Crytek: Current gen will last until 2012

[iTravis]

GDC Europe 2009: Cevat Yerli speaks about the next iteration of Cryengine and why games aren't going to get any better looking over the next three years.

COLOGNE, Germany--As the head of one of the highest-profile PC development studios in the world, Crytek CEO and founder Cevat Yerli is well placed to hold a session titled "The Future of Gaming Graphics." Crytek has been responsible for Far Cry and Crysis--two of the most cutting-edge games on the market upon their release, and he is currently hard at work bringing Crysis 2 to the PC as well as Xbox 360 and PS3.


Yerli was keen to stress that between now and 2012, we shouldn't expect games to advance much beyond what they look like today. "Games 'til 2012 will not look very different than [they do today], since engines are bound to console cycles." Yerli forecasts that the next major CryEngine upgrade will arrive in 2012, around the same time he believes the next generation of console hardware will arrive. That said, he fully acknowledges the strength of the Wii and the prospect of an elongated console life cycle and warned that if a new generation didn’t arrive in 2012-2013, then "it could be a long time."

While Yerli claims that the current graphical benchmark has been set, he says that we should still expect "huge gains in physics, AI, and simulation of special effects" over the next few years. He also says, in reference to the Fox animated movie series, that by 2013 "you will be able to do Ice Age in real time." Matching animated movies in real-time seems to be a major goal for Yerli, who used Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within as a benchmark for CryEngine 3.

"We wanted to beat the faces in the Final Fantasy movie, but doing in real time what they were doing offline. Every day I was getting posted images from the Final Fantasy movie," he joked. He then proceeded to show a video of the incredibly lifelike facial models in the latest iteration of the engine. "One face has more technology than the entire first Far Cry," he claimed.

CryEngine 3 is the company's current technology foundation, which Yerli claims will form the bedrock of the company's games until 2012. Yerli showed off a demo of Crysis rebuilt using the latest technology. It included 3D volumetric clouds, soft particles, parallax occlusion mapping, and a 7km view distance. Clearly, Yerli is undeterred by the criticism he received for the original Crysis and its high system requirements. “It was always my dream to have a game that I could play now, and then in two years when I upgrade my PC, play again,” he stated.

Source: http://gamescom.gamespot.com/story/6...il-2012-crytek

If this is the case then we won't see any games that look better than MGS4 or GOW2 till another 2-3 years from now.

[570091D]

so... he's not going to include any dx11 features in crysis2? no tesselation or hdao? i bet you he changes his tune when dirt2, assassins creed 2, and a few other dx11 games hit the market. when a company that made it's name with cutting edge graphics decides that they aren't going to persue the latest advances in hardware and software tech, you know there is a problem.

[grimREEFER]

i predict that in 5 years from now, computers will be almost twice as fast, but so expensive that only the kings of europe can afford them.

[zanzabar]

the 360 has similar tessellation to dx11, i would expect it be included on the pc

and i think that MS needs a new console now but reasonably at the end of next year if they just keep it the same or minor updates and include a blue ray that would be fine but they are keeping the whole gaming industry back with the ridiculous licensing on multi disk and having such small capacities to work with

[trinibwoy]

so... he's not going to include any dx11 features in crysis2? no tesselation or hdao? i bet you he changes his tune when dirt2, assassins creed 2, and a few other dx11 games hit the market. when a company that made it's name with cutting edge graphics decides that they aren't going to persue the latest advances in hardware and software tech, you know there is a problem.

DX11 only adds tessellation. Tessellation requires totally different base geometry. You'll be able to count the number of devs willing to support multiple art pipelines on one hand. There are just too many consoles and PCs out there that do not support tessellation for it to make a big impact. I would be impressed if Codemasters uses it effectively in Dirt2, especially considering it's going to be tacked on.

[zanzabar]

DX11 only adds tessellation. Tessellation requires totally different base geometry. You'll be able to count the number of devs willing to support multiple art pipelines on one hand. There are just too many consoles and PCs out there that do not support tessellation for it to make a big impact. I would be impressed if Codemasters uses it effectively in Dirt2, especially considering it's going to be tacked on.

i thought that it was the engine not the game that he was talking about

[570091D]

i thought that it was the engine not the game that he was talking about

yeah, i am talking about engines, sorry for the confusion.

DX11 only adds tessellation. Tessellation requires totally different base geometry. You'll be able to count the number of devs willing to support multiple art pipelines on one hand. There are just too many consoles and PCs out there that do not support tessellation for it to make a big impact. I would be impressed if Codemasters uses it effectively in Dirt2, especially considering it's going to be tacked on.

i feel it's reasonable to believe that the next valve engine, id engine, and epic engine all support full dx11 feature sets. crytek is making a mistake by passing this up, as they will be passed by the afore metioned companies.

[NaMcO]

crytek is making a mistake by passing this up, as they will be passed by the afore metioned companies.

