2K Games boss Christoph Hartmann thinks that in order for the videogame industry to expand into new genres, pure photorealism in graphics is first needed.
In an interview with GamesIndustry, Hartmann spoke about how the film industry still has an advantage over videogames because movie directors can easily portray strong emotions from characters. Emotions like sadness, love and all that stuff. He argues that since this is difficult to do in games, most developers go back to the action and shooter genres…which he states as "safer bets."
Recreating a Mission Impossible experience in gaming is easy; recreating emotions in Brokeback Mountain is going to be tough, or at least very sensitive in this country… it will be very hard to create very deep emotions like sadness or love, things that drive the movies…Until games are photorealistic, it'll be very hard to open up to new genres. We can really only focus on action and shooter titles; those are suitable for consoles now.
Hartmann adds that to change the industry dramatically where we can insert a whole range of emtions, he feels it will only happen "when we reach the point that games are photorealistic; then we will have reached an ednpoint and that might be the final console."
The 2K boss does have a point. It's hard to feel that emotional when you're fighting of that "uncanny valley" feeling from the protagonist you're controlling, no?
How far along do you think we are from photorealistic games? Should game designers find a way to circumvent this and not let graphics dictate it?
