Pre-rendered 3d - amazing gaming tech lost in time

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Full-motion_video
This technique hasn't been used in games for decades.

>stage is pre-rendered video
>engine camera is synchronized with the video
>this allows for immensely more advanced graphics that have no virtually no weight on the graphics card

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This game was released in 1996 and ran on every shitty PC.

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  1. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    wtf this is amazing you're a fricking genius for knowing about this

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      Did your mommy leave you unsupervised again so you're going into every thread to leave a le sarcastic reddit quip? Take your meds please

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        Boomers are truly worst generation.
        Not even zoomers with their shit are this repurgant and pathetic.

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          >t. Zoomer

          • 1 year ago
            Anonymous

            No, millenial.
            And no, you are worse than zoomies.

  2. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    Can’t work with lighting engines, so it won’t be used again except maybe by indies. I really couldn’t care less about cinematic lighting, especially since the pre-rendered lighting in the past looked better anyway

  3. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    It's a neat workaround for the techinical limitations at the time but there's no reason to use this anymore. Why spend time and effort to pre-render the scene and then sync it up with the camera when you can just use the already made scene directly at runtime?

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      Because 3d effects still add input lag and require fat cards to run the latest visuals.

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        >Because 3d effects still add input lag

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          All post-processing adds input lag. Were you not aware of this?

          • 1 year ago
            Anonymous

            Explain.

            • 1 year ago
              Anonymous

              This is modern gaming on the 3d effects meme being pushed by graphic card companies for the past 20 years. Post processing sucks for gaming and there's virtually no workaround other than turning off the effects.

              These effects were made originally for video rendering, not gaming. In gaming these effects have to be processed after your input.

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                That's not due to "3d effects" you absolute moron.

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                Since the intention to move can be detected before you actually do it, just put a neural implant in your brain. Then we can have both realistic animation and responsive input.

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                What the heck do you think "3d effects" means?
                For instance, in the game of the video there's lighting rendering, that's a 3d effect. Except since it uses the pre-rendering technique it has no effect on input.

                What a modern game does is basically doing the rendering of this 3d effect after every input you give.

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                As long as frames aren't delayed (e.g. vsync), it doesn't matter how much computation is done between each frame. 60 FPS is 60 FPS regardless, and will (usually) poll your input 60 times, resolving it once per frame. That has nothing to do with "3D effects"

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                moron

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                k

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                go look up what a hardware interrupt is you goddamn ignoramus

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                post process impacts input, but also the wireless controller and just shitty design that doesn't prioritize input snapiness does too, we really just need someone to develop some tech that offsets a frames rendering based on input, similarly to what they do with VR head placement.

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                It's been done but it's way more obvious on flat screens than in VR and it doesn't actually improve latency, just the perception of latency. It's good for preventing dizziness and nausea in VR, but that's about it.

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                you are genuinely moronic anon

          • 1 year ago
            Anonymous

            >All post-processing adds input lag
            >Post processing sucks for gaming and there's virtually no workaround other than turning off the effects.
            peak dunning-kruger

          • 1 year ago
            Anonymous

            Explain.

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7idBKCEgYzU

            This is modern gaming on the 3d effects meme being pushed by graphic card companies for the past 20 years. Post processing sucks for gaming and there's virtually no workaround other than turning off the effects.

            These effects were made originally for video rendering, not gaming. In gaming these effects have to be processed after your input.

            post processing does add input lag, but not for any of the reasons this moron mentioned

            post processing, as the name implies, adds extra fluff to an already rendered frame. The frame is already there, the models are in place, everything is good, but then an effect is applied over every pixel depending on the complexity of the shader you're using. So yeah by definition post processing does technically add input lag simply because the frame will take a tiny little more to render fully. This however is mostly stupid when you consider 60 FPS sets 16.6ms per frame and the impact of post processing is barely 1% of that

            • 1 year ago
              Anonymous

              >60 FPS sets 16.6ms per frame and the impact of post processing is barely 1% of that
              You're claiming post-processing and other 3d effects add less than .1ms? Have you being smoking something? Or maybe you live in a cave? Just launch any game and try it out with and without post processing right now and see for yourself.

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        All post-processing adds input lag. Were you not aware of this?

        Yeah you go play shitty fixed-camera 3D 1990s games to avoid those 2ms of added lag then.

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7idBKCEgYzU

        This is modern gaming on the 3d effects meme being pushed by graphic card companies for the past 20 years. Post processing sucks for gaming and there's virtually no workaround other than turning off the effects.

        These effects were made originally for video rendering, not gaming. In gaming these effects have to be processed after your input.

        You have zero clue what you're talking about, just the fact that you call them "effects" shows that.

  4. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    >this allows for immensely more advanced graphics that have no virtually no weight on the graphics card
    I don't think many consumers had a graphics card that did more than spit out the pixel the CPU sent to the framebuffer in 1996.

