Question about screenshots from gaming sites

[rowech]

Are these always taken in the best resolution of the system? For example, are PS3 shots taken in 1080p while 360 shots are taken in 720p?

If so, would there really be a difference if they were both taken in 720p? My current TV is 720p and I wonder if PS3 would look that much better on it than the 360 would.

These are the three screenshots I'm looking at and seeing an obvious difference in quality...

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v313/acason/Oblivion360.jpg (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v313/acason/Oblivion360.jpg)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v313/acason/OblivionPS3.jpg (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v313/acason/OblivionPS3.jpg)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v68/pjbliverpool/Oblivion_PC.jpg (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v68/pjbliverpool/Oblivion_PC.jpg)

[SackAttack]

depends on who's doing the screencaps.

If they're PR assets, then they're almost certainly going to be captured at the highest resolution, because the idea is to sell the game.

[gstelmack]

That's not screen resolution causing the difference in those pictures, that's texture resolution.

[kcchief19]

Extending on what Sack said, if the screenshots come from the producer you can almost bet they have been "enchanced" significantly, from replacing artwork with more pristine originals to color correction. There are plenty of times when promotional screenshots bare little resemblance to the actually game because while the art may be "inspired" by the game, the marketing department actually recreated the screenshot from scratch using high-resolution images of each item in the screenshot.

It also depends on how the shots are capatured. The first screenshot looks like it may have been taken captured from a video recording of the game. The second and third look like they could be marketing shots, although I'm guessing IGN captured their own -- they probably have a better method of capturing images that the first one does.

I think it has much less to do with 1080/720 than it does with how the screenshot was creeted.

[Tigercat]

kind of like glue as milk on cereal box pictures? I guess video game stills are just a "serving suggestion."

[gstelmack]

There are plenty of times when promotional screenshots bare little resemblance to the actually game because while the art may be "inspired" by the game, the marketing department actually recreated the screenshot from scratch using high-resolution images of each item in the screenshot.

Screenshots have a long and interesting history. One issue is how the print magazines do their prints. If you take a 640x480 screenshot (common back a decade or so ago) and put it in a magazine, it looks like garbage, even if the game looks fine on a typical VGA monitor. And 1024x768 or 1280x720 aren't that much more detailed. To get anything to bear a resemblance to the final shipping product, you pretty much HAVE to take a screenshot at a higher resolution than the actual game. There are some cool programming articles floating around about how to take screenshots at like 16K x 16K for good print results.

There is also the fact that screenshots are static and not dynamic. People will pick apart things in a screenshot that are not an issue at all during typical gameplay. And screenshots don't capture cool things like trees swaying and the like that can really add life to what appears to be a static screen.

The key is, take screenshots not as an indicator of graphic quality, but rather as an indicator of some of the features of the games (what does the HUD look like, what sorts of units are in the game, etc). To see how a game REALLY looks, you want a gameplay movie or check out the demo and see it in action and moving.

[SackAttack]

Greg, I've had more than my share of 'print' screens emailed to me over the years, "just because." Company would send out a press release, and include a handful of 10 MB screenshots or a massive logo file.

Eventually most of them started just putting that stuff on FTP sites for the folks who'd use it.

[gstelmack]

Greg, I've had more than my share of 'print' screens emailed to me over the years, "just because." Company would send out a press release, and include a handful of 10 MB screenshots or a massive logo file.

Eventually most of them started just putting that stuff on FTP sites for the folks who'd use it.

That's probably because they are sending you the same package they use for print and letting you resize it to whatever you want for the web. They don't know how big you're going to display it on the web, and they don't know if you're going to do one of those blowup things where you focus in on some tiny piece of the image. And it's less work for them :D

My comments about screenshots being a horrible way to judge the looks of a game still stand.

[rowech]

I was trying to gauge graphics from websites. If all I have is a 720p TV, is there going to be a big difference between 360 and ps3?

Is an HDMI cable version of 360 going to be that much better than the current model or is it just that sound/video would all be in one cable?

[gstelmack]

I was trying to gauge graphics from websites. If all I have is a 720p TV, is there going to be a big difference between 360 and ps3?

Not enough that it affects your gameplay or enjoyment of the game. The reality is it will depend more on the actual game and how it's implemented than on the console itself.

Is an HDMI cable version of 360 going to be that much better than the current model or is it just that sound/video would all be in one cable?

Since no one has seen one, I don't think you can get a reliable answer; anything you hear will be speculation.

[SackAttack]

That's probably because they are sending you the same package they use for print and letting you resize it to whatever you want for the web. They don't know how big you're going to display it on the web, and they don't know if you're going to do one of those blowup things where you focus in on some tiny piece of the image. And it's less work for them :D

My comments about screenshots being a horrible way to judge the looks of a game still stand.

Well, yes, but half the time it'd be a company I didn't really HAVE any dealings with. They just kind of randomly had my email address because somebody had changed employment from one PR company to another, and suddenly this PR firm I've never heard of is sending me a barebones press release with a 50 MB logo attachment.

Your comments are still accurate. :)

I was just commenting about the 'oy vey' aspect of it.