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Hitting the Ceiling: PGR4 limited by DVD

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Posts

  • ZiggymonZiggymon Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    Threepio wrote: »
    Rather than having two "fixed" times of day, this time around we decided to use our time to create a dynamic weather system.
    We've never had to cut content to fit on the disc, and we probably never will.

    Hmm, sounds like fixed times of day were cut. Yet, they're not! They decided to do something different this time.

    Honest.

    We swear it. Riiiiiiiight. Hear that dinging? The collective bullshit detectors all across the world, clanging in harmony.


    I agree here that features have been cut from the game but it might not be because of the DVD-9 format.

    I do believe that DVD-9 is going to be a crippling factor with Microsoft and the Xbox 360 in the future. Its almost as if the 360 was designed without considering what was going to happen after 2 years. I mean I feel already that the 360 console feels outdated, while im only just thinking that my PS2 hardware is getting to that stage.

    Ziggymon on
  • eelektrikeelektrik Southern CaliforniaRegistered User regular
    edited August 2007
    Threepio wrote: »
    Rather than having two "fixed" times of day, this time around we decided to use our time to create a dynamic weather system.
    We've never had to cut content to fit on the disc, and we probably never will.

    Hmm, sounds like fixed times of day were cut. Yet, they're not! They decided to do something different this time.

    Honest.

    We swear it. Riiiiiiiight. Hear that dinging? The collective bullshit detectors all across the world, clanging in harmony.

    I'm not seeing any bullshit here. So they chose to only do one version of each city instead of two, but instead develop a weather system that allows for more then just 2 permutations of each city. Sounds like a smarter way to spend development time to me.

    eelektrik on
    (She/Her)
  • cloudeaglecloudeagle Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    Threepio wrote: »
    Rather than having two "fixed" times of day, this time around we decided to use our time to create a dynamic weather system.
    We've never had to cut content to fit on the disc, and we probably never will.

    Hmm, sounds like fixed times of day were cut. Yet, they're not! They decided to do something different this time.

    Honest.

    We swear it. Riiiiiiiight. Hear that dinging? The collective bullshit detectors all across the world, clanging in harmony.

    Those two sentences don't contradict each other. It could very well be they decided to do weather instead of sun cycles in this game from the start.

    cloudeagle on
    Switch: 3947-4890-9293
  • NohmanNohman Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    Threepio would have been better quoting the original that set off all this. Its specifically stated that all the textures required for day and night races would not fit on one disc, and they are not prepared to release the game on two discs.

    Now, it may be true that, in light of that, they went away and developed the weather system as an alternative. Even then, with a vastly increased storage space, they could apply that weather system to the night tracks as well, giving even further city environment permutations. Either way, there is no way around it, they had a feature planned, and space forced them to cut it and find a replacement. Blu-Ray, or HD-DVD, or even a requirement of the hard drive would have solved that problem, but they don't have any of those options.

    I do wonder however, if as has been suggested, the night race tracks may appear as downloadable content at one point, whether free or charged for. Would be interesting to see, if perhaps setting a precedence that makes me mildly uncomfortable.

    Nohman on
  • MinionOfCthulhuMinionOfCthulhu Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    Accualt wrote: »
    Wait, so PGR doesn't create textures...they use high-res photographs?
    That would go a long way to explaining why they don't have night and day maps.
    The way Chromehounds did their maps should be the wave of the future.

    How did they do it?

    MinionOfCthulhu on
    mgssig.jpg1152dt.gif
  • BaronVonSnakPakBaronVonSnakPak Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    threepio just wants to retain his fist pump, after bizzare took it away.

    BaronVonSnakPak on
    [SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
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  • slurpeepoopslurpeepoop Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    threepio just wants to retain his fist pump, after bizzare took it away.

    I think in the name of good sportsmanship, he should be awarded not one, but two pumps.

    It's not often the PS3's competition actually has news that paints the PS3 or any of Sony's decisions regarding the PS3 in a positive light. Not only that, but Sony hasn't overshadowed this bit of news with their own even worse news, and they've had the better part of a day to ruin it.

    In remembrance of this rare and auspicious occasion, Threepio should be proclaimed "Ultra Fist Pump Super King Hero Happy Time".

    Enjoy your time in the sun, shiny man.

    slurpeepoop on
  • scootchscootch Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    Fasih wrote: »
    Ok... A couple of things:

    3)Some people appearently do not understand the need to redo textures for the night. In lighting, fact is this: You cannot turn day into night and vice versa. The difference between day and night is not simply a difference in lighting. Any filmmaker would tell you that. You can use 10 Arc Lights of 12000W. And still not be able to turn day into night. Why? Because of many things...

