said in the second post there has to be a balance.

In this sense: look at my last example. The Whitch-Hunters Mod has already been mentioned and I couldn’t think of a better way to show everyone – even to those hell bend on preferring CoH’s style on lowest settings over Warcraft’s – what graphical quality means. Here are the screenshots:

http://img206.imageshack.us/img206/3338/cohimg28mn4.th.jpg (http://img206.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cohimg28mn4.jpg) http://img209.imageshack.us/img209/3604/canonessfriedric08ju2.th.jpg (http://img209.imageshack.us/my.php?image=canonessfriedric08ju2.jpg)

The 3d-models of CoH are so detailed, that even single fingers are modelled and animated. The canoness isn’t more detailed than the average DoW Commander-unit, but the incredible art of the texture makes everything pale in comparison, the more detailed CoH models as well as many models I’ve seen in first person shooters today. It does so, by being highly comic-like in the exaggerated “real” way of Warhammer’s art. In fact it is already far more detailed than we are able to recognize when playing DoW from the usual perspective.
The artist responsible would be able to make the model look incredible even if he was forced to employ textures at considerably lower resolution. This model will look good, no matter where game’s graphics have gone in ten years and a game with such amazing art will be far more than the sum of all graphical effects employed.

Now, imagine DoW was to use such art and additionally employ sparely, but wisely used normal mapping on the models and level textures. It COULD run on the average PC today, as long as relic doesn’t go overboard with graphical “innovation” and WOULD still look incredible ten years after.

For all the reason I mentioned:
That is what I expect to see from DoW 2, not another attempt at a virtual reality.

[runab0ut]

If you listened from the GFW podcast... this topic was raised by the Relic representative: It's their fault in pushing the system requirements up. People w/o proper hardware cannot play their games;

If no one can play = less sales. Meh! :P

Upgrading hardware is almost a necessary evil in the pc gaming community.

[fuggles]

But getting less so.

The WH Mod ran absolutely fine on my Geforce 6 and even better on the 7. They have picked a house style and run with it, which is exactly what Blizzard have done. Whether or not you like the cartoon look, the consistency is what makes it timeless, just like TF2.

[Shuma]

Well... my computer can run Crysis in High with no framerate drop, so if Relic makes DoW2 requiere a super computer, i have it. So, yeah, i would love ultrapolygon marines.

Also, Blizzard is very good with "art direction", hence why their games don't appear to "age".

Don't know what i mean? look at Metroid Prime 3 or Twilight Princess, the Wii is not powerfull enough to have godly graphics but the art of the games make them look godly aniway.

[PathFinder]

My 2 cent.

High end graphic is about more then just eye candy, i look at it as a part of the experience. i have played WCIII and WOW on high graphics, and i have played CoH and the entire dow series on lowest settings (untill a month ago when i got a new PC) and i have to say, I prefer the DOW/COH graphic theme better then Any thing in the blizzard games.

Graphics conveys the feel of a battle, good graphic, especially good 3d modeling and physics put you in the seat, and put u on the ground with ur men. even on the lowest graphics. any one remember the feeling you get when your artillery strike landed in the middle of a mob of infantry? or the feeling when your tiger ace's AP round exploded on the hull of a once-was-a-Sherman? Dow example, when i first got dow original, i sat for hours looking at whirlwind lobbing shells in to eldar infantry and how they scatter and fly. these effects are achievable with the lowest graphic setting. (infact, recently, when i got my new pc, Dow: DC suddenly look god like. for the first time i saw the detail on the units, the lighting effect of pulse rifle fire etc.. the game suddenly become alive.)

you dont get these feeling when you are playing any of the blizzard games. what do u get when u just pyroblasted some one for 5k damage? what feel do u get when your aoe just vaporized a large group of mobs? other then the flashing number on ur screen, u get nothing. blizzard's game feels like a giant calculator. i do 5 damage to u, u do 6 damage to me. damn. i just lost dis battle... i can control each one of my zergling in a zergling rush. you can't. so naturally, i win. I'd rather play chess.

blizzard know their stuff. and they have been appeasing the pro gaming crowd with a well thought out and well designed balance and game mechanics. graphic is not their sell point. nor will it ever be. their graphic are design to look the most clear and comfortable to a player who is attempting to win a high profile game against an equally skilled opponent. that is why i think it never age or go obsolete. cause no one care or notice the graphic inadequacies in their game.

