PHOTOREALITY CHECK

Real-time photorealism is the holy grail of gaming. And it’s coming to the PC sooner than you think, says Jeremy Laird

- Jeremy Laird

FROM THE VERY DAWN of computer graphics, there has been one overarching goal. An end game for PC gaming, a final destination. We’re talking of course about real-time photorealism. In experiential terms, graphics rendered in real-time that are indistinguishable from reality, at least as shown on a 2D screen. Achieve this goal and the observer will not be able to pick rendered computer graphics from real-life motion video. Of course, deciding when any given example of computer-generated graphics has achieved photorealism is always going to be a subjective call. We can all surely agree that the best CGI in movies and TV achieves that at least some of the time. But has any PC or console game yet achieved even fleeting photorealism? That’s debatable.

Just occasionally, you get a snippet of gaming, maybe something with an ultra-high detail texture pack installed, that momentarily breaches the photorealism barrier. If you’ve seen the Star Wars: Battlefront Real Life Mod in action you’ll know what we’re talking about. Occasionally, just for a moment, it can look photorealistic.

But here’s the thing. As you read these words, the PC graphics industry is taking what promises to be the last few steps towards what you might call sustained photorealism. Not photorealism all the time in every game. But sustained passages in certain games that can deliver what almost everyone would agree is photorealism. A huge array of technologies encompassing both hardware and software are currently aligning towards that end result. So get ready. Photorealism is coming to the PC, and sooner than you think.