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Current gen 'to last until 2012' - Crytek

By Guy Cocker, GameSpot UKPosted Aug 17, 2009 9:25 am PT

GDC Europe 2009: Cevat Yerli speaks about the next iteration of Cryengine and why games aren't going to get any better looking over the next three years.

COLOGNE, Germany--As the head of one of the highest-profile PC development studios in the world, Crytek CEO and founder Cevat Yerli is well placed to hold a session titled "The Future of Gaming Graphics." Crytek has been responsible for Far Cry and Crysis--two of the most cutting-edge games on the market upon their release, and he is currently hard at work bringing Crysis 2 to the PC as well as Xbox 360 and PS3.

Cevat Yerli addresses his peers.

Yerli was keen to stress that between now and 2012, we shouldn't expect games to advance much beyond what they look like today. "Games 'til 2012 will not look very different than [they do today], since engines are bound to console cycles." Yerli forecasts that the next major CryEngine upgrade will arrive in 2012, around the same time he believes the next generation of console hardware will arrive. That said, he fully acknowledges the strength of the Wii and the prospect of an elongated console life cycle and warned that if a new generation didn’t arrive in 2012-2013, then "it could be a long time."

While Yerli claims that the current graphical benchmark has been set, he says that we should still expect "huge gains in physics, AI, and simulation of special effects" over the next few years. He also says, in reference to the Fox animated movie series, that by 2013 "you will be able to do Ice Age in real time." Matching animated movies in real-time seems to be a major goal for Yerli, who used Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within as a benchmark for CryEngine 3.

"We wanted to beat the faces in the Final Fantasy movie, but doing in real time what they were doing offline. Every day I was getting posted images from the Final Fantasy movie," he joked. He then proceeded to show a video of the incredibly lifelike facial models in the latest iteration of the engine. "One face has more technology than the entire first Far Cry," he claimed.

CryEngine 3 is the company's current technology foundation, which Yerli claims will form the bedrock of the company's games until 2012. Yerli showed off a demo of Crysis rebuilt using the latest technology. It included 3D volumetric clouds, soft particles, parallax occlusion mapping, and a 7km view distance. Clearly, Yerli is undeterred by the criticism he received for the original Crysis and its high system requirements. “It was always my dream to have a game that I could play now, and then in two years when I upgrade my PC, play again,” he stated.

419 Comments

  • DjTIEST0

    Posted Nov 23, 2009 2:44 am PT

    all i care is gameplay see u have killzone and halo halo is so much better in gameplay dont look as cool as killzone but it play smooth

  • Gorfix

    Posted Sep 23, 2009 4:31 pm PT

    wow i dont think the graphics can get better than crysis. but the new consles hardware comming out 2012 i hope that sony keeps the ps3 slim for awhile cause i just got one. and i am soo psyched for crysis 2 to come out i am going to pre order it right when u can

  • jack_ace1

    Posted Aug 28, 2009 1:17 pm PT

    Crysis was awsome and so was Crysis Warhead,about Crysis 2 it's going to be of the hook.What he says about graphics limitation can be explained like this,that after 2012 we may see our ownself in the games playing in Realtime,Yes it is going to take a death toll to upgrade our pc and who can pridect about those console's,but be sure it is going to be worth the wating.

  • shani_boy101

    Posted Aug 20, 2009 3:18 am PT

    he's right, you know. Graphics have nearly reached their pinnacle (for games like Crysis only higher resolutions will make them significantly better), so devs need to start working on AI and Physics. i've heard rumours that the next level of HDTV's will be released for the public in 2012/13 (around 4096 x 2160, that about 4 times 1080p), that may be one of the reasons.

  • chumbucket843

    Posted Aug 19, 2009 2:16 pm PT

    wow crysis has the best AI and graphics in a game. physics have been beaten by ghostbusters but its still really good. crysis is a kick ass game and anyone who complains about it probably hasnt played it. we just need to get rid of hardware render pipelines and implement software pipelines as this will allow pc to shine graphically along with the consoles and you wont have to complain about games using old directx9 because it will be gone.

  • jmartinez1983

    Posted Aug 19, 2009 5:54 am PT

    AI is where the advances need to be made. Graphics are great, but I don't care how pretty it looks, bad AI can ruin a game.

  • Rhastafurion

    Posted Aug 19, 2009 3:55 am PT

    @Photoshark isn't that already the case? My PC is a budget gaming PC and is already more powerful than the PS3 or Xbox 360.

    Next gen consoles will compete by adding more PC features to a console system, a failure of an idea if you ask me.

  • solidine

    Posted Aug 19, 2009 2:14 am PT

    Whatever. Gaming is getting to be to redundant, specifically because all everyone seems to want to do is make everything look really cool.
    Seriously, **** graphics. I'd like to assume others notice this, and eventually it will change.

    Programming better AI and the like would be useful for making games that actually are better, not just ones that look better.
    Having said that, I won't be rushing to buy a next gen console until I see that happen.

    There have been some really good games this gen, but so few have been worth it in the long haul that I can't justify running headfirst into next gen.
    Not everyone thinks that way, nor do I expect them to, but it looks like the more mainstreme gaming becomes, the more I'm being pushed away. I know I'm not alone in this belief, either.

  • Photoshark

    Posted Aug 19, 2009 12:41 am PT

    Okay, we get the developers' drift in terms of technological advancement. Basically, what this brilliant guy is saying; by the time 2012 comes, PC hardware would have already overtook or completely eclipsed the specs of current-gen consoles.