  5. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    cool looking game

    honestly it feels like a lot of design ability has been lost over time

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      Limitations bred creativity. Plus these guys were real enthusiasts while modern programmers are just pajeets and half of modern designers don’t even like videogames or anything that used to influence the older designers (like DnD)

  6. 1 year ago
    Anonymous
  7. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    People just don't like 3D with fixed camera angles.

  8. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    HEEAW
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    urghhhh
    HEEAW
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    TSUH
    TSUH

  9. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    you know computers are powerful enough to do real-time 3D graphics now right?

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      hes a /vr/ homosexual they are moronic

  10. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    Damn I suddenly remember that I forgot all about Time Commando. Even though I enjoyed it, it sucked though. Despite this post it was, dare I say it, very clunky.

  11. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    >This technique hasn't been used in games for decades.
    For good reason, you dumb c**t.

  12. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    3d is more than just graphics. Having to use a fixed camera angle would make a lot of genres impossible and most other games would be a worse experience.

  13. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    the problem with prerendered shit is you change the display resolution and it looks fricked instantly

  14. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    This technique is alive and well in Hidden Object games

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      But those aren't 3D. That's just a static-image background with sprites in front of it

  15. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    Was fear effect done with this technique?

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      Evidently. You can see that 3d model on the left sticks out due to lack of AA.

  16. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    you can render the best cgi scenes in old 1990s games in real time now with even better graphics

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      >with even better graphics
      That's subjective

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        I could literally take your favourite 3d pre-rendered scene or even cinematic and remake it as a real time fully interactive game scene with objectively improved graphics

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          Be my guest. I'd be first in line to buy (you)r game

          • 1 year ago
            Anonymous

            [...]

            We could actually achieve this in real time now, this is just raytracing with some very specific settings (e.g. harder shadows), simpler BRDFs, and appropriate art direction. Back then it had to be baked of course, today it could be done at runtime (probably less intensive than fancy super soft scattered RT games try to achieve too).

            • 1 year ago
              Anonymous

              I'm sure we could, theoretically, but no developer seems interested. Probably "not worth it" because it's not conducive to making another open-world third-person-over-the-shoulder action-adventure game that looks and plays like a movie

          • 1 year ago
            Anonymous

            I wonder how much time they spent to model this one train car for this one angle and then use it literally as one background out of X.

            • 1 year ago
              Anonymous

              Its still 90% mostly the same workflow as if you used the objects.
              The difference is that you don't need to deal with the fact the source platform can't render any of it realtime, so you render it instead of doing a complex retopo/baking process to get simple enough geometry.

            • 1 year ago
              Anonymous

              Probably not as much as you'd think. Assuming they plan the scenes out ahead of time, you're working with a static camera, so anything not in view obviously doesn't need to exist. It's a bit like creating a set for a movie; you take all the shortcuts you can to save on time and money

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          Be my guest. I'd be first in line to buy (you)r game

  17. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    I wasn't expecting to see a Ganker thread with a Time Commando screenshot today.

    You are based.

  18. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    We can do a lot better than that in real time these days, do you have a point?

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      [...]
      Yeah you go play shitty fixed-camera 3D 1990s games to avoid those 2ms of added lag then.
      [...]
      You have zero clue what you're talking about, just the fact that you call them "effects" shows that.

      Yes, this can be used with modern 3d rendering for much better results than Time Commando (1996).

      This technique is alive and well in Hidden Object games

      You can actually have camera movement with pre-rendered 3d and you could theoretically even go back and forth and it's just that no one ever bothered expanding on it.

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        >and it's just that no one ever bothered expanding on it.
        There's nothing to expand upon, there's only 2 reasons to use pre rendered, you're using heavily limited hardware and want visual quality beyond that, including dense scenes or scenes that cut to a completely different scene quickly or you want a nostalgic look, on modern hardware you no longer have the kinds of limitations that would require pre rendered cutscenes.

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          >you want a nostalgic look
          It has nothing to do with nostalgia. See:

          Be my guest. I'd be first in line to buy (you)r game

          [...]

          >modern hardware you no longer have the kinds of limitations
          Okay then, show me modern graphics that will have this level of detail where everything on the scene is alive:

          [...]

          There was no "overcoming" of limitations, rendering takes graphic cards that cost money. A nearly photo-realistic game would cost the lasted graphics card running with raytracing and input lag; whilst pre-rendering could achieve the same look on a computer running with integrated graphics.

          • 1 year ago
            Anonymous

            input lag comes from a chain of things with the controller itself being the first, especially with wireless input devices being the standard these days and the last of which is the display itself, as far as rendering goes it's caused by a frame not being rendered in time and post process effects, computer doesn't care if frame is real time or pre rendered it still has to draw that frame and if it can do the real time frame sans post process in a specific timeframe then it does it, obviously there's a difference in power but even entry level these days is able to outdo CG from the 90s to the early 10s, as in no ray tracing, you add in ray tracing you're getting games that look as good as mid 10s cgi films.
            >rendering takes graphic cards that cost money
            b***h being poor is not an argument against rendering technology, you know what else costs money games.
            The screenshot is from a game that also launched on 8th gen hardware, it could look a lot better on current gen hardware.