Are they? After the DX10 and especially "DX10.1" flops i have to see it to believe it

[soundood]

i predict that in 5 years from now, computers will be almost twice as fast, but so expensive that only the kings of europe can afford them.

may i suggest a google for moore's law?

here i done it for you Moore's Law

[gosh]

he says that we should still expect "huge gains in physics, AI, and simulation of special effects"

GOOD!

[randomizer]

may i suggest a google for moore's law?

here i done it for you Moore's Law

Laws were made to be broken.

[labs23]

Let's see what happens after DX11 hardwares are fully released. It would probably change Cevat's view, but it won't be much.

I have respect for the Crytek company, but today's time is a bit early for them to tell.

[Jamesrt2004]

GOOD!

+1


i dont care if graphics in a game are shocking if the game play is actually amazing

[dasa]

they are making it into a console game\engine it seems and they are saying there will be nothing new till around 2012 which is getting close to when net gen consoles will be out so i guess they have given up on pc's for now
i find it hard to believe that pc graphics wont improve a fair amount over ~5 years as crysis was released late 2007

[grimREEFER]

may i suggest a google for moore's law?

here i done it for you Moore's Law

its an old joke from the simpsons that i screwed up the phrasing of.
professor frink said in season 7 episode 23 "I predict that within 100 years, computers will be twice as powerful, 10,000 times larger, and so expensive that only the five richest kings of Europe will own them."

[randomizer]

Graphics have had too much focus in the last few years, while physics has trailed behind (CryEngine 2 is powerful but the physics left much to be desired) and I dare not speak about AI. Furthermore, the actual story and gameplay of most games now is borderline plagiarism; the re-hashing of gameplay styles and ideas is just unbearable. If I have to play another WWII game...

[Psykocyber]

may i suggest a google for moore's law?

here i done it for you Moore's Law

May I suggest a google for Simpsons references?

"I predict that within 100 years, computers will be twice as powerful, 10,000 times larger, and so expensive that only the five richest kings of Europe will own them."

On topic: I'm more worried if we will even se a proper new generation. Maybe it will just be the current consoles hardware times two, and that is rather depressing

[adpr_02]

This reminded me of when Doom 3 came out, and they said that it would be at least another year until hardware would be able to play it maxed out (when 512mb cards came out). And the 6800 Ultra maxed it out at over 40fps...

Not really the same scenario, but it just reminded me of that.

[tdream]

may i suggest a google for moore's law?

here i done it for you Moore's Law

Let me introduce you to a game called Crysis on my 3007wfp.

[Lightman]

DX11 only adds tessellation. Tessellation requires totally different base geometry. You'll be able to count the number of devs willing to support multiple art pipelines on one hand. There are just too many consoles and PCs out there that do not support tessellation for it to make a big impact. I would be impressed if Codemasters uses it effectively in Dirt2, especially considering it's going to be tacked on.

RIGHT!

XBOX360 has Tesselation hardware since day 1 .... and it sold quite well I would say.
Codemasters DIRT2 will use tesselation on DX11 hardware - proof? Just head over here and look at that video in HD. When they showing model of crowd. Can you see what is it name??

[trinibwoy]

i feel it's reasonable to believe that the next valve engine, id engine, and epic engine all support full dx11 feature sets. crytek is making a mistake by passing this up, as they will be passed by the afore metioned companies.

id and Epic have already said publicly that their current engines are going to last for a few more years so I wouldn't expect anything new from them before 2012 either. id is also looking to go the voxel route so we may never see tessellation from them. Valve maybe, but I'm still skeptical they will use it in any big way for the reason that DX11 will be a miniscule segment of the market for a long time. Tessellation isn't like increasing texture resolution, you literally have to have two versions of all your geometry, the one to be tessellated and the regular one for older hardware.

XBOX360 has Tesselation hardware since day 1

And where are the games using it?

Codemasters DIRT2 will use tesselation on DX11 hardware - proof? Just head over here and look at that video in HD. When they showing model of crowd. Can you see what is it name??

You're going to have to clarify. That's a video of tech demo of some tessellated rocks (which I myself posted in the R8xx thread).

[zanzabar]

.......
And where are the games using it?
.....

gears uses it, some others do but im not sure off hand but with UT3 on the 360 its an easy fix as an overlay and uses vary little resources.

[trinibwoy]

gears uses it, some others do but im not sure off hand but with UT3 on the 360 its an easy fix as an overlay and uses vary little resources.

Sources please? I have never seen any mention of UT3 support for hardware tessellation.

[Vienna]

Haven't people realized by now that the CryTek guys are no longer PC guys first anymore?

[Jamesrt2004]

Sources please? I have never seen any mention of UT3 support for hardware tessellation.

mass effect uses it =)

and that pina pinate or w/e something game (the lil kiddie one)

they were in AMD sides in 2005 for it so im sure quite a few use it