Cryengine... Cry.

So, I was watching a cryengine demo video... I mean hello? Let me condense the script. To one line.

CryEngine can do anything, apart from the things that actually have anything to do with how worth playing a game is. So, CryEngine can do anything, so long as it doesn't involve a game. Okay, so cryengine can do nothing. Oh, wait, it can melt your CPU. Pretty impressive, ne?

Uhm... No? Never in my life have I gone "OMFG, it;s so realistic!" while playing a game. Never will I. The closest I can come, is "Glass things break when you shoot them? It's almost like a minigame!". Glass breaking is fun. I am never, ever, ever, ever going to think "Whoa! Dynamic shadows! I think I will stand here, then walk over there, and watch the shadow shorten! I have found something fun to do in this piece of shite game! I'm having so much fun! I love this game, I will recommend it to all my friends!". I PROMISE. Graphics exist for one reason, and one reason only. So the player can see what they are doing. Somethign that clearly went right over the heads of the people who made Guild Wars. They seemed to think the purpose of graphics was to make it so hard to see what you are doing that your head hurts and you get the fuck off their server, you freeloading bastard. For their successes in this area, I commend them. I commended them first by not buying their game, and second by not buying any of the expansion packs. Now, graphics can be beautiful. Good graphics are about DESIGN. The graphics in Deus Ex are better than the graphics in Crysis. Wanna know why? There's blue glowing stuff, a dark eerie ambiance, and I can see what I am doing. Everything has square edges. Oh my fucking god, shockhorror. I like square edges. I miss them in real life. The graphics in Arcanum CANNOT BE IMPROVED APON (except there should be more character sprites!). Now, here is a total, complete list of all the instances in which it is ACCEPTABLE to use 3d graphics:

• The game is impossible if it is not rotational. This rotation is impossible in 2d.

Realmyst graphics are shite. The graphics in myst are bad out of lazyness, not technical restraints, and if they rendered the graphics in realmyst, and left them like myst, with a few more animations, the game wouldn't have sucked cock. End of story. The people who thought "oooh, NWN should be 3d are the people responsible for the demo being better than the game. As are the peple who made all the levels after the first one pigshit. The people who said "ooh, make it avaliable for linux!" are the saving grace.

Back to this demo... all of the examples of cool things the character can do are followed by BOG STANDARD animations. Oh, look, he can walk like any other game character in existence. Fricken A. And object motion blur? Remember how graphics exist to allow people to SEE WHAT THEY ARE DOING EASILY? Right. Remove the motion blur. Along with every other kind of blur. Apart from blur it so they don't notice it's shite blur (the latest photoshop filter). And what is the difference between "enhanced cinematic effects" and, INGAME CUTSCENES? which are a huge technological advance that featured in such recent* games as FFVII**. Which also shouldn't have been 3d out of battle.
* 1992? Well, not this millenium, decade, or since the last E3 anyway.
** allong with... well, FF. FFII. Etc. Pretty much every game ever.