    The sky is blue in the morning, and black at night. This is not a light issue. People turn on their lights at night. etc. It just doesn't work.

    all that you described is lighting issue.. what the hell is wrong with you?

    the problem is they're not using proper lighting. they're using lightmaps. it's easier this way to create high quality graphics without huge hit on the cpu cycle.

    scootch on
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  • AngryAngry The glory I had witnessed was just a sleight of handRegistered User regular
    edited August 2007
    Ziggymon wrote: »
    Threepio wrote: »
    Rather than having two "fixed" times of day, this time around we decided to use our time to create a dynamic weather system.
    We've never had to cut content to fit on the disc, and we probably never will.

    Hmm, sounds like fixed times of day were cut. Yet, they're not! They decided to do something different this time.

    Honest.

    We swear it. Riiiiiiiight. Hear that dinging? The collective bullshit detectors all across the world, clanging in harmony.


    I agree here that features have been cut from the game but it might not be because of the DVD-9 format.

    I do believe that DVD-9 is going to be a crippling factor with Microsoft and the Xbox 360 in the future. Its almost as if the 360 was designed without considering what was going to happen after 2 years. I mean I feel already that the 360 console feels outdated, while im only just thinking that my PS2 hardware is getting to that stage.

    crippling how exactly?

    i don't know how you types make through the day, what with all your doom and gloom predictions about everything.

    Angry on
  • capable heartcapable heart Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    I would have liked if they had the weather system *and* day and night versions of a track, but oh well.

    Sigh. DVD.

    capable heart on
  • GlalGlal AiredaleRegistered User regular
    edited August 2007
    You do realize that when they say weather system, they also mean lighting, right? Because I can see night-time scenes in that screenshot list.

    Glal on
  • FasihFasih Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    Fasih wrote: »
    crappy stuff.

    I guess you missed that this thread was wrong and they didn't "hit the ceiling".

    I am truly stunned by your cleverness.

    Fasih on
  • SpaceGhostSpaceGhost Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    SpaceGhost on
    AverageYeo.png
  • FasihFasih Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    scootch wrote: »
    Fasih wrote: »
    Ok... A couple of things:

    3)Some people appearently do not understand the need to redo textures for the night. In lighting, fact is this: You cannot turn day into night and vice versa. The difference between day and night is not simply a difference in lighting. Any filmmaker would tell you that. You can use 10 Arc Lights of 12000W. And still not be able to turn day into night. Why? Because of many things...

    The sky is blue in the morning, and black at night. This is not a light issue. People turn on their lights at night. etc. It just doesn't work.

    all that you described is lighting issue.. what the hell is wrong with you?

    the problem is they're not using proper lighting. they're using lightmaps. it's easier this way to create high quality graphics without huge hit on the cpu cycle.


    I wasn't referring to what THEY are doing. I was referring to what people were saying. Using different light maps is just another (and might I add very elegant) way of solving lighting problems.

    Regardless. My point for DVDs being limited stands..

    Fasih on
  • Death of RatsDeath of Rats Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    Fasih wrote: »
    Fasih wrote: »
    crappy stuff.

    I guess you missed that this thread was wrong and they didn't "hit the ceiling".

    I am truly stunned by your cleverness.

    Eh, it was easier than typing "snip"

    Death of Rats on
    No I don't.
  • DirtyDirty Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    Okay, I admit defeat this round. But I still think that the DVD format is going to be a limiting factor for some devs. Not all games will work well with disc-swapping. Even if PGR4 didn't have anything cut to make it under the cap, I really doubt that there will be games that do.

    I mean, there were single CD (not DVD, but CD) games out on the PS2. But game sizes grew and grew until they got to the point where they were using dual-layer DVDs. Its impossible to believe that we won't continue to see that same kind of growth in game size this generation.

    Now I don't think this will be "crippling" for the 360. The games are still going to be awesome. We probably won't really notice anything as end users, but at the developement end, I do envision a lot of headaches for makers of non-linear games trying to decide what features to cut so their game fits on one disc.

    And even if that becomes a reality, it doesn't really help Sony. As long as the 360 is the sales leader, games will be ported TO the PS3. I doubt 3rd parties will put those cut features back in for the PS3 version. The only games that will benefit from the extra space are the 1st party games.

