SO.. the graphics of SL vs. other 'games'?

If we're comparing SL's environment to that of others, I think the level that we can achieve is on a par with something like Oblivion or Vanguard. Even EQ2 at its higher settings has incredible environmental graphics in regards to local flora.

The SL atmosphere and water quality using Windlight is simply stunning, and I can't think of another game with the exception of Oblivion that really comes close to achieving the same quality.

WoW is full of rich, vibrant colors, but the design is overall "cartoony". So you sacrifice realism for performance, since the more cartoonish graphics mean WoW can be played on just about any machine. EQ2 is heading in a similar direction. I've noticed that while the environments are still much more realistic than WoW's, the game is moving towards brighter, more vibrant environmental colors (as seen in the last two expansion packs.)

On the whole though, I think what we are capable of producing in SL exceeds the quality of those two games, though they are less taxing in terms of draw distance. So I can stand from quite a good distance away in WoW or EQ2 and get a stunning vista, while in SL I frequently miss out on seeing vistas even with draw distance maxed.

I'll be happy when SL gets weather effects.

Image a sunny evening, in the distance a thunderstorm brews. Cracks of lightning light up the sky. The rain starts to trickle, running down the sides of buildings and off roof tops. Avatars who remain in the rain glisten with wet clothes. The wind kicks up as the storm moves in and the sound of rain pattering on the side walk. Lightning sparkles across the now dark sky.

Or picture a gental snow storm or blizzard, where snowflakes whirl around in the wind.

I know there are partical generators that do similar things, but I'm talking about weather patterns moving across entire islands/regions.

*sigh*

Oh, and higher quality avatars with more animation points (more in spine, fingers, etc). They're quite blocky and ackward moving for a '07 "simulation".

Obviously, the main problem with realistic weather effects is detecting roofs. I like the idea of avatars clothes looking wet, but in slightly different situations

Lightning could look amazing.

SL lacks (lots I'm forgetting/don't know about probably):

* functional lights (all we have is a point light)
* realistic light (light just does not shine through a wall)
* shadows
* arbitrary reflective surfaces
* ability to create trees on par with the LL supplied ones
* decent animations / avie skeleton / avie mesh

You can use textures/techniques to cover a lot of those shortcomings up, but mirroring a build to simulate a reflective surface will never look as good as an actual reflective surface for instance.

Noone will ever envy SL for visual quality on even the best looking build, but that doesn't really matter since it's not about the visuals anyway.

I have a picture of my RL daughter in my house. It isn't going anywhere.

Actually, they did have arbitrary reflective surfaces a while back. It's still in the debug settings as "RenderDynamicReflections." Windlight has broken it, but prior to that, it was pretty spiffy. Though if you went into mouse look, the reflections would stop rendering your head.

SL has great graphic can look everybit as good as WoW and other games, as long as you don't actually move or try to drive a vehicle
There needs to be a way to reduce the repeatative streaming over the internet requirement.

The final graphics quality of a game is a combination of the capabilities of the rendering engine used, and more importantly how these capabilities are made available to the graphics/scene designer.

Although SL (especially with windlight) has some great technology behind it, most of the interfaces to expose these capabilities have been severely 'dumbed' down, to be manageable by the 'average user'.

If you for instance compare the interface and complexity of the material editor system in the unreal 3 engine. (screenshot: http://www.unrealtechnology.com/screens/MaterialEditor.jpg) with the simplicity of the 'texture tab' in SL, you clearly see why SL, even with great technology behind it, has a tough time competing with the big names out there on the graphics level.

If we want SL to look as good as this generation of games, the designers need to have the same level of control over the engine, as the professional designers have using the modern high end engines. The issue is, that if the SL system would have interfaces this complex, they would probably only be manageable by a few, dedicated professionals.

We see the effects on the interface of offering the opportunities of a highly complex lighting technology in SL in the windlight interface, which is clearly much more configurable and of a much higher complexity as most other interfaces in SL.

