Evolution of Graphics and Gameplay in Video Games
I’ll bet you a dingo’s whisker that I’m not the only one in the gaming world who feels that over the past decade or so, there has been a rapidly accelerated evolution in the way games look and how they play.
From the classic No One Lives Forever to the jaw-dropping Killzone 3, games have changed in almost every aspect that a game can change in. But the most prominent enhancement, or alteration, if you would like to call it, has come in the graphics and gameplay of the games.
Frankly speaking, no one really expected this rapid evolution. Developers might be standing proud when looking at their progress within these ten or so years, particularly the ones who had the major role in pioneering these changes.
But, does everything they have achieved, all the standards they have set, all the milestones that have been surpassed, worth being proud of? Let’s have a look at what the old times had to offer, and what changes have been incorporated in the past decade or so.
Good Old Days
The days when we played around 30 hours of a punk-styled conspiracy theory game called Deus Ex, the days when we had the oh-so-loved Final Fantasy X, with everyone baffled by its rich story and immensely addictive gameplay.
Those were the days of simplicity; games weren’t keen on trying to look good; they were keen on trying to give a great and memorable experience to the players, while looking decent in-terms of visuals.
Nine out of ten regular gamers, who have been wasting their time playing games for more than a decade, when asked about their favorite games had answered with games that belonged to the era before 2007.
This doesn’t mean that good games don’t come out anymore, it simply means that the impact of some of the older games was simply much more than the impact that the modern games have on us. Whether it is because of the increased regularity of games in current times or simply because old games were truly great, is a debatable issue.
The key feature of the older games was that they were more story-driven, and those that weren’t (such as the phenomenal first three Unreal Tournament games), had a deep feel of uniqueness and originality. Not only that, the gameplay was made in such well-crafted manners that they were naturally never boring or over-stressful.
The Modern Era
If there is a requirement of a partitioning date to be stated which would allow us to differentiate between the modern era and the old times, I would roughly say 2007. 2007 was the year in which things started to change, and we can call the era since 2007 to now, the Modern Era of gaming.
The standout elements that have evolved the most are the visuals and the gameplay. The primary focus of the modern-day video games developers is to make their games look top notch. In fact, graphics have become a sort of standard for game-to-game comparison. We’ve seen some pulchritudinous display of the technological milestones achieved by developers in trying to make games look as close to real as possible.
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Although I have been playing video games since the NES days, I’m not an expert on gaming history by any means. However, I think it’s possible that we are simply in an age where the development of graphics is priority one, with gameplay development taking a backseat. I also think they have always sort of played catch up with each other. Instead of competing with each other though, I think they compliment each other over time.
I think the next stage after these engines are used in products, will be to create the gameplay and total immersion that will fully be able to take control of the environments created by the engines.
With improved physics comes serious innovation.
We are virtually in the age of real-time photorealistic gaming. It boggles my mind to think of the next stage of development.
i hate to be a rat but that photo of of the helghast sniper is from killzone 2, not killzone 3.
It is meant to be of Killzone 2. I wonder if you checked the image tag that says ‘Killzone 2′ added by author.
Interesting read but I have a bone to pick with the writer:
“Those were the days of utmost simplicity” you say this in reference to Final Fantasy X and other games in that era.
I must disagree, it’s silly to say that when games like Pong exist.
I’d remove the adjective utmost.
Really interesting article. I have to comment on your misguided view of the video gaming scene. For starters modern games and oldies have always had a warring debate about which is better. FF 7 over FF 10, Doom over Halo, Castlevania over Devil may cry…. the list goes on.
Todays graphics are top notch… so what.. they should be for the price they put on their games. Sadly the gameplay for many of these titles is nothing more than a refurbished version of what we had since the 1990′s. Though there are many great titles which rise above the saturated market. Portal, Dragon Age, Spore (I am a big fan), Resident Evil 5 ect. So i can’t agree with you all that much but there is a feeling that every other game is battlefield (I played the original, 1942 and Vietnam). Today we have -steam- and many other ways to get games cheaply and quickly… I still remember waiting for my copy of Quake 3 to arrive at the shop.
So Haider Khan I feel that things are moving the way that they should be. The best game developers will survive and the worst will die out like always. I bought an original Quake 4 copy last week for $7 but have no need to spend $60 on any game, this is the real issue here. Over priced games that don’t quite live up to our expectations. Today there is no real need for piracy as we can buy original games for less than $10.
Yet another video game “commentator” speaking out of his bunghole. The Crytek engine doesn’t possess better visuals than the UE engine. It’s primarily about implementation on the art side and shader creation. I can’t believe the level of unprofessionalism among so-called game journalists. What are the qualifications exactly to spout nonsense?