E3 Rumor Control: Killzone 2 real-time renders and 360 retro-compatibility

[UPDATE] This week: Final Fantasy XI will look the same in the HD era.

RUMOR #1: The Killzone PlayStation 3 tech demo was prerendered.

Source: Forums all over the place, such as this thread on Evil Avatar.

The official story: See below.

What we heard: When the lights at Monday's PlayStation 3 demo came up, the audience members picked up their jaws off the floor...and began wagging their tongues. Like a game version of the Kennedy assassination, the audience quickly split into two camps: Those who thought the demo was prerendered, making it essentially computer animation, and those who thought it was rendered in real time, which means it would be close, graphically, to actual gameplay. The fires of speculation were fueled further by the ambiguous comments of Jan-Bart Van Beek, game director of the PS3 Killzone at Guerrilla Games, to the official PlayStation UK site."It's basically a representation of the look and feel of the game we're trying to make," he said. Then a post on the Eurogamer forums laid out a tantalizing conspiracy: Axis Animation, the same Scottish computer animation company that made a cinematic for the first Killzone, had been working on the E3 demo for months as straight-up CG. So how does Sony respond to the allegations? Far from being evasive, it met them head-on. "Yes, it is real time," a rep told GameSpot.

Bogus or not bogus?: Believe Sony? Bogus. Think Sony's lying? Not Bogus.

RUMOR #2: The Xbox 360 won't be backward compatible after all.

Source: British industry news site Gamesindustry.biz.

The official story: See below.

What we heard: Microsoft carefully parsed its words about the Xbox 360's backward compatibility by saying it will be "backward-compatible with top-selling Xbox games." So when Gamesindustry.biz published an article revealing the console's radically different hardware couldn't support current-gen Xbox games, accusation perfidy in Redmond began to fly. "The solution Microsoft has reached is apparently to recompile current-gen Xbox games so that they can be played on the 360," says G'biz. "First on the list, it says, are the best-selling Halo titles." However, Xbox owners were the only ones freaking out. The usually recalcitrant Microsoft bypassed its external public relations company, telling GameSpot directly that, "Our goal is to have every Xbox game work on Xbox 360. You will NOT need to purchase a new 'version.' Your original games will work on Xbox 360."

Bogus or not bogus?: Bogus.

RUMOR #3: Final Fantasy XI will not undergo any graphical enhancements before it is ported to the Xbox 360.

Source: Gee whiz! It's G'biz! Again! Again!

The official story: "Microsoft does not comment on rumors or speculation."--Microsoft spokesperson. Square Enix was unavailable for comment as of press time.

What we heard: One of the biggest selling points of Microsoft's press conference was the fact that it was publishing Final Fantasy XI for the Xbox 360. However, by itself, that "revelation" was only moderately impressive. Considering that Sony showed off Final Fantasy XII at its conference, people naturally assumed that FFXI would be graphically upgraded to fit in with Microsoft corporate vice president and chief XNA architect J Allard's self-proclaimed "HD era" of high-resolution graphics. So when G'biz wrote that no such upgrade was in the works, people were surprised. However, GameSpot's source close to Microsoft said not to worry...sort of. "Every next-gen Xbox title will be optimized for 720p and 1080i resolutions, and at least support 5.1 surround sound. You won't get that with another version of FFXI." That said, you'd think that if the $50-billion-cash-flush Microsoft was using Final Fantasy XI as its centerpiece launch MMORPG, it would likely shell out for some new textures. But if it is, why isn't Microsoft talking about it? [UPDATE] However, once the dust settled from the chaos of E3, American Square Enix reps finally got back to GameSpot--and confirmed that no plans are afoot to revamp FFXI's graphics. "We want users to access the same content no matter where they are accessing from," said a rep in a brief statement.

Bogus or not bogus?: Now confirmed as not bogus.

15 Comments

  • TheDecoy2124

    Posted Jan 30, 2009 3:06 am PT

    Maybe no ones seen the new Killzone trailers or anything, their basically proof it wasn't prerendered.

  • shakensparco

    Posted Jan 22, 2009 5:09 pm PT

    Due to what was said in the interview, I have a feeling the Killzone trailer was indeed fake.

  • amulbocus

    Posted May 14, 2008 5:54 am PT

    Warkunt, i reckon your right mate GS have always been a 360 biased games site. Look at Pulse TV, most of the games are 360 versions, and they hardly play unreal 3 for the ps3. When the 360 version comes out i bet they will hold full on tournaments on ut3. Your spot on about Oblivion for ps3 w hich i one of my faves, but got less than the 360 version even though is by far the better version in every way!! Oh well let the 360 owners get theyr'e last hurrah before its RIP.

