No One Actually Wants Realistic Games… Here’s Why 

The main problem with every game trying to look "realistic" is that they look boring because they all look the same because of a lack of a distinct artstyle.

Art direction > Ultra Realism

Clarity and playability above all else, and then you have the eye candy

graphics or realism can never replace gameplay and plotlines. sure they're enhancing but not a replacement.

definitely do not want yellow paint all over my game. regardless of graphics.

A game can be realistic and fun. When i play games like uncharted 4 and alan wake 2 admiring their graphics is part of the fun for me

*If playing on a monitor I want the traditional way of playing, if playing on VR I want a more "realistic" version of the game*

Thats why i love games like Elden Ring. 5 years from now game will still look amazing and feel good to play, just like dark souls 3. Art style will beat realism for me easily anyday

I love realistic graphics but damn the visual clarity is terrible in most titles. Horizon Forbidden West is graphically superior to Breath of the Wild for example, but the visual clarity in HFW is all over the place with so many particles and effects in the air making everything look grainy or sometimes there is so much detail in a small area that you don't even know what to see causing eye fatigue, this is something that doesn't happen to me in BOTW where everything looks "clean" so to speak due to its simplicity but with a very well-implemented artistic style..

No one staring at the graphics and fancy reflections all day. We need great storyline, optimized games and stable online servers.

Yo Vex... your channel has grown quite a lot... been watching you since you had less than 500 subs. Keep it up bro. 💛

"I don't even have a 4090." My man - Vex!

About 2 years ago i was actively playing mw3 on my ps3 because i had nothing else. I was Having fun everyday. At that point I thought if I buy a PC that can play the latest games on Max Graphics I'll have even more fun.But in the end it just meant that I tested all sorts of games, rarely finished anything and somehow can no longer get any satisfaction from video games. + I still played a lot of mw3 original on my pc either so nothing changed

This is what I've been repeating for a long time. I couldn't care less about "realism" in a game and it looking "realistic". If I wanted realistic stuff simulating life-like stuff I would play a simulator, not a game. Games are supposed to be fun, out-of-the-box from our reality and distraction, artistic, otherworldly, an escape from the world where you can be who you want or do what you want depending on the game, it's a GAME, it can be anything, not to imitate every single detail of the real world, simulators exist for that. Good graphics are fine, yeah, and can make things more engaging for most people because of the immersion, but full-on life-like graphics? No, save that for simulators or make an option to mod the game into what you want, to look like a game or real-world characteristics inside a computer like the movie "Gamer" which is literally real life but people control other people in a video game in the real world.

Your dog just sat its butt on your pillow... You're going to get pinkeye.

Amazing for screenshots ( and thumbnails )

I agree with this 1000%. And I'm glad you made a video about this, Vex!

2:32 💀 Not the casual gamer roast, Vex

I like realism. But I like style even more.

I am both hands on the same deck with you here Vex. With all the marvels of modding and ray tracing, I still find good visuals in the hierarchy to be lower than functionality. For example, properly baked graphics that are - first and foremost - clear, playable and visible are much more important than fidelity because at the end of the day when playing a game you will enjoy these visuals for a moment (which is like 3 maybe 4 hours). After that it's just you, the gameplay and all the inconveniences of hyperrealism, including the fact that you're probably either overpaying for a gpu or butchering the one that you have. What people oftentimes don't realize is that practical application of visuals is way more important then momentary awe that stems from top-notch graphical fidelity. Modders seem to suffer from this mentality that kind of enforces overly saturated, contrasted or monochrome color grading. More than that, I remember what games used to look like 15 years ago and some them were dead-awful with the amount of blur, bloom and other effects like that. Masking imperfections is one thing, another is obstructing the practicality of visuals in favor of fake realism.

You can use the realistic lighting and color mod without raytracing.

Love your videos Vex! Also, What's the name of the soundtrack you used @ 3:24? sounds like a final fantasy or xenoblade chronicles soundtrack but I don't remember the exact name, help

As someone who owns a 4090. I can no longer afford games.

agree i really like that cozy lighting effects in drinking booths and pubs and also contrasty lit up and dark parts of alleys and all that

4:40 the first game I experienced with yellow paint is Dying light where yellow paints or fabric are scattered around to passively guide players around the game.

