Bethesda: people who say graphics don't matter are "lying"

[Chaos Raiden]

Visuals don't count, right? Right. We're men and women of substance round these parts - we look beneath the surface. We're oblivious to the charms of cascading polygons, mushrooming texture detail, high dynamic range lighting and all the rest of that cheap, superficial, tawdry rubbish.

Unless, that is, we're the developers of super-selling, overloaded fantasy role-playing games.

Speaking to OXM in a shelf-fresh podcast - the first we've published for some months, yes - Bethesda's Peter Hines has made some fairly unequivocal remarks on the value of graphics.

"There's a lot of people who say graphics don't matter," he reflected. "To them I usually say 'you're lying'." Put that in your pipe and smoke it, text adventure fans.

According to Hines, good looks are vital because they create "a sense of immersion" in a game world, and with Skyrim, "we're looking for the best sense of immersion you can get".

But there's another, somewhat grubbier, less artistically watertight reason: graphics sell games. That old adage about pictures being worth a thousand words is bang on the money, Hines told us, illustrating this with some painfully close-to-home examples.

"When you boil a game down, somebody flips through a magazine, like OXM for example, and you may or may not get them to read page five of Mike [Channell]'s 16 page coverage of Skyrim - page five is awesome by the way, so don't skip it.

"But they will look at a screenshot and make a snap decision: 'that looks awesome', or 'I'm not interested'. So if you can make something look amazing just at first glance, it's so much easier to get them."

Hines revealed that Fallout 3 marketing used images of action sequences because these showed off the upgraded Gamebryo engine best.

"People were like 'they're not focussing on the RPG stuff, all their demos are all about action and not about quests'. Well, we tend to show what shows well," Hines explained.

"It's very difficult to convey to somebody in a period of time - here's a character that you didn't create, but somehow I'm going to get you to care about this quest and the context of it, right now."

"But everybody gets pretty pictures, and everybody gets the big story stuff, and so I think graphics in a similar way gets a lot of people interested right away."

"They see something, and they say 'holy crap, that looks amazing - now I want to know more about it'. As opposed to 'yeah that looks OK, and it looks like it could be any other game'.

"We don't want to be that. When you see our stuff, we want you to go 'that's Skyrim for sure - that can't be anything else, it looks unbelievable'."

Anybody struggling to believe? Listen to the podcast in full for more hot Bethesda or Skyrim-related info.

Source: http://www.oxm.co.uk/26489/bethesda-people-who-say-graphics-dont-matter-are-lying/

 

[Dark Drakan]

I can see what they are saying but Morrowind, Oblivion and Fallout 3 werent exactly stunning looking games visually but they looked good enough. However the gameplay is what got people so into those games and they are some of the best RPG titles ive ever played. Graphics do matter but they arent the be all or end all of a game.

 

[Klawed Flaw]

I've played Oblivion, and Fallout 3. Both aren'tthe most stunning games in graphics, and really, why should we have life like graphics in every game. Both games are my favorite games, and Fallout 3 is on my top ten favorite games list. I could play Fallout 3 until I have to buy a new copy, in fact.

They may not be the best when it comes to releasing games that aren't easy to trigger bugs in, but they make up for it with fun games. I'm excited for Skyrim, and hope they at least aren't... "Flyin' flyin' so high." when they test the game for bugs.


I have to make that drunk from Oblivion my signature banner. Or better yet, Gallo!

 

[Dark Drakan]

I've played Oblivion, and Fallout 3. Both aren'tthe most stunning games in graphics, and really, why should we have life like graphics in every game. Both games are my favorite games, and Fallout 3 is on my top ten favorite games list. I could play Fallout 3 until I have to buy a new copy, in fact.

They may not be the best when it comes to releasing games that aren't easy to trigger bugs in, but they make up for it with fun games. I'm excited for Skyrim, and hope they at least aren't... "Flyin' flyin' so high." when they test the game for bugs.


I have to make that drunk from Oblivion my signature banner. Or better yet, Gallo!

Skyrim uses a totally new engine developed internally by Bethesda other than the widely criticised and buggy Gamebryo engine used in Oblivion and Fallout. I didnt experience lots of bugs but i knew they were there and glitches happened to many people so im happy they have ditched that dated engine.

 

[Vergil'sBitch]

Dear Bethesda
Star Trek: Encounters...
VeeBee

I hope their graphics, gameplay, story etc are better in other games that they produce.

 

[Klawed Flaw]

Skyrim uses a totally new engine developed internally by Bethesda other than the widely criticised and buggy Gamebryo engine used in Oblivion and Fallout. I didnt experience lots of bugs but i knew they were there and glitches happened to many people so im happy they have ditched that dated engine.

I'm glad they won't be using that engine. Never knew that was one of the reasons the games I've played from them were prone to bugs. Maybe they will make a better Fallout experience if they decide to stop using the Gamebryo engine. I want my post-nuclear destruction world to only be buggy in the sense of Radroaches still being annoying.

 

[Dark Drakan]

I'm glad they won't be using that engine. Never knew that was one of the reasons the games I've played from them were prone to bugs. Maybe they will make a better Fallout experience if they decide to stop using the Gamebryo engine. I want my post-nuclear destruction world to only be buggy in the sense of Radroaches still being annoying.

I dont think that engine will be used again and the engine used in Skyrim will be the base engine from now on for future Bethesda titles and thats looking superb.

Elder Scrolls V Skyrim: Official Gameplay Trailer​

 

[Angelo Credo]

Dear BethSoft.
Minecraft would like a word with you.

That is all.
Regards.
Credo.

 

[Reanbell]

Hrm. I don't think that people are lying when they say graphics don't matter. For instance, my favorite Final Fantasy games are FFIV and VI. These games did get re made for DS, but FFVI's graphics never really changed. It's still the same pixelated stuff we've always seen with it. It really gives you a nostalgic feeling which in my opinion, can be just as appealing as something that looks good. And besides, if something just *looks* good, it's not going to be a good game. I play a game because I want to PLAY it, not WATCH it. For instance, FFXIII had some outstanding graphics. But was it a good game? In my opinion it was extremely lacking both gameplay wise and plot wise. Some of the characters were also very poorly developed. I think it's important to take ALL things into account while playing a game, not just focusing on how pretty it looks. Overall, a game should be played because of it's gameplay, not it's shiny new graphics. I believe it is fully possible to be immersed in the world of a video game without having stunning graphics. If you get into the plot, characters, and have a lot of fun playing, then yeah, it's possible to not care about how it looks. (I STILL LIKE PLAYING PACMAN. COME AT ME, BRO.)