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Graphical evolution of the Halo series.
Posted By: Gravemind <kuukan_no_kage@yahoo.com>	Date: 4/28/07 2:58 a.m.
Earlier this week, there was that whole big to-do about the leak showing a beta build of Last Resort. Many people over at Neogaf and elsewhere were really keen on bashing Halo 3's graphics, as if a low-res video capture of an incomplete build is anything to judge a game's final graphics by. However, if we look at the progression of the Halo series's graphics, we can see that claims that Halo 3 will look bad are wholly unjustified. Halo 1 was at the time of its release one of the best looking games of the past generation, blowing away almost everything I had seen on the Dreamcast or PS2. The sixth generation of consoles has reached the end of the road, and even compared with a much larger pool of games, Halo 1 still has some of the highest-quality graphics of any game released in its generation. Very crisp and clean, with outstanding lighting and use of color as well as an incredible amount of detail and top-notch art direction. If we look at the development of Halo 1 from conception to release, we can see that a lot improved. The "Making Of" documentaries that came with the Limited Edition of Halo 2 showed how Halo 1 evolved from an RTS, to a TPS, and finally to an FPS. As we saw, earlier TPS and FPS builds of Halo did not look anywhere near as good as the final product. Just compare this screenshot of an early build with anything from the actual finished game. While Halo 1 was already a graphically impressive game, Halo 2 surpassed it in almost every way in this department. The lighting, the textures, the backgrounds, and every other major asset had been improved for the sequel. While there were a few issues — most notably texture "pop-in", as well as minor things like lack of detail on ammo packs or lack of spark effects from shooting things — Halo 2 was overall superior to its predecessor, and showed what Bungie was capable of when they pushed the Xbox to its limits. However, it too looked nowhere near as good in earlier builds as it did in the final version. Let's take a look at how the game looked like back in 2002-2003. The E3 2003 demo was the best view of the then-current build of Halo 2. The demo was, despite all of its total awesomeness, was nothing to write home about in the graphics department. I could tell right away that the final game was going to look nothing like that. The demo looked really fuzzy in addition to what was obviously tons of placeholder stuff, though these two screenshots might give us an idea of what it would've looked like were it of proper sharpness: Image 1 Image 2 While the engine used in that build ultimated didn't work, and Bungie had to rebuild the game, the new engine was capable of producing some damn good graphics and may have been better than the original one. Of course, we'll never know for sure. In any case let's take a look at some screens from 2004. These first ones look to be the earliest there are: Image 1 Image 2 And here's some from the beta build (IINM), taken around the time of E3 2004, which was about six months before the ship date: Ivory Tower Zanzibar Lockout Here's some more recent screens, the first from Tokyo Game Show 2004 (representing the lattermost stages of development; the game shipped a few weeks later), the second from the new map Desolation: Ascension at TGS04 Desolation While it doesn't appear that Halo 2 evolved much graphically during the rebuild, we have to remember that Bungie was working on a much tighter schedule. They also likely had a lot of assets remaining or derived from the original engine. However, it's clear that Halo 2 did evolve noticeably in the graphics department during development. Taken together, Halo 1 and Halo 2 show a definite evolution in graphical quality over the course of the Xbox's lifespan. Both games showed clear progression from start to finish, with the second game showing marked improvement over the original. With the Xbox 360, Bungie has far superior assets to work with. It's a given that newer-gen systems are on average far more advanced than their immediate predecessor and capable of producing much better graphics. So what can we expect a next-gen Halo to look like? Well, let's take a look at some (pre?)alpha build shots from the three officially unvieled multiplayer maps: High Ground Snowbound Valhalla Despite being from an early build that is now at least seven months old or more — one that consists largely of placeholder material — these screens demonstrate graphics that far exceed anything seen in the final version of Halo 2. Just compare the textures on the Spartan's armor seen in the Snowbound screen with those in the Zanzibar or Ivory Tower screens. Also note the real-time reflections on the Ghost in the High Ground screen. Nothing like that was seen in the previous two games. As more and more placeholder material gets supplanted by finished textures, lighting, etc., we get a better idea of what can we expect the final version of the game to look like. Oddly enough, the announce trailer shown at E3 2006, despite being the oldest Halo 3 material we've laid eyes on, is probably far more representative of what the final game will look like than anything else we've been shown so far. The HDR lighting, the animation, the textures, the whatever-makes-the-sand-blow, the real-time reflections on the Chief's visor, the backgrounds (love the skies), and so forth look like what I'd expect a truly next-gen Halo title to look like. Just compare the following screencaps taken from the trailer to, well, anything posted