The Next Generation
Bigger, better, sexier, smarter
So you invested in an itsy bitsy PlayStation Two, grabbed a GameCube at the first whiff of a grownup Zelda, and gave in to the Halo 2 hype and hopped on the Xbox bandwagon. But would you believe that a batch of brave new hardware is already on the horizon, some of it (such as Microsoft's latest) set to arrive this next holiday season? Is tomorrow coming too soon or not soon enough? We get four industry insiders to sound off. -- By Shawn Elliott
Chuck Osieja, Executive Producer, Electronic Arts Canada
Recent work: Need for Speed Underground 2
Cliff Bleszinski, Lead Designer, Epic Games
Recent work: Unreal Tournament 2004, Unreal Championship 2
Randy Pitchford, President, Gearbox Software
Recent work: Brothers in Arms
Alexander Seropian, President, Wideload Games
Recent work: Halo, Stubbs the Zombie: Rebel Without a Pulse
Gamestar: What features would you hope to see in next generation hardware and why?
Chuck Osieja: I don't know that there is anything in particular I'd like to see technology-wise that I don't already know (or think) is coming. I would like to be able to get closer to believable human visuals, motion, and A.I., and I'm hopeful that the next gen systems will be powerful enough to bring us that much closer to convincing synthetic actors.
Cliff Bleszinski: I'm hoping for ample amounts of memory. We're really pushing to up the ante with our new games and technology and we want to make sure that the new systems can show off our work in its best light.
Randy Pitchford: I think these guys are doing a reasonable job. The Gearbox team is confident it can make kick-ass games given the specifications we've been made privy to. Still, I want more RAM. High definition [will become the norm] within this generation's lifecycle and more RAM would be nice.
Alexander Seropian: RAM, RAM, and some extra RAM. Beyond that, it would be nice to see more RAM. Ramping up the fidelity of content and the capability of the physics simulation to the order of magnitude needed is going to require a significant jump in RAM and processor speed. Of course, we already expect those features to arrive, so that's not all that interesting to discuss. I think what's more interesting is how we will use these machines. Obviously we're going to play games on them, and it's safe to assume we'll be able to plug these into our broadband connection, but can we have integrated wireless? Can we interface with the other junk in our living room besides the TV, like our satellite or computer? What's the backend software going to look like for net games? Considering the potential uses in the living room and on the net, I think a hard drive or some kind of local storage is more important this time around than last time. On Xbox the hard drive didn't reach its full potential, mostly because Live wasn't introduced at launch. But this time around, that entire infrastructure is already in place.
GS: Alexander clearly wants a hard drive. What about the rest of you?
CO: I'd prefer that there not be a hard drive built into the system. I think it will help keep the price of the system down which will allow it to get into more gamers hands sooner. RP: The next generation will provide faster and larger media reading capabilities, so it's not a given that we'll need to use something like a hard-drive as a place to get data from. With more RAM, we can keep more of what we need handy and we can get what we don't have off of the physical media much more quickly than we have been able to in the past. Also, all of the systems will have writable space (like a memory card). This will be bigger and faster than it's been in the past. We should be able to use that space for bringing in new content off the internet or storing game specific data (save games, etc). When it comes to making decisions for internal components, I don't believe that a hard drive is the best use of the customer's money. If some of the money that was spent on a hard drive was instead put towards RAM and towards improving the memory card concept, customers would be way better off.
GS: Cliff?
CB: A hard drive becomes invaluable whenever a designer implements any sort of online functionality. If the drive is there and built in from the get-go it makes this much easier. Acquiring the drive upon signing up for online service is also a viable option that may help keep costs down for the next generation. The big players are going to have a heavy decision on their shoulders regarding drive implementation; the less steps it takes for a user to get online the more users are likely to flock to a service.
GS: Is next generation hardware arriving too soon?
CO: Tricky question. On one hand, new systems are exciting because they'll remove many of the limitations that we currently face. The opportunities that new systems provide us to do things that currently aren't possible are extremely exciting to me as a game designer. Conversely, I also know that the new systems will bring about a natural de-emphasis on currently available hardware which, in turn, results in a dramatic drop off in the variety of games that are created, as well as the innovation and creativity that go into current gen games. There is still a lot of life left in the current consoles, and because there is such a large install base of owners out there, it would be a shame to suddenly turn off the spigot of great games because of the rush to create games on the next big things.
CB: Absolutely not. The current generation of games is most certainly looking dated compared to the caliber of what we are currently crafting. Bring it on!
RP: It's difficult to say since we don't yet know exactly when it is arriving. Based on what we know (or can speculate about if we don't want to violate any non-disclosure agreements), it's about right -- maybe a year early. But I'm less concerned about when the first piece of hardware is going to arrive as I am about when all of the hardware is going to be arriving. It'll spell trouble if one manufacturer launches their system two years after another. If everything can be kept within one year of each other, we can manage.
GS: Have limitations in the current generation of consoles prevented you from creating the games you've wanted to?
RP: Until someone invents the Holodeck, my answer to this question will always be yes.
AS: Software developers are always pushing the hardware as hard as they can. I'm not sure we'll ever get a machine that we don't think is in some way limiting.
CO: In some cases, yes. There are some specific ideas that we want to explore that just aren't possible with the current hardware. That's the most exciting thing to me about the upcoming systems. I know that we're going to do things that will really blow people's minds. We'll definitely change people's perception of what a game is, and what the experience can be.
That being said, I also find it to be the best part of the job, being forced to find creative solutions inside of the parameters that the hardware provides. If you ask me the same question five years from now, I'll probably give you the same answer relative to the next gen systems. When we started making games on CD we sat around saying, "We'll never be able to fill that much space." Now we have trouble fitting onto DVD.
GS: What will next generation hardware allow you to do with the genre of game you know best that isn't possible on present machines?
CO: In the driving category, I believe we'll be able to come that much closer to fooling your brain into believing that you're behind the wheel of a real car. I don't necessarily mean the physics of the drive, but through all of the ancillary elements that help convince your brain that what you're seeing is real. From the lighting to the textures, to the way that the camera moves and how audio interacts with the car, the road and the player's actions, I believe we'll be able to craft an experience that is on par with the real thing. We'll be able to manipulate your emotional state to the point where you'll react physically to what you're experiencing in the game.
CB: I'm also looking forward to seeing what we can do with advanced physics systems; player interactions with those physics in a sandbox style of action environment are going to be truly compelling.
RP: The worlds will become larger and more realistic. We'll see the world with greater fidelity (high definition). We have new technology that allows us to render larger worlds with more natural lighting and special effects. We will also notice that the other characters in the world with us are smarter and more natural. We're going to be able to supply more computing horsepower than we ever have before to simulated intelligence.
AS: I hope to create characters and worlds that are indistinguishable from what we can capture with a camera. That boils down to two things: a) higher-fidelity content and b) better simulations. In game terms, this is being able to put complex skeletons into characters so that every muscle in their face can animate; putting enough geometry, texture, and special effects into the characters and environments to make them look real; and making everything have physics so accurate that every object behaves the way it does in the real world (or how we decide it does in our fantasy world). If you look at a movie, like Finding Nemo or Final Fantasy, or characters like Gollum in Lord of the Rings, you'll see the kind of fidelity we can expect in videogames.
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