Graphics v. Gameplay - an open debate

I have been a fan of motor racing simulators for many years. The first game I ever owned was Chequered Flag on my trusty fudge-keyed ZX Spectrum. Since then, I have owned just about every motor racing game released for the Spectrum, Atari ST and nowadays the P.C. Some were good, some were bad. I wonder what it is that makes a great game? So many games now come lavishly packaged with hours of FMV sequences, movie actor voice-overs etc, and sod all game underneath. Others are far more simplistic in their presentation, but are actually better games. I agree fully that highly detailed SVGA graphics help in willing the suspension of disbelief, but they are certainly no substitute for good gameplay. F1GP is an inherently simple polygon based game, and yet it is the star in my collection. It may not be much to look at, but it is a thundering good game. Screamer, on the other hand, with its lavish SVGA and 'pounding' (their words, not mine) soundtrack, is not fit to be installed on the same hard-drive. Why? Because its just not a good game. The problem is exacerbated by the demands that highly complex graphics place upon computers. Nowadays, you really must have a pentium of one description or another to get the most out of new games. This I think is a shame. Many motor racing enthusiasts don't own pentiums, and as such are denied the delights of some awesome games. An example of this is the Need for Speed. Although not a heavyweight simulator, I enjoy it thoroughly as light relief between seasons in ICR2. But have you played it in VGA mode? This has to be the worst ever VGA mode I have seen. ICR2 is not too bad in VGA, but NFS is virtually unplayable because everything is so undefined. It seems to me as if the VGA mode was tacked on as an afterthought to placate 486 owners, without actually putting a lot of effort into making it _useful_ for 486 owners. I think there is a disturbing trend amongst software publishers to produce the most visually stunning games they can, with the buzzwords 'multimedia' and 'full motion video' splashed all over the box, without giving as much thought as is necessary to the actual mechanics of the game. A high powered pentium is _not_ necessary to play a detailed driving simulator, it only becomes necessary due to the graphical complexity that is dumped on top. It is my opinion that graphical intricacy should only be an adjunct to a game. If you can turn all the texture mapping off, run the game in VGA and still think 'Wow! This is a cool game!' then you really do have a great game. Anything else is just window dressing. What say you? *********************************************************************** * Paul L. Finnemore - Apprentice Veterinarian * * "Being paranoid doesn't mean that they aren't out to get you" * ***********************************************************************

says... I like a game (sim really), that lets me learn and experience something about a subject. I think Nascar, ICR2, and F1GP do this. no neither is perfect, but I have to make mostly the same decisions that the real drivers have to do, not come up with gamey workarounds or cheats. Well, the graphics have to assist in making the sim function properly as a sim, but not supplant it's reason for being. It seems that game developers are always developing for the next platform instead of optimizing for the current one, which is a shame. You'd think that they could be able to do both. That's why I do like the customizable graphics of something like ICR2 and Nascar. While you need a P133 to run everything on, you don't need everything on to attain the suspension of belief (frame rate), necessary to put your self in the shoes of the drivers. (A good flight sim does this too) I do however think graphics are very important to this process, AS LONG AS THE UNDERLYING PHYSICS are there to support a proper simulation. Los

I am in absolute agreement. Good racing is far more important than fully texture mapped graphics in SVGA. I would say, however, that I find the VGA mode in ICR2 to be very poor - it is difficult to what's in front in some circumstances. SVGA, in this case, improves the playability.

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>Some were good, some were bad. I wonder what it is that makes a great >game? So many games now come lavishly packaged with hours of FMV >sequences, movie actor voice-overs etc, and sod all game underneath. >Others are far more simplistic in their presentation, but are actually >better games. >I agree fully that highly detailed SVGA graphics help in willing the >suspension of disbelief, but they are certainly no substitute for good >gameplay. F1GP is an inherently simple polygon based game, and yet it

is >the star in my collection. It may not be much to look at, but it is a >thundering good game. Screamer, on the other hand, with its lavish SVGA >and 'pounding' (their words, not mine) soundtrack, is not fit to be >installed on the same hard-drive. Why? Because its just not a good game..... >I think there is a disturbing trend amongst software publishers to >produce the most visually stunning games they can, with the buzzwords >'multimedia' and 'full motion video' splashed all over the box, without >giving as much thought as is necessary to the actual mechanics of the >game. A high powered pentium is _not_ necessary to play a detailed >driving simulator, it only becomes necessary due to the graphical >complexity that is dumped on top......... >It is my opinion that graphical intricacy should only be an adjunct to a

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>game. If you can turn all the texture mapping off, run the game in VGA >and still think 'Wow! This is a cool game!' then you really do have a >great game. Anything else is just window dressing. >What say you? >********************************************************************** >* Paul L. Finnemore - Apprentice Veterinarian

* * >* "Being paranoid doesn't mean that they aren't out to get you" * >********************************************************************** Paul I couldn't have said it better myself. Maybe the pendullem will begin to swing back in the opposite direction and designers will start to subscribe to the Keep it simple stupid philosophy aka KISS. By doing this they will spend there time on making better AI and producing more efficent and faster gameplay rather than tediously detial graphics that slow down even the pentiums. When I am flying around the track at Rockingham I am not concerned with wether i can count the blades of grass or not. (that wont make me go faster) Hopfully the industry gurus have their ears on. J Mark

Hi all, I say the SVGA graphics adds somthing special to a racing sim. Lets take Indycar Racing 1 and 2. I have been playing V1 for a while and I thought this game is awesome, then i played V2 under SVGA and thought, now this is and awesome game, even better than the first Version. I agree that hi-res graphics slows a machine down, but even playing v2 with nearly all detail turned off meant I had a better sense of speed than V1, and so it was more exciting, and in my opinion a better simulator of racing a beast around a race track. It really sucks when a game crawls on your machine just because it has some bullshit background that you dont even _look_ at while you are flying through a chicane at 150kph! So why bother with the scenery, or objects or rubbish that just slows the game down. Like I said before, I played V2 of Indycar with nearly no detail, but in SVGA mode, so it was more realistic in terms of the driving characteristics for the cars on the tracks I played, so it is heaps more fun than playing the game in vga mode with all detail turned on! I run Need4SPeed on my DX4-100 and it doesnt go slow at all. This is _not_ a Pentium, so I dont see why everyone says you need a pentium to play the game. I only use a Trident 1mb video card, so I figure if I had a Diamond Stealth it might be even better, but I dont have the cash, like every other computer owner, so I wont be upgrading my machine till the pentium 200mhz machine is the standard. :( -- |Ben Thomas | Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology | |EMAIL ME FOR A MODEM GAME OF THE NEED FOR SPEED BY ELECTRONIC ARTS!!!!! | | THE BEST GAME ON THE PLANET! |

I say look at Big Red Racing, it might have graphics like that classic game 'Stunts' but the gameplay and feel of the vehicles is very good. GP2 looks like its gonna try to make playing the game as if yer watching an ESPN racing show. if the extra graphics affects the performance and handling of the vehicle then it's overkill.