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Enjoyably Hideous Graphics

Started by Clownbaby, July 03, 2018, 03:42:30 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

St_Eddie

Quote from: Old Nehamkin on July 04, 2018, 05:36:49 PM
Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone on PS1 is a bad graphics classic:



I loved Caddicarus' review of this game, where he called this version of the character 'Dumblesloth'.  Spot on.

Quote from: Lemming on July 04, 2018, 05:55:40 PM


Z

Quote from: Clownbaby on July 03, 2018, 03:42:30 PM
I really love Rugrats: Search for Reptar because of its shit graphics. It's just so hauntingly empty and the really jarring muffled voice/sound effects crack me up. Absolute hot mess of a game.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hbeS6Dk8nf8
Honestly, on a CRT in 1999 that looked way worse than it does there. The lack of scanlines and the upscaling almost make it look like a deliberate choice, the motions almost make sense. It looks like a vaporwave recreation of late 90s games as opposed to the fucking terrible looking game it was in 1999.

Bhazor


machotrouts

Quote from: Malcy on July 04, 2018, 04:38:42 PMWe threw him down a flight if stairs in retaliation.

He'd better have died, if he has ANY integrity

St_Eddie

Quote from: Bhazor on July 04, 2018, 11:44:29 PM
Sonic Adventure has to be a classic of bad graphics.



Oh, I don't know.  That's the exact same face that I pull, whenever I find a Chaos Emerald.

Phil_A

Quote from: Clownbaby on July 04, 2018, 01:49:13 PM
Speaking of horrible gameplay,  anyone think the original PS1 Tomb Raider games were near impossible to play? Why did you have to turn Lara before going in a certain direction when Crash Bandicoot and multiple other games had already cracked proper running? Also she wouldn't fuckin pull levers unless you were in a  very specific position

Because in 1993 when development started they were still trying to figure out how a third person character should move in a 3D environment. Mario 64 hadn't even come out then, it was still uncharted territory.

Anyway, it's far from unplayable. It's downright straightforward compared to some of the sequels. Tomb Raider 3 in particular is an obtuse nightmare.

Twed

I quite like the original Tomb Raider's precise positioning. It's certainly not fluid, but...

Bhazor

Quote from: Lemming on July 04, 2018, 05:55:40 PM
The same awesome "let's just stick photos of real people's faces onto low poly models" technique was used to great effect in JACKIE CHAN STUNTMASTER

Golden Eye was the best at that


Especially when you unlock DK mode.

St_Eddie

Quote from: Phil_A on July 05, 2018, 12:10:57 AM
Because in 1993 when development started they were still trying to figure out how a third person character should move in a 3D environment. Mario 64 hadn't even come out then, it was still uncharted territory.

Stop being so reasonable!

machotrouts

Quote from: Lemming on July 04, 2018, 05:55:40 PM"let's just stick photos of real people's faces onto low poly models"

I don't think this is something that's said very often in relation to Harry Potter or Jackie Chan Stuntmaster, but: that reminds me of L.A. Noire. Brilliantly complex and expressive faces, plonked atop disgusting stupid puppet bodies. Not really obvious from a screenshot and I don't have a specific bit in mind, but I searched for a cutscene compilation and from here is as good a place as any to get the idea, I think. If the lack of sync between faces and bodies isn't obvious from watching it, I recommend playing it for long enough that you notice Cole doing the same hand gestures over and over again in interrogations. [FLINGS TWO HANDS TO THE LEFT REGARDLESS OF CONTEXT]

Also, bodies aside, the faces have weird problems of their own – I doubt I'll find a good video example of this, but the transitions between animations can be really jarring and obvious. People walk around with blank 90s stares, then their faces suddenly animate properly as they say something, before turning back to indistinct mush. This is most obvious when you get an idle response from someone you're interrogating – you're clearly just watching a video of an actor looking shifty segueing into a video of an actor delivering a line and back again. A creepy and funny effect once you start looking out for it.

Bit premature to slag off the game with probably the best facial animation that currently exists, but you can tell it's the early stages of a technology that's going to get properly good in the future – it looks goofy in a way that less advanced games don't. If anybody's still using forums in, like, 2030 or so, L.A. Noire's going to be a staple of these threads.

St_Eddie

Quote from: machotrouts on July 05, 2018, 01:10:27 AM
I don't think this is something that's said very often in relation to Harry Potter or Jackie Chan Stuntmaster, but: that reminds me of L.A. Noire. Brilliantly complex and expressive faces, plonked atop disgusting stupid puppet bodies. Not really obvious from a screenshot and I don't have a specific bit in mind, but I searched for a cutscene compilation and from here is as good a place as any to get the idea, I think. If the lack of sync between faces and bodies isn't obvious from watching it, I recommend playing it for long enough that you notice Cole doing the same hand gestures over and over again in interrogations. [FLINGS TWO HANDS TO THE LEFT REGARDLESS OF CONTEXT]

That's true enough but the facial technology was and is phenomenal.  I don't think that there's been a game since, which has even come close.  The believability of said facial tech probably only served to undermine the lackluster body animations, mind.

