Unrecord

[Neon Ignition]

https://www.eurogamer.net/photorealistic-bodycam-game-unrecord-gets-official-trailer-steam-page

A new trailer has gone up for single player tactical FPS Unrecord which takes place from a bodycam POV. The game also has a steam page with the developer confirming that the game is very Unreal and also very real

[QualityChimp]

Y'know, I'm going to be that guy and call shenanigans.

No way this is the work of one guy and a game.

Happy to eat my (nacho) hat if I'm wrong.

[Asura]

No way this is the work of one guy and a game.

Nah, it definitely is.

The whole thing looks to be done with photogrammetry. Very powerful tool, but it's the modern 3D environment equivalent of using photos for sprites in 16-bit games. Can look amazing, but it's very limited what you can do with it. Perfect for a high-concept indie game though.

I've tried a bunch of similar things in VR, and see near-photo-real environments on the Quest. At one of the big VR expos a few years ago a company did a load of alleyways in Venice like this, and you could walk through them. Very impressive stuff.

[QualityChimp]

We'll see.

I guess I've seen this kind of thing too many times to believe it.
Rise of the Robots, Aliens: Colonial Marines, Night Trap and so on.

Fair play, he's done a no-clip video too, though.

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[Asura]

Fair play, he's done a no-clip video too, though

Good on him, I guess. A lot of people think it's a video. Admittedly though, it's a 3D environment created by running a camera through a location and recording it from every conceivable angle to create a 3D version. In a very real sense, it is a photograph. Just one you can step into and walk around.

It's great to see though, because I always love to see someone take a technique and then elevate it to its most absurd degree.

[QualityChimp]

Oh yeah, I want to be proved wrong!

Hopefully it's as good as its preview.

[wakka]

The graphics are incredible. Never seen anything like it. Very interesting to have the outline of the technique used.

[fuse]

As the forum's most tech-savvy type, I can confirm that they made it by attaching the jobber off the top of the Google Street View car and then walking through the abandoned building very slowly.

To get uncharacteristically serious for a second though, I do genuinely dislike that the first application of this hyper-realist VR application is based on a gritty urban environment where a cop is shooting at 'bad guys'. The increase in realism runs parallel to my level of discomfort with the whole thing.

[Asura]

As the forum's most tech-savvy type, I can confirm that they made it by attaching the jobber off the top of the Google Street View car and then walking through the abandoned building very slowly.

Honestly not that far off.

To get uncharacteristically serious for a second though, I do genuinely dislike that the first application of this hyper-realist VR application is based on a gritty urban environment where a cop is shooting at 'bad guys'. The increase in realism runs parallel to my level of discomfort with the whole thing.

I suspect it's because to do this, you've got to move the capture device, to get all your depth data and photo data through an actual place - and they just happened to have access to an old industrial unit that they were able to distress and make a few cursory changes to in order to make a viable set. So unless you've got a huge budget, it's always going to be in a realistic-looking place, or you'd have to actually build, I dunno, a Star Destroyer interior.

[nonny]

Impressive, but equally I don't know if I want my games looking that realistic...

[Wools]

Really love the atmosphere and hyper realism, which are at odds with the pixelated censorship. That takes it up a notch for me as I’m interested to see where the developer takes it.

[huxley]

This would be incredible in VR.

[Asura]

This would be incredible in VR.

It's a real shame it wasn't a permanent thing, but you can see a lot of stuff like this at VKET.

That's the VR expo, kinda like Comicon, but it's ran entirely within VR; you can visit on a few clients but VRChat is the easiest, and it's back in July.

The demo I saw was actually by a company which was doing this - like, each scene in which they placed you, there was a little signpost with their email and phone number, in case you were a business that had need of photogrammetry services. It was really impressive.

[QualityChimp]

Something as hyper-realistic as this, but in VR and playing something non-shooty like "Everyone's Gone To The Rapture" would be next-level gaming for me.

EDIT: I've got a boardgame called Chronicles of Crime where you put on VR goggles to investigate a crime scene then report back to your team what you saw. A police procedural game could be interesting, or a Poirot-style investigation.

I'm letting my imagination get away with something I'm still not convinced is a proper game, though.

[huxley]

Did they use photogrammetry in Half-life Alyx? Some if it looks similar.