[Can Not]

I think the most important thing developers can at this point is changing how you select texture size. Instead of "small, medium, large, huge", they should be 64MB, 128MB, 256MB, 512MB, etc., BECAUSE I HAVE NO CLUE IF MY 128MB CARD CAN HANDLE LARGE OR NOT, but I'm sure someone who made the game would.

I want scalability. I want my friend's 2.2Ghz c2d laptop with Intel GMA to have a stable framerate (800x600 safemode) compared to my laptop's 1.6GHz c2d w/ 8400GS with some settings and 1440x900. Aren't there more grfx that we can tone down? Note: if you buy a laptop for gaming, you'll never regret being one step above integrated. I want my HD 3850 to show me even better grfx but still play beside my 8400GS with playable fps.

Most of all, I want my Athlon X2 2.7GHz to be twice as useful as a Athlon 64 2.7GHz (moderate dual core support).

[burny]

If you listened from the GFW podcast... I would like to. runab0ut, could you give me a link to the specific podcast, please?

Also, Blizzard is very good with "art direction", hence why their games don't appear to "age".

Don't know what i mean? look at Metroid Prime 3 or Twilight Princess, the Wii is not powerfull enough to have godly graphics but the art of the games make them look godly aniway.
I've avoided mentioning Nintendo's games so far, as Blizzard is obviously more closely related to PC gaming and relic shouldn't drive the gameplay-over-hardware to the extreme Nintendo does. But I'm a faithful follower of the direction Nintendo chose with the Wii. What they're doing with the available techinique is nothing short of amazing and really makes you think about how much graphical power is needed in order to make a "good" game.

Graphics conveys the feel of a battle, good graphic, especially good 3d modeling and physics put you in the seat, and put u on the ground with ur men. even on the lowest graphics.
I thought so too - when I was sixteen. Ok, actually a little longer. But believe me, when you age and begin to follow video game's development you realize that all what really matters comes down to this:

Gameplay: I pointed out that what CoH and DoW do here doesn't need more advanced PCs
What do you think when looking at the same game half a year later: "Cool!" or "Outdated!"?


I DON'T say relic should sacrifice the cinematic feel of their games for playability, only they should find the balance between what will deliver this feeling to the customers who need it and what enables the same customers to play the game. You say DC became another game when you got a new PC? I tell you, it could have been this other game from the start.

Relic has no excuse for wasting any processing power (neither the CPU’s nor the GPU’s) for things like “realistic” physics for every stone on the map, when a “mere” modification (the WH-mod), based on their own, aging DoW engine DECLASSES more or less any high-end-effort in the industry, including their own CoH.

you dont get these feeling when you are playing any of the blizzard games. what do u get when u just pyroblasted some one for 5k damage?...blizzard's game feels like a giant calculator.
I must have said it a hundred times here, but I will repeat once more: Don't compare the gameplay's design or the graphical style. You clearly aren't able to distinguish between those. What you love about DoW/CoH and hate about WC/SC might be an entirely different affair for someone else. It is indeed only personal preference. On the other hand: have a look at the dps-tables for DoW (DoWPro has a nice SMALL list of theirs after installation) and tell me again: which game has more number crunching happening beneath the surface?

… cause no one care or notice the graphic inadequacies in their game. What inadequacies? Name them! I suppose you're just not able to distinguish between your personal preference of style and what I call the quality of graphical design.

I want scalability. I want my friend's 2.2Ghz c2d laptop …
Most of all, I want my Athlon X2 2.7GHz to be twice as useful as a Athlon 64 2.7GHz (moderate dual core support).
Do you want to see your Athlon X2 2,7GHz to struggle with low settings in DoW2? Because this would probably mean you couldn’t play the game on every other configuration you mentioned. That’s what I’m worried about when I imagine DoW2’s graphics to be “improved” in comparison to CoH’s as far as CoH’s were in comparison to DoW’s. Of course PC-game's graphic’s need to be scalable, if for nothing else than for the myriad of possible hardware configurations. When I say I want to enjoy a game at full settings I’m just stubborn about this, but it is absolutely vital where you place the requirements of your “full settings” in an age where customers might start to realize that it is not worth spending money on hardware first in order to enjoy every other buggy game.

But wouldn’t it be an undeniable sign of quality when a game's visuals weren't proportionally related to the system it runs on? Because otherwise the game's visuals are only worth as much as the hardware, which becomes "outdated" within half a year.