If you think all forests are that dense, you have never or rarely entered a forest. It’s the opposite, the outside of a forest is dense but inside it’s empty at ground level because the light is stopped by the canopy. It’s the case for both tempered forests and rainforests. I’ve gone off trail in both.

Depth of field and motion blur are the only graphic options I always turn off because it looks better without them. RT usually looks a bit better when it's on, but not that much better to justify the performance drop, so I just let it stay turned off.

Whether we like it or not.... games has, is and will always become more and more realistic. That's how we went from crapy/boxy/pixilated graphics to what we have today.

The best design choices are the Alyx/CS2 art styles: less clutter on screen but every single element matters and the scene is readable at a glance.

@7:45 you convinced me at depth of field. I do not like blur in my games. Be it for foreground or the background. Which will be a problem in VR and 3D without glasses options for games... @13:24 unless you are playing AR games. Cool story bro. I subbed.

Where can you get safe mods or do they not exist, I have a 24gb 7900xtx and if I'm not dropping frames but getting better graphics I don't mind a few frames,, Thanks Vex Top Show have been watching a bit now just subscribed..👍

The most important thing is to make a game good first

Bro doesn't even havaa 4090 🤯

It's stuff like this I constantly keep in mind when tweaking Minecraft shaders

okay, but, about the blurriness, do you imagine what it would look like if this mod supported VR eye tracking to render it sharp where you're looking? Just like PSVR2 does on the horizon call of the mountain. I think this would have fixed the inability to see some areas clearly (not considering the over-darkened areas).

Have u seen the nolvus v6 skyrim yet.

I want realistic detailed 8k textures in games without the blurring

Another good video!

Im thinking of building a new pc, but im unsure what gpu to run. I don't care about RTX, and could get tons of raster performance with an AMD card. The only draw for going nvidia is that DLSS is better than FSR. But as im not going to use raytrace, i shoudnt need to lean on FSR or DLSS anyway, when the top end AMD cards handle games at 1440p well above 100fps.

The only game where I've ever felt like Depth of Field enhanced the experience was Alien: Isolation. When using the motion tracker, you had to manually toggle your focus between the tracker and your surroundings. You could turn DoF off, but having to constantly make that tradeoff of what to focus on while trying to avoid the alien really ratcheted up the tension.

Never noticed the yellow paint except in RE4. I noticed red one on Mirror's Edge and white paint on a ton of games (Indika has it recently) but damn why do I just notice the yellow paint right now 😂

only reason ill do this is to impress my parents and friends but i prefer stylized games like borderlands 3

Its because we don’t want to spend 10,000 dollars.

The Fun Pimps got the "communicating directions" right with 7 Days to Die. They implemented a guide system through their POIs via light sources. If you see a torch, a lantern, a lit bulb, a candle, anything that is lit up, that is the way to go. It meshes perfectly with the game world and hints at the way to progress. The fact of the matter is, yellow paint is a cheat used by lazy devs who either do not know how to design an environment to be clear in which way to go, or don't have the ingenuity to design indicators that blend into the game world, or don't care to put in the effort to figure any of it out.

I like rtx in Minecraft the rtx pack i use is a lot better with torch light but I do have to turn it off if I am trying to light my base up

Nothing can beat the timeless beauty of pre rendered graphics

Got it to work in 4k on my 79xtx with uniscaler, more than comfy upscaling and rt tweaks. Turned it off pretty quick. Looks incredible, but is not fun.

The problem is the lack of contrast. This is a problem with 8-bit color. HDR is supposed to solve some of this problem by adding more bits to luminance/brightness. The real solution is 10-bit color. 12-bit color would even be better. But that sucks up bandwidth which means something has to give like resolution and/or frame-rate. This also points out that ray-tracing is a waste of time; if you want to see better, curated lighting is better.