SL will generally, never look as good as modern games, as long as the interfaces, exposed to the designers will mostly be dumbed down, to keep them manageable for most people.

Actually SL is atm doing a pretty good job in 'automatically filling in the blanks', which would normally need to be dealt with by a professional scene designer. Automated systems can never replace a skilled individual though.

Yes, it does. I've seen better looking "Free-To-Play" MMO's that look 100 times better.

I read somewhere that to keep SL on your Hard Drive would require at least a Petabyte of Hard Drive space. SO- hook up 1024 One TerraByte Hard Drives & YOU TOO!!! Can have SL stored in its entirety on your system for ease of rezzing!!!

I love using benchmarks just to see how my system compares to others. I score high for Oblivion (LOVED it!!!), Half Life2, Pretty high on Crysis, and "OMFG" for others. For SL, my system runs it rather well but with some ocaissional glitches.......

But I still wouldnt trade SL for any of 'em! I keep coming back! I get to socialize without "LFG!! Need Paladins!! Payment Upon Completion" or "Hey? Wanna trade?" (which is code for 'I wann try to rip you off').

As Damanios stated, SL will never be on par with the likes of UnReal 3, Crysis and the like. BUT- we can dream & hope!!!

If you'd really like to compare other online MMO's, my favs at the moment: Silkroad Online, Tales of Pirates, Space Cowboy and Rappelz. All Free To Play. I'd say 9Dragons, but they banned me for an "inappropriate name" after 6 months. LOL! LongDingDong of the Heavenly Demon Clan is no more! Besides, they had some hefty censorship of everything.

That looks quite similar to the editors in Lightwave and TrueSpace, both of which some SL content creators _do_ use.

Again it comes down to the issue I posted above, of how much of "the graphics" you want to attribute to the artist rather than the system. SL can only do shadows if you draw them yourself - but there _are_ other 3D games that do their shadows this way.

I think at some point we have to take the attitude that professional designers can make pretty much anything look good, and therefore we have to look at SL (or graphics engines in general) in terms of how it treats less skilled work, or even non-designs (eg, "how does that plywood cube look?". I know that screenshots of that kind of thing (the infamous spinning cubes with reflection ) are routinely used to give examples of graphics engines.

In WOW you have to remember the game evolved over a number of years, and as I understand things some builds were adapted/ported in from previous Blizzard games.

Having said that some regions are much better than others although in part I accept some of my views may be personal preference. In particular Moonglade appears a little dated, but by comparison The Burning Gorge, Tanaris, and Winterglade are quite good.


As far as the major cities are concerned (I am an Alliance player) my all out favourite is Ironforge, which in terms of graphics is stunning (although I keep getting lost despite the guards maps)

In Second Life the best sites to look at in terms of multiple Sims well built include the Caledon Sims and some of the Dreamland Estate. Victoria City in Caledon can offer a fair view of SL's graphic abilities from a city viewpoint. At top end SL's graphics are perhaps better but for an all round experience including weather and sound WoW comes out on top.

And of course SL will almost certainly never match WoW for performance but that is because of technical software issues (WoW builds are static - SL evolves) although again in the next expansion pack, The Litch King, there is supposed or rumoured to be siege engines destroying buildings

Just a personal view, BTW I have not really visited EU, does anyone else here have views on EU graphics?

So do...most..games don't they? And SL is included in that 'most'

Google is my friend =P

I truly don't know.. but performance wise they are completely different beasts aren't they? Is there any cloth simulation is WoW? I don't remember it from the week I played lol..
And aside from problems caused by the streaming, I can't think of anything in WoW not achievable in SL. Destroying buildings... possible. Siege engines..possible. Weapons, possible, taurans (lol), possible... mounts, possible... everything seems possible...

and sorry but my personal opinion is still and probably will always be that WoW is the bane of the online world... along with Runescape