[Imperial Dane]

Well has anyone considered that with using the Essence engine that specs won't be that different, we could perhaps expect some optimization of sorts, i mean saying that Relic are going to continually be boosting graphics to crysis proportions is a bit far fetched. I would imagine they are more interested in getting in a lot of cool features.

[RMX]

Overall I think you're worried about Relic wasting too much effort on visual eyecandy that would end up in unreasonable system requirements, when a bit more of artistic polishing would give more efficient results.

Also, something makes me think you have lost faith in games that scalate adequately through the graphics settings. Games like World In Conflict right now, or Black and White 1 back in the day, gave me a pleasing experience on both low and high end systems.

I think you want to make DoW2 the new Sims: If you cannot run it in your computer, you're basically screwed. However, we all know they will keep up on par with their generation competitors (SC2 and RA3 seem that will set the pace).

So long as Relic keep their feet on the ground and refrain from abusing heavily the most machine killing effects we should be alright...a very optimized engine would help, too.

[Lomax]

Burny, I like your opinion but this is a pure waste of time. The nest DOW will have a future gen engine and need a new PC, because that's how it works. Relic is not one of the companies who try to be successful on innovation alone. a BIG aspect of why DOW is so successful is the sync kills and the love to detail in the graphics. I'd love if game companies would really try to push one engine to the limit before switching to a new one. But this is the PC market, they don't need to and that why they won't.

[bobromil]

Warcraft 3 have lot lower number of units in game, try playing warcraft3 custom map battlefield 1942(not sure about name) where you built buildings that produce non-controable units which attack move at enemy. It becomes extremly laggy very fast (on highest grafical settings 1280*1024).

On my old computer (p2,8, Radeon 9600, 512 ram) I could play dow(without expansions) everything on highest 1280*1024 except shadows were off, in 1v1 games it started lagging only in full popcap battles with lots of abilities like orbital bombardment or eldritch storm.

Its been a while but I belive that in that warcraft map it was lot laggier with similiar(maybe little bigger but in that map verent any abilities) unit counts as battle of 2 full-popcap armies with abilities in dow.

[Fenrir_hun]

Wow, I must admit Burny You just mentioned those things I was always thinking about.
Games shouldnt be about graphics alone. I know its important, but cmon, there are so many things to add.

For example, If I love the music of a game, its a really good start for me and when the story is all right , I might put a lot effort in it even if it has shitty graphics and lot of bugs.
Just to mention Witcher, which had excellent graphics, but what really got me was the atmosphere and the music, altough it had a lot of bugs and froze ... I even bought the books after that. :D

I remember the blizzard games like wonderfull stories, that to some extent I could controll ( yeah, just to some extent,because they were telling a story , you couldn't change it).

So to get back to my point, that graphics do count, but its NOT the essence of a game.

[ApocalypseXL]

Let me put it this way ppl . Some of the comunity wants DoW2 for chrismas or next easter. While some of us think that graphics don't matter , IF DoW2 comes out whit graphics that don't look stunning his gonna get a bad review .

The world of gaming today means DX10 and nothing less . TBH i'd be surprised if DX10 won't be a part of DoW2 . After all DX9 is gonna fade completrly in 12-18 months . As a game developer you want your game to be selling even 2 years after you launched it .

So far the game engines are geting more and more photorealistical . It's natural for things to evolve for the better . And anyway high end systems are the order of the day . I live in a pretty poor country and still 1/5 PC can take DX10 and ultrahigh graphics .

I don't think Relic will trow itself trough the window and use Essence for DoW2 . It will definatly be a DX10 based graphics engine and multicore based physics engine .

[neucromaner]

there is no way that cartoon wc3 is better graphic quality than dow or worse coh.
what rubbish. you put tears in crysis and the whole graphic industry trying to go for realism. but you like cartoon graphics.
nvidia will not have it. amd/ati will not have it. they will all close shop, if no game company use those fancy routines to achieve realism and stick to cartoon graphics instead. if your computer cannot handle it, dun play the game, dun pull all of us down with you.

[cannonfodder]

ApocalypseXL, DX10 is Vista-only though. Relic would be really stupid to throw away part of the potential crowd only because they use Windows XP.

