Will HD eventually make us shy away from SD gaming?

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neorichieb1971
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Will HD eventually make us shy away from SD gaming?

Post by neorichieb1971 »

In the conventional gaming sense its already happened. But in our niche little shmup land and our TATE'ing there is still a bias towards SD gaming.

In 5-10 years time I would imagine Cave would have gone to the HD realm and never look back again. If the devcos manage to pull off a sort of "look" that gathers mass attention from the shmup community will we lose interest in the DDP's and Garagga's?

So far the higher resolution just fills in the blanks giving a MAME type look, but we all know nothing stays still forever. Has any shmup been released in 720p + and been successful? I don't think so, but once that first title hits, it will change the genre forever.

Maybe HD shmupping just needs the right artists. I must admit I am attracted more to the look of a game than how it plays, since I just adjust according to much I like the aesthetics.
This industry has become 2 dimensional as it transcended into a 3D world.
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Post by PC Engine Fan X! »

There are some current American made arcade cabinets that use such a 16:9 widecreen LCD monitor setup...same thing with Taito's Vewlix cabinet.

It will be, eventually, a matter of time when one of the premire arcade shmup developers will develope for such HD format. Why not take advantage of the extra space afforded of such a tate'd HD widescreen monitor. Making such current modern-day arcade cabinets with HD widescreen LCD monitors is the wave of the future and it is here to stay.

It will be a sad day when such "Standard Definiton" type of arcade games are no longer being made...so be it.

I'd still like to see such an LCD screen manufacturer make a traditional 4:3 type 29" LCD monitor replacement for an Egret II cabinet. Unfortunately, there aren't any being made these days...why is that. The old reasoning of supply and demand with such traditional bulky CRT-based arcade monitors will eventually go the way of the dinosaurs. That is an eventual given.

If you have played the cool 2006 released "The Act" arcade game at this year's 2008 California Extreme show, you saw that it was a very nice and solidly built non-traditional arcade cabinet worth of being displayed in such a modern art museum with it's razor-sharp 16:9 widescreen LCD monitor setup and just a single film editing knob controller to play the entire game session with. The animation was done in true 16:9 widescreen aspect ratio and was just breathtaking. The shapely female nurse character with her sexy hourglass figure was quite something. The subtle ways of expressing emotion with animation without saying a word is what "The Act" excels at. Not a single word is spoken throughout the entire game...it must of been quite a challenge for the animators to pull that stunt off. ^_~

The overall outside asethetics of this particular "The Act" cabinet puts most woodies and even Japanese candy cabinets to shame. With it's intial $4,000 USD asking price, it really didn't fare too well in the arcade game market scene. A few of them have been sold on eBay in the past and are, indeed, unsual arcade game novelities in their own right. It as if the world of classic Laserdisc arcade games from the early 1980's met and collided with today's HD format head-on is what best would describe "The Act".^_~

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~
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D
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Post by D »

Cave has a good thing going. I think they are scared to go HD.
Then again, why would they? Cave SD shmups look mighty fine in SD.
Some new developer should come out with 720p to challenge Cave.
I think Psikyo should do a Gunbird 3 in 720p.
I am just scared to loose 2D, because AFAIK only Cave makes 2D shmups nowadays.
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Post by moozooh »

Haha, HD? Come on, list me at least five non-doujin 2D shmups that are drawn in 480p to begin with.

I see no harm in higher resolutions as long as no scaling is taking place, otherwise there's no reason for it whatsoever. On the other hand, lo-res aesthetics aside, true 480p allows greater detail depth and smoother curves. As long as games are made specifically with that detail depth in mind, they're bound to look better. So if Cave are going 480x640 with their next release, all the best wishes to them.

That being said, 3D backdrops are nothing to be shy of, either.
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neorichieb1971
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Post by neorichieb1971 »

We don't want KOF Millenium editions from Cave with 3D backdrops only. Thats kind of saying "we will only do a half assed job".

The problem with embracing HD hardware for most 2D artists imo is, can they succeed in keeping the artistic impression alive with the extra scanlines? Most 2D lose something in the transition, in fact all do. The scanlines have a charm of their own.
This industry has become 2 dimensional as it transcended into a 3D world.
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Post by moozooh »

That's what I meant by lo-res aesthetics. To me, scanlines mean nothing that I wouldn't be able to do without. If a game was made for lo-res, then had its scanline count doubled, it's one thing. If a game is made exactly for double the amount of scanlines, you'll lose much more by downscaling it. If anything, I'd rather say higher resolution gives more artistic freedom to begin with.
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Post by gennss »

the majority of people i know haven't even upgraded to hd-tv! But even then depends on the game. Shmups should do fine, they're primarily about gameplay.
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Re: Will HD eventually make us shy away from SD gaming?

Post by elvis »

neorichieb1971 wrote:Has any shmup been released in 720p + and been successful? I don't think so, but once that first title hits, it will change the genre forever.
I don't think it will. 3D "high res" gaming has been popular for over 10 years. The first Nvidia Geforce video card hit the market in 1999, and even before then people were already pushing 1024x768 (aka 720p).

In that time there's been plenty of 2D, low-res games released.

High def 3D has brought improvements to some genres. Arguable the First Person Shooter and Driving games took a leap forwards in the advent of 3D. But for side-scrolling platform games and IMHO shmups, it's made bugger all difference to actual gameplay (which still is the part that matters).
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Post by trivial »

For the sake of my eyes and head, I'd rather see higher vsynced refresh rates than rezzes above 640p. Doujin PC shmups still play at 60Hz usually. Forget LCD and throw in more gameplay clocks FFS. Don't care about the slowness of reaction time; care about time's perceptible granularity, real vsync, and lag.

The conventional arcade CRT should have been replaced by multiscanning CRT's instead of any extant pixel-based display. It's a boutique application anyway, with no use for extreme sharpness. Remember this when formulating conspiracies about ports to console, because it looks to me like anyone would port their game for enough money.
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Post by elvis »

trivial wrote:The conventional arcade CRT should have been replaced by multiscanning CRT's instead of any extant pixel-based display. It's a boutique application anyway, with no use for extreme sharpness.
Welcome to economics of scale. Arcades will use whatever's plentiful and cheap.

32"+ high-res CRTs are expensive and heavy, and don't make economic sense.
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Post by SuperPang »

I personally think 9:16 danmaku won't work and we'll see borders.

I'd effing love to see a Treasure or G-rev hori on Type X 2 though.
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Post by moozooh »

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Post by SuperPang »

I said tate :P

I think 1942 Joint Strike proved widescreen vertical shooters just don't work
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