  • Fyre8892

    Posted Aug 18, 2009 10:42 pm PT

    @slaggo
    Wait just a minute there. 28 million PS3s sold? When did this happen? Last numbers I saw (which were from August 5th of this year) had the PS3 at 24.6 million. I hadn't realized that Sony had sold 3.4 million PS3s in the last 2 weeks. Don't even start with me about missinformation.
    Isn't it odd how even with piracy (which must be so rampant) the 360 has a better game attachment rate per console (somewhere close to 8 ) than the PS3 (somewhere close to 5). The fact of the matter is that sales don't make the console (e.g. the Wii). I'm not saying the PS3 is a bad console, it isn't. I'm not trying to start some stupid fight here, but everything in my previous post was entirely factual.

  • akiwak

    Posted Aug 18, 2009 8:32 pm PT

    No way has all the juice been squeezed out of the current gen machines and I doubt everything that can be done will be done by that time. A couple of studios might figure how to reach near total potential by that time but I believe we will see the sweetest looking games at the tail end of these consoles life cycles between 2011-2014.

  • green_dominator

    Posted Aug 18, 2009 6:20 pm PT

    3 years is all we have left?? Eff that man.....
    I'm so freaking sick and tired of spending massive ammounts of cash on stuff....
    VHS in the 1970's, CD's in the 1980's, DVD's in the 1990's, NES, Sega Genesis, Super Nes, Playstation, XBOX, Blue Ray, HDDVD.......It's insane to keep this up til the end of time.....personally I like how games look right now. GTA IV is amazing that never could have been done on PS2, alot of the games now look amazing, it's just people pushing the urge to exploit the new video card technology.....it might be nice but what we have now is good, we don't need to upgrade for another 5 years at least....

  • incinera

    Posted Aug 18, 2009 5:03 pm PT

    @fire8892

    Just show me someone using a pirated blue ray game in a ps3 and i shut my mouth.. lol just because you can burn a blue ray movie, it doenst matter it will work with games... there are lots of layers to crack before you can play a burned blu ray in your ps3, plus you have to modify the hardware.. up to now.. none successfull...

  • CapedCod

    Posted Aug 18, 2009 3:51 pm PT

    There could be a new gen of consoles, but let's be honest: none of them have really hit their full potential yet. Developers still haven't mastered the Wii's motion controls, Microsoft hasn't found a way to keep the XBOX from dying, and the PS2 was, last time I checked, out-selling the PS3. I would love to see the current consoles stay status quo for at least five more years just to see the advancements they make once the devs get a real grasp on everything.

  • GSgirl

    Posted Aug 18, 2009 3:10 pm PT

    We need more quality games than High tech games

  • slaggo

    Posted Aug 18, 2009 2:58 pm PT

    @ Fyre8892

    your post is the typical post i see from microsoft fanboi's...the following link shows current sales for xbox, ps3, and wii...the only one holding strong is the wii:
    http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/38900/118/

    also, it's been noted in past articles that microsoft uses figures from units SOLD (including directly to consumers and retailers) whereas sony uses figures to show units that actually are in the consumer's HOUSE (figures derived from registrations and records of units being sold from retailers when sony representatives go around to the local gamestop and such)....biiiiiig difference in terms of showing the number of units sold.

    i think so far, xbox has 32 million sold while ps3 is like 28....which isn't largely significant. it actually shows sony is catching up because of the lineup of games this year.

    as for "pirated" crap...xbox has the most because it is easily modded. the PS3 simply cannot be modded and it won't play pirated copies of a game... below are google searches of PS3 modding and 360 modding:

    PS3:
    http://www.google.com/search?q=can+the+PS3+be+modded%3F&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-USfficial&client=firefox-a

    Xbox 360:
    http://www.google.com/search?q=can+the+360+be+modded%3F&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-USfficial&client=firefox-a

    please do your research instead of pulling info out of your ass

  • LooseChangepor

    Posted Aug 18, 2009 2:28 pm PT

    I'll be honest, I love my 360 but if ps3 and 360 never came out i would be just as happy playing my ps2. If i had known that consoles life was going to be around this long i may of rocked with it a couple more years. I am in no rush for a new console, graphics are fine to me as is. I mean really how much more can they do thats gonna make me say wow! I'm glad this span is going to last at least 7 years and hopefully longer

  • EYE0NE

    Posted Aug 18, 2009 2:07 pm PT

    @ awheaten

    "This guy, though, seem alittle ambitious. I believe that the Cell, optimized properly, can produce CryEngine's graphics."

    And why would you presume to know more than the guy that made CryEngine?

  • PodXCOM posted Aug 18, 2009 1:30 pm PT (does not meet display criteria. sign in to show)

    PodXCOM

    Posted Aug 18, 2009 1:30 pm PT (hide)

    It would be really gay if we never saw another console generation. It would be the gayest thing ever!

  • Fyre8892

    Posted Aug 18, 2009 1:12 pm PT

    @incinera
    Well I can tell by your humorously terrible spelling of Microsoft that's you're not biased by any stretch of the imagination. The fact of the matter is that MS has sold more consoles than Sony. The 360 also has a better attachment rate (of games and hardware) per console than the PS3 and that does not include "pirated" games.
    Bluray games and movies are entirely piratable. It is entirely possible that the 360 has seen more piracy (likely due to the larger volume of actual sales), but the more popular games are the more likely they are to be pirated. I'm not sure where you get your alleged "facts", but I would work on doing some further research if I were you.

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