[c0416991]

[QUOTE] DOW sadly has a far lower graphical quality than WC 3 [QUOTE]

err, how can that be true? I don't see any sign of wc 3 having better graphic than DOW...actually i feel anything in wc 3 looks too bright and smooth , typical computer graphic feeling. But things in DOW actually looks realistic. And by the way I don't think wc 3 ever tried their best to put on a good texture and model details on thier units,they just looks retard compare to the DOW units...

[PathFinder]

Relic has no excuse for wasting any processing power (neither the CPU’s nor the GPU’s) for things like “realistic” physics for every stone on the map,
of course, this is true. exessive spammage of high end effects does not siginificantly impact overall game play experience. but one thing, as time progress, on average, population will get better and better PC as the cost for computers come down. it is relic's job to make use of the increase in computing power avaliable to players. with that said, i agree that more effort should be emphasised on art design to create a better feel and better looking graphics, and to better utilize the extra computing power available, (and Not to force customer to get state of art PCs) (note CoH's engine was created by relic from a empty sheet, and they didn't emphasis on art as much as physics and realism, because CoH was made to portray realisic and grimness of WW2, <-- in my oppinion anyway.. it did not turn out as awe inspiring, but you can't really say CoH was a fail piece of work.)

of course, when you look at the mechnics, dow > WCIII in terms of number crunching. but then again, all game has quite alot of math built in to it. my point was, that with the graphics and effects, the number crunching is partially covered up by other uncalculable effects such as knock down, explosions etc. for example, a friend of mine spammed harbringer drone against another friend who is well fortified necron with monalith just so the monalith's explosion would confuse his opponent by obstructing the screen. you cant say graphic effects and game play are always unrelated.

[DespotSheep]

Oopse.. sorted... =X cant use hotmail.com.

[Can Not]

Originally posted by burny
Do you want to see your Athlon X2 2,7GHz to struggle with low settings in DoW2? Because this would probably mean you couldn’t play the game on every other configuration you mentioned. That’s what I’m worried about when I imagine DoW2’s graphics to be “improved” in comparison to CoH’s as far as CoH’s were in comparison to DoW’s. Of course PC-game's graphic’s need to be scalable, if for nothing else than for the myriad of possible hardware configurations. When I say I want to enjoy a game at full settings I’m just stubborn about this, but it is absolutely vital where you place the requirements of your “full settings” in an age where customers might start to realize that it is not worth spending money on hardware first in order to enjoy every other buggy game.

But wouldn’t it be an undeniable sign of quality when a game's visuals weren't proportionally related to the system it runs on? Because otherwise the game's visuals are only worth as much as the hardware, which becomes "outdated" within half a year.

I just want my friends to be able to play at playable framerates on their integrated systems while enthusiasts like me can play in even higher HD. Which is called scalability. There should be a 2D engine for DoW for users with terrible graphics solutions. I don't know how well that would work for the low end, but I think its a good idea.

[burny]

Well has anyone considered that with using the Essence engine that specs won't be that different, we could perhaps expect some optimization of sorts,...
This is my hope because that would mean many people were able to play it today, so initial sales will be high. The problem is that I fear this might not be the case.

Overall I think you're worried about Relic wasting too much effort on visual eyecandy that would end up in unreasonable system requirements, when a bit more of artistic polishing would give more efficient results.
Ultimately, I'm worried their next game will sell according to its potential when they fail to reach a broad range of customers, because they do as you say. Besides that I feel there are massive graphical shortcomings in DoWs visuals that cannot be compensated by simply raising the polygon-count, texture size or employing more effects and cost the game much of its graphical longevity. I already pointed those out.

Also, something makes me think you have lost faith in games that scalate adequately through the graphics settings. Games like World In Conflict right now, or Black and White 1 back in the day, gave me a pleasing experience on both low and high end systems.
I'm just not willing to sacrifice visual quality for playability. Either I play a game at settings how it is supposed to look like, or I leave it be. That automatically makes me no potential customer for neither DoW2 nor Starcraft 2 at the moment. But I'm still worried DoW2 might gamble its potential, and focus too much on the users with high end PCs, which would hurt the game immensely when it has to compete with Starcraft.

@Can Not: Same as above, I'm worried DoW2 might make the fatal mistake to overstress "established systems" and only reach the "enthusiast". If your friends are willing to upgrade their systems for DoW2 they have to be enthusiast for the game. But for every enthusiast there will be someone (probably even more than one) who won't upgrade and consequently not spend his money on the game.
I might of course be over-dramatizing, but even then remains the critique why most developers create games that need to scalate to be playable at all on the majority of systems by the tme they're released.