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Anm_F89z7ks

            Resident Evil Zero's minium is a GTX260,
            >https://technical.city/en/video/GeForce-GTX-260-vs-HD-Graphics-620
            That's comparable to integrated graphics (CPU) from 2016.

            And again, the graphic quality is nearly unlimited. They could have added more detail if they wanted and it would not hurt performance. That's the value of this tech.

            >the graphic quality is nearly unlimited
            No, because now you have to severely limit your game and bloat it through the roof as well as remove any dynamism, if you wanted to do say a single train scene, just 1 car in 4k@60fps where the camera moves on a dolly from one end to the other mixed with all the dynamism you are looking at gigabytes of data, and if you want to have a scrolling background outside of the train that doesn't just repeat every few seconds that gigabytes more data, and god forbid you have anything in the pre rendered scene change because now you have to re render and store the entire interior scene again, and don't for a second think you can just change a small area, frick no the bounce lighting would be all off and you could see a visible seam around that area because of those changes. You could do the same scene in real time for mere gigabytes and it would look better because now the player character is able to impact the lighting of the scene as well.

            • 1 year ago
              Anonymous

              Dumb rambling.
              >input lag comes from a chain of things with the controller itself being the first
              Wrong, post-processing amounts to a significant amount of input lag.

              Ray tracing adds at least 30ms of input lag.
              DLSS, the new promised feature to improve performance, is currently bragging for reducing its input lag from over 100ms to 50ms.

              Add up all those post-processing features together plus a bit of the monitor and you get essentially a game being streamed from south to north America. That's NOT the controller, you buffoon.

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                >it's only post process that does input lag
                >there's literally no other source
                >it's literally the same for every single game no matter what post process effect you use
                >didn't even mention dlss but still talks about it like i did
                >completely ignores that it's actually the ai denoise from the ray tracing that causes the input lag
                >didn't even say it was just the controller but trys to claim that's what i said
                Shit reply, try again.

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                >I made a dumb argument so I'm gonna make a series of greentexts inventing a list of strawman arguments you didn't made so I can win

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                So not only did you completely ignore the point of my argument, but your post is nothing but strawman, fricking hell you are moronic.
                That's 2 shitty attempts.

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                A controller is attached with a 70cm wire directly into the machine. It is not gonna be an input lag problem. You need to chase for the worst Bluetooth controllers to get an input lag of over 20ms from it.

                No, moron, input lag from modern games is coming from post-processing and because normies are so dull-brained they buy games based on graphics alone and don't notice a .5 second delay.

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                RDR2 input lag is mainly due to them wanting cinematic animations and not responsive ones that jerk the character with near infinite acceleration.

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                My whole point was that input lag was cumulative, I didn't even say that the controller was a core source, just that it's a start and eve pointed out that that's mostly an issue with everyone moving to wireless controllers, because who doesn't, everyone plays wirelessly, well that was that micro point, the rest of it is a completely separate point, pay attention gay.

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          Resident Evil Zero's minium is a GTX260,
          >https://technical.city/en/video/GeForce-GTX-260-vs-HD-Graphics-620
          That's comparable to integrated graphics (CPU) from 2016.

          And again, the graphic quality is nearly unlimited. They could have added more detail if they wanted and it would not hurt performance. That's the value of this tech.

  19. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    i hate how deceptive nostalgia gays are. Probably because i empathise with them and like old games too.
    Trying to convince people to return to pre-rendered because its easier on the gpu is hilarious and dumb

  20. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    Time Commando is such a piece of shit game.

  21. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    Didn't rail shooters do this all the time?

  22. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    >This technique hasn't been used in games for decades
    It has, but it's very hard to pull off in full 3D games, and really limits where and how it can be used.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      To be fair, Myst pulled off integrating FMV with the environments a lot better in 1993 than Obduction did in 2016. They really just did a shitty job, and the game was fricking boring to play

  23. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    It hasn't been used in decades because it's obsolete technology and the number of genres it's even viable for is seriously limited.

  24. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    Op you are a dumb but don't feel sad there is a valid reason for wanting pre-rendered games again
    >because you want it.
    What this? what is this sorcery? where is the logical technical justification for it. There is none.
    You just want it. So get to it and make it.

  25. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    my mom wouldnt let me play this game because she say I was killing animals in the prehistoric stage 🙁 my dad beat it though so thats cool

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      >my dad beat it though so thats cool
      beat your mom?

  26. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    wegs still proudly keep the prerendered aesthetic alive to this day

  27. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    >*thrusts spear*
    >FRICK FRICK FRICK FRICK FRICK

  28. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    lol is this why those levels wouldn't let you move backwards?

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