Twed

Quote from: Bhazor on July 05, 2018, 12:18:04 AM
Golden Eye was the best at that


Especially when you unlock DK mode.
I knew (as in was hired and then fired by) some of the people who hold the patent for that.

That's right. The patent for that.

AsparagusTrevor

LA Noire was impressive on the whole, certainly ambitious, but stuff like Uncharted 4 and Injustice 2 look better to me since the elements all fit together more convincingly.

The LA Noire tech was too expensive (money and memory), time-consuming, cumbersome and inflexible so I don't know if that tech as we know it will ever be evolved, I reckon the game will remain a unique curio in game history.


Glebe


Twed

Quote from: Jobey on July 05, 2018, 09:31:14 AM
Die Hard Trilogy PS1.
10/10 for effort though.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKBpkVggl04
The light gun shooter part of that was pretty good.

Solid Jim

It's probably cheating to keep naming PS1 games, but Sentient had a cast of characters who were each unique in their hideousness (except when it glitched out and failed to load their faces.) You would wander a maze of indistinguishable corridors populated by a sea of unforgettable faces, each slightly too big for its owner's head, and watch them gurn at you as you asked them pointless questions.

A fascinating game which was utterly ruined by the inclusion of a punishingly restrictive time limit. Still, I feel its inaccessibility and the distance of time lend it an air of mystique, like some artifact too advanced to be comprehended or enjoyed by mere humans.

madhair60


madhair60

Quote from: St_Eddie on July 04, 2018, 04:14:29 PM
Also another pro-tip (which became an automatic procedure, when booting the game up as a kid):  Pause the game and enter C B A B B A B B C B B C C B B C B C A C C A A A B B B A C A, to enable an extra gory mode!

I did this and it made a sound indicating something but the gore is the same as it usually is (fucking gory)

St_Eddie

Quote from: Solid Jim on July 05, 2018, 11:39:32 PM
It's probably cheating to keep naming PS1 games, but Sentient had a cast of characters who were each unique in their hideousness (except when it glitched out and failed to load their faces.) You would wander a maze of indistinguishable corridors populated by a sea of unforgettable faces, each slightly too big for its owner's head, and watch them gurn at you as you asked them pointless questions.

A fascinating game which was utterly ruined by the inclusion of a punishingly restrictive time limit. Still, I feel its inaccessibility and the distance of time lend it an air of mystique, like some artifact too advanced to be comprehended or enjoyed by mere humans.

I've still got my boxed PC copy of this game and your brief review is spot on; utterly impenetrable and yet, admirably ambitious.  A game which, in many ways, defies classification.

Quote from: madhair60 on July 05, 2018, 11:48:46 PM
I did this and it made a sound indicating something but the gore is the same as it usually is (fucking gory)

The differences are minor and admittedly, I never really noticed much of a difference myself.  However, it's still best to activate the code, just so that you can be sure that you're getting my goriest possible experience.

lazarou

Quote from: St_Eddie on July 06, 2018, 12:15:07 AM
The differences are minor and admittedly, I never really noticed much of a difference myself.  However, it's still best to activate the code, just so that you can be sure that you're getting my goriest possible experience.

That code isn't so much for extra gore as it is for the extra enemies, far as I remember. Notably it adds back in the women enemies who were cut from the release version.

Bhazor

I've been wanting to set up an emulator just to play glitched up Tomb Raider. One of the trippiest things I've seen in a game.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VutzIK3DqZE


St_Eddie

Quote from: lazarou on July 06, 2018, 01:21:47 AM
That code isn't so much for extra gore as it is for the extra enemies, far as I remember. Notably it adds back in the women enemies who were cut from the release version.

Huh.  The more you know!  It was always listed as an 'extra gore' code in those little cheat booklets that you got with gaming magazines, back in the day.  I guess that's technically true, given the extra enemies you have to splatter.  I'm so used to using the code, that I can't imagine playing it without the female enemies.

the

Quote from: Bhazor on July 06, 2018, 01:37:06 AM

Nice, seems to be displaying each polygon's texture as flat. Creates a feeling akin to the old 2.5D coin ops (eg. Galaxy Force II), except they're not scaling.

samadriel

That looks really cool.  Much prettier than your average glitch.

Fry

Quote from: Clownbaby on July 04, 2018, 01:49:13 PM
Speaking of horrible gameplay,  anyone think the original PS1 Tomb Raider games were near impossible to play? Why did you have to turn Lara before going in a certain direction when Crash Bandicoot and multiple other games had already cracked proper running? Also she wouldn't fuckin pull levers unless you were in a  very specific position

Holy shit I was just about to make a thread about this, but from a different perspective.