...this is a pure waste of time...
Thanks for reminding me. I'm sure it is, as development on relic's "secret project" probably began somewhere around the release of Winter Assault and is in a state now where nothing graphics-related will be changed any more, but certainly not because "that's how it works". Not that I had much hope they would listen anyway...
Speaking of "the way it works": I claim the videogame-industry (PC-games) will not be able to continue to work the way it did until now. That's why I fear DoW2 might suffer. I've given reasons and examples why I think this will be. There has been more than one post in response simply saying "it is that way". Why do you think developers will get away with increasing hardware requirements the way they did until now? Give me reasons!

@bobromil: We should stay within the limits of what an engine has been created for. This means the maximal stress it will put on the hardware probably happens in multiplayer, with maximal number of players and the largest possible amount of units per player.

@Fenrir_hun: Ah, the music - it can make a story told by the simplest means feel alive or deliver the feeling of a game better than any graphical effect any hardware can do. Unfortunatly this is one of those things where so many games lack. Content-wise DC's and SS's intro-sequences where more or less the same as DoW's original CG sequence, but it was the music that raised the original a class higher.
Playing a lot of Nintendo games however, I'm a little spoiled in terms of game-music. ^^
Back to topic ;)

IF DoW2 comes out whit graphics that don't look stunning his gonna get a bad review .
And by stunning I understand "maximal possible pseudo-realism", right? Also, you probably don't think the Whitch Hunters-mod's model's look stunning enough for DoW2, do you?

So far the game engines are geting more and more photorealistical . It's natural for things to evolve for the better . And anyway high end systems are the order of the day . I live in a pretty poor country and still 1/5 PC can take DX10 and ultrahigh graphics .

I don't think Relic will trow itself trough the window and use Essence for DoW2 . It will definatly be a DX10 based graphics engine and multicore based physics engine .
That's your opinion, but you somehow forgot to mention why "photorealism" is the natural better option. The only problem is: real photorealism is unachievable on a PC. It only exists in reality. With digital means you can only get so close. Not that approaching "realitiy" wasn't worth a try, as I said it is a valid design option, but we shouldn't forget that there is more than the graphics of a game the developer should pay attention too. Also most reviewers happen to favour the gameplay in their reviews over graphics and can overlook that a game does not look "real". If the most high end graphics were this important in game reviews tell me how Super Mario Galaxy can be one of the, if not the highest rated game to be ever released?

But I'm convinced that you will get DX10 in relics next project. However if this IS DoW2 the use of an updated essence engine is rather likely. But why should they throw themselves "out of the window" by creating a game actually most fans can play (beacause it runs with DX9 as well)?

@neucromaner & c0416991: I really don't get the feeling from your posts that you read mine and tried to understand what I mean by graphical quality.

...the number crunching is partially covered up by other uncalculable effects such as knock down, explosions etc.
I know what you mean. In the end it is a personal decision wether one wants to be more conscious of the math or preferes the more indirect approach of DoW/CoH.

[Makenshi]

Hmmm... you know what I think? PC's are like cars: always get the best there is, and only change it once every seven years. You won't regret it. ;)

[Thoth]

I would say the first one looks prettier not because I'm a graphics whore (the only game I flatout refuse to play based on graphics is Wind Waker; I HATE that art style), but simply because I find it more pleasing and attractive to the eye than the second. It's the same with Warcraft's art style for me. I don't care at all for Warcraft 3's graphical style, but that doesn't mean I dislike exaggerated styles; only WC3. At any rate, DOW2 should try and find a middle ground between high-end and high-quality. It can look photorealistic but no one will care if no one can play it (Crysis felt this problem greatly, apparently).


I completely agree. :wtf:

[bman3k]

I think they should aim a bit higher for graphics in DoW 2, prices for computer hardware are dropping quite fast and I think eventually the general gamer population will have relatively decent hardware. The graphical beauty of DoW was amazing for me, units had individual animations and everything, as opposed to WC3 where units would perform the same attack animation over and over again with no flow between them. Right now I'm playing DoW on a laptop and I have the unit textures set to high and everything else to medium and I don't have problems at all, eventually I will get a desktop for gaming and I'd love to be able to set everything on high and have it look amazing.