Ultimately have the photo realism effect is another option at game devs disposal and gives them another option regarding a game’s visual style and consumers another mod choice which is great imo!😱😳🤯🥳👍

at least in minecraft there are some shader mods that allow you to adjust the torch lighting but

Gameplay comes first. It's a entertainment medium... I always hated how realism is preached.

Listen the yellow paint sucks but if they don’t put it in I will be lost for 3 hours. Jedi survivor gives me a whole map and I still feel like a blind mouse sniffing cheese.

DoF will be the next graphical effect after motion blur I will turn it off then. :'D

I have watched so many benchmarks, cyberpunk mostly, that I get turned off by the sound effects more than the visuals. I just turn off the benchmark once it comes on

Rendering DOF is honestly so great for vr. Lets you run some crazy intensive vr games with midrange hardware.

The color hue in Cyberpunk is important to create cyberpunk mood, it is an artistic decision. Making it real life, well it is good for people who never own a car.

First person driving is a lot better than third person in VR with high fov. But without that.. yeah third person is better. Eye tracking and VR with that fuzzing.. could help a whole lot with improving performance too. dynamic foveated rendering for the win! Seems to me like you could replace paint with something that fits storyline.. incorporate things into cyberpunk like the HUD is eye implants or contacts or use magic spells or Red Dead style tracking to find where to go next. Also for VR: Try Vorpx or Depth3d reshade.. I bet that viewers would love to hear about it.

i don't know what focus on eye tracking would be lke, but it seems like the most functional way to play a game where you want what youre looking at to be in focus would be to make everything in focus so we can glance at whatever we like. the real world is always in focus in one sense (not counting our eye, thing don't become fuzzy when no one's around) it's just our eyes that make specific things in foccus, so do i want the game to recreate the world for my real eyes to look at or to recreate what my gmee eyes would see. i'd like to keep control of my real eyes 🙂

same with me. enonce enjoyed playing crashlands game more than sun haven. simply because they have lesser items to loot that i can actually focus on it.

I've played through the entire Cyberpunk game 4 times already. At this point I am really more interested in making it great looking and take screenshots, rather than replaying it again (of course, will do it again sometime). After using only AMD gpus for ever since I got my first gaming PC, last year I switched to Nvidia specifically to be able to enjoy Cyberpunk with maxed graphics and Path Tracing. Couldn't afford 4090, but got a pretty good deal on 4080.

You gotta turn depth of field off in cyberpunk

That thumbnail is from Driveclub, a 10 years old game and it looks amazing ngl.

I think being lost can be sometimes be a good thing the get the players thinking but being confused is a bad thing

Back in the 90's we were all losing our minds over Doom. Was it realistic, oh hell no! Was it damn good fun, can I get a hell yeah!?

Ironically, the only time Path Tracing actually makes a big enough difference imo is when implemented in very old or simplistic games like Quake, Minecraft, Doom or Portal BUT the thing is that it also requires an update to textures and ingame objects, surfaces to give that wow look. Path tracing alone does not achieve that wow look AND fps still plumets.

Honestly I tend to think even the creative intent isn't contrasty enough for my taste. I tend to use Nvidia Freestyle, just press Alt F3 in any game, and turn on a color modifier and sharpening filter. Some games I've noticed just turning on the sharpening makes textures that otherwise look muddy suddenly look hyper realistic. Just a couple days ago I was gobsmacked by the rock texture they use on Tatooine in Lego Star Wars Skywalker Saga. I just end up using this in nearly every game now. Still wish the simulated ray tracing was in all games though. Only one I know of is FFXV

10:38 i like cooler colors so the "realistic" one is better in my eyes

You should "review" the game Vexx. Just for fun

that's some diegetic non-diegetic paint if I've ever seen some

Hey there I was actually asking Rx 6750 xt 16 gb Or 4060 ti 8Gb - 16Gb? Using for:Gaming-Streaming-content creation

this leads me to think, that devs knowws how to evoke emotions through colors and sound. they know when to show which scene when, and which location inside the game when. not only emoke emotion, but also to trigger our satisfactory hormone.