above: Image 1 Image 2 Image 3 Image 4 Now this is what we should be basing our opinions of Halo 3's graphics on, not pre-alpha stuff from EGM or the ViDOCs, and especially not some fuzzy poor-quality video some schmuck made of a beta build. If this isn't sufficient to wow people, I don't know what is. I guess it needs GoW-quality visuals even for early builds. In any case, whoever makes patently ridiculous claims such as that Halo 3 doesn't look any better than Halo 2 is either blind, is looking for attention, or is an idiot, or any combination of the above three. Note that the final version of the game might look even better than what we saw in the announce trailer. In fact, I'd say it's highly probable that this'll be the case. Also, a lot of people have unrealistic demands of what Halo 3 should look like. It's almost as if they want every shooter there is to look like it was made with Unreal Engine 3. However, this is not and has never been Bungie's goal. Brian Jarrard said "We definitely have another strategy than Epic Games when it comes to graphics. We’ll never engulf our game environments in lots of details like that. GoW looks absolutely fantastic, but we want to avoid compromising Halo’s unique visual style. That’s why we’re making a clean, sharp game as opposed to one with insane amount of details." In other words, Bungie is going for a totally different style than Gears and other UE3-powered games. However, they're also going to make a game that is nonetheless equal in quality to those games. The art direction, textures, lighting, and other graphical assets will come together to make a game that will be among the best-looking titles this console generation. We've seen a clear progression in quality from pre-alpha material composed largely of placeholders to the announce trailer that shows off the prowess of the Halo 3 engine. It stands to reason that the public beta (actually a delta build) will likewise show that the graphics have evolved a lot from earlier builds. In the four or five months between the end of the public beta and the release of the final, finished game, we'll also likely be treated to more stuff that shows graphics that have progressed past what we saw while playing the beta. My advice is: DON'T PANIC! We've seen what Bungie was capable of doing with the original Xbox, so they sure as hell can bring us the best of the best graphics with the power of the 360 in their hands. I may have had gripes about decisions they've made regarding gameplay, but if there's one thing they're good at, it's making games that walk all over almost all the competition in the graphics department, teabagging them for good measure. I have no doubt that Halo 3 will be a perfect "10" as far as graphics go. As a side note, I'm also optimistic about the game overall, not just about the graphics, but that's for another post. Before I go, I'd like to go back to the subject of the beta leak itself. I watched it knowing full well that a) it's a beta build and thus nowhere near what to expect from the final game, and b) it's a frackin' leak, which means piss-poor picture quality thanks to the abysmal photography skills of whoever records them. Taking these things into consideration, I was impressed with what I saw. While it's hard to make a lot of stuff out, it's clear (to me at least) that everything is very well animated. When textures and lighting were noticeable, they looked like they'd look damn nice playing on an HDTV. I'm usually a fairly decent judge of what something fuzzy will look like de-blurred (Swedish mag leak vs. legit copy of EGM, for instance). All in all, Last Resort looks like a great remake of Zanzibar, and I can't wait to play it myself this fall. Well, I'm off to bed. Got a LAN party tomorrow. I'll get around to C&P-ing this to Neogaf and other forums sometime this weekend (actually, I think I'll just link this post, that way I won't have to redo a bunch of tags). May or may not do any good, but what the hell? Can't say I didn't try. There's always going to be haters and naysayers no matter what, but as they say, you can't please all of the people all of the time. Also, that "other post" I mentioned about why I'm optimistic about Halo 3 is something else I plan on writing up sometime this weekend. Later, folks.

Message Index

Graphical evolution of the Halo series.	Gravemind	4/28/07 2:58 a.m.
Re: Graphical evolution of the Halo series.	ajenteks	4/28/07 3:07 a.m.
Here's the thing...	stan	4/28/07 3:16 a.m.
Sorry about that.	Gravemind	4/28/07 3:20 a.m.
He might have been kidding ;) *NM*	Hawaiian Pig	4/28/07 5:23 a.m.
Re: He might have been kidding ;)	DangerousHippo	4/28/07 12:28 p.m.
Re: He might have been kidding ;) *NM*	doober187	4/28/07 7:36 p.m.
Nope *NM*	DangerousHippo	4/28/07 8:49 p.m.
Blah!	Gravemind	4/28/07 3:17 a.m.
Still can't seem to fix that link.	Gravemind	4/28/07 9:42 p.m.
Re: Still can't seem to fix that link.	Rockslider	4/29/07 3:13 p.m.
Re: Still can't seem to fix that link.	Gravemind	4/30/07 5:00 p.m.
Beautifully written! Well done.	Avateur	4/28/07 4:45 a.m.
Bravo!	madcowjim	4/28/07 4:53 a.m.
Re: Graphical evolution of the Halo series.	RVideo	4/28/07 5:12 a.m.
Re: It's all about polish	Justinian	4/28/07 7:53 a.m.
Re: It's all about polish	gspawn	4/28/07 10:14 a.m.
Re: It's all about polish	macegac	4/28/07 12:07 p.m.
Re: Graphical evolution of the Halo series.	sillymikey	4/28/07 5:03 p.m.
Re: Graphical evolution of the Halo series.	Rockslider	4/29/07 3:10 p.m.
Re: Graphical evo... Teabagging	Red_Breast	4/29/07 6:18 p.m.
Wish I'd never asked	Rockslider	4/30/07 4:32 p.m.
Re: Graphical evolution of the Halo series.	Gravemind	4/30/07 4:53 p.m.