[LoRd KoRn]

I totally agree with the initial post. While technically some games are extremely inferior to new products, it is their overall visual style, their charme which still lets them look good even today. Sometimes you can half your framerates by increasing the detail by such a little amount that you really wonder if it is worth it. Blizzard is up there on the throne for good reasons, they find the best mix between detail and performance and most importantly, their games always have a destinct, interesting look. It is about the design, not the number of polygons. For DoW 2(3 or 4 or whatever) it is far more important to transport the grim, dark atmosphere of the Warhammer 40k universe by wise color/contrast selection and effects which actually look good without beeing hardware intensive(example WC3) etc. rather than aiming for fotorealistic grafics which only 5% of all players could run smoothly without scaling down the grafics so that it actually looks ugly again.

[burny]

Hmmm... you know what I think? PC's are like cars: always get the best there is, and only change it once every seven years. You won't regret it.
You know, for the price of the "best" PC there is, I could actually get myself a car. Which by the way wouldn't half its value every year. ;)

@LoRd KoRn: Nice summary of everything I've said, you get my point. I just had to write that little novel. ^^

Another great example of how style can trump high end technique any time and which won't make people who dislike Warcraft's style so angry:

http://pcmedia.ign.com/pc/image/article/860/860572/warhammer-online-age-of-reckoning-20080318032134584.jpg

[culturek]

The nature of the Warcraft universe and the GW 40k universe are quite different. I don't see how the cartoony Warcraft graphical style (which is awesome for that series) translates.

The problem that THQ got into on the current DoW was that the engine had some serious graphic limitations. Remember when it first came out it required a pretty decent setup to run on full details.

I would expect the same to be true for the new generation engine for Dawn of War games. Something that can scale with the expansions as they are released to incorporate that 40k feel even better.

Something I'd love to see is a Medieval 2 Total War style gameplay type. You can build out your army, select a battlefield, and just go toe to toe battling. Accommodating that kind of gameplay requires a vastly different engine that accommodating the current style of gameplay.

[Korbah]

What interests me Burny is your criticism of DoW's graphics.

You've raised the fact in your earlier posts that WC3 still looks great even compared to CoH. Certainly when you compare the DoW pic with the avatar+csm against the WC3 one the most striking difference is the quality of the terrain and map. Quite simply WC3 looks loads better. But why?

The models in DoW are superior - more poly's and more detail. Add uber textures and you get WH mod's glorious appearance. However, the terrain I'd argue is lower quality in DoW. The basic tileset is poor. You could conceivably take the WC3 scene - darken the colours and insert the DoW units and it'd dramatically improve the look of the game.

I'd argue that the issue with DoW's visuals are less engine bound and more to do with the quick and dirty textures and models used in the terrain. If someone were to go and make a new map with custom terrain and textures and really go to town - I'd be quite interested to see how it improves the overall appearance of DoW.

I already know myself the effect of a bit of anti-aliasing, forced full textures and randomised models + custom FX's has a fairly dramatic improvement in visual quality. I use all this in my mod DoWpro - compare for yourself DCpro 3.2's necrons, orks or chaos against DC's and you'll note a significant visual improvement without greatly changing the demands on the pc. I'd argue that a significant enhancement in the core decal and terrain tilesets would give DoW a fairly convincing facelift without necessarily increasing its performance demands - the current textures aren't particularly small they're just low quality and repetitive.

Thoughts?

[Lor]

I have to agree with Korbah. His point is highlighted further by mods like IDH and KRMZ's Witchhunters. The high quality textures on the models etc make the maps and scenery look plain and boring.

[PitSoulja]

first off in the orriginal post with dawn of war vs war3, first you can't compare the 2 I can see it quite clearly that the realism from dawn of war looks clearly much better then warcraft3 ever will, second warcraft 3 does not run well on low end machines with higher amounts of units even when the graphic cards at that time were only 128mb the frame rate dropped like a mother.

ok and heres another thing, high end or quality. put it this way. HAVE BOTH. don't sacrafice one and not the other. if we can't have a billion units running on the screen without frame rate dropping to like 3 fps then we need something stronger. like you said pretty and quality can't come without a cost. and thats what we want. we don't want things on low end machines why? because they don't look so good. so if this means you have to go out and spend a whole nother $5,000 on a machine to run the game then so be it. sure it will leave some people mad but this is why things are made. I'm not going to worry hey don't add this because I can't play it. to hell with the person that can't play it sorry you're missing out and all but thats not everyone else's problem.