    But I know, moot point, stfu, lol sony.

    Dirty on
  • NohmanNohman Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    Glal wrote: »
    You do realize that when they say weather system, they also mean lighting, right? Because I can see night-time scenes in that screenshot list.

    I still think the most recent comments from them are damage control, with quite massive levels of spin.

    For a start we know its not just "certain Fanboys" who said they couldn't do it, it was a Bizarre staff member himself, who said the devs could do it, but the storage medium could not.

    Secondly, while yes the image crop-sheet they use for environment modelling does show day and night textures, it shows some areas with purely day (as in dawn 'till dusk) and other areas at night.
    For example, Macau is always in the daytime, but if you play it during a storm everything looks darker and more foreboding. If you play during a blizzard then things are slightly tinged blue and everything seems more frozen. Of course, playing this track in sunshine will make everything appear bright and yellowy.

    I think this backs up what I said, Macau will be during the day, and the clever weather and lighting effects can give the illusion of being early morning or early evening, but you cant drive round Macau in the middle of the night under a full moon.

    I still think all of this is important only from a PR perspective, as has been said before, developers are going to be constrained by the size limits of a DVD though most will get around that by simply using a second disc. If thats not an option for some reason then it becomes an actual problem, as they can't rely on the hard drive. Sony made the better decision in this regard, not so much with blu-ray but with the built in hard drive.

    Of course, the flip-side of that decision is that my ps3 cost half a terms student loan.

    Nohman on
  • GlalGlal AiredaleRegistered User regular
    edited August 2007
    Wait, what does Blizzard have to do with this? Are these guys a Blizzard branch?

    [edit] Huh. Whoda thunk it.

    Glal on
  • NohmanNohman Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    Actually, I'm pretty sure they need to just get that one guy to shut the hell up and stop adding fuel to the fire; these both come up later in the thread on the Bizarre forums that started all this.
    Um, disc space isn't an issue - we just decided to do more cities with more environments, but without time of day. We have *double* the amount of locations/tracks than PGR3, we *could* have chose to keep the same amount but used different locations.

    DVD space was never an issue, we just decided to use it this way rather than another. To be honest I don't understand the fuss, we're still going to knock your socks off.

    Chris

    PS: (2 disc solutions and 'installing' solutions are very, very bad. Way to split your userbase.)

    which was followed soon after by
    Ben wrote:
    Wow, some kind of reaction to this one folks. Yes, it's really worth just reiterating what The Boy has said above me. We've got double the number of locations this time around, and lots of new features and graphics which all take up valuable disc real-estate. We could have just shipped with the 5 new cities in PGR4, but we chose to put all of them in there because of the new motorcycles and weather conditions which really bring the old cities into a new light.

    I think everybody will agree that having twice the number of locations is better than having day & night textures for each.

    Multiple disc or DLC options are not really viable for all of the reasons already outlined in this thread. No matter what the size of your optical media is, there will ALWAYS be limitations. It's the job of Bizarre to work inside those limitations and make the game the best it can be within them. Which is what we're doing right now.

    If read what they are really both saying, then yes, I think they definitely did have space considerations, just they are very artfully dancing around the question. They say they are using the space one way, rather than another, which immediately begs the question "If space is not limiting then why not both?"

    Obviously that adds extra time on to development, just how much I don't know but I would imagine that adding in a set of night textures for each area wouldn't take all that long. Surely designing and implementing the weather system and modeling all the tracks/cars are the most time consuming parts?

    Nohman on
  • DarkSymphonyDarkSymphony Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    it's inevitable that at SOME POINT in time, DVD-9 will be too small. Is that time now? Maybe, maybe not. It seems that in this generation some cuts will be made to make a 1 dvd-9 game as opposed to 2. It probably won't happen often either, but I assume it'll happen a few times.

    Blu-Ray being a much bigger storage capacity disc is a fantastic thing, it's just really unfortunate of the cost. I do wonder though, what would it really take to get the PS3 down to $450 or $400? like, would cutting out all back compatibility and a couple other things really do it? or would it really have to rely on blu-ray becomming less expensive? thus, just waiting it out.

    DarkSymphony on
  • slash000slash000 Registered User regular
    edited August 2007
    Here's the thing. Nobody said that BluRay was a bad move because of the disc size.

    People said that BluRay was a bad move because of the price increase it added to the system.


    Of course I'm going to stop here and not get into one of those arbitrary value arguments.

    slash000 on
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