How far off are we from photo-realistic graphics in gaming? 10 years?

[Zappykins]

OdinHades said:

You know what's funny? Around the year 2000, when PS2 was releases, I read an article in a magazine about "photo realistic graphics". The people were really impressed from the PS2 graphics and guess what they said. They said, we will have photo-realism in 10 years. They said, in 10 years "games will look like TV". Oh, well, maybe they were referring to Xbox One... (jk)

Funny, 10 years have passed and games still look like games. Sure, you have those nice little tech demos, but those graphics aren't used by any game whatsoever.There are also more problems than just power. You need very talented designers who can bring realistic conditions into a game. And once you stop talking about "photo realism" and start talking about just realism, oh boy. You'll need realistic animations than. Animations that don't repeat themselves over and over again, as that isn't realistic. You need NPCs who move naturally, talk naturally...

tl;dr - We're very far away from realism in games in any possible way.

Part of thr problem is their target as moved.  TV has gotten better, much, much better.  If they were only trying to create a fuzzy SD interlaced photo realizic picture they would go about it differently.  But todays progressive 1080P signnals, and soon 4K, is a much better picture. EVen our TV has gotten more realistic looking.