[Znuff]

Holy crap, thats alot of text. Anyway, its quite possible to have higher quality gfx while leaving options to turn them down for people with low end machines. COH is a good example and as its also a Relic game and DOW2 will very likely be based on that engine. So I dont see what would be the problem? They obviously wont use worse gfx for DOW2 then for COH and there is no reason that they wont alow for the same amount of options as for COH either. :bored:

[Can Not]

I agree with PitSouljah, I don't think people without SLI'd 9800G X2's, 2 Quad Core CPUs oced to 4.0Ghz, Vista 64bit with 8GB DDR3 1600Mhz RAM, Atleast 4 hard drives in a RAID 0, and a PhysX card should be able to play.

[Forge World]

I have a brand spanking new pc that can run Crysis very high settings at a blistering frame rate so I say (quite selfishly) bring on the nice DoW 2 graphics... yummy!

[Versian]

I just wanna ask, is scaling so hard to do? Can't the game be BOTH high-graphics and suited for high-end? Low graphics that could run on just about every computer around the time DoW 2 will be released AND amazing graphics that are better than real life.

[borgeater]

Scaling back is a critical part of selling pc games, but just how far the scaling back suggested in this thread is mind boggling. INTEL INTERGRATED GRAPHICS HAVE NO BUSINESS RUNNING DOW 2.

[Croaxleigh]

Well, according to this post: http://forums.relicnews.com/showpost.php?p=2907554&postcount=592

The graphics are supposed to be close to the intro of Dawn of War, though slightly less high-poly.

[burny]

@Korbah: I have thoughts on this, yes. But it will take more time to take the necessary screenshots and write them down. I will answer this later.

I agree with PitSouljah, I don't think people without SLI'd 9800G X2's, 2 Quad Core CPUs oced to 4.0Ghz, Vista 64bit with 8GB DDR3 1600Mhz RAM, Atleast 4 hard drives in a RAID 0, and a PhysX card should be able to play.
Oh, you forgot to mention that they absoluteley should force 1.920 x 1.200 resolution, possibly higher if there are monitors anywhere supporting those resolutions. Otherwise there could still be people left able to play the game! ;)

I just wanna ask, is scaling so hard to do?
No, it isn't that hard to do, just remove every detail that would make the graphics look good and you can play a game on a considerably weaker PC. But there is a limit to scaling. As soon as you HAVE to scale in order to make a game run smooth, especially in multiplayer-games, you can expect the framerate to suffer when there is more going on. Even if you are willing to accept low-quality graphics in order to play a game, you might get annoyed when the playability is hampered.
...amazing graphics that are better than real life.
That's the Witch Hunters Mod to me rather than CoH, Crysis or WiC. They manage to outclass the competition without any need for a CPU/GPU that needs a small power-plant in order to run.
Reading some opinions, not only here, but in other forums or message-boards really makes me think about how much contact to reality some gamers have left. No offense, but I believe somebody judging games by the degree of simulated "reality" they offer, should switch off the PC/Console, go for a little walk and get themselves a concentrated dose of real "reality" while reflecting what a "game" is.
There is nothing to say against advancing the graphical technology, but from an economical point of view, advancing graphics too far will hurt PC games in the future, as the PC is far from beeing a homogeneous platform. What we call high-end today slowly crosses the border between what is reasonable for personal entertainment and what is a pure waste of energy - in every sense. Some people just don't seem to understand that pure high-end also means becoming visually outdated very quickly. DoW and CoH unfortunately are games that show this very clearly in some aspects of their visual presentation.

INTEL INTERGRATED GRAPHICS HAVE NO BUSINESS RUNNING DOW 2.
I cannot recall myself saying DoW2 should be runnable on an integrated graphic-card. I rather remember saying that CoH is a good measure, as long as DoW2 doesn't try to push requirements much further. So what are you refering to?

@Croaxleigh: That is an interesting summary indeed. I am eagerly awaiting first screenshots. And I am already rather sure that some of my fears are absolutely justified.

[Versian]

Burny, it's great that you are bringing this up. I hope this gets to the developers of DoW2 so that it gives them a lot to think about.

However, I have to disagree with your example. The screenshot from WC3 does not look better than the CoH screenshot on low. WarCraft 3 appears to have a higher quality, but indeed it is not. Play close attention to anything in WarCraft 3 and it looks quite bad. What happens is that Cartoon Graphics lower our standards and make it easier for a game to look good.