  • Heromoua

    Posted Jan 2, 2008 6:01 pm PT

    Well, after the E3 trailer this year, we look back to the first trailer as not bogus, because all of the graphical were still in tact, in fact even better....it was just the presentation of the first trailer that wasn't there.

  • FFVIIROCKS

    Posted Jul 11, 2007 10:27 pm PT

    So what it Killzone 2 was prerendered? Big effin deal... it was still cool and they did a great job at persuading me into getting it when it comes out right? thats all its about and so what if its not the clearest most coolest graphics around... its if the mo fo plays well, handles well, has fun gameplay is what matters most... and if you compare the graphics to 5 years ago...im pretty sure youd be fine with what ya got now. They will eventually get to a point where the graphics cant get any better, and i believe were getting close.

    and if its not prerendered, hell yeah, PS3 will be the only system that can pull this huge of a feat off.

    (halo 3 is overrated, gonna be decent, but way overrated)

  • smokingsbad

    Posted Jun 26, 2007 1:45 am PT

    You fanboys are idiots. Common sense would've told you that damn trailer is CG. Plus your calling GS biased because Oblivion got .1 less when ported to PS3 because it came out later. The graphical difference was practically miniscule. Then your saying GS is all for MS just because GOW got a 9.6. Have you seen other review sites? GOW has been getting 10s almost everywhere.

  • djkearse36

    Posted Jun 25, 2007 6:41 pm PT

    yea gs is all for the 360

  • elmecca

    Posted Jun 3, 2007 3:08 pm PT

    @ Warkunt lol nice name

    anyways yea....hell yea ..totally agreed , Gamespot is always throwing disses to PS3 in their reviews (written) and on their OnTheSpot , like WTF they gave GoW a 9.6 like MGS2 UNACCEPTABLE!!! ....nothing and i mean NUTHINGG can reach MGS2's score except MGS4 of course itll be a 10 ......i think M$ is slippin bills under the table around here ...ehherrrmm! ....omg im so gonna laugh when this game comes out to look like th trailer , and i dont doubt it may the trailer be CG or not they wanted to represent the look of the game and if you look at the screens it doesnt look as sharp as a CG movie , it looks like actual graphics but just good , i think the guys at Guerrilla got pissed bcause how much they dissed Killzone back then (fuking Halo fans)....and they're just going all out

  • Warkunt

    Posted Apr 15, 2007 5:45 pm PT

    Gamespot favors Xbox over the PS. it's obvious. go look at the ridiculously high score for Gears of War. 9.6?! for another killswitch clone with better graphics? that was by far, the worst 1 player campaign mode i've ever experienced and still it earns the over ratedness of 9.6 from GS? LOL! then look at Oblivion on the PS3. a 9.5 when they gave the 360 version a 9.6. the PS3 version clearly has better graphics and it runs better than the 360 version, with even less load times. and then to put an end to this, compare the xbox library to the ps2 library. does GS favor the Xbox? Yes. They do. and it seems like every time i say something like this, someone reports me and gets the post deleted. GS can't handle the fact that some people WILL eventually notice their fanboyism. they rate xbox games a little TOO high. maybe they just love shooting games and hate other genres. i'm pretty sure that's it.

  • Schillinger

    Posted Mar 7, 2007 10:59 am PT

    "Believe Sony? Bogus. Think Sony's lying? Not Bogus. "

    Yeah, that's been GS' attitude since the 360 came out. Bias? Never!

  • EMAN2g

    Posted Mar 7, 2007 10:58 am PT

    ...lol pre rendered SONY for the lose

  • wklzip

    Posted Nov 27, 2006 8:43 pm PT

    wow this is old

  • jakeboudville

    Posted Aug 28, 2006 8:34 pm PT

    cool

  • LordAndrew

    Posted May 25, 2006 9:40 am PT

    Would it have killed Square Enix to give FF XI a graphical upgrade? Why didn't they just release it on Xbox instead?

  • Ace_Gunner

    Posted May 14, 2006 10:39 am PT

    FIRST! OR SECOND! OR ONE HUNDRED-THOUSANDTH! On a year-old story! w00t! w00t! But seriously, even if Killzone was pre-rendered, graphics will probably get to that stage at some point during this console generation. Somehow I doubt it'll be anytime soon though.

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