From Computer and Video Games (UK):
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EXCLUSIVE: EA REVEALS NEED FOR SPEED NEXT-GEN!
Speaking to CVG at EA's salubrious Vancouver headquarters, Underground 2
producer Chuck Osieja confirmed that a Need For Speed title was already in
development for next-gen systems, stating: "I think what we're working on is
going to revolutionise the way people look at driving games."
"If we pull it off, we'll do for driving games what Gran Turismo did for
driving games on PS2 and PSone. It'll be that amazing in terms of visual
quality and what the experience is for the player. Since we are getting a
head start on that [creating a revolutionary next-gen product], I can't
reveal too much but one of the things we think about is, it's not going to
be photo-realism, right? The next-generation systems can throw 30,000
polygons into a car and guess what, it doesn't look any better than a 10,000
polygon car with the rendering techniques I can do.
"It's what I can do to gameplay, and what is the experience I can change for
the player on a next-generation system to make those people a) want to
invest in that system and b) buy that game. So we're spending a lot of time
now trying to figure out what those next steps are...
Osieja also revealed how next-generation hardware is already facilitating
the unavoidable convergence of games and movies, detailing how EA is working
closely with Hollywood talent on its projects: "We've benefited a lot from
things like The Lord of the Rings, and obviously Underground and Bond all
benefited from the knowledge of the Hollywood people who have come in and
just helped us with tweaking lighting and making sure that things look right
to the eye, whether it be [something like] the camera shake, which I think
we finally did really well in Underground last year. Now they're being able
to take that stuff and apply it to real-time, next-gen systems."
One of the only indicators of the potential power of next generation gaming
hardware seen by the public at large has been Microsoft's demonstration of
its XNA next-gen software development platform - most famous is the "Crash"
demo, showing a car being smashed into a wall, then disintegrating in a
unnervingly realistic manner.
We asked Osieja outright: with Need For Speed next-gen, are we talking the
same level of quality seen in the "Crash" demo, or beyond that?
"Easily that. We just looked at a video the other day of a Porsche GT flying
up in the air, floating over and basically coming apart - and we'll be able
to do that now, with our dev stations. But that's a part of it. At the end
of the day the licensor is always very touchy about what you do to their
product. I'd love to blow up their car, I'd love to set it on fire, I'd love
to do all this stuff and they say you can't.
"Even though we can do a lot of stuff we're still going to be restricted by
what the licensors allows us to do. But yeah we can do that stuff."
Johnny Minkley
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"Steve Smith" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:<LKKtc.17007$[email hidden]>...
Sounds amazing!!!