It is my opinion that Dawn of War has a greater graphical value. Some things in the game might lack a little detail but overall the quality of the graphics is quite good.

However, I believe that the perfect answer to this question is just to find a balance. Make the game extremely scalable, low graphics that any computer can handle, and high graphics that put other games of that time to shame.

[bman3k]

Recently I actually tried playing DoW at it's highest settings, with forcehighpoly, anti aliasing and fullresteamcolour and I must say "wow" and I'm playing on a laptop. The models look quite nice and I think if the surrounding terrain was worked on and they just touched up the textures, they would be done graphically for DoW 2. I loved seeing the shadow of the orbital drop pods, that looked so cool :D.

I'll admit that WC3 terrain and environment graphics are better, but what do we really care about? The pretty forest or the Space Marine Force Commander pummeling a Bloodthirster back to the depths of the Warp? I've never really played CoH, but I know the graphics are quite a step up, I'd be happy if they just used that engine.

[Adjudicator]

I can't fathom anyone saying that CoH screenshot looks better. Granted its not the best shot of the game, but that particular shot looks rather awful.

Even if youre going for realism less drabness might help out, especially since tabletop WH 40K isn't exactly "realistic looking".

[Triceron]

I've had a lot of discussions with friends over DoW2, and one of our biggest worries is accessability of this game, especially for low-end users.

Taking a look at the withering PC market, many more gamers are looking towards the accessable, casual games more and more now than the hardcore high-end graphics. People want games they can run on a laptop, and games they can play for ~15 minutes and stop. I think Blizzard really hits the mark here for designing Starcraft 2 as Starcraft was, a well balanced RTS that can be played in short sessions with graphics that are accessable to the low end user.

While I admire Relic for taking the initiative in pushing the bar in graphics, I think the focus in higher end graphics and looks is going to hurt their target audience. It's all speculation on how this will affect people who have 3+ yr old machines (like I do) and this kind of game shouldn't expect the players to upgrade or get new machines to play on decent settings.

I'd even go as far as suggesting an option to have a completely different set of textures made for low end users. The high end user could turn on normal maps, spec maps, dynamic lighting and all the bells and whistles, but for multiplayer or low-end users, you can choose to use 'Optimized Diffuse' textures. This set of textures would be color only, but it would have lighting and highlights painted in and using a decent resolution texture map, like the Witchhunters mod quality. This way the units might look different in style due to static 'faked' lighting, but at least it doesn't look like a muddy low-quality version of a high-res game.

[rinari]

You don't know how happy I am that someone brought this up at last. There will always be those who are willing to throw down huge amounts of money on top of the line hardware each year, yet for every one of them there are dozens who can't or won't.
The eyecandy or performance question is something that is becoming far more prominent these days as, over the last many years, developers have focused far too much on pretty screenshots and top of the line effects to sell games. Something brilliant was unfortunately lost along the way...gameplay.

I was a dedicated PC gamer since the early 90's, starting with such goodies as Eye of the Beholder, Warcraft 1 and Wolfenstein 3D. Unfortunately that is coming to an end due to the insane cost of PC gaming compared to other options (consoles). A fair number of people are migrating to consoles simply because they can throw down $400 on a console that will last for 5 years and play their games at nice framerates and without hardware compatability issues. Some will disagree, but I find that a much more enticing option than forking over that much PER YEAR to play the current PC games at 1/3 the framerate. In regards to DoW2, I can only hope they heed the advice and follow a more blizzard-esque method towards graphics. It isn't so much about using a cartoony style as much as using good art, coupled with crisp textures and lower-poly models to create a game with high framerates and an appealing appearance.

In my opinion, DoW2 should be about gameplay and action (ala sync kills, explosions etc) rather than selling a mediocre game with buckets of shaders and obscene poly counts. Being able to zoom into an orks photo-realistic nose hair means absolutely nothing to me compared to good gameplay and smooth framerates. I may be willing to throw down for some small upgrades to enjoy DoW2 the same way I enjoyed DoW and its expansions, but I'll be damned if I'm throwing down a grand for some pretty shader effects. Heres to hoping they aim for the broad base rather than the hardcore minority.

[SpArTy]

Dont judge on those screens, its too early. Actuall game graphics may be a far cry.

[Triceron]

I don't think the graphics are going to change a whole lot from the screens either though.

Dawn of War ended up looking fairly similar to the original pics that were released upon announcement, the marines didn't look all that different, nor did the other races.