It is a good question nowadays. Aren't we come to games to switch from REAL world? Honestly, even future of VR is scary me a little, cause although Im a videogames nerd, I want to games continue to be a games, but afraid one day it really came to the picture of future which all of us saw in movies. Recently I switch to 3080, especially for CP, still decent card, and RTX is good thing, but trying different settings I asked myself - does such fps/picture ratio worth it? I mean, maybe years later I could back and play this all max settings as easy like now I can turn x8 MSAA in most games that sometime was heavy like RTX today, but for now... it is not worth it if your card cost less 1000$.

When mentioning Visual Clutter, it reminds me when my friend showed me Forspoken, when the first gameplay was revealed. It was like pitchforks in my eyes. Constant particles everywhere on every hit, movement, jump or such. I thought the fighting look cool, for sure, cos i'm into powered fighting, like Infamous, however, Forspoken instantly pushed me away with it's Visual Clutter. It obstructed the gameplay beyond my belief

The real colors look so much better imo

The problem (for me) with the realistic games can be resumed in 3 things: 1 - They just focus on real graphics (not gameplay) 2 - Usually it gets too dark/bright. 3- Not optimized (my potato turned into a baked potato) And with one of these it can really ruin your gameplay.

Minecraft with certain shaders really needs HDR on an OLED screen with how dark they can be

Game design and graphics are two completely different things. Did it occur to you that maybe the trees were meant to be an environmental hazard? Having both the dual purpose of immersion and also acting as obstacles to prevent your ability to avoid attacks? Like it or not, that’s an example of good game design, not bad. Yes, depth of field is pretty much something I always turn off. It can’t be implemented well without eye tracking. And yellow paint makes the player feel like a child. However, and this is important, it’s a false dichotomy to say it’s either the yellow paint or be lost for hours. Ocarina of time, no yellow paint. Half life, no yellow paint. Baldur’s gate 3, no yellow paint. And think about when yellow paint is used in games. It’s used to show that some object can be interacted with. It’s the same concept when computers or switches in games are lit up as green or red to show they can be interacted with or not. These tools are used to improve game pacing. If you playing a game and you are in a room full of computers, do you want to interact with every computer to trigger the cutscene? Or would you like a handy green light that lets you know what to interact with? The problem with yellow paint is that it is too intrusive to the point it breaks immersion. NOT that it helps you know which way to go. There are plenty of other ways to subtly hint to the player on how to progress. The problem is that yellow paint isn’t subtle.

depends of the game tbh

When I was young, I used to play in the woods a lot One of the problems is you don't see where you're going a lot of times, except for what's right in front of the flashlight. God help you if you drop the flashlight, and it's off. Man, you're just literally stumbling through the woods. to say that you can't see in the woods when it's dark without a flashlight. It's an understatement. The video game is not as bad, even with it as good as it is. It still is not as bad as real life.

I belive the DOF in cyberpunk ist implemented with reshade ist not acurate i recomend you too probe the DOF of the Mods Natural and Realistic in Watch dos 1 ist most relistic an well implemneted.

The realistic graphics work in Alan Wake 2 because they serve the game tonally. It's a horror game so it has to feel stifling to fight a boss in the middle of the night in a forest.

I'd play through Cyberpunk 2077 in a near realistic look. I'd either eventually get used to it or I'd find somewhere to camp for the in game night

Idk if its just me but the higher fidelity we get to, the more I have a hard time separating what im looking at. Like, the more realistic a forest or foliage looks, and especially the higher fidelity and density it has, the harder it is to pick out objects or enemies from the background. Things that I normally would not have a problem picking out irl in the same circumstances. Im guessing its not just me since games have started to make anything of interest glow or have an outline, but its a shame because it makes some games very difficult to enjoy for me.

Pac man doesn't have Ray tracing yet it's still fun

Lol it feels my eyes confused too grays color

That's why I like Zelda BOTW and Zelda TOTK so much. Its graphics are good enough and the entire focus of the game is not to leave you lost looking for what to do because there is always something interesting on the horizon.

i use this mod i had fun with it. but i get the point you make alan wake 2 looks amazing, i had the same issue in the forest and getting to the nursing home was a bih

Regarding enemy AI (rather than graphics/visuals), countless people have pointed out that a completely realistic stealth game or war game would NOT be fun at all. If a stealth game like Metal Gear Solid had enemies with intelligence, vision, and hearing as accurate to real-life as possible, nobody would want to play the game. It would be infuriatingly frustrating and tedious. Even gamers who love a seemingly-impossible challenge would be like "Fuck this bullshit."