I love the gameplay on the original Tomb Raider, the clunky block-based platforming is satisfying to me in a way that free form running just isn't. It turns traversing a level into another sort of puzzle, whilst still testing your reactions. Seeing a platform you need to get to, and a bunch of different ledges of varying lengths and heights, and having to apply the knowledge of Lara's various movement mechanics to get there is really satisfying. "Ok, so to get there I need a running jump, but there's no where around here where I can get the appropriate enough runway to pull off the running. What if I move that block over there, and approach this ledge from a different angle...". Then actually having to use certain button combinations to time the jump right then hang off somewhere and shimmying along.

To me it all actually feels like climbing in a way other games don't, reminds me of being a kid and trying to scale a big tree. Looking at different limbs and branches and thinking "can I reach that? Do I have to go around the other way? Can I make a jump to it?".

Uncharted and assassin's creed have nothing on it.


Also the combat mechanics are really fun too there I said it.

Fry

Atmosphere of the original Tomb Raider is up there with the top games of all time, the shotty graphics makes everything a lot more eery and alien. Like you're genuinely  entering another world tucked away in a mountain. Fuck I think it might be my favourite game.

St_Eddie

Quote from: Fry on July 06, 2018, 10:38:21 AM
Holy shit I was just about to make a thread about this, but from a different perspective.

I love the gameplay on the original Tomb Raider, the clunky block-based platforming is satisfying to me in a way that free form running just isn't. It turns traversing a level into another sort of puzzle, whilst still testing your reactions. Seeing a platform you need to get to, and a bunch of different ledges of varying lengths and heights, and having to apply the knowledge of Lara's various movement mechanics to get there is really satisfying. "Ok, so to get there I need a running jump, but there's no where around here where I can get the appropriate enough runway to pull off the running. What if I move that block over there, and approach this ledge from a different angle...". Then actually having to use certain button combinations to time the jump right then hang off somewhere and shimmying along.

To me it all actually feels like climbing in a way other games don't, reminds me of being a kid and trying to scale a big tree. Looking at different limbs and branches and thinking "can I reach that? Do I have to go around the other way? Can I make a jump to it?".

Uncharted and assassin's creed have nothing on it.


Also the combat mechanics are really fun too there I said it.

I feel much the same way.  I have a similar view in relation to Metal Gear Solid.  The first game plays a bit like Pac-Man, what with the overhead radar map, level layouts and the enemies cones of vision.  The following Metal Gear Solid games never did it for me.  The same applies to the tank controls for the early Resident Evil games; it just feels more satisfying to me than have free movement.

Lemming

I also absolutely love TR1's controls and feel, for the reasons Fry stated. The atmosphere really is incredible, especially in the Egypt levels, there's no other game that conveys such a strong feeling of isolation and abandonment, but also with a weird feeling wonder that compels you to explore further. Atlantis also rocks just for the slowly escalating surrealism as you go further into the ruins, again it's hard to think of another game that manages something like that. When the occasional supernatural stuff happens, too - the Midas hand, the non-human mummy in Qualopec's tomb that inexplicably comes alive for a split second and throws itself at you, etc - it's perfectly placed and rare enough to make you feel like there's something seriously weird and wrong going on in these tombs, but you'll never know exactly what.

To play devil's advocate for people bashing TR's controls, Tomb Raider 3 has some fucking dumb parts, especially anything requiring you to use the new sprint feature, and anything that requires quick, precise turns where the controls just won't cooperate with you. Part of TR1's strength is that it's fairly slow paced and gives you plenty of time to examine rooms to plan how you'll traverse them in advance, whereas TR3 has too many parts that require quick, unplanned reflexes which don't lend themselves to the control scheme at all.

Clownbaby

I feel proper incompetent now for not being able to stand the original Tomb Raider controls but yeah, Tomb Raider has always been so good at atmosphere. You genuinely do feel like you're holed away in an ancient space full of ancient air that hasn't been breathed by anyone for hundreds of years.

This is what that Tomb Raider origin story game on PS3 was totally missing. Yeah the graphics were nice, but the scenery never changes and it didn't have the unique puzzle-based strategy climbing thing that is the whole identity of the Tomb Raider games. Also, even though I'm a woman and people keep saying women should be offended by big-boobed game characters, I was annoyed that they kind of made Lara look sort of average freckly girl next door like Ellen Page or something, so it was like playing some other generic survival game. Lara Croft is hot and has stupidly big boobs but she's also very intelligent and somehow able to do extreme acrobatics and parkour, that's what made the games fun.

Also speaking of gameplay, I don't really like the extreme realism you get with some more recent games where the characters get tired every 10 seconds or the gameplay merges too much with the cinematics, as in you're walking and the character is kind of just pointing itself in the right directions and jumps for things by themselves. Feels like the game's just playing itself.