TR3 Graphics are Ahead of it's Time

[Tomb Raidering]

Originally Posted by dg1995

In TR 3 whenever you used guns Lara's face changed into an angry face from expressionless face.
Also when you died she would use a different face where she closed her eyes.

So she had 3 faces. While Snake didn't have any face or eyes outside of codecs.

Lara also had the angry face in TR1...

[Caesum]

Originally Posted by Tomb Raidering

It stopped innovating. It just evolved. Some new crawling, sprinting, rope-swinging moves plus some fancy lighting effects aren’t innovation. I’m not trying to sound shadey, and I know that this isn’t Core’s fault... but facts are facts.

Well said. TR3 wasn't innovative from the gaming industry perspective. It just enhanced the original formula a bit and thats that. Yes, it was prettier and fancier than TR3, but it was more of a natural/necessary enhancement rather than a ground breaking change in the series, let alone industry. There was nothing "ahead" about TR3.

I think the only game which can be considered "innovative" when it comes to Core's TRs is TR4. It was far prettier than any of the game, changed level design entirely, added a lot of new features and just felt fresh. No other TR game from Core's era could bring that much of a "new" feeling while still using the outdated technology.

Originally Posted by Tomb Raidering

The same can be said for AoD.

I wouldn't go as far as that. Yes, TRAOD wanted to be innovative, but in the end it just tried to copy all the popular mechanics at the time. Moreover, it failed at that and turned into a mess of a product (which I love btw). TRAOD as the one we received was not innovative at all. It was more of the same, just in new robes. And the robes were torn.

I'll just repeat that TR1 was the only truly groundbreaking, ahead of its time game. It literally shaped the gaming industry and established a formula that was used in many action-adventure games later.

Originally Posted by dg1995

In TR 3 whenever you used guns Lara's face changed into an angry face from expressionless face.
Also when you died she would use a different face where she closed her eyes.

She only had two faces, Neutral and while shooting. There was no "closed eyes" face. It's not in the wad even.

Originally Posted by dg1995

Also isn't this unfair to compare TR 3 with nintendo 64 games?
That console was more powerful graphic wise compare to PS1.

Maybe, but we're talking about graphics here. At the time TR3 was released there were games with prettier graphics. TR3 was held back by the engine and hardware so saying graphics were "ahead of its times" seems strange.

[dg1995]

At that time no console and pc game looked better than Virtua Fighter 3.(A 1996 arcade game)

I was just saying that TR 3 has one of the best ps1 graphics.

Also in the defense of TR 3 graphics versus MGS 1:
MGS was also mostly just indoor areas and it's outdoor areas(Excluding the ending)didn't even have skyboxes from what I remember. TR 3 also looked better in that regard.

[Kirishima]

Originally Posted by dg1995

...While Snake didn't have any face or eyes outside of codecs.

I think that was partially a stylistic choice brought about by graphical limitations. Here is a quote of from someone involved in the PC version's port when they tried to add eyes for that port:

"We've put much better high-res textures for the eyes (hired someone from Texas to do it for us), when we got the idea rejected by Hideo himself (by the phone), he told us (through the interpretter) that the game during normal game-play did not have any eye-movement, so higher-res textures would look like crap, while with a blurry texture your own eyes won't see it as a problem - it's really sometimes LESS is better."

[dg1995]

Originally Posted by Kirishima

I think that was partially a stylistic choice brought about by graphical limitations. Here is a quote of from someone involved in the PC version's port when they tried to add eyes for that port:

"We've put much better high-res textures for the eyes (hired someone from Texas to do it for us), when we got the idea rejected by Hideo himself (by the phone), he told us (through the interpretter) that the game during normal game-play did not have any eye-movement, so higher-res textures would look like crap, while with a blurry texture your own eyes won't see it as a problem - it's really sometimes LESS is better."

IDK, that explanation on why they shouldn't add eyes sounds kinda dumb. Early 3D video games used to have eyes without movements.
Max Payne was like that.

So imo it was a bad choice to not add eyes for the pc version.(At least some cutscenes would look better)

Also higher res textures always look better than lower res ones imo.(It just needs a faithful upscale from the smaller one)

[_Seth]

Originally Posted by dg1995

Also when you died she would use a different face where she closed her eyes.

If this is true then that is brand new information, as I've never noticed.

[New Dwight]

Originally Posted by _Seth

If this is true then that is brand new information, as I've never noticed.

mesh swaps werent present until tr4.

[Kirishima]

@dg1995

I think I found a picture of what that was supposed to look like.

https://www.mobygames.com/images/sho...eep-moving.jpg

[SrDanielPonces]

Originally Posted by dg1995

Kinda funny some people say MGS 1 had better graphics while compare to TR 3 it had very small and tiny rooms.

Originally Posted by dg1995

Also in the defense of TR 3 graphics versus MGS 1:
MGS was also mostly just indoor areas and it's outdoor areas(Excluding the ending)didn't even have skyboxes from what I remember.

That's not a good excuse, in MGS you are able to look anywhere in the map using the binoculars, no matter if it is inside or outside.

[Kapu]

Originally Posted by paulojr_mam

Oh, I see. Can't think of even one PS1 game like that with this "skinned model".

Not to be rude, but you literally mentioned two such games in this same post of yours

Originally Posted by paulojr_mam

Tht said, facial animations in those games aren't that hard technically, just changing face textures or, in the case of Spyro and Crash, moving vertexes.

Honestly Tomb Raider is the odd one out when it comes to individual meshes for characters instead of a single skin with skeleton. The first two Resident Evil games had individual meshes, but by RE3 they'd switched to fully skinned.