Valve stake their entry for graphical achievement of 2003

[replicant]

Half Life 2 - all real time, all in game.











It amazes me how graphics are still improving at this stage.

[C']

I like the look of the prison type level. Looks really fun to play.

[Treble]

I've always thought lighting, size of levels, lack of pop-up and excellent draw distance are more important that intricate detail. If Doom 3 and this get the lighting perfect, everything else is secondary imo.

Tis looking excellent so far.

[1P_King]

**** me, i am going to need a new PC

[Flojomojo]

Wow, decent outdoor FPS shooting, in daylight no less. Cool!

[Molloy]

Christ above. That looks stunning. Blows Doom3 and its limited environments out of the water.

I'm going to be springing for a new PC in 6 months time.

[Max M]

It looks very impressive and is a good example of how next-gen consoles should look, but I must admit that I get worried by visuals like this... as gaming gets more and more realistic, all the imagination and creativity that got me into gaming in the first place seems to be slowly trickling away.

I just hope we continue to see different art styles like Pikmin, ICO and Rez to go with the realistic stuff, but with the sales of some of those games and the cries of "kiddy!" towards Nintendo all the time, I can't help but worry about gaming's future.

The day every game looks like The Getaway is the day I quit gaming. Having said that, the Shenmue series is a good example of how a game world can be very realistic, but still be atmospheric.

[Baroque]

Half Life 2 - all real time, all in game.

It amazes me how graphics are still improving at this stage.

Nawh!
We've only started along the 3D path, look at the Final Fantasy: The Spirit Within, or Pixar's upcoming Finding Nemo. The technology to render those moves further down towards the consumer everyday, where the bottle neck is right now, and where it will be in the future is the sheer amount of people you need to get that level of detail onto the screen.

[Tobal]

Let hope they improve the gameplay, cos if its just Half-life with new amazing graphics there no point in playing it the worlds moved on and HL gameplay is super boring and dated today compared to the console efforts.

What beast of machine will we need to get this playing at good Frame-rate?

[Vaipon]

Very nice water effects. I think Doom3 is a lot more impressive personally though. Dunno, maybe I just need to see some more darkly lit HL2 shots before I'm totally convinced...

[JRMacumber]

Last night I read Half-Life 2 previews in two different magazines. They both must have been at the same showing, because they were pretty much identical. Still, it sounds absolutely amazing, and I cannot wait to play it. Half-Life and all its add-ons are getting worn out on my PC.

[Dj Lucky Strike]

Jesus that lightin usin blue filters really makes it look real!!

[bash]

Words. . . cannot. . . . . . describe. . .

*dies!*

[Magnakai]

Hmm.
Am I the only one who's not really impressed by these? Sure, they're nice looking. I guess there's a pretty high polygon count. Nice pixel-shaded water... Even so, from a purely graphical level, it's not nearly as impressive as Doom III was to me. From a genuine gameplay perspective, I'm anticipating Half Life 2 far more than Doom III. I really like the look of these open levels. Those gasmasks that those guys are wearing look pretty sinister.

And for the record, I think that little details are the way forward. I want lots of things to point and go "oooh" at. And I want to notice new little things on the third time through. My only real concern is that these levels look a bit sparse...
But it's early days. I'm certainly looking forward to it.

[Super Stu]

As a PC owner since the CGA days, I'll assume youre taking the piss. Whether you think theyre as good as Doom3 or not, theyre a cut above anything seen before in a FPS.

PC starting to lead the way graphically, once again.