by Pete Davison

Created on: January 04, 2009

This is a question that, at first glance, appears to have an obvious answer.

"Yes, of course they are. Are you crazy?"

The "are you crazy?" is optional, depending on how well you know the person, of course.

Let's take a closer look at this issue, however, as there are more factors at work than some people take note of. Firstly, there is absolutely no denying that game graphics have been on a gradually accelerating "curve of amazingness" ever since the early days, with many games we're getting now carrying almost photo-realistic graphics, and with the advent of high-definition console gaming with the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, we're now getting games on our big-screen TVs that once would have only been seen on a high-specification PC.

Also related to the presentation issue is that we're now getting games that we're in full control of that look as good as, if not better than, the pre-rendered, limited-control "interactive movies" of the early CD-ROM era. Anyone remember games like Cyberia, Lawnmower Man and numerous other such monstrosities, heralded at the time as the beginning of a new era but now seeming rather laughable due to their woeful lack of actual interactivity? These days, we are getting games with graphics that knock the socks off these pre-rendered "masterpieces" but allow us the full level of control that we expect.

We have also seen the dawn of the "sandbox game" genre - open-world games where there is a vaguely-defined goal, but a lot of freedom for the player to explore as they please. The best-known examples of this genre are probably Oblivion and Grand Theft Auto, but numerous others have tried the same concept to varying degrees of success. There's no denying that a sandbox game offers an unprecedented level of freedom to explore. There is also an unprecedented level of freedom for developers to hide secrets in places that no-one will ever find unaided, leading to a huge boost for the strategy guide salesmen - but this is perhaps an overly cynical view!

One may argue, however, that the more vaguely defined goals of a sandbox game lead the narrative to suffer, as there is less structure and "pressure" on the player to follow the storyline. Certainly, titles such as Oblivion are often mocked for the player's ability to go off and do something completely unrelated to the story of the game while a quest-critical character simply stands in place for months of game time, waiting for the player to return. This is, of course, ridiculous, but entirely

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