For a game to look and feel good with ultra realistic graphics, it needs to be designed to take advantage of that, otherwise you are handicapping yourself, and there aren't many games that will let you get away with that without giving off a very weird uncanny valley vibe. So instead, game developers opt for hyperrealism, making games look realistic, but exacerbating details and colors, to keep you in the moment, but detached from reality. There is never any doubt that its a videogame, neither visually, or psychologically.

I mean bluring the bike out isn't really how your eyes work. Your eyes blur anything not directly in the center of vision. The only way to mimic this in games is either with eye tracking or with 3D images like 3D displays or VR. It's sort of like motion blur. The human eye can track even extremely fast objects, but your eyes have to track it. It's actually more an extension of the same depth of field effect. I'd say these effects make graphics less like the human eye and more like a camera. They seem to more target making video games look like a cinema camera recording and less like vision as vision just isn't possible without actual depth.

I really like for my game to look real AF. I turn off depth of field though, because my own eyes focus on what I'm actually looking at lol. And the devs might make make the game how they want it, but if I like it better how I want it, that's what I'm gonna choose every time. I'm never playing vanilla Skyrim ever again lol

5:11 bros mesmerized by the plot

Triple A studios be like: Graphics > Gameplay Same with geometry dash level creators: Over-Decorated Graphics > Gameplay/Playability And this trend is getting more and more frequent that gameplay or playability doesn't matter in games and it sucks

I want more realism in graphics in games, but what I don't necessarily want is more simulation.

Mostly its just massive amounts of depth of field. I always turn of depth of field in all my games, my own eyes already have the depth of field effect

At the end of the day, what Vex is saying is really just an opinion. Obviously nobody wants too much clutter or a lack of direction in the games they play, but otherwise, preferences vary. No matter how much you yap about how "graphically altering the game with mods will going to ruin your gameplay, dumbass!!! haven't you heard about developer's intent?!?!? important buzzword!", some genuinely like the changes in saturation, colour tone, and graphics that various mods bring. A lot of people love higher-res textures, higher poly counts, higher object density, and true-to-life lighting. A lot of people would gladly play at 60 fps rather than 120 fps to accommodate those preferences... most don't even care about hitting 120 fps in singleplayer titles in the first place since they actually go outside. On console, plenty even play at 30 fps over 60 fps because they care much more about fidelity than performance. And that's fine, as long as there are settings to satisfy both parties. If you don't like the changes in gameplay and performance that come with shader packs or Minecraft RTX, you can just, you know.... play the normal Minecraft.

How do you not like this settings/graphics? I frucking LOVE them, if I could I'd have every game this realistic. I'd love to play games like "The Witcher 3" and like every JRPG looking this good. I'd "jeez in my pants" if I got my games looking like this all of a sudden.🤤

Even with those mods i wouldn't say it looks real life. Its more realistic but still looks kinda different.

Today I still play clash of clan,Red Alert2(mental omega). They don’t have “realistic” but they have more fun than many AAA game right now.

Speaking as an old gaymer cat, there's a general correlation between technical capacity and fluff. The more fluff you can afford, the more you put. But over time, the problem became that the fluff was weighing on the game rather than making it better. This isn't even just for computation only: when Final Fantasy VII came out on 3 CDs, everyone was amazed at the amount of content, and all the minigames they could put that "enhanced" the game. Except almost all of these minigames weren't fun. They were all removed in the later games because they just made the game less fun to play. The same has been happening since the 90s. This is why I'm so skeptical of new capacity or techniques like Raytracing: sure it CAN make the game better. But will it? To me, RT still seems like a cool concept in theory, but I have yet to see it really make games better, not just shinier or more reflective or detailed. All the details in an RT scene does not equal a better gaming experience, just better eye candy.